“There are 3 rules to me helping you: I can’t bring back anyone from the dead, I can’t make anyone fall in love with anyone else (although pure animal fuckin’ lust is another matter), and I can’t kill anyone for you (well, I mean, I could, but let’s not go there).”
So if Robin does a good thing, like help Becky, she gets rewarded (would have won reelection if she hadn’t bowed out).
And if she does a bad thing, she faces no consequences because it’s Robin, let’s just count our blessings she didn’t do something WORSE.
Wow. She really has cracked the code to Only Fail Upwards. Thing is, she managed to do it while being not an Old White Straight Dude. In fact, she’s zero out of four. This may be unprecedented in our society.
Guys, we need to be very afraid of Robin. She might actually be a genius.
Ethnically Hispanic, last I saw. For weird reasons, we tend to mix ethnicity and ‘race’ (skin color) into a whole amalgam… Throwing in a nice helping of nationality while we’re at it.
But, back on topic, since Robin is Hispanic, then she can’t be white (or at very least isn’t “white; non-Hispanic,” as it shows up on the checkboxes these days).
Hispanic people can be any race- there are white Hispanic people (I mean, Spanish people for one), Afro-Hispanic people, Indigenous and Hispanic people… In the US we’re most “aware” of people who either are mestizo or who are treated as mestizo as soon as someone realizes they’re Hispanic, but that’s a very oversimplified picture.
Huh. Is there somewhere she’s specified as such? Her surname is Italian; I know in the US that there’s been a history of discrimination there but last I checked that has been considered white for a long time.
@Not Someone Else- I don’t quite know if you understood this or not, but there was a healthy topping of ‘not being serious’ about my whole “since Robin is Hispanic, then she can’t be white.” My entire point was that we conflate the terms race and ethnicity; Robin is white *and* Robin is Hispanic.
Robin is not white and hispanic. Becky clocked her sister as Latina just by looking at her (“the Mexican chick with glasses”) so I’m guessing that means they’re not white and that it’s visible, because while people can be white and Mexican, white Americans (particularly ones fresh out of communities like Becky’s and Joyce’s) don’t see a white person with an Italian last name and go ‘The Mexican chick?”
…I always just figured “DeSanto” was a shortening of “De Los Santos,” a perfectly cromulent Spanish-language surname. Lots of folks shorten their surnames.
whiteness is a social construct.
Is Marco Rubio white? Maybe, depends on who you ask and in what year. Italians are [provisionally] white now, and a person might not be able to tell if someone is Italian or Mexican.
Sometimes “white; non-Hispanic” will be the only “white” option on a form, which, as someone who is very much white but *also* Hispanic, is always frustrating to me.
This does seem to be the case much less often these days, though; more often now I’m seeing it as two separate questions– one about race (which now usually lets you select multiple options rather than just having people go under “multiracial/mixed” if there’s not just one that they fit), and one asking if you’re Hispanic/Latino– yes/no.
Why would they bother to specify that white does not include hispanic if there is no white option that includes hispanic? That’s just strange to me. Why not just white?
Because I guess you’re just supposed to select “Hispanic” or “multiracial” or something if you’re not “white; non-Hispanic.”
It always annoyed me. Like, if you wanted me to just pick one thing, I’d pick “white,” like, okay, no problem. But I don’t want to pick an option that specifically denies part of who I am.
I’m Ukrainian but I work as a translator, mostly of documents, and the first time I saw a document with that question on it (death certificate) I questioned if I was having a stroke. If you must have a question like that leave it write-in, what the fuck are those checkboxes. The word “hispanic” isn’t even translatable into Ukrainian (or Russian) without some truly insane contortion of meaning, because the category it refers to is just… wow. WHY DOES THAT GO ON OFFICIAL DOCUMENTS OH MY GOD
All this time she seemed like a caricature of herself mixed with a modern politician
And it turned out it was a planned and carefully curated persona so she could do whatever she needed to do – either getting praise for doing the right thing or no backlash because, “She’s Robin”?
Like damn, her character did a 180 and it’s kind of scary how secretly competent she is
I get the impression that in the past she genuinely did whatever she wanted and faced minimal consequences, but since meeting Leslie and Becky she’s found a moral center and started to care more about the people around her. She still plays up the wacky hijinks because that’s what people expect, but she tries to put it to a better use now.
Robin, you never fail to amuse. Which is odd considering how much you fail at other basic things. One of which is trying to comfort someone of their mistakes and then accidentally raising their anxiety immensely.
Now the question becomes: Is Leslie going to tell someone about Jason, or is she going to let it continue? And which one will make her feel worse?
What’s there to tell? Robin acted with pretty total transparency when hiring Jason. They know he was disciplined for having gotten with a student, and the school knows they fired him, so… who is left, really?
I didn’t think Robin could get away with hiring him again, especially since the firing was over sex between a student and TA. If she has hired him without the school’s knowledge then they could just bar him from working there if they choose to.
However if the school doesn’t care and nobody else cares then this is a great thing. Might bother Leslie a bit that she inadvertently got Jason hired after not wanting to hire him, but then again maybe not.
He was I think fired, but given an opportunity to defend himself, which he chose not to do. Penny, who was also fired, tossed his name out there but did not in fact even know he’d done it, too, she was just being spiteful.
One of the sagest pieces of wisdom (aka, one of the only pieces of wisdom) Robin has ever dispensed is to make mistakes. So yeah, at least she’s following her own advice?
How is this sound logic? Owning that you’re a terrible person doesn’t excuse bad behavior. Especially when no one is asking Robin to do any of this. She’s entertaining sure, but that doesn’t go very far. Leslie doesn’t seem pleased by the argument at least.
Sound logic in that she’s shown she is aware of being the perfect Teflon Scapegoat
Which is honestly… Terrifying. Somebody being dumb and awful is one thing. Somebody being smart enough to understand all that and use it?
That’s terrifying. Leslie probably realizes she can’t even out Robin to anybody because her persona is so iron clad that nobody would believe her, and Robin could use this to extract favours because she’s essentially forced Leslie into a contract against her will – Would be easy for her to, if Leslie ticked her off, flip this onto Leslie and have people go, “We expect this of Robin, but YOU!?”
That’s debatable. We can only speculate on intent cause she never actually asked and took care to be vague. I don’t think Leslie actually knew what she wanted yet or if she had the right to even act. People are allowed to have conversations without committing to them. Using peers, colleagues, as sounding boards for discussion. Honestly it kind of feels like Robin’s taken advantage of the briefest amount of trust Leslie gave her to try and score some points with her.
The point Robin is making here is that she can risk her career in ways that Leslie cannot. Even if Leslie wanted to help Ruth she woulda felt obligated to stay out of it. Robin just does whatever dipshit idea pops in her head because that’s what people expect of her. So she can do something Leslie was conflicted about doing and then if it goes tits up Robin will take the brunt of the backlash because again, it’s what everyone expects of her.
I’m really not a fan of people doing a “favor” they decide I’m asking for, when I’m not. I do like Robin as a character, unreasonably. But maybe not for the next 24 hours, feeling kind of pissy.
Yeah, Robin’s a goofball and kind of a real-life Daffy Duck sometimes, but she isn’t stupid and is surprisingly savvy, particularly after having tasted legitimate consequences for herself and others as a result of her actions.
So, you still get the wacky, but you also get her knowing her limitations more and trying to act with a level of responsibility and forward thinking. Just, still dressed up as “eat a bowl of gummiworms for breakfast” nutty.
Ruth is the gay student and Jason is the problematic boyfriend. I’m going to assume it’s just imprecise language although it’s possible Robin has made some assumptions about Ruth that are not accurate
Robin strikes me as one of those people who isn’t fully comfortable with receiving praise/thanks, so couches it in her wacky shitbag persona. I do sort of wonder what she desires from Leslie. Like, there is/was a mutual attraction, but this kind of feels like more than that, like Robin views Leslie as a moral compass and legitimately wants to do right by people, she just is trying to do it in her own way.
(Which, credit to Robin, her way has worked at least twice so far, between this and giving Becky the genuinely good advice of allowing herself to make mistakes, something Becky did quite need to hear.)
Actually, I saw all of this, but panel 3 has Robin kind of spelling it out, doesn’t it? She knows that Leslie stuck her neck out to help her, and Robin still feels bad about Leslie feeling burned by that, even if it did arguably work out for the best.
I don’t recall Robin helping Leslie. I think Robin knows Leslie used to have a crush on her but doesn’t, and that drives her absolutely crazy. Obviously everyone should give Robin attention regardless of whether she returns their affections. Hell maybe she even does want to date Leslie but isn’t ready to admit it.
I think Leslie got over the crush. The whole squatting in her apartment, not taking any responsibility for her political views, and complete hypocrisy of promoting conservative and anti-lgbt legislation while being gay herself kind of ruined the appeal.
all of that was there during the crush, except for the sqatting in her apartment.
Leslie knew all those things , beforehand. All of them. It was just as gross to crush on Robin beforehand as after.
Flipside was Robin was outed nationally , a plot that Leslie was sort of in on from the begginning.= when she squatted ( hid really) . Leslies not entirely innocent how that could have turned out during a campaign. The only part i think Leslie regretted was the media spotlight, which she had a hand in.
There is not one single part of that story that leslie was innocent of. and Thats what I think she regrets.
and Robin gets that, that Leslie wants to what she wants, but also wants to be guilt free.
She’s a terrible person that’s performing acts of favouritism and abuses of power just to try to woo someone who doesn’t want to interact with her any more than necessary.
No amount of lesbianism or ‘attractiveness’ or wacky hijinks is going to change that part.
As a very gay masc-adjacent person who is super excited every time Asher does a dorky thing onscreen, I, specifically, have zero standing to complain. 😀
I liked Robin there, and her ‘wacky hijinks’ are more suited in that universe (and it was a less politically charged time, so you could make jokes about Palin that didn’t feel as too close to home).
She doesn’t work as well here, and I don’t want to let a different universe’s version of her affect how I view her as a character in this one.
This is very interesting to me. That some people who’ve read Shortpacked have a better perception of Robin and are willing to give her more credit. I haven’t read Shortpacked, so to me she’s just an annoying character. Maybe she was better in Shortpacked or the setting was better for her if that makes sense? Like she’s creepily obsessed with Leslie, mistreats her sisters, and abused and misused her political power. Why is all of that okay? Sponsoring Becky is a step in the right direction, but it’s a small step.
Liking Robin has nothing to do with her actions being, “okay.” Okay does not equal interesting character. Robin is a weird, feral, force of chaos and hijinks. Is she a p.o.s.? Sure! Half the characters are! But after reading though all these super jerks who feel too real, it’s a welcome change of pace to have someone who operates on more of a looney tunes logic. A jerk who will crack a joke rather than a skull.
A few reasons why Robin fit better in Shortpacked!:
1. The universe was a much better fit for ‘wacky hijinks’, it’s the same universe with aliens and actual superheroes after all. Just some of the things that happened over SP! were Mike fighting a giant mutant honey frosted bun, a proposal done using the moans of a couple having sex, and the universe being invaded by cereal box villains. Not to say it was completely surreal, but a lot of things got accepted for ‘oh yeah, just another day in SP!’.
2. Robin’s career as a politician had much less focus in SP!. There, she just fell into the job (during a sugar rush), and the only things she did as a politician were fight Sarah Palin and try to enact a bill to get dudes to kiss. She didn’t really abuse her power, she didn’t destroy any lives, and she failed more often than she succeeded. Plus, the world was a much less serious place back then, so political jokes were easier to pass off.
3. Robin did carry over a lot of goodwill from SP!, as did Mike and Carla. They had their jerkish moments there too, but their ‘good’ moments were both much more favourably shown, and also, again, less ‘real world ramifications’ or ‘people were cool with it’.
Dropping out of her congressional race wasn’t a small step, it was a grand gesture. And she needs more than just grand gestures. This probably feels like to her a small(er) thing she can do to help someone out.
Now here’s a question you forced me to think of at gunpoint: If a grand gesture is insufficient [something] of [other thing]*, can we then consider it a small step in the bigger picture? Like yeah, Simon may have sold his second car to help with Tina’s medical expenses, but he’s still a problematic gambler.
*I’m not a social lawyer like half** the other people here, idk the appropriate words
**I’m also not a statistician like the other half
I think grand gesture and/or consistent little things depend on who was wronged and in what ways.
Her grand gesture did more than just help Becky. She took herself out of the position where she hurt people. She’s not in congress, and she’s not a lobbyist. It’s a big step, but not the whole journey. Simon has stopped gambling, it was somehow dependent on him owning that car (he was a street racer? I dunno, I’m overextending your metaphor). He still hasn’t made up for the important things he’s missed in people’s lives, the money he borrowed and never paid back, etc.
My love of Robin extends beyond any given universe she finds herself in, and is more important than any continuity. She could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and she wouldn’t lose me.
I love Shortpacked Robin, but I can’t say the same for this one. She burned through my Shortpacked goodwill during her time as a Republican. She’s working slowly at building it back but she’s still not one of my favourites.
What did she do that was an abuse of power here? Like, a TA would be her employee, and she really didn’t need to hire Barry at all. She also didn’t need to be transparent with the class about Jason’s past.
Like, yes, she left a (deservedly) bad impression on you early, but it’s also kind of obviously leading you to make certain leaps here. Happens to all of us sometimes, but don’t be super shocked if you don’t get a ton of people agreeing with it.
She could have only hired the unqualified sex pest, and she didn’t. She could have concealed that he was an unqualified sex pest, and she didn’t. She could have punched everyone in the face until they voted for the unqualified sex pest, and she didn’t!
In fact, when you consider all the things she didn’t do, hiring an unqualified sex pest and then telling your not-girlfriend “I’ve done this thing for you” is barely anything!
Yeah. Like, for a long time, Dorothy was my least favorite major character in the comic. Was she particularly problematic? No! She’s Dorothy. I just didn’t find her all that interesting.
You can dislike a fictional character without villainizing them, and you can like a fictional character without sanctifying them.
There are also just different ways people connect with characters in a story– like, I’ve seen various people in the comments talk about who they like in the comic based on who they would want to be friends with IRL. This is not at all how I think about these things, though I think it is fine to do so. But sometimes people get mixed up in what it is other people mean by liking/loving a character.
Agreed! And I feel like in fandoms (honestly I hate that word so much now) there’s a hypocritical fear of being a “bad person” for enjoying a flawed character and people feel like they gotta justify it and cover their ass. Like, idk, we all like Ursula from Little Mermaid, right? Great villian with a great song inspired by an even more amazing and flawed person – Divine. But I mean look at the story, Ursula lies and manipulates a teenager into giving up her voice for personal gain. Am I suddenly endorsing that behavior when I drunkenly belt out POOR UNFORTUNATE SOULS at karaoke?
You hit the nail on the head. Robin copies the popcultural idea of what a professor looks like. Or to be exact: it’s a copy of what Indiana Jones wears when teaching classes. Which again, is a thing that might work for Leslie, knowing her movie preferences.
I want to say Dina … but I feel she would refuse any sort of supernatural resurrection on principle.
Then again she has many zombie-like qualities: she likes hanging out around bones, she has peculiar culinary preferences, she appreciates brains, she bites people, she can stand still in ambush for ages, she eats Becky alive… We are sure the hat isn’t some kind of alien parasite, right? I think I’ve seen its eyes move.
See now for some reason split Robin’s description of her actions as relating to different individuals. In my head Jason was the privilaged white dude, but Barry was the problematic boyfriend.
After thinking about it a bit, I think Leslie is perhaps being a little disingenuous here. When she went to Robin and asked ‘hey, can you hire a TA, and would you be willing do so if they were a sex pest?’ This right here is the exact outcome she wanted with the exact reasoning Robin is describing now. ‘I can’t do it because I can’t hire TAs and also I’m a good person who thoroughly condemns sex pestery, but Robin’s a massive piece of shit who totally won’t care about the details, so SHE can do it.’
It’s genuineLy true that when put to it Leslie didn’t outright say to Robin ‘I want you to hire this guy as a TA, he’s a sex pest of some flavor, one of my students asked me to help him.’ But it was certainly her plan in going to Robin in the first place, and that Robin picked up what was being put down while she was actively paying attention shouldn’t surprise anyone.
In What’s-His-Name’s defense (lmao), if I were a fragile billionaire with more money than skin cells, I’d also buy and deliberately ruin a social media website that was full of people effortlessly dunking on me over and over and over and over and-
Wow, that actually makes sense, and from Robin, of all people. Robin, for all intents and purposes, just tole Leslie, “don’t worry, I’ll be you flack vest, I’ll take those hits for you.” Even if they never become a couple, this could be one endearing friendship.
I love Robin not just because of her glorious Shortpacked! days but because her mere presence in this comic upsets people who want black and white morals from their fictional characters.
Disliking a character for things they’ve actually done is not the same as wanting everyone to act like a moral paragon, anymore than liking a character is claiming them to be a moral paragon.
Because twitter made a new policy that you can’t see tweets unless you’re signed in which has fucked up twitter embeds everywhere cuz the company is run by a dipshit.
Wow just wow, he’s not gonna get money from advertisers if you have to be logged in to see the ads and limit how many tweets can be READ? I wouldn’t be surprized if that bloated bigoted dipshit was huffing BREAK FLUID.
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Whatever is wrong in your world, blame me
If you got a boy, not a girl, blame me
Just blame me, just blame me
Whatever is wrong
If all else fails, you can blame it on me.
Underrated song, that.
Damn, that’s really catchy.
Oh Robin, it’s more of a “some of column A, some of column B” thing. i.e. Porqué no los dos. It’s both Robin, you’re both.
And I’m here foe it.
Now I’m picturing Robin singing “I’m in the mood to help you dude. You ain’t never had a friend like me!”
“There are 3 rules to me helping you: I can’t bring back anyone from the dead, I can’t make anyone fall in love with anyone else (although pure animal fuckin’ lust is another matter), and I can’t kill anyone for you (well, I mean, I could, but let’s not go there).”
So if Robin does a good thing, like help Becky, she gets rewarded (would have won reelection if she hadn’t bowed out).
And if she does a bad thing, she faces no consequences because it’s Robin, let’s just count our blessings she didn’t do something WORSE.
Wow. She really has cracked the code to Only Fail Upwards. Thing is, she managed to do it while being not an Old White Straight Dude. In fact, she’s zero out of four. This may be unprecedented in our society.
Guys, we need to be very afraid of Robin. She might actually be a genius.
The key thing is that you need to a bit of a cartoon character to pull it off, which I think is a hard strategy to replicate.
Oh my god. Yeah, definitely.
Zero out of four? She’s not white?
Ethnically Hispanic, last I saw. For weird reasons, we tend to mix ethnicity and ‘race’ (skin color) into a whole amalgam… Throwing in a nice helping of nationality while we’re at it.
But, back on topic, since Robin is Hispanic, then she can’t be white (or at very least isn’t “white; non-Hispanic,” as it shows up on the checkboxes these days).
Hispanic people can be any race- there are white Hispanic people (I mean, Spanish people for one), Afro-Hispanic people, Indigenous and Hispanic people… In the US we’re most “aware” of people who either are mestizo or who are treated as mestizo as soon as someone realizes they’re Hispanic, but that’s a very oversimplified picture.
They can be any race, but Becky knew Roz was Latina just by looking at her so I don’t think the DeSantoses are supposed to be white.
Huh. Is there somewhere she’s specified as such? Her surname is Italian; I know in the US that there’s been a history of discrimination there but last I checked that has been considered white for a long time.
@Not Someone Else- I don’t quite know if you understood this or not, but there was a healthy topping of ‘not being serious’ about my whole “since Robin is Hispanic, then she can’t be white.” My entire point was that we conflate the terms race and ethnicity; Robin is white *and* Robin is Hispanic.
@Bysmerian…
It’s directly mentioned on several occasions regarding Robin’s political career, including the comparison to AOC; here’s one such reference from Leslie herself… https://www.dumbingofage.com/2011/comic/book-1/06-yesterday-was-thursday/knock/
Oh, gosh, no, I’ve heard that said straight up seriously by people so I didn’t get it, sorry!
Robin is not white and hispanic. Becky clocked her sister as Latina just by looking at her (“the Mexican chick with glasses”) so I’m guessing that means they’re not white and that it’s visible, because while people can be white and Mexican, white Americans (particularly ones fresh out of communities like Becky’s and Joyce’s) don’t see a white person with an Italian last name and go ‘The Mexican chick?”
…I always just figured “DeSanto” was a shortening of “De Los Santos,” a perfectly cromulent Spanish-language surname. Lots of folks shorten their surnames.
whiteness is a social construct.
Is Marco Rubio white? Maybe, depends on who you ask and in what year. Italians are [provisionally] white now, and a person might not be able to tell if someone is Italian or Mexican.
Okay, I stand corrected!
Sometimes “white; non-Hispanic” will be the only “white” option on a form, which, as someone who is very much white but *also* Hispanic, is always frustrating to me.
This does seem to be the case much less often these days, though; more often now I’m seeing it as two separate questions– one about race (which now usually lets you select multiple options rather than just having people go under “multiracial/mixed” if there’s not just one that they fit), and one asking if you’re Hispanic/Latino– yes/no.
Why would they bother to specify that white does not include hispanic if there is no white option that includes hispanic? That’s just strange to me. Why not just white?
It’s because the people who create application forms are lazy/ignorant/Xbox fanboys/racist/stupid, or some combination thereof.
Because I guess you’re just supposed to select “Hispanic” or “multiracial” or something if you’re not “white; non-Hispanic.”
It always annoyed me. Like, if you wanted me to just pick one thing, I’d pick “white,” like, okay, no problem. But I don’t want to pick an option that specifically denies part of who I am.
I’m Ukrainian but I work as a translator, mostly of documents, and the first time I saw a document with that question on it (death certificate) I questioned if I was having a stroke. If you must have a question like that leave it write-in, what the fuck are those checkboxes. The word “hispanic” isn’t even translatable into Ukrainian (or Russian) without some truly insane contortion of meaning, because the category it refers to is just… wow. WHY DOES THAT GO ON OFFICIAL DOCUMENTS OH MY GOD
I’d straight up marry Robin, ngl.
Les might beat you to it.
She already did in one reality.
Leslie to Yotome.
They’re my OTP from beyond realities.
Honestly, me too. Robin is fuckin’ smooth here.
She’s the best. No contest!
i was like ‘man dumbverse robin is less interesting than walkyverse robin’ and then this strip happened and i shut my mouth
She’ll always be more at home in Shortpacked! but this is still a really good bit.
All this time she seemed like a caricature of herself mixed with a modern politician
And it turned out it was a planned and carefully curated persona so she could do whatever she needed to do – either getting praise for doing the right thing or no backlash because, “She’s Robin”?
Like damn, her character did a 180 and it’s kind of scary how secretly competent she is
It kinda makes one realize how she managed to snag a seat in a government office to begin with.
If you accept this take on Robin, it also makes her whole time at Leslie’s even more sinister.
Oh definitely, she went from idiot with occasionally endearing points to, “Holy crap she’s terrifying”
I get the impression that in the past she genuinely did whatever she wanted and faced minimal consequences, but since meeting Leslie and Becky she’s found a moral center and started to care more about the people around her. She still plays up the wacky hijinks because that’s what people expect, but she tries to put it to a better use now.
I have to say, Robin’s on to something here. Leslie’s hands are completely clean, while Robin’s hands smell of chocolate and peanut butter at worst.
Oh hey, I just noticed one of TA’s must have tied Robin’s bowtie for her between scenes. That’s a cool detail.
Also, I love Robin’s face in panel 5.
I do, too. I also love that she’s doing that whole “fluffing my hair up, cause I’m so hott” thing
But do they have to tie it while standing behind her because they can’t do it from the front?
Dumbing of Age Book 13: …just all of panel 5 really
Robin, you never fail to amuse. Which is odd considering how much you fail at other basic things. One of which is trying to comfort someone of their mistakes and then accidentally raising their anxiety immensely.
Now the question becomes: Is Leslie going to tell someone about Jason, or is she going to let it continue? And which one will make her feel worse?
What’s there to tell? Robin acted with pretty total transparency when hiring Jason. They know he was disciplined for having gotten with a student, and the school knows they fired him, so… who is left, really?
I didn’t think Robin could get away with hiring him again, especially since the firing was over sex between a student and TA. If she has hired him without the school’s knowledge then they could just bar him from working there if they choose to.
However if the school doesn’t care and nobody else cares then this is a great thing. Might bother Leslie a bit that she inadvertently got Jason hired after not wanting to hire him, but then again maybe not.
Was Jason fired or did he quit before the process got to him?
He was I think fired, but given an opportunity to defend himself, which he chose not to do. Penny, who was also fired, tossed his name out there but did not in fact even know he’d done it, too, she was just being spiteful.
One of the sagest pieces of wisdom (aka, one of the only pieces of wisdom) Robin has ever dispensed is to make mistakes. So yeah, at least she’s following her own advice?
Oh God. I can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner.
Robin is the real New Mike.
Eh, Mike gave a little piece of himself to everyone he touched in his life. Sometimes for a nickel.
And Leslie is Dorothy?
Disturbingly sound logic here by Robin.
How is this sound logic? Owning that you’re a terrible person doesn’t excuse bad behavior. Especially when no one is asking Robin to do any of this. She’s entertaining sure, but that doesn’t go very far. Leslie doesn’t seem pleased by the argument at least.
Sound logic in that she’s shown she is aware of being the perfect Teflon Scapegoat
Which is honestly… Terrifying. Somebody being dumb and awful is one thing. Somebody being smart enough to understand all that and use it?
That’s terrifying. Leslie probably realizes she can’t even out Robin to anybody because her persona is so iron clad that nobody would believe her, and Robin could use this to extract favours because she’s essentially forced Leslie into a contract against her will – Would be easy for her to, if Leslie ticked her off, flip this onto Leslie and have people go, “We expect this of Robin, but YOU!?”
Like cripes, she may actually be evil
“Especially when no one is asking Robin to do any of this.”
Leslie kind of did. Yeah, she was “just asking questions” and didn’t identify Jason, but the intent was clearly there.
nope. she might have gotten around to it, but she did not ask Robin to do anything.
That’s debatable. We can only speculate on intent cause she never actually asked and took care to be vague. I don’t think Leslie actually knew what she wanted yet or if she had the right to even act. People are allowed to have conversations without committing to them. Using peers, colleagues, as sounding boards for discussion. Honestly it kind of feels like Robin’s taken advantage of the briefest amount of trust Leslie gave her to try and score some points with her.
The point Robin is making here is that she can risk her career in ways that Leslie cannot. Even if Leslie wanted to help Ruth she woulda felt obligated to stay out of it. Robin just does whatever dipshit idea pops in her head because that’s what people expect of her. So she can do something Leslie was conflicted about doing and then if it goes tits up Robin will take the brunt of the backlash because again, it’s what everyone expects of her.
I do love panel #2 here:
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2023/comic/book-13/02-turning-saints-into-the-sea/hiss/
“Anything, for you.
Always.”
I love that.
Oh, gosh, no, wrong avatar for that comment!
I’m really not a fan of people doing a “favor” they decide I’m asking for, when I’m not. I do like Robin as a character, unreasonably. But maybe not for the next 24 hours, feeling kind of pissy.
Panel 4 is the softest Robin we’ve ever seen I’m thrown off guard a bit
Robin is your Friend on the Other Side.
“C’mon, shake my hand.
Won’t you shake…a poor sinners hand?”
Me reaching through the screen towards Robin: “YESSSSSS!”
yeah ok but the face shes making in the last panel is sooo cute
robin actually being helpful and thinking one (1) step ahead is grand
Yeah, Robin’s a goofball and kind of a real-life Daffy Duck sometimes, but she isn’t stupid and is surprisingly savvy, particularly after having tasted legitimate consequences for herself and others as a result of her actions.
So, you still get the wacky, but you also get her knowing her limitations more and trying to act with a level of responsibility and forward thinking. Just, still dressed up as “eat a bowl of gummiworms for breakfast” nutty.
This is what makes intelligence without judgment so dangerous.
Somehow I think that fails to comfort Leslie/
Are the gay student and his problematic boyfriend hypothetical or actual people?
Ruth and Jason doesn’t seem super hypothetical. Ruth being bi is of little consequence.
She’s Ruth.
Ruth is the gay student and Jason is the problematic boyfriend. I’m going to assume it’s just imprecise language although it’s possible Robin has made some assumptions about Ruth that are not accurate
Ah gotcha. She’s still talking about Jason, and Ruth is the gay student, technically bi but I get it.
Robin strikes me as one of those people who isn’t fully comfortable with receiving praise/thanks, so couches it in her wacky shitbag persona. I do sort of wonder what she desires from Leslie. Like, there is/was a mutual attraction, but this kind of feels like more than that, like Robin views Leslie as a moral compass and legitimately wants to do right by people, she just is trying to do it in her own way.
(Which, credit to Robin, her way has worked at least twice so far, between this and giving Becky the genuinely good advice of allowing herself to make mistakes, something Becky did quite need to hear.)
Actually, I saw all of this, but panel 3 has Robin kind of spelling it out, doesn’t it? She knows that Leslie stuck her neck out to help her, and Robin still feels bad about Leslie feeling burned by that, even if it did arguably work out for the best.
I don’t recall Robin helping Leslie. I think Robin knows Leslie used to have a crush on her but doesn’t, and that drives her absolutely crazy. Obviously everyone should give Robin attention regardless of whether she returns their affections. Hell maybe she even does want to date Leslie but isn’t ready to admit it.
I can’t help thinking Leslie would be better off with Robin than that other criticize-everything asshole.
I mean…I agree but that’s a low bar. Leslie deserves better than trading one ass for another. Even if it’s a nice ass.
She hasn’t appeared in years. I just assumed she vanished from reality like Penny.
-assumed+hoped
They were quite literally made for each other, so that’s hardly surprising
Oh yeah, thanks for reminding me that Anna exists.
And Robin knows that Leslie has a girlfriend, offhand I think she mentioned it once.
Makes her behaviour even worse.
I can’t blame her for taking her shot.
…Yes, you can. Don’t hit on someone you know is in a committed relationship unless you know they’re open (and/or they flirt first).
I
Robin is weirdly self aware and willing to use her own flaws to other people’s advantage and it’s confusing and bizarre
She’s a former right-wing political profiteer. Of course she’s an expert at spinning things. 🙄
At least she got the benefit of being a cute lesbian.
From Leslie’s expression in the last panel, that might be what she’s thinking. “Why an I not making out with this cute lesbian?”
Leslie hates Robin, I highly doubt that.
People don’t have to like you, for you to wanna make out with ’em.
I think Leslie got over the crush. The whole squatting in her apartment, not taking any responsibility for her political views, and complete hypocrisy of promoting conservative and anti-lgbt legislation while being gay herself kind of ruined the appeal.
Oh shit, I misread the prior comment as “Robin wants to make out with Leslie”. Yeah no, Leslie is probably not interested.
all of that was there during the crush, except for the sqatting in her apartment.
Leslie knew all those things , beforehand. All of them. It was just as gross to crush on Robin beforehand as after.
Flipside was Robin was outed nationally , a plot that Leslie was sort of in on from the begginning.= when she squatted ( hid really) . Leslies not entirely innocent how that could have turned out during a campaign. The only part i think Leslie regretted was the media spotlight, which she had a hand in.
There is not one single part of that story that leslie was innocent of. and Thats what I think she regrets.
and Robin gets that, that Leslie wants to what she wants, but also wants to be guilt free.
As Leslie put it, ‘the last vestiges of warmth she had for her have long faded’.
Her ladyboner was stronger than her knowledge of her politics, but the more she interacted with her, the more grossed out she was.
Robin is taking ‘you had a crush on me once, you can like me again!’.
Uh oh, she’s becoming self aware.
If she breaks the Fourth Wall, what will protect the Drama Tag?
The drama tag got pulled inside the first week of school, no damage to the fourth wall required.
Honestly Robin, it’s a little of both.
Robin DeSanto: She’ll be a hot piece of shit so you don’t have to.
Robin, my problematic fave. Shooting her shot with morally questionable antics. Makes my gay lil heart go boop-a-dee-boo
People coming round on Robin is surprising.
She’s a terrible person that’s performing acts of favouritism and abuses of power just to try to woo someone who doesn’t want to interact with her any more than necessary.
No amount of lesbianism or ‘attractiveness’ or wacky hijinks is going to change that part.
Very surprising. Typically this kind of fandom only happens to literally every white male villain.
Go diversity?
As a very gay masc-adjacent person who is super excited every time Asher does a dorky thing onscreen, I, specifically, have zero standing to complain. 😀
I’m a shortpacked veteran. I’ve never, at any point, disliked Robin.
Gonna second that. My perception of this character will always be shaped by Shortpacked, and it buys her a lot of goodwill
Third-ed. We saw the lengths that Robin was willing to go to for the sake of the people she cared about.
“Just think you were this close to banging some control-freak self-absorbed chick who doesn’t care about your feelings!”
“Closer than you think…”
That Robin? Sure, I remember that Robin…
I read Shortpacked! too.
I liked Robin there, and her ‘wacky hijinks’ are more suited in that universe (and it was a less politically charged time, so you could make jokes about Palin that didn’t feel as too close to home).
She doesn’t work as well here, and I don’t want to let a different universe’s version of her affect how I view her as a character in this one.
This is very interesting to me. That some people who’ve read Shortpacked have a better perception of Robin and are willing to give her more credit. I haven’t read Shortpacked, so to me she’s just an annoying character. Maybe she was better in Shortpacked or the setting was better for her if that makes sense? Like she’s creepily obsessed with Leslie, mistreats her sisters, and abused and misused her political power. Why is all of that okay? Sponsoring Becky is a step in the right direction, but it’s a small step.
Liking Robin has nothing to do with her actions being, “okay.” Okay does not equal interesting character. Robin is a weird, feral, force of chaos and hijinks. Is she a p.o.s.? Sure! Half the characters are! But after reading though all these super jerks who feel too real, it’s a welcome change of pace to have someone who operates on more of a looney tunes logic. A jerk who will crack a joke rather than a skull.
She has an ass of gold and a heart that won’t quit. (Thanks, Johnny Wander.)
A few reasons why Robin fit better in Shortpacked!:
1. The universe was a much better fit for ‘wacky hijinks’, it’s the same universe with aliens and actual superheroes after all. Just some of the things that happened over SP! were Mike fighting a giant mutant honey frosted bun, a proposal done using the moans of a couple having sex, and the universe being invaded by cereal box villains. Not to say it was completely surreal, but a lot of things got accepted for ‘oh yeah, just another day in SP!’.
2. Robin’s career as a politician had much less focus in SP!. There, she just fell into the job (during a sugar rush), and the only things she did as a politician were fight Sarah Palin and try to enact a bill to get dudes to kiss. She didn’t really abuse her power, she didn’t destroy any lives, and she failed more often than she succeeded. Plus, the world was a much less serious place back then, so political jokes were easier to pass off.
3. Robin did carry over a lot of goodwill from SP!, as did Mike and Carla. They had their jerkish moments there too, but their ‘good’ moments were both much more favourably shown, and also, again, less ‘real world ramifications’ or ‘people were cool with it’.
Dropping out of her congressional race wasn’t a small step, it was a grand gesture. And she needs more than just grand gestures. This probably feels like to her a small(er) thing she can do to help someone out.
Now here’s a question you forced me to think of at gunpoint: If a grand gesture is insufficient [something] of [other thing]*, can we then consider it a small step in the bigger picture? Like yeah, Simon may have sold his second car to help with Tina’s medical expenses, but he’s still a problematic gambler.
*I’m not a social lawyer like half** the other people here, idk the appropriate words
**I’m also not a statistician like the other half
I think grand gesture and/or consistent little things depend on who was wronged and in what ways.
Her grand gesture did more than just help Becky. She took herself out of the position where she hurt people. She’s not in congress, and she’s not a lobbyist. It’s a big step, but not the whole journey. Simon has stopped gambling, it was somehow dependent on him owning that car (he was a street racer? I dunno, I’m overextending your metaphor). He still hasn’t made up for the important things he’s missed in people’s lives, the money he borrowed and never paid back, etc.
My love of Robin extends beyond any given universe she finds herself in, and is more important than any continuity. She could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and she wouldn’t lose me.
I love Shortpacked Robin, but I can’t say the same for this one. She burned through my Shortpacked goodwill during her time as a Republican. She’s working slowly at building it back but she’s still not one of my favourites.
What did she do that was an abuse of power here? Like, a TA would be her employee, and she really didn’t need to hire Barry at all. She also didn’t need to be transparent with the class about Jason’s past.
Like, yes, she left a (deservedly) bad impression on you early, but it’s also kind of obviously leading you to make certain leaps here. Happens to all of us sometimes, but don’t be super shocked if you don’t get a ton of people agreeing with it.
“I’m going to divine what you want and do that without asking and it’s a good thing actually” is a bit of a toxic relationship paradigm.
She could have only hired the unqualified sex pest, and she didn’t. She could have concealed that he was an unqualified sex pest, and she didn’t. She could have punched everyone in the face until they voted for the unqualified sex pest, and she didn’t!
In fact, when you consider all the things she didn’t do, hiring an unqualified sex pest and then telling your not-girlfriend “I’ve done this thing for you” is barely anything!
liking a character in a fictional story is not an endorsement of their actions.
This might be the most unhinged take I’ve seen in this entire comments section.
(damn it to hell i forgot to mark this as sarcastic)
Yeah. Like, for a long time, Dorothy was my least favorite major character in the comic. Was she particularly problematic? No! She’s Dorothy. I just didn’t find her all that interesting.
You can dislike a fictional character without villainizing them, and you can like a fictional character without sanctifying them.
There are also just different ways people connect with characters in a story– like, I’ve seen various people in the comments talk about who they like in the comic based on who they would want to be friends with IRL. This is not at all how I think about these things, though I think it is fine to do so. But sometimes people get mixed up in what it is other people mean by liking/loving a character.
Agreed! And I feel like in fandoms (honestly I hate that word so much now) there’s a hypocritical fear of being a “bad person” for enjoying a flawed character and people feel like they gotta justify it and cover their ass. Like, idk, we all like Ursula from Little Mermaid, right? Great villian with a great song inspired by an even more amazing and flawed person – Divine. But I mean look at the story, Ursula lies and manipulates a teenager into giving up her voice for personal gain. Am I suddenly endorsing that behavior when I drunkenly belt out POOR UNFORTUNATE SOULS at karaoke?
Exactly. I’d probably hate to meet Bender form Futurama in real life but that doesn’t stop me from quoting every line he’s ever spoken.
I have always supported women’s wrongs in this webcomic.
Look, Robin, you can be hot-sexy and hot-dumpster-fire at the same time. They’re not mutually exclusive.
As long as nobody digs further beyond the Robin Shield.
still feels weird hearing all that while she’s in that suit, very 1920s
You hit the nail on the head. Robin copies the popcultural idea of what a professor looks like. Or to be exact: it’s a copy of what Indiana Jones wears when teaching classes. Which again, is a thing that might work for Leslie, knowing her movie preferences.
Aw, Robin. I think she sees things a little too clearly here, for the limitations of contrived ethics Leslie has imposed on herself.
Wait, was that mouseover-text an actual, real-life Wise Guys-reference? Cool!
Happy Gilmore
Hilarious and classic “You eat pieces of sh** for breakfast?” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LAnmnS0-9g
Amazigirl is immune to criticism, Robin is (relatively) immune to consequences
Look out Les! she’s trying to seduce you with smooth words, a rockin bod and bowties!
It won’t work on me! Mostly…. I prefer necktie over bow on my partners..
(obligatory reference) “Bowties are cool.”
Yes, but more options with a traditional
Plausible deniability never sounded so romantic
Your horns are showing, Robin (with or without an additional y)
Panel 4 is love.
Wait… Robin is helping?
I really like this actually. 🙂
She certainly sees it that way.
If you have Robin you will never need Batman. That’s a huge win.
Speaking of cute lesbians, guess who got back into Autistic Girlies Bracket via revival round?!?!? 🤩🦖🌈
I want to say Dina … but I feel she would refuse any sort of supernatural resurrection on principle.
Then again she has many zombie-like qualities: she likes hanging out around bones, she has peculiar culinary preferences, she appreciates brains, she bites people, she can stand still in ambush for ages, she eats Becky alive… We are sure the hat isn’t some kind of alien parasite, right? I think I’ve seen its eyes move.
When did she eat Becky alive?
The slipshine, eating her out to be exact. 😜
Also @True Survivor, ding ding ding! 😁
Yeah I assumed from the fact they went around telling everybody they boned.
I want a Robin in my life
Do ya want Dick, Jason, Matt, Steph, or Damian? They’re all pretty good, I’m their own right.
The one in Arkham Knight
This is an incredibly self-aware and insightful strategy.
It’s easy to forget that Robin was a “serious” politician for a long time.
(as in, it’s easy to forget she was serious about politics and not just winging it)
See now for some reason split Robin’s description of her actions as relating to different individuals. In my head Jason was the privilaged white dude, but Barry was the problematic boyfriend.
Panel five: Leslie has a hopeless look on her face like, “I have no idea how to unpack this pile of nonsense”
The scary part is Leslie is clearly buying this.
What part of her expression is making that clear to you?
Oh No. Robin is Boris Johnson but hot
After thinking about it a bit, I think Leslie is perhaps being a little disingenuous here. When she went to Robin and asked ‘hey, can you hire a TA, and would you be willing do so if they were a sex pest?’ This right here is the exact outcome she wanted with the exact reasoning Robin is describing now. ‘I can’t do it because I can’t hire TAs and also I’m a good person who thoroughly condemns sex pestery, but Robin’s a massive piece of shit who totally won’t care about the details, so SHE can do it.’
It’s genuineLy true that when put to it Leslie didn’t outright say to Robin ‘I want you to hire this guy as a TA, he’s a sex pest of some flavor, one of my students asked me to help him.’ But it was certainly her plan in going to Robin in the first place, and that Robin picked up what was being put down while she was actively paying attention shouldn’t surprise anyone.
I agree.
Uh-oh. Looks like Twatter finally shut the embedded feed off.
In What’s-His-Name’s defense (lmao), if I were a fragile billionaire with more money than skin cells, I’d also buy and deliberately ruin a social media website that was full of people effortlessly dunking on me over and over and over and over and-
Wow, that actually makes sense, and from Robin, of all people. Robin, for all intents and purposes, just tole Leslie, “don’t worry, I’ll be you flack vest, I’ll take those hits for you.” Even if they never become a couple, this could be one endearing friendship.
Okay, there’s a madness to the method…
Leslie and Dorothy at different points of the same character arc
I love Robin not just because of her glorious Shortpacked! days but because her mere presence in this comic upsets people who want black and white morals from their fictional characters.
Enjoying Robin to own the libs?
lol no just to own ppl who for some reason want everyone in this webcomic to act like a moral paragon.
Disliking a character for things they’ve actually done is not the same as wanting everyone to act like a moral paragon, anymore than liking a character is claiming them to be a moral paragon.
No it’s not, but telling other people they’re horrible for liking a character despite them having done bad things is very much there.
Are the moral paragon wanters in the room with us right now?
the moral paragon is right behind me, isn’t he?
Support women’s wrongs!
now kiss
“What if we kissed and we’re both teachers 😳”
speedy robin statuette, but in professor suit instead of shortpacked uniform.
her logic makes sense..her rep’s so bad that if it did cause controversy well its HER ya know that’s how she is lol
Hey anyone else here notice that Willis’s tweets are no longer visible in the right panel? 👀
Because twitter made a new policy that you can’t see tweets unless you’re signed in which has fucked up twitter embeds everywhere cuz the company is run by a dipshit.
Wow just wow, he’s not gonna get money from advertisers if you have to be logged in to see the ads and limit how many tweets can be READ? I wouldn’t be surprized if that bloated bigoted dipshit was huffing BREAK FLUID.
I’m not super a fan of Robin, but I appreciate her willingness to take the heat for Leslie because she knows her own reputation.
Stupid random ad keeps popping up in the lower right corner of my screen, blocking the last panel of the comic!