Luann by Greg Evans and Karen Evans for March 19, 2018

And as Fay is being driven to the Fuse….

There will be no mention of leftover lingerie.

No angry lingerie cuustomers that found out only certain people got a refund.

No Pru learning what type of person Ann is.

No Ox learning who Les’s mom is.

~~~

Plot gap sucks.

Well done, Fay, you lost your conference again… in front of your own mother when it came to discussing a certain boy.

No doubt she could audition for the Dick Tracy character Mumbles.

Okay, Everyone that Wanted the Ann Vs Tiffany arc to end?

I hope You’re “Happy” now!

Luann’s got her work cut out for her.

Well, Fay, I think you just kissed your audition goodbye. The moment she sees Axel and his pouty lips, it will be all over.

By the by, first panel: Did someone run over mom’s face?

Fay needs to concentrate on everything she needs to learn. If she gets good and becomes the big girl on campus – Axel is likely to maintain interest.

Tiff trots off to see a Mrs. Fogarty and everybody is poised for an interesting twist to the long Ann Eiffel arc. The Evans’s pull the rug from under us with a new arc featuring sweet little Fay. However I’ll take bets we are not done with the Ann Eiffel arc. Patience, patience.

Well, I guess this is the end of the the bootleg lingerie novel. Now on to a boring commercial. The arc change was going to happen any moment. Guess that moment has come.

I knew it. Greg did it again. Pulled the rug from under us with a new arc right at a cliffhanger in the Ann Eiffel vs Tiffany arc. Fay? Too bubblegum for me. She’s cute, adorable, all that, but meh. Just the old classic preteen girl pining for a bad boy.

Uh – oh.

Yay~!! Fay’s back~!! ✨

I find it amusing that Fay has undergone more character development in less than a year’s worth of strips than Bernice has in over thirty years’ worth.

I also find it amusing that Luann’s boy-crazy nature seems to have rubbed off on Fay. I guess someone had to inherit the propensity for obsessive-yet-oddly-chaste adolescent crushes, since Luann is a bit too old to be acting that way anymore.

Fay is a little overconfidence.

But i want to see Ann brought down and in cuffs.

Extremely unlikely that I ever CARE now!

Fay’s not mumbling – she’s speaking in a smaller font!

It doesn’t sound like a play called “Quibbling Siblings” would have the male and female leads being romantic, Fay.

I think part of Fay’s problem is Mom.

Welp, guess that’s it for the Ann Eiffel arc. Looks like we won’t be finding out who Mrs. Fogerty is or what happened with Tiffany. I’m sure everyone was on the edge of their seats over what was going on with Fay.

BORING!

Guess I’ll be skipping this week’s arc.

Whoa big change! They are going to the Fuse so you never know what is up Greg’s sleeves. Fay is a flashback to the uncertainty that Luann faced at that age with Aaron Hill, but again with trepidation, I bet that the outcome will be different between them. I think Axel really likes Fay, a lot, but is masking his shyness with apparent lack of concern, and teen-age boy “attitude”. When the realize they like each other the issue will be to keep them from getting too close to each other too fast, and not for sexual issues although those always underlie puberty romance. I think just trying to express feelings for another person will be the frame of the arc.

I can’t recall such a dark plot being carried for so long an then dropped with such little resolution. Very unsatisfying.

I get the feeling Fay is a doppelganger of Luann at that age. Why do you suppose she has been added to the ballooning cast of characters?

Absolutely one of the most boring storylines in Luann. It’s going to be a long couple of weeks.

If Team Greg wanted to put this Eiffel arc on hiatus he should have prepared us better. The last strip should have had one panel viewed from behind Mrs. Fogerty (to keep the mystery of who she is) and Tiff facing her with Forgerty asking some nondescript question indicating the start of counseling. That would continue the anticipation but with some sense of where a next arc would pick up. The second panel should have shown Dez, Bernice and Luann getting over their shock from Saturday’s strip and questioning among themselves just what was going on or some empathetic comments for Tiff or sipping tea or SOMETHING. Right now we have three characters frozen in shock that are going to look incongruous doing whatever they will be doing in their respective future arcs.

In the Grey wedding segment we could at least anticipate wedding plans and the mother-in-law suite problems for Gunther & Les. A satisfying set aside.

That was clumsy end to the Eiffel arc.

Oh no. Back to Fay. So boring. I got whiplash from changing story lines.

Next lesson:

“Know When To Dummy Up!”

“Whisperer’s Mother”

“Say The Secret Word, And Get A Surprise!”

“Speak Softly, And Carry A Long, Long Muzzle”

“You Always Hurdle The Ones You Love”

“Know When To Hold ’Em, Know When To Fold ’Em…” (♪)

“Her First Speed Trap”

“You’re On A Roll!…Now, Slow It!”

“I’m Ready To Deliver The State Of The Reunion”

“A Professor Almost Graduates”

“A Speed Bump On The Personal Log”

“Curb Your Tongue’s Enthusiasm, Knave!”

“Teen Eggshells, And ‘Wham!’ "

or

“Minefield Of Dreams”

Hey, this is better than Brad and Toni (sorry! Toni and Brad) storylines.

I’m not sure I know how to interpret “Who’s Axel?” Does it mean Overbearing Mother actually doesn’t know Axel, or that Overbearing Mother wants Fay never to speak of that boy again?

I wonder what the mother does. I have started to think she is an actress herself (or at least some Important Person) who demands her daughter become successful; but I grant there’s no evidence other than the mother’s overbearing personality.

Or did past strips indicate yes, the mother is an actress?

I must say, Axel is the worst character ever to appear in this strip. Unlike other “bad” characters, Axel is not the least bit entertaining, he’s only offensive. If the Evanses would continue to irritate readers by introducing the ugly little brat, they could at least make him a “full-fledged” villain.

Fay’s mom reminds me, slightly, of ‘Linda’, the wife from Bob’s Burgers. I guess Fay could be likened to ‘Tina’ from there as well…

…and that would be Mrs. Fogarty…?

TYPICAL!!!!! we get about 90% of the arc and then we are switched to another story!

Don’t always be so quick to assume that two seemingly unrelated stories can’t intersect. Maybe Fay’s plot does, or maybe it doesn’t …but this week just started, so we’d have to wait and see.

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Luann and Quill’s “NY trip argument” didn’t neccessarily relate to the Fuze’s grand opening, but they did intersect in some way!

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Likewise, the “monthly dinners” between Al, Irma and Gunther grew to include Les, and then also intersected with the development of the angle of ‘Gunther and Tiffany’s being more of friends’, which moved along the ‘struggles’ of “Les vs. Gunther”, which could potentially lead to something, as Al and Irma endeavor to plan out a wedding…

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And Zebo’s class, which brought us Jack and Nil, eventually led to the intertwining of these characters with others, such as with Luann’s post breakup with Quill, she took a chance on a “double date” which included not only Jack and Nil, but also Bernice as the fourth person….and this even led to a “Tiffany vs. Luann 1up contest” at Kidz 1st, with Jack at the center.

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And the “TV bandit” and “late curfew” stories and “Dez’ arrival” intertwined with each other, which led to Tara’s intruduction…. and then led to them both meeting “Lady Lingerie”, which brought Ann Eiffel into the picture, leading to the scam, which also got intertwined with the story of Tiffany’s depression, which connects these two characters, by way of Tom Farrell….

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And there’s always the “indirect impact”, like when something Elaine did or didn’t do, seemed to to bite George, Kramer, or Jerry, in the end….

2

I like Fay…. but, I do not like Axel.

So, I hope if Fay is featured all week, there is mostly interaction between Fay and Luann about how to earn a part in the play…. not a bunch of “mentoring advice” from Luann on how Fay may figure out how to capture Axel’s attention. But with the discussion with Fay and her Mom today, I suspect I will be disappointed and it will be Axel, Axel, Axel.

It’s bad enough that Sunday’s comics don’t carry over from Saturday, but to run an arc and just leave it hanging and switch over to something totally irrelevant is Ridiculous and so freaking annoying What’s up with Greg

Whoops, power outage. ;p

There ain’t no such thing as a bad time for a Fay arc. :D

So many WHINERS today !!!

You’da thought they had interrupted the Superbowl overtime for a repeat showing of The Wizard of Oz !!!!

Ye Cats! The Fans are as Divided over this Strip as the Country is right now.

And what is all this HATE directed toward Faye? “Folks” now dislike her more than they do Les.

Faye’s is a sweet, innocent middle school kid. Hardly a threat, now is she?

You know, I’m kinda of glad we are taking a breather from Tiffany Vs Ann.

Because I’m betting that when we return and the that Arc finally it ends, that half the Fans are going to be MADDER and even MORE Divided at it’s outcome……,

Nice. From a story about an under involved parent to a story about an over involved one. I don’t much dislike Faye, but her mom is getting worrysome.

When we finally see Tiffany again, she will be exactly as drawn before. All the extra weight lost.

Will it only be a coincidence that this will be the day after Easter?

We left Tiff (temporarily I hope) on an upbeat note. I think the whole lingerie debacle served as growth media for her: (1) accepting herself more as a person than a clothes horse, (2) recognizing the power of friends and (3) letting go of daddy’s coattails.

Quibbling Siblings was in yesterday’s Luann Againn so I looked it up and it dates from 1993. Besides the one repeated yesterday I found one more, and big surprise: Greg Evans has written a play w that title:

https://www.facebook.com/luanncomic/

http://web.gocomics.com/luann/1993/08/22

“Um, he’s just a boy who’s trying out. No big deal.”

I am proficient in Mumbling as well as English. Fay just had a momentary relapse because, you know, she a young teen and Axel’s a boy and hormones!

Fay is cute, has a crush on a boy, and may not be as shy as she first appears. Let’s just wait and see. Greg likes to pull the rug out from out predictions.

I couldn’t read the Lilliputian font, and was too lazy to find a magnifier. “You’ll see him at the wedding.”?

Later on, Luann and Fay go out shopping.

Luann says that Fay would look great in a lime green top.

Fay says that her mom won’t allow her to wear such a bright color.

This gets Luann to do a bit of erroneous thinking, which, of course, will make her do something stupid.

When Fay does her play, a talent agent will approach, saying Fay is perfect for a part in his sitcom as Julia Louis-Dryfus’s daughter. Then suddenly we will switch back to Tiffany in the courthouse basement – researching Ann Eiffel’s records.

What is this? Luann redux? well I guess there are more boring story lines, like anything involving Luann for instance, Oh wait! this is a boring Luann story line. My mistake.

what the girl said:Um he is a just a boy who is trying out no big deal.