Tag: random students

Pop Will Eat Itself

Link to today’s strip.

Well, in fairness, that’s typically how high school popcorn/candy sales work.  The parents will buy two or three, some relatives will be guilted into picking up a couple, and the seller doesn’t even have to stop lounging in front of the TY!   Watching Elvis the Pelvis!  You know, I think it’s time he had a haircut!

As I said, that’s how it usually goes.  Though it’s kind of sad to see how little Les thinks of his charges; naturally, none of them are going to put any effort into this…or into anything else, ever, for the rest of their lives.  Supposedly, Les is a teacher, and is supposed to inspire them.  Instead, he would just prefer to offer yet another highly-punchable smirk.  The man is a walking disease.

It’s surprising that he still has all his teeth.

Craigslist

Link to today’s strip.

I honestly don’t know anything about “senior class trips” so I don’t know if Craig’s question has a legitimate basis (“Can a senior still go if he’s in danger of flunking?”) or if this is just more “Today’s Kids–the Marching Morons” that this strip loves to toss onto today’s world.

A better question might be something like, “If you’re so gifted, Mr. Moore, why are all your students still idiots?”

As ever, the students are all clueless while the staff are cynical saints, weary of the impossible task of imparting knowledge.  Does anyone remember Funky Winkerbean back in the Act I days–wasn’t it the reverse?  The staff were all cynical tight-asses, dedicated to stopping fun, while the students were happy free spirits?  Has Mr. Batiuk’s dim view of high school aged along with him, so that the heroes have shifted sides?

It’s something to ponder, from a strip that offers pretty much nothing to ponder, other than “Why is this still happening?”

Anus Major

“In a spirit of generosity”, Tom Batiuk really should put down his Funky felt tip, retire “Funky” and “Crankshaft”, and free up some real estate for some new talent in the fading genre of daily newspaper comics. TB waited almost a month to squander another Sunday’s worth of ink, newsprint, and Photoshop effects on a followup to Kablichnick’s Ursa  Major “joke”. In today’s retelling, however, “Jim Twain” goes with our bobanero’s (funnier) punchline. Not so fast, teacher! Even dim Owen realizes we’ve heard this one. And it sucked. “But no, my friends,” teases Jim, in French to be extra condescending; he then recites the joke and delivers the punchline like a steaming turd before smirking blissfully and hitching his suspenders (the science teacher’s “mic drop”). Cody is appalled by this microaggression; deadpan Alex declares Jim to “comedically on fire” while visualizing him to be literally so.

Your genial host is “comedically extinguished” after serving as your host these last two festive weeks. Thank you, readers and contributors, for visiting and supporting the web’s premiere source for Funky Winkerbean snark, Son of Stuck Funky. I’m pleased and proud to preside over one of the smartest and funniest online communities I’ve even partaken in. The comedically sur le feu Beckoning Chasm takes over Monday. Happy 2016! —Votre ancien assiette en porcelaine, TFH

Huis-clos

Link to today’s strip.

So…for Les, life is watching blonde women interact with their lockers while he endlessly walks down a brick corridor.  Or some damn thing–who honestly knows what the point of this strip is supposed to be.   I’m starting to think that Tom Batiuk is simply trolling us (as others here have pointed out).   I’ve read this episode over carefully and I cannot make head nor tail out of it.  Is the point supposed to be “High school lasts forever”?  Is it that Les hates his job because it makes his life Hell?  Is it that hairstyles on blondes are getting shorter?  (Panel four must be from a previous year, since Les is dressed differently.)  Or is the point that, every time the school year starts, there are blonde women with lockers–only, get this, the women are different each time!  Really, that sounds the most plausible but it’s weak, even for this strip.

So, I don’t get this one.  I honestly thought we’d get the “bullying” arc started up again, but I guess Mr. Batiuk thought we needed some Les Wisdom(c) dropped on us.   Too bad he forgot the Les Wisdom Decoder Ring(c) to go with it.  It just looks like a hellscape to me, with a pair of word balloons pasted on.  (Look at that dialogue.  Tell me than any random sentences couldn’t substitute there and make the same amount of sense.)

Sorry for rambling, but I don’t see this one as an “episode.”  Instead I see things like the adult Les’ face in the “Westview Class” masthead image among all the teenagers and I think, Is that supposed to mean something?  Les has always been old?  Then I note that in the penultimate panel, Les’ hair is all disheveled, and it’s neatly combed in the last panel.  Again, is there a point to that?

I do like the Modigliani face in panel five, and I like that someone went nuts with the Scotch tape in panel three.  And all those bricks.  Endless bricks.

Bricks.

Ah, I get it now.  We’re supposed to want to slam endless bricks against Les’ head.  Okay!

Thus ends my time in the Les Chair.  Tomorrow, the fabulous DavidO takes over the hosting duties…and good luck to him!

See you then, and thank you for your indulgence!