Funky-D
Cidu Bill on Jan 15th 2010
S.P. Charles: I actually understand what Funky’s talking about; but WTF on so many levels… Is this strip supposed to make some sort of sense, or has Tom Batiuk gone Pat Robinson-crazy?
Filed in Bill Bickel, CIDU, Funky Winkerbean, Star Trek, Tom Batiuk, comic strips, comics, humor, trellium-d | 26 responses so far
Elyrest Jan 15th 2010 at 02:28 pm 1
S.P. Charles - Not to disparage Tom Batiuk (way too easy), but I think he has crossed over to another realm. He is however still being paid to do this so he is doing something right. Unlike Pat Robertson I don’t think Batiuk is evil.
S.P. Charles Jan 15th 2010 at 02:35 pm 2
Okay, if the best you can say about a comic strip artist is that he’s not evil…
Elyrest Jan 15th 2010 at 02:38 pm 3
No - he draws well too.
David Jan 15th 2010 at 02:46 pm 4
Based on the last two days, I propose a temporary extension of Godwin’s law to include Pat Robertson. It’s just too easy.
Regarding the comic, Harry looks waaaay too happy about Trellium-D, and Funky looks way too something - smug, drugged, ODed on laxatives?
yellojkt Jan 15th 2010 at 03:01 pm 5
Only total nerds watch ST:ENT. I barely made it to the end of ST:VOY.
Cidu Bill Jan 15th 2010 at 03:13 pm 6
So you’re saying, yellojkt, that there’s a strict nerd hierarchy?
The Bad Seed Jan 15th 2010 at 03:21 pm 7
Pat-Robertson-crazy to the power of Rush-Limbaugh-crazy.
Kamino Neko Jan 15th 2010 at 05:09 pm 8
Clearly Harry’s a big Enterprise fan.
Otherwise that’s one random-ass analogy.
John Small Berries Jan 15th 2010 at 05:25 pm 9
There absolutely is a hierarchy, Cidu Bill.
Fnord Jan 15th 2010 at 05:53 pm 10
Montoni’s is coated with the stuff that turns Vulcans into emotional, violent drug addicts? Of course, it makes so much sense now. Or something.
Tim Jan 15th 2010 at 07:24 pm 11
There was a recent “Weregeek” strip about the hierarchy of geeks, that I’m too lazy to look up. I agree with yellojkt; Enterprise was a waste of electrons. As much as I hate to admit it, I know exactly why the ST franchise went downhill; Roddenberry had a vision of a utopian future, but his replacement (Ira Steven Behr) had a negative view. That’s why things went from “exploring, where no one had gone before” to “resistance is futile.”
turquoise cow Jan 15th 2010 at 07:25 pm 12
Wow, I never thought that Funky was that big of a nerd. The other two, sure. I would think that he was just trying to appeal to Harry’s nerd-ness in order to cheer him up, but the explanation is far too specific for him not to have watched the episode himself.
I’m not a huge Trek fan. I never watched more than the first episode of Enterprise. I never remember the name of those weird metals or space anomalies from the episodes that I have seen. In order for Funky know the name of the rare metal, he’s either a big nerd, or he just watched the episode either. I don’t remember him ever taking part in any of those nerdy conversations between the Montoni’s customers though.
John Small Berries Jan 16th 2010 at 12:39 am 13
Star Trek has always played a role in Funky Winkerbean; back when it was mostly a pun-a-day strip, quite a number of the gags involving the school’s computer made references to Star Trek (the computer signed Klingons up for classes, forced the faculty to don Starfleet uniforms if they wanted it to cooperate with them… I have a hazy memory of it being able to beam people from place to place within the school, usually to their surprise).
My guess is that Batiuk is a Trekkie himself, so naturally all of his characters are as well.
Powers Jan 16th 2010 at 08:11 am 14
Ira Steven Behr was the showrunner for DS9 during what is considered its most meaningful, deepest seasons. He certainly can’t be blamed for any perceived deficiencies in Enterprise or Voyager.
Cornbread Jan 16th 2010 at 08:50 am 15
Powers - because certainly someone who is capable of doing one good thing is therefore incapable of doing anything wrong.
Excuse the snarkiness. I thought Enterprise was totally lame.
Thomas Jan 16th 2010 at 10:57 am 16
As far as I’m aware, Behr was only involved with DS9 and a small amount of TNG. So no, he did do anything wrong on Enterprise or Voyager, because he wasn’t there.
Jeff Jan 16th 2010 at 01:53 pm 17
Does Trellium-D also cause cancer?
Karen Jan 16th 2010 at 03:34 pm 18
Oh, dear sweet merciful heavens. It isn’t enough that Batiuk is crazy as a latrine rat, now he’s giving Trek fans a bad name. Ptooey.
Oh, and Enterprise stank.
Spiritcatcher Jan 16th 2010 at 04:01 pm 19
ST:ENT season 1 did nothing more than establish the characters, season 2 was boring and irrelevant. So in season 3 they tried one big story arc and lots of effects and CGI and overreached. Season 4 had small story arcs over 3-4 episodes, explored the history of the Star Trek universe and was pretty much brilliant. And then the series got cancelled. In season 4 they even had a clever explanation why the ST:TOS klingons looked so human …
John Small Berries Jan 16th 2010 at 11:34 pm 20
Spiritcatcher, what was the explanation for the non-ridged Klingons? (Despite being a lifelong Trekkie myself, I quit watching Enterprise after the first few episodes.)
As to the characters, in the episodes I did see, there was Archer, Sato, T’Pol, Doctor Phlox… and then the other guys, who were all written with the exact same personality so I couldn’t even get a handle on which name went with which face. Did the other guys ever get distinct personalities? And did Jolene Blalock ever get over the “emotionless=complete lack of affect” style of “acting” that plagues most Vulcan characters?
Ed Jan 17th 2010 at 03:47 am 21
Jeff: No, Trellium-D doesn’t cause cancer. But if I remember right, it causes Vulcans to go slowly insane. Which is almost as funky.
Spiritcatcher Jan 17th 2010 at 07:01 am 22
There’s that banned procedure to produce genetically-enhanced humans … the Klingons got their butts kicked by some enhanced teenagers on the run and secretly decided to adapt the technique in their fight against the Romulans … race-wide. They botched it and caught themselves an auto-immune disease. To dampen the negative effects they were forced to inject themselves with … *gasp* … human genes. But it should wear down after 2-3 generations. “We don’t like to talk about it.”
Oh, and the others … Malcolm, Trip, Travis, got fleshed out. Considering Jolene Blalock, i suspect she was chosen exactly for that style … they wouldn’t have chosen her purely as eyecandy, would they ?
Powers Jan 17th 2010 at 07:58 am 23
It’s amazing how many people who stuck with TNG through its first two seasons gave up on Enterprise after two episodes. Gimme a break.
And yes, Cornbread, your sarcasm is not only unnecessary but misplaced. I apologize for not specifying that Behr was not involved with Voyager and Enterprise, but I thought you might be able to read between the lines.
John Small Berries Jan 17th 2010 at 11:23 am 24
Spiritcatcher: Thanks for the explanation! And glad to hear the other male characters became more than cardboard cutouts.
I’m not blaming just Jolene Blalock - nearly every actor who’s played a Vulcan “acts” as though the only way they can convey a lack of emotion is to remove all expression from their faces and voices. But if you go back and look at TOS, both Nimoy and Lenard put inflections into their voices; they changed their facial expressions to indicate that there were actual thought processes going on in their heads.
Then again, that was before Botox - maybe modern Vulcan actors can’t change their facial expressions!
Elyrest Jan 17th 2010 at 12:37 pm 25
“It’s amazing how many people who stuck with TNG through its first two seasons gave up on Enterprise after two episodes.”
Powers (22)- What you haven’t taken into account here was that when TNG came on the air that TOS had been off the air for almost 20 years. Fans were dying to see a ST series. (I thought only the first season of TNG was painful.) When Enterprise came on it was 14 years and three series later. This changed the dynamic quite a bit. I held on for most of the first season of Enterprise, but I didn’t like the characters that much. The main reason I bailed was Scott Bakula - an actor I have always enjoyed. His portrayal of Archer was wooden and humorless. Maybe the character was written that way, but I started disliking him so I stopped watching.
Fnord Jan 17th 2010 at 11:11 pm 26
@22: I think I figured out the difference there. People wanted to like TNG, because it came after a long drought and tried very hard to stay true to the spirit of the original series. It was clear they were trying, so Trekkies were willing to put up with the initial cheeziness and awkward pacing.
Enterprise, by contrast, seemed to go out of its way to alienate fans. It started its very first few episodes by contradicting extremely long-held Trek canon, such as the date of first contact with the Klingons, despite the fact that Trek fans are in love with consistency. It attempted to be dark and “gritty”, despite all the fans who liked Trek because of its idealistic premise. People decided that Enterprise wasn’t even attempting to move closer to what they wanted, so this time they decided it wasn’t worth the stiff acting and the unlikeable characters.