Tag: Rana

Paper View

Cory cares not a rat’s ass about climate change; he just enjoys being a shit-disturber. What I find disturbing is the hit-or-miss quality of the artwork in today’s comic. Check out the grotesesque grinning mug at the far right of panel 2: what’s he smiling about? And I recognize Summer by her blue hair, but has her face melted? What dread, degenerative disease has caused Rana’s droopy mug in the penultimate panel? And Cory seems to age about 15 years between panels 4 & 5. He morphs, mid-harangue, from a dopey child to a sardonic hipster.

Wouldn’t recycled paper be the most eco-friendly option? I’m not sure how cutting “farm-raised trees” has less of a carbon impact than cutting trees that are, uh, free range? It’s like telling a vegetarian that it’s ok to eat that burger because it came from a farm-raised cow.

Say Cheese

Taking the senior class photo has changed? Because it’s being taken with a cellphone? Wow, progress, huh? Something else that’s changed is TB’s draftsmanship, if indeed it is he who drew this. I have no idea who the old gent taking the picture is, but I guess he’s another throwaway teacher, or maybe a passerby who the class asked if he would oblige. But this whole strip looks like it took ten minutes to draw. We recognize Maddie by her hat and red hair, and Cory by his shifty demeanor. But is that supposed to be the Capitol dome in the background? Might as well be Podunk City Hall.

Flashback to the 2007 Washington trip…Chien is still a drip…

Statutory Ignorance

Today’s haphazardly drawn tableau finds the senior Scapegoats admiring a statue which their chaperone incorrectly identifies as “Eternal Vigilance” (its actual title is “Guardianship”).  I’m reminded of a quote from Mark Vonnegut’s memoir, The Eden Express: “The price of eternal vigilance is insanity.” Query whether Cory’s opinion of “shrinks” is based on firsthand experience.

Flashback to the 2007 D.C. Trip:
Chien may have been one of the (few) fairly attractive Batiuk women, but her fans may have forgotten how bitchy and unpleasant she could be…

Quarant'anni di Montoni's

Finally, a special occasion that actually deserves to be celebrated at Montoni’s. The joint hasn’t been this packed since Darin discovered breakfast pizza. Everybody’s here…of course, Becky and Wally have to slave away back in the kitchen, and Khan’s been a persona non grata since opening up his own eatery nearly a year ago. Holly and Donna are in the same shot, proving they are not the same person; ditto Summer and Pete (wasn’t he leaving town?). Dead Skunk Head John and Bull are either gazing lovingly at one another or have just finished sharing a joint.

An Inconvenient Douche

Unlike Tom Batiuk, I strive to keep my personal opinions out of my “writing”. But since he insists on preaching to us (through Jim the Science Guy) about climate change (I don’t call it global warming), I’m going to vent a little “greenhouse gas” here myself: I’m one of “those people” who  do not believe that the planet is irreversibly heating up, even after the just-ended record-warm winter (which I, not being a winter sportsman, enjoyed the hell out of). There is at least as much credible scientific opinion to disprove climate change as there is to prove it.

That’s my opinion, and you, dear reader, are welcome to your own. On to today’s strip. We find Cory actually awake and paying attention in class (because even Cory is concerned about Global Warming). He shares that he “heard someone on the radio” (these kids and their radios these days, am I right?) call Global Warming “a hoax”. Cory gives a sly, demure tilt of his head, as if to say “Gee, Mr. Kablichnik, that feller on the radio can’t be right…can he? Say it ain’t so, Jim.” Jim wearily throws up his hands; he’s heard the deniers (such fools!), and sets Cory, and the rest of us, straight.

For your pleasure: previous strips dealing with the “fact” of Global Warming:

May 25, 2008: Same premise as today’s strip (and how long has Rana been in this class?) But I gotta give props to Jim for mentioning a classic Randy Newman song.

December 5, 2010: “Of course Global Warming can actually mean we get more snow. That doesn’t make sense to you?”

June 23, 2011: Principal Nate is on board with the whole global warming thing, to the point of inserting it into random conversations: