Centerville woman
Still talking in today’s strip
Took a creepy turn
So, what is the deal
Les leaves his writing around
Women pick it up
And just like before
The woman who picked it up
Keeps it for decades
Why was this two arcs
Really, a baffling story
Why even one arc
Still, creepy woman
Has not purchased Lisa book
Holding up the line
But, seriously
She kept a high school essay
I just can’t even
Well, that didn’t last long. The shared affection seen yesterday has evaporated, like much of Lake Chad, by today’s strip. In its place we get ennui, hairy sofa cushions, and a plot synopsis for the Waterworld prequel.
None of that surprises me, though. What does surprise me is that TB didn’t have Kablichnick deliver this joke to a class full of terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad young people. In any event, it adds to the clip show feel of this whole week.
Today’s strip makes it two strips in a row for Donna. That hasn’t happened in a good long while. Wait… Wait. Funky’s there, so this has got to be Holly.
Sorry about that. I’m sure the whole “Holly and Donna look alike” joke is wearing thin these days, but when they appear in back-to-back strips I think it is obligatory. At the very least, it sure hasn’t worn any thinner than jokes about old people getting older. What is Holly looking at on that computer anyway, a Punch and Judy fan site?
You know, I’m starting to think this week is a collection of deleted scenes from other week long arcs. It’s like getting a bonus DVD with Ishtar.
Scene change in today’s strip! And you thought we were gonna spend all week at the high school… Frankly, so did I.
So Holly… uh, Donna doesn’t know what head cleaning solution is. Donna, the middle-aged adult, doesn’t know what head cleaning solution is. Donna, the comic book geek and Space Invaders champion, the wife of tape-baking super nerd Crazy Harry, doesn’t know what head cleaning solution is.
Yeah, OK. It’s better than looking in on Les’ classes at least.
Making their first appearance since January 2016 are Summer and Keisha. I’m sure the sounds of one-on-one basketball right outside his door do wonders for the terminally distractable Les’ writing process.
If “see you later, alligator” is good enough for Cliff and Vera, I don’t know why Les and Cayla feel the need to “update” it. Let’s not get started on Les calling his black wife a monkey. Instead let’s examine Batiuk’s tendency to take a feeble but acceptable joke and proceed to stretch it ’til it breaks. He could have left it at “they’re working on an update blah blah blah.” But, because it’s Sunday and he still has two panels to fill, he’s gotta drop in the stuff about going “viral” and “beta testing”.
It’s all well and good that Batiuk recruited a couple comic book pros to draw Crankshaft and Funky Winkerbean. But the draughtsmanship, maddeningly inconsistent as it is, isn’t the problem with these strips, it’s the writing.
Son of Stuck Funky 
