Luann by Greg Evans and Karen Evans for January 04, 2014

So, apparently, her raised eyebrow is part of her “bad news face”….

Be bold, but ask permission.

Why do we pick projects as potential partners?

“Rebel With A Permission Slip”

“Throwing Caution To The Wind (If That’s Okay With You)”

“How Evel Kinevel Was Born”or “Baby Steps For a Daredevil”

Run, Rosa. Get in your car, go back to the party, and forget that 2013 ever happened.

Mama’s boy in action. Take it to the limit!

Baby steps

…5 minutes? Really, Gunther? that’s all you can spare?

Gunther needs to have a long talk and some strong advice from Quill. He respects Quill and might just listen and take it to heart. Maybe that will shake him up enough to show some initiative. If not, Rosa best be movin’ on.

She probably should anyway as this is not a good fit and would lead to a lifetime of frustration for both of them.

Rosa:He means 5 hours late. C’mere, you…

Gunther, you do have respect for your mother, and there is nothing wrong with that. Just as my last comment to Rosa to never take a guy home past his curfew, you are correct in reassuring your mother that you are home. Your front doorstep is home, so you are on time, not late. You just needed to let your mother know that you had arrived home safely. Now tell Rosa that you had a great time, thank her, and for gosh sake, spend what is left of those five minutes kissing her and asking her out to the movie of her choice, which you will walk her to ASAP after you get your nine hours of shut eye.

Evans hasn’t shown that Gunth and his mom are in any way sponsoring Quill’s stay in this country and therefore are relieved of legal responsibilities in this regard.

Some well known songs for the playlist, with altered titles, after a battery of tests and inspections:

“Hot Blooded (After A Series Of Well Thought Out Tests)”“Breaking Up Safely Is Hard To Do”“Give Me Just A Little More Time (To Run One More Test)”“Take A Chance On Me And My Safety Goggles”

Now who’s doing “R (rated) stuff”?

He could have a Mr. Incredible suit on under his New Year’s ensemble.

Depends entirely upon which of Luann’s clothes you were supposing he’d be wearing.

He’ll just claim he’s doing a revival of “Rocky Horror…”

Now if I were to be vulgar i would say something about 5’ historically being aplenty and that without inspiration to speed things along...But, I shan’t.

Gunther is hardly the average case. Paradoxically, his extreme nervousness should make him last longer, if he can…rise to the occasion at all.

Five minute ravishment, coming right up!(Never diss an engineer.)

The nerdship Gunther-prise will almost never drop its shields, although it had to do so in order to de-cloak in the library.

“Brought to you” by….Star Check: Metamorphosis… “Planning on a Wednesdayish release….” – ’Axis Crayons: Bold as…Something Bold’-And by….John Playne Daycare Centers….

Well, it’s a start – of sorts. Next he leaves out the “OK?” Whoknows where it might lead…. Gunth may yet be a mentsh!

(cue commercial for Star Check: Metamorphosis’)….

“After Voyager’s serendipitous and successful exploration of the Delta Air Quadrant, and with a bit of bouncey turbulance, they decide to send out another Intrepid Class Starship…. – Enter Captain Gunnie…. Ready to take on the challenges of this new mission (with permission from Admiral Berger), and the latest in Beta tested Strawfleet equipment, he leads the U.S.S. Door Prize (after his previous craft, the Enter Cautiously was somehow wrecked when the left turn signal light went out) on a mission, to search every inch of the last quadrant in the galaxy….. to sell Federated Insurance…. oh… and also to prove something to somebody named Rosa…. – Starring Gunther Berger as…uh…. Gunther Berger (after a very successful screen test)… Ed Rogers as some neighborhood liason , and a bunch of people who could only find red uniforms laying around…. – ‘Star Check: Metamorphosis’…..rated P.C….”

Cruel! Give SOMEBODY a BREAK!

Quick Gunth, run inside for a minute and ask Mommy for instructions on being bold and independent.

It’s like the old husband joke, “I’m in charge here! Right, dear?” ^Also an old wives’ saying: ‘If you’re the head, then I’m the neck that turns the head!"…

That’s the same way in our house…. four shoulders of support… (of course, that’s two shoulders apiece….)

That’s the same way in our house…. four shoulders of support… (of course, that’s a pair for both of us… a left one and a right one…)

It’s Rosa that needs to learn a few lessons. (And so do most of the people who post here in the comments.)

Lesson One: “Go Well Together” does not mean “Are Alike In Every Way”. Rather than looking for your perfect match, it’s often better to look for someone who fills in the places where you’re deficient and vice versa. Look at Knute and Crystal.

Lesson Two: “Different from me” does not mean “Wrong”. Some of us grew up watching “The Beverly Hillbillies”, where the subtle moral message was "other folks have other ways of doing things that are just as valid as your own. Problems only arise when you expect everyone else to do things the way you do them.

I may be in the minority, but I maintain that there wasn’t going to be anything “happening”…. except maybe a quick last minute crunch time negotiation session (read: "Pleaaaase, baby, baby, please!…. standard fare for someone trying to keep the “lovelight burning”…) and maybe a flash forward to a future arc with Gunther trying to keep cool, while dealing with love life “on the rebound”…

Uhh…. comment # “Three-Score”?….

OK, Gunther is showing that he’s willing to bold, or at least what he considers to be bold. Rosa’s initial stunned reaction is certainly understandable, but if she thinks about it for a bit, she’ll realize that he’s willing to try to please her. Remember, he has not had a father figure to guide him in this area, and so in many ways he’s still a child. The potential is there.

Maybe I’m rooting for Gunther because I was basically him when I was his age.

Damn website glitches. Forgot to not hit Refresh Comments after posting.

Nobody wants a man who can’t take the initiative. Gunther is going to be the protector of both Rosa and the kids, if they have a future together. Is he up to the job? That is a man sized job. His niceness is more like weakness. He is going to be pushed around and Rosa will have to stand up for him. I don’t think he even understands what Rosa means by “risk” and been “bold”. He reminds me of Jon in Garfield. He had better wake up now.

And when my kids were in high school, you darn right they had rules to abide by. Curfew was important, among them.Rules shape character. They teach responsibility.

Sorry Gunther, but being bold does not mean asking permission.

Being bold means being a leader.

Rosa wants Gunther to take the lead role in the relationship.

Rosa is patient with Gunther. She may see something in him that we do not see. Great strip! Following since the early 1990’s.

How did she go from dark skin to light?

There is a difference, of course, between protector and provider. Can Gunther provide for a family? On an engineer’s salary, better believe he can. Protect? Well, Rosa’s still looking for the bashing bullies with a backpack Gunther. Rosa knows he’s gotta be in there somewhere…

I’m not sure which Rosa I like better.

Did not recognize Rosa in earlier strips. She looks so different now.

She’s been anglicized….

Gunther was more bold years ago!What happened, Gunther?

Like I said yesterday I fear that Gunther is a Momma’s boy. I have a niece that was married to a guy like that.

It seems the author/artist Greg is having Rosa indulge in stereotypical behavior, i.e. she fell in love with Gunther for what he is but now wants to change him…

Poor, poor Rosa. Could be a very unsatisfying life……

Gunther needs to man up! This Rosa/ Gunther relationship is going nowhere.

he’s made a start.

Well…. this is going to be a tad painful! This week’s arc would have been the perfect opportunity for Greg to end the Gunther/Rosa “ship” if he wanted to… but he didn’t. Hopefully, it means he still has hope for them. Although, if it isn’t meant to be, he should end it as quickly as possible.

That said, I think he’s going to have some difficulty ending it before graduation. I think it would be most awkward having them both in the school but not together… the same reason why it’s quite dangerous to start a “workplace relationship.” What happens when you have to “end” it?

It’s all about Rosa’s patience. She may very well be the one to turn Gunther… perhaps, with a little help from Quill (hopefully she’ll recognize that opportunity and take advantage of it). But it will take patience and time.

Hopefully, she he has enough of both. Or enough wisdom to realize that it won’t happen in time, and end it quickly.

Rosa deserves better.

The mouse that roared? Mr Milque Toast? He just doesn’t get it and why should he?

I’m going with Rosa will bring him our of his shell..Notice how she explains things to Gunther while Luann was more ‘demanding’ to Quill..I’m hoping they both will work out.

Evans is true to the Gunther character. He’s going to try to man up but will always fall short. Does Rosa care enough for the G-man to be happy with that? Only time will tell. On to “another topic Monday”.

Gunther’s response is touching in it’s genuineness, but heartbreaking in it’s naivety.

Getting really overdone….towards which this cartoonist has a very strong tendency even while coming up with some good stuff other times.

“No,no, come on in and have some cookies sweetie!”

Come on, Rosa, leave. If he doesn’t get THAT, then he doesn’t deserve even another glance from you.

Goodbye Gunther.

Common, cut the G-man some slack. The “ok?” in panel 3 is really an “ok!!”.

Besides, Quill is already in bed.by himselfasleepno curfew needed

As bad as being married to an emotional cripple as Gunther might be, imagine how much worse it would be to have his mom as your mother in law. And probably living with you.

Back when RWR made his “bombing in five minutes” quip, he shook the world by reminding one and all that Mutual Assured Destruction was not a safe means of keeping the peace because it requided all participants be sane and serious. .That is not a safe bet.

Please don’t let this story continue into next week. It is like watching a car wreck, you don’t want to look at it, but you can’t look away either.

There is nothing he can do in 5 minutes that will make Rosa happy. If he ever does get married his mom will be on the honeymoon.

This comic satire has split the commenters apart.

On one hand, Rosa is growing up and wants Gunther to grow with her.

On the other hand, Gunther has every right to live his life (with or without Rosa).

In Gunther’s mind, he is a nice guy. He shows respect. He does not allow peer pressure to influence his decisions (he does not smoke, did not get Rosa pregnant, drinks, curses or engages in any illegal behavior).

If you enjoy Luann’s comic strip, then good for you!If you do not enjoy it, then take your own advice and move on!

Yes, by all mens, let’s do “more”. The world needs more stds and more teenage pregnancies. And we definitely need more men who grow up believing that every time their whatzit twitches they have to do something about it.

The problem with teens today is peer pressure!I like Gunther. He is mature. He justifies his actions by exhibiting discipline. He does not pressure Rosa in any way.Many young men learn those lessons in the military.

Gunther is being drawn as a stereotyped Aspie. Media tends to assume that all Aspies live at home with mommy.

A lot of entertaining can be done in five minutes.That’s why all the old Warner Brothers cartoons timed out at seven minutes.

Nail her Gunth

Mama’s boy, mama’s boy, mama’s boy…Ewwwwww!

Oh. My. Now that’s mature.

> The library incident happened only one time>Why do you think that? Luann happened to use her key to open up the library one time, and there was Gunther, naked. What are the odds that the one time Luann chose to come in early was the one time that Gunther took off all his clothes? What a coincidence!!!! Either you believe that Gunther experienced extraordinarily bad luck, or you believe that if Luann had come in early on some other day instead, then she likely would still have seen the same thing. I tend to believe in that alternative explanation, which requires a much less improbable confluence of events.

Gunther, you are clueless…but I can relate…:)

Soooooo, Gunther’s “Problem” is His Mom, eh?

Well THAT’S Easily Solved. We just get Need to get Ma Berger a Boyfriend to Keep Her Occupied and Distracted.

HEY, How ‘bout Hookin’ Her Up with That Guy from Oz?

Fogarty probably isn’t his own type… – Time to do some research on “the Chin”, instead…

Rosa:Somehow I’ll…make a man…out of you…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZSS5dEeMX64

Poor girl has it at least as bad as Captain Shang.

Of course, Gunther’s a little slow on the uptake, so I found the 10 hour long version.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNBAJznZgjQ

From Emergency/Adam 12/Dragnet/D.A. ?…

> Do you have concrete proof that the Gunther-naked-in-the-library incident happened more than once? >(1) Do you have any proof that it didn’t happen more than once? No of course you don’t, since no one knows what Gunther did on the 99.9% of the other days when he was alone on the library. So neither one of us can offer any concrete proof that it happened only once or that it didn’t. We can only infer what happened on the 99.9% of the times when Gunther was alone in the library and we didn’t get to witness it.-(2) You believe that what happened on the 0.1% of the time when, by pure coincidence, Luann was there, was the only time that Gunther ever was naked in the library. Again I must ask you, what are the odds of that?-(3) It is far more likely that the one day that Luann happened to walk in on Gunther was a random day at the library rather than the only day that Gunther ever took off his clothes there, so that is what I suspect is true.-(4) Neither one of us has, or can possibly have, “concrete proof” of what the days were like when Gunther was alone in the library and Luann didn’t walk in. All we have is the probabilities. You believe in an extraordinarily improbable situation (namely that the one day that Luann happened to come in early was also the one day that Gunther happened to get naked), and I consider the more probable explanation, namely that Gunther got naked there a lot and Luann just happened to come in on a “typical” day, to be a more reasonable explanation simply because it does not require such an amazing set of coincidences.

If so, she’s going to be racking up a bill from San Diego Emergency Services….

“Emergency center, how can we assist you?”“My cat’s in the tree again!”“Okay, don’t worry… we’ll reroute your call to 311 for you…”“I’d like to have Officer Reed again, please!”.. – or:“411, how can we assist you?”“Officer Jim, please!….”“Uh, ma’am, we can only give you info!…”“Yes, please inform me how soon he’ll be here!”…

Well, that’s a start … Go Gunthie!

We saw it happen once. This does not mean it happened only once. We didn’t see what happened on the other 364 days of the year that Luann didn’t come in early. You are saying that a coin was flipped 365 times, and the one time we saw it it came up heads, so obviously it must have come up tails the other 364 times, just because tails is nicer. In your estimation, Gunther was simply really, really, really, really unlucky. Maybe, but I see no reason to discount the much more probable situation, namely that he did this sort of thing from time to time, and he was merely unlucky that this time he got caught.-Also, if Gunther didn’t take his clothes off ordinarily (or at least occasionally), why did he do so out in the open instead of in the rest room? I would certain have changed in there, and I suspect you would have, too. He seems to have had a strange level of comfort about being naked in the stacks.

> Which one of us has their mind in the toilet?>Gunther?

It wasn’t a freak rainstorm – it was the lawn sprinklers (or at least, that was Gunther’s excuse). That seems like an entirely predictable event (presumably they come on at the same time of day, so he should have known the schedule if he often comes in early), and how often have you been caught in a lawn sprinkler but felt no need to take off all your clothes afterward? And even if you did, wouldn’t you have done so in the rest room. just in case someone else did come in early?

Girls mature earlier than boys. So, they usually marry guys older than they are.However, some guys never mature. That’s what the army was for-but, not anymore!!Time away from everything, (Rosa, Mom, school,) is needed.

Again I say, what a dunce.

Hey! I resemble that remark!

The TV show OZ!

It’s pretty obvious Gunther’s mom has her apron strings firmly tied around his testicles. She’s afraid of him growing up and leaving home. Maybe Rosa can help Gunther come out of his shell and grow a set in the process.

Sure you really want to be that bold, Gunther?You might scare Rosa….

“Rosa: the final frontier.” That was Good! ;)