Crankshaft by Tom Batiuk and Dan Davis for December 11, 2024

Smug Smarmy Smirkers like Dinkle are funny, when those bloated bloviators get their comic comeuppance! But this is a Tom avatar, so that ain’t happening. Tom always roots for the Snobs over the Slobs in 80s comedies. (The Pulitzer Prize Committee waits in the wings, with a comically oversized Publisher’s Clearinghouse check)

If I had the rotten tomato concession in that auditorium, I’d go home that night a rich man. Unless someone else was selling hand grenades.

Will one of the Centerville students please throw their musical instrument at that grinning jackanape and wipe the self-satisfied smirk off his punim? Does Batiuk actually think readers find his smug preening amusing?

4tn panel, and so tonight’s performance will be exceptionally poor.

Where’s Cranky? (Someone had to say it…)

I think it would be just awesome if none of the band showed up that night.

The problem with Dinkly is that he is an unrelatable character … no effort has been made to let readers know why he acts as he does. That’s OK, as far as it goes, some supervillains didn’t have a lot of motivation, either. However, they remained interesting if they are seen through the eyes of a superhero with whom the reader DOES empathize … and thus some kind of interaction with the audience is maintained. Good writing is largely “show and not tell”, this seems like the opposite.

On the positive side…..ummmm……..ummmmmm…..nope. Sorry. I got nothing.

And next, we’re going to get a lecture on the virtues of humility.

How did he get such a “large” audience? Are they all parents of band members?

And, of course, the kids have done nothing at all.

Someone needs to sock him right in that smug panel three mug.

Dinkly must be patting himself on the back with his left hand in panel 2…careful Harry, don’t dislocate your shoulder.

If you’ve ever been (forced to go) to a band concert, this looks painfully familiar. The directors congratulate themselves like it’s Carnegie Hall.

Geez….can this guy become any more of a horse’s a$$ than he already is?

Please let him fall off the podium and impale himself on his baton …

Modest, ain’t he?

He looks wrong

That ole boy never get off himself!!!!!!!

we’ll see…

with or without the band. :J

Meanwhile down at the Dale Evans …

ED: “When the new Bean’s End catalogue comes out I think I’ll get one of those growhouses.”

JJ, do you actually think that anyone, except you and all your troll buddies, find your smug attempts at intelligent writing amusing? Too easy, LOL…

Does anyone find YOU amusing? Probably not. If you want to throw dirt, expect it to be returned.

Sunday’s strip conspicuously showed the concert date as “DEC 12.” Today is the 11th. Is Dinkle rehearsing his self-adulation for tomorrow night’s concert? Or has TimeMop®, the Rather Elegant Solution™, struck again?

In a perfect world… after all his self-puffery, Dinkle raises his baton in the first panel of tomorrow’s strip, and… the same shattered notes come forth in the second panel. Because, in the real world (or a quarter inch from reality™) a substitute band director, no matter how brilliant (even as brilliant as Dinkle imagines himself to be), is not going to magically turn around a band that’s playing this badly in the space of less than a week. And, in the real world, nobody would blame the substitute for the band’s bad performance; any credit or blame would land squarely on the regular band teacher.

So Batiuk could construct an interesting story in which Dinkle fails (with a soft landing and no real harm to his reputation) and has to deal with the fact that even The World’s Greatest Band Director™ can’t fix some performances. But that would be interesting and allow for character development. I’m not holding my breath.

Sadly,when the temperature drops below freezing there is a shortage of overripe tomatoes

Only if it sounds good of course…….

4th panel: “and so tonight’s performance will be John Cage’s famous piece 4 minutes 33 seconds. Sit back, relax, and enjoy!”

All Dinkle and no Crankshaft make Batiuk a dull boy.

All Dinkle and no Crankshaft make Batiuk a dull boy.

All Dinkle and no Crankshaft make Batiuk a dull boy.

All Dinkle and no Crankshaft make Batiuk a dull boy.

All Dinkle and no Crankshaft make Batiuk a dull boy.

More like ripped off than pulled off.

Why am I always losing Cranky? That’s who this strip is about, right? That’s why I keep reading, right? This jerk is the pits!

A bit full of yourself, aren’t you?

What a jerk the conductor is!

Where’s Crankshaft? Soon I won’t even look for this!

The thing is, this was a well-performing band before Harry showed up. The self-proclaimed world’s greatest band director has ruined them.

Alternatively, this was already a good band before Harry showed up. They’re playing poorly on purpose to make “The World’s Greatest Band Director” look like a lying blowhard.

OK, I’ve concluded that Harry’s little speech must occur before the concert, because the audience is still in their seats and have not escaped or rioted like the crowd that attended “A La Recherche du Sacre Bleu Printemps Perdu” or whatever it was back in 2013.