February 2020’s second bonus strip is here and it’s got a late-night Sal and Malaya! I bet they’re getting along very well. All patrons can go check it out at the Dumbing of Age Patreon!
*whispers* you can also upgrade your pledge to see tomorrow’s strip riiiight nowwww
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Mike has transcended a la astral projection
or maybe asshole projection
Asshole projection. Stronger than Palpatine, but less annoying than Palpatine’s return.
Yep. Mike is calling her from the Asshole Plane.
My first mental image of that involved somebody bending over and squatting whilst pointing their bare bum at a white screen, in order to project video footage at it…
Staring at his phone that way I’m getting Quantum Leap vibes.
“Ziggy says today’s going to end in disaster.” “Who’s Ziggy?” “I don’t know, some reference my grandpa used to make.
I got that reference!
C’mon now, you don’t need to be grandparent-old to have seen Quantum Leap!
(Googles Quantum Leap and sees it’s been off the air for 27 years)
…Okay, you do have to be at least parent-of-a college-student age.
DVDs exist.
What’s a DVD?
it’s Netflix pressed into a physical shape.
It’s like a VHS tape, except worse in almost every way.
Ha, hardly. Higher resolution; able to jump instantly to any point, without having to wind the tape forward or back; and fewer moving parts to fail. Sure it’s got a finite lifespan, but so does magtape.
magtape does have a significantly longer shelf life than your standard disc based media, however there are archival dvd/blurays which have very good shelf life.
Asshal Projection?
Perhaps AssTrhole Projection?
Asshat projection.
Ass-Troll Projection
You nailed it!
Zoom out to reveal Hayden Christensen and Brendan Fraser standing next to him.
Which Brendan Fraser?
I’m guessing the School Ties version so she can imagine him naked shower-wrestling with Matt Damon.
Encino Man
Scrubs Reference. I got it.
“Where do you think we are?”
That scene WRECKED me. ;_;
They humped him back to life??
The need to make fun of people’s insecurities transcends death.
There was a Lupin the 3rd movie where Inspector Zenigata was in a coma and declared brain dead. Hearing Lupin’s name snapped him out of it and he immediately awoke and tried to arrest him.
Amber engaging in self-pity did the same to Mike.
Please tell me Mike isn’t dead and that’s Amber’s imaginary Mike
That’s the real Mike but he’s actually dead.
Pretty sure that Mike is imaginary, wether the original is alive or not…
Schroedinger’s Mike
Heisenburg’s Mike? You can know where he’s at, but not if he’s alive or dead. OOOorrrr, you can know if he’s alive or dead but not where he is; heaven, hell, purgatory, partying with Reah, wandering loose cannon between planes, like in The Terminal?
Sudden swerve – Mike has always been imaginary, every previous Mike scene was actually Amber, and it was Amber who fell off the stairs last night.
So who’s Walky’s roommate…?
Michael.
Amber in a blonde wig, obviously.
Thank you for giving that answer so I didn’t have to.
Yeah, it’s all in your head.
Asstral Projection RISE UP
Who’s that guy?
What would they do if they knew it was Michael?
Man, Eglamore has really gotten a new look today.
i got that reference!!!
Well, you know, sometimes he dresses up. This is just a bit more than normal.
Heh!
Wow, it has been a while since I last read that joke!
I approve.
Damn, first his hair breaks the laws of perspective and now his all of him breaks the laws of light refraction! What laws will he break next?
The law against screwing your mom. For a nickel.
I love how you can tell he’s not real by his lack of detailed color rendering
I never even noticed that. Is Amber hallucinating, or just imagining him? Hopefully the latter.
For me it wasn’t that, it was the fact he’s apparently phased half into her bed
You can see his legs actually in the last panel, there’s some blue shapes that look like legs that were not in previous panels anyway.
So is this her Inner Mike or her Outer Mike? Because it’s hard to tell.
Based on the art, Inner Mike.
BTW Willis, good job on the art today. I normally kind of skim art in comics(sorry), but you managed to make Mike noticeable enough that I picked up on something being different instantly, but without turning him into a force ghost.
Don’t flatter yourself, amber. There was exactly zero chance of Walky getting any studying done today.
Correct.
Just today?
Yess!!!
Oh god he isn’t shaded it actually happened
Or he is hurt somewhere. This is her memory of what happened bleeding from AG to Amber mixing with her anxiety and self loathing.
I think the barrier between Amber and AG is about to break and she is gonna remember what happened and it will not go well.
Alternate theory—
This is the Mike from the Walkyverse somehow projected into the DoAverse for reasons
Okay, so, place your bets here – is he really here or do I need to be more worried about Amber than usual?
I can say one thing for sure- if Willis just forgot to add the shade layer to Mike I imagine there’s some headsmacking right now. 😀
I think yes and yes.
A real mike would be visible in 3 other panels.
No, he’s not here. Yes, you should be worried.
If you didn’t consider that Amber needs therapy and that she needs it right now, then yes, you should be more worried than usual.
Already thought that but hallucinating’s a new one.
The ‘most likely hallucinating’ is a new and exciting level of ‘wait, FUCK,’ but honestly given that may well be a stress/only partially suppressed trauma thing and not permanent (except for, you know, how she had AG screaming ‘No’ as the mask a while back seriously GOD Amber you need qualified psychological support), I’m at least as worried about ‘having sex with Walky and enjoying it means I’m garbage.’ Because even if Sal gives her blessing so you’ll shut up about it already, Amber still thinks they’re not supposed to. And even though clearly Walky was not gonna study WHATSOEVER, especially not while you two were going all ‘I want you! But I can’t! But that makes me want you more!’, they were supposed to be studying and her taking up that time is a personal failing on her part.
I don’t think I was quite worried about ‘the fact that I like you is proof that I’m garbage’ up to this point, but in hindsight the signs were very much there and GOD, that’s up there with ‘We ruin everything we touch… Both of us, we’re already ruined. We can touch each other.’ for ‘holy shit that’s a deeply unhealthy mindset to have for a relationship.’ (I wanted to look up that strip just to confirm to myself that one was bad, and it was even worse than I remembered, sweet FUCK Billie. August 30, 2014 for those checking since I still can’t remember how to get links working properly. Also, wow, we’re coming up on six years since the Sexy Lesbian Suicide Pact.)
Jeez Amber. Where do you think we are?
Updoot for the Scrubs reference. And shit. Now I can’t even delude mused that Mike survives.
Holy shit, a wild Mike appears!
WHO YOU GONNA CALL?
Your mom, obviously.
Like
But will it be FOR A PENNY?
W-… Was I the only one that fell for it or…?
Yeah this is 95% a subconscious thing.
*plays the Michael J. Fox cover of “Johnny B. Goode” on a little Bluetooth speaker in the corner*
Try the Judas Priest cover instead. It’s everything the Fox cover tried to be, but better!
is Mike even there? i hope he’s there
Hey Mike! Who’s minding the store?
Um,what?
I’m assuming this is real. If Mike had died, or even been hospitalized, it would have been pretty clear he had been assaulted by someone even if there was no clear proof of who did it. It likely would have been some kind of campus incident that most of the characters would be aware of and Robin would have absolutely brought it up when talking about how she got extra security for Becky. The idea that Mike could have secretly died with no one knowing is just a little too far fetched
Counterpoint: he’s comfortably lying back in Amber’s bed (where he was clearly not 0.5 seconds ago, and the comic went to lengths to show us so), and he’s entirely unshaded, strikingly unlike everyone else in today’s strip.
Counterpoint: Becky has been shown to be able to teleport out of her dress, so this may be comical exaggeration of… Something
Or they were so horny they didn’t mind him being there.
She didn’t teleport out of the dress, she tore it off.
So super strength, not teleportation. That’s Joyce’s power.
And Dina’s.
What’s Mike standing on, Linkman?
The floor. Just past the end of her bed. Also Mike is too shaded. His forehead is shaded just under his hair and his neck is shaded under his chin. On the other hand if Mike were just hanging around it would be in the room he shares with Sally, not the room Amber shares with Dinogirl and Amazigirl.
But alive or dead, this is pure Mike.
In other news my spell correct still wants to change Walky to Sally each and every time.
Compare the last panel to the first. How much taller is Mike than Walky? Which side is Mike standing on of the head of the bed (pink plank)?
In case you genuinely don’t know what people mean when they say he’s not shaded: yes, there are shadows in his line-art, but his coloring is flat.
Compare it to Mike’s shading in https://www.dumbingofage.com/2019/comic/book-10/02-to-remind-you-of-my-love/empathizing/ Are you claiming he was a force ghost there as well?
Mike literally has shading on his hair and skin in that very strip.
Shading on his eatm the sided of his head, under his sleeve at his forearm, and significantly more shading on his neck than ‘thick line under his head’, VS none of the above
Mike is sitting on the bed. You can see part of his kegs next to Amber’s elbow.
Only it isn’t there in the panel before, so he is either Joyce or a ghost
He’s not standing, he’s lying on the bed right where Amber and Walky were 30 seconds ago. You can see his knee through the side-rail. The fact that you couldn’t see the knee in the frame before should be a big clue that something is up in either the DOAverse or Amber’s perception of it.
Odd though it may seem, there are time gaps between panels.
Blaine and Ross probably took the body, dead or alive. Then they either disposed of him if he was dead, or they’re holding him somewhere if he’s alive
What if
Mike has been her imaginary friend this whole time
and all the times he interacted with other characters was just her writing fanfiction of her life
This adds weight to my “DoA is St. Elsewhere and Amber is Tommy Westphall” conspiracy theory.
Mike has never been real, he is just a mass halluzination – everyone projects their dark side onto him.
I quite like this idea.
Slipshine of Walky jizzing his pants when?
Jokes aside, if this isn’t legitimately Mike, having her not acknowledge him, and having him with his phone out (playing with it? Having recorded the hump session?) seems like a bit of an odd choice. Hmm.
Eurgh! Walky is off to a class with his boxers full of baby-batter.
Did he start washing his clothes yet?
Tissues are a thing.
Tissues are only poor to medium at getting semen out of cloth when you have rubbed it in.
More likely he rubbed it out.
That, too.
He’s just appeared out of nowhere, though ~ the space where his legs are in the last panel was visible, and empty, in the panels before.
The dialog doesn’t seem to be taking a long break before the last panel, either; he’s riffing on what she just said.
Come on, that would be ridiculous.
Walky Performs a Dryhump
I love how after all the hidden spellings of “Mike” throughout the strips the textbook Wally is holding has Mike’s hair on it.
And now we’re reaching peak mental breakdown, and God I am ready for it. LET THE MERGE OF ALTER EGO AND AMBER COMMENCE.
“Merging” is not common with DID, nor is forcing it recommended. I doubt that’s where we’re ultimately going with Amber’s storyline.
What hidden spellings of “Mike”? I went back and checked but I’m oblivious and can’t find any
Willis has been hiding the word “Mike” (sometimes split up across panels, with one holding “M”, the next “I”, and so on) in many, and possibly all, of the strips featuring Amber since the Fall.
I went back and found a couple in the windows of wide shots. Are there others? Can’t find any in the strips that only have closeups
The last strip in which Amber and Walky appeared had M-I-K-E successively appear on the cover of Dina’s textbook.
I went back and found M-I-K-E in all Amber strips post-getting-out-of-bed.
Man, Willis is clever.
Me too.
Is that symbolic for Mikes fate lingering in her subconscious or is Willis screwing with us?
The fact that it’s specifically the Amber strips suggests that it represents her subconscious (or maybe Amazi-Girl) whispering about the Big Event she can’t remember
Porque no dos?
I went back through all the most recent strips tagged with Amber. I don’t know how but I completely failed to notice this until you mentioned it.
Same here!
Hidden in plain sight. Well done, Willis!
Alters don’t merge together at random like that and certainly not during a mental breakdown (which would prove to AG that she needs to be around). AG’s memories might eventually leak through but that won’t be because they’re merging. That’s kind of a thing the alter has to be willing to do and can’t be forced into from my knowledge and not everyone wants to do that.
Amazi-Girl couldn’t just write Amber a note? (Not sure if I’m kidding or not.)
I assume that if this wasn’t actually Mike, he wouldn’t be tagged.
We’ve had dream-characters and photographs tagged. Blaine was also tagged when he appeared to Amber in a figment of her imagination for cutting Ryan up and thus proving herself a “true O’Malley”.
This manfestation of Blaine:
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2017/comic/book-7/04-the-do-list/proved/
is clearly imagined, not actually present.
And Blaine is shaded and fancy coloured, undermining the “mikes not shaded” comment above.
.
.
WILLIIIIIIIIIIIIIIISSSSSSS!
Sometimes Willis uses the wrong tag and then changes them after the reveal.
So either this is entirely legitimate or just a figment of her imagination designed to deal with her internalized guilt for failing to save him when she had the chance.
I think that explains the “little less crazy” “wait for it” because…the next comic is probably her realizing that she’s talking to a figment of her imagination designed to deal with her internalized guilt for failing to save him when she had the chance.
That ain’t really Mike; it’s his Force ghost.
The jerk side of the Force is strong in this one.
The jerk side of the Force is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be unnatural.
Like trolling people, gaslighting, misinformation, and throwing nickels at moms.
If you strike me down, I shall become more of an asshole than you can possibly imagine.
Amber, stop sabotaging yourself and Walky! You need help and- MIKE IS ALIVE! MIKE IS ALIVE! MIKE IS ALIVE!
… Or is he? Knowing Amber’s fractured mind, he is probably an hallucination and this is the Fight Clu-Ouch! Okay, I know we don’t talk about it!
FINALLY SOMEONE LET ME OUT OF MY CAGE
NOW, TIME FOR ME IS NOTHING CAUSE I’M COUNTING NO AGE
Now I couldn’t be there
Now you shouldn’t be scared
I’m good at repairs
And I’m under E’s snare!
If I keep self control
I’ll be safe in my soul
AND YOU’VE BEEN DOING JUST FINE
Maybe Mike was too obnoxious for Hell.
Well he’s alive, kind of expecting a broken leg or something
Wait, now I amthinking he is not really there
HE NOT DEAD.
Given that boring outcome, it was sure worth excruciatingly dragging out for a month! Maybe!
Wait for it.
…is Mike making fun of her for hallucinating him? How very Mike.
This is how Willis is getting around the No Death Rule, and how he’ll resolve Joyce’s crisis of faith: Heaven is real, and Mike is pulling an unsolicited Angels in the Outfield for everyone he knew.
I don’t know that Willis would go and solidfy heaven being real or not. Wether he believes or not, it certainly doesn’t seem likely based on what has been shared of his background, but it also doesn’t fit the style of his narative. Certainly the human condition provides no such guarantees beyond the perspective of individual opinion.
Is Mike gonna convince her that having memory gaps is serious enough to get hit the ‘Emergency Therapy ” button?
“Don’t drink me”
Amazing how many people think Mike’s not dead just because Amber is hallucinating him now.
Look more carefully people. It’s impossible for real Mike to be there because he’s not in the exact same spot in 3 other panels. Walky didn’t see him in the bed he was just in. It’s a hallucination.
He’s taken a level-up in Dina-apparition.
Yes it’s probably not the real Mike, but oddly enough, people moving between panels is a thing.
Moving up and into the bed with no panels showing that movement and no one noticing? It’s not impossible, but it’s definitely implausible and a weird way to set up the comic.
He’s past the headboard, not in the bed. Or at least he would be if he weren’t all in her mind. The important point is that he would be hanging around Walky’s room and not hers.
Slow clap. Welcome back, Mike.
Fuck, I should’ve noticed the lack of shading on him.
You should have also noticed a similar style with Mike in many previous strips. Not the recent ones that occurred at night, but I linked above to a relatively recent one for comparison. https://www.dumbingofage.com/2019/comic/book-10/02-to-remind-you-of-my-love/empathizing/
Mike’s hair and skin have a subtle sheen in the strip you just linked. Not so in today’s strip.
This is multiple levels of Not Good.
….. is this a loophole for “Nobody dies”?
….Is mike tall or did he teleport onto the bed and is lying down in it or is this a mental thing going on
His legs are visible on the bed. He’s in a lounging pose.
That’s the sheet, not his legs.
The sheet is a lighter color.
Either Mike cashed in all his nickels for a respawn or he paid half price to come back as a ghost. Let’s find out!
Or he such an asshole he got kicked out of hell.
Mike Durden
Is Mike really there?
Obviously not real Mike (barring super powers) but I’m hoping this is more akin to the Blaine ghost we saw way back when. If a student died on campus surely people would know.
This does not bode well.
I’ve got a really bad feeling about this
I feel like I just stepped into the crazy zone. I don’t feel safe feeling relieved.
Its Walkyverse Mike and only Amber can see him
“To Remind You of My Love”
Makes sense for Walkyverse Mike, who canonically died
Twice
The simple shadows and black shirt really do make him look like the Walkyverse version
What if Amazigirl is also Walkverse Amber ?
She’s in disguise??!
Turning the superhero she invented and the guy she married into inhabitants of her brain is really horrifying. I’m glad I’m not a Walkyverse/DoA character
So is the Mike that fell the imaginary one or is this the one, we will have to wait.
“Hello, I’m ghost!Mike and I’m your new alter.”
Mike is now a Force ghost haunting Amber.
So Mike is either a ghost, a projection of Amber’s subconsciousness, or a timeline reset happened and the events of the previous night never happened.
I’m guessing that he’s a DID alter created by the stress of seeing Mike die. He’ll live rent-free in Amber’s head as the voice of her dark side (what people have previously called ‘Red Amber’) – both in terms of her insecurities and her urge to cause harm to others for her own convenience.
This is very intelligent and if you are right I will be really mad.
I pretty much concur with your analysis. *nods sagely*
Nnnnnoooooooo no mo nkno kknononononononononononoNO
At first, without reading everything, I instantly spotted Mike and I was so relieved.
“Finally. But, FU Willis for making us so anxious over this.”
But then, after reading it all…
“yeeee, that’s an imaginary Mike
*fists towards the sky*
DAMN YOU WILLIS!!!”
I can’t tell if this is actually Mike and he’s somehow alive, or if Amber’s just imagining him there.
Mie is a tulpa, now.
Mike, welcome to the Tulpa Zone
So he died and she is either in denial or keeping it from everyone.
Man died like a hero thou
Amber and Amazi-Girl aren’t sharing memories anymore, and only the latter knows something happened to Mike.
Except Amber seems to subconsciously know something’s wrong, and who knows what her subconscious might tell her through “Mike”.
I like to think all the subtle hints in Amber’s recent appearances are from Amazi-Girl frantically pounding on their shared cubicle wall.
“Shit’s seriously important this time! STOP IGNORING ME!!”
Fairly sure that everyone is right and this is not a corporeal Mike, but for a second I was convinced that the punchline of this strip was that Mike had been fine this entire time and we’d all been stressing ourselves out over nothing.
I feel you, this was me as well. Then I missed *happy noises* in the comments and started reading the conversation in more detail. Now I’m sad.
Likewise.
We still don’t know if Mike is dead or not.
Mike, where the FuCK IS YOUR SHADING you sneaky momboinker
I came out to my girlfriend last week. I’m agender and also drunk while I type this. Fuck gender I don’t want it. All of my best decisions lately have been made while drunk, but in a not gross way, let’s keep an eye on that, I don’t regret them when I sober up, keep it that way. Anyway, Mike isn’t gummi shaded like Abmer, just like in JOIce’s dream. He’s an hologramic hallucination like Rimmer, or M I imagining it
Hey, congrats on coming out to your girlfriend. I’m agender myself.
Yumi, you’re cool. You’re gonna prosperous soon I promise you.
Congrats on coming out. Maybe keep some aspirin handy today, though.
Gonna have green hair tomorrow. Chemical smells r gone be good for hangover Taffy, thanks for the aspirin advice.
Congratulations!
Congratulations!
Congratulations!
oh my god i didn’t notice the shading. that nails it
also congrats on coming out!
Congrats on coming out and on having green hair. Both are awesome.
To paraphrase Johnny Dangerously: Willis, you farging icehole
Willis drew bedhead on Amber. It’s surprisingly effective!
Is “effective” the new hip lingo for “hot as hecky”
I now feel compelled to start saying “Hot as hecky”.
Please, keep seated and fasten your seatbelts. We are approaching turbulence.
Also: Dumbing of Age Book 10: Oh. Wait for It.
… so IF this is Amber hallucinating (which I think is likely), then this isn’t going to be the real Mike (obviously). He isn’t going to have the real Mike’s true personality, or any insights beyond what Amber can produce on her own. He’s not going to show growth from his last-minute epiphany. His personality will really be Amber’s perception of the real Mike’s personality, and his words will actually be an expression of her own subconscious.
Right now, her subconscious is telling her she’s crazy.
I really enjoyed this comic but I think I’m done.
You’re a person your feelings are valid. You have value as an individual and your choices are yours to make.
Por
QUE!!!??????
Oh Mike, you show up and immediately are filming Amber’s self pity rant.
I’d love if that was real Mike not Psycho figment mike
What’s the diff, exactly?
It would mean that Mike is alive and unharmed rather than another splinter of Amber’s already-shattered psyche developing its own independent existence.
I don’t think this means “developing its own independent existence” any more than her chat with Blaine after coming back from the stabbing mean that.
Though there she did seem to know at once he wasn’t really there.
CALLED IT
OR MAYBE I DIDN’T
DAMN YOU WILLIS
So I am assuming Mike is dead and this is some sort of projection as a memorial for him was mentioned a while ago in Something positive
Hold up, what memorial?! Link, please!
For whatever reason cannot post the link. The date of the comic was Jan 27th. Has a memorial wreath for mike in it
Your link: https://www.somethingpositive.net/sp01272020.shtml
I don’t HTML, I’m too lazy for that…
But Something Positive isn’t in continuity with Dumbing of Age. It’s in continuity with Shortpacked.
So I guess Walkyverse Mike is dead? Sorry, Walkyverse Amber.
It’s not so bad. That Mike has gotten better before. Even Dina did, by the end.
…Dude, where did you enter from ? 😐
also you BETTER have removed your shoes first.
Reading this Comic makes me hurt inside. But not reading, ie skipping a couple a’ days, isn’t any better. The feels hurt, and not knowing hurts, an’ imma shut up now.
I feel you. Been hurting a little from not knowing. Now it hurts more even though we still don’t really know…
Amber is getting worse. Now she start having visions!
I’m a call it. If a college student had died on campus, it’d have made the local news and people would have been talking about it. The fact that no one has even heard of anything up to this point means that Mike is alive. Because a college student being seriously injured after going to a party isn’t news.
So a few complications to that. We know after the incident Amber got back to her room. We don’t know what happed to the Evil Dad Alliance. If we assume AG/Amber freaked out and just bolted and Toe Dad helped Blaine up from the rope Blaine could have talked Toe Dad into helping him either hide the body or kidnap the injured Mike (because if Toe Dad was arrested for this he could’t “save” his daughter from her wicked ways, so God must want him to help cover this up… that is exactly the kind of thing Blaine would do).
Another possibility is that Mike falling broke AG completely. Loosing her firm superhero moral compass she goes off the rails and either kills or deeply injures both Toe Dad and Blaine (or Toe Dad runs off and she cuts the rope). Then to protect Amber “Dark AG” disposes of the bodies/stashes the injured out of site. This would be the “DC Injustice” version.
Personally, I don’t think that’s “imagination Mike”, I think that’s the real Mike. But real Mike isn’t actually real Mike. Instead, this is all part of the Roomies/It’sWalky/Joyce&Walky universe, and Head Alien is real and has been controlling the plot all along to drive Amber insane and pave the way for Head Alien’s return.
And no, I’m not suggesting anything silly like Mike being Head Alien in disguise. That would be just bonkers!
Mike is obviously a disguised Monkey Master.
You are my hero.
“So Amber, wanna see a fun video of when you blacked out last night and murdered your dad?”
Blaine dead instead of Mike? that sounds good to me
Why not both?
Sorry, “both” is often an option people overlook
Wait, this isn’t all happening like, the day of Mike getting murked?
I assumed that we had just jumped back in time a day or two, maybe even a couple hours, and all the stuff with Mike and Blaine and whatnot is currently yet-to-happen.
also, and this shows what i get for not talking to anyone else about the strip – i’d firmly convinced myself that Amber really has quit being Amazi-Girl and we’ve been watching Dorothy for the last however long in the strip, which is why she’s so tired all the time. She’s been doing her studies AND doing Amazi-Girl stuff to keep the legend alive.
No. No, we haven’t. That would make everything blue.
It’d make absolutely no sense for any of the events of today to have happened before the party (which took place at the same time as Mike’s encounter with the Evil Dads).
At the party, Joyce and Dorothy would’ve had more pressing concerns than the Jacob Fiasco (as in, she would’ve been far more worried about Toedad being up for bail).
If the events of “today” were indeed part of a backwards time-jump then Robin would’ve arrived before the party took place. So no one, especially Becky, should’ve been surprised at her showing up.
oh, cool, shows what i get for never ever reading the comments lol
Why does a living Mike seem implausible, while a buff and agile Blaine in a super-hero costume remains perfectly OK with everyone?
Living Mike seems plausible to me, but maybe completely uninjured Mike is not quite the same thing.
Same.
Eh, I’m kinda reverse on that.
Blaine putting on a mask was… a bit of a step too far (for my taste).
Mike only fell like a story and a half.
Perfectly survivable, though probably screwed his leg up for a bit.
Hello, Darkness, my old friend.
I once again state that I ship Amber/Therapy.
I’m not sure why we’re under the impression that the options are “Amber is hallucinating and Mike is dead” or “Amber isn’t hallucinating and Mike is alive.”
I honestly believe Amber is hallucinating and Mike is alive. That’s not the real Mike. The real Mike might’ve been kidnapped or he’s currently hospitalized, and this is Amber’s mind trying to communicate to her the fact that something happened to him by projecting Mike’s personality and image. There’s no way he’s been in the room, in that bed, this whole time. But that doesn’t mean he’s dead.
I want it noted that I am a psychic because I made a comment on the strip Brainspace on Valentine’s Day about a dream I had that Mike’s next appearance would be him casually uninjured. Whether he is a hallucination or not, I don’t know yet, but I am counting it regardless.
“Counting it regardless” – sounds like you’ve already mastered an important part of being psychic. 😉
Yes, you must count all victories, even technical victories.
I try really hard not to take advantage of my patreon-granted ability to see the future, but days like today, it is IMPOSSIBLE not to go look!
Days like today are a solid reason to Patron. But before you peek ahead one day, you should remember that it was the mind of Willis that created Mike.
So… Mike has died and his spirit possessed Amber?
Mike just poof-ed into existence, like Jeannie.
From this point forward, DoA is a 60s magical housewife sitcom.
Mike has just been in Amber’s head all along, the pinnacle of her self loathing directed outward.
Does this mean it was technically a threesome?
For those still potentially wondering if this Mike is real or not. He’s not. This is Amber and Dinah’s dorm noted mostly by that toy in panel 1 which looks more transformeresque than any toy Walky would have. Also Dinah was here moment before the humping. You could argue that perfectly safe and not jn a coma Mike walked all the way to the girls dorm and hid in the corner of a room just to watch Amber and Walky grind on each other or that the two dragged Dinah to Walky’s room just so she could stop them from fucking but my question for both those theories is why? It’s a ghost Mike. Ambs be cray.cray.
Wait so Amber is saying that since she’s a terrible person she deserves guilt so she can continue to make terrible decisions because that guilt is what she deserves anyway?
To be fair Walky put the idea in her head via Garbage Roof.