About the newspaper comic, of course, and the small town that’s the setting of the strip. I believe it’s supposed to be in Ohio, but has there ever been any more specific details in the strip as to where (i.e., a character mentioning it’s a half-hour’s drive from Columbus, or is a suburb of Akron, something)?
It’s definitely in the general vicinity of Cleveland: Everyone’s a fan of Cleveland sports teams and nobody of Cincinnati, and there have been some scenes set in recognizable spots of the Metroparks, Downtown, or other Cleveland locations.
Myself, I always picture it as a sort of amalgamation of Lakewood and Westlake, though it’s probably further south than that.
And while we’re at it, Calvin and Hobbes and Ziggy were also set in the Cleveland area.
Westwood is in a suburb of Hell. This is amply demonstrated by the fact that Tom Batiuk is Satan, at least for his characters.
Certainly for Lisa and Wally. We never have found out exactly what happened to him.
Crankshaft seems to do OK, though. I think he’s just too ornery to die (or retire, or go senile).
Westview is located above a toxic waste dump, downstream from a nuclear power plant and under an enormous cluster of power lines.
Funky himself just got a callback from his doctor’s office to schedule a followup because they noticed something strange about his prostate. Les’s stalker from high school is back and working at the high school with him.
Lisa and Wally were just the beginning…
I think it’s more like Medina. Tom Batiuk was born in Akron and went to Kent State University. Montoni’s is absolutely based on Luigi’s in downtown Akron, right down to the animated bandbox.
I always thought of it as a distant southwest suburb of Cleveland. Near Medina sounds about right.
He spent a good part of his formative years in Elyria. A girl I went to college with had him as her junior high school art teacher there, so I always picture Westview as the Elyria/Lorain area.
/choie shakes fist at Snooooopy for beating her to the punchline about cancer clusters.