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Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg @theradr.bsky.social ⋅ 19d
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(he/him)
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New game! BOLTED 
malaya’s new haircut is pretty similar to my current “forgot to go to the barber for six months” look, so this strip is kinda like looking into a bizarro-mirror
I for one think it’s cute
And by extension, toby must also be cute.
I have no reason to think otherwise.
aw, shucks
Oh for sure, I think Malaya’s pulling it off! for me, it’s just in the “long enough to get in my eyes but too short to pull back” zone, and That Cannot Stand
That zone is the fucking worst and you have all my sympathy.
That zone is why I never cut my hair.
Relatable.
I thought “bowling ball” hair was out this year?
Strange game. The only way to win is not to play.
Curses! I had to look it up, like a dope
Great movie
How about a nice game of chess?
How about a nice game of Mario Cart?
The creme de la creme of the chess world in a
Show with everything but Yul Brynner
Sounds great!
These foolish games are breaking my heart.
I’d let you watch, I would invite you,
But the queens we use would not excite you.
I get my kicks ABOVE the waistline, Sunshine
It’s comments like these that make me read before I comment, in case someone has made my comment for me but better than I ever could.
Bah, where’s the fun in that?
But I did read the comments. Bagge just got here first, by a minute.
I know it’s a quote but I disagree. Not playing is also playing, at least in Malaya’s eyes.
There’s just no pleasing some people.
When do we get to see the strip where the 3DS magically transforms into a Switch?
Also, awww, Sal cares what Malaya thinks of her.
She cares what Marcie thinks and Marcie listens to Malaya….
therefor she is afraid Marcie will stupidly get the same haircut in the hopes of getting into Malaya’s pants…I think I vomited in my mouth a little at that thought
In a few real-life years, when used Switches can be purchased with one afterthought gift card.
More like she cares about Malaya keeping quiet, and is trying to navigate the rocky shoals of what will keep her shut up the longest.
The only winning move is not to play.
what are the odds two people with becky gravatars both quote the same line from the same obscure movie
Is it obscure? Because I’ve heard of it enough that I was like, “I think I know what that’s from” just from reading the line, and it came out over a decade before I was born. On the other hand, sometimes you just know obscure things for no real reason.
Sometimes I feel that’s my standard way of knowing things.
Me: *wins the middle school geography bee for my grade level*
Friend: Wow, how did you know all that?
Me: I…don’t know…
That’s a reason why I really like trivia games, that brings unexpected sides of people to the table.
“Why, mr bro-friend who is really into beers and cars and nothing else as far as I knew; that’s an alarming amount of knowledge of depressed 19th century poets you have amassed there.”
i ended up on my school “Academic team” which was a codename for the Trivia team. Actual interaction with the teacher running it:
Teacher: “This volcanic glass was used to make spearheads and hand axes in the (something) era. What is it?”
Me: “Obsidian.”
Teacher: “How do you know that?”
Me: “Dungeons and Dragons. Dark Sun, specifically.”
And while the source movie may be obscure, the quote itself is fairly popular.
I placed second in my school’s third grade geography bee. Only lost it because the last question was something like “where does the Bishop of Rome live” and I said Italy because Rome is in Italy, right? NOPE turns out the Bishop of Rome is the Pope and he lives in Vatican City, the world’s smallest city-state. Extended family’s all Protestant and I was raised agnostic, the hell am I supposed to know that in third grade? I was robbed! It was a public school, separate church and state! It was 20 years before I touched the Geobee Challenge CD-ROM again.
Knew that Honolulu, Hawaii is the westernmost US capital city, though! (That’s the only other question I remember all these years later.)
Hahaha what a total coincidence.
All people with Becky gravatars are not connected via a hive mind network made of pure awesome or anything. That would be silly.
Hahahaha
I must be old, that didn’t used to be an obscure movie.
One of these days I need to get a cane so I can shake it at the damn kids.
When you wrest it from my cold, dead hands!
Same. Can whistle the theme, and I’m not even american (and at that time we had films released like 3 whole years after…)
You aren’t really old unless that is an obscure movie to you because it was a teener movie when you were too old for teener movies.
I missed the memo on this one; I heard it so many times but for some reason didn’t realize it came from a movie.
I did a Google search just now and I definitely recall hearing about WarGames, but never watched it.
I’m always amused by those famous quotes I’ve heard used so many times that I’ve either forgotten the source or forgotten that I never saw the original.
Not playing was her second thought, but that just means being yelled at for not playing.
…I fucking love that hairstyle on Malaya.
Dude, right?
I like Malaya’s new haircut, but I still can’t stand her because she’s such a huge jerk.
If Sal’s hadn’t been used to draw attention to Malaya’s hair cut, I never would have noticed. Just me, I guess.
Oops, “If Sal’s THOUGHTS…”
A) Malaya, you look super cute, and congrats on your cute face.
B) Sal, it’s nice that you’re trying, but there is no right answer once Malaya doesn’t like you and it’s entirely your own fault she doesn’t like you so. There’s that.
Malaya didn’t like Sal long before Sal did anything to “deserve” it, Malaya just fucking sucks.
I mean, Sal was pretty rude to her upfront. But I agree that Malaya fucking sucks, and that’s really what this strip highlighted for me.
Malaya has plenty of irrational AND rational reasons to dislike Sal.
But frankly I think an even bigger motivator is that she enjoys behaving like a rude brat.
This can only end in make-out.
“We can’t ev’r tell Marcy about this.”
“I already texted her. She said ‘pix or it didn’t happen’. So, I took some of us.”
“God damn it, Malaya!”
We actually don’t know who started it for sure – they were already sniping at each other in Malaya’s first appearance. However, considering Sal first put hands on Malaya (not to mention acting like a clingy toddler in general about Marcie), yeah, I’m gonna give her this one
We don’t know, but we can look at Every Single Interaction Malaya Has Ever Had With Anyone and that gives us a pretty good guess who started it!
…that IS a pretty solid conjecture right there.
Normally I would say sure, that’s valid conjecture, but the vast majority of Sal and Malaya’s interactions have Sal starting shit.
What makes you sure that Malaya didn’t napalm every bridge possible in the first few meetings and we simply didn’t see that? No, Sal isn’t great about sharing Marcie, but given that Sal has genuine healthy friendships with Danny and Joyce of all people (working on Ethan and Amber, who are also wholesome in their own right/when they can be), are you really going to say it’s Sal’s fault that she and Malaya (by far the most combative character in the cast who isn’t an outright villain) have a poor relationship?
I’m not saying it’s for sure it’s either of their fault, because we haven’t seen their first interactions. I am saying that, in the scenes we HAVE seen, Sal has generally picked more arguments.
Sal gets a lot of slack that others don’t. If this were Joyce mentioning someone’s haircut, there would be people in the comments chastising her for a boundary violation.
? What boundary violation? Malaya’s never expressed, or even implied, that her hair is a sore spot or that such comments would not be unwelcome and it’s not generally something most people would expect to be unwelcome.
The only boundary violation I can think of for Joyce would be hanging around in Malaya’s room while neither she nor Sal were there, but this is Sal’s room.
I think that’s sort of the point– that people come down more on other characters for infractions, real or imagined, more than they do with Sal. Whether that’s true or not, though, is it’s own issue, and either way that doesn’t lead to “so we should give Sal less slack and be unreasonably harsh on her as well.”
In that case, I suggest checking the comments in just about any comic that features her parents and/or discusses race. Plenty of unreasonable assholes hung around there.
….. huh.
*goes back to the comics where Becky got a haircut and Joyce almost went catatonic*
*checks the comments*
…. people were saying that Becky needed to respect boundaries more.
…. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but I wasn’t expecting that.
Hey, go back a little less to Joyce and Becky visiting La Porte and you’ll find those same people at Joyce’s church!
How dare Becky violate… Her own body? Of her own volition and to better fulfill her life?
Go to Toedad talking about her hair being her womanhood and you’ll see the mindset they were in. Women doing things of their own volition to better fulfill their lives are a serious threat.
Becky’s hair is an example of one of the very cool things about this comic: her cutting it and Joyce’s initial reaction, followed around a year later by Toedad letting us know why it was so important for Becky to do.
Then emphasized again later with a throwaway comment about “accidentally” getting gum in her hair while she was still at home so she’d have to get it cut short.
Get A Haircut And Get a Real Job
Clean your act up and don’t be a slob
Get it together like your big brother Bob…
Y’all got nice haircuts, good instruments too
You got a good band–you just don’t know how to do!
Say neighbor? I saw your band don’t on the Square (yea you!)
There must have been–wow–over TEN people there!
What we yelled, we know you heard
You pretended not to hear us–pretended not to know how to Play Freebird!
Nobody wants to hear Freebird.
Ugh. Misspelled and miscorrected. It should read:
I saw your band DOWN on the Square (yea you!)
I like the haircut a lot.
Sal really ought to just do whatever, Malaya will interpret any and all actions on her part as she sees fit, anyway.
The only way this situation could get more awkward is if sal already mentioned her haircut earlier and forgot abt it
Why is Sal standing in the middle of the room to play her DS? Who does that? Go sit down.
The walls are not to be trusted
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/02-threes-a-crowd/drastic/
I liked Malaya’s old haircut better…
Oh Sal, you should know by now that you just can’t win with Malaya. She is a fundamentally flawed human being, you will never get through to her.
She can get through her if she became Danny Phantom, or did like Scorpion in Mortal Kombat 11, but that would kill Malaya.
Wow, haircutting right to the chase.
heh!
Technically, yes, haircut.
Whenever anyone gets a haircut in fiction, I’m like “Ooo, are they about to come out?” So, like, as ridiculous reasoning as that is, this strip gave me more hope for Marcie and Malaya, maybe even soon.
But what if they grow their hair out?
They’re also about to come out, everyone’s queer.
No, it’s less dramatic and more gradual, so I don’t have as many associations with it. Though if someone’s a trans woman or trans femme, it might be part of changing identity expression. But the Dramatic Haircut trope is stronger in my mind, and a combination of real life and fiction hace linked it to coming out.
Hmm. What then if they go from ponytail to just letting their hair down? That’s kind of a dramatic shift.
I mostly just imagine sparkles appearing around them shojo style when they let it down.
What if they get rid of their combover? (Not that that ever happens in fiction.)
Then the Roman senate is about to declare them dictator for life. They get stabbed shortly after.
So the same thing happens in fiction that happens in real life? (Julius Caesar would never have dreamed of getting rid of his comb over, he was way too vain.)
I actually know what happens in real life, because I did it myself when I was forty. What happens is that no one notices.
Or no one says anything. My high school vice principal (Mr. R) had a comb over. It was terrible. But I wasn’t going to say anything about it– to his face. But once my friend got called down to speak to Mr. R, and he said he didn’t know who Mr. R was, and I said, “He’s the one with the awful hair.” And my chemistry teacher burst out laughing.
Anyway, now I sometimes work at the same school, and Mr. R is still there but thankfully no longer has that comb over. But I’m not going to be like, “Boy, good thing you don’t still have that trainerwreck of a hairdo going on.”
On a listserv I was on years ago, someone once asked, “Why do men grow comb overs?”
My response: I never grew a comb over. I just kept combing my hair the same way for thirty years until one day I realized I had a comb over.
Well, basically the last time we saw her, Malaya was kinda-sorta questioning her gender, and she was queer in the Walkyverse, so … my mind went to the same place. This haircut seems a little more butch than her last one, for lack of a better word.
…Or should I say less feminine? It just looks a little more boyish. But it’s still got the little wings in the back. I don’t know. Don’t mind me.
It looks kind of… extremely gelled down in cartoony mode, but I’m 90% sure that’s supposed to be a bowl cut. So yeah, one of the masc/butch-region haircuts lbpq ladies get a lot, but not abruptly so.
What? That already counts as ‘less feminine’ or ‘more butch’????
What the … is a feminine haircut supposed to look like if this one doesn’t register on that scale?
I didn’t say it was not feminine, just, yes, less feminine. Admittedly part of that judgement is just that it’s a lot shorter, and I know it’s not good to equate shorter hair with less feminine. But there’s something more to it, something I can’t describe (partly because it couldn’t exist quite like that outside of a comic strip I think). I wouldn’t call it the bisexual haircut, and it’s not quite a standard bowl. And the wings in the back are throwing me off. But without those, it does remind me of a little boy’s haircut.
Malaya’s new haircut does kinda look like the bisexual haircut to me.
Yotomoe wants to know your location
Special note on the composition: Willis doesn’t use thought bubbles much, and they’re boffo here. Also the last panel speech bubble really gets across how soft-pedaling nice Sal is trying to be.
Malaya, last panel: “Do you like it? Do you hate it? Does it provoke any reaktion in you? Did it give me your attention? Please let me know what you think so I can be contrary”
Malaya: “I dare you to say something that actually makes me angry.”
Sal: “I think you are actually a good person.”
Malaya: “Wait what?!”
Sal: “You like to pretend to be an obnoxious bongo to hide that you are a good person.”
Malaya: “I HATE YOU!!!!”
So if Sal says “I love your hair!” she’d go get her head shaved?
That seems very likely.
Poor Sal. Malaya’s just a passive aggressive time bomb. I’d drop her in the first quarter.
Sal has said that she hates change so I think it’ll take a while of Malaya being like this towards her for her to put in a room transfer request, because that’s a whole floor of new people (and she likes some of the people on this one)
Love her character design, hate her character. Kind of like a lotta people I know IRL. Huh.
This is what makes good villains: good designs and being so morally reprehensible that their defeats/deaths will be satisfying.
Nah, that’s a Hate Sink, which IS a kind of “good” villain, but not the only one. Good villains have complex motives and their own deep story arcs that make you sympathize.
Malaya is just an asshole.
God dammit, Malaya.
This brought up Feelings last night, and I blame Malaya for the nightmare I woke up from in the morning.
The annoying part is I can’t find words for any of it.
Hm. My thoughts on this is it brings up feelings similar to being around an abuser, where no matter what you say, you’re wrong. That can create a walking on egg shells feeling. Tension, anxiety, apprehension. In the context of the comic as a whole, it’s a bit different, but those are the main emotional associations I see from it.
How different is it in context of the comic?
Yeah. And being so, so angry but having no way of expressing it that wouldn’t make things worse, and being angry about not being able to express that anger, and so it just stays inside and makes you feel sick and trapped and helpless… So then you’re angry *and* nauseous… And you feel stupid for not being able to twist words the way they do, or at least call them out on it….
Seeing other people talk about the way my last roommate made me feel is really encouraging.
I can now also add Malaya to the Obligatory “Fuck You” List.
Eight, sir; seven, sir; Six, sir; five, sir; Four, sir; three, sir; Two, sir; one! Tenser, said the Tensor. Tenser, said the Tensor. Tension, apprehension, And dissension have begun …
The Demolished Sal?
I like the hair cut. That is all.
Yo, cool username!
I like it.
Malaya is the type of person you could never defeat in an argument because she uses a twisted logic that twists your words in her favor… kind of like what conservative mouthpieces and hyper jealous people that you shouldn’t involve with romantically.
Yeah, this has actually developed into an abusive relationship with Malaya as the abuser. I’m not saying that Sal is entirely blameless in the earlier phases of this conflict, but ever since Malaya moved in, Sal has attempted peace, whereas Malaya has harassed, bullied and gaslighted Sal.
Nasty piece of work.
IT’S CUTE
Am I supposed to like…ENJOY Malaya?
She’s DW from Arthur if DW grew up to be an even bigger pompous prick.
I would say she’s not really supposed to be well-liked or enjoyable most of the time. There are people that like her but I am not one of them.
You don’t look be like UltraCar
Meanwhile in Malaya’s head: “Come on ask about my hair, I’ve waiting all day for some recognition just ask about my.
Sal:…..So New Haircut?
Malaya: Couldn’t wait to chime in could you, you freaking busybody.
100% yup.
lmao I love this because it’s probably true.
What’s the likelihood that Malaya had a haircut just to provoke a response from someone?
Probably Amber, as it’s a shorter clone
I came into the comment section to comment on how this is a perfect encapsulation of why I can’t stand Malaya, but now people are getting me wondering if she’s going to wind up transmasc and I don’t know how to feel about that.
I mean, I love it, but it’s giving me a little internal war about whether I love it because I’m being sexist, thinking iher personality’d be okay if she was dude-adjacent, or whether there’s some kind of terrible trope she’d be subverting that would make it different, or whether my projected self-loathing is just that strong that imagining a hypothetical unambiguously horrible transmasc character makes me feel better.
So uh… boo, bullying Sal, or something, I don’t know
Nah her feminine side, ok when she focuses on herself as she is a narcissist, are the only times she is tolerable.
If she ever comes out, congrats to her (them?), but I’d still hate her. It would suck if the only canonically nb character were a horrible person though. Note to David Willis.
B/C Only Binary characters are assholes/ allowed to be complex interesting people, and Nonbinary/Lesbians/other sexualities need to be beacons of example?
I don’t care what Malaya identifies as, she will be an asshole regardless of who she sleeps with or what she identifies as
Note the word “only” in Pl0x’s comment. Also, Malaya doesn’t seem overly complex or interesting to me. Mostly I’m getting the asshole quality from her. Yes, only allowing LGBTQ+ characters to exist if they’re perfect is a bad way to go, but not being happy that your limited representation comes in the form of a character you don’t like isn’t some sin.
(limited and only referring to enby characters, since there are many other LGBTQ+ identities represented in the comic)
How different is it in context of the comic?
Supposed to be a reply
Malaya looks cuter than usual today.
Ok. Now get glasses, and you are the Amber clone.
Danny is suddenly inexplicably attracted to her, to annoyance of Sal . Which is what Malaya needs to be interested. Spite.
I’ve been wondering for a long time what it is that really grinds my gears with Malaya. Yes she is supposed to be very anti-everything and there to mess with the flow or whatever but why does she bother me
then i realized that (and i am not making this up) she reminds me of my twin sister, who does similar things to cut me down. For example, for one of my final essays I was supposed to write about something that changed my life and I wrote about going to camp and the other campers being supportive AF about me questioning my sexuality (revealed at some kind of “anonymously write down your secrets and then we will discuss them without revealing your names” thing; like half the camp was questioning as well)
She took the opportunity to point out that the board that read my essay probably gave me a good grade because they didnt wan to insult the LGBTQ+ community, instead of, y’know, my WRITING being actually GOOD or something
anyway I came out as bisexual last year and she told me that I probably only did it for attention (because she says I’m still the baby of the family or something??). She is not homophobic she just loves to cut me down.
At first I thought Malaya was really put together, now I see she doesn’t even have her snark under control.
Regarding Sal’s blue thought bubbles, is this what you could describe as ‘Malaya living rent-free in Sal’s head’?
craving the attention ain’t ya.
But Sal “she’s gonna yell at me either way” is kinda sad
Malaya would probably be pleased that she has Sal that intimidated.
I think it’s more than Sal is trying to actually make peace with her roommate. However, this is gonna fall flat on its ass because her roommate is Malaya.
I lived in a house with that kinda mindset about my roommates before, it’s not healthy.
Toxic Malaya
Sal is trying to push the right buttons but what she doesn’t realize is that Malaya has only one button
FIGHT ME!
Am I the only who thinks Malaya’s new haircut makes her seem less threatening and de-aged? I feel like if she came and yelled at my face now, it’d be like getting sassed by a tween with no bite. Sure, she could still try to throw hands but it wouldn’t be intimidating.
Yeah it almost makes you want to head pat her because she is small and cute.
Acting on that impulse would definitely result in a need for immediate cauterization and an eventual prosthetic.
Still worth it.
No way Malaya is powerful enough to remove a limb in such short order Sal? Sure, just look at her funny. Sarah? Maybe, given a baseball bat and sufficient pre-enraging. Dina? Just tell her that dinosaurs should have never had feathers.
But Malaya? Please, she’s Mercenary Tao trying to play footsies with Saiyans in Age 774.
WTF is going on here?
I love that people here are so supportive of queer people, but assuming that Malaya cutting her hair a bit shorter (it’s not even very short) must mean that she’s either a trans man or queer is really sexist.
Women can just have short hair, you know? (Malaya’s isn’t even very short!)
I have much shorter hair than Malaya, but that doesn’t make me or my hair masculine (nor does it mean that I am lesbian, although I am happy to say that my hairstyle was originally inspired by that of a really rad lesbian).
I guess tomboys went extinct in this day and age, huh?
Mostly I’d say it’s hopeful thinking, because if she’s bi/pan, then maybe eventually she’ll get with Marcie. Which is good for people who like Marcie and want to see her happy.
As for trans/nb, it’s based on a previous strip which could signal to her having a queer gender identity.
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2019/comic/book-9-comic/02-but-the-sun-still-shines/overwhelmingly/
Also, getting a haircut (or otherwise changing their hairstyle) is simply a common thing that queer people do when they come out, realize they’re queer, or they’re questioning their identity. It’s a sign of exploring their identity and expression. Sure, cis straight people do that too, but LGBT+ people even more so. And lots of readers here are queer, so they will naturally pick out signs of possible queer characters.
I’ll just say that despite Marcie’s current desire, I don’t want Malaya to get with Marcie precisely because I want to see Marcie happy.
I gotta agree with that. Or should we decide who to ship Marcie with on the rebound after SS Marcalaya crashes and burns?
Characters sexualities are consistent throughout different DW works. She was a flavor of queer before, so people are hoping this is her starting her exploration journey.
Malaya is confirmed not straight, as she dated ultra car in her humanoid chassis.
I’m not seeing the sexism? Nobody is insulting her. The way you seem so horrified that people might think someone is trans or queer is kinda shitty though
She isn’t upset people are assuming a character is queer. She’s upset because she is interpreting that people are coming to that conclusion based solely on a hair cut. It’s totally shitty for people to make identity assumptions based on physical traits butting also ignores that Malaya is a flavor of queer based on past works and that the queer coming out hair cut is an actual thing many people do to reclaim identity.
I’ve only seen theorizing, not concrete assumptions. Why tf should people need evidence to headcanon that a character is queer or non-binary?
Someone on Patreon noted Malaya’s resemblance to Buttercup.
Suitable gravatar is suitable.
Damned if you do, damned if you don’t, eh Sal?
Ahh, my favorite choice. No choice!
I tend to be oblivious to haircuts, so I won’t comment regardless because I don’t notice it at all.
Unless it is such a big change that I don’t recognize the person, in which case I don’t say anything because we haven’t been introduced.
Yes, the ol’ “If I never draw attention to myself, people won’t expect things from me,” trick.
Hoping Sal takes this opportunity to bail before she gets sucked in.
“Ah was tryin’ ta be friendly, but yer takin’ the same tack ya always do. Lates.”
Just get the hell out of dodge. No point in offering an olive branch when it’s going to be treated as poison literally every time because the receiver is an asshole. Give Malaya what Joyce gives Mike and Sal will be better off.
Internal monologue ban is becoming weaker!
This will end in Sal and Malaya having an affair, thus crushing Marcie’s heart.
“AH DID IT FOR YA!”
See my reply near the top.
I love Sal so much in this strip
willis draws so many amazing shirts. I want them all.
Do people really think in accents? I guess it makes sense, if your brain voice is yours.
Yep. Unless I’m thinking about words I can’t quite pronounce right – I was never much good at mandarin tones, so I tend to think the words the way I’ve heard other people say them instead of the mangled crap that comes out of my mouth.
Also, your own accent tends to sound to you like no accent at all – it’s all those *other* people who have accents, not you
As someone with a speech impediment, I think my internal voice is pretty different from what others hear– I certainly don’t *think* in a speech impediment. So I guess my internal accent is more a conglomeration of the speech I’ve been most exposed to, while my speech gets me asked if I’m from places that I’ve never even been.
And yeah, accent-wise I don’t tend to notice my speech as “accented” as much as “default,” even though in actuality it differs from the default of my usual environment. I only really notice it when I’m talking and things REALLY give out.
To Sal, it’s not an accent. To Sal, it’s all those yankees she’s surrounded by who talk funny.
Or, as my linguistics professor friend reminds us, everyone has an accent. The people who you don’t think have any accent, that just means they have the same accent that you have.
Horrible people can be hot. Malaya just got red hot.