Crankshaft by Tom Batiuk and Dan Davis for June 22, 2024

“And I must say, now I understand why The Burning started on this night, in an obscure theater showing a crummy movie to a pack of drooling mouth-breathers!”

I’ve wondered exactly what Tom “Schulz Was Overrated” Buttuock was doing with this strip. Turning Crank into Funky, while also turning Funky into Crank? We have FW’s constantly contradicting continuity (how many 50th reunions did that 1 high school class have?), pairing it with lame CS Dad Jokes that are so cheesy, they’d get thrown out of a Wisconsin cheese festival for stinking up the limburger tent. And  WHAAAAAT THE FU—  TIMEMOP? This strip ends on 12/34/24. I know there’s no such date, but Tom doesn’t. And yet, he still has to squeeze in another book signing at a comical book store.

The good news is, we haven’t seen Dingleberry yet. But there’s the threat that he’ll show up when The Burning begins to play his fiddle.

What would a realistic number be of the people who understand today’s strip, regarding the characters involved here? 100, tops? A few dozen? Let’s be real about this.

Surprising no one said it yet. Okay, I will. Where’s, uh, whatshisname…

The return of Time Mop!

This exactly what was become to Funky Komix. It all became about theengs like komix and Starmuck Jones and everything not about title character who was rarely appear anymore. There certainly a pattern here. It like radioactive waste slowly decaying into other elements. Like Uranium is decays into Uranium, Thorium, Radium, Radon, and then Lead, Weenkerbeanium or Crankyshaftium both sooner or later decays into Komix Booxium, Starmuck Jonesium, Dinkle Bandium, etc. It probably just matter of time when this will decays into Les Moorium and Lisa Ghostium too.

…and the ruination of Crankshaft is complete.

Timemop?! Are you frickin’ kidding me, Batty? Have you lost your mind?! Why don’t you introduce the dumbest thing you’ve ever written into a second strip?

Congratulations, Tom. You win. I’m done. BTW, the final move is mine. I’m giving you the Marie Kondo treatment. You no longer bring me pleasure. UNFOLLOW!!! Buh-bye!!!

Can we start a deadpool estimating how long Crankshaft will continue before cancellation?

TL;DR: This is crap.

“Oh yeah, baby! OH YEAH BABY! You KNOW how I love it when you talk about sparking others to BUILD ON IT to create a Science of Algorithms that will allow us to recognize Humanity as Our something something Humanity AAUUUUGH oh baby, oh baby, you have such ALGORITHMS!”

Wait… just WTF is Masoné signing in the second panel? Doesn’t really look like a comical book (and is “Starsuck Jones” even in print anymore? I thought it was an old comic from the long-defunct Batom company). There’s no stack of newly-printed books for him to sign, so this isn’t a standard book signing. Did TimeMop® bring the book with him? Is Masoné in fact signing The Nudger™’s copy of the Master Plan for Human Development?

I know I’m over-thinking this. Most likely Batty’s script just said “Masoné is signing a book or something,” and this 1958 Sears catalog supplement was the first thing Davis found in the Crankshaft Reusable Art Portfolio.

The Winkerbean-ification rolls on…Shaft fans (all three) are NOT PLEASED!

Where can I get one of those Starbuck Jones tee-shirts?

Time and space have no meaning, anything can happen

Let the games begin!

P2: A very special Pluggers-Crankshaft crossover event.

Serious question: when he decided to “retire,” why did Batiuk end his better known and longer-tenured strip, Funky Winkerbean, and move those characters to Crankshaft, rather than vice-versa? The net effect would have been the same. Was 50 years of FW just a nice, round number to go out on? He could have folded Crankshaft, kept FW going and attempted Blondie-like longevity.

Is that Time Mop?

Well today’s strip, an inside joke that makes sense only to those who followed Funky Winkerbean to its bitter and confused end, seems like a raised middle finger to the people who’d been reading Crankshaft for the last few decades. You liked the comedic antics of the grumpy old bus driver, over-the-top gags about racing to leave parents in the dust, stacking up miles of traffic behind his bus, Lena’s dark-matter brownies and similar silliness (all of which more or less worked in the space of a gag-a-day comic strip)? Tough; Batty’s not interested in that stuff. Time to get serious and deal with subjects of importance like komix and book signings and Claude Barlow’s “music.”

Ever get the feeling that sitting at a table signing things was the highlight of someone’s life?

what was worse this weeks cranky or the five days of ian mollusk rocket ship to land ?

“I’m always interested in how clip-art character’s heads look super weird!” MASON: “Okaaa—”(monstrous head melon snaps at his neck)

Panel 2: The lumpy guy looks like a fat Andy DuFresne from the film “The Shawshank Redemption“.

Change the name of this ‘toon…………to boring!!!

And the week is now complete — six straight days of Batty Whack thinking that we readers NEED TO BE REMINDED EVERY! STINKING! DAY! THAT THIS IS ABOUT “STARBUCK JONES III: THE RISE OF THE BANDELORIANS”!

from the description of “Crankshaft” by creator, Tom Batiuk: “… along with the help of artist Dan Davis, the story of Crankshaft’s struggle with the universe continues, and whether it’s a backyard grill, a leaf filled gutter, a squirrel invested bird feeder, or one of Lena’s inedible brownies in the bus garage he continues to soldier on in his own inimitable and cranky fashion.” “The story of Crankshaft’s struggle” to be in his own comic strip. : )

As I dimly recall, this guy was a school janitor in FW, and also a time traveling visitor from the future.

Wow. It’s just a comic strip young man… not the end of the world…

Since it is set along time in the future, we haven’t gotten there yet. But thanks for your interest.

I’m guessing that Cranky won’t appear in his namesake comic anymore, so I guess that’s one less comic for me to read. Oh, well. Books are better, anyway…

Does he seem to have an overly big head on his shoulders in the last panel?

Fascinating, really, how that door in the wall has “Komix Korner” written on it in Goofball font, and right next to it is a sign that said “Komix Korner – Upstairs” with an arrow curving up. This can only mean that the typical Komix Korner customer is so dim that, even after they open the door and see the stairs, they have to be reminded to climb the stairs—and do it in an upward direction.