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David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 15h
Alex Maw @xjmaw.bsky.social ⋅ 6m
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 1d
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 1d
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
QT 
@forbiddenqt.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
magdalene visaggio 
⚧️ @magsvisaggio.com ⋅ 3d
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“LIKE OMG I DIDN’T REALIZE THE WORLD WAS FULL OF DECISIONS AND TEMPTATIONS AND EVIL AND SHIT”
I mean stuff
I know right? It sucks when reality crumbles and then shatters the bubble you’ve encased yourself in.
The technical term is “ontological shock”; I love it. Sort of keeps you on your toes mentally. And you get the satisfying feeling of telling people “It was like the world and I had a chicken death race, and the world chickened.”
Is it freakout time now?
Oo, I love freakout time. You can shout “HABABABABABAGEBEBEBEBEBE!” all you want and no one looks at you funny.
***BEE DOE BEE DOE BEE DOE***
Prop design in an animated show? Is Dexter and Monkey live action!
You don’t “design” props in a live-action show. Generally you pick them out from a selection of existing objects, since you’re not a wizard.
But in animated things, everything is designed beforehand. The animators don’t design everything on the fly as they’re penciling in walk cycles, stuff is drawn up first, all of it.
And, yes, you can get an Emmy for doing an exceptional job.
Some of the props in live action shows are designed by the production staff — particularly in science fiction shows (they didn’t just find a bunch of phasers lying around in the Desilu studios warehouses, for instance, or pick sonic screwdrivers at the local hardware store — though after the original prop kept on breaking they did eventually buy a bunch of sonic screwdrivers at the toy store for one of the Doctors).
pick up sonic screwdrivers at the hardware store
The SONIC hardware store
I get my Sonic Screwdrivers by mixing vodka and orange juice and then shouting a lot.
I get mine by taking a Sonic Orange Slushie and mixing in Vodka…
I get mine by mixing vodka and orange juice, then putting it on a treadmill cranked up to top speed.
Of course, it’s a friggin’ mess, which I think makes it even more accurate.
Amateurs.
6oz discount store orange juice
6oz discount store vodka
4 to 8 drops blue food colouring
1 freshly pureed wild hedgehog (starved for at least 24 hours beforehand)
a dash of sriracha
a scoop of ice
Put all ingredients in a large cocktail shaker and shake well, then strain into a pint glass. Garnish with a sprig of parsley and a red & white striped hi-top sneaker.
^ then serve to your worst enemy and tell them the recipe. Enjoy seeing them pass out as puke gushes forth from every orifice. Add skunk for added hilarity.
I remember reading (back when the show had just recently gone off the air, if you can believe that) that the original Star Trek’s prop guy, Irving Feinberg, actually made a lot of those props out of balsa wood and crap out of his junk drawer.
“Even back then, most television shows had prop budgets of hundreds of dollars per episode,” he said. “Mine was tens of dollars.”
Thus the Christmas-tree-light control panels and the guys behind the walls pulling the doors open.
And we love them for that.
Or, occasionally, by saying “wait, McCoy needs some kind of medical scanner? Um… well, this salt shaker looks kinda weird. Let’s go with that.”
You can totally design props for live-action. It’s not going to be real common for modern-era kind of stuff, but if you need a phaser or a sonic screwdriver or a mind-wiper, you can’t just buy one. Someone’s gotta fabricate that stuff, and someone’s gotta design it in order to do that.
(oops, distracted by cheezburger, Makkabee said what I was going to say already)
(but at least I can haz cheezburger)
Depends on the budget. Sometimes you can commission a set of futuristic looking armor for your space marines. Sometimes you’re stuck with hand-me-down Starship Troopers uniforms.
Is that the “Bug Planet” movie? If so, I want to see more of that uniform Mrs. Sheen was wearing in the shower scene.
the former Mrs. Sheen wasn’t in the shower scene. That was the redhead. Mrs Sheen however can be seen in birthday best in Wild Things…
I’ve never really thought about animation having prop and set design before, but it makes a lot of sense. Maybe it’s because people tend to talk about character design a lot more.
One more reason you’ve really got to hand it to those South Park guys.
Hmmm, as an animator who has also worked in live-action, gotta disagree with you there. The first point is pretty much a matter of nomenclature: In animation we don’t really talk about “prop” design. We’d talk about art direction or production design, which is more all-encompassing than just the objects that the characters are directly interacting with.
And in Live-Action, production design (again, that or art direction are the preferred terms) is an intense process, not just for science-fiction as others have mentioned, but for historical shows (“Vikings” and “Game of Thrones” have to build pretty much everything you see on the screen from scratch), but also for contemporary settings. A show like “The West Wing”? You have to research the White House in huge detail and reconstruct it. A show set in a more normal office? Decisions have to be made about how that office looks, and why, and it usually needs to be built from scratch so that it can be a set in a soundstage.
And finally (I know I’m being anal), here are the categories for animated work at the Emmy Awards:
Outstanding Animated Program
Outstanding Voice-Over Performance
Individual Achievement in Animation
Outstanding Short-format Animated Program
Only four awards.
Blasphemy! You’d think this wasn’t based on a real show! :O
DOA; Fun AND educational! ^_^
“Emmy? BAH! That’s the Golden Globe of TV awards!”
-Calculon, paraphrased
I have to agree with Walky about Taxing Taxonomy. Carolus Linnaeus would classify Taxing it as Craptacular.
Well I messed that up royally, and there’s no delete button, so feel free to point and laugh.
Hah Hah. Hah Hah.
Count Dracula made a clerical error on a webcomic. Let’s all point and laugh at his humiliation.
Damn you, Yotomoe and your Grim Adventures references too.
I’m just glad you’re around to get ’em.
Dracula don’t do clerical work. Dracula scrape and lick! Blaghlaghlaghlaghl
I do not say Blaghlaghlaghlaghl.
I got that one, Yay me!
I’m not even sure what part you messed up, so I’ll just point at myself.
You’re obviously unfamiliar with the standard four-point Standardised Difficulty Grading structure, as introduced in seminal puzzle game “Lemmings”.
1/ Fun
2/ Tricky
3/ Taxing
4/ Mayhem
Thus this is Taxonomy at the third level of generalised difficulty. Presumably the preceding episodes started out with some Fun Taxonomy, before proceeding quickly to Tricky Taxonomy. By the end of the episode in question, we can assume things had fully progressed to that most difficult of situations: Taxonomic Mayhem.
“evolution probably happened”
dat science propaganda
Dina was a bit more forceful than that…but no more than Joyce was.
C’mon Joyce, you don’t need your friend. You and Ethan are going to make it. Also, once you go Jew nothing else will do.
Once you go gay, you’ll have to stay.
Once you go red, it’s all in your head…
Once you go dork, he’s the only one you’ll pork.
Once you’ve gone putz, you’ll realize we’re all nuts.
Once you go plaid, it won’t be just a fad.
Once you renounce God, you end up kneeling before Zod.
Once you go Yotomoe you’ll say “No mo’ fo’ me”
Once you go Herc, the rest just won’t work.
Once you go hick, no one else does the trick.
Once you start rhyming, I question your timing.
Once you don’t stop, I blow my top.
I think you won.
Truth.
Once you go Brit, all else is shit.
One you go otaku, there is nothing else to mack to.
I wanted to play too.
Well I guess we know Walky is fundamentally wrong.
Much as I wanna violently shake her for her ‘sciencet propaganda’ jab, I do kinda gotta feel bad for Joyce here…I mean, even if it’s a stance based in ignorance, it can’t be easy seeing your perfect, stable little world come crumbling down around you.
That said, this’ll probably wind up being good for her if Dorothy’s the one to talk her down rather than someone still very far inside her comfort zone. Yeah, if she learns to accept it, this could be a sign of positive movement for Joyce, but still, I can’t help but feel for her a little.
Well, yeah, we should feel bad for her. After all, it’s not really Joyce’s fault that she believes all this stupid crap. She never really had a choice. It’s her parents, and her pastor, and whatever other authority figures she’s had, that have taught her that evolution is a lie, and gay people are abominations, and premarital hanky-panky will get you damned to hell for all eternity. This is all she’s ever known, and now that she’s finally learning that not everybody thinks like she does, it’s going to be hard for her.
Joyce (and individuals like her) are not going to abandon their core beliefs based on a rational argument, especially if the argument is presented by someone who lacks the ability to comprehend human emotions (as opposed to dinosaur hunting patterns).
Frankly I don’t feel that Joyce’s views on science should be shaken at all, as opposed to her feelings about homosexuality and pre-marital sex. Joyce can always stick her fingers in her ears during Dina’s rants about common descent, or how the scientific term for a theory is not the common term for a theory. But she can’t stop viewing Dorothy, Ethan and Joe as people she sees everyday. Ethan and Joe are both Jews, and Dorothy’s an atheist; according to Evangelical core beliefs, even if Ethan never finds a boyfriend, Joe stops fooling around during college and marries a nice Jewish girl and Dorothy becomes head of the CDC and cures cancer, they are all going to Hell. Who cares about dinosaurs? Joyce’s real crisis is that the “sinners” aren’t evil people.
The kindness that Ethan, Dorothy, Billie, etc., have shown Joyce are making her question her core beliefs. Dina’s rants shouldn’t be having any such effect.
Walky kind of put your cute little problems in perspective, didn’t he, Joyce?
You could have had spiders.
Yeah, I mean Alien Ace Action was from the same season like Taxing Taxonomy and had waaaaaay better prop design!
AAGH! Now I have one more episode to conceptualize!
…but one less since Willis has his own ideas for “Taxing Taxonomy” and I don’t want to step on his toes…
Aagh, it’s all evened out?
Willis! you must create these cartoons! your fanbase demands it!
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/JustForFun/DexterAndMonkeyMaster
Ok where is Dina? Joyce needs an edge pushing.
Dina never appears when you’re looking for her.
Yes, Heisenberg ca e up with his uncertainty principle while looking for Dina. And Waldo.
So one cannot know both the velocity and position of Dina eh? Maybe someone can compensate for this?
Not until you collapse the Dina function, anyway.
Dina is both behind the door and not behind the door until you have opened, walked through, and closed it again. For every door.
Am I the only one that thinks this sounds dirty?
Dina is everywhere, man. You can only see her when she wants to be seen though.
Man its basically inevitable at this point that Becky is gonna start having shitloads of sex.
It’s inevitable that she’s going to pick up one of Joyce’s calls WHILE having sex.
It’s inevitable that she’s going to pick up one of Joyce’s calls WHILE having sex with Joe. On a tapestry.
IT’s inevitable that she’s going to pick up one of Joyce’s calls while having sex with Joyce. on a tapestry.
Wait, like Dumbiverse’s version of the Joyce clone or Joyce was having sex with Becky and just didnt notice?
Also I find the idea of Joyce having a look alike in place of her clone oddly appealing. Off to writing fanfiction.
Becky: Joyce…DO IT. don’t talk back. JUST. DO. IT. also only do it with a consenting age person that you feel mutual attraction to and only when you feel you both are emotionally mature enough to intertwine genitalia and then use the appropriate sexual protection.
That’s love baby!
Going to START? She’s probably waist-deep in wang already.
(Oh man, I’m … sort of sorry for that … it just slipped out. But I’m still grinning stupidly at it)
For some reason in my mind “Christian College” == Bandcamp. Makes it worse that I actually WORK at one. (No staff/student “interaction” has taken place, but I harbour no illusions that the dorms fail to heave on a regular basis)
Man, Walky and Dorothy’s relationship (which I hereby officially dub ‘Dorky’) is gettin’ rocky.
Their relationship seems fine to me? ‘Dorky’ also seems exceedingly fine to me.
They’re arguing over something important, now.
And by “lifestyle decisions”, Joyce means “Billie’s boobs”.
THEY’RE EVERYWHERE!!!
And OVERWHELMING!!!
AND HUUUUUUUUUUUUGE!!!
And FULL OF BOOOOOOZE!
FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE!
Young, dumb, and full of rum?
Ethanol fuel tanks for the sex machine!
Dorothy has the best Comic Book Guy face.
…and now I re-read Dorothy’s lines in that voice. Worst. Brain Worm. Ever.
Maybe the home-schooling wasn’t such a good idea. Losing your innocence is like chicken pox- better to get it done young.
Yeah, or else you go complete bonkers and not the good kind of bonkers.
Oh no, Joyce is experiencing worldview collapse!
…I’m loving the shit out of this.
Civil engineering on cad uses blocks for landscaping, electrical, storm drain, etc. Saves tons of repeat drawing time. Guessing this is the same type of thing Mr. W. is talking about? I draw a tree and make a ‘block’ out of it. Animator draws a sword and ‘blocks’ it for repeat use?
Joyce does meltdown better than anyone I’ve every seen. Except …Leslie did a pretty good one. And so did Mike. And Sal. And even Dinah. And ah Nm. Got a feeling all of them have at one point or another if I did some research. But, Joyce still best I think.
Am I the only one around here who sings the praises of the episode “The Man, The Monkey, and the Bowling Ball”?
Also, I hope Joyce can take the inevitable popping of her worldview bubble. I feel like something similar is going to happen with some of my cousins who are basically Joyces that are still in home school.
What, no love for the MechaGorilla Kong story arc?
AAGH… NOW THE BALANCE HAS BEEN DISRUPTED…
*Adds another title to the Word document*
To misquote The Great Leader,”As long there is creativity and imagination, the balance will always be disrupted”
“Na na na na na na na na… Batman! …I mean, Leader!”
I’m kinda glad Willis knows what “Taxing Taxonomy” is about because all the ideas I had for it were less wacky and more weird and obtuse.
Still, with 40+ episodes made up by us fans, I’ve got a lot of ideas to sort out and pick between. I’m still working, but it’s not a quick task.
Feel free to make my made-up one an unpopular one amongst fans. That way I sound all the crazier for singing its praises.
Personally I think “I Heart-Spring-Break” was the worst. TMTM&TBB was merely average in comparison.
Why is there no love for “Dexter and Monkey Master Go Quantity Surveying”?
You’re perfectly entitled to believe whatever you want to, but if your first semester in college shakes you to your foundations…well, honestly that’s probably the best use of your first semester in college.
Also, I don’t care if everyone is jumping on the “Walky is Wrong” bandwagon. “Wedding Smashers” IS the best episode. Was it technically perfect? No! But it was the most entertaining. There’s really nothing more to it than that.
“Wedding Smashers” isn’t Walky’s favorite, but Drothy’s, he prefers “Time Shorts” …. which doesn’t change the fact that they’re both wrong (on a fundamental level) !
The faces your gravs are making make this a very entertaining exchange.
This is not just a matter of cartoons. It is a matter of life and death.
This is like watching a transcription of a Dragonball Z episode… *grabs popcorn*
Man. I guess I’m the only one who really loves “Dexter’s Daily Do-se-do.” I can’t help it. Just… the gingham, the skirt flip, the fiddling. That expression on Dexter’s face. Monkey Master’s–
Well, y’know. You’ve seen it. I guess I have low tastes.
I hope Becky tells her to leave Ethan alone. Even if she says it in a rude homophobic way, I hope she gets Joyce to leave him be. I ship Ethan with any gay man. Yes, even him. That’s because I really want to accept himself, and realize that just like there is nothing wrong with being straight, there is nothing wrong with being gay.
I just want someone to tell her that sexuality isn’t a choice! I mean seriously. Does Joyce wake up every day and decide if she wants to be gay, straight, male, female, sexual, asexual? Nope. So seriously Joyce, let Ethan be.
*ahem* End rant
Given Joyce’s recent confusion about her own sexuality, that might not be the best way to get the point through to her. I think she may be afraid that she actually is only straight because she wakes up every day and decides to be.
want HIM to accept himself. oop
I want him to accept Jacob. Or Jacob to accept him. Or they could trade off.
Yes, yes. Let the doubt flow through you. Strike out with all your confusion. If you strike Dina down she shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
Cognitive dissonance levels are going critical! Prepare for imminent worldview implosion!
Also, in all seriousness, I foresee major character development in her future.
Or maybe just the re-emergence of Anti-Joyce :-/
AntiJoyce!
Am I the only one who wants Willis to start a Kickstarter to fund a pilot for a real Dexter & Monkey Master show? The more the DoA characters talk about it, the more I want to actually WATCH it.
It couldn’t be worse than some of the cartoons already on. But I worry any more brainstorming will cause poor Totz the Plaid to have a breakdown.
Joe + nameless girls in the background of Panel 1 is a nice touch… i’d like to think it’s a standard background layer that’ll turn up again, Joe and all.
It looks like Joe is holding court on a discussion about sex positions.
Extensive Googling is telling me there’s no such thing as an Emmy for prop design, but whatever. Dexter and Monkey Master is a fake show, why shouldn’t it win a fake Emmy?
According to Willis, it’s one of those “Outstanding Individual Achievement” awards that are handed out on a case by case basis.
Must have been one heck of a prop design then.
Could have been terrible. Could have been a malaprop.
That was a horrible pun and I hope you feel bad for it.
Nah, that’d be a razzie, or whatever the emmy equivalent is. A “Lemmy”?
Could be worse. Joyce could be in a good college US history class. On the level of using _Lies My Teacher Told Me_ to tear down textbook ignorance and lies, which are probably even stronger in conservative Christian homeschool books than in mainstream ones.
Dorothy, don’t get distracted by Walky’s silliness. Look at Joyce’s sadness in that last panel.
Actually, I’m not so sure that is sadness. It might be the beginning of inspiration. All those who kickstartered this last book, you know what I mean (spoilers).
Oh god I did but I’m trying to dodge spoilers.
Must resist the temptation to go log in to the Kickstarter.
No dialogue IIRC. More creates mystery / foreshadows than actually spoils anything.
Does that mean you’ve figured out the plots to all the Dexter and Monkey Master episodes?
Cause if so… I’d like to see those….
Coming this Fall, David Willis’s new webcomic ‘Dexter and Monkey Master.’
it’s set in the Monkiverse.
Eventually it becomes a real cartoon, inspiring millions of kids to read the original comics they were based on, and getting confused when everyone in the comments sections says things like “fictional”.
Bankrolled by Kickstarter, of course.
Stretch goals of cameos by particular Walkiverse characters.
High-value backer levels gain you or a person/character of your choosing (copyright permitting) a background, walk-on, or brief speaking part, or the option of designing some random piece of scenery or a sponsor logo appearing on a mall signboard. Top level is a chance to actually voice a minor character even if you’re rubbish at it.
Animation by the MLP:FIM studio, natch.
It took me way too much research to figure out that “Taxing Taxonomy” is a fictional episode in a fictional TV series.
Also, “landscape design” and “interior design” both work with pre-existing objects to create an appealing whole. Selecting and choosing (and sometimes making) props to create a live action setting that supports the story perfectly is not a simple task.
Completely incorrect!
…It is a real episode in a fictional TV series. =P
Dorothy’s face in that last panel reminds me of Faz/Amber vaguely.
Joe called out Amber as a brunette clone of Dorothy the first time he saw her.
I smell foreshadowing in the second panel. I hear it snickering. (Particularly given the first panel’s first line.)
Why was my post removed? She really is an uneducated creationist and really pissed me off. I also now noticed she said “lifestyle choice” and am even more annoyed.
Refrain from using certain words like “dumbass” on this board when referring to folks. It’s a civility thing.
(And I removed your OTHER post you just made because Jesus Christ, man, keep those halfcocked uneducated thoughts about persecuted minorities to yourself.)
I was only talking about Joyce.
And I even said I didn’t have a problem with them.
You realise she’s a fictional character whose dialogue has been deliberately written to create such a mental reaction, right?
Dude needs to take a long hard look at the previous comic.
And then Joyce’s psyche fractures and we get to see Dumbiverse Evil Joyce, whoo!
However, Dumbiverse Evil Joyce is preoccupied with evolution, and seeks to create the ultimate pony.
It will have a horn and breath fire.
I don’t think I’d call Anti-Joyce “evil”. She was certainly, by Original-Flavor Joyce’s standards, sinful, but that’s not the same thing. And remember, Anti-Joyce didn’t murder Joyce.
Tradition holds that the duplicate is always evil, regardless of the realities of the situation.
Unless the original is evil.
And has a goatee
Aww man. Give it 2 months and she’ll find out that Becky has been told she isn’t allowed to contact anyone on the outside and that their friendship is annulled…
When she says Becky, this isn’t necessarily a reference to Becky Bookman now, is it? We’re not also getting an Ultimate Webcomics: Multiplex in addition to Ultimate Webcomics: Dumbing of Age? Probably not, but that’s where my head went to.
She means her best friend, Becky.
One of the subtler things about DoA is that character development doesn’t really have…big moments, or at least not so far. There’s just the characters’ constant exploration of how they are and trying to make sense of the situation they’re in, and it’s quite rare for them to get opportunities to talk things through with other characters and get their point of view, either for practical reasons or because the other character feel they shouldn’t or because they themselves feel they shouldn’t.
And there’s constantly new stuff to deal with, but their experiences from previous interactions carry over and slowly, slowly affects them. It’s great.
(…I usually don’t talk too much about favorite characters and stuff, but I hope Sarah shows up again soon. I know she doesn’t exactly lend herself to social situations, but I just.)
I just remembered what Sarah told Joyce about Dorothy last time they talked. Which was like two hours ago Joyce-time.
And May 6th our time.
Ooh, ouch. Poor Joyce.
Also, interesting that she’s so close to the atheist, already.
You know, IU really does have Christian fellowship type stuff. Multiple ones, even. I’m surprised she hasn’t sought them out. Or run into them directly during “clubs advertise to freshmen” early in the term.
I know very well how Joyce feels
Unfortunately, life often doesn’t afford us the space to handle things one at a time. I hope, if she gets the chance, Joyce gets something out of talking to Becky, but I also hope it doesn’t lead her to taking two steps back in development.
“I want to talk to my old friend” “Have you been hiding something from me?” whoooooooah back off controlly mccontrollingfriend
Well (unless you were being sarcastic, in which case I’m toneless mcsarcasmblind), “she’s always helped center me” is a pretty worried thing to say.
Science Propoganda?Seriously?
I was just about to comment that.