A witch accidentally marries a monster, and now she and her familiar has to navigate life around her monstrous husband and her even more terrifying in-laws.
Guilded Age
T Campbell, John Waltrip, Florence Machina
Welcome to the saga of the working-class adventurer! Enjoy the complete story with new annotations daily!
No End
Erli, Kromi
A queer romance about people attempting to build lives in a cold, post-apocalyptic world ravaged by hordes of undead.
Cyanide & Happiness
Explosm
Satire, dark humor and surreal humor.
Paint the Town Red
Windy, Winter Jay Kiakas
Winona runs a werewolf shelter with partner in crime, Odile in the Gothic city of Merlot. One day they take in an injured vampire, and soon unravels many of the dark secrets of Merlot.
Shaderunners
Alex Assan, Lin Darrow
A ragtag band of bootleggers open a speakeasy for bottled colour in the greyscale city of Ironwell.
All Known Alternatives
Karolina 'Kajotko' Jankiewicz
Akane has only one way to get back home: collect the 42 keys to parallel worlds. Eri and Ben are just trying to get through the summer before university. When a magical key turns up in an old spare set, all three are forced to change their plans and fast.
Dumbing of Age
David M Willis
Joyce has been homeschooled her entire life until now, when she's suddenly a freshman in college! Things don't go well.
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To be fair, the fallout ultimately happened because Danny decided to say something incredibly insensitive to Ethan right outside the room a comatose Mike was in.
Look it’s easy to misremember things, and Danny did say “would it be so bad if Mike didn’t wake up for a while” which is the sort of thing that ages extremely poorly when Mike never wakes up at all.
I’ve been permanently traumatized from citing individual strips because one time I wrote an essay on Joyce’s character motivations with 15 of them at the start of the Faith-Off and the final entry was proven wrong the next day.
The last part was about how I read Joyce as still deeply respecting Becky’s religious beliefs and that she, personally, viewed her newfound atheism as a failure state. That she still wanted to be Christian but couldn’t anymore, but thought well of Becky for keeping it going.
I still feel pretty firmly that Joyce’s word choices were self-directed, in that she was criticizing herself for believing all the horrible chaos she had endured was part of a divine plan and not random bullshit from people who were supposed to protect and love her, but they were self-directed in that she was blaming the worldview, culture and life that led her to that horrible chaos to begin with.
The commentariat seems to be overlooking the inconvenient reality that Danny is also hooking up with the girl who held Ethan hostage with a knife at his throat during her botched convenience store robbery.
Ever see the Sound of Music? Danny has become Rolf as far as Ethan is concerned. Amber got her catharsis by stabbing Sal but Ethan has every reason to fear and hate her.
Last I remember, Ethan really wasn’t fussed about Sal after she approached him. I can crack open my copy of whichever book that was in, to double check.
Ethan and Sal squared things forever ago, and even earlier when he just knew that she was at the college he told Amber that the three of them were just kids and she had probably changed. Just in this story he told Amber that Sal could do better than Danny.
I think it’s distinctly possible Ethan will take that back, like hypothetically he starts resenting Sal because he forgave her for Amber’s sake and never really got to deal with it for himself, but Sal’s pretty pointedly not a reason he’s mad at Danny.
As long as he doesn’t go deep down a selectively considered “what if” butterfly effect tangent.
Mike went splat because of something to do with Amazi-Girl. The gas station robbery catalyzed Amazi-Girl’s existence as part of Amber’s trauma processing mechanism. Sal was the perpetrator in the gas station robbery.
“Therefore, if Sal hadn’t robbed the convenience store, Mike wouldn’t have gone splat.”
I really hope he doesn’t process it that way, because it’s irrational, but his train of thought could go there…
I do actually think this’d be a pretty easy thing for Ethan to go through, but that’s because I think of Ethan right now as someone who’s reevalated his existing relations and found them wanting, which’ll make it a drama bomb if he ever finds out Blaine only drove him and Amber that night because Mike thought it’d be funny. Less something he’d do as an objective fact and more out of grief and the constant drama he gets pulled into.
This isn’t meant to sound like a condemnation, but if Amber/Danny/Sal/Mike were going through what Ethan is now, I think he’d be poking and prodding at them to be supportive, because being a wall to lean against has been his thing. What I wonder now, though, is if he’d perceive his withdrawal from the rest of the cast as something they allowed; like if they really cared, they’d keep trying like he did for Amber.
I remember this moment, where Ethan sees Sal’s doubt and uncertainty, and seemingly the moment where she surrendered and let him go. I think once the actual robbery was over he mostly felt bad for her, he’s always seemed aware that she was a kid too.
You can see those emotions in the way she’s handling the knife! And again, she seems to have let him go and surrendered, which is hard to miss from his perspective.
They outwardly hated each other but ironically could have been the kind of friend the other needed. Danny is is usually passive, but was one of the only characters to call out Mike’s shitty behaviour to his face, and call his friends out for tolerating it. Mike in turn seemed to respect Danny for this, and the few times he subtly hinted at his own feelings happened while talking to or about Danny.
Is it just me, or does anyone else think that all the character arcs (except maybe Ethan’s) are resolving? If Amber takes Joe’s advice and Joe takes Amber’s, he tries again with his newfound perspective to date Joyce. She might well be interested at this point. Amber hates herself less each day, Sal finds romance with Danny, Ruth with Jason. Dina and Becky find a physical point they can both deal with, Becky and Joyce get along despite their deep difference in religion, which does not change. Dorothy sees she is needle more at Yale and changes schools, and Ethan meets someone who cheers him up. Storyline ends.
Well, they’re “resolving” in that DoA isn’t “supposed” to go past freshman year and we’re now in the second semester. We’re in the second half of the total story, basically.
I wouldn’t say they’re resolving so much as the cast is now slowly moving towards the characters they’ll be at the end of the strip, in that “Joe taking Amber’s advice” and “Joe asks Joyce out” would be separate plots that each have their own runtime. Sal’s dating Danny now, that’s something that’s happened after seven years of first befriending Danny and very gradually opening up to him to the point of calling them friends and then opening up some more when she realized that she wanted to be with him, but it’s still going to have its own ups and downs and the question there is “if they’re dating now, will they by the end?”
Dorothy getting the letter to Yale is the most pointed indicator of the series being on a timer now, except that timer can last for as long as it likes; we skipped all of November and December to get to January and who knows how long this semester will last, we just know it’s most likely going to end with Dorothy leaving and the series ending.
I don’t anticipate ‘we won’t move past freshman year’ being an ironclad rule by now so much as a realistic assessment of the time scale. It took us TEN YEARS to get through the first semester. Maybe in another ten years Willis will want to do something new again, but this was designed to be a comic he could make forever even if young kids meant not staying up to date on Nerd Discourse or the latest toy drama that were ultimately key parts of Shortpacked, not just ‘wanting to play with the characters in a new setting’. (This has not proven to be the case, but it was still the concept.) If Willis still wants to keep writing Dumbing of Age in another 10-15 years, even if we are moving to the end of the spring semester by then, the series is designed so he can do so. (I believe the original FAQ question was questioning the idea of leaving the fall semester.) There are plenty of ways to either keep Dorothy on the cast (concluding that she can go to Yale for law school, for instance, because she’s better served in undergrad building connections with her friends and professors than getting a marginally more prestigious undergrad degree, or doing occasional cuts to Yale where she goes through her own storylines including some payoff about Leland being there,) or tweak the cast to accommodate her absence (Howie and Faz could both be at college sophomore year without fudging established ages TOO much, introducing a new character who’s order-oriented and everyone immediately goes ‘what the hell it’s a smaller Dorothy’, giving background characters more screentime.)
If Willis does want to move on, he can start moving things into endgame whenever… but I do think planning that move ten years in advance might be unlikely, especially since by that point the twins would be fifteen-sixteen. (In other words, thinking about college themselves.) Ten years ago we were still operating under ‘no one important will die because the grieving will take forever’ and ‘Amazi-Girl will never be shown unmasked… well, yeah, Amber might still be around but we won’t see it confirmed and Amber’s still in Shortpacked so she probably won’t have a major role.’ (This was originally a thing! It hasn’t been a thing for longer than it was ever a thing, it’s been broken and subverted and technically accurate in complicated ways in every possible iteration, and I don’t blame people who don’t remember it was ever a thing because it was SO long ago, but like, it WAS originally a thing.) Ten years ago the idea of exploring Sal/Danny again was pretty much unthinkable. Blaine hadn’t actually been reintroduced yet ten years ago and wouldn’t for a while yet, but when he was introduced Willis said ‘Amber’s Blaine’s only kid, Faz is his stepson’ and later admitted they forgot ever saying that when Faz came back years down the line. Plans are malleable as the plot develops.
I think it’s amazing that this is a strip where the Creator comes to the comments section to hang out and is greeted as just “one of the folks”. Makes me grateful for what a welcoming and kind space this is here. I mean that with all sincerity — I am genuinely grateful to meet youse all.
(Even though I can’t sing any of their songs properly because Steve Perry’s a countertenor and I sound more like Brad Roberts from Crash Test Dummies with a head cold.)
I think I might have made this one up. I don’t remember it from any local stores and there’s no hint of it in my search histories. It’s just a puffer hoodie vest with a striped sleeve shirt.
Sometimes I feel crazy for not being fond of this song, like it’s fine but it’s not even the best song on the album named after it imo and I see people all the time treat it like it’s “emo bohemian rhapsody”
That might not be a bad thing maybe? This could easily sound gatekeeper-y, but do super fans prefer a great song by [artist they like] being the one that gets flogged to death in the mainstream or something not so great, leaving “secret” treasures for themselves?
ACTUAL FANS’ preferred songs are irrespective of their popularity. The opinions of people who go “it’s popular so it’s good” and “it’s popular so it sucks” (aka hipsters) can be safely disregarded in any and all cases.
On the other hand, there’s something to the “flogged to death in the mainstream” issue. Or at least there used to be – I’ve got no idea what mainstream music even is these days when there’s access to so much.
Back in the day, the popular songs often got so massively overplayed on the radio you’d get sick of them, even if you did like them.
Maybe it’s because I associate it with Gurren Lagann AMVs, but I honestly have a hard time thinking of Welcome to the Black Parade as an “emo” song. It just plain slaps.
The reason it’s treated like “Emo Bohemian Rhapsody” has to do with the operatic, changing structure of the song; more than anything else. It’s not my fave MCR song either but bruh, you gotta recognize it’s iconic ;3
Somehow, I completely missed the early-2000s emo wave, even though I was its target demographic at the time. I only remember a few of the really big hits that were on heavy rotation on the radio and in Newgrounds portal submissions.
Too busy rifling through the bargain bins at the thrift stores looking for 70s and 80s metal and prog rock, I guess…
For me, it’s definitely a result of this really being the only song of theirs that I’ve heard, and it’s structure reminded me of a sonic song (adventure 2 era), which I was really into at the time.
That said, I could easily believe that there’s better songs on the album, as I always felt Through the Fire and the Flames was the worst of all the songs on Inhuman Rampage.
I had to look up what song this was (“Welcome to the Black Parade,” by My Chemical Romance) because I can almost never tell a song by its lyrics. Not even sure if I’ve ever heard the song before.
There’s some songs where I can tell by the lyrics what it is, but for a lot of songs even if I’ve heard them before, I can’t always tell what song it is with just the lyrics.
Aww, at first I thought they were singing together while Danny played. And I thought it was the sweetest, most adorable thing. This is only a little bit slightly less sweet.
This is adorable, and I am glad Sal isn’t clamming up due to people going by. Like, I know she’s sang with Danny before, but it seems like it’s usually been in total privacy.
Last time this happened they were sitting in exactly the same spot and Marcie and Malaya walked right by her and she saw Amazi-girl watching her from a distance.
Well it’s a bit more problematic for songs with a great role of sustained notes, since uke can sounds a bit dry, but I guess that with an electric one and effects you could even play Ligeti’s Ricercata…
Also, because of time slip, a song that would’ve been PRIMO emo teen fuel when this comic started probably is a “classic” to them now. (Black Parade came out in 2006, so when the comic started the cast would’ve been 14 at release. Now they would’ve been toddlers.)
HOLY SHIT I WASN’T EXPECTING MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE. Despite the title of the chapter! But afjgvdhgng GLORIOUS, how dare you Amber. An angry ukelele CAN actually nake it work. Lookit them go ;3;
I’d be fucking delighted, honestly, if they all become a group of friends. Danny and Sal are the stable straight couple I never expected to ship, I don’t see it being threatened by Amber (and Amazigirl)’s presence – She needs love and support, and also people who aren’t afraid to call her out when she’s Back On Her Bullshit. And Joe needs more friends too – Who does he have, apart from Danny (and Joyce)? The four of them already have a great dynamic – Please Willis ;AAA;
Headcanon: Amber’s fave MCR song is The Ghost of You, because it reminds her of Stucky :3c
Nothing Amber has said or done in this comic at this point has upset me more than the assertion that a song “shouldn’t” be played on a certain instrument. It’s completely antithetical to the spirit of creativity that drives art. People covering songs in ways that “shouldn’t be done” has led to some real interesting stuff. Let people get weird with their music, like, c’mon man.
Eh, I’m not enough of a music person to think of a specific example off the top of my head, but there’s definitely some songs that aren’t going to work with some instruments without some major alterations.
Well yeah, of course, but the alterations are a part of the fun. I’m not gonna be playing metalcore on the celesta without making a couple tweaks here and there, but dismissing the idea outright just feels close-minded to me. Music is a medium that’s built on reimagining performances over and over again in different ways.
On the other side, most of progress regarding barock interpretations these last 40 years have been about finding their original sound, and therefore putting all romantical interpretations with modern instruments to shame…
As another example, it’d be extremely difficult to find interest in Ravel’s Bolero with x-times the same instrument.
Or better said, it’s not that it’s not possible to do it, but that can betray the intent, the general feeling and/or whatev, flanderizing it.
Personally I hate cover-bands that do exactly the same a the band, and even more, those who do it and miss its soul….well, practically, I hate cover-bands.
The song continues, “–on and on we’ll carry through the fears, oh oh oh. Disappointed faces of your peers, oh oh oh. Take a look at me ’cause I do not care at allllll.”
Definitely way too late to clear things up for OP, but if anyone else is coming to this later and doesn’t pick it up from the comic, Joe’s not waving to Danny in greeting, he’s trying to get him and Sal to cut the song (because of how it could hit Amber, especially given their last couple of strips).
Joe’s expression and the reason for it in the last panel is a little more open to interpretation, I read it as maybe a little bit of leftover grumpiness (which could be due to the perceived insensitivity of song choice and either missing or ignoring his signalling), but mostly he looks nonplussed to me (probably at how it hasn’t really affected Amber after all).
When I worked at Sonic, there was a high schooler who, when given access to a speaker, would blare Sinatra while we cooked. Time doesn’t matter nearly as much as whatever little it used to, when it comes to music taste.
I wouldn’t know, but they don’t really need to for the scene to work.
It’s easier than ever to develop esoteric music tastes, all of these characters are dorks, and two of them are specifically music nerds. They could be singing a much more obscure song than this and I’d still accept it.
It may come as a shock to you that people can and do in fact listen to music from before their time! Some people make it their entire personality in fact.
I feel like doa commenters forget that the internet exists and young people can experience things after their initial release. Which irks me as someone in the characters age range who has in fact experienced all the things commenters gawk at “kids these days” still doing
It’s so sweet that Danny and Sal meet to sing always in the same place, maybe at the same hour and every night♡. Amber is back to her usual constant critique everything and everyone, but that makes the happy moment with Joe before even more special
I started a bunch of old numetal tracks lately too.
Apparently what I’m doing now that I am almost 30 is catch up on all the songs I should have been listening to when I was 15, where I was extremely insistent on listening to classic rock.
I don’t think there’s any song where I wouldn’t at least listen to a cover done with different instruments or in a different musical genre than the original version of the song. I’ve found a lot of good covers of songs I like that way.
There is also Polka Floyd. https://www.polkafloyd.com/ The Accordion player, Steve, is in a lot of bands, one of them with me (a different one than this).
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I forget, did Danny have any connection with Mike?
I mean, Mike was the whole reason he and Ethan had the whole fallout.
For their first interaction, Mike straight up lied to Danny that he and Dorothy had hooked up.
To be fair, the fallout ultimately happened because Danny decided to say something incredibly insensitive to Ethan right outside the room a comatose Mike was in.
Less “decided” and more “Danny’d”
His last words to Mike were “goodbye forever, Mike”
I never noticed that; that’s amazing
I think literally every single encounter they had was a negative one, so, not especially.
Genuinely curious how Mike trying to seduce Danny would have gone, because I think Danny’s always considered him an asshole.
Well, but Ethan KNEW Mike was an asshole and yet here we are.
Ethan knew Mike was an asshole but still considered him a friend*, Danny didn’t know him as anything other than an asshole.
“would it be so bad if he (you’re best friend from HS) died?”
And then Mike fucking died. So there’s for real no way to save the Ethan/Danny friendship/ship
Danny didn’t say that. He didn’t say “would it be so bad if Mike never woke up again” either, which is another thing I’ve seen said.
Danny’s such a good lad that we gotta invent reasons to hate him these days.
The commentariat is really Dannying up their character reads lately.
Look it’s easy to misremember things, and Danny did say “would it be so bad if Mike didn’t wake up for a while” which is the sort of thing that ages extremely poorly when Mike never wakes up at all.
On one hand I can sympathize that not everyone here is a tryhard In Too Deep nerdlinger like myself.
On the other hand, stop it. You can search by character tags, it’s super easy!
Almost as easy as copy/pasting a link!
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2020/comic/book-10/04-is-a-song-forever/alonetime/
I’ve been permanently traumatized from citing individual strips because one time I wrote an essay on Joyce’s character motivations with 15 of them at the start of the Faith-Off and the final entry was proven wrong the next day.
May I ask what proved you wrong? I am very interested in your takes on things even if I disagree sometimes.
The last part was about how I read Joyce as still deeply respecting Becky’s religious beliefs and that she, personally, viewed her newfound atheism as a failure state. That she still wanted to be Christian but couldn’t anymore, but thought well of Becky for keeping it going.
I still feel pretty firmly that Joyce’s word choices were self-directed, in that she was criticizing herself for believing all the horrible chaos she had endured was part of a divine plan and not random bullshit from people who were supposed to protect and love her, but they were self-directed in that she was blaming the worldview, culture and life that led her to that horrible chaos to begin with.
Danny knew Mike enough to dislike him and have no patience for him.
The commentariat seems to be overlooking the inconvenient reality that Danny is also hooking up with the girl who held Ethan hostage with a knife at his throat during her botched convenience store robbery.
Ever see the Sound of Music? Danny has become Rolf as far as Ethan is concerned. Amber got her catharsis by stabbing Sal but Ethan has every reason to fear and hate her.
Last I remember, Ethan really wasn’t fussed about Sal after she approached him. I can crack open my copy of whichever book that was in, to double check.
Aye, there it is. Unless his Bully Maguire act has changed things between them, they appears to be fine.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2018/comic/book-9-comic/01-flyin-to-the-red/sorted/
He says she can do better than Danny, so he seems to have a better opinion of Sal than he does of Danny right now.
Ethan and Sal squared things forever ago, and even earlier when he just knew that she was at the college he told Amber that the three of them were just kids and she had probably changed. Just in this story he told Amber that Sal could do better than Danny.
I think it’s distinctly possible Ethan will take that back, like hypothetically he starts resenting Sal because he forgave her for Amber’s sake and never really got to deal with it for himself, but Sal’s pretty pointedly not a reason he’s mad at Danny.
Sal also doesn’t have any direct connection to Mike’s death, which is the root of Ethan’s current issues
As long as he doesn’t go deep down a selectively considered “what if” butterfly effect tangent.
Mike went splat because of something to do with Amazi-Girl. The gas station robbery catalyzed Amazi-Girl’s existence as part of Amber’s trauma processing mechanism. Sal was the perpetrator in the gas station robbery.
“Therefore, if Sal hadn’t robbed the convenience store, Mike wouldn’t have gone splat.”
I really hope he doesn’t process it that way, because it’s irrational, but his train of thought could go there…
I do actually think this’d be a pretty easy thing for Ethan to go through, but that’s because I think of Ethan right now as someone who’s reevalated his existing relations and found them wanting, which’ll make it a drama bomb if he ever finds out Blaine only drove him and Amber that night because Mike thought it’d be funny. Less something he’d do as an objective fact and more out of grief and the constant drama he gets pulled into.
This isn’t meant to sound like a condemnation, but if Amber/Danny/Sal/Mike were going through what Ethan is now, I think he’d be poking and prodding at them to be supportive, because being a wall to lean against has been his thing. What I wonder now, though, is if he’d perceive his withdrawal from the rest of the cast as something they allowed; like if they really cared, they’d keep trying like he did for Amber.
I remember this moment, where Ethan sees Sal’s doubt and uncertainty, and seemingly the moment where she surrendered and let him go. I think once the actual robbery was over he mostly felt bad for her, he’s always seemed aware that she was a kid too.
I think he was seeing the knife.
You can see those emotions in the way she’s handling the knife! And again, she seems to have let him go and surrendered, which is hard to miss from his perspective.
I’m pretty sure every time they interacted, Mike was a jerk to Danny.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/tag/danny+mike/
They outwardly hated each other but ironically could have been the kind of friend the other needed. Danny is is usually passive, but was one of the only characters to call out Mike’s shitty behaviour to his face, and call his friends out for tolerating it. Mike in turn seemed to respect Danny for this, and the few times he subtly hinted at his own feelings happened while talking to or about Danny.
Brilliant, and I have no doubt that Sal is carrying the song. Either way, it is nice to see them hanging out and enjoying each other’s presence.
So what is going tomgo wrong next?
Whatever trainwreck-in-motion brought Liz to campus. She keeps not leaving and it’s getting weird.
She’ll carry the song, she’ll carry the song…
Is it just me, or does anyone else think that all the character arcs (except maybe Ethan’s) are resolving? If Amber takes Joe’s advice and Joe takes Amber’s, he tries again with his newfound perspective to date Joyce. She might well be interested at this point. Amber hates herself less each day, Sal finds romance with Danny, Ruth with Jason. Dina and Becky find a physical point they can both deal with, Becky and Joyce get along despite their deep difference in religion, which does not change. Dorothy sees she is needle more at Yale and changes schools, and Ethan meets someone who cheers him up. Storyline ends.
Well, they’re “resolving” in that DoA isn’t “supposed” to go past freshman year and we’re now in the second semester. We’re in the second half of the total story, basically.
I wouldn’t say they’re resolving so much as the cast is now slowly moving towards the characters they’ll be at the end of the strip, in that “Joe taking Amber’s advice” and “Joe asks Joyce out” would be separate plots that each have their own runtime. Sal’s dating Danny now, that’s something that’s happened after seven years of first befriending Danny and very gradually opening up to him to the point of calling them friends and then opening up some more when she realized that she wanted to be with him, but it’s still going to have its own ups and downs and the question there is “if they’re dating now, will they by the end?”
Dorothy getting the letter to Yale is the most pointed indicator of the series being on a timer now, except that timer can last for as long as it likes; we skipped all of November and December to get to January and who knows how long this semester will last, we just know it’s most likely going to end with Dorothy leaving and the series ending.
I don’t anticipate ‘we won’t move past freshman year’ being an ironclad rule by now so much as a realistic assessment of the time scale. It took us TEN YEARS to get through the first semester. Maybe in another ten years Willis will want to do something new again, but this was designed to be a comic he could make forever even if young kids meant not staying up to date on Nerd Discourse or the latest toy drama that were ultimately key parts of Shortpacked, not just ‘wanting to play with the characters in a new setting’. (This has not proven to be the case, but it was still the concept.) If Willis still wants to keep writing Dumbing of Age in another 10-15 years, even if we are moving to the end of the spring semester by then, the series is designed so he can do so. (I believe the original FAQ question was questioning the idea of leaving the fall semester.) There are plenty of ways to either keep Dorothy on the cast (concluding that she can go to Yale for law school, for instance, because she’s better served in undergrad building connections with her friends and professors than getting a marginally more prestigious undergrad degree, or doing occasional cuts to Yale where she goes through her own storylines including some payoff about Leland being there,) or tweak the cast to accommodate her absence (Howie and Faz could both be at college sophomore year without fudging established ages TOO much, introducing a new character who’s order-oriented and everyone immediately goes ‘what the hell it’s a smaller Dorothy’, giving background characters more screentime.)
If Willis does want to move on, he can start moving things into endgame whenever… but I do think planning that move ten years in advance might be unlikely, especially since by that point the twins would be fifteen-sixteen. (In other words, thinking about college themselves.) Ten years ago we were still operating under ‘no one important will die because the grieving will take forever’ and ‘Amazi-Girl will never be shown unmasked… well, yeah, Amber might still be around but we won’t see it confirmed and Amber’s still in Shortpacked so she probably won’t have a major role.’ (This was originally a thing! It hasn’t been a thing for longer than it was ever a thing, it’s been broken and subverted and technically accurate in complicated ways in every possible iteration, and I don’t blame people who don’t remember it was ever a thing because it was SO long ago, but like, it WAS originally a thing.) Ten years ago the idea of exploring Sal/Danny again was pretty much unthinkable. Blaine hadn’t actually been reintroduced yet ten years ago and wouldn’t for a while yet, but when he was introduced Willis said ‘Amber’s Blaine’s only kid, Faz is his stepson’ and later admitted they forgot ever saying that when Faz came back years down the line. Plans are malleable as the plot develops.
Much of that isn’t even “arcs are resolving” so much as “some arcs that will need to be resolved have been introduced”.
I wouldn’t call “resolution” anything based on characters dating each other, as most college dates tend to be short-lived.
okay but consider the following:
i’ll actually die in real life if sal and danny break up
Please don’t, aren’t you aware about the author’s Twitter handle?
Seriously, Willis will take that as a bet.
AMAZING song, wrong instrument LOL
And oh yeah, another panel where Amber looks like a Pikachu!!!
You drew her like that on purpose, didn’t you Willis?
The Black Parade (the whole album) actually sounds pretty nice on Ukelele, a lot more cheerful than intended maybe.
Here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6X_hcnv6wU
Hmmm. Spin spin, wheel of Grav!
Oh hell no. Last Draw of the night!
Yeah, upon letting the flavor unfold, now it reminds me of Adventure Time
That settles it, I’m making a DoA storyline title song playlist.
I actually have one, though it’s a little out of date.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL70lMOaD7WKpQn1YWAuKe8OQokzcT7Dic
okay i think i updated it
I think it’s amazing that this is a strip where the Creator comes to the comments section to hang out and is greeted as just “one of the folks”. Makes me grateful for what a welcoming and kind space this is here. I mean that with all sincerity — I am genuinely grateful to meet youse all.
Agreed.
And I will check out that playlist tomorrow at some point. Very curious to see what all it contains and what all I’ve missed/not recognized.
F!#$%ING JOURNEY
F!#$ YEAH JOURNEY
(Even though I can’t sing any of their songs properly because Steve Perry’s a countertenor and I sound more like Brad Roberts from Crash Test Dummies with a head cold.)
Willis, I adore you and your work. This has been my nightly teleserie since you started it. Thank you so much for the playlist – Impeccable taste!
Another vote for boffo.
Glad somebody volunteers for that.
May be hard to find this song being played on ukelele, however
Found lots, actually.
Honestly I’d be more surprised if there weren’t ukulele covers, its probably their most popular song
Huh, now I can hear what it sounds like in the comic
Too bad I never found out where Amber’s shirt is from…
Not sure it’ll do any good, but I’m still offering a free pixel art commission for anyone who can point me to it.
I think I might have made this one up. I don’t remember it from any local stores and there’s no hint of it in my search histories. It’s just a puffer hoodie vest with a striped sleeve shirt.
I have closure now.
Thank you, Emperor Willis.
Also you still get that commission, if you want it.
closest thing I could find is “ Augusta 360 Sleeve Stripe Jersey – Gold White”
(but that’s short-sleeved)
When I said “you” I meant Emperor Willis. Sorry if that wasn’t clear.
yeah i just wanted to try to find the shirt anyway
….
wait no found it in colors that aren’t yellow
try “Soffe Striped Sleeve Tee”
Sometimes I feel crazy for not being fond of this song, like it’s fine but it’s not even the best song on the album named after it imo and I see people all the time treat it like it’s “emo bohemian rhapsody”
I always preferred “Dead!” from that album. But I am An Old, and my tastes about anything released after 2004 are not to be trusted.
“Dead!” Is a fun one but imo “Disenchanted” is the best song on the album and it’s not a close contest
You can’t be Old. I’ve never heard of the song or the album, and don’t who the band is. Now that’s Old.
Same, can confirm.
That migh also make you young. I guess.
That might not be a bad thing maybe? This could easily sound gatekeeper-y, but do super fans prefer a great song by [artist they like] being the one that gets flogged to death in the mainstream or something not so great, leaving “secret” treasures for themselves?
ACTUAL FANS’ preferred songs are irrespective of their popularity. The opinions of people who go “it’s popular so it’s good” and “it’s popular so it sucks” (aka hipsters) can be safely disregarded in any and all cases.
On the other hand, there’s something to the “flogged to death in the mainstream” issue. Or at least there used to be – I’ve got no idea what mainstream music even is these days when there’s access to so much.
Back in the day, the popular songs often got so massively overplayed on the radio you’d get sick of them, even if you did like them.
Maybe it’s because I associate it with Gurren Lagann AMVs, but I honestly have a hard time thinking of Welcome to the Black Parade as an “emo” song. It just plain slaps.
The reason it’s treated like “Emo Bohemian Rhapsody” has to do with the operatic, changing structure of the song; more than anything else. It’s not my fave MCR song either but bruh, you gotta recognize it’s iconic ;3
Somehow, I completely missed the early-2000s emo wave, even though I was its target demographic at the time. I only remember a few of the really big hits that were on heavy rotation on the radio and in Newgrounds portal submissions.
Too busy rifling through the bargain bins at the thrift stores looking for 70s and 80s metal and prog rock, I guess…
For me, it’s definitely a result of this really being the only song of theirs that I’ve heard, and it’s structure reminded me of a sonic song (adventure 2 era), which I was really into at the time.
That said, I could easily believe that there’s better songs on the album, as I always felt Through the Fire and the Flames was the worst of all the songs on Inhuman Rampage.
Trite as it may be
A “Keep Calm and Carry On”
Sure suits Amber now
But what they sang here
Is just mockery
I had to look up what song this was (“Welcome to the Black Parade,” by My Chemical Romance) because I can almost never tell a song by its lyrics. Not even sure if I’ve ever heard the song before.
There’s some songs where I can tell by the lyrics what it is, but for a lot of songs even if I’ve heard them before, I can’t always tell what song it is with just the lyrics.
You can always say or type some of the lyrics into Google and it always pops right up.
IJ think Amber’s a little saltier about Danny and Sal than she wants to admit.
Well, yes, but that doesn’t mean she’s wrong in that last panel.
Yeah, I hope Sal starts giving Danny guitar lessons.
Imagine trying to take the ukulele from Danny
Imagine being about that life
I have to, the closest I can get is editing it out with Microsoft Paint.
Not gonna lie, for the forseeable future, I will most be looking forward to seeing Dan & Sal just hanging out and being a nice couple.
That said, Amber does have a point.
Appropriate Gravatar is appropriate.
I do want to see challenges in it, but handled maturely in the end, no massive drama, just trust and love
Because dammit I want a healthy relationship in this comic
Aww, at first I thought they were singing together while Danny played. And I thought it was the sweetest, most adorable thing. This is only a little bit slightly less sweet.
…I thought for a minute she was singing “Come Sail Away.”
I imagine it’s somewhat like that coffeeshop acoustic cover of Mr. Brightside
It’s not an exaggeration to say I now subsist solely on cute Danny-Sal moments.
Well, TOO BAD, you’ll get weirdly appropriate song choices with ukulele accompaniment AND LIKE IT, Amber!
Lies; every song should be played on ukulele.
Gotta confess to having a bit of a taste for western pop/rock songs played on eastern instruments.
I am trying to picture how that song would sound on the banjo.
What song is this? I don’t think I know of it.
Welcome to the Black Parade by My Chemical Romance
This is adorable, and I am glad Sal isn’t clamming up due to people going by. Like, I know she’s sang with Danny before, but it seems like it’s usually been in total privacy.
Last time this happened they were sitting in exactly the same spot and Marcie and Malaya walked right by her and she saw Amazi-girl watching her from a distance.
THAT’S BULLSHIT. EVERY SONG SHOULD BE PLAYED ON UKULELE.
Well it’s a bit more problematic for songs with a great role of sustained notes, since uke can sounds a bit dry, but I guess that with an electric one and effects you could even play Ligeti’s Ricercata…
Welp, time to look up Welcome To The Black Parade ukelele covers ^^;
Just look at the top of the post right under the comic, the author has thoughtfully provided one.
Man, music rules.
sometimes i get the feeling/he’s watching over me/and other times i feel like i should go…
Also, because of time slip, a song that would’ve been PRIMO emo teen fuel when this comic started probably is a “classic” to them now. (Black Parade came out in 2006, so when the comic started the cast would’ve been 14 at release. Now they would’ve been toddlers.)
I had to look it up, it’s about 20 years after my time.
I know this song.
And I agree with Amber.
I dare you to sing along, Amber.
oh woops wrong song
HOLY SHIT I WASN’T EXPECTING MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE. Despite the title of the chapter! But afjgvdhgng GLORIOUS, how dare you Amber. An angry ukelele CAN actually nake it work. Lookit them go ;3;
I’d be fucking delighted, honestly, if they all become a group of friends. Danny and Sal are the stable straight couple I never expected to ship, I don’t see it being threatened by Amber (and Amazigirl)’s presence – She needs love and support, and also people who aren’t afraid to call her out when she’s Back On Her Bullshit. And Joe needs more friends too – Who does he have, apart from Danny (and Joyce)? The four of them already have a great dynamic – Please Willis ;AAA;
Headcanon: Amber’s fave MCR song is The Ghost of You, because it reminds her of Stucky :3c
Gravatar Roulette, go go go
Nope, iu Lucy but you don’t match my vibe – Trying again!
Nothing Amber has said or done in this comic at this point has upset me more than the assertion that a song “shouldn’t” be played on a certain instrument. It’s completely antithetical to the spirit of creativity that drives art. People covering songs in ways that “shouldn’t be done” has led to some real interesting stuff. Let people get weird with their music, like, c’mon man.
Don’t forget their art! And games too, Slicks!
Obligatory clip of Steve Martin pointing out that some musical styles are antithetical to the Banjo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaGBIfUoB78
Well, songs sung blue can be sung with a cry in your voice, but before you know it get to feeling good.
You simply got no choice.
Eh, I’m not enough of a music person to think of a specific example off the top of my head, but there’s definitely some songs that aren’t going to work with some instruments without some major alterations.
Well yeah, of course, but the alterations are a part of the fun. I’m not gonna be playing metalcore on the celesta without making a couple tweaks here and there, but dismissing the idea outright just feels close-minded to me. Music is a medium that’s built on reimagining performances over and over again in different ways.
On the other side, most of progress regarding barock interpretations these last 40 years have been about finding their original sound, and therefore putting all romantical interpretations with modern instruments to shame…
As another example, it’d be extremely difficult to find interest in Ravel’s Bolero with x-times the same instrument.
Or better said, it’s not that it’s not possible to do it, but that can betray the intent, the general feeling and/or whatev, flanderizing it.
Personally I hate cover-bands that do exactly the same a the band, and even more, those who do it and miss its soul….well, practically, I hate cover-bands.
Dang, it’d sure be weird if Joe, Joyce, Danny and Sal all hung around together.
Just some roomies hanging out with their pals
Sounds like that could plausibly happen as a double date, after Joe and Joyce get to that point.
Any ukulele can make it work.
https://youtu.be/jBtEiG1UoaM
The song continues, “–on and on we’ll carry through the fears, oh oh oh. Disappointed faces of your peers, oh oh oh. Take a look at me ’cause I do not care at allllll.”
oh my god those 2 are getting even more adorable, and it’s been preparing for a long time
Playing and singing together is the cutest thing!
Is there an official ship name for Sal and Danny, cuz whatever it is I love them so much.
How about “Sal and Danny”?
(I despise “cute” ship names, not least because they tend to be used as shibboleths, in-group markers.)
Walkercox
Im looking for Sal saying she likes black metal… If this is true, it’s funny how she went for this until ukulele covers.
Sal doesn’t actually like death metal
Black metal isn’t actually death metal.
It’s jazz.
Nah, baby metal.
Joe looks grumpy in the final panel. Why is that? Is it because he waved to Danny and Danny was too focused on the music to wave back?
Well spotted, looks likely that’s the reason, especially with panel 2 like that.
Definitely way too late to clear things up for OP, but if anyone else is coming to this later and doesn’t pick it up from the comic, Joe’s not waving to Danny in greeting, he’s trying to get him and Sal to cut the song (because of how it could hit Amber, especially given their last couple of strips).
Joe’s expression and the reason for it in the last panel is a little more open to interpretation, I read it as maybe a little bit of leftover grumpiness (which could be due to the perceived insensitivity of song choice and either missing or ignoring his signalling), but mostly he looks nonplussed to me (probably at how it hasn’t really affected Amber after all).
The perks of making it official is that you get to cuddle during your ukulele jam sessions on the Got Dumped Stairs.
It’s true love.
man that was a little old for MY year, do the kids even listen to MCR in high school anymore??
When I worked at Sonic, there was a high schooler who, when given access to a speaker, would blare Sinatra while we cooked. Time doesn’t matter nearly as much as whatever little it used to, when it comes to music taste.
I wouldn’t know, but they don’t really need to for the scene to work.
It’s easier than ever to develop esoteric music tastes, all of these characters are dorks, and two of them are specifically music nerds. They could be singing a much more obscure song than this and I’d still accept it.
It may come as a shock to you that people can and do in fact listen to music from before their time! Some people make it their entire personality in fact.
I feel like doa commenters forget that the internet exists and young people can experience things after their initial release. Which irks me as someone in the characters age range who has in fact experienced all the things commenters gawk at “kids these days” still doing
It’s so sweet that Danny and Sal meet to sing always in the same place, maybe at the same hour and every night♡. Amber is back to her usual constant critique everything and everyone, but that makes the happy moment with Joe before even more special
I’m listening to MCR now because of this strip.
I started a bunch of old numetal tracks lately too.
Apparently what I’m doing now that I am almost 30 is catch up on all the songs I should have been listening to when I was 15, where I was extremely insistent on listening to classic rock.
What a coincidence. I listened to this exact same song at the end of my sophomore year of high school!
i prefer this version
watch?v=Mpea-VSJYnE on youtube
I don’t think there’s any song where I wouldn’t at least listen to a cover done with different instruments or in a different musical genre than the original version of the song. I’ve found a lot of good covers of songs I like that way.
That doesn’t stop Danny.
As for songs in the wrong style, I submit the Comfortably Numb polka. https://youtu.be/gkHv0it3TS8 I have booked this band.
There is also Polka Floyd. https://www.polkafloyd.com/ The Accordion player, Steve, is in a lot of bands, one of them with me (a different one than this).
… Ana Chronistic hasn’t posted since Tuesday, are they ok?
Oh gosh. I hope so.
It’s been so long since i listened to this song i forgot a bunch of the lyrics, so i guess it’s time to obsessively listen to it on repeat again
If you’re looking for ukulele covers of MCR, you can’t go wrong with emmanoodle
I really wanna agree with Amber on that, but hearing Sophie’s cover (as linked in the description) has me sold that it works fine on ukelele
Sal is just biding her time until she can finally GET HER REVENGE ON ETHAN!
Yes, this is all an elaborate plot to finish what she started!
Look, its the disappointed faces of your peers! Clever bit of visual wordplay.
Man, I kinda want to see this in live-action now for some reason.
As a ukulele player, this made me laugh.