jesus christ tomorrow’s strip early on patreon oh my god
Iantos @iantos.bsky.social ⋅ 1d
Phil Lewis @phillewis.bsky.social ⋅ 14h
preternia @preternia.com ⋅ 16h
preternia @preternia.com ⋅ 12h
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 14h
Jon Munitz @jonmunitz.bsky.social ⋅ 17h
preternia @preternia.com ⋅ 12h
Chris McFeely @chrismcfeely.bsky.social ⋅ 14h
TFNation @tfnationltd.bsky.social ⋅ 15h
Sorenson & McFeely
Lost media
Pre-recorded script reading
Special guest cast
Details below!
tfnation.com/blog/20...
#TFNation #Transformers
Iantos @iantos.bsky.social ⋅ 1d
assbutt @nasboat.org ⋅ 2d
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do gay be crimes
And don’t forget to drink sleep, avoid school, stay in milk, and get 8 hours of drugs.
woa, 8 hours? That’s a good mushroom
that is a bad trip. ~<3
There’s such a thing as “too much” of a good thing. Like 8 hours of mushroom. No, I don’t speak from experience, why do you ask
cheese. chocolate. lasagna.
As long as the chocolate is served separately from the cheese and lasagna.
my intent was more “you might think you can’t have Too Much of these, but I regret to inform you”
Having too much of either cheese, chocolate, or lasagna on top of 8 hours of mushroom (about 3 grams, I’ve heard) is definitely something to regret
I dunno, yo’, a nice spicy bitter-cocoa molé lasagna with extra sharp cheese sounds just about perfect right now…
And so long as the mushrooms are the NON-psychedelic kind, and are just tastefully roasted atop the lasagna, I’m still game!
I was DD at a mdma party once; those peeps were about 8-10 hours in a cuddle puddle. (didn’t partake of the molly, but think i got a contact high anyway)
YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES
+1
it is the way
Later she’ll tell her that the cops already tackled her and there’s no escape anyway. If the cops are all on the take, fighting them is the only justice. Also devesting is morally and ethically required, and Dorothy must wreck Joyce by her own hand in all timelines.
Remember mlk went to jail, no shame in following suit. Try not to get sniped despite that, though. But gays doing crimes is also a noble tradition.
Rooftop sniper (watching epic drama between these two): “JUST KISS ALREADY YOU TWO DAMMIT SHIT DO IT HOW HARD CAN IT BE”
I know Willis always uses exact character quotes as book titles, but perhaps “Be Gay, Do Crimes” could be the title of the 14th book?
Also… *big inhale* …. NOW KISS, ALREADY!
Someone might still say it. Possibly in response to all this. We can only hope.
instructions unclear
couldn’t figure out how to do gay, so did E instead
can now do gay, but became more crimes than promised
“these b*tches gay good for them”
REAL SICKOS HOURS
SICKOS STAY WINNING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
[Relevant Gravatar is Relevant]
What can I say, every time I think I should change it, Willis makes sure I don’t have to
Same, same.
57%! Take that, morality police!
Yes… Ha ha ha… Yes!
yeah yeah yeah
ya both can be like Bonnie & Clyde
hopefully MINUS the dying in a hail of gun fire
speakin of
yo cooli foolies better HURRY UP AND GET THE FUCK OUTA DODGE!
*plays “ADVICE” by the pillows on hacked muzak*
How about Thelma and Louise?
Two gal pals that take to the open road
in search of excitement and adventure.
I never saw it, but surely nothing bad happens to them in that movie
Didn’t it end on a cliffhanger?
And kicked off with rape.
It was a cliff, and hang time was impressive.
Pretty sure it was Autobot favourite Cliffjumper.
I don’t think I’ll ever forget the bit where Sarandon and Davis talked about the possibility of a sequel (despite the obvious, uh, problem):
“We could have bounced!”
They had parachutes.
Ba dum tiss…
yeah feel sorry about their boyfriends but hopefully understanding. if not some ‘ouroborus’ polycule like walky mentioned
I imagine joe being more ‘upset/affected’ while walky being like “I told you/knew it” and gloat to joyce the first chance he gets
well that’s kinda gay
lil’ bit
Practically Gal Pals, you might say.
“Roommates.”
The “who’s cutting onions?” gag is less cute when it’s tear gas.
I have no comments on this page other than to apologize for my shitty comment on the last page.
Without any idea what you are referring too, you can’t imagine the amount of self-control it takes to avoid asking, “Which one?”
And yet,
I only consider my comment on the dudes to be a dick move.
I apologize for nothing else because if this goes where we all know it’s going Joyce and Dorothy are dirtbags who I believe deserve any hate directed at them in that moment.
Would I get over it? Most definitely, but in the moment they will be my least liked characters of the main cast and would prob stay that way for a couple pages
If life wasn’t messy, Bissel wouldn’t exist.
And Dyson would be making a sphere.
And if every porkchop were perfect we wouldn’t have hot dogs.
Is that you, Peter Porker?
More like Rebecca Sugar.
Hey, you do you.
Really? Mary is right there.
Joyce’s mother, Walky and Sal’s parents . . .
Nope apparently making boys sad is way worse than racism, transphobia, sexism, etcetc. How dare they.
If you’ve been cheated on before, but never experienced any of the “isms” I can fully understand being hit harder by this.
The human experience is not universal. Of course your own personal past is going to affect the emotional response you have now.
your comment was basically “lesbians only hurt dudes” which is just a bad take, no one in this story suffers after a breakup which this isn’t necessarily what is happening but realize how little time passes in any part of this comic and how many relationships have swapped during that time, no one cared how many different girls Walky has been with, why the sudden concern now? ~<3
Technically this would be a “Bisexuals always cheat” thing but also Walky has only dumped 1 chick this whole comic and has been dumped twice then cheated on
Walky has not been cheated on.
Dorothy fucking Walky does not constitute a reinstatement of their relationship.
Joe might get cheated on depending on what Joyce and Joe have discussed and if in their minds kissing counts.
Also, if Joyce goes to talk to Joe and tell him that she’s going to date both him and Dorothy, then again, not cheating. To cheat requires hiding information from one’s partner. With informed consent and agreement, it is not cheating in any way.
Joyce would be cheating on Joe here hard stop. There’s no retroactive “teehee i told him after 🩵” this would be cheating and their relationship would be starting with cheating.
Good.
Also, Dorothy and Walky are in a relationship again. They’ve talked about it. Even when Dorothy stopped whatever was about to happen in Joyce’s bed, “I’m with Walky” was one of the reasons.
Yeah, it’s definitely not implied to be a very serious relationship this time around, but Dorothy herself does seem to consider them together. (Though I think it’s unclear if she truly does, or if she was just offering that as another reason she can’t have what she wants yet again. Kind of as a weird self-harming thing, if that makes sense?)
Y’know what? This is fair.
While I’m completely fine with it because this is fiction and I’m here to watch the characters be dramatic and messy as hell, I think it’s fine for cheating (or behavior toeing that line) to hit a bit too close to home. (I personally don’t think Joe will entirely relapse into his old habits, but I guess it’s too early for anyone but Willis to say for sure.)
Also, thanks for apologizing for your comment. Not because I’m personally offended – I think it’s technically wrong, but I can understanding why you might feel that way – but because that takes a lot of guts to do publicly.
I hope you’re doing okay today. ;~;
I agree it is the wrong take and I was just over reacting. Idk man I just really attached myself to joe
he doesn’t deserve to have his biggest trauma basically thrown in his face by someone I KNOW isn’t meaning to hurt him intentionally and I lashed out in a stupid comment (i said smth even dumber in the patreon)
I dont think Joe will relapse but i worry about him doing smth self destructive like isolating or smth. I’m doing a lot better now that I’ve had time to stew.
This arc is going to kill me i s2g
No, I feel you, I do really feel SO bad for Joe in all of this sdkfjsdf. He’s really become such a great character in his own right recently, so as excited as I am for the overall queerness of the comic to be visibly increasing… POOR JOE OMG. (And to a lesser extent Walky? I feel like he’s know the writing is on the wall for a while, though.)
Fingers crossed there’s some way for the characters involved to handle these messy feelings at least SOMEWHAT gracefully.
You can tell this was written during the biden administration because they’re using Woke Gas on the student protests against the current ongoing genocide.
Where’s the sickos meme when you need it?
The sickos meme was the friends we made along the way.
So, yup. Ride or Die status confirmed.
Ha
GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY
I fully believe the comment section will handle this in a mature and tasteful way that won’t involve some of them wanting the sniper to fire at them for cheating.
I’m getting my gas mask ready
Are you my mummy?
I needed this laugh, cheers haha
Go. To. Your. Room.
Actually, yes, I am.
The only correct answer when dealing with _those_ things.
(mind, the better response is to get the helloutta dodge)
Curse of Ra
Even if they kiss, that sort of comment would be a major overreaction, but I don’t think what they’ve done quite counts as cheating YET.
I’m glad someone made this comment. I was afraid for a moment no one would get it.
Yeah I’m just not gonna read any more comments on this strip below this one because surely! Surely you are correct and there’s nothing ridiculous happening down there.
I don’t know Li. Maybe it’s just me but even this situation feels inherently ridiculous and fun. Like Joyce is walking through tear gas to embrace her totally platonic bestie while quoting possibly the gayest bible verse, her bestie who is performatively trying to get arrested at least in part to avoid the deeper implications of their mutual situationship. And at least half the comments are howling in sick approval while the other half gasp in horror.
I feel like we’ve gotten too lost in the drama weeds if we start policing how people choose to respond. The jokes are there. Just my opinion. Not directly specifically at you or anyone. Just in general.
Have you been to this comment section, getting lost in the drama weeds is bassically what everyone here does.
Nah, the gayest Bible verse is the one where God creates lesbians. Sure, the verse makes it sound like it’s a bad thing (it’s a punishment to the men for having weak faith), but still….
Which verse is that? Tell me more!
Is it Romans 1:24-32?
I wonder what older story Paul (or the author, if not Paul) is referring to, there…
This bears further study!
Choosing not to read comments below this one is more about my blood pressure. I’m not telling anyone else how to feel about things.
man rip joe and walky
they should kiss and squeeze each others butts about it
Feel so bad for Joe especially right now. He’s tried so hard and changed so much and this could really rock him
Okay, my single solace I am taking, is I just imagined Current Joe trying so hard to back-slide into his old self, as a cope, and genuinely failing to become a horn dog again, because he has successfully grown as a person and he can’t change that.
This. Joe’s a Good Dude now.
RIP meaning “Rest In Power”, right?
this is so gay ;_;
Be crime, do the gay
im just gonna cry over this development
Much as I appreciate this moment they’re having, they really should get out of there. Maybe climb the fence like some of the other protesters appeared to be doing in the background of yesterday’s strip
They should, but it’s not like they’re being distracted by their moment and forgetting to run. The whole point is Dorothy refusing to leave. And Joyce refusing to leave her.
Jocelyne should get out – jail’s likely to be rougher on her and she can arrange for a lawyer.
When you thought it couldn’t get any gayer Willis always go beyond.
They’re both already blonde, so I guess the next stage is to scream for three minutes and grow their hair down to their waist(s).
I fell like i am close to getting that reference but it escapes me.
Dragonball Z
This is being besties.
And this is to go even further beyond!!
yup. and the first time Goku does it on screen, he even says, “and this is to go even further beyond!“
Did Joyce walk through some tear gas, or is her face in the final panel just weird?
Also, while the idea of Dorothy/Joyce makes me happy I still feel bad for Joe, and to a lesser degree Walky. I feel like Walky will be less hurt than Joe; is that fair to say?
Her eyes and nose look kinda red, I assume because of the gas. And yeah, while I like the idea of Dorothy and Joyce as a couple, I worry how Joe and Walky will feel about it.
Well, she’s already making Dorothy to cry.
Joe will cry, right after Jocelyne, Amazi-girl, that will be arrested tomorrow.
Definitely looks like she walked through some of the tear gas IMO.
Yesterday and today’s strips definitely indicate her walking through tear gas and covering her face with her arm to block it out and the last time we saw Joyce before yesterday’s there was a tear gas canister flying past her face so it’s possible that one deployed in pretty close range to her.
Walky will think Dotty finally realized she’s too good for him. He’s always put her on a pedestal.
Joe will take it on the chin because he wants Joyce to be happy, and his entire hat was “I will suffer for other people’s happiness.” Barring Sarah’s sister coming back, I don’t see him dating at all after this plays out.
Unless he backslides and goes full debauchery, which, given how things are going, is possible.
Hot take, after a breakup of Tony & Sarah, Joe & Sarah, now friends over the workout station, end up dating.
Joyce getting jealous that her adoptive big sister gets her world rocked by Joe before she does would be INCREDIBLE content.
I just don’t see Joe going after anyone in the cast going forward. Sarah’s an acquaintance, and she’s too close to Joyce.
I dont see Joe getting into another relationship hard stop tbh.
tbf if things play out on the worse half of outcomes, yeah, this is a very prescient prediction.
Just call me Atreides
Gayer than anything I’ve done this week, and that includes gay sex.
cheers on the gay sex tho!
Your Daisy avatar is hilariously ironic then
It’s what she would want me to do.
Dorothy and Joyce are about to have that, too.
Right there. Middle of the meadow. Plain sight in the protest. Everyone else stops what they’re doing. Sniper (a secret member of the Sickos) can’t stop watching. Riot cops are frozen. Only A-G continues rampaging around stomping coppers.
It’s all a secret plan they cooked up with AG to distract the cops so she can beat them up and let the rest of the protestors get out without getting shot herself.
we’ll never know how many lives dorothy and joyce saved that day, by just absolutely goin’ hog wild on each other in the middle of a riot. o7 to that sniper, he never had a chance
VICTORY IS AT HAND
Really don’t like this unfortunately
Joyce can do better.
She seems to be doing pretty good to me.
I mean she nearly did but then Willis decided they didn’t need Joyce Joe slipshine money that day and instead went this direction. I love Dorothy but right now I mean Joe literally pointed it out himself. He’s literally better than her morally and honestly in life in general right now. Dorothy is not yet peak.
i’m really hating this aspect of the current arc
I’m kind of not a fan either. It feels… artificial to me. Contrived.
Due to the lack of hints that Joyce might be into Dorothy?
Have we been reading the same comic?
I know, right?
Contrived is a good word for it. It feels very “fine, here!” rather than two girls actually realizing their feelings for each other. Dorothy’s whole “I never get what I actually want” shtick suddenly including Joyce just feels very out of left field.
I mean, I’ve technically been a Joeyce shipper forever but at the same time I’m like Amber in that I ship everyone with everyone so…yeah, I couldn’t really vote on the sickos vs paladins poll lmao
Hey it says no cowards!
Are they gonna be caught kissing on camera in the middle of the protest like I suggested a week or so ago?
Because that would be cool.
It would suck for the boyfriends, but still a net positive in coolness overall.
Boyfriends, Joyce’s family, Becky…
Calling it now….they’ll be kissing, and that’ll be the image of the protest in the news, and Joe’s going to see it in the paper or watch it go viral.
Joe’s going to be very much on the list of people who won’t be surprised by this outcome.
Along with Walky who I seem to recall once introduced his girlfriend Dorothy and Dorothy’s girlfriend Joyce.
AND it’ll make Joyce’s mysterious Other Brother pop up finally and we’ll find out that the thing he did was Be Gay and he knows what Joyce is about to experience from her family with this out in the open.
Yes… ha ha ha… YES!
I think given the clearly long-building nature of this and the uh, fraught nature of Joyce’s coming out arc, Joe will probably handle this…. not SUPER well but probably with at least some attempted grace
Cheating is a complicated and many feathered thing and they haven’t actually like, crossed the line into it at this point (although there was clearly intent there which is — Significantly Not Good. don’t get me wrong.) but as long as they address this head on from here and don’t like, carry on behind their respective lovers’ backs, i trust that there’s gonna be some maturity involved here bc everybody’s already watched Becky fuckng Going Through It. doesn’t mean joe or walky are gonna be PERFECT about it but also, like, this shit’s complicated yo. frankly if we’re gonna talk cheating they’ve been “emotionally cheating” for a long time, but with queerness its much more multifaceted than that.
Anyone got $20 on Joe outwardly being okay then going on a self destructive spiral?
Oh Joe will 100% pretend to be okay, that’s his Thing. Which *way* he self destructs is up in the air.
I don’t think he’s going full Debauch Mode, but I have a feeling he’s going to slide out of everyone’s lives and no one will notice until he’s been gone a semester to a different school that has a culinary program.
I def dont think he’s going to the list levels but I can see some bad decisions inbound
Oh, that would be good. Buries himself in cooking to work through his feelings in a non-regressive way, focusing on keeping himself “good.” Leads to him actually deciding to go to culinary school. I’d like that for him.
That would make sense to me. I’m hoping he’s got a “bright side” planned for him bc he genuinely deserves *something* — but, differing from a lot of the comment section here, I’m not sure if Being Better For A Girl is as different from his dad as he’d hope. It’s improvement! But until he’s improving for *himself* it’s not really anything permanent or meaningful. Joyce is a great catalyst, but Joe is still trying to find his own identity, and I don’t think Joyce is a good shorthand for it — so this is an interesting way to force that issue. Joyce is a wonderful person for him, but isn’t *the* person for him. So who is he after the fact? Does he backslide? Does he do cooking, or toy design, or therapy? Who knows? But whatever it is it’s going to be entirely new territory.
Walky is a bit more of a complicated situation where Walky has been, not-so-different-from-Joe, going from relationship to relationship and like, kind of growing as a person? but still being very stubbornly immature about it. as much as cheating sucks, “being cheated on” is one of those firmly “walky is the one being wronged But It’s Complicated” where it might force some growth and empathy from him in a similar way as the stuff w/ his parents — so much of his relationship stuff so far has been about *his* immaturity. we don’t have a very good sense of who he wants to be (i mean, it’s first year uni. who DOES have a good idea of that?)
i can see walky trying really hard to brush it off as “haha i mean i guess my girlfriends being all gay now thats hot whatever it’s funny” and then having to actually process it at some point, maybe with sal, bc walky… is incredibly bad at actually Feeling Things. but also maybe he and joe *can* kind of bond over this, reverse-gendered grace-and-frankie styles.
I don’t think so. Cooking is associated with Joyce at this point.
Aaaand with that I find myself firmly in the “Sickos” camp after weeks of being on the fence between that and “Relationship Paladins”.
Also “then let’s become criminals” is a hell of a one-liner. Should definitely be a book title.
also also for a sec i didn’t realize Joss was in the bg and was trying to figure out why she was shrunked
also also also since i wasn’t in the comments last night i just wanted to say that was a hell of a full-strip spread.
Jocelyne: (Confused trans noises.)
I think she’s been aware of those two being those two, but is gonna interrupt quite soon with a “Look, kids, do the lezzing _later_ ’cause we’ve got incoming. Now move!” while grabbing them both by the collar and hauling them behind her.
I like that possibility
On one hand, I’m very glad I was wrong about her nose bleeding. On the other, OH NO! HER NOSE AND HER EYES!! THAT MUST BURN SO MUCH! Poor Joyce…
Oh yeah also bisexuals confirmed not that it hasn’t been very obvious for a while now but you know
Some people really need help getting the hint. And some probably going to need it Even after this.
Two women could stare each other dead in the eyes declaring their romantic and sexual attraction to each other and some people will still go “like a sister/mother”.
Dorothy is literally Joyce’s biological mother and raised her for 18 years. They can’t be gay together.
They can’t be gay because Dorothy has power over Joyce. What’s the power over Joyce? I don’t know, she sometimes suggests Joyce do things like get glasses so she can see, or that she masturbate, and Joyce simply CANNOT say no to Dorothy. Pay no attention to the fact that the current strip is literally Dorothy telling Joyce to do something and Joyce saying no.
Joyce still hasn’t declared any such thing.
Dorothy has.
Are you sure you’ve read today’s update and yesterdays?
I think anytime people crawl out of the woodwork to deny that Joyce is queer, you know that particular strip is ESPECIALLY queer, so much so they’ve just gotta squawk
Still worried about Jocelyne, tbh
She have to leave, now, and drag Asma together
Really hoping she and Asma get out okay, yeah.
I hope Asma is long gone. Leslie as well. (Not so concerned about Robin, and police violence against a former Congresswoman would have some media value.)
None have been seen since the clearing started though
That’s a good point about the media coverage vs Robin. Kinda hoping she does get arrested, tbh. She’d either make just the right kind of fuss, or at least make a very entertaining mess.
I love what’s happening in this moment (haha… yes… yesss!!!) but I really hope Jocelyne drags them both out of there, like, forcibly.
Too bad “out of there” is the location where police are actually attacking people, as Joyce is already aware.
Alright, so if this thing actually happens: how does this stack against Ruth/Billie and Joyce/Ethan in terms of “well that’s a little yikes”?
Acceptance of the two them as individuals being ok together: almost no yikes other than Dorothy’s tendency to be a “mom friend” (no abuse issues, no unbalanced power dynamic, no hiding their sexuality).
Fallout from the two of them getting together based on current friendships, romantic partners, and family bias: potentially a lot of yikes, but most likely a smedium amount. On a scale of 1-10, I’d say 4 yikes with the possibility of reaching 7.5 yikes.
This was a great yikes forecast, ty.
Pretty low honestly, like just 2 or 3 points above average.
Honestly that sounds like an overestimate. .5 yikes to 1 yikes max.
Yiketereology is not an exact science.
This is going to have a ton of implications that will result in things going places. My money is on Polyamory.
I’ll go in on that.
DoA – Home of Disaster Lesbians
that’s right, disaster lesbians! if you can lesbians fifteen feet up in the air without getting wet, you get no down payment!
wut
you don’t know big bill hell’s? well, congrats in being one of today’s lucky ten thousand!
I hope your disaster lesbian insurance is fully paid up.
Volume title: Then Let’s Become Criminals
And let’s live dangerous!
“let me have this” this being what? getting arrested? getting your arm broken by a cop? being permanently blinded because they shot “non lethal rounds” right at your face?
yeah basically, dorothy wants to martyr herself for the cause, because she’s dumb
becoming a martyr because you don’t love and accept yourself is a way easier out then actually dealing with your problems. People who are actively having mental breakdowns, can fall back on that idea very hard.
Sounds great, let’s do that.
luckily i don’t know from experience because it’s definitely a thing i’ve never done
Not only that, but I doubt Dorothy really cares about the cause she’s trying to get hurt or arrested for. Based on the fact that she didn’t seem to care about it much before she went to the protest with Joyce, to check on Jocelyne.
Jesus, Dave really hates Joe lol
Huh how you figure that?
Other characters have been kidnapped, drugged, physically injured, threatened, kicked out of their homes, hell one even died… but Joe’s girlfriend likes another girl so he’s the one Willis hates?
Make it make sense.
Take the shot! Previously established roof sniper, TAKE THE SHOT! These two gay as hell girls cannot be allowed to further consummate their shared attraction! Think of Joe and Walky! What about how they feel?! Joe’s been so good lately!
He has been 🥲
Being a nice guy doesn’t mean she can’t realize she has feelings for someone else. That’s life.
It can mean she doesnt cheat on him? Yknow? Common decency to your partner?
Rooftop Sniper is secret member of Sickos. Enthralled, watching these two through his scope. Not paying attention to questions and orders coming over his radio.
Only thing keeping Amazi-Girl alive.
Damn, Joyce unleashing her inner Julia Gray badass self.
And she’s not even wearing a Sal leather jacket. Imagine how much more badass she could be with that!
I’m still not sure why Dorothy feels she needs to stay there and get arrested. She didn’t seem to really care about this cause before they went to the protest, and I doubt she would’ve gone to it at all if Joyce hadn’t taken Dorothy with when she decided to go check on Jocelyne. And if she doesn’t genuinely care about the cause the other protesters are there for, there’s no point to her getting arrested for it.
How did Ethan put it that one time? “Sometimes, when we’re already reduced to cinders, we create a new self to destroy.” Not sure if it’s fully relevant, but worth considering.
It’s also possible that Dorothy has changed her goals but not her methods of reaching her goals. She’s ditched wanting to become president, but it’s harder to ditch the self-destructive/sacrifice habits.
dorothy wanted to be in charge
people in charge are doing a bad
dorothy wants to reaffirm her goodness
joyce is good
joyce frequently acts on rage and gut instincts
dorothy will be like joyce
difference is that circumstances for joyce usually involve situations which she has firsthand knowledge of in which her gut reaction usually ends up being the right move
dorothy does not havethat advantage here but she’s not letting that stop her
Because this doesn’t actually have anything to do with the specific protest for Dorothy, it’s about her dealing with her issues in a very 19-year-old way
A lot of being 19 years old, is simply riding your fuck-up momentum from fuck-up peak to fuck-up valley, and then back again.
Y’know, I was gonna say that Joyce and Dorothy didn’t care enough about this to go to the protest in the first place, so it’s weird that they’re suddenly all-in.
But is it, though? “Now that I’m here, I can’t just walk away,” seems like a reasonable turn. Seeing injustice up close has pissed them off and galvanized them. They weren’t all that invested, but now they’ve learned more about the situation, and the thing that’s directly happening in front of their face isn’t even about that, it’s mistreatment of the protestors. Joyce was just assaulted, and she wasn’t even a protestor to begin with.
This is definitely the correct read imo
Yeah but I’m not sure how much of the comment section can read.
She’s trying to be a martyr because she’s gotten to a point where she just hates herself, and this seems like the easiest way out.
Y’know, if not for people doing laundry on the weekend, these two would have just held hands and orgasmed together, and it would somehow be less gay.
Like, it’s not even close. I don’t think I could have sex gayer than this.
you can do it, we believe in you!!!
I don’t believe in them, this is very, VERY gay.
Yeah, I can comfortably say with complete acceptance and self-love that I will never be able to gay as hard as this. Hell, I hope I don’t! It seems like you can only gay this hard, in really, really tragic circumstances.
*Shakespeare nods in agreement.
You don’t want to gay too close to the sun. Hubrisexual.
Something something Icarussy
This comment nearly killed me, lmfao.
thanks to you both i am now deceased [affectionate][rolling on the floor laughing my ass off]
Sicko stocks flying to the fucking moon atm.
Remember those few panels about Joe saying he wants to be a better person & making the comments against Rachel about it bc there’s a genuine attempt being made?
Man, I really hope none of that tanks after Joyrothy (Is that the ship name? I’m out of the loop) announces itself so hard to the comic that old Jontron Joke about being subtle is ACTUALLY gonna look subtle.
I don’t think there is a ship name. May I suggest J-Dot?
Doyce? Browner?
sometimes I miss good old slash (e.g. Joyce/Dorothy).
Me too.
Joyothy
Doyce
On tumblr I’ve seem Jorothy, but, admittedly, not by many people. I don’t there a ship name ever caught on.
Jorathy unfortunately is indistinguishable between Joyce/Dorothy and Joe/Dorothy, which makes it a bad choice. I’ve used Joyrothy, but it’s a little clunky. Joyothy?
Entire civilizations will rise and fall, which will never manage to do anything as gay as whatever these two are doing.
I guess they can have their big damn kiss in the holding cell of the local jail ;_;
Popcornnnn getya popcorn heeeyaaa can’t signal fascinated rapt attention without ya popcorn.
Popcorn? I demand something finer than popcorn for this beautifully orchestrated piece of romantic drama.
Michael Scott Oh my God it’s happening dot gif
SO LEEET’S BEEEE SINNERS TO BE SAAAAAIIIINTS
AND LET’S BE WINNERS BY MISTAAAAAKE
i hope these are lyrics from the band dorothy likes
Lauren Aquilina technically but I think Dorothy would like her.
Sickos are winning SO HARD
Also Joyce you look really hurt, I think it was a bad idea to watch through the Tear Gas
I’m reminded of Joyce declaring that she would eat fire if she could squeeze it out of a packet. You’re not going to stop Joyce with just plain tear gas, fascists! You have to get two different chemical weapons that touch! Ideally at least one of them should have chunks.
Funny how Dorothy praised Joyce’s “stupid, beautiful anger” when most of Joyce’s truly transformative actions – including these – have been declarations of love and acceptance.
A lot of Joyce’s moral expression and action, is a result of a deep-seated anger at how needlessly awful the world is, and I relate to her on that a lot.
i feel this arc has been awfully tone deaf and insensitive. i don’t like the idea of joyce and dorothy getting together and i haven’t liked the development of their relationship becoming romantically charged even a little bit and i fear there’s nothing that could ever possibly be done to change my opinion on that matter; but i do feel like the concept could have had a more tasteful arc to breach the subject than it’s had. it’s a shame because this is literally the only arc that i have thus far felt this way – pretty much every prior one has been well paced and with well written conflict and development, even when focusing on relationships or characters i haven’t particularly cared for. such a bummer.
Yup
I can’t tell whether I actually agree with you or whether I just dislike all three things in the trifecta of “this romance specifically,” “will they/won’t they in general,” and “consistent miscommunication plots.” I know that right now reading the development of this relationship makes me anxious when I used to be psyched anytime the two of them were onscreen. I also know that serial and archival reading tend to make things like this read really differently, and while I can’t say I’d expect to enjoy this either way, it going faster and resolving one way or another faster might well take a decent chunk of the ick out of it.
I am not one of the “cheating or adjacent plotline universally bad” people and me disliking something doesn’t necessarily make it bad. But sitting with something I’m feeling those ways about for months is worse than just having it be over with and liking or disliking the outcome, and I can’t tell how much that process is contributing to how bad this one’s been feeling. I guess in six months I can do a reread and find out.
see the thing is i don’t care that it’s a cheating plot – cheating can make for an interesting storyline in works of fiction even though i do feel like it’s still way too early for a cheating plotline to work for these specific characters, but like. it’s whatever. i think it is way, way way more important, specifically, the context of HOW it’s happening… and it’s tactless the way it is being tied to the protest plotline that is so politically charged in the specific way that it is, with the conflict being centered upon as emotionally equal to the circumstances of the protest. willis usually handles such subjects so tactfully and with class, sooo. i just really think this one has been too thoroughly fumbled. and yet everyone’s worrying about the wrong thing – i could get real petty and mean about how i feel about the specific relationship and how it’s being received, but i truly feel that doesn’t even matter half as much as, oh by the way this is a political protest about the unjust bombing of a foreign nation that is weirdly parallel to multiple things happening in real life right now as we speak. and i am saying this as a lesbian: it’s kind of cruel and kind of tactless to make whether or not two fictional teenagers in college are going to hook up the central focus of such an event, coming from an author who is ordinarily so, so much better about these kinds of things. i don’t CARE about whether they’re cheating on their boyfriends with each other and i don’t CARE about whether it’s a f/f relationship and i don’t CARE if it’s been hinted at for like a decade or so at this point. i think doing it specifically this way was a bad call and that’s more important, imho.
JD you get it so hard. Oh my god you get it sooo hard. I’m also a lesbian who feels this way, literally to the LETTER. Especially the “i could get real petty and mean about how i feel about the specific relationship and how it’s being received, but i truly feel that doesn’t even matter half as much as [the political aspect” LIKE YEAH. YEAH, SAME. I was really unhappy with it to begin with but this aspect is what made me decide to cancel my patreon like… I gotta go, dude! at least for a while.
I think you’re right, but it’s weird because the sliding timescale has in many ways made it hard for me to take the protest that seriously as a plotline to begin with because of the sense that it can’t really get that into the specific without dating the comic (and in some ways I’ve been surprised by how specific it’s been, though still vague enough that I could see it relating to many things in the future). I do think Dorothy engaging with this kind of stuff allows her to hit some important character beats that make me hesitant to say that plotline was a bad idea, but I will pretty strongly agree the protest situation would feel a lot more real if Dorothy’s relationship to politics was the main thing the narrative was using it to talk about instead of… This.
I’m kind of with JD here
I don’t like the possibility of Dorothy and Joyce cheating by getting together while still dating their boyfriends, it’s why I voted “relationship paladins” in the poll, but at this point I’m more bothered by the fact that this plot of them maybe realizing their feelings for each other and getting together is more of the focus than the protest. I’ve been hoping to see more of the protest since Jocelyne talked about it months ago in real time. And while we’ve seen some the protest in recent strips, considering what the protest is about I feel like it deserves more attention than being just background stuff while two bi characters maybe realize their feelings.
If they do end up smooching in the next immediate strips (I would have preferred for them to have broke up with their respective partners before that happened, but oh well, this strip isn’t called “Maturing of Age”), I do wonder what this means for Joyce’s feelings for Joe going forwards because I don’t see them up and disappearing just like that (as in I don’t know Joyce necessarily wants to break up with him, Dorothy I can easily see breaking up with Walky again, but Joyce and Joe seem like a different matter).
Also presuming smooching happen and that their peers (including Becky) eventually learn about this, I do wonder what kind of emotions Becky is going to go through? Even with her present relationship with Dina I can’t imagine this having zero effect on her, and not just because of her past feelings for Joyce but also because of current anxieties concerning the concept of sexual fluidity/change in individuals?
If the smooching happens I hope Joe dumps Joyce. He doesn’t deserve someone who doesn’t even think about him in a moment like this
I think in this specific situation of a protest about to be rushed by police and Dorothy on a self-destructive spiral, Joyce can be forgiven for not actively thinking about Joe in this specific moment. It’s the aftermath of this situation that will be indicative of what Joe deserves from Joyce.
We’ll just have to see where we are a week from now I suppose.
I just want it to be said I do think Willis can write this well, but if it isn’t this could permanently tank my opinion on both of these two.
And when they were in the bedroom, it was clear that Joyce didn’t hesitate for a moment.
I think Joe and Joyce has always been a non-starter. She’s been prepared to have sex with Joe and least a couple of times, but hasn’t been able to pull it off. I’d say that, deep down, it doesn’t feel right to her.
*at least*
It’s probably just me, but I don’t think they’re talking about the same things.
I could also definitely see Willis doing a swerve like that where Joyce is approaching this from a platonic love scenario while Dorothy is. But it could go either way honestly.
Willis very much isn’t written Joyce as being straight just so you now
Even though he swore Joyce was “canonically straight.”
He changed their mind. It’s something they are allowed to do.
There’s also the amazing phenomenon known as ‘sometimes people think they’re straight and later in life realize they aren’t’. Joyce has in the past expressed an infatuation for Sal and her hair, has mentioned wanting to climb into Jennifer’s breasts to be ‘warm and safe forever’ and there’s been build up with Dorothy for a long, long time. She’s very much been not straight for a while.
Look, the history books don’t just misrepresent sapphic love as being “just good friends.” Think about how many of the classics involve two male characters who are “just good friends,” despite fighting and dying and sacrificing themselves for one another as a narrative device on the regular.
It’s very easy for lots of people in this culture to misunderstand where the boundaries are between platonic and romantic love. It’s because we live in a neo-fascist culture, that actively suppresses our ability to recognize that, through deeply-entrenched cultural propaganda.
I think it’s more conceivable that Joyce is being unintentionally naive than most other people seem to. If she actually thought it through, I have full confidence she’d figure out exactly what’s happening, on the spot; but, right now, she has every reason not to be thinking about the deeper implications of what is happening. Her friend is distressed and in trouble. Therefore, making her friend feel better, is the only thing she’s willing to think about, or react to.
Like, she came here for her sister, but her sister basically waved her off. In her head, that problem is solved. But, oh boy, suddenly Dorothy is having another crisis.
Ironically, Dorothy is trying to “be like Joyce,” but the two of them are so codependent, that just leads to Joyce codependently coddling Dorothy, the same way Dorothy used to do to her.
I think you’re on to something.
Oh my God I hope that’s the case. Because for one, I feel like this is just out of character and way too fast a development for her, and two, it would be really funny
Jocelyn has no idea what’s happening here.
But neither do Dorothy or Joyce.
But guys theyre totally not gonna cheat on their boyfriends and if you think they are you basically believe in thought crime or hate poly people or something. also ignore this is happening at an anti genocide protest bc who even cares about that? /s
i mean i think the narrative cares quite a bit about the protest! willis doesn’t HAVE to keep drawing charging cops and fleeing protesters in the background, but he’s doing it anyway. wouldn’t be happening if that wasn’t an important detail. our girls are being really self-destructive right now, and part of that is the, y’know. ignoring their fellow protesters and continuing their little drama.
i’m not gonna get into the cheating shit because billie and ruth have literally assaulted each other and amber has assaulted just so many people not even counting cops and abusers and sal got marcie fired because she can’t deescalate and sarah fired joyce at jacob like a torpedo and joyce, dear lord that girl’s done and said just SO much messed up shit, none of these folks are pure of heart and they’re probably gonna keep fucking up for as long as they’re alive, it’s kind of what the comic’s about, so yeah, dorothy and joyce did a little cheating, i dunno what everyone’s so freaked out about
Part of the difference is that the narrative has treated almost all of those things as bad, but here it seems to be being romanticized. Especially with Joyce, the vast majority of her messed up shit has led to her learning that was messed up and she shouldn’t do it.
Obviously the arc’s not over yet, but what would that look like here: Cheating with Dorothy and losing Joe and messing up even her friendship with Dorothy in the process? That’s not where I want any of this to go.
I don’t like the idea of Joyce and Dorothy cheating, even if they would make a good couple, but I feel like I’m one of the few people in the comments today who cares more about the anti-genocide protests and the cops going after protesters than the possible new lesbian couple.
It’s definitely felt like the cause/protest has been a backdrop for this tragic sapphic storyline, a bit.
But we’ll see. The story probably can’t afford to do political debate for months and months on end as a derail, but if it at least wraps it up a little more tastefully I’d be more okay with it as a narrative device.
I’ve really found this entire storyline distasteful. The constant queer-baiting, the will-they won’t-they teasing of whether or not they cheat, the insistence on teasing out both the NSFW Patreon and the normal Patreon wherever it applies, how out of character it feels for these characters at times to be making certain leaps to make their decisions(Joyce’s willingness to ‘go do laundry’ even though she is in a relationship and has gone on record to care about being faithful to their partner?)
How about the quiet setting up for both Walky and Joe to just be magically okay with being cheated on? Especially Joe, with his prior conversation with Dorothy and introducing another girl to interact with. Or lets talk about how this protest is being used as a backdrop in order to escalate emotions to the kiss they keep post poning? It’s cheating if done at home, but under these circumstances it is passion, right? Let’s see how quickly the protest is wrapped up with side dialogue and shoved into a corner once it has outlived it’s use.
I also am uncomfortable with how this reinforces some bad stereotypes about bi-people. Mainly the one where (generally straight) people claim that bi-partners have a tendency to cheat. But don’t worry, Joe will be cool with it. Because reasons.
I dunno, maybe we will see some justifiable hurt or anger from one of the boyfriends if this all comes to pass, but I just don’t have much confidence in the writing anymore.
Some things to correct, this is not queer baiting, for that the characters woild need to not be queer and the possibility of them being so be dangle to attract tge audience. Also tgat as we see witg Dorothy conversation with Danny it is very much not the case that cheating it’s being treated as a normal thing that all bisexuals or a particularly good thing in general.
If I could edit it, I would. These are fair points.
Love inventing future strips to be Epsom salty about
I was aware I was making a lot of assumptions, but decided to post it anyway. The fun thing about DoA and being outraged about what might or might not happen, is the backlog is over a year built up, so it’s already long set in stone and whatever is gonna happen is gonna happen.
This is extra funny because Joyce and Dorothy have basically just dicked around outside for about half an hour in the cold, on one of Joyce’s overly intense whims, accomplishing very little on the back of disproportionately large emotions.
This behavior is often referred to as “these girls are still, technically, teenagers.”
I’ll be pretty upset if the protest and these two’s behavior during said protest effecting the people and movement of the protest negatively do not get used or explored. I’ll be pretty upset if cheating happens and Joe and/or Walky just role with it. Either of those things is borderline a reason for me to drop this comic. It represents a hamfisted lack of skill and forethought. Willis has improved as a writer over time and has gotten pretty skilled so I do not assume that will happen until it happens.
I will separately be upset if they cheat because I don’t like cheating and relationships born from cheating rarely work. That isn’t as an egregious flaw in writing however. Their dynamic is way more interesting without cheating and possibly something that could have serious longevity, but if it is founded on cheating it’s just drama for the sake of drama in the grand scheme of things and I don’t generally find that interesting in most stories.
Says literally nobody.
check the comments from the last few weeks my guy
I have, i made dome. I stand by my statement.
Joyce not knowing she’s cheating on Joe seems like it’s dependent on Joyce taking Jennifer’s “it’s not gay if you say no homo” as true and also that it means it’s not cheating.
And I don’t like it because it seems too contrived. She’s surprised but arguably open to the idea of “making out a little bit” being platonic, but then Jennifer adds platonic friends can bang once, and we don’t see her reaction to that. Joyce knows Jennifer is in denial about being bi, though.
Second, Dorothy said they can’t make out because they’re with Walky and Joe.
And Joyce has shown she knows kissing crosses a boundary and that masturbating with Dorothy is distinct from masturbating alone, when she told Joe she’d been faithful since they’d been together.
I think that’s why I’m not invested in Joyce and Dorothy together right now. It’s a combination of cheating-storyline and too-contrived. one or the other and it’d interest me more.
It does, it feels like way too fast a change. Unless she’s completely autistically misreading this situation and thinks it’s fully platonic
I think people have also failed to consider the possibility that Joyce is not the only neurodivergent woman in this situationship.
I have considered that this is 100% Dorothy’s POV and she’s dramatically misreading this situation and that’s why Joyce has seemingly had zero thoughts in this arc, but the scenes with Joyce and Becky in private we saw kind of disproved that for me. Also the intent to “do laundry” on top of that convo.
I mean yeah, if it was from Dorothy POV then Willis would make that clear, so what she is doing is very much how it looks.
That’s what I just said felt too contrived.
As someone who got cheated on by a GF who was awakening to her bisexuality, I want characters I respect not to do that. I am an ally, your sexuality is yours to explore and you love who you love. It will never excuse cheating on your partner.
As a lesbian. Being queer is not a get out of jail free reason to cheat lol. It’s so easy to not cheat on someone if you have even a modicum of love or respect for them or the telationship and it really bums me out that my fave character in this strip apparently… doesn’t! Lmao.
As a bi person who has been cheated on 5 times who also had/has feelings for their best friend while in a committed relationship with a dude (whom I have discussed this stuff AND even this storyline with many times, he’s a good dude), I have 952 million things I hate about this storyline.
If I look at this strip today in a vacuum and erase everything else I know about these characters, it is a very cute and powerful strip. The art is gorgeous. “Let’s be criminals” is a great ending line.
But like… I hate basically everything else about this lol.
Well then i am afraid you gonna have a bad time since it’s clear that is the story being told
Yeah, I was commiserating with other people who felt similarly.
Great summary Bittersweet.
Reality is messy. Good people do shit things. Sorry about it.
I am not dismissing your pain, but I AM dismissing the current trend of treating cheating as the worst thing ever (and also flattening it to the point where having a sexually charged conversation one time is the same as a multi year affair), to the point of there being more outrage at a hint of cheating than actual abuse half the time.
It can be a sore spot for you (seriously! That is fair!) and not a bad storyline.
I mean you’re absolutely minimizing their pain.
“…(and also flattening it to the point where having a sexually charged conversation one time is the same as a multi year affair)…”
That’s been a sticking point for me, too. They were looking at one another, one of them had her hand near (not even on) the other’s face, and folks are carrying on like they were going at it with a double-ended Black & Decker 3.5hp vibrator. And here, Joyce runs back to her dear friend Dorothy, citing a Bible verse that, yes, is used in some lesbian weddings, but far as I can tell nobody ever got around to telling Joyce that, so she only knows it in the context of the Book of Ruth as relayed by whichever translation of the Old Testament her former church used.
Y’all are attributing to Joyce a level of knowledge of LGBTQIA+ culture that is highly improbable for a home-schooled 19-year-old who only decided to become “atheist” (by which she mostly means listening to secular music and saying “fuck”) a few months ago.
I mean she also became atheist in the same tgat sge stopped believing in god. And the fact wherever or not Joyce knows that meaning of that verse is not really important because Willis know and ge wrote in tgat scene for a specific reason.
Just want to say I don’t buy the “it doesn’t matter if Joyce understands the context of the verse since Willis does” argument. It could be foreshadowing, or it could be irony. (For my part, I think the comment upstream about Joyce being unintentionally naive is spot on.
Did she stop believing? Because she still acts a lot like a believer – just not a devotee of the Evangelical tradition she was brought up in. And yes, it is very important to this “cheating” conversation that everyone his having whether Joyce understands the quote the same way that Willis does. If Joyce is still thinking of Dorothy as a very close friend, then no, there has been no “cheating”, any more than I was cheating on my wife by hanging out with a college friend who happens to be a woman (a very pretty woman, as it happens, but we realized in college that we were incompossible, and besides I’m deeply in love with my wife).
Dorothy’s intent may be clouded by her understanding of a verse she’s probably only encountered in lesbian contexts, but Joyce, so far as we are aware, has never seen it outside Ruth and Naomi, which she does not understand as a lesbian story.
On that strip alone, it’s not impossible, but combined with her actions in this strip, her earlier suggestion that they go do laundry again and whatever was going on in her bed before her date with Joe, whatever this is, it isn’t just a close friendship. Sex is definitely on the table.
I’m on board with Joyce not really understanding her own feelings yet, but she’s still acting on them.
One don’t uproot years of indoctrination in a couple of months if she says she doesn’t believe, tgen she doesn’t, just because she still got bits of it stick to her doesn’t make it any less true
Very much on her face as far as I noticed, just like now (except now it’s both hands). But whether you’re allowed or expected to touch anyone other than your romantic partners, and where, varies a lot between micro-cultures. To Joyce, who grew up isolated with Becky, it’s just what best friends do.
Okay, I’m not and have never been monogamous so I really want to clarify something because I’ve learned over the last couple months that my opinion about what constitutes “cheating” is miles away from what half the commentariat considers “cheating”.
You mention “whether you’re allowed… to touch anyone other than your romantic partners” and I just want to know – are there monogamous relationships where you’re expected not to even put a hand on other people? That feels wildly controlling and abusive to me, is that normal for monogamy??
No no, that’s 100% abusive and controlling. If you can’t handle your S.O. touching anyone else at all, you can’t handle dating.
Okay good. I know sometimes my radar for cheating can be off, but SHEESH.
Context though.
Yeah, in the abstract, “no touching” is abusive and controlling, but it depends on the touch and the context, right? Like here, after reciting a verse commonly used for lesbian weddings, touching her cheeks with both hands, leaning in close, responding to her protests that “we can’t” with “Let’s become criminals”.
Or the previous night, lying in bed touching her cheek saying “it would be easier if it was with you”.
It’s intimate enough that in both cases, Dorothy was protesting “we can’t”
This is a useful explanation. I still really heavily disagree that this rises to the level of cheating (not saying you think it does, but several people clearly do), but I appreciate you taking time to clarify because ~hooboy~.
In this particular strip, yes, but I think the wider context makes it very different from “they touch each other’s face and use a certain quote” being the main evidence that this is or could lead to cheating. Dorothy and Joyce came here from mutually agreeing to “do laundry.” After several strips of Joyce realizing that’s a type of sex [by her parameters] and both of them showing signs that they know “doing laundry” together isn’t exactly innocent or chaste. This comes after Joe talked directly to Dorothy about the boob pic and what it signifies. Doesn’t mean people can’t have different opinions on what’s happening, but there’s a lot of things culminating in this moment that go well beyond one touch or one charged conversation.
Yeah, no you’re crazy.
Also cheating is emotional abuse 🩵
You know, this brings me to something that’s bugging me:
Amazi-Girl shouldn’t be here. Because for all that it’s cool and good that she’s out here assaulting the cops, it’s quite frankly super-unrealistic. And while the unrealistic elements have always been there, I think they hurt the overall quality of the comic and its attempts to have real drama and consequences-
basically, you can’t really say “reality is messy” about this comic when Amber’s over there being Batman.
I’m very curious to see if there are going to be any consequences to Amazi-Girl just openly brawling with cops.
Just to be clear — have they already emotionally cheated, or are they in the clear if they break up with their partners after this?
They’ve already PHYSICALLY cheated, it doesnt matter what they do know they’re backstabbing cheating twits
I don’t see anything they’ve done so far as physically cheating. They’ve been on the verge a couple of times, but backed off. I’m not even sure what you’re thinking of.
That said, I do think there’s a huge difference between cheating once (even more if it’s just to the level of a kiss or something) then immediately breaking up in response and cheating then hiding it and lying about it.
Being dumped by a partner for someone else sucks, but if that’s happening it doesn’t really make a difference if they made out before telling you or only after. Finding out it had been going on for months is a whole different thing.
When did they physically cheat?
I think planning to “do laundry” crossed the line into emotional cheating.
I wouldn’t call that emotional cheating.
More like “attempted cheating” or “conspiracy to cheat”.
While I don’t entirely disagree (cheating IS an unethical thing to do, full stop)… unfortunately, realizing your feelings are romantic in nature is a little bit complicated when it’s for someone of your sex/gender and you’ve been raised to not think of that as an option.
This has been lampshaded a bit in the comic itself by now, but Joyce especially seems almost ENTIRELY unaware what normal sexuality is and feels like. She knows she’s horny, but is definitely vague on specifics of how that feels, because she’s THAT repressed. Dorothy, who’s definitely been aware that bisexuality is very much a thing, also clearly didn’t realize her feelings were romantic in nature until Joe basically spelled it out for her. (She may have suspected before that conversation, because she was raised with more awareness of these things, but it’s also fully possible to realize that same-sex attraction exists while not realizing that applies to you yourself.)
Add on additional complications if you’re certain flavors of neurodivergent, which both of them have been implied to be.
Again, yes, cheating is an incredibly shitty thing to do to someone, and it very much harms the trust built in a relationship. IT IS BAD. I don’t want any this to read as a defense of cheating, because I’ve never even been tempted and can’t imagine doing it, myself. And many people are never be able to move past something like that, and I agree that Walky and ESPECIALLY Joe would be justified by dropping their asses ASAP if they go further before talking it out. There’s no way this lack of communication isn’t going to hurt them (UNLESS there’s been communication off screen that we haven’t been privy to yet as readers).
But, at the same time… people can hurt each other, sometimes EXTREMELY DEEPLY, and work through it eventually anyway. We’ve seen it with other characters in this comic (the Amber/Amazi-Girl system and Sal, Ruth and Billie, Billie and Alice), where characters did pretty horrible things to each other but were able to grow past it. It DOES happen, even IRL.
TL;DR: Shit’s complicated, feelings are messy, and even otherwise nice people don’t always do the ethical thing.
(I say all this as someone who has never cheated on my partners, has ADHD and is married to an autistic guy, and is polyamorous and bisexual, BTW. So I’ve definitely thought a lot about the ethics of cheating, the process of realizing your own nascent queerness as a young adult, and how being neurodivergent intersects with it.)
Book 14: Let’s Become Criminals
joe no
Jocelyn is Not Amused
She is, however, rather confused.
I suspect she’ll figure it out, she’s a clever woman
“Why the hell are these two still…oohhh I get it now.”
She’s a writer. She’s on the lookout for this stuff.
…hooooly sheep
also that’s very nice panel angles today
Yes yes, I know, consequences will be dire and all, it’ll hurt other character, yes yes I know. Just.
Babes, if my impossible crush– A best friend, a beautiful, loving spitfire of a woman who inspired me to be better… Came back for me, through police violence and teargas, to tell me something like this? Shit, I’d be a goner. There’s no mistake I wouldn’t make for her.
The yearning here is exquisite.
If this is wrong then baby i don’t wanna be right.
Hey one thing that I haven’t seen anyone mention:
Joyce, herself, may well be completely crushed, if it turns out she was taking Billie’s advice on “how much lesbian sex with your best friends is normal and socially acceptable” completely literally, and she genuinely is so naive that she does not realize that she’s doing Joe as dirty as possible. She’s mostly just worried about her friend, and is trying to do right by her.
Like, it is a cartoonish outcome, that that would happen…but this is literally a cartoon. I think “Joyce crashes to reality when her big sister directly lays out to her that this is scummy behavior” is a potential outcome, after the three of them get arrested, and Jocelyn has to become impromptu counselor to these two kids.
I’d love this one.
I think this is legitimately one of the only options that salvages this moment for me
I would really really love some variety of this to happen OMG. I do feel like Billie telling Joyce “OH YEAH SEX WITH YOUR BESTIES IS NORMAL AND IMPORTANT” probably influenced her actions the last couple of days, even if she clearly had feelings for Dorothy before that.
And, to be honest, it’s not exactly impossible for this type of naïveté to happen out of fiction too. I’ve definitely known people who were sheltered and/or neurodivergent and genuinely didn’t know what counted as ‘normal’. (I’ve also been a bit of that person in the past, though I think I’ve mostly caught up by now haha?)
ADDING: I definitely do not want three queer people (one of them potentially very obviously trans) to get arrested, though. But I would love the gist of the rest of your comment to happen in some way!
Fortunately, everyone involved in this love-quadrilateral is an adult. They will all handle this in a very mature manner and come to the rational answer of “polyamory”. No one will get angry, or hurt, or pitch a fit, or do anything involving relationship drama. And really, who wants relationship drama in a comic like this?
(More seriously, I don’t think they are technically cheating if they give their boyfriends notice they’re breaking up before they start making out. … okay, “making out” might not be where the line actually is drawn, but I still don’t think it’s cheating yet.)
I want relationship drama now. You don’t fucking hand wave cheating
After they kiss, they should both black out and wake up having killed the dictator of Bulmeria and led a people’s revolution.
I so want to like this. In a vacuum, this strip hits so many strong notes in terms of drama and emotion. Messy emotions and drama, but isn’t that part of the fun? That last panel hits very hard.
But thinking about it big picture, I do not like this. I don’t like that it’s coming so close on the heels of Joyce’s tryst with Joe. I don’t like that Dorothy has decided to become a martyr despite Jocelyn begging her to leave and it pulling Joyce back in. Protest, yay, but Dorothy’s decision feels so short sighted in terms of the REALITY of what they could face, and the difficult situation it forces Jocelyn into with her sister and Dorothy now at risk. I don’t like that, given the proximity of Joyce’s Big Night with Joe, we could learn in the next few strips that, ah ha, Joyce wasn’t actually talking about the same feelings/risks/devotion Dorothy was. We already had that fake out “nevermind, stay tuned!” in the dorm room, let’s not have another rendition. Or, equally uncomfortably, she IS on the same page, and Joe and Walky are now collateral damage. “Be gay, do crimes” is fun and catchy–cheating is still a shitty thing to do. And, it’s also not a great foundation for Dorothy/Joyce, however shippable they may be. If this is how they DO get together, I just sigh and have to look forward to the drama fallout down the line for their relationship. I don’t want to see them feel guilty when everyone questions their decision, or try and justify this when Joe and Walky are justifiably blindsided and hurt. The angst of this arc has tipped over from “conflicting yet intriguing” to “however this ends, I’m tired and I hate it.”
Not condemning any of the characters to damnation, not saying they deserve misery. We read this for the drama and feels, just because I don’t personally love this arc doesn’t mean it’s awful bad irredeemable.
Before reaching this point in the story, there was already a hatred towards Dorothy, which in my opinion, was too unfair and seeing this strip generates very shocking feelings, believe me, if there is one thing I do not wish for it is for my perspective on her to change and much less for her to end up with Walky, yes, many things about him can be criticized, but ending one of the most brilliant ships in this way… is a whim, but I hope it does not happen, dream is free.
“I’m tired and I hate it” is EXACTLY how I’m feeling.
I don’t like the pairing for multiple reasons but one that I only recently realised is that it’s a relationship largely built on big, traumatic moments, and that’s been exhausting to read.
Joe/Joyce (even if it’s not my preferred pairing either) has been more quietly sweet, and I’ve personally enjoyed that more.
I know some people like the messiness, so that is that.
For anyone looking to increase the “ick” factor of this relationship, I would remind everyone the Amber’s plan was to launch Dorothy at Joyce to free up Walky.
Oh fuck yeah, I forgot about that.
I can’t wait for the part where the boys are magically okay with this because it serves the author’s interests.
I don’t think that will happen. Willis loves mess, nothing is ever that simple and a clean break happy ending would be too finite.
But I do already feel tired about what happens if Dorothy and Joyce get together. On the one hand, cheating is bad and it’ll hurt Joe/Walky, and cause drama and angst. That, I totally expect. But on the other hand….what, we’re NOT supposed to ultimately root for Dorothy and/or Joyce embracing their sexuality, we’re NOT supposed to root for the moment when they finally get together after all the awkwardness and angst? Mm. That just can’t be. This strip hits too hard and is too emotional. The arc of coming to terms with their relationship is too evocative.
Whereas if they don’t get together, it feels like a very long arc to a sad end. Cheating is wrong, etc., but the struggle and emotional turmoil for especially Dorothy, but also Joyce, can’t just peter out. And to have moments like this, only to pivot away from this relationship that has been building, would also feel unsatisfying? Either way, characters are going to get hurt and reactions are going to be divisive.
I dunno, I’m not saying Willis can’t pull it off. Heck, he’s probably pulling off all of the emotional conundrums and complexities he wants to, that has to be at least part of the “point” of this entire arc. Maybe I’m just feeling too old, or tired from the week, or didn’t eat enough chocolate today to enjoy this arc right now.
I think I would have gotten over myself if it didn’t feel so out of character for Joyce. Like everything leading up to this point has felt earned, except for Joyce’s weird willingness to be unfaithful. She has felt alarmed by the idea to the point she had to be comforted by Joe of all people about laundry day because she was afraid what happened right before her and Joe got together. But suddenly the very same woman she was concerned she might have been unfaithful with(she wasn’t) is the one she is trying to initiate things with again.
Like ya, this is a messy drama comic, and it’d be messed up to root against them discovering their own sexualities. It also is just too juicy to not have it done in a messy way where they discover this without breaking off their relationships first. I totally get all of that.
But man, the leap in logic for Joyce to come to this point feels out of character based on previous events. What caused all this, Jennifer’s bad advice about getting one go at her best friend is free? I refuse to think Joyce is that naive. She spent the entirety of the comic growing past that.
Yeah, it really feels like Joyce is suddenly more-than-platonic friends with Dorothy, just because Dorothy is realizing she’s into her.
Up until the dryer incident and the almost-cuddling to Paramore part, their relationship read more parent-and-child than lovers. (Remember all the mom-friending Dorothy was doing, like getting Joyce the drawing class supplies and booking medical appointments for her?)
People are going to flame you for saying it (because they ship it)
I’m not saying Dorothy is a mom to her, or mom-coded, whatever. But she never read to me as a ‘lover’ for Joyce because she always read as the mom friend. The authority on things. The shepherd to a lamb.
Like a lot of her behaviors come off as a chiding mother moreso than a partner. It’s part of why nobody wanted her to be the RA when the chance came up.
Well you all seems to be the minority on that reading.
I will say that Joyce hasn’t been above morally shaky behaviour to do what she wants (trying to get Jacob with Sarah even when he was dating Raidah, then herself trying to get with Jacob, etc.).
Difference here is that she seems both happy with Joe and also wading through tear gas to be with Dorothy, and while both can be true, it’s like seeing two different versions of her happening in the same day and it can be a little jarring.
And in both those cases with Jacob, the narrative was pretty consistent about painting those actions as wrong. As a character flaw that she was learning from the consequences of. Especially after the fact, but even while it was going on. In the end, she didn’t get to date Jacob.
We’re not really seeing that here. We’re seeing it a bit with Dorothy – Danny’s reaction to her talking about cheating, for example. And we’re seeing Dorothy struggle with it – being the one who’s clearly tempted, but keeps saying “we can’t”.
We’re not really seeing anything of that struggle from Joyce. Which I find very strange.
I feel like maybe that’s an unfair expectation for Joyce possibly Dorothy too but she’s at least consistently expressed hesitation and guilt. Joyce doesn’t seem to have fully comprehended what her emotions are or the implications of them. She just knows she wants to love and support Dorothy and those emotions have existed practically since they met. It just never culminated into anything beyond emotion and technically still hasn’t. She might not even realize it until they actually kiss or in some way break their romantic tension.
I just think at this point saying Joyce seems okay with cheating is assuming a lot. It could be accurate but we still just don’t know where she is or what her boundaries are. I do think Jennifer has possibly planted some ideas but Joyce might also be running on the belief her and Dorothy have already been in a physical relationship. There’s just a lot of variables to unpack here.
I’m not really trying to put any expectation on Joyce her. I’m saying that I find it interesting we haven’t gotten a glimpse at what’s going on in her head and that I think that’s probably intentional. That one way or another it might not be what we expect.
I suspect Joyce either doesn’t think of this as cheating for unknown reasons or is still in much more denial than it seems. Either matches her previous behavior more than “I’m going to cheat on Joe with Dorothy” or even “I’m going to drop Joe for Dorothy without a moment’s hesitation” does.
So this started with the dad seeing a picture of Jocelyne at a protest. I feel like this is going to end with EVERYONE seeing a picture of Joyce and Dorothy in an embrace.
ding ding ding. it could be as early as literally tomorrow that Dorothy plants a fat face-hugger on Joyce, possibly to Joyce’s honest surprise and shock.
The hard swerve into Dumbing of Age becoming an Alien spinoff was not on my bingo card, but you won’t get me complaining.
It’s the Hunger Games moment, huh.
I find it quite hilarious that Dorothy is doing everything in her power to avoid the inevitable, for herself, for Joe, and for relationship paladins everywhere and Joyce is just like “Nah. I’m actually a sicko!”
That is why we love her.
https://www.tumblr.com/queenofsodor/788883977426599936/made-this-to-torment-my-doa-reading-friends-a-week?source=share
I couldn’t NOT share this beauty to accompany this magnificent strip.
………..fam you don’t know how much I immensely approve of this.
How many of those has Walky downed yet?
We love a high effort shitpost!
*Bi-chief kiss*
I just hope she doesn’t string Joe along. If you’re gonna cheat just admit to it and don’t waste your partner’s time.
I’m so excited for CNN to play footage of Dorothy an Joyce kissing with “LESBIANS SUPPORT TERRORISM?” On the banner.
“We report, you de”… oh.
Why not, Dorothy?!?! You can split up with your boyfriends, or maybe they would be down with a sort of V situation or maybe Joyce would not be willing to give up Joe or only one boyfriend would be down but at least you can just fucking discuss it??
Does she think her attraction to Joyce is predatory in some way? Like she’s groomed her? Because there is no actual reason you can’t be in a relationship! Gaah.
Tgere were certain commenters a while back that actually thought that was the case.
I actually do not care that much about Joe’s love life in so far of the fact that I think it would be more interesting for Joe to have to really grapple with his hang-ups now that he can no longer spend his time playing the role of “The perfect boyfriend”, but in a selfish bid to simply bolster a rarepair that i just really like, may i suggest that well all start to enthusiastically consider the potential of Joe x Roz?
my opening and closing argument in support of this ship is that they’d just be really cute together your honor
i for one support your simple desire to just enjoy fictional characters the way you want, because they literally aren’t real and no actual people get hurt, and because that’s sort of one of the core purposes of entertainment media
Yeah, I mean, honestly, “have I really changed or was that just something I was trying on for Joyce, and even if it IS the former, does Joyce’s betrayal cause me to backslide anyway, at least temporarily, and, OH GOD, how unimaginably smug will Rachel be if that happens” is a storyline that I love for Joe. His redemption arc has been a little easy for me.
I kind of hate myself for thinking this, but I can see Rachel seeing Joe trying to find a lesson to grow from in the aftermath and suddenly deciding she wants some of dat.
Boy I sure hope these gal pals stay faithful to their fellas, I’d hate to see Wally and Moe get hurt just so Joyce and Dorothy can smooch like they were always meant to
Wally and Moe is my favourite muppet duo
When “Fuck the police” includes relationship cops
Speaking of incredible amounts of gayness, anyone here has olayed the game date everything? It has become my latest obsession.
I need to get it, I’ve been invested in it since its reveal
The escalating urgency of the advertisements to see the comic a day early on Patreon are adding so much to these strips for me.
i had a whole thing typed up here. instead im just gonna say i am interested in this fictional story and can’t wait to see what these fictional characters do next!
how dare you not take a prominent moral stance! you must be one of the evil sickos!
Ah no, my disaster bis!
You do not in fact have to put your life at risk in order to show your devotion to each other…
But if you wanna we won’t stop you!
Jocelyn is just watching this drama play out at the worst possible place and time.
already left an earlier comment but i’m struck by Willis’s decision-making here where Joyce is deciding not between a Horrible Man and a Great Girl but an Actually Great Guy and a Great Girl — which is a really, really nice change of pace. so many sapphic stories set up any male love interests to be the worst people possible *specifically* to “justify” the sapphic interest, whereas Walky and Joe are like. Decent Dudes. They didn’t do anything to “deserve” this or “cause” this; Joyce and Dotty aren’t lesbian “because” of a lack of good men, or because the men in their life aren’t being good enough. The fact that the comment section is so split between “hey like. joe is a good guy wtf” and “yessss do it” demonstrates to me how well this is working, because from an *outside* perspective, they’re both good options! But for Joyce, this attraction isn’t following any rules about who’s Better or who’s Nicer or who’s More Morally Decent to Her; it’s about something being new and terrifying and something she can’t avoid. Same for Dotty, just from different directions; goes to show that even being raised atheist doesn’t insulate you from the general homophobia of society. Idk if any of this makes sense but with each strip over the last like, three days or so it’s all been falling into place and I’m very pleased with the results so far even if I was ????? at first with the whole storyline.
Put it perfectly
yeah in terms of the characters having interesting arcs that are complex in a way that real life college situationships actually are, has made for really entertaining drama. it’s good character-driven episodic writing. it’s gonna have interesting, far-reaching effects on the ensemble cast. it’s an entertaining story that fully fits into the existing universe.
it’s a shame that seemingly most of the readership just can’t find enjoyment in it, for a variety of justifiable reasons
Thank you, this put a lot of what I’ve been feeling into words. I also feel like it re-emphasizes that love and successful relationships aren’t prizes you can win by being a good guy nor something you automatically arrive at by doing all the right steps. Sometimes it really wasn’t about you, even if on paper in every aspect you two were right for each other
I do like that aspect of it, but I’d like it more if we actually saw any that conflict from Joyce, but we really haven’t. The closest bit was the morning after when she talked to Dorothy about it just being excess horniness – and then without missing a beat suggested doing laundry.
If we’re all reading this right (and it certainly seems to be presented that way) she seems to be all in for whichever of them she’s with at the moment, without really experiencing any conflict in that.
We’ve seen Dorothy being torn apart over her, but nothing similar from Joyce. I don’t completely know what to make of that, but I think there’s still another shoe to drop about what’s going on in Joyce’s head, because on the surface none of this makes a lot of sense.
THIS. Joyce isn’t experiencing any visible distress about choosing. She’s down with Joe when Joe is there, down for Dotty when Dotty’s there.
Right now, she is literally saying “Let’s cheat on our boyfriends” like it doesn’t matter.
Unless we get some kind of flashback where Joyce and Joe talk about opening up the relationship, her reactions make ZERO sense for her character. It’s Batman grabbing a gun levels of WTF.
Agreed. That read on what Joyce’s doing doesn’t fit her character. Willis is a good writer who doesn’t have characters casually out of character. Therefore, that read on what Joyce is doing is probably wrong.
I’m not sure how it’s wrong, but I think it is.
I doubt it’s the “talk about opening up their relationship” thing. That seems a really cheap way to keep building this tension and then letting it all fizzle. But some other shoe is going to drop.
I hadn’t realized that this was a problem in queer-positive media… but the plot you described where female MC has to choose between bad man and good woman? That actually describes the plot of a story idea I had. I, a cishet dude, still fell into this trope. Some serious food for thought and soul-searching. My thanks.
Honestly I think I’m one of the only one not particularly bothered by the cheating. Nostly because im pretty sure Joe knows how Joyce and Dorothy feels and has been concerned about the relationship since the beggining and this has been built up aince the start of the comic. And I think both he and walky sort of know that thier relationships are bot solid. Walky knows hes a crisis rebound for Dorothy and knows hes likely just rebounding from Lucy. And I really think Joe needs to be hurt because of how he treated women in the oast and it would be the wake up call that finally solidifies his change
I am so tired of the “Joe hurt women” thing. He made a revenge of the nerds list and was at worst a sexual pest. He never cheated, everyone was fully aware he was a promiscuous person who wasn’t looking for relationships. What hurt did he commit?
have you ever been objectified? have you ever held a conversation with someone only to realize that they haven’t been listening to a word you said? have you ever just been in a public space, existing, living your life and minding your own business, only to one day learn that someone you don’t even know has been watching you, imagining himself having sex with you, and quantifying you?
i say this as a fan of joe, and someone who likes his character – how is that not hurtful?
0/10, wouldn’t bang this guy’s comment.
Joyce wasn’t on that first awful date. (Overshadowed by how awful her and Mike were, but still, Joe was not at all up front with her.)
Also.
He didnt mean any harm but his objectification and putting out thia list thaf told people like where these women were was harmful and dangerous. I love Joes growth and like him and Joyce but I think he is still too much in his do it for her because I like her. This would hurt him and force him to not just change for Joyce but becasuse it is right and bring him full circle.
Holy shit Willis, this is the best plotline in the whole story
YES. This is how I like my (fictional) romance. Desperate. Overly dramatic. Painful. Take note kids. This is how you write drama. Multiple wants and needs, criscrossing in tangle of oppositions and unlikely aliances. This is what Joyce and Dorothy want. And also, in a not quite indirect way, what they need. But that sits in opposition of their other wants. And their other needs. And the needs and wants of others. Innocents.
I’m so glad I came back to this delicious smut.
Also, kudos on the nice inflamation around Joyce’s eyes from the tear gas. They are gonna hate their decision in a minute, but right now it gives the exact battle scratch vibe needed.
How is this more gay than if they just had sex? I’m not complaining at all.
they both still have a lot of hetero-normativity to unpack before their actual sex becomes even close to as gay as this
like, shit, the laundry thing is gayer than if they actually mashed genitals
Because Joyce is paraphrasing Ruth and Fried Green Tomatoes. Two Saphic Classics
As a Relationship Paladin*, I am way happier with this than the other ways they’ve almost gotten together. They are actually talking and not pretending nothing is happening. That feels much much better to me, even if I worry about how forthright they’ll be with the boys. Though. Probably, hopefully, pretty damn forthright, if they are actually admitting they love each other and want each other and are fucking committed to each other.
Also, goddamn Willis, the tension and epic drama of it all.
*I of course ship it, but pretending nothing is happening while preparing to have sex is viscerally upsetting to me. All I wanted was a path forward with words and honesty as solutions, instead of denial. I was still gonna keep reading, either way, but I am thankful for this storyline**. Also it’s objectively awesome, goddamn, imagine the stories they can tell their grandkids.
**Still got my fingers crossed for ethical non monogamy.
OH GOD
NOW KISS
Thelma and Louise?
No
Dorothy & Joyce!!! :DDD
Epic dramatic kiss time!!!!
Also “I can’t leave you if I stay” is a great truism.
the bisexuals are bisexualling!!!!!!
Yup, they sure are headed to cheating on their partners at mach speed.
Bi pride, or whatever.
It’d be kinda funny if after this, Dorothy kisses Joyce, but Joyce legitimately wasn’t expecting Dorothy to kiss her, like with Becky.
More and more every day, I’m starting to believe this is where the train is gonna stop at the station.
That’s gonna be a veeeeerrry awkward night in the jail cell.
yeah, most holding cells don’t have exterior windows, but this one does, because the sickos needed to watch that evening play out live in HD
Tomorrow, Joyce headbutts Dorothy in the nose, grabs a guy passing them, snaps his neck, and throws his body at the cops.
this is queen behavior and is always morally justifiable
That’s the fastest I’ve ever seen someone organically reach the point of “Be [bi], do crimes.” Maybe not a record-breaking speedrun for bi%, but certainly for crime%.
I think we can let the lesbians have this one. We don’t need more rep like this.
Teenage train wreck incoming, it seems.
Jocelyne standing _right_ there, totally witness.
Damn it, Willis. Not like this.
A – Blinded by love !
B – And by tear gas.
A – And by tear gas…
“She’s not my prey, just like you said, Dorothy. All along, she was *yours*”
You know, I once shipped them because “ha-ha wouldnt it be crazy if?”, but I’m going to be honest now. This story arc has not endeared me to the pairing. I feels like I’m watching a train wreck and I mean that in the worst way.
I’m gonna be honest this storyline has done everything but endear me to the idea of these two being together.
I don’t see the narrative point to them both essentially cheating on their current partner, I don’t get the reason all these feelings had to come to the surface when they are BOTH unavailable. Love Triangles are my least favorite trope in anything, and while I appreciate Joe and Walky are not treated as lesser choices, there is still encouragment of them cheating on their current partners.
And everyone starts calling anyone who points that out a “relationship paladin” as if somehow its okay to cheat on your partner if they work really well together.
Plus the use of a protest as a backdrop to the romance is… Weird and I’m gonna be honest this feels like a bit of a slap to the face
Fellings don’t really ask for permission for when they come out or not i don’t know what to tell you
They don’t.
But I don’t think he was blaming Dorothy or Joyce for having feelings, but Willis for how he’s bringing them out. It’s not a conscious choice for the characters, but it is for the author.
That jist don’t really matter to me so i cannot relate.
Yeah, I don’t like this at all.
that’s because dorothy is half-correct about this behavior being a trauma response. it’s just that, to her and joyce, they’re reading Dorothy being gay as fuck as the trauma response, which is totally incorrect; Dorothy is gay as fuck and has been attracted to Joyce, the whole time.
The trauma response part is the part where Dorothy has literally become clinically obsessed with Joyce, to the point that she would never let her out of her sight ever again, because she’s so afraid of reliving the trauma of Joyce being taken away from her forever.
Dorothy would never move this fast, or be this reckless, or act this knowingly immoral, if she weren’t operating with her lizard brain, which is telling her that she needs to double down on every effort to make sure Joyce and her are not separated ever again. But, she’s literally having a trauma response, where their co-dependent bestieship is concerned; she’s become so obsessed and co-dependent, that she can only fixate on escaping the seemingly inevitable reality where Joyce is, once again, wrested from her life, forever.
So, even without the baggage of the cheating stuff, I think it’s very reasonable that this arc hasn’t endeared anybody to the ship, who wasn’t already shipping it before the arc started. That just means that those people do recognize, how terribly, catastrophically unhealthy and bad for each other Joyce and Dorothy will be if this is the time and place that they get together. The story isn’t selling the pairing as good, because it’s actually trying to do the opposite, in my eyes. Everybody can easily see that the way these women are acting, will only lead them both to more trauma and more tragedy.
Dorothy and Joyce are bi as fuck. Dorothy and Joyce do sincerely love each other on a level that heavily leans on the line between platonic and romantic. Dorothy and Joyce would actually make a good couple! The lesbian pharmacist saw them, and immediately went “aww, cute baby co-dependent disaster lesbian couple!” But, their relationship is not going to end well, for either of them, if its starting point is that Dorothy is so deep in her separation trauma, that her and Joyce become even more co-dependent than they already are, and it feeds into Dorothy’s obsession with keeping them together, at all costs.
It’s a case of “very right place, very wrong time.” As cute and lovey-dovey as their whirlwind romance is, anybody who has real-life relationship experience can spot from a mile away, that this is also toxic as hell.
I like this take. It made me think and look at the characters in a new and interesting perspective. Thanks for taking the time to write it down, comrade.
And then tomorrow’s strip reveals this was all a tear gas-induced hallucination.
I get it, that’s either bisexual or lesbian tear gas. Because its pink.
I’ll see myself out.
actually, “bisexual lesbian tear gas” happens to be my gender
Nah
Am I the only one that thinks before this can be called “cheating” on Joe and Walky they first need to finish figuring it out for themselves and then actually be within talking distance of Joe and Walky in order to have the appropriate conversation? If all that happens and they still don’t tell them, then it might be “cheating”.
It’s still cheating if the partner doesn’t know.
true, but right now it’s just dangerously close to cheating.
Not as close as “Do you want to do laundry?” was.
It’s hilarious for this to be the de-escalation in that category.
yeah, I’m not a relationship paladin, but havin’ a J/O with the bros is still cheating on your girlfriend, so doing laundry with your bestie surely also counts
It can be, sure.
It’s not cheating YET. But it’s headed full tilt into cheating with no brakes in sight.
I want this to happen for them because it would mean being honest and open with themselves, but at the same time I’m really not looking forward to the several steps back on the Road to Change that this is going to give to Joe.
I actually dont think it will. I think it will hurt him badly but I think he needs to bebhurt and realize that doing the right thingbisbthebright thibg not just for Joyce and I think he’s in a good place to recover from it.
I’m fine with a 2 steps up, 1 step back approach to character growth.
Not sure I’m going to be fine with this as the catalyst for it, but I’m also not at all sure we’re going there.
so…. should lester be tagged? that’s a lot of fucking cops man
Aside from the obvious lesbian victory here, it strikes me that quoting the Bible while she charges forward to be brave and good when it’s needed most will help her come to terms with her relationship with atheism too. So far it’s just been time allowing the anger to pass. But Joyce was shapes by her religious upbringing and fixated on the Bible as part of her undiagnosed autism. Her interpretation of it helped shape who she was going to be. Knowing that she still likes that part of herself, even if so much else from that time was in retrospect terrible and problematic, might help bring her some closure.
I’ve actually been kind of thinking: I think part of why this version of Dorothy’s love and devotion is appealing to Joyce so intensely, is because it resembles the expectations she was taught as a young girl, as to how she would feel for her future husband. Dorothy’s love right now is complete, all-consuming, and unrelenting force that cannot be resisted or denied. That’s exactly the impression of romantic love that Joyce was conditioned to crave for her whole life. That’s what she was taught would be her responsibility to her future spouse, and how she was supposed to treat them.
In a sense, Joyce is back-sliding, here; she thinks that, because the queerness of the relationship inherently makes it secular, that it therefore can’t be wrong – which is the exact same logic she used to use to justify her faith. She’s just flipped which things she thinks are evil.
So, since whatever she’s feeling right now, can’t be wrong, it must be okay…and that leaves her blind to the fact, that the whole reason that these feelings are so appealing to her, is actually that they are playing into her internalized notion of romantic love, which she learned from being a conservative christian woman.
Wait, are we actually gonna get the kiss of chaos 2K25? Has the day of reckoning finally come? The fallout so grand it changes everything? Tectonic shift?
Hey Willis, thank you for your work. No matter what anyone says in the comments, we’re all obviously deeply invested, coming back every day to read and discuss. I think that you’ve created some stellarly complex characters, of a caliber that I think major films and books strive for and often miss. These are characters that feel feelings, make mistakes, hurt and get hurt, love others with defiance, and redeem each other. (also make hilarious one-off jokes and get into silly impractical comic scenarios, because this is still a web comic). I don’t know if you still look down here, wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t, but I just think you deserve to be reminded how impactful this work is to your readers. Looks forward to more as always.
We’re emotional because we care
I hope to see a DoA animation so badly, but I’m afraid whoever will make it, the story would be more “straight” for wider audience (something something censorship).
That’s one reason why Comics > Animation > Movie adaptation
I don’t know Amos, did you see She-Ra and the Princesses of Power? How about Steven Universe? At least a few years back, the world was cool with pretty sweet queer themes, presented as normal and good.
Many people were very much not cool queer themes with tgose sgows specifically.
Especially shera
yeah deadass idk how someone writing a serial can juggle this many characters, many of whom are foils of one another, and have them come and go from prominence in the strip over time, and yet all the storylines tend to weave together very tightly, and in ways that both feel believable, but also make entertaining high-stakes conflict. if anybody ever thought Willis didn’t know what the fuck he was doing as a writer, they probably don’t understand writing.
I’m fine, I’m normal
Two ships crashing together in the uh, afternoon.
Me a queer person, shaking their head: This is why we need to live in a polyamorous society rather than a monogamous.
The monoplot strikes again. So much less drama if people were just able to share.
I’m pretty dubious of that. I am personally familiar with one(1) stable polycule and tons of drama bombs.
like, on the one hand, removing “you have a romantic/sexual relationship with someone else!” as a source of justified anger is definitely going to help in a lot of ways, but I don’t think it helps with like, 90% of the sources of drama in most relationships, and the social complexity of polycules tends to be very high.
You know its funny, I’m kind of hoping this is Joyce’s plan, but both Joe and Dotty say no. Because she’s going full steam ahead without discussing it with either of them. it would feel a lot better then Joyce’s current “I know it’s cheating and I don’t care” proclamation at the end of this strip.
Wild thing to say, Jernacious
they’re right and they should say it. monogamy is a social construct enforced to allow for stable empire-building. i do not, and have not, ever believed that it was truly human nature.
Babes even in polyamory you still need to set boundaries and generally keep your prior partner(s) informed LMAO? Do you think its just a free for all and you never need to set expectations or tell them who your other partners are/who you’re developing feelings for? Human nature or not, we’re social animals with the emotional capacity for caring about others feelings- and so we should.
Of course I know all of those things.
However, all of those behaviors would be naturally baked into our social norms, if it weren’t for the fact that comphet monogamy utterly dominate our entirely culture, by design. The whole point of this framework, is to make it so that polygamy doesn’t happen in the first place, and part of how this is accomplished, is by actively preventing the general population from learning those relationship skills, in lieu of just following the social dogma.
The whole reason people don’t know the sorts of things that you assumed I don’t, is literally the whole point of the social conditioning we all had to live through. The fewer people you allow to obtain the constructive relationship skills that make ethical polygamy possible, the crazier it seems, and the more that monogamy looks like the “sane, rational option” in comparison. That’s precisely why I implied that monogamy is a cultural psyop, in the first place.
Alright I’m critical of the social structures around monogamy as much as the next gal, but I’m pretty sure monogamous behavior and social custom predates empire building societies.
And most likely, so did cheating.
Like many pair-bonding species, there are deep genetic incentives both to pair up with another person and to cheat on them.
Joyce is such a heartbreaker. Everyone that fell for her ends it tears: Ethan, Becky, Jacob, Dorothy(today
), Joe (tomorrow)
Pretty sure that Joyce didn’t break Ethan’s heart considering he’s gay and they remained on good terms the entire time. But yeah I’m starting to see a potential pattern here.
Seemed to hurt Raidah more than Jacob, honestly.
Joyce secretly smothered Mike in his sleep, so she also broke Ethan’s heart.
I TOLD Y’ALL the kiss is coming!
Aaaaand this is where the comic changes, PLOT TWIST, the government is using experimental tear gas that modifies Plank’s constant, giving everyone present or in the vicinity CRAZY SUPERPOWERS! The even will probably be called something like THE BIG BANG, the superpowered victims BANG BABIES aaaaaaaaaand this is the plot to STATIC-
I’ve never seen the movie, but is anybody else getting “Thelma & Louise” vibes here?
I’m only vaguely aware of what that even is, aside from something that presumably has two women in it. I recall a passing reference to the two women getting the blues, followed by a swan dive of some description.
Is it tomorrow yet?
I really dislike everything about this. From the use of the protest as a backdrop for this whole build up.
It endears me to neither of these two, nor the relationship. Dorothy I think is the only character who consistently is doing things wrong with no consequence to her? Like it feels like it’s always excused or brushed over.
Like- Joe even brings up how she’s clearly into Joyce, and we learn that she was in denial of it. Like she KNEW, but admitting it to herself meant her actions towards Joyce went from ‘oblivious’ to intentional attempts in her mind. But she was already aware of it and just denying it. Plausible deniability.
Joe took away the plausible deniability.
I hate cheating plot lines. People saying ‘real life is messy’ but this is a webcomic with a superhero beating up cops at a protest.
I hate that this is how their plotline is happening. I hate that they’re breaking up Joe/Joyce for this trainwreck.
And yes, I think Joe/Joyce is going to break up because of this. There’s too much invested into this stupid plot line for it to be a bait and switch of “Lol Joyce thought it was all platonic” or the ever-contrived “She took Billy’s comment at face value with no critical thought.” for justification.
I am so tired. I hate it. And I know once it officially happens I’m going to lose interest in this comic because that’s whats happened in literally any media I was obsessed with when a plot point like this happened.
Not to say Dorothy never has bad things happen. But they’re never really consequences of her mistakes.
She has nightmares due to her trauma. That’s pretty much the extent of it.
I think that’s also part of what is rubbing me weird about this. Because this is clearly not her doing something good- something that should have some kind of consquence/fallout from it. (Re: Cheating, ignoring advice on falling back on a protest out of some weird self destructive behavior with no concern to how it’ll affect Joyce and Jocelyn?)
But it’s being framed in a super romanticized way, narratively speaking. Like the story is on her side to an extent in this.
But fallout from it would take away from Dorothy/Joyce, and it feels like there’s too much build up for him not to have them get together. So… do we just have a massive friend blowout? Is it not treated seriously/ does everyone just joke that they ‘called it’ with no concern to anything?
You making a lot of assumption that honestly show you don’t think very highly of Willis writing skills.
Cheating plot lines are super fucking hard to handle well so I dont blame them for being skeptical on willis’ ability. I’ve seen amazing writers drop the ball on this kinda story and personally I think Willis has dropped the ball on much easier stories in the past. (Not often, but on ocassion. Like just killing off Mike (no I’m not over it))
Cheating storylines aren’t hard to handle. Some viewers are just literally triggered by even the slightest hint of infidelity. People have triggers; that’s not a personal flaw. But, also, stories do not become bad stories, because they failed to be written in a way that never triggers anybody.
We’ve had a thousand things in this comic worse than people cheating on one another; those things simply weren’t triggers for anybody, so it never became an on-going source of stress for anybody, in that particular way.
That’s probably because, most readers probably haven’t had their friend thrown of a building to their death, or had a friend kidnapped, or watched their other friend stab a guy to near-death right in front of them, or had their childhood friend become permanently disabled as a result of their own actions.
None of those things were broadly triggering, because it’s much harder for somebody’s nervous system to react to something bad, when it’s both extremely specific and extremely unlikely. But, lots of people can be, and have been, affected by infidelity in their real lives, or at least know somebody who has. It’s much more likely that something that common, triggers substantially more people, than all of the obviously worse stuff that’s happened to characters in this comic. It’s something that could believably and suddenly upturn a person’s entire life, and it’s a worthwhile thing to feel activated by.
So basically what I’m saying is, I certainly don’t judge people who really, really can’t stand that sort of thing, and I don’t think it’s weird that the presence of the plot point genuinely hurts their enjoyment of the comic. I know that certain very specific things in this strip, in the past, have made me absolutely feral. That cycle seems to be a constant for most of the people here in this comment section.
But, a story introducing an element that any one person has an extreme reaction to, is not the same thing as the story getting worse, or being poorly handled. Some things are just not for some people, for completely understandable reasons, and at the end of the day, there’s never going to be a way to rationalize somebody out of their physiological responses to a stimulus.
I’m really sad that that means some people can’t reasonably be expected to enjoy the comic right now, and I’m honestly very sympathetic, because I know for a fact I’ve been there at least once or twice. But, it’s ultimately not a creative problem; it’s just a human problem. That’s not anybody’s fault.
That seems very reductive. It’s not just that “some people are triggered by any cheating story”.
The way cheating stories are hard to handle is that it’s hard to write them and treat them as actually bad things, especially if you’re simultaneously writing them as a great romance between the cheaters. In most of those other cases of bad things happening in the story, those things were treated as bad things.
This currently looks like Joyce and Dorothy are going to cheat and also become the major protagonist couple. The narrative seems to be treating this like a romance arc based around cheating. Which is awkward.
(Mind you, I’m not at all convinced that’s what’s going on, but all the cues are there.)
Cheating plot lines are hard to handle in general. My take is there’s no ending of this that I truly feel satisfied by because of how he’s been handling it.
He’s fumbled before to certain extents. He’s not infallible. I’m very aware of that. My assumption that he’s going to commit to it isn’t something I pulled out of thin air. I’m basing it on how he’s treating this whole situation.
okay
I agree. ‘Real life is messy’ would be Dorothy going for a kiss and Joyce saying WTF NO, or this exploding in their faces because every friend of theirs disapproves, or them going directly to Joe, who in fairness was not upset with Dorothy for being in love, so I don’t think will actually hate her for this (as Dorothy pumped the breaks and Joyce pressed on).
I can genuinely imagine a scene of Dorothy desperately trying to convince Joe not to break up with Joyce because it will destroy her, and desperately take all responsibility and agency in the action away from Joyce, and make herself out to be an evil conniving villain who lured and tricked Joyce, and how Joe needs to forgive her and hate Dorothy…and Joe is just like “naw, sorry, I get it, but I’m not mad at you at the choice you made, because I would have made that same choice at every point in my life, leading up to now. You didn’t do me wrong. But Joyce chose to do me wrong. We’re cool. I’m only disappointed with her.”
Dorothy’s head would fucking explode. And, presumably, Joyce would calm her down. With sex.
OMG something like the first paragraph happening would actually be really really interesting! (I mean, the second paragraph would also definitely be interesting, just less likely.)
Though speaking of, I’m still having a hard time guessing what Joe’s reaction to this is going to be. He seemed EXTREMELY chill about Dorothy also being in love with Joyce, and while he has a lot of trauma about cheating, I think he’s always framed it in his mind as the man(/him) cheating on the woman(/Joyce). I… actually don’t know how much being cheated on is going to hurt him, if that makes sense? He seems much more worried about him being the instigator because he’s always seen himself as a horny playboy, so it’ll be interesting to see how he reacts to Joyce being the one to play with fire.
I don’t think when he saw Dorothy was attracted to Joyce that he realized how Joyce would respond to that. Even knowing about the laundry.
He’s already been shown on record absolutely presuming that there’s no way that the “doing laundry” Joyce is discussing, could actually have a serious connotation. IIRC he had a brief exchange with Jennifer about it.
Basically, my reading is still that Joe has Joyce up so high on an unreachable pedestal, he simply hasn’t even begun to imagine that she is capable of hurting him. He both sees her as harmless and morally pure. It has not occurred to him, in any fashion, that Joyce could do something less than perfect – which is precisely why he was so sympathetic to Dorothy having what he recognizes as the same feelings for Joyce, that he has.
He probably wouldn’t have been so kind and supportive to Dorothy, if he already knew that Dorothy was the first person to ever make his girlfriend cum.
i know its from the tear gas but joyce’s eyes look really good like that .
This is the single greatest day in the history of lesbianism, only to be followed by every successive day in the history of lesbianism. This is making me SO happy my girls are finally going to do it YESSSSSSSS! Yeah, it’s gonna be messy, and it might not work out, but god damnit I’m rooting for them.
Tge Messines is an important part of it
wait guys i found becky’s alt account
I really cannot wrap my head around people cheering for somebody cheating on a significant other who has a huge hang up about cheating.
Like, how are we celebrating this?
That’s is: I bougth Patreon to read tomorrow strip
Welcome to the club!
“Sex Criminals!”
And then Willis reveals they’re actually Chip Zdarsky.
kiss or the joker will blow up a hospital
roommate pointed out that the pink tear gas is metaphorical sakura petals. im going insane i love toxic yuri.
oh my god they’re right, its literal toxic yuri
Woof 500 comments. That is always a good sign of good products discussion isn’t?
honestly, of all the recent strips I’ve happened to scroll down, this is the most civil it has been in days, maybe weeks. people’s takes seem to be either softening and becoming more nuanced, or else, the bulk of the people who just genuinely aren’t enjoying anything about this have stopped reading and commenting.
500 comments and y’all can’t manage to make the ‘being sent to horny jail’ joke hanging over this entire strip like a sword of Damocles huh. My disappointment is immeasurable.
there’s such a thing as rushing a punchline. patience is a bigger virtue in comedy, than it is in real life.
Nah cuz if someone get’s actually arrested it is too late. If they kiss it is too late. If they get interrupted it is too late. Last strip and the one before it were too early. This is just about the perfect comedic timing.
we’ll cut away to walky eating taco bell for one strip first, though
Hey everybody, how’s it going? Obsessively refreshing the page? Yeah me too.
*touches the comments section*
Something happened here
Fun lovin’ criminals
Let’s be criminals.