Our Saturday send-off starts off with Simpsonesque yuks as Gil, filling in for someone with a name out of a Westchester County beauty pageant, introduces himself in Groundskeeper Willie fashion and the students (including the clock) respond with their best Nelson Muntz laughs. Ever the straight man, Gil introduces his own vulnerability as he claims not to be vulnerable. The stage is set for some classic substitute teacher comedy when reality rears its head again for the umpteenth time in the last three months.
The introduction of the mass shooter drill into the halls of Milford High, while no doubt as reality-based as anything else we’ve seen here of late, really just feels like piling on at this point. Real life is complicated and messy and, by George, this strip is gonna do its best to be the same. It’s almost become a multiverse, daring the older-skewing readership to let itself be drawn in and face up to the challenge of keeping track while attempting to draw in younger readership by daring to cover all these modern problems all at once.
Ponder that if you will, while I leave you with a fun poll as a break from the grim realities of the Thorpiverse.
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This Week in Milford 
The shooter drill is no surprise but a guy who once said “ thems your teammates “ also being fluent in French definitely is.
Comment by franku2016 — October 22, 2022 @ 10:18 am
Teenchy, What this site needs, My Friend. I loved the poll!!!!!!! Touché, My Man.
I gotta go with Bobby Howry. Without being very familiar with Ryan van Auken, the other guys were annoying(Bader, Macy) and your typical fly in the room buzzing around that you want to eliminate but can’t because you don’t have a flyswatter handy but I wouldn’t consider them psycho.
Howry seemed to have a bit of a dark side to him and the kind of person that would do something more drastic this time and skip the billboard to express his displeasure. But that’s me talking.
I could put Pedro Martinez in the Other portion of the voting but he hasn’t proven slinky/nettlesome enough to warrant my going to the voting booth.
Comment by tdrewhardin — October 22, 2022 @ 12:08 pm
1. Time to be a hero, Gilberto! Charge through that wall of imaginary bullets like you’re Han Solo!
2. As a kid in the 80s, (and growing up in what would have been a primary Soviet or Chinese target) I’m old enough to remember actually having one (and only one) nuclear attack drill… Hard to believe there was once a time when outbreak of fire or ICBMs were the worst possible things we could ever imagine happening in school… And yeah I know that depending on where you grew up, tornado drills or earthquake drills were also a thing…
Comment by Hitorque — October 22, 2022 @ 12:23 pm
@franku2016 — I was only joking yesterday, but maybe rebooted Gilberto really is a Cajun from way down in the Bayou?
Comment by Hitorque — October 22, 2022 @ 12:26 pm
As for the poll, my first choice would be Corin Karinninnina, aka Peppermint Patty for being exiled to a junior college she never wanted to attend, but I know mass shootings being done by females are extremely rare…
I could also see Vic Motormouth Doucette doing it after getting shot down by the hottest girl in school Tessa what’s her name, but then I remember Vic can’t walk.
That mook who had a butter knife so he could shovel tons of peanut butter straight out the jar and into his mouth hole in class, and got expelled for having a weapon, maybe?
My next candidate would be “MAKE MILFORD GREAT AGAIN” Mr. Brito, for getting humiliated by some high school kid in his obsessive campaign for the library board, which he assumed was strictly a formality… Nevermind the fact that this same kid was humping his daughter’s brains out and everyone knows he was too poor to afford a regular supply of condoms…
Martinez L. Luna definitely seems like the type to come after Gilberto in a blind resentful drunken rage with a shotgun in the right conditions…
Same for Lucha Libre — I dunno, his life just seems a little TOO perfect… Perfect son, perfect wife, has a Bradyesque track record for sporting success, etc… Those guys can just as easily snap, too.
But the person I’d most like to see show up in a parking lot and put 31 rounds up Gilberto’s rectum is that small time golf hustler over at Milford CC… He’s owed some fuckin’ revenge for a couple summers ago…
Comment by Hitorque — October 22, 2022 @ 12:54 pm
Despite it being a woman (which is extremely rare), my vote is for Boo Radley, who faked her death and has been waiting for the right moment to strike back at the school she secretly loathed.
Comment by MopMan — October 22, 2022 @ 1:06 pm
Clearly, invisible Pete deWindt. Remember him? Of course not! Guy was on every team for about 6 years and never got a story line. That treatment can really lead to the slow burning rage that turns into one desperate bid for the FRONT PAGE!
Comment by Downpuppy — October 22, 2022 @ 2:24 pm
I agree with Hitorque. It’s gotta be Peppermint Patty comin back but she’s gonna be pregnant and looking for Mimi. Butt into my life, bitch? Thanks for your help…. Bang
Comment by franku2016 — October 22, 2022 @ 4:32 pm
No option for Marty Moon, or would he be too drunk to shoot straight?
Comment by Little Guy — October 24, 2022 @ 12:31 pm
@Little Guy: Marty would go on his podcast and claim that Gil and the MHS faculty were “paid crisis actors,” then end up owing $1B in damages from defamation lawsuits.
Comment by teenchy — October 24, 2022 @ 2:45 pm
[…] will become the new normal in visual storytelling, at least for a while. We can thank Barajas for helping us prepare for that, I […]
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