One of the qualities about Brother Francis that I find truly endearing is his adoration of breasts at the expense of absolutely everything else about his comic. Brother Francis, who does not know any women personally, nonetheless is so fascinated by the curvy bits on their fronts that he tends to draw random girls who have absolutely nothing to do with his strips in the foreground while the actual named characters fade into the background. So intent on the breasts is he that he does utterly silly things such as making Betty's and Veronica's silhouettes into deformed Rorschach blots, drawing a little Kool-Aid face on Betty's purse,* inserting a mannequin head wearing a coonskin cap into the background, and giving Veronica a "credit card" that is half the size of her head.** What does it matter? None of these things are boobies. No one is looking at them, anyway.
Eventually, Brother Francis is going to give up on the background altogether. Archie strips will become an endless parade of bosoms, each more swollen than the last. After that, it will only be a matter of time before the other monks enter his cell one day to find him huddled in a corner, giggling madly and trying to make love to his mattress.
*Or is that a truly terrible attempt at creating the Watchmen happy face? If so, Brother Francis is falling into a sad little trap that often ensnares his fellow cartoonist-monks as well; he thinks he is being edgy and up-to-date, whereas he is actually just demonstrating his extraordinary ignorance.
**Yes, Josh Fruhlinger made a similar observation earlier today. I am late. And slow. And wanting not to mark any more. Damn it.
14 comments:
Is "purtres" related to "portrait", "picture", or neither?
So far I have managed to avoid owning any creaunce cardes.
"Purtre" is an alternate spelling of "portraie," which means "portrait." Middle English can be pretty fun sometimes.
Francis is also forgetting that Betty and Veronica are supposed to be about as attractive as women get in Riverdale. This makes it even stranger that the focus of the second panel is on the female Bo Ryan and not the two conversants (who also have boobs, Frankie, so you don't have to give up your hobby).
Yes...I'm often puzzled at the way Francis will take a totally random female character and stick her breasts into the front of the middle panel while two perfectly busty major characters natter at each other in the background. Perhaps he's bored with Betty and Veronica and longs for variety? Or perhaps my Watchmen theory really is correct? We do have at least two possible references: the happy-face bag and the next-best-thing-to-the-Hiroshima-lovers silhouettes.
I was about to say I had no idea why Brother Francis would be a Watchmen fan, but then I thought about it. A young man...constantly among other young men...lacking any real chance of meeting girls...and drawing comics in his spare time? He's the definition of a Watchmen fan.*
*Okay, okay...I only said that because it was funny. I am a Watchmen fan and, in fact, a fan of comics in general, and I'm a 34-year-old woman.
I, too, wondered at Brother Francis' penchant for the introduction of extraneous figures of virginal beauty. Why not alternatives such as a firmly-muscled David, or scantily-haired senior Latin instructor?
Too easily came the sinful response, that Brother Francis visualizes the lustful daydreams of a novice prematurely locked into celibacy! Avaunt!
Instead, may we not to greater spiritual benefit praise Brother Francis for expressing in allegorical form the universal longing for the milk of human kindness?
Kem, we miss you.
Dmontag: I miss me too. I'm really sorry for the extended break. It's just that...let's see...
After the first two batches of midterms, there was another one, followed shortly by thirty-six essay proposals. On the day after I finished marking the proposals, I planned to catch up marking presentations and presentation reports, but I couldn't, since I spent all day answering e-mails from the ninety students who had essays due the next day (yesterday) and the day after (today). Now I have ninety essays to mark...plus forty more two weeks from now...plus forty more one week after THAT. One week after THAT week, I have the first of the four exams...followed three days later by the second and the third. The fourth happens ten days after THOSE.
I am tired all the time. If I want to work on my comic, I have to do so in the wee hours. I am about to do so now; I have to scan, edit, and colour tomorrow's comic, preferably before I go to bed. I did watch the finale of BSG tonight, but I'm going to spend all weekend marking. I would LIKE to be able to translate comics, but I simply don't have the time right now.
Eventually, however, the marking will end...or so I sincerely believe.
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh...
We all feel for you. Good luck with it. We look forward to reading your blog again when you (finally) get caught up enough to write it.
don't you have a slave, i mean work-study, you can make do all that junk?
xy: Nope. I myself am a slave (i.e., a sessional). I shall remain so until May 4, at which point I shall be free (i.e., unemployed). I'm afraid I'm going to have to remain on hiatus until then. However, on May 5, there MAY BE COMICS! (I make no concrete promises. On May 5, I may be too tired to move.)
Tomorrow, I hope to mark about twenty essays. This plan is actually really, really funny. I'll be lucky if I get through six. I hate my life.
have you tried eliminating sleep from you daily habits? i find it frees up quite a large amount of time.
It's May 6th, we're all hoping for comics...
Yay, Kem! GO KEM, GO!!
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