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Hey, he comes back from the dead, feeds people his blood, and can only be killed with a piece of wood, how granular we gonna make this classification system?
I mean, Vampire lore has been incredibly varied over the years. The original Dracula had a number of traits that most people nowadays would not recognise as being stereotypically vampiric, and Anne Rice’s vampires of 50 years ago are barely even the same species as the vampires from Buffy, less than 20 years later.
Yes, Buffy is over 30 years old now. And the vampires in both movie and series share more in common with Twilight than Dracula.
There’s a fantasy quartet that starts with LIBRIOMANCER, by Jim Hines, where magic comes out of books to infect the real world. One of the interesting subplots is the various subspecies of vampire, like Sanguinarius Meyerii, aka sparklers – from Twilight.
I feel there are five basic axes to cover the various types of vampires
Blooddrinking: (from ‘tomato juice works’ to ‘can drink animal blood but is weaker for it’ to ‘must drink human blood directly from source’)
Unholy: (from ‘is disavowed by most organized religions’ to ‘holy objects that the wielder believes in will repel’ to ‘burned and can be killed by crosses or holy water’)
Weakness to sunlight: (from ‘sparkles’ to ‘carries a parasol outside during daytime’ to ‘any exposure to sunlight near-instantly turns to ash’)
Mind control: (from ‘lull into a relaxed state’ to ‘paralyze while maintaining eye contact’ to ‘turn into a mindless thrall’)
Bats: (from ‘wears a cape’ to ‘can control bats and possibly fly’ to ‘turns into bat or swarm of bats’)
And then there’s kind of a miscellaneous checklist. Invisible in mirrors? Can’t cross running water? Weak to silver? Need to be invited in? Enmity with werewolves? And so forth
For whatever reason, Sarah has taken on the role of Mama Bear to Joyce (and that was even BEFORE Joyce’s real mother revealed herself to be the arschloch that she was)… and no matter how strong you may be, you don’t mess around with Mama Bear’s cub.
I’d believe that, honestly. Joe is smart enough to not want to be in the room when the boyfriend conversation inevitable happens. Or just be around Sarah in general after all the times he’s been a pain in the ass for kicks.
Nah, it’s that despite his efforts earlier to be a Cad, Joe’s a Gentleman. It might actually be a solid natural defect in his character (cads, aka people without ethics, tend to end up with wealth and power, or power that provides wealth, while Gentlemen usually end up stuck keeping the damned world from collapsing.) He cooperated with Sarah’s efforts because it’s HER room too, and not his.
Sarah’s done something similar with Jen. It is important to note physical strength isn’t the same as fighting ability. Joe’s easily stronger than Amber but Amber would likely beat him in a fight.
Feats are important though and this counts. We’ll need to see if Carla can move a Joe or similar. Sarah might beat her as of now.
So far, the only “combat” we’ve seen Asher in was when Walky decked him and he decided not to retaliate. Definitely not enough to judge his capabilities in an actual fight.
Dina can climb a Joe, and also take down Amber (although in fairness after Amber sets herself up for it and with her not fighting back), plus has the guts to face down her girlfriend’s furious, gun-toting dad and bite him (during the first abduction). She can rip through multiple layers of denim with her teeth (converting Amber’s dungarees to jeans). There’s her invisibility power, door teleportation ability…
She pretty much only fights to defend dinosaurs and loved ones, so probably wouldn’t take part in a fighting competition to satisfy our curiosity – but I’m not sure we can entirely rule her out as a contender!
This is a good point but the problen with trying to scale someone like Galasso is that he doesn’t have enough appearances to analyze his feats. Comic always trumps speculation. All we really know for him is that he’s tall and fears Becky’s god. That tells me Becky would likely win the matchup through wits. I haven’t read Shortpacked it Galasso has done impressive stuff there or actually has access to ninjas let me know.
Jacob is similar, we just haven’t seen much from him. We do know he works out. We’ve seen it. That does a lot to put him over others for physical strength at least. Combat ability, stealth, magic or super powers, intelligence, skills still leave a lot to be desired.
I think Sarah disapproves of Joe more than Dorothy does. Dorothy’s disapproval has a jealously component. Joe has a knack and reflex to piss Sarah off.
I think she’ll disapprove of them dating, but really despise the most that there will be more Joe in her life.
Now I’m just picturing that series of pictures of the Shortpacked! crew doing the kneeling which was a reference to something that Willis explained, but I can’t really remember.
Just that even in non-canon drawings, Leslie would rather rip her own arms off than participate.
It tended to be Sonic the Hedgehog characters because 1) Sonic attracts some particularly odd fanart subtypes, and 2) Sonic is very cool to kids, and largely acceptable to the kind of Christian parents who would restrict kids’ media options evidently, but then the kids need to make him Explicitly Christian for their particularly sheltered worldview and so, Sonic kneeling at the cross fanart.
However, it was by no means EXCLUSIVE to Sonic, as I remember.
Christian (I assume Evangelical) teens drawing fictional characters worshipping Jesus is a real phenomenon, mostly on Deviantart. I think it was a reference to that general thing, but also specifically the Sonic stuff because Sonic fanart is its own weird thing.
Hey NGPZ, you may be interested into looking for a fan-manga called “Pokémon Festival of champions”, comes out twice a year and it is like crack. It got hooks in my soul.
Oh god. Oh god, of course Joyce made her own reference to the phenomenon of fanart showing kids characters who aren’t explicitly Christian but who were deemed child-appropriate by Christian parents enough for their preteen kids to draw them Kneeling Prostrate Before The Lord.
I wonder if there’s a Twilight equivalent to that subgenre of HP fics where Harry repents his sins of Witchcraft and Wizardry and turns to Jesus. Can Fundie!Jesus cure vampirism and/or lycanthropy?
I mean it probably exists but I wouldn’t be able to point you in any direction. Harry Potter and Christian fundamentalism are not my thing and my Vampire fandom is limited to What We Do in The Shadows (film/show) Castlevania and Bram Stokers Dracula.
Oh, you added the punisher skulls. No wonder I couldn’t find that version. Wouldn’t be surprised to see someone selling it. There are enough versions with Punisher symbols, mixing that and the Christian symbolism seems inevitable.
I don’t hate the flag, but wow that’s awful. Not the sonic part, that’s kind of funny, but the actual flag. I’ve seen the version with the cross and the lion, but adding punisher skulls instead of stars takes it to a new level.
I guess she could have asked why he was there in the first place, or told him to leave and then let him do so under his own power. But abruptly dragging him out mid-sentence is funnier, and it’s not like Joyce won’t explain tomorrow.
It’s not rude to drag a known sex pest out of your bedroom without warning. Sarah trusts him so little that she couldn’t let Joyce and Liz hang out in HIS room unchaperoned, after all.
Really hope this “Clearly framed as comedic in nature” scene doesn’t bring out the “character is being an evil monster!” crowd.
Like, yeah, this is not cool by Sarah, but in context it’s a fun gag that overemphasizes Sarah’s reaction to Joe’s reputation and him being around Joyce.
As somebody who’s been a bit irritated with Sarah’s attitude recently: this is fine. It was funny. I am worried about how this conversation might progress from here though.
Not wanting people to turn a simple gag into a real life court case is gatekeeping, actually. It’s my human right to joylessly force the United States legal system into every possible scenario and paint normal cartoon teenages as violent criminals. If you don’t have fun reading my unhinged rants about why these characters should be in federal prison, you’re tone policing me and trying to stifle ideas that make you uncomfortable. Only my emotional responses are valid, and anyone who so much as questions them is a wokeflake.
This is a response I have been seeing unironically on too many comments on things in Facebook lately “Your criticism of my criticism is gatekeeping my opinions!”
What’s particularly funny about the bit is that it takes several minutes to scoot someone. Did joe just accept his fate while joyce was engrossed in the development of her pun? Did sarah just make no noise even as she deposited joe at the open door? Absolute dorks i love the fuck out if everyone in this strip. A 10/10 gag that has distilled everyone perfectly. Cant wait for dorks to take this too seriously.
Joe’s survival instincts tell him that any form of protest against Sarah related evictions would be extremely detrimental to his health. He’s just going to sit out in the hall until Joyce explains the situation and be ready to run if Sarah starts sounding particularly angry.
Especially since, as I interpret it, he’s pushing himself along with his feet as she pulls because it’s not worth a fight right now, and the other option is getting strangled by his own collar/ruining his shirt while Sarah gives herself a hernia. That’s the real source of the ‘scoot scoot’ sound effect.
Ohhh that gave me a weird vibe. This might amuse you Willis, but I remember reading some iteration of your comic years ago and thinking all the characters had a childhood just before mine and they were more adult than me.
…and then you remind me of Joyce being into Twilight as a kid and a got whatever the emotion Ethan felt picturing Bruce Wayne leaving the theater after watching Pokemon the Movie:2000
That movie is boring as hell. There’s no way it would help inspire a kid to become a vigilante. If anything, the rich guy collecting rare exotic birds is going to encourage Baby Bruce to do the same. After his parents’ death, Bruce becomes a bird-themed villain who trains falcons to steal jewelery, and names them after Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres.
And now we enter the awkward territory of Sarah finding out that Joyce and Joe are chummy now. Grab your full plate armor and build a bunker cause it’s getting apocalyptic in here!
“You know he just wants to get in your pants, right?’
“We’ve been talking since the kidnapping. Uh, the first kidnapping. When Mr McIntire came here to shoot Becky. I mean really talking. I’m closer to him than to you. I guess we’ve been dating a while now? It’s hard to say when things changed, it’s been like a gradual thing. I want to get in his pants more than the other way around, but I don’t know if it’s going to happen. It’s not going to be on his initiative anyway.”
“But you know he’s a sex pest? He looks at women like Walky looks at nachitos. Remember the ‘do’ list?”
“Yeah, he hasn’t had sex since then. Like, at all. I don’t think he’s that person anymore.”
That’s a reasonable conversation these girls could have! But it won’t happen cause of the reverse Bechdel rule. (And probably other reasons too.)
The Bechdel test was covered early in the comic: A movie has to have two named women characters who have a conversation that’s not about a man. So the comic has a rule that no conversations between two women are ever about a man, or at least not primarily about a man. (And in the few scenes where two men have a conversation, it’s about a woman.)
Serious question now. Does the entirety of DOA actually fail the reverse Bechdel test??? that would be based af. (and impressive.) i doubt it but i can’t immediately recall any strip between two cis male characters who talk about something other than a woman/trans person…??
…then again. If we reconfigure the rule to not need to apply to single strips but to entire scenes… that scene has Amber mentioned. The Ethan-Asher interaction recently, another contender, mentions Jennifer in one of the strips.
…And besides, there’s a case for a more lenient Reverse Bechdel Rule that disqualifies gay/bi male characters, at least in the context of them flirting or other such gay interactions
i would still be impressed if the rule held under these rules
also wait a sec. @Amelie there seem to be two different “reverse” going on here.
If the Bechdel test is: “is there at least 1 conversation (in the entire text) between named non-cis-male characters which isn’t about a cis man?”
then the reverse might be: “is there at least 1 conversation between named cis-males characters that isn’t about a non-cis-male character?”
OR, and i vaguely remember that was what that old punchline was implying, it could mean “do ALL conversations (as opposed to at least 1) between named non-cis-male characters pass the Bechdel test?” in this version conversations between dudes are not relevant.
Aww Joyce! I have that quirk too! My brain is always looking for words to mush. I sometimes feel embarrassed by it, like I’m drawing attention to myself when it’s not my place. However, I’ve been working on getting comfortable taking up social and physical space. Seeing Joyce do this is helpful for that quirk at least!
Reminded me of Black Jesus and the Black Disciples. I wonder how Joyce’s family’s worldview would have changed, had they had a more historically accurate Picture Bible and grown up worshipping a Black man.
Cops are overgrown children cosplaying War, with all the rest of us forced into their stupid, childish game without our consent, consuming vast funds from the public treasury and ruining lives by the hundreds of thousands.
unknown@collie.bsky.social ⋅ 19h
I cannot get over these cops wearing night vision to arrest a dude on a Southwest Airlines flight in broad daylight.
a woman posted a pic in a group chat of a baby turkey she bought thinking it was a chicken. She captioned the pic "IS THIS A TURKEY?!?"
Anyway, I haven't been here because I've been yelling IS THIS A TURKEY at everything. You should try it
y'ever figure, hey, i should put joyce in bisexual flag colors for this storyline, but you also figure, hrm, that might telegraph things 8 months in advance, so you... add orange stripes and... it works, somehow it works, nobody points out the pink/purple/blue
Jonathan Joss being shot outside his home while protecting his husband after being sent a threatening and distressing package is WHY we need Pride
It's 2025 and people are still being shot and killed for being queer
This is why we march and why we fight
the thing about white liberal Americans is that they'll argue to accept bigots into their tent before accepting the bigots' targets.
the targets that have been on the same side as white liberals from the jump.
John Redcorn was pretty much the only contemporary Native representation I had in comedy growing up. Probably the funniest Native character in cartoon history and a lot of that was on Jonathan Joss' pitch perfect rezzy uncle performance. RIP to one of the best to ever do it.
today in #9chickweedlane i learned that, yes, lolly is so edda 2.0 that she's even wearing her mother's wedding dress as she gets married to Her Dad (But Taller)
unknown @collie.bsky.social ⋅ 19h
ETPC @etpc.bsky.social ⋅ 1d
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surprisingly nonviolent for Sarah
(then it turns out the vampire pile is the Jesus pile)
Hey, he comes back from the dead, feeds people his blood, and can only be killed with a piece of wood, how granular we gonna make this classification system?
Both of them object to crosses.
It’s why he gets warded off by them, it’s Jesus going “Oh, me, not all that crap again, why does everyone have to remind me of the Romans…”
One gets invoked to make holy water, and the other is vulnerable to it?
Well, if there is one thing we learned about vampires in the recent years, it’s that it’s a spectrum.
It has to be a spectrum, if it encompasses Dracula, Angel, and Count von Count.
And the Reformed Vampyres of Discworld.
And Edward Cullen.
Bunnicula to The Strain to Ethan Hawk to Colin Robbinson.
How insensitive! You left out Count CHOCULA!!! what do you have against Count Chocula, is he just not good enough for you??
And Count Duckula, can’t forget him.
Plus Count Chocula!
Laura, you are a being of taste and memory.
I mean, Vampire lore has been incredibly varied over the years. The original Dracula had a number of traits that most people nowadays would not recognise as being stereotypically vampiric, and Anne Rice’s vampires of 50 years ago are barely even the same species as the vampires from Buffy, less than 20 years later.
Yes, Buffy is over 30 years old now. And the vampires in both movie and series share more in common with Twilight than Dracula.
There’s a fantasy quartet that starts with LIBRIOMANCER, by Jim Hines, where magic comes out of books to infect the real world. One of the interesting subplots is the various subspecies of vampire, like Sanguinarius Meyerii, aka sparklers – from Twilight.
Buffy premiered in 1997. Closer to 30 than 20, certainly.
I believe Librain was including the 1992 film to which the series is technically a sequel
I feel there are five basic axes to cover the various types of vampires
Blooddrinking: (from ‘tomato juice works’ to ‘can drink animal blood but is weaker for it’ to ‘must drink human blood directly from source’)
Unholy: (from ‘is disavowed by most organized religions’ to ‘holy objects that the wielder believes in will repel’ to ‘burned and can be killed by crosses or holy water’)
Weakness to sunlight: (from ‘sparkles’ to ‘carries a parasol outside during daytime’ to ‘any exposure to sunlight near-instantly turns to ash’)
Mind control: (from ‘lull into a relaxed state’ to ‘paralyze while maintaining eye contact’ to ‘turn into a mindless thrall’)
Bats: (from ‘wears a cape’ to ‘can control bats and possibly fly’ to ‘turns into bat or swarm of bats’)
And then there’s kind of a miscellaneous checklist. Invisible in mirrors? Can’t cross running water? Weak to silver? Need to be invited in? Enmity with werewolves? And so forth
Sarah isn’t yet aware of their relationship status, violence will come once that’s made clear to her
Don’t be ridiculous. Jesus belongs in the zombie pile.
Only if zombies are lumped together with liches, as they already are with ghouls.
How about a compromise and we just go for the more general “revenant”? Let’s see anyone dispute *that* on a scriptural basis…
I mean, you literally have Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead, so there’s precident for revenants.
Yeah, man. That was stinky and gross…
yeah c’mon JC. don’t raise the dead. we all know they come back wrong
undead invasion in Matthew’s version of the crucifixion story too.
Nah, no Jewish liches, please; we have enough of that conflation from the actual D&D!
I see Sarah subscribes to a “Scoot first, ask questions later” philosophy.
…I’ll see myself out.
Joe’s decently beefy, right?
Sarah is STRONG.
Definitely well over 6 feet in height. I’d say 210-220 lbs easy.
For whatever reason, Sarah has taken on the role of Mama Bear to Joyce (and that was even BEFORE Joyce’s real mother revealed herself to be the arschloch that she was)… and no matter how strong you may be, you don’t mess around with Mama Bear’s cub.
I see the “scoot scoot scoot” as Joe helping her, because it seems less confrontational to have Joyce explain than to stand his ground.
I’d believe that, honestly. Joe is smart enough to not want to be in the room when the boyfriend conversation inevitable happens. Or just be around Sarah in general after all the times he’s been a pain in the ass for kicks.
Being in the hall gives him headstart if he hears Sarah scream his name in anger.
I was gonna say, shoutouts to Sarah for having enough muscle to drag him out, that’s impressive, Joe’s gotta be like 190+
If he was not *scoot scoot*ING I imagine there would be a sizable “URRRRAAAARRRRRGGGGHHHHHHHAAAAAAAHHHHH” from sarah
Nah, it’s that despite his efforts earlier to be a Cad, Joe’s a Gentleman. It might actually be a solid natural defect in his character (cads, aka people without ethics, tend to end up with wealth and power, or power that provides wealth, while Gentlemen usually end up stuck keeping the damned world from collapsing.) He cooperated with Sarah’s efforts because it’s HER room too, and not his.
Sarah’s pretty strong. Maybe top three in physical strength on the DoA power rankings.
Carla’s probably up there for her ability to carry Jennifer by her shirt.
And then… Ruth? Jacob?
Like in terms of who would win in a fight I’d probably say top three would be Sal/Asher/Amber, though.
Sarah’s done something similar with Jen. It is important to note physical strength isn’t the same as fighting ability. Joe’s easily stronger than Amber but Amber would likely beat him in a fight.
Feats are important though and this counts. We’ll need to see if Carla can move a Joe or similar. Sarah might beat her as of now.
is it a feat, or is it a rule of funny?
How many tons of TNT are needed to move a 6′?” buff guy the length of his own body? How many lightspeeds are in each scoot?
I dunno, I’d say that Ruth has demonstrated more combat ability than Asher.
So far, the only “combat” we’ve seen Asher in was when Walky decked him and he decided not to retaliate. Definitely not enough to judge his capabilities in an actual fight.
No, but don’t discount that we’ve seen he can take a punch (even if said punch was potentially from a glass fist.)
I only remember Jacob being big, not using strength.
Somebody has said not necessary big muscle means more strength.
He carried Joyce that one time, but we do not know how impressive a feat that is.
Dina can climb a Joe, and also take down Amber (although in fairness after Amber sets herself up for it and with her not fighting back), plus has the guts to face down her girlfriend’s furious, gun-toting dad and bite him (during the first abduction). She can rip through multiple layers of denim with her teeth (converting Amber’s dungarees to jeans). There’s her invisibility power, door teleportation ability…
She pretty much only fights to defend dinosaurs and loved ones, so probably wouldn’t take part in a fighting competition to satisfy our curiosity – but I’m not sure we can entirely rule her out as a contender!
I dunno, are we counting minor characters like Galasso and Jacob?
Galasso does not fight. He has minions for that
He may have ninjas at his disposal.
This is a good point but the problen with trying to scale someone like Galasso is that he doesn’t have enough appearances to analyze his feats. Comic always trumps speculation. All we really know for him is that he’s tall and fears Becky’s god. That tells me Becky would likely win the matchup through wits. I haven’t read Shortpacked it Galasso has done impressive stuff there or actually has access to ninjas let me know.
Jacob is similar, we just haven’t seen much from him. We do know he works out. We’ve seen it. That does a lot to put him over others for physical strength at least. Combat ability, stealth, magic or super powers, intelligence, skills still leave a lot to be desired.
Also take your bets on who’s disapproving more of Joe/Joyce, Sarah or Dorothy (initially)
Sarah not only hates Joe, but she’s opposed to all forms of human joy.
Not so! She delights in schadenfreude!
My bet: Sarah will be louder about it, but Dorothy will quietly disapprove more.
I think Sarah disapproves of Joe more than Dorothy does. Dorothy’s disapproval has a jealously component. Joe has a knack and reflex to piss Sarah off.
I think she’ll disapprove of them dating, but really despise the most that there will be more Joe in her life.
re alt text: “There’s nothing wrong with pregnant Sonic!!”
…somebody please find that cursèd music video
Very restrained of Sarah, for now, until she finds out Joyce and Joe are dating.
Also what is her workout routine beacuse I imagine Joe is 200+ lbs mostly muscle and Sarah dragged him like an empty cardboard box.
Her workout routine is primarily rage, supplemented with a healthy amount of spite.
And that bat.
Now I’m just picturing that series of pictures of the Shortpacked! crew doing the kneeling which was a reference to something that Willis explained, but I can’t really remember.
Just that even in non-canon drawings, Leslie would rather rip her own arms off than participate.
Maybe the fake Calvin drawings?
It tended to be Sonic the Hedgehog characters because 1) Sonic attracts some particularly odd fanart subtypes, and 2) Sonic is very cool to kids, and largely acceptable to the kind of Christian parents who would restrict kids’ media options evidently, but then the kids need to make him Explicitly Christian for their particularly sheltered worldview and so, Sonic kneeling at the cross fanart.
However, it was by no means EXCLUSIVE to Sonic, as I remember.
I wonder why Sonic is so on verge on cringe. After reading your comment, maybe Sonic is so on verge of everthing.
Christian (I assume Evangelical) teens drawing fictional characters worshipping Jesus is a real phenomenon, mostly on Deviantart. I think it was a reference to that general thing, but also specifically the Sonic stuff because Sonic fanart is its own weird thing.
It’s its own weird MANY things.
It’s rule 34, but all reversed.
I do sometimes forget Joyce was into Twilight.
Hehehe sonic
BTW thanks to everyone who shared healing music yesterday, much appreciated all of it 🥹
The sad thing is that if anyone in this comic is a Sonic fan, it’s almost certainly Mary.
Hey NGPZ, you may be interested into looking for a fan-manga called “Pokémon Festival of champions”, comes out twice a year and it is like crack. It got hooks in my soul.
Oh god. Oh god, of course Joyce made her own reference to the phenomenon of fanart showing kids characters who aren’t explicitly Christian but who were deemed child-appropriate by Christian parents enough for their preteen kids to draw them Kneeling Prostrate Before The Lord.
This is possibly my new favorite strip ever.
But did any of the characters chop their own arms off with a chainsaw?
Man what a drag.
heeheeheeheehee
Ah see what ye did thar
This is good stuff
oh boy, time for her to complain about joe, then assume joyce was talking to Raidah when she tells her to F off.
I wonder if there’s a Twilight equivalent to that subgenre of HP fics where Harry repents his sins of Witchcraft and Wizardry and turns to Jesus. Can Fundie!Jesus cure vampirism and/or lycanthropy?
I mean it probably exists but I wouldn’t be able to point you in any direction. Harry Potter and Christian fundamentalism are not my thing and my Vampire fandom is limited to What We Do in The Shadows (film/show) Castlevania and Bram Stokers Dracula.
I didn’t realize there were multiple of those. The most famous or the only one I know is parody
all the vampires walkin’ through the valley
Move west down Ventura Boulevard…
There is an XKCD of that song, let me look it up. here it is: https://xkcd.com/2811/
look what I had laying around, from some time after I read those shortpacked strips.
https://www.tumblr.com/huesatlight/727775266996404224/cursed?source=share
this image is for flag code enthusiasts only. If you hate the flag, you’ve been forewarned.
Absolutely fuck all could have prepared me for this
Is that… flagse?
that part is real, I just added sonic and replaced the stars with smaller defaced flags.
Oh, you added the punisher skulls. No wonder I couldn’t find that version. Wouldn’t be surprised to see someone selling it. There are enough versions with Punisher symbols, mixing that and the Christian symbolism seems inevitable.
Also, Punisher skulls instead of stars is pretty metal, and I’m pissed that the most boring, violent people on Earth have appropriated it.
Trigger warning
I forewarned you!
Sorry, accidentally flagged it
which should be ironic…
I choose to interpret it as Sonic desperately trying to pull the impaling cross from poor Aslan’s head, hidden by corporate America…
wow this flag is incredible.
(i’m not up on sonic fanlore so i dont get that bit)
I don’t hate the flag, but wow that’s awful. Not the sonic part, that’s kind of funny, but the actual flag. I’ve seen the version with the cross and the lion, but adding punisher skulls instead of stars takes it to a new level.
Last panel Joyce–I’m so glad I’m not the only person who does that (constantly, in my case)
Making puns is a completely healthy action
Honestly, that’s just smurfing rude. Joyce was clearly having a conversation with Joe and can have guests in her own room.
Sarah can overstep a bit when doing what she thinks is best for Joyce.
SarahHalf the characters in this comic can overstep a bit when doing what [they think] is best for Joyce.And half the members of this comment section, too.
Joyce making her own decision? What a grand and intoxicating idea.
It is not too late for Sarah’s mercy!
its a little rude, but a person has a say over who is not welcome in their home.
Kinda? It’s a shared room, so Sarah might get some say. I think that’s the sort of thing that the roommate agreement is supposed to address.
I guess she could have asked why he was there in the first place, or told him to leave and then let him do so under his own power. But abruptly dragging him out mid-sentence is funnier, and it’s not like Joyce won’t explain tomorrow.
It’s not rude to drag a known sex pest out of your bedroom without warning. Sarah trusts him so little that she couldn’t let Joyce and Liz hang out in HIS room unchaperoned, after all.
Really hope this “Clearly framed as comedic in nature” scene doesn’t bring out the “character is being an evil monster!” crowd.
Like, yeah, this is not cool by Sarah, but in context it’s a fun gag that overemphasizes Sarah’s reaction to Joe’s reputation and him being around Joyce.
Is this gonna be batery or assult lawsuit?
Littering.
Grand Theft Auto. (that was Joyce’s ride Sarah just towed away)
As somebody who’s been a bit irritated with Sarah’s attitude recently: this is fine. It was funny. I am worried about how this conversation might progress from here though.
Not wanting people to turn a simple gag into a real life court case is gatekeeping, actually. It’s my human right to joylessly force the United States legal system into every possible scenario and paint normal cartoon teenages as violent criminals. If you don’t have fun reading my unhinged rants about why these characters should be in federal prison, you’re tone policing me and trying to stifle ideas that make you uncomfortable. Only my emotional responses are valid, and anyone who so much as questions them is a wokeflake.
that is a truly batshit stand, and i applaud you for taking it.
This is a response I have been seeing unironically on too many comments on things in Facebook lately “Your criticism of my criticism is gatekeeping my opinions!”
Joyce just coined the term for a bloodsuckers-only orgy.
I love the image of her just scooting him over the course of a couple minutes. I too would like Sarah to scoot me.
What’s particularly funny about the bit is that it takes several minutes to scoot someone. Did joe just accept his fate while joyce was engrossed in the development of her pun? Did sarah just make no noise even as she deposited joe at the open door? Absolute dorks i love the fuck out if everyone in this strip. A 10/10 gag that has distilled everyone perfectly. Cant wait for dorks to take this too seriously.
Joe’s survival instincts tell him that any form of protest against Sarah related evictions would be extremely detrimental to his health. He’s just going to sit out in the hall until Joyce explains the situation and be ready to run if Sarah starts sounding particularly angry.
Joe knows better than to fight back against Sarah.
Sarah has the moment of surprise, clearly depicted in the 3rd panel.
Several minutes? The room is like 7’x7′ and he’s sat in the middle of it. 30 seconds, tops.
Especially since, as I interpret it, he’s pushing himself along with his feet as she pulls because it’s not worth a fight right now, and the other option is getting strangled by his own collar/ruining his shirt while Sarah gives herself a hernia. That’s the real source of the ‘scoot scoot’ sound effect.
Ohhh that gave me a weird vibe. This might amuse you Willis, but I remember reading some iteration of your comic years ago and thinking all the characters had a childhood just before mine and they were more adult than me.
…and then you remind me of Joyce being into Twilight as a kid and a got whatever the emotion Ethan felt picturing Bruce Wayne leaving the theater after watching Pokemon the Movie:2000
That movie is boring as hell. There’s no way it would help inspire a kid to become a vigilante. If anything, the rich guy collecting rare exotic birds is going to encourage Baby Bruce to do the same. After his parents’ death, Bruce becomes a bird-themed villain who trains falcons to steal jewelery, and names them after Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres.
Well, I mean. He clearly can’t stop hoarding Robins
Exactly. Imagine how much worse he’d have become.
He will put all of them inside him, in order of largest to smallest.
Uh oh.
Sonic can be kneeling in the cross, or Joyce randomly saying “Sonic the hedgehog” in the end, like Walky….
And now we enter the awkward territory of Sarah finding out that Joyce and Joe are chummy now. Grab your full plate armor and build a bunker cause it’s getting apocalyptic in here!
Sarah doing her best Lily Hammerschmidt from Leftover Soup.
it’s such a missed occasion that the strip isn’t titled “Vampile” XD
“You know he just wants to get in your pants, right?’
“We’ve been talking since the kidnapping. Uh, the first kidnapping. When Mr McIntire came here to shoot Becky. I mean really talking. I’m closer to him than to you. I guess we’ve been dating a while now? It’s hard to say when things changed, it’s been like a gradual thing. I want to get in his pants more than the other way around, but I don’t know if it’s going to happen. It’s not going to be on his initiative anyway.”
“But you know he’s a sex pest? He looks at women like Walky looks at nachitos. Remember the ‘do’ list?”
“Yeah, he hasn’t had sex since then. Like, at all. I don’t think he’s that person anymore.”
That’s a reasonable conversation these girls could have! But it won’t happen cause of the reverse Bechdel rule. (And probably other reasons too.)
reverse Bechdel rule?
It’s like the Bechdel rule, but the person in top sits with their back to the one on the bottom, giving them a better view of the butt.
“On” is a word, automangle.
can’t wait for autocorrect to become intelligent enough to understand when i mean “in” and when i mean “on” smh.
and also to assume “butt” every time i write “but”, not the other way around, smhhhh
hm. this was meant to sound comedically dystopian but ended up sounding plausible
* can’t way for autocorrect to be able to trawl all of my data ever and simulate my brain with enough accuracy that…
The Bechdel test was covered early in the comic: A movie has to have two named women characters who have a conversation that’s not about a man. So the comic has a rule that no conversations between two women are ever about a man, or at least not primarily about a man. (And in the few scenes where two men have a conversation, it’s about a woman.)
ah cheers, didn’t remember that =)
Serious question now. Does the entirety of DOA actually fail the reverse Bechdel test??? that would be based af. (and impressive.) i doubt it but i can’t immediately recall any strip between two cis male characters who talk about something other than a woman/trans person…??
…ok, wait, no obviously there’s a few such moments like the infamous Ethan-Danny discussion at the hospital.
…then again. If we reconfigure the rule to not need to apply to single strips but to entire scenes… that scene has Amber mentioned. The Ethan-Asher interaction recently, another contender, mentions Jennifer in one of the strips.
…And besides, there’s a case for a more lenient Reverse Bechdel Rule that disqualifies gay/bi male characters, at least in the context of them flirting or other such gay interactions
i would still be impressed if the rule held under these rules
also wait a sec. @Amelie there seem to be two different “reverse” going on here.
If the Bechdel test is: “is there at least 1 conversation (in the entire text) between named non-cis-male characters which isn’t about a cis man?”
then the reverse might be: “is there at least 1 conversation between named cis-males characters that isn’t about a non-cis-male character?”
OR, and i vaguely remember that was what that old punchline was implying, it could mean “do ALL conversations (as opposed to at least 1) between named non-cis-male characters pass the Bechdel test?” in this version conversations between dudes are not relevant.
ok bye
There are conversations with Walky and another dude that are about nachitos, and only nachitos. I think those would count. For something.
Malaya might be mentioned, Liz definitely.
Funny gag and all but also another example of Joyce’s friends infantilizing her
Hoping this isn’t a throw away gag but instead leads to some, much needed, character growth for Sarah
Pretty sure she would have dealt with Joe’s presence in exactly the same way regardless of who else was in the room.
She can want her hate sink not to be in her home, without it being “infantilizing”. She’s her own person, not Joyce’s fairy godmother.
Pest control Sarah at your service, I heard there were an infestation of Joes here, right?
Yeah, there’s a lot of discourse on the scooting, but the “Did you know …” line is comedy gold to me.
Sarah comes back in on a mechanic’s rolly board, somehow covered in engine oil. “Found your problem. There’s a Joe in here.”
sCoOtInG dIsCoUrSe
once you’ve caught a Joe they can be a pain to get rid of, and next thing you know they’re crawling into all your friends’ beds, too.
Aww Joyce! I have that quirk too! My brain is always looking for words to mush. I sometimes feel embarrassed by it, like I’m drawing attention to myself when it’s not my place. However, I’ve been working on getting comfortable taking up social and physical space. Seeing Joyce do this is helpful for that quirk at least!
I too love a good word smush!
Discourse about Joyce and Sarah and Sarah’s treatment of Joyce and whether or not Sarah is assault and batterying Joe: welcomed, delightful
But the content I need injected in my veins directly is actually Sarah and Joe interactions. I need this confrontation like I need oxygen.
Well, this lovely song, “Distant Relatives” just popped up on the jukebox…
https://youtu.be/yGTWK7rbmks?si=A98zUssJ7QVelkMg
Reminded me of Black Jesus and the Black Disciples. I wonder how Joyce’s family’s worldview would have changed, had they had a more historically accurate Picture Bible and grown up worshipping a Black man.
Hisomnt c
Ghoktaf slomsh, dflkhjkkh.
Ref the alt text: I got that reference.