Discussion (125) ¬
[ Comments RSS ]
Sean Thomason @seanthomason.bsky.social ⋅ 11h
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 12h
Rolling Stone @rollingstone.com ⋅ 13h
Dana Simpson 
@danacorn.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
Dana Simpson @danacorn.bsky.social ⋅ 1m
Loading ...
Barb O. Saur 
⚧️
Moseth Rothenberg
Seth: “The context for my sexist attitude is so I have room to grow into the pseudo-Prince Charming that best befits the lovely main character”
Joe: uh what
As Joe reads on, he sees fictional depictions of their interactions at the figure drawing class, the awkward confessions, everything, until they’re in the exact state they are now, with Seth reading the paper.
Odd thing is, Joyce has a six month buffer…
So we’ll get to see that sometime in the mid-2030s! (Assuming the 66:1 passage of time ratio is still in the ballpark.)
Well, the _characters_ passage of time is 1/66th. But if Joyce is truly a projection of the Author, then she may also write with a sliding dilated time scale. So we may be looking at something like 1/66/66th, or 1/4356th time scale in Julia Grey’s timeline.
however, we also have to weigh that against Joyce writing the comic to build to Julia Grey being an ace space fighter pilot who takes orders from Commander in Chief President Doris. That is, while the individual strips are at 1:66, there may be elisions or time skips that result in the comic covering all the way to President Doris’ election before Joyce graduates.
Death (by embarrassment) of the Author.
If I ever published something, that’s how I would die.
You can’t hurt me anymore. I remember everything I drew in High School.
I remember my worst social interactions in high school and they play like a video in my head on repeat. So often.
Unless it compares to standing on a muddy field and shaking your foot to get a clump of mud off your foot, starting a slide that saw you shoot across the mud, somersault kick a girl in the face and land face down in said mud, I think I’ve got you licked.
That’s why I never publish anything.
That’s what I claim is why I never publish anything. But the truth is much darker. I just don’t produce.
My host bod is already a zombie at this point, so eh. XD
Oh Joyce, this is the problem with basing characters on your friends. They’ll either be insulted, annoyed, or creeped out. Possibly all three.
Have you ever played Dragon Age 2 (great game, especially if your willing to overlook some obvious budget-cut-related flaws if a game has great story)? One character Isabella writes “friend-fiction.” It is deeply disturbing.
I have not played 2 yet, I have played the first game, and Inquistion, but I haven’t gotten to 2 yet. Probably should have played 2 before Inquisition, but oh well.
When I do play it, I shall be on the lookout for Isabella and her fiction. Until then, I’ll just have to imagine how disturbing it is.
Key point, you need to like the Dragon Age 2 story and that’s not guaranteed. It’s an extremely divisive game even relative to the other Dragon Age games.
I’ve never understood the hatred some people have for DA2. I liked it just fine. I just assumed that since the gameplay was different from the DA1 that people just hated change.
DA2 is a massive downgrade in terms of scope, for one thing. Way less freedom in character creation, the map is smaller and there’s a lot less variety in the combat encounters.
But also it’s a very story driven game, and if the story ain’t clicking for you it’s not going to work, especially since you have considerably less power to change the outcome than the last game. And there’s definitely a lot of people that the story didn’t click for.
Dragon Age: Origins is high fantasy. You are the big hero, everyone loves you, and you will save the world from the armies of the orcs.
Dragon Age 2 is Fantastic Noir. You are in a hopelessly corrupt city, you can’t make any systemic changes, and every attempt to do good is only going to be a minor victory at best.
It’s humourous in-context (and Isabela-Aveline routinely riff on each other) but yeah I can see why it’s also not something you spring on someone without knowing them really well enough.
Or to quote, “I will never, ever be clean again.”
It is very funny, just in a uniquely disturbing fashion.
Have you ever watched Bob’s Burgers?
Tina writes, specifically “erotic” friend fiction.
She’s a little innocent, so I put erotic in quotes, but it’s exactly as cringe inducing hilarious as it sounds.
And is also a little heartwarming somehow.
“Is the Jimmy Jr. in your story based on me?”
I had an older friend in highschool who would threaten to do that to other people, but I’m like 90% sure she was joking. It was 2014, she was into yaoi and got me into Homestuck. It’s impossible to know for sure what she would and wouldn’t do.
Not to mention keeping to plot so close to your own life its practically a comic style diary might come back to bite you if there are people you don’t want up in your buisness.
It’s also likely to be a problem when you’ve plotted out an epic decades long story based on your current takes on your friends and their relationships.
My friends wanted me to insert them in my college comic. I refused for this reason. All my characters were based on aspects of my personality and life to be safe. So glad I never fell into the friend fiction trap!
They just wanted cameos! Like a certain scared raccoon-like kitty in the Lackadaisy pilot!
(you can actually READ my gravestone in the HD version)
I used to be a member of a fanfic group that heavily featured author avatar characters getting involved into the text. On several occasions I was involved in round robin fics that had said avatars interacting. I always felt a bit uncomfortable writing the avatars of the other characters and would obsessively analyse how they’d continued the story, trying to work out if they thought I’d got them wrong.
On the other hand, I thought most of them wrote Daibhid better than I did.
Should be “the avatars of the other writers“, obviously.
This is why Daisy said not to set your heart on that, Joyce!
She was warned! Perils of trying to tell serial fiction in a newspaper.
… did anyone else read that as “Penis of trying to tell serial fiction”?
I didn’t see it until you said that, now I can’t unsee it.
Yeah me too, thanks Professor Rose! I needed that.
Nope. Just you. And NGPZ.
At least she doesn’t have to time Sunday strips into the story arc her dailies are telling. (Sunday strips used to have more lead time in ye olde newspapre days.)
Also, it’s the 21st century. If she’s that worried about the sequence her comic publishes in, she should post it online.
Yeah but the Internet is where losers like Walky post their comics, not upstanding individuals like her who earned their place in the venerated pages of the newspaper because of merit and definitely not because of any completely arbitrary decisions made by the staff.
I see you are rocking the Jason Gravatar tonight. A fine choice.
Indeed.
It
Is.
Jackpot!!!
Sal FTW 🥳
The alternate title of this week’s strip: Busted.
They totally skip over Seth’s slut phase. It’s the character progression that really sells it! Daisy has no concept of what a slow burn romance is!
She’s shipping Julia and Doris, so I don’t think Daisy is interested in straight romance.
Yeah, she’s probably jumped straight to the one where Julia has to give Doris mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
(Note to non-Patrons: This is an entirely canon Roommates!!! strip that Joyce has really drawn.)
There Will Be Donuts. I swear.
Obligatory reminder that National Donut Day is June 2nd!
Hoping for another 69 Mouse-Ear Blvd strip.
c u r s e d
I wonder how word for word this strip is for Willis’ own life experiences.
Uh oh
Omg that’s the cutest Sal face
I don’t know much about the history of the Willis-verse. Did it start as a college produced comic strip, and if so, is this a slight that Willis has been waiting 25 years to vent? If so kudos for playing a hell of long game.
Yes, and probably yes.
Compare and Contrast
Thank you so much. That is so cool.
Also he’s best friends with a guy named Randy who plays the Banjo and wears a hat.
No, the character in the strip’s name is Danny, and Joyce doesn’t know why she picked it but it just felt like it fit the character she definitely didn’t base on that one guy who sometimes does and sometimes does not have a hat.
The Danny character has appeared at least once in the Paetron strips.
The joke is that Joyce hasn’t bothered naming him at all.
They’re so cute together.
I’m going to hop aboard this ship.
PLEASE tell me this is one of the freebie bookmarks that you hand out at conventions.
Well that explains the Seth name. Mess around and find out, eh, Joyce?
Ah, the problem of storyline comic strips – chronology.
it is kinda weird that a newspaper would do that. i mean some stand alone comic strips like garfield doesn’t matter with an ‘order’, but you’d think joyce or someone would either ‘demand’ it being in the proper order or even just label teh number and only send it in chronologically one at a time
When I had my strip in the IU newspaper, I quickly learned to deliver them two strips at a time (two fit on a page) or else they’d get jumbled in publication. So every other day I’d just drop off a photocopy at the newspaper office.
Gosh I just love their dynamic. Mostly cause I think Joyce is hot butlt still, so cute
But*
I get nervous around hot people, it happens
“they might not print in the right order”
My abacus-sense tells me that this might be based on personal experience
“Abacus-sense…clacking…”
It all adds up—you can count on it.
Sorry Joyce but you going to have to go further then slightly different names. Might even have to commit to giving your characters different haircuts.
Seth, not bad, and I love how easily Joe figured it out instead of just assuming “different ‘Old Testament’ name” as the connective tissue.
Joyce’s pouting about all of this is delightful.
Truely a match made in heaven.
Wait did the stubble actually come back?
She’s a witch!
Atheists can have little a witchcraft
As a treat
Now the real pro strat here would have been to reverse the order of this and the previous strip…
Maybe they did and this *is* the reverse order.
Aaaah, I love their interactions. I particularly love how comfortable Joyce is with him physically. She climbed up to fix his face, and just stayed up there to drape over his shoulders.
Would be funny if a Walkyverse character made it to the Juliaverse without being in the Dumbiverse.
aww the teasing. and lol surprised joyceh asn’t also set up her own website or just use twitter instead like walky’s going to do (And lol surprised there’s no editor giving her notes/feedback unless they don’t rly care as long as it’s not ‘inappropriate’ )
i’m glad joyce has her hair down again
Finally, a cute hetero couple in something I like. Aside from this, Dragon Ball, The Legend of Zelda, Stevens’ Universe Spider-Man and Castlevania, I have a hard time liking the straight couples in stuff. That seems like a lot all in a row, but goddamn I watch/read/play a lot of varied stuff and it’s Straightsville Wyoming over here but there’s nowhere to shop and nowhere to eat and nowhere to hang out. Idk what it is, a lot of them just have fuck-all chemistry and I can’t really get into it. Feels less like “These two are a couple because we wrote them as one” and more “These two are a couple because we wrote that sentence”, if that makes sense?
Point being, good job making the straights seem less boring. 10/10.
Haven’t seen Steven Universe, except for the “Stronger Than You” sequence. However I approve of all your other mentions; I have a strong desire to see Zelda and Link together, and Krillin/18 is the best couple in all of anime. Spiderman and MJ is also just a really chill couple to enjoy(not lately but that is besides the point.) As for Castlevania, I like Sypha/Trevor for their chemistry, and Soma/Mina for being a cute couple and Soma’s determination to protect her.
Gimme that melee boi (usually with a shield) and a brainy caster lass any day of the week. Steven and Connie invert that dynamic to an extent, which is neat. They have to very obviously enjoy each other’s company and be able to tease without it feeling like something one of them can’t take.
Hey Taffy if I may ask, what anime is your avatar from? I really like it.
Currently, none. That’s Suria from The Rock Cocks.
I screamed when Steven and Connie kissed at the end of future. That was somehow a bigger moment and more surprising to me than any of the ample gay shit.
Also Castlevania the games or anime? Bc i love how the show does romance, i really liked hector and Lenore’s dynamic despite how fucked up it was (dark fantasy, my standards are different) and I’m still mad about how they ended.
Also love how subtle Trevor and Sypha were revealed. Just subtle, getting closer, cuter moments and more touch, the hint at sharing a bed before the full on confirmation they slept together. No making a big deal out of it, just a slight shift in their dynamic
I haven’t played any of the games. Didn’t have a Nintendo Anything til I was like 17, then my DS got stolen and I didn’t play another one until my girlfriend bought a Switch. Now I just like Zelda and basically nothing else, so it’s only been the show for me.
I am personally super not into Link+Zelda canonical pairing, but at the same time love me some AU fan animations that make them both wholesome absolute dorks about one another (look up “shar” on Youtube if you care to, for a prime example)
Then again I also thoroughly enjoy A Tale of Two Rulers, which is a fancomic that involves Zelda and Ganon getting together, so.
THE STUBBLE ACTUALLY GREW BACK BYE I’M DEAAAAAD
It’s a stand power, I knew it, I fucking knew it XD
The faces are SO expressive and funny/cute in this whole strip, great job Willis. ♥
I am guessing that this is one of those times where Joyce Is Beimg Extremely Autobiographical isn’t it
OMG the Stubble(R) did come back!?!?!
<..>
*runs to the mountains screaming like a mad man*
Joe’s face in panel 3 is so delightful. Reading his girl to filth.
Re: Alt-text, sums up about 40% of comments section discussion concisely.
And I am low-balling it!
He’s onto you, Joyce
I really like after time skip Joe. And if you had told me I would come to like Joe when I started reading the comic I would have though you were crazy. But here we are
Joyce is going to be a beautiful parrot
Parrot? Pika Pika?
Is that some romantic or sexual euphemism of which I am not aware?
Like the parrot that perches on the shoulder of the pirate captain, I think.
Hm, with a big ugly hat and a fancy colorful jacket, Joe could do Pirate Captain pretty well. If he lets the stubble grow back.
Yesterday ADLegend21 mentioned Joe’s eyebrows seeming to have been shaved along with his stubble. Now here they go again. I have to go back and reread ~13 years of comics to see how they appear with his expressions.
the perils of self- and friend-insert writing
srsly joyce I think he’s cool with it
You can’t just have your characters announce how they feel! That makes me feel angry!
I’m more impressed that Joyce actually WILLED Joe’s stubble back
Either that or he’s homer simpson and comes back five seconds after he shaves
Is it, tho
Facial hair growth is related to testosterone levels. Being near Joyce makes the stubble appear.
Honestly, I was wondering where Joyce got “Seth” since all the other names were just that transparent.
Joe probably had a lot of friends call him Brosefh, so it was easier to hear it phonetically.
Wasn’t there a strip earlier where joe asked “is there a character named Moe in your comic” And Joyce replied “not if I can get some white out”
Oh, I think I remeber that now.
I wonder if they’ll give any reason WHY the strips are appearing out of order.
I mean, is it just a case of the newspaper being careless? Did an editor second-guess Joyce thinking “this should be the order”?
I mean, they’re comic strips and probably are all the same size, so I doubt they pick them based on “what fits best today”.
cause it’s just thrown into the back of the layout by people who don’t really care about it. just like the original version of Roomies! Willis is clearly still a little upset about it lol
Either Joe’s facial hair grows really fast, or Joyce developed new magic powers.
Whiskers visible under the skin.
Very much liking the physical proximity, the casual body contact going on here, showing just how comfortable, how natural this is for both of them, nothing forced or performative happening
Unlike Walky and Lucy
On one hand, I get what you’re saying, but on the other, I feel like Walky could be mid-intercourse with Lucy, intertwined, and people would still be posting, “But does he even like her, though?”
I see no logical or practical reason to post the strips out of their intended order except to pointedly discourage sequential storytelling, or you know, be a dick to the writer, which is common in the entertainment industry too
Just ask the people who made Firefly.
I appreciate the gradual nature of this relationship. Even though Joyce is just melting with horniness, it has so much weight that they hold hands or that Joyce touches Joe’s shoulders. The smallest amount of intimacy progress represents a big threshold for Joyce physically and for Joe emotionally. Makes you shiver with antici-
.
Ah, I thought she might be going for 3rd son of Adam from the Old Testament. Jewish reference for the non-practicing (I want to say Agnostic, not Aethist, but can’t quite remember) Jew.
Makes note to dive into the Internet to see if the name Joseph is related to Seth in any way.