bunt cake: a webcomic thing

July 17, 2007 9:35 AM

"I like to think that baseball players are a pretty imaginitive bunch. I mean, these are guys who, when asked what they wanted to be when they grew up, said something nuts like 'baseball player' — and then didn’t change their answer." Bunt Cake: a webcomic for those of us who like baseball cards recontextualized and our humor depantsed and set on fire. Or something like that. [via mefi projects]
posted by Terminal Verbosity (37 comments total)

Your favorite moderator's project sucks.

I snark because I love.
posted by felix betachat at 9:42 AM on July 17, 2007

I was a little lukewarm on the first few, but this one cracked me up: Teeth Casserole

Also, as I didn't follow your MeFi projects link, that one made me realize this is by someone from the blue. Nice, cortex.
posted by barnacles at 9:43 AM on July 17, 2007

"Man, why is the site suddenly all slow and OH SHIT"

Thanks, TV! And it's a pun, felix. It's also kind of a shame that even the mis-spelled domain is camped by domain speculators.
posted by cortex at 9:45 AM on July 17, 2007

reminds me of this site vaguely.
posted by horsemuth at 9:47 AM on July 17, 2007

It's also kind of a shame that even the mispelled domain is camped by domain speculators.

No doubt trying to capture that lucrative/elusive semi-literate housewife demographic. Did you try meetloaf.com?
posted by felix betachat at 9:50 AM on July 17, 2007 [1 favorite]

This should be turned into a Bunt Cake Construction set somehow, just like Red Meat. Funny stuff.
posted by vito90 at 9:52 AM on July 17, 2007

Needs more Bake McBride.
posted by sleepy pete at 9:54 AM on July 17, 2007

I'll just cut-and-paste my comment from MetaChat (I hope that's not too gauche!):

Ha! Your project brought back memories of the summer I decided to become a serious baseball card collector (a career that lasted all of four months). My proudest acquisition was the Ken Griffey, Jr. Upper Deck rookie card -- an item that shot up in value after his first couple seasons, when everyone thought he would be the savior of baseball. I still remember how excited I got when I checked the Beckett guide and saw that sucker priced at sixty bucks (and climbing)! We'd all heard about the Honus Wagner card that had recently sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars -- surely a mass-produced Ken Griffey, Jr. would someday (perhaps after shattering Hank Aaron's home run record by the age of thirty?) be worth twice that amount!

Needless to say, many injury-plagued, mediocre seasons later, the card's value has plummetted, dashing my boyhood dreams of a life of luxury and ease. Meanwhile, a balloon-headed roid freak is set to break the home run record wide open. (And back in the day I probably traded my best Barry Bonds card for a 3-D Cecil Fielder, or some shit.)

So, cortex, thanks for the memories!
posted by Atom Eyes at 9:55 AM on July 17, 2007 [1 favorite]

Ra for those that like it, but golly! I didn't even crack a smile.
posted by Wolfdog at 9:59 AM on July 17, 2007

Needs more Bake McBride.

Yes it does. Also needs more Sixto Lezcano, Dick Pole, and Rusty Kuntz.

"Two-thirds of the earth is covered by water. The other third is covered by Bake McBride."
posted by vito90 at 9:59 AM on July 17, 2007

Since I love baseball, and comics like Get Your War On, it's hard for me to dislike this!
posted by ORthey at 10:01 AM on July 17, 2007

Also needs more Sixto Lezcano

I remember cheering for that guy when I was a kid. It's Lezcaino though, right? Anyway, the scoreboard used to flash: "Six-to!" "Let's Go!" over and over when he came up to bat.
posted by LionIndex at 10:06 AM on July 17, 2007

Crap. No i in the last name.
posted by LionIndex at 10:06 AM on July 17, 2007

The baseball card medium is a very good idea. The comics themselves are either too esoteric for me or just generally don't make much sense. Number two (the one I like best) seems like an homage to "Zippy", which is neat-- I also think Zippy is either over my head or nonsensical with the occasional strip that will be much better than anything else on the comics page.

I like seeing cards that I remember from my childhood. That's really the best part of the whole thing. Saying "oh, I had three of that bastard and never got the Steve Balboni card I wanted in all those packs I bought."

Cortex can have my Roger Clemens rookie card to use as long as he promises to wipe his butt with it when he's finished and send it to Steinbrenner.
posted by Mayor Curley at 10:07 AM on July 17, 2007

pretty much the entire card market died, sadly. Now I have to work for my retirement
posted by efalk at 10:07 AM on July 17, 2007

Heh, that was a lot funnier than I expected it to be.

cortex is starting to remind me of why the lucky stiff, especially the Poignant Guide to Ruby.
posted by djgh at 10:12 AM on July 17, 2007

the cards definitely stir some memories, and of course cutting them up is wonderfully heretical.

the humor?
posted by ioesf at 10:12 AM on July 17, 2007

Cortex can have my Roger Clemens rookie card to use as long as he promises to wipe his butt with it when he's finished and send it to Steinbrenner.

Don't waste the postage. Eventually Steinbrenner will come crawling back to it, no matter how full of shit it is.
posted by felix betachat at 10:12 AM on July 17, 2007 [3 favorites]

Number two (the one I like best) seems like an homage to "Zippy"

It's kind of odd—I love Zippy to death but it didn't really occur to me consciously when I started to put this thing together. But that's pretty spot-on—the way that Bill Griffith just sort of shoe-horns whatever thoughts he's having on language usage and pop culture into the shoebox diorama that is the Zippy context consistently pleases and impresses me. The strip gets talked about a lot over ot Language Log lately, which is awesome and apt: while Zippy is not really a satisfying daily-gag read, it's just plain wonderful in its oddness.

Cortex can have my Roger Clemens rookie card to use as long as he promises to wipe his butt with it when he's finished and send it to Steinbrenner.

Include an SASE and you've got a deal.

reminds me of this site vaguely.

Huh! Kindred spirits, all over the damn place.

Ra for those that like it, but golly! I didn't even crack a smile.

Yeah, I think I'm gonna get a lot of that. Heh.
posted by cortex at 10:18 AM on July 17, 2007

Not to put too fine a point on it
posted by inigo2 at 11:12 AM on July 17, 2007

Heeeey I was just looking at these but didn't catch the FPP. Well, cortex, I like.

Howeva. I think you should let the comix speak for themselves more. I enjoy reading the thoughts about them featured below, but I think you'd get more thoughtful interactions with the illustrations from your readers if you didn't softly and caringly masticate the available musing/analysis. Less is more. (Spoken like a true modstalker.)

I think I like the underdressed Lasorda the best, sort of building off his public weight concerns to my imagination. Did other middle aged fat men actually buy slim fast because of him? O folly of the 1980s.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 11:26 AM on July 17, 2007

I have to agree with the Mayor. Great idea, but I don't get the results. Like, why is it imaginative to never think of another idea for what you want to be when you grow up?
posted by DU at 11:27 AM on July 17, 2007

It's one of those projects where everyone likes a different part, it seems.

I did find some of the panels amusing (the guys in the painted classroom, especially), but I was most tickled by the commentary below.

The Dumbo thing (7/13) had me slain with giggles, in particular. They would have lasted longer, but then I clicked the Buttersafe link and got all distracted by the randomness there.

Anyway! Neat stuff, cortex. Good on ya for being brave enough to put this kind of surreality out there.
posted by batmonkey at 11:33 AM on July 17, 2007

I like it. It's a weird, dry, surreal sort of humor, and it tells me that if I don't get the joke, it's my fault.

cortex is strange and awesome.
posted by Faint of Butt at 11:36 AM on July 17, 2007

Howeva. I think you should let the comix speak for themselves more.
I had the same thought, actually.
posted by Wolfdog at 11:43 AM on July 17, 2007

I dunno....I wanted this to be really funny. It had/has so much potential, but I didn't even smile, and I'm all about quirky humour.
Just not for me I guess.
Unfortunately, I say, "Meh."
posted by Shfishp at 12:04 PM on July 17, 2007

Thin macros that are only funny if you're much higher than I am or have been in recent memory. Sorry 'tex. Too much LOLCATZ, not enough actual jokes.
posted by klangklangston at 12:05 PM on July 17, 2007

Dev note: figure out how to pipe bong smoke over http.
posted by cortex at 12:07 PM on July 17, 2007

Dude, we could make the biggest bong ever from here to Portland! Gotta be a gravity one, or have some of those crazy aquarium pumps though, because I just don't have the lung strength...

(Man, I need a regular dealer here... I don't want to have to deal with my girlfriend's ex-roommate with the ass stitches anymore...)
posted by klangklangston at 12:20 PM on July 17, 2007

It definitely had it's moments. You need a few recurring characters though like Jim Thome in The Dugout.
posted by drezdn at 12:25 PM on July 17, 2007

It's reminds me a bit of A Softer World, only with a tad less edge. Except for the teeth casserole line which makes me laugh everytime I think of it.

Adding it to my myriad of online comics to see where it goes.
posted by slimepuppy at 1:14 PM on July 17, 2007

boys: What we do is, we shotgun it. LA->SC->Portland.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 2:17 PM on July 17, 2007

Hm. Not funny.
posted by rxrfrx at 4:07 PM on July 17, 2007

I know it's not funny— I'm totally serious about the bong, dude!
posted by klangklangston at 4:22 PM on July 17, 2007

ass stitches?

There's a story in that, I'll bet.


Probably not a story to read while eating dinner, but a story, nonetheless.
posted by batmonkey at 6:10 PM on July 17, 2007

that was so bad, I think it gave me cancer
posted by subaruwrx at 12:25 AM on July 18, 2007

OK, so my girlfriend's roommate got this ass cyst drained and stitched, around the end of April. And sure, it's a surgery, and I've had some ass pain of my own (though nothing comparable). It's just that he proceeds to monopolize the livingroom couch and TV for the next two and a half months straight, all the while having pain that stops him from, say, doing the dishes (even as cockroaches invade) but doesn't stop him from cooking up a plate fulla bacon and then leaving it on the stove, half-eaten.

He's a decent enough guy, but kinda a moronic stoner who's managed to not leave the house at all except to buy terrible food, rent terrible movies and buy pretty decent pot (and rip us off on the price in a particularly transparent manner).

We had to move out before I clubbed him to death.
posted by klangklangston at 10:56 AM on July 18, 2007