# Funky Winkerbean spoiler question
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [June 28, 2010, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841 "2010-06-28T21:04:09Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@panamajack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panamajack)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/21 "2010-06-29T02:52:23Z")
“I know where I came from — but where did all you cancers come from?”
---
### Author:  [@Sigmagirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sigmagirl)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/22 "2010-06-29T12:45:56Z")
Or . . . the old geezer is Crankshaft.
---
### Author:  [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/23 "2010-06-29T13:42:17Z")
> [@Sigmagirl](#):
>
> Or . . . the old geezer is Crankshaft.
Ed Crankshaft doesn’t give advice. That would require a “care what other people think of me” gland, which it’s quite obvious that he lacks.
---
### Author:  [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/24 "2010-06-29T13:58:33Z")
Crankshaft offered to pay or partially pay for college tuition for a bunch of “at risk” kids. While he might not care about what most others think, apparently he does have a heart.
---
### Author:  [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/25 "2010-06-29T14:08:11Z")
Time to return to the [Comics Curmudgeon](http://joshreads.com/?cat=64), to see what he & his minions make of this latest revolting development.
I’ve managed to avoid that Wretced Hive of Scum & Snarkiness since the [Settlepocalypse](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ForBetterOrForWorse)…
---
### Author:  [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/26 "2010-06-29T14:11:15Z")
> [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#):
>
> Crankshaft offered to pay or partially pay for college tuition for a bunch of “at risk” kids. While he might not care about what most others think, apparently he does have a heart.
Yeah, maybe I’m spending too much time at the Comics Curmudgeon.
---
### Author:  [@multimediac17](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/multimediac17)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/27 "2010-06-29T14:16:44Z")
Funky Winkerbean is _real_?
I thought it was a made up character for a gag on The Simpsons - you know the one where Bart complains that Springfield gets all the crappy balloons for their Thanksgiving parade and Marge says “What are you talking about? Look, there’s Funky Winkerbean! Over here, Funky!”
---
### Author:  [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/28 "2010-06-29T14:45:13Z")
> [@multimediac17](#):
>
> Funky Winkerbean is _real_?
>
> I thought it was a made up character for a gag on The Simpsons - you know the one where Bart complains that Springfield gets all the crappy balloons for their Thanksgiving parade and Marge says “What are you talking about? Look, there’s Funky Winkerbean! Over here, Funky!”
Yep, Funky’s a real comic strip (well, the “comic” part is purely categorical at this point, but…). It started out as a light-hearted strip about a bunch of high-school kids, but at some point in the 90s, I believe, the cartoonist either stepped into the Hellmouth or started to really hate his characters and it’s been pure bathos since. It’s gotten to the point where the cartoonist is some kind of malevolent demiurge inflicting cancer, death and a lack of all comfort and compassion on his strip.
Shortpacked’s [take on Funky](http://shortpacked.com/comic/book-5/01-a-talking-car-joins-the-cast/cancer/) isn’t far off the mark. Although, along with cancer, there have been amputations, deafness (in the iconic bandleader character, no less), financial failure, and the ghosts of dead people creepily stalking their surviving spouses. Oh, and at least one case of near-incest.
---
### Author:  [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/29 "2010-06-29T15:27:31Z")
When the cell phone didn’t have any reception after the accident, I just figured, “This is _Funky Winkerbean_, land of constant, dull, aching misery. Of course Funky is with Sprint.”
---
### Author:  [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/30 "2010-06-29T16:01:52Z")
> [@BrotherCadfael](#):
>
> I’d call it a certainty – Rod Serling once heard that irony is good for the blood, and figured that, if a little is good, a whole lot must be great. Twilight Zone, here we come!
And because it’s a Batiuk strip, the comic is going to turn out to be worthless…
---
### Author:  [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/31 "2010-06-29T18:06:32Z")
I flipped open the comics section of the paper for the first time in eons, and wept for humanity.
Funky, Luanne, and a bunch of strips that were comedies are now maudlin soap operas. And not even well-written ones.
Remember when the ‘funny papers’ were… y’know, _funny_?
---
### Author:  [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/32 "2010-06-29T18:31:55Z")
> [@digs](#):
>
> I flipped open the comics section of the paper for the first time in eons, and wept for humanity.
>
> Funky, Luanne, and a bunch of strips that were comedies are now maudlin soap operas. And not even well-written ones.
>
> Remember when the ‘funny papers’ were… y’know, _funny_?
You mean like Dick Tracy, Brenda Starr, Prince Valiant? 😉 (Two of those still run daily in the Chicago Tribune.)
Luann is really awful over the last week or so - she walked in on Gunther changing, saw him completely naked, and is blabbing about it to anyone who will listen **and** whining about why no one will take **her** “traumatization” seriously. Gee, how kind.
---
### Author:  [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/33 "2010-06-29T18:37:02Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#):
>
> You mean like Dick Tracy, Brenda Starr, Prince Valiant? 😉 (Two of those still run daily in the Chicago Tribune.)
>
> Luann is really awful over the last week or so - she walked in on Gunther changing, saw him completely naked, and is blabbing about it to anyone who will listen **and** whining about why no one will take **her** “traumatization” seriously. Gee, how kind.
Yeah. The day after, when she was dishing about it in the cafeteria to her friends, my first thought was “What a biyotch!” I mean, she at LEAST considers Gunther a friend, doesn’t she? That’s what I’ve been getting out of the last few years of the strip, anyway. So why would you MAKE SURE that your friend’s most embarassing moment ever is spread throughout the school? And worse, spread to adults?
Oh, and the mixed signals are horrible, too. Luann has been switching between wide-eyed shock and come-hither eyes with Gunther ever since it happened.
---
### Author:  [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)
#### Post date: [June 29, 2010, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/34 "2010-06-29T18:37:42Z")
> [@digs](#):
>
> Remember when the ‘funny papers’ were… y’know, _funny_?
I didn’t ever think Funky was funny.
🙂
---
### Author:  [@MLS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MLS)
#### Post date: [June 30, 2010, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/35 "2010-06-30T16:39:04Z")
So – what’s the latest theory? The speculation at my house is that he’s in a coma. Or dead. Can’t decide which.
---
### Author:  [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)
#### Post date: [June 30, 2010, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/36 "2010-06-30T16:47:30Z")
If he were dead, you’d think the mime would have opened his car door for him.
---
### Author:  [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)
#### Post date: [June 30, 2010, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/37 "2010-06-30T16:59:33Z")
> [@MLS](#):
>
> So – what’s the latest theory? The speculation at my house is that he’s in a coma. Or dead. Can’t decide which.
I’m going for Twilight Zone time travel. It’s taking so damned long to play out, though, that I might decide something else in a day or two.
---
### Author:  [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)
#### Post date: [June 30, 2010, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/38 "2010-06-30T18:08:58Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#):
>
> If he were dead, you’d think the mime would have opened his car door for him.
Well, maybe. But Masky McDeath would kind of spoiler the ending of the storyline in that case, wouldn’t he? Besides, Death obviously doesn’t need to make special trips for pickup in the Funkyverse. It’s everywhere, like God.
---
### Author:  [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)
#### Post date: [June 30, 2010, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/39 "2010-06-30T18:13:00Z")
I hadn’t read Funky in years, and I come back to find him old and washed-up. Is Tom Batiuk looking to end the series soon?
---
### Author:  [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)
#### Post date: [June 30, 2010, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841/40 "2010-06-30T18:18:59Z")
> [@MOIDALIZE](#):
>
> Is Tom Batiuk looking to end the series soon?
No, just torture the characters. 🙂
[Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841.md?page=1)
[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funky-winkerbean-spoiler-question/544841.md?page=3)