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David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
Puff the Magic Hater @mskellymhayes.bsky.social ⋅ 19h
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
Joe Chouinard @joechoui.bsky.social ⋅ 8m
eeee!
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Shaenon K. Garrity @shaenon.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
TFW2005 @tfw2005.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
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Is… is Dorothy decompressing right now? It’s not a lot, hell, it’s momentary, but are we seriously witnessing it happen?
honeymoon’s over =C
…but in a good way. Dorothy’s overburdened herself, dropping the relationship, in a no-harm-no-foul style, means that she can get a handle on what she needs to do and maybe, if this get stable again, they can come back to it.
It’s not a “happy” ending, no. But given the circumstances, it’s one of the best outcomes possible.
Yeah. I think this can be good for both of them, but so are vegetables. Still can be a pain.
Actually, I’m not sure they *are* breaking up here. I think Walky is stepping back from that, which I actually think might be the right call—blaming human attachments for Dorothy’s problems is not a healthy answer. Dorothy is overworked. Taking away her relationships may not be the answer Walky assumed it was earlier.
Oh! It’s the “on pause” comment. I interpreted that initially as Dorothy literally just asking to take a moment out of her schedule, but yes, that’s probably a breakup.
Though for the record, I’m not sure I’m ready to step down from what I said—this may be a healthy choice for Dorothy to make*, but it doesn’t necessarily do much to break her pattern of pushing herself past her limits. I dunno, I’m a skeptic.
*It would not have been the right one for Walky to make for her.
It’s a break-up, but it’s not a normal “we’re not compatible and can’t do this” break-up. This is a “whatever I might want to do, I’m just not able to be in a relationship right now”.
Relationships take effort to go through, and self-care is super important…
In theory yes, but if it’s a “I need to give up one of the few things that helps me relax and destress so that I can spend more time stressing and working”, that’s not really self-care.
If it was the relationship that was stressful, that would be one thing, but I don’t think that’s really what’s going on here – trying to help him study aside.
Lol, a pause isn’t a break up. She wants to reorganize and come back to the relationship. Walky probably didn’t think of it as an option. I honestly should’ve done this last semester but if I had stopped seeing my bf during a very stressful time, I might not have made it out in one piece. These two, in theory, should be fine afterwards.
And that bit about “might not have made it out in one piece” is why I’m not happy with this. External stress is not actually a good reason to push away your supports.
I see what you’re saying, I just can’t quite agree. honestly I shouldn’t have used myself as an example last night, my situation isn’t 1-1 with Dorothy’s. I’m a bit more like Ruth lesse, a pause wouldn’t work for me.
Right now, their relationship is stable and she can pause. Dorothy is independent as hell, so she knows how to get down to business and come out of this struggle in one piece. Walky can use this time to learn to be independent and figure his stuff out. When they unpause, hopefully they’ll be a better team.
sorry it took a while to reply but I
had to rewrite everything like 3 times, fml, andalways get nervous with having opinions on the Internet. I have a useless twitter account, lol.I butchered that strike through so bad omg
I’m assuming there’s going to be some setting of terms of what ‘on pause’ means next strip, but I really don’t think it’s a break-up per se so much as putting ‘relationshippy’ stuff on the back-burner. So if you ask Dorothy tomorrow whether Walky is her boyfriend, she will say yes, but she is not focused on ‘actively’ being his girlfriend and she in turn does not expect him to focus on ‘actively’ being her boyfriend. This could LEAD to a break-up if it drags on long enough for one or the other to become dissatisfied and want to move on, but at present it is not a break-up itself.
I really don’t see why everyone is assuming that “on pause” means that the relationship is over. When I put a game “on pause” I have not shut the game down. I have merely stopped interacting with it while I take care of things of a more urgent priority. And when those things are handled, I take the game “off pause” and resume where I left off.
Yes, I know, people and relationship aren’t video games, but I think that is the metaphor that these two videogaming people are using. After all, they just got done saying “I love you” to each other. Nobody is getting kicked to the curb here. Sure, they may grow apart before they get around to the unstated off-pause, but that does not seem to be the current assumption on either of their parts. I’m sure Walky will be ready to run back to her side the moment he hears that she was admitted to Student Health Services due to a nervous breakdown.
If vegetables are a pain, you may not be using them correctly.
She’s not dropping the relationship! They both said they love each other, and they said “on pause” not “it’s not working.”
Granted they’re young and in college; one or the other may find someone else; but as of right now, they are on pause, not stopped.
Pauses don’t usually unpause in my experience
Then it probably wasn’t strong enough in the first place. This is not the time in one’s life for lifelong commitments. The whole strip is about growth and change, exploring and challenging things that make us comfortable. This is probably the most responsible and caring thing they could have done for each other.
Maybe, maybe not. If so. This at least was a maturely handled breakup.
Which is saying a LOT for Walky.
Garbage stays on the roof, ground floor is for trying to make everyone happy. Trying.
Delenda est amor, Willis?
Baby don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me, no more.
I feel like that hovertext deserves a Damn You Willis, especially given that it means Kernanator is likely right about the Valentine’s strip being far worse than expected. I mean, yes, as-written, the hovertext implies we’ve escaped Valentine’s Day pain- but this is Willis, so it can’t possibly actually mean that.
Carthago Delenda Est!
Oh my god that’s the most painless way that could have happened i’m shaken
I’m only a little sad, which is about as good as it gets D:
You know what this means, right?
Valentine’s Day is going to be so much worse than we thought.
Valentine’s Day co-incides with Ash Wednesday this year.
Calling it, it’ll either be something with Billie and Ruth, or Ethan and Mike.
Or Becky and Dina.
NO.
When you guys say “or” you mean “and”, right?
DO NOT WANT.
If Becky and Dina break up, the comic’ll plummet into a dark pit of despair from which there is no escape. Willis will give up working on the comic in favor of alcoholism, and the rest of us will shuffle through life blankly, vaguely recalling brighter days.
So… A valentine’s strip involving Billie, Ruth, Mike, Ethan, Becky, and Dina. I only see that working as one strip where several plot threads come together. So we’ll have Ruth screaming at Billie for being drunk, Ethan will ask Mike to marry him, and Becky will say the Pterodactyl is her favourite dinosaur.
So … Billie breaks up with Becky, Ethan asks Dina to marry him, and Mike and Ruth have a screaming fight and hatesex afterwards?
–Dave, there’s still a month for the plot threads to, you know, plot’n’stuff
Or Ethan and Danny. Though Jacob and Raidah are also on dangerous ground, I don’t think there’d be enough “Damn You Willis”-ing on that one—despite it being pretty clear now that Jacob/Joyce would not be a seaworthy ship, for various reasons.
All that said, I’d put my money on Billie and Ruth. You have definitely called it, Doctor Who.
Raidah isn’t really all that awful- she stands up for decency (at least to the point of being intolerant of the use of ‘retard’ as a slur) and doesn’t cause trouble for others when she has ability to do so (as evidenced by her not reporting Sarah’s battery on her). Yes, she’s stuck-up and her concepts of decency get twisted because of that, and yes, she’s too self-absorbed to really match well to someone with Jacob’s temperament, but she really hasn’t done anything to deserve any major drama.
On the other hand, both Jacob and Raidah seem rather technical about how they approach things, so it feels far more likely they’d have a mutually agreeable, well-discussed, maturely managed split than anything drama-associated. I mean, not unless Sarah’s plan to hook Jacob up with someone else manages to actually succeed.
I wouldn’t say Raidah ‘doesn’t cause trouble for others when she has the ability not to do so’ – she did harass Sarah for about a year and she only stopped going out of her way to say things to her AFTER she got punched in the face.
I think HeySo meant that despite having the ability to sue Sarah for assault she didn’t. Not that Raidah actively avoids causing trouble for others when she can. Considering the fact that she actively held that over Sarah’s head like some huge favor and harassed Sarah on site to the point where Sarah could not reasonably tell the difference between trying to hurt her and being out shopping and happening to run into her, and Raidah brought it up as evidence Sarah was toxic. Also suing Sarah for assault would require time, and energy and as bad as her friend group is even they might see that as too far, and that could encourage Joyce to call the cops if she ever sees them with weed.
Yea you don’t get credit for that one time you were not maximally evil in my books.
If we’re calling it, at the moment I would call Danny walking in on Ethan and Mike. But I dunno.
In honor of the martyred St. Valentine, the Valentine’s Day strip will feature someone being beaten with clubs and then beheaded. Let’s just hope it’s Blaine or Ryan.
You fool!
You’re assuming it won’t get worse!
QUICK! ASK ANYTHING OTHER THAN WHAT’S THE WORSE THAT COULD HAPPEN?
What’s the best that could happen?
How bad can it be?
Well, dang. That worked out a lot better than it had any right to. For now, at least.
I Just Wanna Stop–and tell you what I feel about you babe
I Just Wanna Stop–the World ain’t right without you babe
I Just Wanna Stop–For Your Love!
I Associate This Song With The Eighties But Really It’s From The Seventies.
The 80s actually started in 1978.
The 70s really kind of got screwed, since the 60s lasted until around 74.
Danny: That’s a very good idea. London is a country coming down from its trip. We are 91 days from the end of this decade and there’s gonna be a lot of refugees.
(Withnail and I)
He was right. I remember the early 70s in Devon and a lot of hippies roaming around looking for something.
Most music decades start in the year 4 or 5. Beatles in 1964. Disco in 73-74. Elvis not in 1950 but mid-Fidties.
The first couple of years are the hangover from the previous, and a lot of people trying to invent/figure out what the “new sound” will be.
Feeling it
I’m not crying you’re crying
Jk I’m totes crying
Joke’s on you! I’m crying too.
same
I’m not. This is SO much better than it could have been. They both love each other and have told each other so, they’re still friends, they’re in agreement about the course of action, neither acted on impulse to do something they normally would which would make things worse. Guys, this is the best possible strip.
more pain is coming, isnt it?
I have to admit, this is actually a really mature sort of act for them to do. I think a good relationship knows and understands when the people involved might need a break, which doesn’t mean ‘let’s date other people’. It just means they need a breather. They’re still in love, still care for each other dearly. It’ll hurt, because they’re young, but they’re very mature for this and I trust em.
Phew, just a hiatus and not a full cancellation.
Though I worry it might be more of a “Fox continually changing the timeslot” situation.
Bounce it between a graveyard slots! Air a few episodes out of order! Put it up against football on the other networks! Our late-night cable rerun block needs cheap filler, dammit!
At least one thing you forgot to include, is “Blame the fans for just not caring enough to guess when the show would next be on, despite the network not actually listing the time slot changes anywhere”. -.-
That’s the justification for the half-assed print-on-demand DVD release in three years, which includes a previously unknown animatic.
“Walky and Dorothy” are still on schedule for a winter premiere … in-universe.
As long as “I’ve made a huge mistake” reflects the Bluth family, and not anything in this comic.
Thank you for not being one of those “Nooooo” comments. A lot of people seem to think it’s a break up. For once, I’m getting mad at the comments section here, lol.
That is odd. I thought it was pretty clear in the strip.
I will admit I have missed the mark in other strips myself.
I thought so too, hopefully tonight’s strip clarifies it for everyone.
(Also I think our gravs are appropriate)
So appropriate.
Nooooo
Beautifully handled, but ow. ;-;
It’s quiet.
TOO quiet.
Nary a “Damn you, Wills!” in DAYS!
Can’t have that, now.
Damn you, Willis!
But the retooling! The retooling will DESTROY THE.M
Dorothy, I know this might be news to you, but… YOUR PARTNER DOES NOT HAVE TO BE YOUR PROJECT!!! YOU DON’T HAVE TO TAKE A BREAK WITH WALKY TO NOT HAVE TO FIX HIS FUDGING MATH SCORES!!!!
I’m thinking she’s cutting caramel-cinnamon distractions rather than the weekly math-fixing. But still, they could still have lunches or such and keep the realtionship going. If they weren’t hormone-loaded freshwomen and freshmen, that said.
Yup, she seems to feel that something that brings her joy has to be cut out for her studies. Down that road lies poor mental health. Remember when you said a carefully regulated amount of fun is important, Dorothy? Well I don’t agree with regulating it but you need to remember that now. Being able to feel happy and emotionally balanced is more important than your ridiculous, self-imposed academic standards.
Think of it like sticking your toe in a hot pool during a winter’s day. The distraction encourages further immersion in the distraction, and when you pull yourself away from it, you’re less better able to focus on the things you need to deal with (ie, cold~=schoolwork).
It may not be conducive to good mental health, but given the pressure that high schools and universities put on their students (especially the top ones), I can see how it can be the only functional way to allow yourself to firmly focus on what you need to.
Also, given that she has a clear goal by which those standards are relevant, there’s absolutely no grounds to call them ridiculous. I mean, past presidents haven’t given us any indications that such qualifications matter in the least, but committing to what you want to do and putting your all into it.. that’s the heart of living, isn’t it?
Certainly, knowing you tried your hardest at what you’ve decided to dedicate yourself to is going to be less of a regret in the future than continuing to give it your all. That doesn’t mean she won’t possibly regret giving up Walky for the sake of her dreams, but it means that, in a choice like this, she’s choosing the option that is least likely to leave her with regrets. Kudos to her for that, even if she *is* managing her life in a way that is unhealthy.
On the other hand, she seems stressed to the snapping point, and once a student reaches that, everything they’re juggling just kinda starts slipping through their fingers. So yeah, all things said, you’re right that she’s probably approaching this in a way that’s going to only hurt her.
If you’re of that mind-set, everything becomes a project-task-challenge.
…which I think is a pretty apt description of Dorothy’s mindset right now.
I’m crying but actually this is a much more healthy thing than I had first envisioned
going back through valentines day strips and the one that kills me is 2014’s valentine day strip
That second panel! Right now, my family is going through a lot: vancer, a young son with ASD, job deadlines… I showed that you my husband and said, “I think this goes for both of us.”
Um, that’s “cancer,” not “vancer.” It did get to my brain, but I can’t blame this on it.
Vancer was a lancer, and he had quite the pole,
I hoped he’d ride me like a stallion, but to him I was just a foal.
I followed him and tried my best to convince him, that I was quite the find,
But in the end it was cancer, not vancer, that ended up on my mind.
—
Figured you deserved a smile out the circumstance, at least. Best wishes toward things destressing for you soon.
Be of good cheer, there are some remarkable treatments out there, right now!,I know, I’m part of one. I’m rooting for you. Good luck!
“Going on pause”, so not a complete break-up then. That’s better than I was expecting.
RE: ALT-TEXT: But it does coincide with the fact that stores are putting up damn Valentine’s Day stuff already.
The stores around here had their Valentine’s day stuff out the week before New Year’s..
There’s a very narrow window of opportunity to stock up on discounted goodies. (All the candy in red and green wrappers has to go, to make room for the same candy in red and pink wrappers.) By January 2nd, all that was left were cheap chocolate advent calendars and those big tins of pre-popped popcorn that showed up in October.
That’s really sweet. Mature, too.
Well, at least it wasn’t a repeat of the Danny situation…..
It’s Walky with: surprisingly healthy relationship breaks
Missed opportunity for an intentional punny typo…
It’s Wacky with…
Yes I know that C is on the opposite side of the keyboard from L and I don’t care.
Agh. Two people I know have gone through this exact situation except gender-swapped. It, uh, hasn’t gone well.
WE WERE ON A BREAK!
*in British accent* I think we need to be perfectly clear, you were on a break.
This is the way that we love
Wait….
…. this is healthy….
WHAT COMIC IS THIS???
Not gonna lie, this went a lot better than I feared
I mean Dorothy’s inability to balance her interpersonal relationships and her academic pursuits isn’t actually all that healthy.
The Willis giveth.
We will receive the Anti-Valentine Day, when a figure of Valentine is strung from a tall building and dangled in the sighing wind.
… garbage … garbage …
the rustling rats will whisper as trails of hope slither into the drains.
My… my… feelings. Oh this comic is beautiful.
The “can I just put my face in your shoulder for years so I can stop feeling like I’m going to collapse” feeling is incredibly relatable and one of the many great things boyfriends are for.
So obviously it’s best to put that on pause. More important things to do.
Sounds legit.
Next panel : “zzzz”
Yeah, that’s what I’m thinking too: Dorothy is heading for a crash of some kind!
As long as she doesn’t end up calling him Eef.
I would also accept Inelegant Blubbering, which, each time it’s happened on me, has brought two people much closer.
As long as
one of them? who am I kiddingDorothy has tissues.Fairly relevant for me to a lesser degree. I’ve had a casual sexual partner for a little over a year. We are close sexually in a way I never had been before but…we keep it casual because a)we aren’t compatable. and b) We both put work and school first.
I could never do B personally. I’m the kinda guy who as long as he’s enjoying whatever’s happening if fine with his situation so I don’t think I could put work and school over someone I care about. I envy the people who can tho.
Well dang.
here is kitty’s finnish word of the day!
korkeakoulu (college, academy)
it is a compound word of korkea (high) and koulu (school). but our counter part of american high school is called lukio.
have a nice day!
Sad. But maybe hopefully they can get back together in a bit when Dorothy stables out
Man this really sucks, they’re never going to get back together are they?
Dorothy isn’t going to stable out unless she changes something else drastically.
I’m not sure they’re actually going to really not be together, despite their intentions. Is Walky going to stop caring or offering her support when he sees her so obviously frazzled, even if they’re officially “on pause”?
Probably not. But pauses never work out in my experience, it just goes downhill.
I’m worried that this is going to be like the typical one-two punch that has taken up most of their relationship; Dorothy makes an adult move and Walky does something stupid.
I’m kind of confused. Why are people assuming that Walky just broke up with Dorothy? Yes, that was his intention, but I’m not sure that he’s actually going through with it. People are reading too much implication into this comic.
Oh! It’s the “on pause” comment. I interpreted that initially as Dorothy literally just asking to take a moment out of her schedule, but yes, that’s probably a breakup.
No Walky!
You got together with a Kiss, only a Kiss can pause…
( She will follow this logic )
(Get your Pausing Smooch now. You both need it)
Throw a toy at her!
Willis. You’re good!
Everytime i try to predict and think That this or that’s gonna happen, you come back and suprise me. I love this comic and i love you man!!
We are not dead yet? Willis didn’t annihilate our hearts with a beam of pure romantic despair? HOORAY!
That beam will activate on Valentine’s. We don’t have much longer to live.
Well, that depends… Is this a “On Pause” that means “I still really like you and want to be with you but I don’t have the time to go on dates and stuff right now. Wait for me?” Or a “On Pause” that’s really a “I don’t have time for a relationship right now and, to be honest, I’m not THAT into you so when it came time to decide what I had to cut from my life, you had to go.”
Remember, Dorothy’s done the latter before to Danny.
She did say the L word back.
But we can clearly see the difference. Dorothy wasn’t happy that Danny followed her. She didn’t want to be with him. We haven’t seen that from her with Walky- we’ve seen her turning to him for a place to feel better and relishing their time together.
What happens emotionally from here I can’t guess, but I’m fairly confident in saying that this is about her stress, not about her wants.
Of course, it’s possible she’s less into Walky than she currently thinks she is- perhaps with him being a rebound (yes she broke up with Danny but it WAS a three year relationship) or something else. I’m not expecting such, but again, I never try to predict where this will go.
Right now it means love you don’t have time right now we will pick up later, but it will cause the relationship to lose momentum and could lead to a real break up.
…well this went as well as it could have
Valentines day story? Special dates are overrated. Best moments come off guard and take you by surprise. Those are the moments and times that are special.
You know I’m sort of glad Dorothy initiated this. Partly because this way Walky’s concerns are addressed and on pause implies the default is when Dorothy has her life back together they can pick it up again.
I know I’m not saying anything new here but this is about the best way this could go. They both get some time to (hopefully maybe) get their heads together, it’s pretty much mutual, and it comes after a moment that I suspect they both really needed.
If Walky had gone with what he originally was going to say I doubt it would have gone half as well as it did. I really respect them both here.
Now we just need Dorothy to start addressing her mental health and realising that devastating that now isn’t worth any “maybe” for the future.
Everything went better than expected
Careful, Dorothy – the only thing holding your books up now is the pressure of your body against Walky’s. Better be careful, or they’ll wind up in the snow.
Paused Amazi-girl, paused Walky, taking care of Dorothy. This is good.
She doesn’t look like she’s going to take care of Dorothy. She just sounds like she’s getting rid of the one stress release in her life. I’m pretty sure she’s not replacing Walky-time with self-care time. Which would, in fact, be bad.
Guess who just binge-read this whole comic from start to finish! THIS GUY! Man oh man is it good!
Yep.
How many DYWes did you emit in the process?
–Dave, I need to know for a research paper
Is he saying because he loves her he is going to give her the room she needs to get her ducks in a row?
NO! FUCKING NO! PEOPLE AREN’T WILLING TO BE ON PAUSE! THAT’S NOT HOW PEOPLE APPROACH SITUATIONS!!
It can be.
It doesn’t work, but that doesn’t mean people don’t try it.
Well, I don’t know, it kind of does. I think you learn with time how to pause without pausing. Sometimes when my husband and I are both very stressed we sort of live in parallel while just focusing on our own lives. We still usually have dinner together, but not always. We always sleep in the same bed together as long as one is not traveling, though sometimes at different times. Regardless, after a week or so when things have calmed down, we go back to our happy normal interactions. Such is the flow of life.
It’s not super common, but plenty of other people do it. I know a couple people personally who’ve done it. Sometimes it’s followed by a full breakup, sometimes it ends up averting one.
Dorothy and Walky are both under a lot of stress right now, and they’re both having trouble managing their current workloads and just adjusting to college life / pre-adulthood in general. I think they’re in exactly the sort of mental space that would lead someone to want to take a short break from the social pressures of their relationship so they can sort the other parts of their life out. The fact that they’re both feeling that way gives them a pretty decent chance of actually resuming their relationship as before, since there isn’t any new tension created between them like there would be if only one of them needed this.
“Can we,,,, can we, be on pause for a bit?”
“Dorothy, I’m not into Furries.”
Wrong staaaaaairssssssss.
I’ll admit, I didn’t see how the Walky/Dorothy thing would go well. And somehow, they figured out how to do it. All because Walky realized he loved her, too, and wasn’t afraid to say it
Huey Lewis and the News’ “Power of Love” is going to be in my head all freakin’ day.
Wait, hold on, the drama deescalates instead of escalating?
…Willis, are you alright?
So, who is going to be the one to mess this up and pull a “We were on a Pause” excuse ala Ross
But, guys, Dorothy giving up one of her few stress-relief, positive things in her life isn’t healthy either. I mean, sure, I’m glad they decided to go on a break (hopefully not a la F.R.I.E.N.D.S) instead of outright breaking up, but the reasoning is… kind of iffy to me.
What I’m hoping is that despite the pause, Dorothy will keep turning to Walky for stress-relief and Walky will keep supporting her and they’ll eventually realize there really wasn’t a pause at all.
I can see, in the middle of their pause, Dorothy showing up at Walky’s room to watch cartoons, like she did that first time.
(PUPPY NOISES INTENSIFYING AGAIN)
Well lets face it Walky wouldn’t really know what love is at the moment but being on a pause (whatever that actually means) is probably the best thing for him here as it means he can try to get his head around math without the spectre of Dorothy hanging over him
… Well, “on pause” is better than “over”.
But still.
=(
Apart from everything else, panel 1 Dorothy is adorable!
To me the ‘on pause’ means ‘Can we cuddle like this for a few moments?’ Not the end of the relationship.
Willis, don’t think you can weasel out of giving us a real Valentine’s Day strip!