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August 31, 2007
Tug McDraw
For the second day in a row, the print version of "Prickly City" from my morning paper is radically different from what shows up in the online version!
August 30, 2007
Climb Aboard the Tug Train
FINALLY, something interesting comes across the transom.
Today's online "Prickly City" is different from the strip that appeared in my morning paper.
Let's compare and contrast.
PANEL ONE
A slight variation in the dialog. But what's that? Is Winslow wearing a T-shirt in the print version?
PANEL TWO
Another slight variation in the dialog. But what's that on Winslow's T-shirt??! It looks like some kind of symbol...
PANEL THREE
Why, it's a PEACE SYMBOL!!!
PANEL FOUR
Sly, very sly, you old bastard.
Discuss amongst yourselves.
Posted by CJo at 10:52 AM | Comments (11)August 29, 2007
The Tugger Becomes the Funnee
After a couple of years of fits and starts and bitching and moaning, it finally appears that Prickly City is "hot" "live" or "real-time." How else to explain the commentary on the alleged exploits of Rep. Craig Larry (name changed to protect his identity). After all, while Iowa has the "Field of Dreams" site, Idaho is known for its "Field of Creams" site. If you tug it, they will come. Scotty, working blue. Bravo. Author. Encore.
Posted by Sacki at 10:01 AM | Comments (6)August 28, 2007
Tug Job (But Not The Kind Republican Senator Larry Craig Had In Mind)
Uh oh, he's doing it again. Every once in a great while Stantis loves to dabble in the ol' philosophy - usually picking a quote he loves that's inevitably from a liberal philosopher and twisting its real meaning to suit his neo-conservative views. Does anybody know if Stantis was a philosophy major before he dropped out of college?
I'm not really sure what Stantis is talking about here. Carmen is still tugging on that rope she found on the ground yesterday, and now she reveals that she has no idea who's on the other end - it's just "them" and if she stops pulling "they win." Even that idiot Winslow realizes how stupid that logic is, which makes me wonder: did Carmen do something to piss Stantis off?
This might be a part of Stantis's whole mid-life/mid-term Republican crisis. Like a lot of other Republicans I'm sure he's confused about his party - they had everything, all three branches of government, and they completely screwed it all up. Is the rope a metaphor for Iraq? Is Stantis trying to say that it was just something Bush thought he needed to do and now he can't give up or "they" (the terrorists, who had nothing to do with Iraq but don't tell Republicans that) will win?
Who knows, who cares. Lazy azz Stantis found a way to draw Carmen once and copy and paste her for at least two days, probably the rest of the week, and Winslow is only a slight variation in each strip. Way to go, Stantis: you found a new and inventive way to slap together a strip without having to exert any effort other than coming up with a stupid storyline that even you have to admit doesn't make any sense. Bravo. You redefine "the worst" every single day.
Posted by The Furnace at 08:33 AM | Comments (0)August 27, 2007
Breakdown Takedown You're Busted
Wow. Things must be pretty bleak around Prickly City Inc. these days. Stantis has gone from semi-incoherent to full-fledged dementia in the span of a week. I almost feel bad picking on him when he's struggling with his doubts about the future of the strip, as symbolized by Carmen tugging, warring, and yanking with the unknown "them that's not us."
If I were Shira-Chan, I might be sharpening my Manga-Drawing Pencils. Stantis seems to be nearing a complete mental breakdown and could soon need another two weeks off to recovery from "surgery."
Posted by CJo at 02:26 PM | Comments (1)August 26, 2007
Suggestion Box
Single panel throwaway today. Yet another instance of Stantis writing a strip he could have done two years ago and pulled out of the mothballs because he couldn't be bothered with coming up with something original.
Instead of just bitching about Prickly City, which is fun all by itself, let's make this an interactive Shrubville today. How would you, dear readers, improve on the strip?
A summary as to how bad things have gotten this year: PC went from short, mini-storylines usually involving a political hot topic from two weeks prior, to one loooong storyline about Winslow running for President that went nowhere and had no real direction. Other minis focused on things like hating technology, bitching about pretty blond teenage celebrites, or digging up obscure research studies in order to make a conservative talking point. Instead we're getting things like the Winslow bond story, where something happened outside the realm of anything we've read in the comic but, in keeping with the strip, wasn't funny and had no real point.
I'm the first to admit that I was wrong in suggesting that Stantis pick a storyline and stick with it for longer than a few days. I feel partially responsibe for the "Winston for President" epic, that Stantis was apparently making up as he went along. One of the keys to having your characters go through something that last weeks and weeks is to know where you're going with it. That clearly wasn't the case. We had the Prickly City primary with Winslow winning with two votes, but then Stantis remembered Iowa was coming up, so he couldn't decide if Winslow should be in Iowa or not (giving us that oh-so-memorable week of "Winslow is such an idiot he doesn't know what Iowa is"), and to this day we still don't know if Winslow ever made it (on one hand his volunteer campaign workers think he's in Iowa by mistaking Kucinich for him, then they told Carmen not to send him, then Winslow was making a campaign speech which we're probably supposed to think is him in Iowa).
But then Stantis dropped it without any rhyme or reason. Instead we got Winslow bonds.
If we were given the reins to Prickly City for a few months, what would you suggest as a quick fix-it to put things on the right path? I have a few thoughts...
- If you're going to do something for a month, know what the heck it is. Going back over the last few months I still don't know what Stantis was trying to accomplish, and I doubt he does either.
- Prepare one-offs to insert into the storyline that make sense but don't take away from the overall story arch. Things like the "you're wrong" strip don't make any sense if Winslow and Carmen haven't been fighting for months. If Winslow hasn't whined about technology in ages, we're not going to understand that the whole point of that one strip where Winslow's head blew up was Carmen was trying to get Winslow to survive without his cell phone for a few panels.
- Get Carmen and Winslow back on to their conservative and liberal paths. Winslow has become so stupid we don't know where he stands on anything (other than "corn is dumb") and Carmen has been strangely quiet on the issues for quite some time now. It's as if Stantis is afraid to admit he's a conservative, yet he still loves to make fun of liberals - but has decided it's enough to just say they're stupid and leave it at that. That's not what you're paid to do, Stantis - be loud, be proud, be a Bush neo-con like we know you are.
- Give us a new character. For the love of god, please, give us someone else to focus on. This has been the number one issue around Shrubville for years now. With Winslow being an idiot, and Carmen losing any sign of personality, we're left with pretty much nothing at all.
- Tackle the big issues. Talk about playing it safe - Stantis hasn't gone out on a limb all year. What happened to the guy who lied about Howard Dean and stirred up the hornets nest with his heartless Terri Schiavo and Sandra Day O'Connor strips? What, are we supposed to believe that nothing major is going on right now? Come on Stantis, tackle the FISA issue and explain why it's a good thing to give up our rights. Defend Alberto Gonzales. In two weeks, praise President Bush for flip flopping and now saying that Iraq IS like Viet Nam. Give us SOMETHING to talk about.
That's it for me - what recommendations would you make to help Prickly City at least be readable in the near future?
August 25, 2007
Why Can't Prickly City Be Made In China Too?
Ugh. Anybody got a bucket?
We're back to semi-repeats again after that bizarre detour into Winslow bonds. Carmen and Winslow each scream "you're wrong," but then say they're still friends, then get busy screaming "you're right!" All together now....awwww.
As in awwww...this sucks.
It really sucks because Carmen and Winslow haven't been arguing at all lately. Was this a strip Stantis wrote a year ago and found buried at the bottom of his sock drawer, like the ones he ran a week ago? It seems familiar - maybe CJo can help us remember a strip similar to this with the whole "you're wrong - but we're still friends so let's keep agreeing to disagree" sappiness that originally appeared back when these two were fighting constantly.
And that's one of the problems with this strip. Since Stantis can never be wrong, he's had to morph both Winslow and Carmen into mini versions of himself. So they don't so much as argue as just stand on different sides of various issues, making comments and "jokes" while we're all left scratching our heads wondering why the heck if they're supposed to be a liberal or conservative they've suddenly shifted positions for a week.
What makes it even worse is that Stantis spent over a month on Winslow's campaign, and he and Carmen never once argued about the issues. I remember Carmen saying that she saw it as an opportunity to use Winslow to get her views out there, but it never happened. Instead we got weeks and weeks of seeing how stupid Winslow is. Now this week we get a bunch of retreads and then a few days of this stupid bond crap that Stantis never set up and had zero humor involved (where was the character from China that was supposed to come and collect on the value of Winslow's bonds? Isn't that the logical next step in all of that?). And now we're back to these two arguing - kind of hard for us to really buy Carmen and Winslow screaming at each other when they haven't had a disagreement in months.
I wonder where Stantis is going to go from here. I think the Winslow bond thing is dead. I don't see him sending Winslow back on the campaign trail, unless he wants to spend some time on that Iowa straw poll from a few weeks ago. He's not going to talk about the bridge collapse or the mine tragedy. Definitely no commenting on FISA or Gonzo or the war in Iraq. So what's left? Any idea what Stantis is going to spend next week wasting our time with?
(Oh and as a side note, I love from yesterday's strip how Stantis's wording is so terrible he once again botches a punchline because he doesn't know how to use the space in a panel. I love how "nuts" is so far to the left it's hard to see that it actually is the second half of the word doughnuts. Geez Stantis sucks.)
August 24, 2007
Today's strip? Not so bad in a should-be-a-single-panel-political-cartoon sort of way. Stantis can do the political cartoon thing. One panel concepts are right in his wheelhouse. Softball-lobbed, eephus-like, right over the heart of the plate. It's the only pitch he can hit for power, what with his fists full of ham and his bat a cudgel.
I thought I'd remind us all of some famous Stantis political one-panels for lack of anything else to say.
As you might expect, he recently hacked away at one of his favorite targets: steroids and Bonds.
Boy, those steroids sure did make Bonds big, didn't they. But his head is so tiny! What about the HGH, Stantis??
This all calls to mind one of his first hacks at steroids, the old syringes-as-asterisk piece from 2005...
I'd have to say my favorite one-panel Stantis strip was from back in the Terri Schiavo days. Let me set the scene...
Schiavo's hospital room. Schiavo, unplugged, her face in a ghoulish mask of death. A shadow in the shape of a crucifix drapes over her lifeless corpse. The shadow, it turns out, is cast from Jesus himself, who has appeared in the hospital (still dying on the cross, no less!), who asks his father (God!) to forgive them/us/heathens/Democrats...
As the thieves and scoundrels (and Nazis) said upon opening the Ark of the Covenant before their faces twisted and melted under hellfire's heat, it's beeeeeeeeeeeeauuuuuuuuuuuuuuutiful...
Here's another chestnut, which depicts John Kerry trying to run away from the state he represents:
Gee, think Stantis will re-do this strip but instead feature Mitt Romney, who was the Governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts when same sex marriage was legalized? Yeah, me neither.
And last but not least, the John Kerry Flipflop Strip. Short, sharp, simple-mindedly literal, and shitty.
Gee, think Stantis will re-do this strip but instead feature Mitt Romney, who seems to flip and flop and blow with whichever way the prevailing political winds are blowing? Yeah, me neither.
August 23, 2007
Junk Bonds
This is certainly a unique situation here. Winslow and Carmen are reminiscing about events that happened outside the universe of the published strip.
Winslow issuing Winslow Bonds was never a published event, which makes this particular series not only unfunny and pointless, but also jarring and confusing.
I suppose one could congratulate Stantis for allowing his characters to live and breath outside the realm of what he sends to the syndicate. One could make a reasonable argument that this is conducive to character development in the creative process, as the characters flourish in his brain.
But screw that. We're talking my brain, not Stantis's. Carmen and Winslow live for exactly 3 seconds on a daily basis -- the time it takes to read the strip. Then they die a painful and horrible death as I fling the comics pages to the ground and stomp on it until I'm exhausted.
Posted by CJo at 11:05 AM | Comments (6)August 22, 2007
Alternate Beginning, Middle and Ending
Here we are, and as per usual, 2 weeks behind the times and slightly less topical than a hemmorhoid cream. Nevertheless, it's refreshing to see our favorite author acknowledge the accomplishments of Barry Bonds, after so many daft and pointless strips earlier in the series which cast a wary eye upon him and his achievements on the baseball diamond.
Add in the fact that there's a sly undercurrent giving a nod and a wink to Gary U.S. Bonds and his 1981 smash hit "This Little Girl" and this may turn out to be the best one-day panel in the history of Prickly City. If only it were intended to be as described, which, of course, it wasn't.
That fact, however, shouldn't stop us from looking forward to the future tribute to Gary & Kirby Puckett. One had hits with the Gap Band, and the other robbed hits from falling in the gap! Oh, the hilarity.
Posted by Sacki at 10:33 AM | Comments (1)August 21, 2007
So Is Winston Still Running For President?
Do you ever get the feeling that Stantis is STILL learning on the job? For two solid months Stantis carried on the "Winston for President" storyline, something he had never tried before. Now that he seems to have run out of stuff to say about that, we're back to Carmen and Winslow standing around in the desert talking about whatever. No transition, no "Winslow, why don't you take a week off from the campaign and relax?" Instead we've gotten three strips in a row that could have been run at any time during the history of Prickly City - and actually, they have in slightly different forms.
First we got Winslow's head exploding (again), then we got Winslow talking about sideburns (again), and today we get Winslow offering up the lamest of lame "play on words" (again). This time it's the brainstorm that if we start a "cold" war, we can beat global warming. Get it? Get it? Cold/Warming? Yeah, I know, it's hard to type I'm laughing so hard.
The depressing thing is that the Republicans in charge really did want another cold war, in part to distract us from issues like global warming and issues on the homefront so they could follow their imperial ambitions. Check out PNAC sometime if you're wondering what the heck I'm talking about. They were hoping for another cold war, but for something like that to happen they would need a catastrophic event to happen on U.S. soil to get the American public to support their policies. Hmm, wonder what that could have been...
Anywho, sorry, no conspiracy theories today. Instead let's just focus on the Worst Comic Strip In The World. Maybe tomorrow we'll get Carmen and Winslow running around the desert, talking about a "report" Carmen read talking about how fat kids are, or Winslow chatting up his latest crush. Because lord knows Stantis has run out of things to say about Winslow running for president.
Posted by The Furnace at 08:41 AM | Comments (1)August 20, 2007
What a Dingbat
Winston is a regular Mike Stivic, what with the lambchops and his head full of meat and the liberal political views and the always arguing with the conservative and crotchety Carmen. What a delightful and edgy sitcom "Prickly City" would make. Someone thaw out Norman Lear's corpse. (If he's dead, that is. If he's alive, someone thaw out his brain, which has been in a deep freeze since he brought us 'Who's the Boss.')
In today's episode (filmed live in front of a studio audience), Winston grows sideburns and Carmen calls him a hippie. In tomorrow's episode, Winston remembers he's in a presidential campaign and he tries to get to Iowa. In Wednesday's episode, Winston shaves off his sideburns much to the delight of Carmen. In Thursday's episode, Winston tried to get to Iowa. Man, this thing writes itself.
At any rate: STIFLE, STANTIS!
Posted by CJo at 09:56 AM | Comments (2)August 19, 2007
I Guess Winslow's Not Trying To Fly Anymore
There was something familiar about today's strip. I remembered writing about how Stantis had drawn Winslow's exploding head to look like the sun before - and sure enough, he's done it in the past. Too bad we can't look at the old strips, but that's why I put up that little sun picture so I can remind everybody that Stantis is a no talent hack who can't come up with an original idea to save his life. Winslow takes too many "stimulants" - Winslow pops his head at will - doesn't matter. If it means Stantis can simply trace an old drawing and save himself a few precious minutes so he can continue to worship at the feet of George W. Bush, he will.
What else can you say about this nonsense? Winslow blows off his own head, then asks for his phone back so he can take a picture of it. There's NOTHING HERE. No political commentary, no jokes, nothing. Are we supposed to laugh at Winston's head popping off? That Stantis wastes five panels showing him trying to explode his head? Egad. I feel sorry for guys like Pellucid who try to defend this crap. Then again conservatives are the same ones that still defend Bush and Cheney.
On a side note, I read on one of the blogs a really good comparison. Listening to Bob Murray, the asshole who owns the mine in Utah that's so far resulted in three deaths and probably nine total, how is he any different from Guiliani (or for that matter Bush) after 9/11? While the media portrays them as some kind of heroes for not running around screaming in a panic, the reality is that if these guys weren't so cheap and negligent in the first place there's a good chance they could have prevented these disasters. Murray has a terrible mine safety record, and just donates more money to Republicans when the heat is on. Guiliani could have saved hundreds of firefighters and rescue workers if he had gotten them the radios and equipment he knew they needed since the first WTC attack. And Bush...well, we all know about the August 6th, 2001 PDB and the title: "Bin Laden Determined To Strike In U.S." Maybe Guiliani should name Murray his running mate and they can run on the platform, "We got you into this mess - but only we can get you out."
Worked for Bush in 2004.
August 18, 2007
Yeah, Like The Republicans Have Had a Decent Candidate In 20 Years
The best the Republicans have to offer.
Oh hey, look - Scott Stantis decided to take a break from his gripping "Winston for President" series to offer political commentary. I'd almost forgotten that the whole reason Stantis even has a strip is because he's supposed to offer political insights. Instead we've been treated to "corn is dumb" and "Winslow is dumber."
Stantis finally jumps on the "nobody likes the Republican candidates" bandwagon, and in fine Prickly City fashion he wastes most of the strip on nothing but the sky and the desert (which require zero artistic ability, which is why Stantis loves these strips so much). I think that's supposed to be a tumbleweed rolling through the strip. Or Kevin the Apocalypse Bunny - hard to tell.
I wonder if Stantis will go anywhere with this, and prove he's not really a Bush Republican like he keeps claiming. There's a ton of material here to work with. Giuliani and his claims that he spent more time than the 9/11 workers at Ground Zero so he's "one of them," Romney strapping the family dog to the roof of the station wagon for family trips while telling us the reason his sons aren't serving in the military is because they're serving the country by helping him get elected, Fred Thompson's infamous red pickup truck - and that's just the tip of the iceberg.
Instead Stantis will probably whine about Ron Paul and how he wants to get out of Iraq. It's really depressing when folks on the left cheer for this guy - yeah, he wants to bring our troops home, but do you have any idea where he stands on the other issues? Trust me, while his views on Iraq are admirable, he won't be all that different from Tancredo or Brownback when it comes to everything else (what, you didn't know he wants to abolish public schools?).
Then again this is Prickly City, so after wasting tomorrow on an unrelated topic (how long has it been since he referenced Britney or Lindsay? been a while) he'll go right back to "Winslow is or isn't in Iowa and is still an idiot." Which is really depressing, since I don't think Stantis has picked up on the fact that it's no longer a case of critics of the strip reading because they're outraged - people are completely apathetic about the strip now. You can always tell when Stantis has said something stupid and offensive - people would come to Shrubville to vent. Nowadays Shrubville is just like today's strip - no activity whatsoever. I don't think that's a poor reflection on us - people could just care less about Prickly City.
And if that means the end of PC, we hear at the Ville of the Shrub would be more than happy to close our doors too. Especially Sacki, since I don't think he's read the strip in months.
August 17, 2007
Circumspect Child-of-Corn Malachai eyes Winston before casting his vote...with a SCYTHE!
Blah blah blah blah
Mr. Comic Strip Man continues his Blithering Idiot routine
No one cares
Posted by CJo at 08:45 AM | Comments (1)August 16, 2007
All Over But the Shouting, Just a Waste of Time
I don't want to turn this into a rant about how when Itchy plays Scratchy's skeleton like a xylophone, he strikes the same rib twice in succession, yet he produces two clearly different tones. (I mean, what are we to believe, that it was some sort of a magic xylophone or something?). I know this is only a comic strip (and a horrible one at that), and, as such, we should be able to suspend disbelief every now and then. We should allow the strip's creator some leeway in his story development and some wiggle room in his characters. But this last week or so has been so tremendously off-the-charts-ishly suckfuckingly stoopid that it's painful and embarrassing to witness.
Let's trace the Iowa thread through to today...
8/2/07: Winslow wins the PC Primary, so it's off to Iowa
8/3/07: 2 Votes/Woodrow Wilson diversion
8/4/07: 2 Votes diversion contiunation
8/5/07: Sunday Funday
8/6/07: It's off to Iowa to hire a staff but we're broke
8/7/07: We're broke because we spent $64.0 million on Randy the dancing llama of the apocalypse
8/8/07: Wandering Jesus-like through desert with globe looking for Iowa
8/9/07: More globetrotting looking for Iowa
8/10/07: Hitchhiking Across America to Iowa
8/11/07: Winslow arrives it Iowa only to learn it's still Prickly City
8/12/07: Sunday Funday
8/13/07: Winslow arrives in Iowa only to learn it's still Prickly City
8/14/07: Winslow's Iowa campaign staff which he can't afford thinks Winslow is in Iowa when Winslow is still in Prickly City
8/15/07: Er...Um...Winslow's campaign staff which he can't afford doesn't want him in Iowa so they are paying Carmen -- his campaign manager -- to keep him in Prickly City
8/16/07: Er...Um...Winslow is in Iowa and insults Corn
Now matter how you slice this thing, it's rotten.
So if I may add some "constructive" to my "criticisms" and offer this foolproof way for Scott Stantis to escape the hole he's dug...to chop down the weeds he's so far in that he can't see where he is...to guide him to safety on his journey up shit creek without a paddle...
QUIT, you stupid dumbshit!
Posted by CJo at 08:55 AM | Comments (2)August 15, 2007
On A Cold and Gray Chicago Mornin
I rarely, if ever, come in here and ponder what our favorite author could have or should have done, instead preferring to take the spoiled skirt steak that is Prickly City, lay it out, and pound the hell out of it until it can be moderately palatable. But really, that Winslow guy should be heading off to Graceland to take in the Elvis show, perform some karate, and eat some fried Samoa cookies. Not only that, but our favorite author could then somehow work in a rant about thongs, because he, like the Vis, is a straight-up white cotton panties kinda guy. Must be a southern thing.
Posted by Sacki at 10:10 AM | Comments (2)August 14, 2007
The Neverending Story Part 64 Million: Short Jokes Are Easy
"Hey, did ya hear? Dennis Kucinich is short! Haven't heard that one before, have ya? Oh, and if you didn't like that joke, he's got a tail too! Cuz he looks like something out of Middle Earth! Ha ha ha ha!"
- What I imagine Scott Stantis said to Toby when trying to explain today's strip.
The stupidity continues today, with Carmen once again explaining to Winslow that he's not in Iowa. But the rest of his volunteer campaign is. With the exception of the actual campaign manager, Carmen. That makes sense, right? That Winslow is such an idiot he never left Prickly City, but Carmen is still there with him too?
I'm actually dumber for reading this strip.
Anywho, the Dingbat Duo are still in Prickly City. However Winslow still has supporters, despite only winning the caucus with two votes and having wasted $64 million dollars - on what, we never really found out (except for that HYSTERICAL dancing llama joke, because to Stantis dancing llamas are funny). But the volunteers are just as stupid as Winston/Winslow, leading to the wonderful Dennis Kucinich "jokes." Oh, and don't forget to enjoy Stantis's drawing of a stereotypical liberal woman. The only thing she's missing is a Fish t-shirt and armpit hair.
Technical question: why are Winslow's comments in the first two panels in thought balloons, but Carmen's aren't? I have a feeling it's because Stantis is so terrible with his writing that he's afraid people couldn't tell who was talking, but I get the sense he's not exactly following the norms when it comes to writing a comic strip. Especially since he doesn't do it in the last two panels.
So here's what I'm taking away from today's strip: Winslow is incredibly stupid. Carmen is just as stupid, since she's still in Prickly City with Winslow. Winslow somehow still has supporters even though Stantis never told us what he wasted the money on. Stantis is going ahead with the Iowa portion of the storyline, even though the straw poll was this past weekend and he won't be able to get to it for a few weeks. Jokes about how Dennis Kucinich looks are easy, and Stantis loves easy jokes. Oh, and it reaffirmed my belief once again that Stantis is the worse comic strip artist on the planet.
What about you? Read something between the lines I missed? Did you think the "Kucinich has a tail" joke was actually clever, or Stantis trying too hard? And don't you just love how Stantis sabotages his own final gag by having to write "kidder" as "kid-der?" Kinda ruins the moment when you can't actually read what the woman is saying.
August 13, 2007
Yet the Same
Oh, right. I'm supposed to comment on today's strip. Sorry for the delay. I simply couldn't be bothered until now.
You can imagine Scott Stantis clucking his tongue over this right now. "Tsk tsk," he'd be saying. "My mortal enemies can't even get up the gumption to fight me. Where did they learn to be so lazy?"
From YOU, Scott Stantis. We learned it from YOU.
Today repeats Saturday which was a repeat of the entire week. No new ground is covered. Winslow has gone nowhere. Winslow is going nowhere. Winslow will never go anywhere.
Prickly City is just a waste of newsprint at this point. It's not even good enough for Fish-n-Chips paper. We're talking, at best, bird cage liner. I know this; you know this. My guess is Stantis knows this too, but can't pass up the money-for-nothing. When will the newspapers wake up and yank this garbage?
Posted by CJo at 11:56 AM | Comments (2)August 12, 2007
At Least I Know What Peggy Hill Looks Like
Seriously, Peggy Noonan? Stantis had a week to come up with something embarrassing and something conservative that Winston/Winslow had tattooed on his butt and the best he could do is Peggy "Read my lips - no new taxes" Noonan? Sure she writes for the Wall Street Journal and used to write for Ronnie, but aren't there about a hundred other things that would have been a little more, oh, I dunno, current that Stantis could have used? When was the last time anybody actually paid attention to Peggy Noonan? Yeesh.
Knowing Stantis, the other options were Betty Ford and Nancy Reagan. If you're going to go old school on us, could you at least have picked someone people don't have to look up on wikipedia if they're not into politics? Phyllis Schlafly is funny to say and Fawn Hall is hot. What, Michelle Malkin and Ann Coulter were too predictable? At least people under 50 know who they are.
I mean the idea behind today's strip is fine. Carmen (and a group of supporters that must be volunteers since Winslow can't pay them - even though Winslow is so stupid he thinks he's in Iowa - sorry, I won't go there this morning) grills Winslow, spotlight and all, trying to get him to admit his dirty little secrets before the press find out. Gee, she's a great campaign manager, ain't she? Might have been nice if she had done that BEFORE the Prickly City primary. Winslow spills on the hysterical Peggy Noonan tattoo (it even says "forever" underneath it! That's funny, right? Right?). However Carmen was looking for an even more devastating revelation: something about a "fuzzy and disorderly" in Cleveland.
You know, in any other strip that might be somewhat humorous. Granted it's usually Republicans that are getting busted for something illegal lately (usually involving gay sex - hear the one about the young Republican who not once but twice is accused of trying to give men oral sex - while the guys are asleep? Gotta love those family values conservatives), but I can go along with a character having something silly like that on his record. But didn't Stantis just spend an entire week establishing that Winslow doesn't know where Iowa is, much less Cleveland? I know Cleveland is the go-to location for punchlines, right up there with New Jersey, but how is that at all in keeping with the character? No reason for it to be in there, but Stantis is so used to ripping off other funnier writers that he slapped it in there thinking it would be a bonus laugh.
I dunno, I guess it would help if Stantis could figure out what kind of comic strip he's writing. That's probably too much to ask from a strip that's been running for over two years now.
Posted by The Furnace at 09:04 AM | Comments (0)August 11, 2007
Because Actually Sending Winslow To Iowa Would Make Sense AND Be (Potentially) Funny
Sometimes you just have to sit back and marvel at how terrible, horrible, no good, very bad Scott Stantis is as a comic strip writer. He redefines "awful" with each new strip.
Yesterday Winslow was hitching a ride with what we're supposed to know is a truck driver. We never actually SEE the driver, mind you, because that would be too much work for Stantis. Maybe he missed the "how to draw a semi truck" class when he dropped out of college.
Apparently it was a short ride, since Winslow is still in Prickly City - which is only four blocks long.
Winslow is so impossibly stupid that he thinks he's in Iowa. It's sort of like those sci fi stories where the guy thinks he's landed on a strange alien planet, when really he just crash landed back on earth. What might have been funny: Winslow ships himself to Iowa in a crate, can't see where he's going, and he accidentally falls off the back of the delivery truck and ends up on the edge of Prickly City. See, was that so hard Stantis? In two seconds I came up with a storyline that would have made sense instead of the crap you've thrown at us all week.
Anywho, Winslow is a complete moron now. He thinks people in Iowa speak "Iowanian." Ha ha ha - get it? No, because that's not funny. And amazingly enough, Winslow thinks that Iowa somehow looks different from Prickly City. I mean come on - he's that stupid? It's as if Stantis actually has Winslow in Iowa, looking at the cornfields and the tractors passing by, while Carmen is still in the desert. But nope - they're standing in the same place.
Oh and to top things off Carmen calls Winslow "dingo-breath." Wow. That's about as unfunny as you can get.
I'm begging somebody - anybody - Pellucid - please explain to me why this is supposed to be funny. Why any of it makes any modicum of sense. How can one man take something with so much potential - Winsow running for President - and turn it into a heaping, steaming pile of crap? Seriously, it's as if he's trying to suck more than anybody on the comic pages. He's like the Bill Kristol of the funnies - wrong about everything, yet somehow he's still got a job. At least when Stantis is wrong, people don't die. They just don't laugh.
August 10, 2007
Hallelujah! Winslow's a Bum
Winslow follows the grand tradition of hip-flask slinging madmen and steaming cafe flirts everywhere and decides to hit the road. Hitchin'-n-hikin'. As he's pulling into town on the interstate with his steel train in the rain, the wind bites his cheek through the wing. It's those late nights and freeway flying that always makes him sing. And it's the singing that gets him tossed from the truck. (Along with his suitcase full of grapes and his Picasso-inspired guitar.)
Time to hit the rails, son. Third boxcar, midnight train. Destination: Iowa, City of Ames.
Posted by CJo at 12:19 PM | Comments (2)August 09, 2007
Bullet with Coyote Fur
Despite all your rage, Winslow ("Well Crud..."), you're still just a rat in a maze. Trying to find Iowa. To the boredom and utter confusion of comics page readers across the nation.
I think both Sacki and The Furnace (in comments) had yesterday's strip figured out. Winslow counts three fingers on the globe to get from PC to Iowa, then takes three steps and expects to be in Iowa. All the while doing the waltz (1-2-3, 1-2-3, Box Step, No Turn).
Alas, it is Stantis who gets it all wrong. When I think "Waltz + Globe" I arrive at the answer of "Vienna" not "Dubuque."
So whilst Winston wanders whither, hither, thither, and, of course, yon, the rest of us wander down to our local rathskeller and drink until every last brain cell that still tries to register some meaning out of Prickly City is obliterated. Or maybe that's just me.
Posted by CJo at 09:15 AM | Comments (2)August 08, 2007
Keep Your Hands North Of The Equator, Buddy
Oh, that Winslow. How he is susceptible to every fad that comes along.
You might be thinking that sure, globes are millennia old, and the waltz is a couple of centuries old. But nobody has come up with the EXXXTREME GLOBE WALTZ - until now! Winslow, you fucking genius. You should be president.
Posted by Sacki at 10:14 AM | Comments (1)August 07, 2007
And Yes, Carmen's Left Eye In The Third Panel IS a Question Mark
So it turns out that Winslow actually raised $64 million, not the $60 million that Stantis originally told us back in June. Hey Stantis, if you don't want to be bothered with keeping track of your own story details you can always use the seach engine here to look back so you can maintain some continuity in your strip.
Anywho - yeah, $64 million. Using her awesome math skills (apparently she wasn't a Child Left Behind), Carmen figures out that's $32 million a vote. Apparently she's already forgotten that one of those votes wasn't even for Winslow, or Winston, but Woodrow Wilson.
Then we get the AWESOME punchline - Winslow spent all of the money on hookers, just like Senator Vitter. Oh wait, I'm sorry - he spent it on a "dancing llama" named "Randy." I'm sure if Randy was a black man in a Florida men's room and Winslow was a Republican he would have saved himself a ton of money.
What makes today's PC so priceless is that Carmen is supposed to be in charge of Winslow's campaign, hence in charge of the money. So once again Stantis inadvertently slams the Republican party, showing that they're really the ones who spend money like drunken sailors and can't be trusted with the economy. Way to go Stantis, I like the cut of your jib.
I wonder what else Carmen and Winslow wasted that $60 - sorry, $64 million on. I bet it wasn't anywhere near as cool as what President Bush wastes our taxpayer money on...
August 06, 2007
I know we frequently bring up the concept of strip ordering in an ongoing storyline in Prickly City. As stated previously, one gets the impression that Stantis finishes, say, a week long series of Prickly City, then gathers up each separate strip and tosses them down a flight a stairs, deciding the order of publication based on the order at which he picks up the strips off the ground.
Please allow a quick review of last week to help illustrate:
Wednesday, the Day After Election Day: The election returns are in! Winslow wins!
Thursday: Carmen announces that after Winslow's victory, they must travel to Iowa.
Friday: The election returns are in! Winslow wins by two votes!
Saturday: Two votes continuation!
Monday: Carmen announces that after Winslow's victory, they must travel to Iowa. But Winslow is broke!
I just don't understand the placement of Thursday's strip. If you put Thursday's strip on Saturday and shift up the two others then VOILA, you have some semblance of sense. But as it stands, it's another Stuporous Series of Strips down the Stairs with Scott Stantis.
Posted by CJo at 12:20 PM | Comments (1)August 05, 2007
TEOTUSAWKI
You win, Stantis. You and your neo-con buddies have won. It's over, and you're in control and the country is yours. I'd say "at least you can't screw it up any more than you already have," but I know that's not even close to being true.
You've gotten everything you've ever wanted, Stantis. You've got a comic strip where you don't have to be funny, where you can repeat the same boring "Winslow melts in the summer heat" strip and still get paid, still be able to keep your job even though it looks like it was drawn by a ten year old. And nobody can touch you because you're a neo-con.
Same thing's happening in Washington. We know that Bush has been illegally spying on us since 9/11. The New York Times found out about it before the 2004 election, but decided to sit on that info until late 2005 before telling us. Then the illegal spying continued on - in fact, your neo-con brothers decided that habeus corpus didn't need to exist anymore either. The Attorney General has spent the last few months lying to Congress, saying there was no debate over how illegal these spying programs are despite what the head of the FBI and the guy who temporarily replaced Ashcroft as AG says.
This past week we found out that a secret court found that part of Bush's program was really illegal and had to stop. So what happens? Does the Democratic party in Congress step up and say "Knock it off?" Nope. Because they're so afraid of a guy who has 26% of the population on his side, the most unpopular president in history next to Nixon, and a Republican party that's in disarry, they bent down, kissed his ring, and approved all of the changes he wants in FISA.
You've won, Stantis. The country is yours. No matter what We The People want, you neo-cons are going to get your way. A judge says your spying program is illegal? Call the Dems weak on terror and they'll make it legal. Your strip sucks? Who cares - if you go, so goes an actually funny liberal strip for "balance." But you're not going anywhere, are you Stantis? You and the neo-cons did it. Your 30 year plan after Nixon left office worked like a charm. Steal elections. Politicize the justice department so you can keep stealing elections. Turn the Supreme Court ultra-conservative. Make the Democratic party irrelevant. Invade any country whenever you want. Spy on Americans in the name of "patriotism." And make as much money as you possibly can, no matter who gets hurt. It's your neo-con way of life.
And it's the end of the United States as we know it.
August 04, 2007
Flashback Goggles: Primary Edition
How many people write and draw Prickly City? I'm starting to wonder if there's a committee of high school interns that slap it together, and then Scott Stantis acts as if he's the "mastermind" behind the whole thing. How else to explain the inconsistencies in the characters, the storyline, and the drawing from day to day? Let's take a look back at this past week, shall we?
SUNDAY: Winslow takes a leak with his mic on before he speaks before hundreds of Prickly City residents, all anxious to listen to their homeboy candidate for the Democratic presidential nominee.
MONDAY: Winslow claims to have been out campaigning by shaking hands with factory workers, but all of the factories have been sent overseas thanks to the Republicans (I figured out that last part myself).
TUESDAY: Election day. Single panel of the campaign headquarters building.
WEDNESDAY: The day after. Single panel of Winslow saying he won.
THURSDAY: Winslow is such an idiot he doesn't realize that even though he won in Prickly City, this now means he has to go on to Iowa and the rest of the states for their primaries and caucuses. Luckily he's got Carmen around to tell him these things since he's such a moron.
FRIDAY: We find out that despite the hundreds that turned out for the campaign rally, only two people voted for Winslow. Oh and Carmen - who is running his campaign - wasn't one of them. We don't learn who Carmen DID vote for if it's a partyline primary and she voted on the Republican side. Oops, guess Stantis forgot that the Republicans and the Democrats tend to, you know, hold their primaries on the same freakin' day. How bad must the Republicans feel that nobody voted for them?
TODAY: Winslow now magically understands the entire primary process and exclaims that he's the front runner.
For the life of me I can't figure out what Stantis is doing anymore. Is he commenting that not enough people participate in the election process? Or that the Democrats have such a weak field of candidates that only Winslow voted for himself along with some old man somehow stumbled into the voting booth? And does he realize that he just slapped the faces of all of the Republican candidates by showing that even though Winslow is such a doofus he could only get two votes, it's two more than Romney, Giuliani, McCain, and all the rest COMBINED?
Then I remember that Stantis had a city holding a presidential primary and realize that he doesn't know what he's doing.
This is bad. I mean REALLY bad. We've knocked Stantis around in the past for his non-sensical storylines, but usually they'd be done with after a few days and he'd go back to obsessing over how evil technology is and how much he hates blond celebrities while talking about them constantly. Now he's spending day after day on something where he's completely clueless, simply making it up as he goes along without a care in the world whether or not it makes any logical sense or if it's even funny (and I doubt he cares at all about that second thing).
And don't get me started on today's drawing. My lord, is it atrocious. Carmen literally has a bald spot on the front of her head in the second panel. The rest of it looks like a first draft, where Stantis was so busy he just traced over some old drawings and forgot to go back and finish the job. Or maybe it was those interns I theorize are really writing and drawing the strip at this point.
I realize there are times when I'm supposed to just sit back and say "it's just a comic strip, don't look into it too much." But with Prickly City I can't help myself. Did any other Democrats campaign in Prickly City? Did any Republicans? Why did good little neo-con Carmen not vote? Was it because of her age? If that's the case, why did a coyote pup get to vote? Heck, why is he even allowed to run? I know, I know - I'm trying to be realistic and I shouldn't since it's a stupid comic. But is there another comic out there that allegedly offers political commentary but leaves you scratching your head instead of laughing?
I never thought I'd be saying this, but can Stantis hold a recount and discover someone else won so we can put a bullet in the head of this stupid storyline? Please?
August 03, 2007
Ted Roosevelt, Woodrow "Winslow" "Winston" Wilson, and Billy Howie Taft put on a brave face, but we know how they really feel about today's strip
wow that election was sure close huh only two votes separated winslow the winner and noone the loser because you see only one person ran and only two people voted in the prickly city primary and those two people were winslow himself and not carmen who you might think though she's not old enough to vote even though she's old enough to complain about thongs and some old guy voted too who apparently thought he was voting for woodrow wilson because the old guy was old and so it's off to iowa for winslow and presumably carmen as they continue this campaign and stantis continues this wonderful storyline and if it seems like today's entry was dashed off with no effort and no punctuation or structure you would be correct because really why should we spend more time on deconstructing the strip than stantis does on writing it the end
Posted by CJo at 09:00 AM | Comments (3)August 02, 2007
Shut Your Cornhole
So, Scott Stantis wants to piss on the fine folk of Iowa, does he? It's all rather amusing coming from a man who makes his home in Alabama.
Just for fun, I put together a quick-n-dirty comparison chart of Iowa vs. Alabama.
In which state would YOU rather live?
August 01, 2007
No More Years! No More Years!
So, in other news, today is the birthday of Tom Wilson, writer of Ziggy. While some might think Ziggy is the naz with god given ass, and others might find him too preachy (like Mindy does), it should be noted that Ziggy is "a small, bald, pantless, almost featureless character (save for his large nose) who seems to have no job, hobbies, or romantic partner, just a menagerie of pets: Fuzz, a small white dog; Sid, a cat afraid of mice; Josh, a discouraging parrot; Goldie, a fish; and Wack, a duck."
It is also, of course, a one-panel comic. So whatever its faults, it doesn't stammer on, presenting storylines that go nowhere or go on and on about nothing and nothing, signifying nothing. Here's to you Ziggy, and your freeballin' ways. Hang loose, my friend. Hang loose.
Posted by Sacki at 09:38 AM | Comments (3)
picture courtesy of JB