Crankshaft by Tom Batiuk and Dan Davis for August 23, 2024

“I’m down to one comic strip after the syndicate suggested I “retire” the other one and I’m sitting here mooching pizza off a small-town newspaperman. How do you think it went!?"

Is this a standard interview question? "Instead of telling us about your comic STRIP, could you instead tell of us your greatest failure in life?" BATS: “Yes! I totally bombed at comic BOOKS, which was NOT MY FAULT. And 50+ years later, I blame it on someone so dead, they can’t sue me for libel!”

Can’t write, can’t draw, and his stories were cheesier than that Montoni’s pizza stuck on his claw.

What pizza did they order? American “cheeze” slices still in the plastic wrap, topped with bubonic plague sores?

bill, you’re slipping if all you’ve got is pizza! LOL…

“Yes, we were poor then, but we were happy… because we were poor! With just a cup of tea…a cup of cold tea… Without milk or sugar… or tea!”

“I ended up doing a stupid newspaper comic strip. How do you think it went, genius??”

This like going to watches a James Bondscraft movie but being forced to watch Ion Flaming talkings about himself throughout the show.

Isn’t the name of this strip Crankshaft?

I think I feel a sideways Sunday approaching.

“First I went to DC, where they said my gigantic word Zeppelins covered up the art. So I ducked into a phone booth and cut the words to a minimum. Then I went to Marvel and they said I should use bigger word balloons to hide how bad my art was.

“Then I went to King Features, and the rest is history…”

In today’s Crankshaft, it’s great to hear how the master of it got his start and ideas for his long career.

I think they are about finished with the pizza…..I hope!!!

I wish the publishers of CS would tell Batty that his stories are too long.

Skip goads Batton into sharing the tale of his greatest failure. Batton enthusiastically complies. Obviously, “Batton” is a sad old man starved for attention.

But then, Slyock Fox premiered, and he learned to draw rudimentary characters. The rest is history.

so it was beneath him to apply for a job at harvey comics but then this guy would have ruined casper

Jon Gnagy, a memory of boring rainy Sundays from long ago. Thanks.

Panel 2: Why does Batty draw his own face in the upper-left-hand corner? It’s not like we don’t already know it’s him talking.

In real life neither DC or Marvel accepts “blind applications or submissions”—so just how DO YOU get a job with them if you can’t get your foot in the door?

Bob Rozakis, now retired after a long career at DC, recently celebrated his 50th wedding anniversary

Meanwhile, Skippy has dozed off due to old age and incredible boredom.

This is a terrible story line—what happened did Crankshaft die??

Batton: “Then somebody beat me up for hogging a telephone phone booth for three hours.”

Seriously? Did Batyuk actually do this in real life? What an inconsiderate jerk. Suppose someone needed the telephone.

Why not do the rewrites while enjoying a coffee comfortably seated at a restaurant table or booth, instead of being crammed inside a tiny telephone booth? Not too bright.

Batton: “The people at Marvel laughed at me because I couldn’t stand up straight.”

What a maroon.

Disappointing…

well why not lie for free greasy pizza

Did they get tired of doing Crankshaft? Are Tom and Dan ending another comic strip?

Wouldn’t this be happening during the so-called Silver Age great expansion, when the two giants were bringing out new books left, and, right? If I’m right (A big "if,) if you had even a “smidge” of talent as a writer, AND, were willing to work at wages would be far from making you rich, they’d hire you on the spot?