Welcome to the saga of the working-class adventurer! Enjoy the complete story with new annotations daily!
Paint the Town Red
Windy, Winter Jay Kiakas
Winona runs a werewolf shelter with partner in crime, Odile in the Gothic city of Merlot. One day they take in an injured vampire, and soon unravels many of the dark secrets of Merlot.
Hemlock
Josceline Fenton
A witch accidentally marries a monster, and now she and her familiar has to navigate life around her monstrous husband and her even more terrifying in-laws.
Cyanide & Happiness
Explosm
Satire, dark humor and surreal humor.
Dumbing of Age
David M Willis
Joyce has been homeschooled her entire life until now, when she's suddenly a freshman in college! Things don't go well.
All Known Alternatives
Karolina 'Kajotko' Jankiewicz
Akane has only one way to get back home: collect the 42 keys to parallel worlds. Eri and Ben are just trying to get through the summer before university. When a magical key turns up in an old spare set, all three are forced to change their plans and fast.
No End
Erli, Kromi
A queer romance about people attempting to build lives in a cold, post-apocalyptic world ravaged by hordes of undead.
Shaderunners
Alex Assan, Lin Darrow
A ragtag band of bootleggers open a speakeasy for bottled colour in the greyscale city of Ironwell.
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I’m pretty sure we know that he’s sorry that being a decent and loyal boyfriend forced him to say things that hurt her, despite the fact that her own seemingly desperate and clingy actions forced him to that point.
Of course that assumes that we temporarily ignore the fact that he’s a flesh-eating hell beast who has Satan worshiping at his feet. Taking that into account, he is clearly madly cackling behind that sham demeanor of decency, which is part of a clever act he’s been maintaining since the start of the comic just to screw with us.
What did danny ever do? He had a thing with amazi-girl and he didn’t wanna ‘betray’ her because it was going well. He’s just too derpy to not realize. More Amber’s fault for not telling him or at the very least dumping him as Amazi girl properly.
Exactly. The less weird he is the more people can relate to him. We see his mistakes and go “Gee I’ve done that before” and we get mad at ourselves and Danny, but mostly Danny.
Why do you think the weirdest character in the comic is more popular than the main character?
Each comic so far has had a focused character, not exactly a main character, but a focused one. In this comic, that character would be Joyce. In Roomies!, it was Danny; in It’s Walky!, it was Walky; and in Shortpacked, it was Ethan.
That’s not true. He’s truly exceptional both in the areas of doing stupid things out of questionable virtuosity *and* in not understanding things that are done or said around him, yet opening his mouth anyway.
You have to admire the way he is unafraid to prove himself ignorant of the subtle nuances of social interaction in a way that attracts the most contempt. Even in this attempt to apologize, he reveals that he’s not really sure if he did anything wrong, and if so, what it was. He’s not even he really needs to apologize, but he can’t stop himself from trying, seeing as how the interaction had not reached its zenith of awkwardness and cringeworthiness.
What has he ever done that was so horrible? Yes, he blew up at Amber when she was feeling particularly vulnerable, but it’s not as if he just did it out of the blue. She was keeping a huge important secret from him that, under a rather unique set of circumstances, is only really huge or important to them! Nobody else really seriously cares about Amazi-girl. It’s not as if telling him her “secret identity” would put him in danger or something. She kept it from him because she’s just as socially awkward as he is, and just like with him, it’s hurting other people! They’ve both done stuff wrong, but neither of them really did anything THAT wrong.
It’s not like Danny even wanted to know the truth. On several occasions he flat out told her not to tell him her identity because it would ruin his fantasy. Subjecting a real girl to rules made up in a comic book tells her that he doesn’t consider her a person. Had he been less dismissive of the truth, she might have felt welcome to tell him and done so earlier.
What he did, that was so terrible was refusing to see and treat her as a person.
I remember back when it was first airing but it took a long time to finish episodes so they just showed the first half twice in a row. Confused the crap out of me as a kid. ^_^
I ran into a few of the creators of the show at a comic con a few years ago, they were trying to reboot Reboot. Haven’t heard anything else about it, but I am still hopefull it will happen.
In real life I probably wouldn’t even notice him being around. But then again I have a sort of bull-in-china-shop way of meandering through life, so I sometimes overlook the details in the dust clouds.
Probably because he reminds of my middle/early high school self, i.e. the reason I can’t be trusted with a time machine. I’d VERY likely end up strangling myself while screeching “WHY ARE YOU SUCH A WHINY SHIT!?”. Then boom, paradoxed out of existence. I was a introspectively whiny dumbass convinced I was a “good guy” just because I stayed out of trouble and adults liked me because I was quiet. Not only that, I never did try to be a good person and constantly bemoaned my life situation, which is, in all honesty, PRETTY FRIGGING GREAT. I’m trying my best to be as helpful to people and supportive for their struggles in a positive and direct way. I’m basically a foil of Mike in that regard.
Danny is NOT a good person, he’s Lawful Neutral. He stays out of trouble, but only to serve his own impulses or desires. Not that he’s wrong to do that, but his often motivated by selfishness when trying to help others. Like when he was agonizing over Roz and Joe’s sex tape, he was bent out of shape because he thought HE’D get caught up in it. And his rejection of Amber after that speech he made just to pursue her costumed vigilante persona in his unrealistic romance fantasy? I would strangle him myself if I was able.
Are you saying he should have worried about Joe and/or Roz? He has known Joe most of his life. He knows how Joe is. No doubt he correctly assumed Joe would enjoy that kind of attention. And Roz.. well.. she went around campus with a giant condom on her head passing out contraceptives. What about a sex tape is going to bother her?
Should he have been worried about himself at all? I don’t remember why/how it affected him.
That’s the thing, kept saying “WE” when referring to the deep shit he thought he was going to get caught up in. If Danny had any right to be angry, it should have been over them filming it while he was present (but asleep), and attaching the camera to his foot. But Danny kept agonizing over the potentially media attention even after Joe made it clear that he was happy to be in the sex tape. Danny was more worried about himself than Joe in that instance, even though he wasn’t involved in the tape and couldn’t be held responsible for it in any way.
What annoys me about him is that he thinks he’s a good guy, but he doesn’t act like one. You’re right that he’s not much worse than the other characters, but he clearly thinks of himself, and presents himself, as one of the best.
The real good guys are those who look out for others, who notice when people need help and then offer it. Most of the time they don’t really realise they’re doing anything unusual. Danny is the opposite: his “good guy” status is, like everything else, entirely in his head. It’s a fantasy of the way he wants others to see him, not something he actually wants to do.
It’s cause being a basically ordinary inoffensive relatively decent guy makes him an easy template for people looking for someone to hate to project their pet hatreds onto.
Now, that makes sense. If a character’s main fault is that they’re weak or gullible, we hate on them in a attempt to show we’re not weak like them. If their main fault is that they’re aggressive or self-serving, we praise them because we’d like to seem strong ourselves. Have I understood right?
I suspect that for many long-term Willis fans it’s because the original version of Danny (in Roomies) was whiny and self-righteous. The Dumbing of Age version doesn’t really deserve the hate.
For me, it is because he is a passive loser. Although I would say I look down on him instead of hate.
He thinks that his love is enough for a relationship, not that he needs to contribute anything or have any initiative. Well great Danny, what do you add, what makes YOU lovable? Why should Dorothy both carry you and sex you up?
His dream is to be merely the object in a superhero(ine) story. Again, no action needed on HIS part. Don’t get me wrong, I think women like this aren’t great either, but society judges men like this far more harshly.
No action on his part. No real direction or ambition. Just that putting himself in a story is enough to be carried to a happy ending without earning a thing.
So yeah, in general he may be average, but he makes himself far less so.
Yeah, not so much. She offered to help him out of an awkward situation with his parents, and he accepted this. Then he proceeded to do everything possible in his power to undermine the help she was giving, just short of blowing it, and then after it was all over, he took a big ol’ poop on her as a token of his thanks.
Danny is brimming over with the inevitable malice born from willful ignorance and a complete absence of self-examination. Until he gives up the idea that bad things just happen to him and takes responsibility for the circumstances he finds himself in, he’s going to continue to be the most obvious target for scorn in this strip.
Never mind that she crossed the awkward line into “friend that is openly crushing on you that you aren’t interested in” (thus making the situation even more awkward) while she knew he would feel like this would be cheating on the girl he was dating at the time. A misunderstanding that she could have cleared up at any time (she even had the mask on her!) but chose not to.
Danny made some big missteps with that situation, but at least 70% of the blame is on Amber, since she had all the facts and tried to pressure him into feeling the same way about her that she felt about him without opening up about herself and the true nature of their relationship. The fault’s mostly on her. While whiny and passive-aggressive about it, Danny did the right thing by telling her they couldn’t hang out any more after what she did.
Well, keep in mind, while she did invade the situation, she was near a panic attack and was escaping her abusive father. So while she could have made a better decision, we can accept that she was not fully cognicent of everything her action might result in.
Also, Danny didn’t say he didn’t want to hang out with her because of her actions. He said it was because of his feelings for her and for Amazi-Girl. He laid a lot on her very quickly, and chose a girl whose name he doesn’t even know over a girl who had proven to be a good friend to him, even if she did have some issues.
I wouldn’t say the fault is MOSTLY on Danny or MOSTLY on Amber. I think it’s a mix of their own decisions, and of other factors around them.
Almost as if some foul god was twisting the machinations of fate to warp every innocuous misstep or failure of comprehension into its most cataclysmic, yet dramatic, end.
Sorry that sounded way less creepy in real life. I meant that i like your response the best out of every single comment I’ve seen about that situation.
No. He rejected her in order to pursue a relationship with her in a costume. Amber didn’t approach Danny as Amazi-Girl until the evening after he rejected her as Amber.
Or if you mean the friend-dumping at the bridge, that was because, as he confessed in Galasso’s, she’s a real person and that scares him, so rather than dealing with maybe actually having real feelings about someone real he’s going to kick her out of his life and run back to his safe but exciting fantasy to hide.
He had created a situation where he’d told his parents he had a girlfriend but they can’t meet her or know anything about her. Amber provided a physical presence for his story. It’s not her fault he went so far with it or didn’t bother to ask why she’d done it.
The first thing he did when she walked up and said “Hey lover” was drag her aside and demand to know what was going on and saying that he was uncomfortable with it. Amber then talked him into it over his continuous objects. These are verifiable facts; this comic does in fact have an archive.
When people say that any of that situation was Danny’s idea, it is a perfect example of how people will lie to themselves and distort their own memories to support an existing belief. Annoying, but fascinating in its own way.
Amber was not the one that made Danny make a public confession of love for her and then friend-dump her because he couldn’t deal with his own feelings.
It could’ve been just a wacky sitcom hijink. Amber gets to evade Blaine, Danny gets a friend to pose as his Canadian girlfriend so he’s not embarrassed in front of the other Wilcoxen, Danny tells Amazi-Girl (who of course already knows) about it afterwards like the honest and loyal guy he likes to think he is, everyone has a good laugh, roll credits. But no, Danny had to Dan it all up.
While it is technically accurate to say she has NEVER apologized or attempted to explain, it has only been a day. If she didn’t have this huge block about letting anybody know her dad exists, I would expect an apology or explanation within a week.
Let’s say I have a REALLY bad memory (and may have been missing out on this strip for a while). How far back do I have to go to get why Amber is mad at Danny boy here?
Yeah I have a hard time picturing her wearing any top that isn’t a sweatervests even during seduction. Not sure whether her or Nenene gave the other the fetish, or if they just entered the relationship with a mutual kink, but hey.
Can’t lie. My friends and I love Mario Kart. We piss each other off so easily. The best part is that I’m decent at the game, but 4 of my friends are pros.
Compared to all the vibrant, emotional, deep characters we have in the Dumbiverse, Danny’s just fairly blase, and doesn’t have anything compelling about him. Not yet anyway. Maybe further story arcs will expound. But for now, he’s just a regular old white, slightly introverted college kid.
He comes across as very immature and annoying. That kid in college who still seemed very young and childish, you know? It just annoys me, despite him being just a character.
We were doing so good, for so long, but NO. Willis just HAD to go and bring back the feels.
I have a bad feeling that this is just the tip of the iceberg, the first pebble in a veritable feelvalanche.
Ruth finds a bottle of booze in Billie’s dorm. This causes a psychotic break in which she turns it into a molotov cocktail and proceeds to light Billie’s room on fire only for the spire to spread uncontrollably burning and maiming 1/3rd of the cast and killing at least one if not two of them. /asspulling.
Wow, so much Danny hate. Honestly the guy thought he was doing what was right. Even though he is a thick-skulled idiot, the one instance that people are REALLY hating on him for is simply him being loyal to the one he desires. Is that really such a bad thing?
*Hides in corner in preparation of rotten vegetable bombardment*
I mean, I can’t blame the guy. He did nothing wrong here, other than being a little harsh with her (which was completely understandable) It’s mainly Amber’s own issues, and resulting silence, that’s leading to this shit. And even after that, Danny still tries to be the bigger man, and step up and fix what happened. Even though Amber should’ve really been the one trying to mend fences, although I can’t be too mad at her for what she did/is doing, she’s got pretty deep issues.
All Danny hate aside, he’s completely in the right here, assuming the standard suspension-of-disbelief on recognizing heroes applies in the dumbiverse (which it appears to do) He did nothing wrong in this situation. And what sucks is, Amber isn’t entirely wrong here. She did what she did for a pretty damn good reason, and is holding herself back from explaining that to him which, again, isn’t wrong in and of itself. But it has led to quite a cluster fuck :\
He is certainly not completely in the right, but he is also not completely in the wrong? He handled the situation very badly (aka danned it up) and definitely should apologize to Amber.
How did Danny handle this situation wrongly? Yes, he doesn’t know amazi girl’s secret, but they’re obv bonding despite that, so I don’t think he did anything wrong here. And his way of going about this is completely in his character.
He from his own working knowledge has nothing to be sorry for. In this instance. He’s still, whiny, annoying, morally pushy, self-obsessed, and otherwise Danny, but in this situation, he actually was in the right. IF, IF, he didn’t realize Amber and Amazi-girl are the same person. If he did know and is simply not acting with that knowledge in mind, he is an asshole. If he doesn’t, then he is merely stupid in addition to being, whiny, annoying, etc, etc.
I fail to see how he is any of those things. Even if he knows she’s Amazagirl, They have both agreed so operate as if she isn’t, down to her hiding it from him.
That she was emotionally hurting does not absolve her of responsibility for her actions. Amber used him.
Everyone gets mad at Danny for trying to end it with amber when he was clearly in the right and demands he apologise to amber. Danny apologises and everyone is thrown into an uproar, Willis should just stop trying to please the fanbase because the fanbase is filled with Mike’s.
Yeah, he’s just trying to see if this technique will work, instead of genuinely taking back what he said. I don’t remotely get the impression that he means it, and it doesn’t seem Amber does, either.
” I don’t remotely get the impression that he means it”
Well, yeah. He didn’t do anything wrong, so he doesn’t regret his actions. He’s unhappy that Amber’s in pain, and is casting around for something to ameliorate that.
Bro…there’s gonna be a thousand and one times that you, as the guy, will think you’re right in an argument with your girlfriend. But you decide to apologize anyway because u value what you have, and want to fix it, and don’t mind putting aside your pride.
Yuhno, it hindsight I should’ve just left out that last sentence , I only added it in a soft attempt to add humour to pointing out the fan base is filled with hypocrites. So I guess… I’m sorry?
’cause he’s never admitted that it was his own feelings that led to drama, right? And he definitely goes around being angry at people for stuff that he did, like the whole “getting his room/best friend in the news for a sex video”. He was involved in the decision behind that, yeah.
But I see a lot of similarity between Danny’s actions in this storyline and my own actions from my youth, and it makes me angry because I can’t believe he’s that stupid.
^ This. He really was a terrible guy there. Dumbiverse Danny, to the contrary, is just a regular kid. Kinda delusional and stupid, but good hearted. I just really think he should listen to Joe more.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but when I re-read DoA from his pov, I found I didn’t like how tactless, self-centered, and self-pitying he was, not to mention his tendency to be self-righteous even when he’s the one being a jerk. That he was willing to sell out his new girlfriend for his old one (or rather: that he was doing so in order to a) claim some false moral high ground and b) ruin her new relationship) and then turns around and tells Amber they can’t be friends anymore for said new girlfriend doesn’t really instill a lot of faith in him for me. If you add that he’s wishy-washy, unwilling to make or allow for change, and tends not to take other people’s dreams seriously, and I just . . . can’t really feel all that sorry for him.
And now, to argue with myself in a way, the above is not to say he does not have his occasional moments! He just has a tendency to Danny it up thereafter.
Also, comic link to some of what I was referencing above: In which Danny tells Dorothy she can have shoes for Walky OR get an interview about Amazi-Girl. And hey, it’s entirely possible that I’m misreading things wrt that being a betrayal and Amber would totally be pleased her new boyfriend is willing to give away information about her that will help Dorothy figure out her secret identity, but . . . I’m guessing not.
Danny was absolutely being an asshat there, but you know what? If everyone else can be forgiven their douchbaggery because of their emotional state at the time, why can’t he?
The love of his life, who had broken his heart a week prior, showed up at his place at the buttcrack of dawn to steal from him for her new boy toy. I wouldn’t have been in any mood to be civil, either. In fact, I’d have been a lot more cursy about it.
Possibly more over the early hour than anything else. I hate mornings.
One, everyone else isn’t necessarily forgiven for their emotional state at the time – I can think of several comic events where I don’t think being upset mitigated people being jerks. I like and enjoy Ruth, for instance, but a lot of her early behavior is unacceptable. It really depends situation to situation.
Two, Danny was already up and contemplating bed-skirts, so it’s not like his judgment was impaired by sleepiness. (Aside: the bed-skirts thing was a plus in his favor in my books.)
Three, I’d have understood if he was rude, short with her, or even just stared at her in disbelief while stating something like, “This is beyond the pale. No, you can’t borrow my shoes for your new boyfriend. Get the fuck out of my room and don’t come back.” That’s not the same thing at all, though, as potentially betraying his new girlfriend just so he can play head games with his ex.
And as I said! Maybe other people view that event differently! It’s okay to hold differing views on the story and characters. I’m just giving examples of what I, personally, find irksome.
—
Also, because this is already a discussion about Danny and what we do and don’t like, I am going to take this space to say that I think I’d have enjoyed him a lot more if he spent more time around Sarah. It felt like there was real character chemistry there – not romance or friendship (though they’d make interesting friends), but that they played well off of each other. Danny could play the straight man to Sarah’s humor, and Sarah being Sarah might inspire him to some form of self-reflection and change for the good.
Anyone in the same situation would be very unhappy and very unlikely to be civil. And people tend to forget that they would likely be very similiar to danny if in that situation. Maybe not completely but the emotions would still be there.
What do you think constitutes “selling out”? He offered to be interviewed for the newspaper. I don’t even think he and Amazigirl were dating at that point, but even if they were, agreeing to an interview is not the same thing as giving away sensitive information. What matters would be what would be said at the interview. For all we know, he was just going to talk about how she saved him from bullies, was all super kung fu, and wore a yellow and blue costume with a cape.
If you click the comic right before the one I linked, you’ll find that he brings up Amazi-Girl in the context of “Yes, I have a girlfriend, too, but no, you’re wrong, it’s not Amber.” (Ah, even more enjoyable and painful to read in retrospect.)
Wrt the interview, I guess we will never know what info he would and wouldn’t have included, but from what he divulged as a precursor – that she didn’t just save him the once, that they hang out all the time, etc. – I felt like he was entirely too willing to give information to a girl Amber-as-Amazi-Girl ran from.
Fortunately for Amber, Dorothy turned down the interview opportunity and did not proceed to stake out Danny’s hang-outs or stalk him in her spare time to make another stab at that Amazi-Girl article. Even so, it doesn’t change that Danny was offering that interview in the context of being Amazi-Girl’s boyfriend, not a by-stander or rescue victim, and that first feels very different to me than the latter two.
Pfft, I need to get more sleep or caffeine to compensate. I only just noticed that I phrased part of that first sentence all wrong and implied either that Walky is a girl or that Dorothy also picked up Joyce somewhere in the bargain. Belay that “girlfriend” and replace with “new significant other.”
And why should he be? Amber was being manipulative and trying to make him act like her boyfriend. If he doesn’t know that she’s Amazi-Girl (and at this point we can reasonably assume he doesn’t) then he ABSOLUTELY did the right thing. But since he does have feelings for Amber, he’s feeling guilty about it for stupid reasons while still understanding that he did the right thing, so he’s confused, and so his apology comes with a question mark attached.
You’re right, if he’d just said “No, you’re not my girlfriend” to his parents, people wouldn’t TOTALLY be hating on him for embarrassing her when she was emotionally vulnerable! Nope. Not at all.
As far as I can recall, Danny’s not connected to anyone who currently drinks. So it’ll be a bit before there’s any character growth. Though that assumes that his growth will be similar to ‘Roomies’ Danny. If not, then we might be seeing some shortly.
He’s already said the spoiler in question’s safe this time around. I seem to recall it being something like “I already killed off x and y, I don’t want to do it again.” And then saying he’s not really interested in killing people he already killed in the old universe unless they’re really boring.
(Saunters in wearing sunglasses and a tie around his head)
It’s you, Danny! You’re my favourite! You are the best, you know why? Cause you’re so thick! You’re mister thick thickity thick face from thicktown thickannia. And so is your Dad!
I’m pretty sure it isn’t Amber playing a Dating Sim right now.
Danny, on the other hand, just consulted a multiple choice list of responses, puzzled over them long enough that he almost lost the chance to make any response, took a desperate stab at the one he hoped would keep himself on the Amazi-Girl path w/o writing his friend Amber out of his personal story (even though they can’t hang out until his current drama with her resolves, not sure if he’s thought that part through, yet, but I digress), and THEN let his uncertainty overwhelm his reading of his chosen line, engulfing it in a question instead of the declaration.
Does Danny even know why he is apologizing to Amber? I think he needs to take Amber aside and explain to her exactly what he is apologizing for. He may find that he is entirely off-base (well, we know that he is since Amber = Amazi-Girl), and it gives Amber a perfect opening to take Danny into her confidence.
I mean, on the one hand, if you’re going to cut someone out of your life, don’t jerk them around with half-hearted not-quite apologies as though you’d never said you couldn’t be friends anymore. If you don’t want them to be unhappy with you or not talk to you in respect of your decision to never speak again – then don’t tell them you want to cut them out of your life. What is Danny trying to achieve here?
The whole situation is due to them both making bad decisions, but if Danny’s looking for reconciliation, this isn’t the greatest way to go about it. How is Amber supposed to react to this but to keep on walking?
(Or, y’know, sending Danny a message with her DS (is that a thing you can do?) and having an open and clear conversation about a) her role as Amazi-Girl and b) everything that happened during Family Weekend, but c’mon. This is Dumbing of Age, not Age of Honest Talks and Good Decisions.)
Well I think he only said that because he was angry and he felt like he was cheating on a girl he really cared for. And it made him feel like shit, so I’m guessing he put some of that into making amber feel a little shit.
He certainly could have done it better but people seem to forget that you say things when you’re angry without really thinking. Your emotions not your brain is making you think this is the best way to handle the situation. And most everyone does it. When our emotions get the better of us we say things we don’t truly mean or can’t take back. Or they have a small truth to them, but we blow it out of proportion because “fuck I’m angry”.
I’m sure he understands what he said was a bit drastic, but sometimes your emotions just get the better of you.
I guess my biggest reason for feeling “?????” over this comic is that I can’t tell, due to his apology having a question mark and only being delivered after they’d passed each other, whether he genuinely wants to talk it out and be friends again or if he just wants to make himself feel better about having upset someone who was once a friend. (I could understand even the latter considering his age and that he doesn’t seem to deal well with conflict.)
I definitely agree that sometimes people say things they don’t mean, even to the point of “I never want to see you again,” when they’re angry and hurt and afraid (and I personally think Danny was at least a little afraid in addition to being angry when he said all of that). I just can’t tell if Danny is rethinking things or . . . what, exactly.
His thought process and motivation here is a mystery to me. I guess I am going to have to wait and see what tomorrow’s comic will hold.
I think the question mark is he is saying it but he isn’t completely sorry.
I mean he feels what he said was mostly right. And I agree, Amber did use him, but if he truly didn’t care for her at all any more he wouldn’t have said anything. But he saw she was hurting and felt he should at least try to make it better.
I think the “?” means “you made me feel like i was cheating on someone i really cared for and that isn’t okay, but I don’t want you to feel so hurt for what i said.”
Danny isn’t wrong here. If anything, Danny is acknowledging that someone he was friends with is hurting and while clumsy about it, is fishing around to see if he can stop the hurt or offer a little sympathy.
I get that Amber’s childhood was horrific and that the girls has issues, but a bad childhood doesn’t make her any less wrong. She shoehorned herself into Danny’s time with his parents, she told the lie about them dating, she put emotional pressure on him to try to force him into a relationship with her despite knowing that he is in another relationship that he takes seriously (and no it doesn’t matter the we know they are the same person – he doesn’t. He has to work with the information he has.) She could have fixed this with the truth at any time, and she chose not to.
I also don’t understand how every other character gets cut slack because of their crappy parents, except Danny. Everything we’ve seen so far shows that his parents don’t place any value on him at all. If he isn’t dating someone they approve of, attached to someone they make clear is superior to him, he is a waste of their time and a disappointment. His obliviousness is probably a learned skill to protect himself from that.
True, and I agree, Danny was just trying his best to be faithful to amazi-girl even if he didn’t know the girl he was sitting with WAS Amazi-girl, amber came in and make things really difficult for the poor man.
BUT I do also recall that she was at the time running from her father, and while I agree a bad childhood does not excuse a person from doing bad things at the time she needed a way out, and Danny was the best way and the person she seemed the most comfortable with.
Given the circumstances I don’t blame either of them.
I was wondering how long before someone brought Amber’s father (Blaine?) into it. She had just punched him; he was chasing her through the dorm; she needed to be somewhere, in public, where Blaine couldn’t continue to act like an asshole without doing it in front of witnesses (I believe the term is ‘hiding in plain sight’); and Danny and his parents were the first people she came across. If she had come across Asma and her friends heading over to Galasso’s for pizza instead of the Wilcoxes, she’d have tagged along with them instead. Any port in a storm, dont’cha know?
“and no it doesn’t matter the we know they are the same person – he doesn’t. He has to work with the information he has.”
In fairness, she -does- know, and if we’re talking about her emotional turmoil, that’s a fair point. He doesn’t know, we can’t blame him, but she -does-, and that excuses her behavior. Sure, she could be honest about her secret identity, but there are a few snags to that plan. 1) He told Amazigirl he didn’t want to -know- her secret ID. 2) It is not an illegitimate concern for her that he might change the way he feels about both of them if he finds out they’re the same person. He might feel like he’s been played a fool by both women that he cares for, which could lead to feelings of betrayal and embarassment. and 3) She’s a COSTUMED VIGILANTE. That’s kinda illegal, and opening up to anybody about her identity could have consequences.
“In fairness, she -does- know, and if we’re talking about her emotional turmoil, that’s a fair point. He doesn’t know, we can’t blame him, but she -does-, and that excuses her behavior.”
I wasn’t talking about her emotional turmoil though. I was talking about how very few people seem to want to acknowledge that she is in the wrong, and in a much greater degree than he is.
Also, I believe that while it explains her behavior, its doesn’t excuse it – IMO naturally. Believe me, I know from abusive parenting and self esteem issues and wanting to hide your problems from the world. Just because you did something to protect yourself – and in this case getting the hell away from her father was definitely protecting herself, it doesn’t mean you’ve done the right thing. She holds all the cards here. She has all the information. And if telling the truth means she has to take the consequences of her actions, that’s kind of how the world works.
My point is that the onus is on her to fix this, and so many people blaming Danny for Amber’s choices – no matter why she made them – just baffles me. Then again, I only read DOA. Maybe there is residual hate from other ‘verses that I’m just not getting.
I totally blame him for not knowing. He has all the information we have except actually seeing Amber put the mask on, plus more that we have no way of having from this side of the fourth wall, and, stupid running gag aside, if there’s anyone in the audience who honestly couldn’t tell that Amazi-Girl was Amber before the strip where we saw her put the mask on, I’ll go out and buy a hat so I can eat it.
Best case scenario here, the one that all the Danny apologists keep pushing, is that Danny is honestly oblivious. Which makes him not only ludicrously stupid, but also translates to “not paying enough attention to the girl he alleges to care about, has spent hours hanging out with in both guises, has made out with, to be able to recognize her when she changes clothes”.
Alternately, he does subconsciously recognize her, but just isn’t letting himself consciously think about it. Which means that he’s created this whole mess just because he values his Lois Lane fantasy more than he does Amber/Amazi-Girl herself. (This is my preferred scenario.)
Or he does consciously recognize her, and is just pretending he doesn’t. Which makes him just a complete fucking asshole.
And for all the people going, “Oh, Amber should just tell him!”: Well, maybe from a relationship perspective she should. But Amazi-Girl is, at best, dancing right along the edge of legality. This is why she tries to get the bad guys to throw the first punch, because then she can claim self-defense. If she throws the first punch, that’s assault and battery, and she’s a violent criminal. (She may be anyway; I’m not sure what Indiana’s laws on vigilantism are like.) If the wrong people find out who Amazi-Girl is, she could be in very serious legal trouble, the cops and jail time kind. Does telling this guy that she’s known for three weeks, that doesn’t seem to be able to lie to save his life, is completely oblivious about everything, and who just acted like a complete jerkwad to her after claiming to care about her, the secret that could get her into that trouble still seem like such a great idea?
If she tries to get them to throw the first punch, that already means she has no claim to self defense. It’s going there with the intention to get into a fight, and then getting into a fight.
She might be in for a very bad surprise.
Regardless of the desire to start a fight, the responsibility for escalating things falls on the person that throws the first punch. It doesn’t matter how badly person A may want person B to start a fight beforehand, if Person B throws the first punch, person B started the fight, and person A is (legally) blameless for the altercation. There is no law on the books for “goading with intent to get assaulted”.
Actually, there is. It’s not illegal to start a fight verbal, but it *IS* illegal to defend yourself if you start the fight that way. If you insult someone and provoke them to the point where they punch you, they’re going to jail, but if you punch them back in ‘self defense’, so are you. Sometimes, laws are written to plug obvious exploits ahead of time. At least, in some jurisdictions and in some cases!
This.
Self-defense has an actual legal definition. If you could have easily avoided the fight – for example by not causing it, or by running away instead – then you have no claim to self-defense.
The police hear “but it was a self-defense” all the time, and they will not believe it, because it’s almost always a delusion or an outright lie.
People see what they want to see. It’s the reason Superman can get away with only using glasses. It’s also the classic suspension of disbelief of comic books. In addition, while from our side of the wall, it’s obvious, the same may not be true for our beloved characters. Amazi-girl is Amber’s height (not particularly tall or short), white, with brown, middle length hair. That’s about as average as they come. There’s no way, in a real world scenario (which it would be, for them) you could pin Danny not knowing that they’re one and the same on him.
P.S As a further example, celebrities have sometimes dressed up as normal people and gone to their own events, and it takes much longer than you think for people to recognize them.
Forget all this Danny hate. Sure he can be a prick at times but hey none of these characters are saints, even the Christian ones and Danny hasn’t done anything worse than say….oh a girl who goes all “you’re whiter than me!” crybaby on her brother (racial hatred is 20 times worse).
How about this: She turns and runs into his arms and sobs. Then forgives him and tells him about her ugly and screw up past, opens up and bears her soul to him and then…if he still rejects her, okay he’s a prick. If not I think she also owes him another little confession at an appropriate time when he will accept the truth of it (if she told him now he’d just think she was screwing with him).
“oh a girl who goes all “you’re whiter than me!” crybaby on her brother”
Being frustrated that your sibling has always gotten it better than you with your parents due to circumstances outside your control and that said sibling has always remained not only oblivious to this, but has actively blamed your poor relationship with your parents on you is completely different than . . . whatever it is you’re trying to frame this as.
Except we still have no proof that it’s not just a childhood resentment that has no actual backing in reality. Kids do that sort of thing all the time, they pick what they’re insecure about (in this case making Sal the racist one who feels not ‘good enough’ because she’s not ‘white enough’) and say that’s why their parents always hated them and preffered their other sibling. Anyone who has never said ‘you were always mom’s/dad’s favorite’ is an only child.
Comments from the author imply that there is an actual thing there. And at the very least we have seen that Sal’s mom has absolutely no problem COMPLETELY IGNORING HER after a protracted absence.
Regardless of whether you buy Sal’s reason (and I do), she explicitly tells Walky it started before the robberies, hence her major frustration with him constantly bringing that up.
I approve of your avatar, but I kinda wanna hit you in the arm right now. What Sal has towards Walky isn’t “racial hatred”. She resents the fact that their parents play favorites with him. And they do, pretty obviously. (In the case of their mom, downright heartlessly.) Racial bias is just one of her suspicions of why.
Uh, no. “Narrow-minded” doesn’t make sense here, and “thoughtless” is obviously wrong. Children usually grow up admiring and respecting their parents. Sal is fucking DESPERATE for their love and approval. For her to love them THAT MUCH, wonder why they don’t love her, and then still accuse them of something “taboo” is the result of many hours of thought.
“oh a girl who goes all “you’re whiter than me!” crybaby on her brother (racial hatred is 20 times worse). ”
You kind of have no idea what ‘racial hatred’ is if you think “You’re being treated better than me because you’re whiter” is it.
I think quite a bit of it is also carryover hate from the Walkyverse Danny. That is the reason a lot of the other characters get the pass as well. Danny pretty much is one of the bottom tier characters people like to hate.
The ? Apology is perfect. Is he truly sorry? Is he kinda sorry and still kinda mad? Is he very sorry but unsure if saying so right now will make things better or worse? Is he sure that Amber will never want to talk to him again? Does he want to keep Amber as friend but can’t handle the mixed feels?
An iPhone might give her away if Danny called Amazi-Girl and Amber’s phone rang, in front of him. Preferably with caller id where he could see it clearly.
Heh! I just realized after reading the comic a second time that Danny did notice the 3DS and I then remembered that Amazi-Girl and Danny were playing on their 3DS’s at one point. Odd he would recognize that but not that Amber was Amazi-Girl. Little late for the apology mind but both of them are at fault here.
I have actually never read anything but DoA and Shortpacked and I still can’t stand Danny, so it definitely isn’t carryover from anything else. He’s self-centered, self-righteous, and obnoxious. I hated him the second he tried to force Dorothy to choose between getting shoes and information because he was still upset with her for not being into him and having different priorities than he did, and from what I’ve seen from him in this comic, he still doesn’t think about anyone but himself with any kind of depth or interest. Yeah, I’m hoping this thing with Amber gets him to start doing that, and yeah, he thought he was doing the right thing, but he was harsh and cruel to Amber while doing it and until there’s a decent apology this guy can just rot.
I think a lot of people have been like him or thought like him before recognizing it and correcting it. He is a pretty solid character with believable flaws and I like that. I would be willing to bet he grows out of it eventually, recognizing and overcoming ingrained character flaws like that is sort of a huge part of college. and a major theme of DoA.
Just because people are like him in real life, it does not mean I need to appreciate him as a character. I don’t like him. As soon as he shows signs of change, I’ll start appreciating him more? Until then I’m going to stay disliking the guy.
I think Danny has the right to put any silly conditions he like on the use of his shoes, since they’re his, so he’s automatically blameless.
And the different priorities Dorothy had were that she was too busy with schoolwork to have a boyfriend. She came for the shoes, of course, to borrow them for her new boyfriend that she’d dumped a week after dumping Danny because she was too busy to have a boyfriend. Clearly being unsympathetic to the ironclad unchangeability of that priority of hers shows that he is unable to think about anyone but himself.
In conclusion: I read your post and parse it as “Dorothy is infallible, so Danny is a bastard for not completely supporting her. Also Amber is infallible so he’s doubly-proven in his bastardry.”
“She was too busy with schoolwork to have a boyfriend” is absolutely not the reason she broke up with him, nor even why she told him she broke up with him.
First point: They’re his shoes. So if he was against lending her the shoes, he could have said ‘no, I don’t want to lend some random guy my shoes.’ He deliberately played a stupid game like a petty douche out of his resentment for her. I’m not saying he’s evil, I’m saying I don’t like him because he’s petty and self-centered. It wasn’t about them being his shoes, it was about the terms he put on her borrowing them, point blank.
Point two: I don’t even have to refute this apparently, because Willis showed up and did it for me.
Point three: You reading in the idea that I’m saying Amber is infallible (she isn’t) and Dorothy is infallible (my god she isn’t), is amazing, seeing that I literally said nothing about them aside from mentioning the fact that Dorothy broke up with Danny. I could very easily go into how Amber screwed up and Dorothy’s ideas about relationships, but I’m not talking about them, I’m talking about Danny. Be that as it may, yes, I think Amber messed up. I think the situation she messed up in gives me more sympathy to her- she was being chased by her abusive dad who was literally out to attack her. She put Danny in an awkward situation- that he agreed to, even though it was still unfair to him, but none of her words or actions towards Danny reached the same level of intentionally cruel that he used towards her.
Basically: Amber screws up because she omits information and hides her motivation because she can’t express herself openly out of fear. Danny screwed up because he is literally so self focused that he harms people out of callousness even if he’s trying to do the right thing, and also strikes me as petty. One is a character flaw I can forgive more than the other. You’re welcome to disagree, but I’m hardly going to accuse you of putting Danny on a pedestal because of it.
Well, let’s see you walk up to your ex and ask him to lend your current boyfriend some shoes. Especially after you dumped your ex (all reasons aside, getting dumped is going to leave your ex with all kinds of bad, torn up feelings) Regardless of reasonings, Dorothy dumped him, and then proceeded to hook up with another guy less than two weeks later. That shit hurts, no matter the spin or angle you put on it. And THEN brings said guy over, asking for help. That’s just not tactful, even within the bounds of general disbelief established by fiction.
Next, Danny wasn’t harsh, or cruel, but he WAS angry. And aggressive with it. You can be that way, without being cruel or harsh. And he just “laid down the law” so to speak. While Amber’s reasons are somewhat justifiable, and she has her own issues, Danny can’t really know that, because she doesn’t let him in. All he sees is a nice girl he likes, but doesn’t want to get too close to, for fear of cheating on his current girlfriend and/or hurting himself, or either of said ladies. So his reaction was quite justified.
Amber doesn’t need to reveal her heroic identity.
She doesn’t need to reveal that the person who was putting her in danger was her dad.
She should say something like,
“Amazi-Girl wasn’t there to save me, yesterday, Danny. You were. Thank you for letting me hang out with your family in a very public place. I’m sorry for acting weird. I was scared. Somebody was trying to harm me. No, I don’t want to talk about it. BUT, while I know we can’t hang out anymore, if you ever break up with Amazi-Girl… Um, after the things you said, you can’t just… Oh, never mind. Goodbye, Danny. Best of luck with Amazi-Girl.”
Yeah, ‘should’ being the operative term, here. It’s going to be much more entertaining if things stay awkward between them for a bit, while he overhears from other sources something of what went on.
The neat thing about him hearing about the Blaine thing after the fact is that he’ll join the readers in incorrectly blaming himself for failing to act on knowledge he didn’t have!
Well, of course. Danny is supposed to have psychic powers, obviously, and be omniscient.
And I’m sure if he’d told her in front of his parents that, no, she wasn’t his girlfriend, everyone would have been hunky-dory with that and not pissed at him.
[Speaking as if he was a real person, not a webcomic character.]
I don’t find Danny to be especially dislikeable. He is overtly blinkered enough that in real life I wouldn’t spend time with him unless he changed the way he approaches things. But so far as I can see, Danny is a pretty ordinary guy.
He’s also still very young. Chances are high that he’s going to change a hell of a lot over the next few years. He’s also in with a generally good crowd of people, which offers even better odds that he’ll develop for the better.
I think it’s easy to forget how much people can change, or how hard-earned life lessons can be. Sure he gets on people’s nerves now, but it’s not as if he has someone with experience or good insight to point him in the right direction when he messes up. He’s figuring this stuff out on his own. Most people learn from their mistakes. Give Dan time to learn from his.
Yeah, few characters have made really good decisions. Ethan’s been dating a woman even though he’s gay, Billie still hasn’t given up alcohol, Amber’s been beating up criminals for a hobby and being a total shut-in the rest of the time, and Walky and Dina are still learning social skills. When Joe, Roz and Dina seem to have made the least mistakes,
a plague has hit our house
both children singing billie eilish's "what was i made for" but entirely in "meows"
we can't get them to stop
it's been weeks
please send help
The plantation burning reminds me of when the residential school burnt down in Shubenacadie.
I was very young. Not understanding why we were all there watching a scary looking building burning. Cars lined up all over both sides of the road. It seemed like the entire rez population (1)
Someone is citing the MA constitutional provision explicitly allowing the state to impede federal marshals enforcing the fugitive slave act, DAMN the average citizen is radicalized
you’re laughing. the largest antebellum plantation house burned down & there are brides who will not get to spiritually absorb the poisoned spectral energy of the land for their big day, & you’re laughing.
Me if I ever see Tony Hawk: Hey you’re Tony Hawk the famous skateboarder. That’s right I recognise you. Won’t be able to get any content out of this will you, you piece of shit
How to read all 28 issues of my Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane run on Marvel Unlimited:
1: The first four issues were published as the miniseries "Mary Jane."
www.marvel.com/comics/serie...
today in #9chickweedlane i learned we have to be shown children learning and relearning what sex is, for Reasons, even though they already clearly know and have prepared nuanced questions about it!
also that Gran must hate, if she's still alive, how Old Juliette is the same but with gray hair
one of my favorite things is when a commenter explodes WHEN DO THESE CHARACTERS GET THERAPY but directed towards a character who canonically has a regular therapist
Hot Toys Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith 1/6 Scale Darth Vader Deluxe ($495) & Standard ($315) is up for preorder at Sideshow - shrsl.com/4wcx6 #ad
If you preorder make sure to hit the Exclusive versions since they include a commemorative plaque and cost the same.
Dana Simpson 
preternia @preternia.com ⋅ 2d
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I speak on behalf of many when I say: “Damn it, Danny.”
Dan it, Damny.
Damny it, Dan.
Damn nation.
Dan you, Willis.
God Dammit, Ross.
Book ’em, Danno.
*Ech*
Dan you to HELL!
Danit Janet
d-d-d-du-duh-dang it Danny.
I deny everything
God Dan it.
Danning around at the speed of sound…
Got places to Dan now, gotta Streetpass Amazi-Girl!
Can’t stick around gotta keep Danny on,
Guess what lies ahead, it’s all up to Galasso!
(been singing this in my head XD)
So was I… >.>
Danning around at the speed of Dan, people, do you realize what this means? We have something to power ftl space flights, finally!
Here’s your $20.
Fuck you, Dan.
I think we all are, Danno.
The problem is, what he’s sorry about is the consequences, not the actions/words.
We don’t know that.
But we do know danny… XD
I’m pretty sure we know that he’s sorry that being a decent and loyal boyfriend forced him to say things that hurt her, despite the fact that her own seemingly desperate and clingy actions forced him to that point.
Of course that assumes that we temporarily ignore the fact that he’s a flesh-eating hell beast who has Satan worshiping at his feet. Taking that into account, he is clearly madly cackling behind that sham demeanor of decency, which is part of a clever act he’s been maintaining since the start of the comic just to screw with us.
I’m pretty sure you meant the second paragraph to be ironic and the first one to be straight, but frankly they both read like irony to me.
Too late Danny…
Screw you Danny!
Made so, so, so much better by your gravatar. xD
What did danny ever do? He had a thing with amazi-girl and he didn’t wanna ‘betray’ her because it was going well. He’s just too derpy to not realize. More Amber’s fault for not telling him or at the very least dumping him as Amazi girl properly.
At the risk of having R.C. Monroe come after me with a beer stein, this.
I still don’t understand why people hate on Danny so much. He’s a good guy, he’s just really average.
This.
Double This.
Super this.
Ultra this.
Triple ultra true.
Exactly. The less weird he is the more people can relate to him. We see his mistakes and go “Gee I’ve done that before” and we get mad at ourselves and Danny, but mostly Danny.
Why do you think the weirdest character in the comic is more popular than the main character?
This comic has a main character?
Each comic so far has had a focused character, not exactly a main character, but a focused one. In this comic, that character would be Joyce. In Roomies!, it was Danny; in It’s Walky!, it was Walky; and in Shortpacked, it was Ethan.
this was helpful to me :-.
He reminds me of myself.
(Ignore my gravatar please. :P)
Danny fucks people’s moms for nickels?
That’s not true. He’s truly exceptional both in the areas of doing stupid things out of questionable virtuosity *and* in not understanding things that are done or said around him, yet opening his mouth anyway.
You have to admire the way he is unafraid to prove himself ignorant of the subtle nuances of social interaction in a way that attracts the most contempt. Even in this attempt to apologize, he reveals that he’s not really sure if he did anything wrong, and if so, what it was. He’s not even he really needs to apologize, but he can’t stop himself from trying, seeing as how the interaction had not reached its zenith of awkwardness and cringeworthiness.
The boy is an artist, it has to be said.
What has he ever done that was so horrible? Yes, he blew up at Amber when she was feeling particularly vulnerable, but it’s not as if he just did it out of the blue. She was keeping a huge important secret from him that, under a rather unique set of circumstances, is only really huge or important to them! Nobody else really seriously cares about Amazi-girl. It’s not as if telling him her “secret identity” would put him in danger or something. She kept it from him because she’s just as socially awkward as he is, and just like with him, it’s hurting other people! They’ve both done stuff wrong, but neither of them really did anything THAT wrong.
It’s not like Danny even wanted to know the truth. On several occasions he flat out told her not to tell him her identity because it would ruin his fantasy. Subjecting a real girl to rules made up in a comic book tells her that he doesn’t consider her a person. Had he been less dismissive of the truth, she might have felt welcome to tell him and done so earlier.
What he did, that was so terrible was refusing to see and treat her as a person.
^^^This
Implying.
Nothing about the mistreatment Amber has subjected him to has involved subtle nuances.
I dunno why everyone else does it. I just do it as a joke.
That said, Danny’d probably get on my nerves in real life.
Yeah, me too. Sure he’s annoying but it’s just fun to hate on him. DoA Danny isn’t so bad, I’ve kind of enjoyed his story so far.
Your Gravatar! Someone remembers Reboot!
Yay!
I remember back when it was first airing but it took a long time to finish episodes so they just showed the first half twice in a row. Confused the crap out of me as a kid. ^_^
I ran into a few of the creators of the show at a comic con a few years ago, they were trying to reboot Reboot. Haven’t heard anything else about it, but I am still hopefull it will happen.
In real life I probably wouldn’t even notice him being around. But then again I have a sort of bull-in-china-shop way of meandering through life, so I sometimes overlook the details in the dust clouds.
Probably because he reminds of my middle/early high school self, i.e. the reason I can’t be trusted with a time machine. I’d VERY likely end up strangling myself while screeching “WHY ARE YOU SUCH A WHINY SHIT!?”. Then boom, paradoxed out of existence. I was a introspectively whiny dumbass convinced I was a “good guy” just because I stayed out of trouble and adults liked me because I was quiet. Not only that, I never did try to be a good person and constantly bemoaned my life situation, which is, in all honesty, PRETTY FRIGGING GREAT. I’m trying my best to be as helpful to people and supportive for their struggles in a positive and direct way. I’m basically a foil of Mike in that regard.
Danny is NOT a good person, he’s Lawful Neutral. He stays out of trouble, but only to serve his own impulses or desires. Not that he’s wrong to do that, but his often motivated by selfishness when trying to help others. Like when he was agonizing over Roz and Joe’s sex tape, he was bent out of shape because he thought HE’D get caught up in it. And his rejection of Amber after that speech he made just to pursue her costumed vigilante persona in his unrealistic romance fantasy? I would strangle him myself if I was able.
*note, the 2nd to last sentence refers to how I’m trying to act currently, just to clarify.
Are you saying he should have worried about Joe and/or Roz? He has known Joe most of his life. He knows how Joe is. No doubt he correctly assumed Joe would enjoy that kind of attention. And Roz.. well.. she went around campus with a giant condom on her head passing out contraceptives. What about a sex tape is going to bother her?
Should he have been worried about himself at all? I don’t remember why/how it affected him.
“Roz.. well.. she went around campus with a giant condom on her head passing out contraceptives. What about a sex tape is going to bother her?”
I’ve known plenty of folks who participate in the former. I feel confident that none of them would be happy with the latter.
That’s the thing, kept saying “WE” when referring to the deep shit he thought he was going to get caught up in. If Danny had any right to be angry, it should have been over them filming it while he was present (but asleep), and attaching the camera to his foot. But Danny kept agonizing over the potentially media attention even after Joe made it clear that he was happy to be in the sex tape. Danny was more worried about himself than Joe in that instance, even though he wasn’t involved in the tape and couldn’t be held responsible for it in any way.
What annoys me about him is that he thinks he’s a good guy, but he doesn’t act like one. You’re right that he’s not much worse than the other characters, but he clearly thinks of himself, and presents himself, as one of the best.
The real good guys are those who look out for others, who notice when people need help and then offer it. Most of the time they don’t really realise they’re doing anything unusual. Danny is the opposite: his “good guy” status is, like everything else, entirely in his head. It’s a fantasy of the way he wants others to see him, not something he actually wants to do.
It’s cause being a basically ordinary inoffensive relatively decent guy makes him an easy template for people looking for someone to hate to project their pet hatreds onto.
Oh also, identification aversion.
It’s the opposite of why everyone jacks off to an actually loathesome shithead like Mike.
Now, that makes sense. If a character’s main fault is that they’re weak or gullible, we hate on them in a attempt to show we’re not weak like them. If their main fault is that they’re aggressive or self-serving, we praise them because we’d like to seem strong ourselves. Have I understood right?
I suspect that for many long-term Willis fans it’s because the original version of Danny (in Roomies) was whiny and self-righteous. The Dumbing of Age version doesn’t really deserve the hate.
For me, it is because he is a passive loser. Although I would say I look down on him instead of hate.
He thinks that his love is enough for a relationship, not that he needs to contribute anything or have any initiative. Well great Danny, what do you add, what makes YOU lovable? Why should Dorothy both carry you and sex you up?
His dream is to be merely the object in a superhero(ine) story. Again, no action needed on HIS part. Don’t get me wrong, I think women like this aren’t great either, but society judges men like this far more harshly.
No action on his part. No real direction or ambition. Just that putting himself in a story is enough to be carried to a happy ending without earning a thing.
So yeah, in general he may be average, but he makes himself far less so.
this
I think its easy to pick on him because he makes lots of mistakes, can be a bit thick in the skull, and is uncomfortable around the opposite sex.
You know, like a normal human. Like the rest of us.
Quoting Doctor Who wont help you now Danny ol’ boy.
He ain’t no Tennant…that’s for sure!
Even bowties won’t make Danny cool.
To say nothing of wearing multi-colored clothing.
The 6th Doctor’s clothes are the opposite of cool.
But the 4th Doctor’s Multi-Colored Scarf is indeed cool!
Danny wouldn’t be worthy of it!
Hell, not even a fez would do that. =/
Woah, woah, woah!….woah…. I wouldn’t go that far. Fez are pretty cool.
But Faz isn’t.
Yeah, have to agree on that. Faz is an asshole and a half.
There is no way he could make celery look fashionable!
Few people can.
I don’t think it counts as quoting DW unless he follows it up with “I’m so so sorry.”
Book ’em, Danno.
…Sorry, all the other comments up til now were “Something something Danny”, and I just wanted to fit in.
Just walk away Amber. There are other straight guys who won’t smack you around in the sea.
It took me a minute to figure out that you didn’t mean someone who’d literally take her to the sea to smack her around.
Danny puts amber in a car and makes the 100 hour drive to the nearest ocean to slap her around.
Sometimes you just got to smack a bongo in the sea.
If King Triton had understood that we could have skipped like half of The Little Mermaid.
With a fish.
I thought it was some kind of innuendo…
…Amber’s at fault here though. Pretty much ninety percent.
Yeah, not so much. She offered to help him out of an awkward situation with his parents, and he accepted this. Then he proceeded to do everything possible in his power to undermine the help she was giving, just short of blowing it, and then after it was all over, he took a big ol’ poop on her as a token of his thanks.
Danny is brimming over with the inevitable malice born from willful ignorance and a complete absence of self-examination. Until he gives up the idea that bad things just happen to him and takes responsibility for the circumstances he finds himself in, he’s going to continue to be the most obvious target for scorn in this strip.
Never mind that she crossed the awkward line into “friend that is openly crushing on you that you aren’t interested in” (thus making the situation even more awkward) while she knew he would feel like this would be cheating on the girl he was dating at the time. A misunderstanding that she could have cleared up at any time (she even had the mask on her!) but chose not to.
Danny made some big missteps with that situation, but at least 70% of the blame is on Amber, since she had all the facts and tried to pressure him into feeling the same way about her that she felt about him without opening up about herself and the true nature of their relationship. The fault’s mostly on her. While whiny and passive-aggressive about it, Danny did the right thing by telling her they couldn’t hang out any more after what she did.
Well, keep in mind, while she did invade the situation, she was near a panic attack and was escaping her abusive father. So while she could have made a better decision, we can accept that she was not fully cognicent of everything her action might result in.
Also, Danny didn’t say he didn’t want to hang out with her because of her actions. He said it was because of his feelings for her and for Amazi-Girl. He laid a lot on her very quickly, and chose a girl whose name he doesn’t even know over a girl who had proven to be a good friend to him, even if she did have some issues.
I wouldn’t say the fault is MOSTLY on Danny or MOSTLY on Amber. I think it’s a mix of their own decisions, and of other factors around them.
Almost as if some foul god was twisting the machinations of fate to warp every innocuous misstep or failure of comprehension into its most cataclysmic, yet dramatic, end.
You. I like you.
Sorry that sounded way less creepy in real life. I meant that i like your response the best out of every single comment I’ve seen about that situation.
He IS interested in her though. He just rejected her because she reminds him of Dorothy too much.
He rejected her because he’s technically in a relationship already.
No. He rejected her in order to pursue a relationship with her in a costume. Amber didn’t approach Danny as Amazi-Girl until the evening after he rejected her as Amber.
Or if you mean the friend-dumping at the bridge, that was because, as he confessed in Galasso’s, she’s a real person and that scares him, so rather than dealing with maybe actually having real feelings about someone real he’s going to kick her out of his life and run back to his safe but exciting fantasy to hide.
“She offered to help him out of an awkward situation with his parents”
I disagree completely. She showed up and CAUSED an awkward situation, and she has never apologized or attempted to explain.
He had created a situation where he’d told his parents he had a girlfriend but they can’t meet her or know anything about her. Amber provided a physical presence for his story. It’s not her fault he went so far with it or didn’t bother to ask why she’d done it.
The first thing he did when she walked up and said “Hey lover” was drag her aside and demand to know what was going on and saying that he was uncomfortable with it. Amber then talked him into it over his continuous objects. These are verifiable facts; this comic does in fact have an archive.
When people say that any of that situation was Danny’s idea, it is a perfect example of how people will lie to themselves and distort their own memories to support an existing belief. Annoying, but fascinating in its own way.
Amber was not the one that made Danny make a public confession of love for her and then friend-dump her because he couldn’t deal with his own feelings.
It could’ve been just a wacky sitcom hijink. Amber gets to evade Blaine, Danny gets a friend to pose as his Canadian girlfriend so he’s not embarrassed in front of the other Wilcoxen, Danny tells Amazi-Girl (who of course already knows) about it afterwards like the honest and loyal guy he likes to think he is, everyone has a good laugh, roll credits. But no, Danny had to Dan it all up.
While it is technically accurate to say she has NEVER apologized or attempted to explain, it has only been a day. If she didn’t have this huge block about letting anybody know her dad exists, I would expect an apology or explanation within a week.
Since she does have issues about opening up…
…you may well be right.
Yeah, start a relationship with one of them as Amazigirl instead of as Amber and see how it works out for ya…
We’ve seen that. It ends up with growing affection and sloppy makeouts despite an unhelpful costume.
Though I admit we haven’t tried the situation with Danny being Amazigirl…
Ya Dan’d it! Big Time!!!
I wonder if saying sorry is like a reflex for Danny
His other reflexes include shooting blood from his eyes and being a bongo
His other reflexes include shooting blood from his eyes and making us hate him
Oh sry my computer messed up there
Maybe he’s Canadian, like Ruth?
Hey! Don’t try to dump Danny on us Canadians!
Agreed! Canada don’t want that!!!!
He doesn’t say “Hi”. He says “I’m Sorry”. And it’s always correct in-context.
No, that is just Canadians.
Realllly hope I don’t have that Danny Gravatar…. Would be really awkward.
Relevant news: Indecisiveness strikes again…..
Yaaaaay Danny Gravatars, inadvertently apologizing for everything we say.
HAAAAA, you got the Danny Gravatar! XD
Could be worse. You could have the queen of bitter disdain here.
But the bitter queen of disdain is a great gravitar for fake internet arguments!
A wild Danny appears!
Danny uses apology!
It’s not very effective …
But look at those eyes!
Danny is danning it up
Like usual!
Maybe losing the question mark in his tone would help him somewhat.
It seems to me/Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word…
Let’s say I have a REALLY bad memory (and may have been missing out on this strip for a while). How far back do I have to go to get why Amber is mad at Danny boy here?
Less than a month I believe.
Hint: use tags. http://www.dumingofage.com/tag/danny+amber
Except I can’t spell, so http://www.dumbingofage.com/tag/danny+amber
Whoah. I didn’t know you could combine tags. That would’ve made some things a lot easier.
I found out from someone else in the comments section, but I thought it was you…
Maybe you shouldn’t end your statements like they’re questions?
You’re not suggesting that Danny is Australian are you?
I wasn’t aware that I was?
Lol, can’t tell if serious question, or joking continuation of reference.
Apparently we Aussies do have a bad habit of ending sentences with a question or at least sounding like one, did you know that?
I get the same thing said to me all the time, maybe I was aussie in a past life.
All of the above?
Are you sure you even know what you are saying?
I’m not sure?
Also, who is the GotD (Gravatar of the Day)?
Batman, apparently.
Yomiko Readman.
That’s Yomiko Readman? When did she start wearing her shirts unbuttoned to the navel?
John: Since the existance of fanart ^_^ of cause!
Presumably during her downtime in hiding with Nancy the Younger…
I dunno; I think around these parts sexy The Paper fanart ought to leave her in the sweater-vest.
Yeah I have a hard time picturing her wearing any top that isn’t a sweatervests even during seduction. Not sure whether her or Nenene gave the other the fetish, or if they just entered the relationship with a mutual kink, but hey.
You sure are, Danny. You sure are.
Accept it for the emptiness that it is, Amber. ACCEPT IT FOR THE TROOOOOOOOOTH!
So who is Amazi-Girl going to play Mario Cart with now?
She always has herself… and the 7 CPUs.
But someone should warn her that Luigi cheats…
But MC is best enjoyed with others.
Can’t lie. My friends and I love Mario Kart. We piss each other off so easily. The best part is that I’m decent at the game, but 4 of my friends are pros.
…I really don’t like Danny. I’m trying to, but I mostly just want to pass on him. Am I supposed to dislike him?
Compared to all the vibrant, emotional, deep characters we have in the Dumbiverse, Danny’s just fairly blase, and doesn’t have anything compelling about him. Not yet anyway. Maybe further story arcs will expound. But for now, he’s just a regular old white, slightly introverted college kid.
He comes across as very immature and annoying. That kid in college who still seemed very young and childish, you know? It just annoys me, despite him being just a character.
We were doing so good, for so long, but NO. Willis just HAD to go and bring back the feels.
I have a bad feeling that this is just the tip of the iceberg, the first pebble in a veritable feelvalanche.
hmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Oh fuck he’s got the Mother of All Drama Bombs waiting in the wings.
Oh fuck this college is gonna burn.
BURN BABY, BURN!!!
Disco Inferno!!!
Ruth finds a bottle of booze in Billie’s dorm. This causes a psychotic break in which she turns it into a molotov cocktail and proceeds to light Billie’s room on fire only for the spire to spread uncontrollably burning and maiming 1/3rd of the cast and killing at least one if not two of them. /asspulling.
He did say a while back he was gonna break all our hearts sometime in February.
I believe him.
well I now know what month to dread! D:
But we also get Ruth in February!
Panel 4 should be attached to all future Danny appearances. And possibly retroactively attached to all previous Danny appearances.
Wow, so much Danny hate. Honestly the guy thought he was doing what was right. Even though he is a thick-skulled idiot, the one instance that people are REALLY hating on him for is simply him being loyal to the one he desires. Is that really such a bad thing?
*Hides in corner in preparation of rotten vegetable bombardment*
The road to Danny’s personal hell is paved with good intentions and cemented with cluelessness.
Danny stop quoting BP spokesmen
Only a twerp, a dweeb, and an asshat says I’m sorry with a question. Danny you are all three rolled into one megajerk.
I mean, I can’t blame the guy. He did nothing wrong here, other than being a little harsh with her (which was completely understandable) It’s mainly Amber’s own issues, and resulting silence, that’s leading to this shit. And even after that, Danny still tries to be the bigger man, and step up and fix what happened. Even though Amber should’ve really been the one trying to mend fences, although I can’t be too mad at her for what she did/is doing, she’s got pretty deep issues.
Amber should go mess with SarahxJacob before coming back to Danny. Things always get worse before they get better right?
All Danny hate aside, he’s completely in the right here, assuming the standard suspension-of-disbelief on recognizing heroes applies in the dumbiverse (which it appears to do) He did nothing wrong in this situation. And what sucks is, Amber isn’t entirely wrong here. She did what she did for a pretty damn good reason, and is holding herself back from explaining that to him which, again, isn’t wrong in and of itself. But it has led to quite a cluster fuck :\
He is certainly not completely in the right, but he is also not completely in the wrong? He handled the situation very badly (aka danned it up) and definitely should apologize to Amber.
How did Danny handle this situation wrongly? Yes, he doesn’t know amazi girl’s secret, but they’re obv bonding despite that, so I don’t think he did anything wrong here. And his way of going about this is completely in his character.
He from his own working knowledge has nothing to be sorry for. In this instance. He’s still, whiny, annoying, morally pushy, self-obsessed, and otherwise Danny, but in this situation, he actually was in the right. IF, IF, he didn’t realize Amber and Amazi-girl are the same person. If he did know and is simply not acting with that knowledge in mind, he is an asshole. If he doesn’t, then he is merely stupid in addition to being, whiny, annoying, etc, etc.
Let’s be real. To address those ifs…I like the guy, but Danny is just not smart enough to pull off that level of cunning
I fail to see how he is any of those things. Even if he knows she’s Amazagirl, They have both agreed so operate as if she isn’t, down to her hiding it from him.
That she was emotionally hurting does not absolve her of responsibility for her actions. Amber used him.
Are there any ships for Amber to board now?
I’m pretty sure Joe charges no entry fee on his cruise liner.
Even better, Joe is perfectly willing to ‘tip’ the hotter entries.
*snort* Yeah, I’m sure Amber would have Nooooo Problem making Danny wait in the hall until the sock came off the door. *snicker*
Aaaand just like that, you wrote the plot for every cuckold/netorare hentai story ever.
Pretty sure it is neither if you just think you are in a relationship.
I mean, yeah, they WERE, but they aren’t now.
Idunno to put it simply Danny just irks me
Oh Danny, that shouldn’t have had a question mark at the end.
Everyone gets mad at Danny for trying to end it with amber when he was clearly in the right and demands he apologise to amber. Danny apologises and everyone is thrown into an uproar, Willis should just stop trying to please the fanbase because the fanbase is filled with Mike’s.
I heard that over your mom trying to give me a nickle.
Mike is not a hypocrite. Mike just knows every reason you have to feel bad.
You think Willis is trying to please us? It’s his comic, he writes it how he wants and we have to accept it.
If anything he tries to make us feel horrible.
In our defense. It seemed to be kind of a half-assed apology.
Yeah, he’s just trying to see if this technique will work, instead of genuinely taking back what he said. I don’t remotely get the impression that he means it, and it doesn’t seem Amber does, either.
” I don’t remotely get the impression that he means it”
Well, yeah. He didn’t do anything wrong, so he doesn’t regret his actions. He’s unhappy that Amber’s in pain, and is casting around for something to ameliorate that.
That’s not any better. Now it’s just kinda like he’s talkin’ down to her, y’know?
No?
Bro…there’s gonna be a thousand and one times that you, as the guy, will think you’re right in an argument with your girlfriend. But you decide to apologize anyway because u value what you have, and want to fix it, and don’t mind putting aside your pride.
Yuhno, it hindsight I should’ve just left out that last sentence , I only added it in a soft attempt to add humour to pointing out the fan base is filled with hypocrites. So I guess… I’m sorry?
I see what you did there.
oh ho ho
Oh that took me a second you clever person you.
He wrote this strip like two months before we saw their “break up.”
Am I the only one who actually feels bad for Danny? What the fuck did he do to deserve all this hate? I just don’t get it.
I mean not saying he really did anything to get my sympathy, but SOMEONE needs to balance everyone else back out because I mean… damn!
People like characters that grow and change from their experiences.
Danny only grows more and more pissy as these things just keep happening to him that he’s not in any way responsible for, not one little bit.
Danny isn’t an anti-hero. He’s an un-hero.
’cause he’s never admitted that it was his own feelings that led to drama, right? And he definitely goes around being angry at people for stuff that he did, like the whole “getting his room/best friend in the news for a sex video”. He was involved in the decision behind that, yeah.
I don’t know about other people.
But I see a lot of similarity between Danny’s actions in this storyline and my own actions from my youth, and it makes me angry because I can’t believe he’s that stupid.
And that I was that stupid.
Danny racked up a lot of hate debt from Roomies!
^ This. He really was a terrible guy there. Dumbiverse Danny, to the contrary, is just a regular kid. Kinda delusional and stupid, but good hearted. I just really think he should listen to Joe more.
Everyone from roomies! is an asshole.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but when I re-read DoA from his pov, I found I didn’t like how tactless, self-centered, and self-pitying he was, not to mention his tendency to be self-righteous even when he’s the one being a jerk. That he was willing to sell out his new girlfriend for his old one (or rather: that he was doing so in order to a) claim some false moral high ground and b) ruin her new relationship) and then turns around and tells Amber they can’t be friends anymore for said new girlfriend doesn’t really instill a lot of faith in him for me. If you add that he’s wishy-washy, unwilling to make or allow for change, and tends not to take other people’s dreams seriously, and I just . . . can’t really feel all that sorry for him.
And now, to argue with myself in a way, the above is not to say he does not have his occasional moments! He just has a tendency to Danny it up thereafter.
Also, comic link to some of what I was referencing above: In which Danny tells Dorothy she can have shoes for Walky OR get an interview about Amazi-Girl. And hey, it’s entirely possible that I’m misreading things wrt that being a betrayal and Amber would totally be pleased her new boyfriend is willing to give away information about her that will help Dorothy figure out her secret identity, but . . . I’m guessing not.
Danny was absolutely being an asshat there, but you know what? If everyone else can be forgiven their douchbaggery because of their emotional state at the time, why can’t he?
The love of his life, who had broken his heart a week prior, showed up at his place at the buttcrack of dawn to steal from him for her new boy toy. I wouldn’t have been in any mood to be civil, either. In fact, I’d have been a lot more cursy about it.
Possibly more over the early hour than anything else. I hate mornings.
One, everyone else isn’t necessarily forgiven for their emotional state at the time – I can think of several comic events where I don’t think being upset mitigated people being jerks. I like and enjoy Ruth, for instance, but a lot of her early behavior is unacceptable. It really depends situation to situation.
Two, Danny was already up and contemplating bed-skirts, so it’s not like his judgment was impaired by sleepiness. (Aside: the bed-skirts thing was a plus in his favor in my books.)
Three, I’d have understood if he was rude, short with her, or even just stared at her in disbelief while stating something like, “This is beyond the pale. No, you can’t borrow my shoes for your new boyfriend. Get the fuck out of my room and don’t come back.” That’s not the same thing at all, though, as potentially betraying his new girlfriend just so he can play head games with his ex.
And as I said! Maybe other people view that event differently! It’s okay to hold differing views on the story and characters. I’m just giving examples of what I, personally, find irksome.
—
Also, because this is already a discussion about Danny and what we do and don’t like, I am going to take this space to say that I think I’d have enjoyed him a lot more if he spent more time around Sarah. It felt like there was real character chemistry there – not romance or friendship (though they’d make interesting friends), but that they played well off of each other. Danny could play the straight man to Sarah’s humor, and Sarah being Sarah might inspire him to some form of self-reflection and change for the good.
(Also, their interactions yielded great! expressions.)
THANK YOU
Anyone in the same situation would be very unhappy and very unlikely to be civil. And people tend to forget that they would likely be very similiar to danny if in that situation. Maybe not completely but the emotions would still be there.
What do you think constitutes “selling out”? He offered to be interviewed for the newspaper. I don’t even think he and Amazigirl were dating at that point, but even if they were, agreeing to an interview is not the same thing as giving away sensitive information. What matters would be what would be said at the interview. For all we know, he was just going to talk about how she saved him from bullies, was all super kung fu, and wore a yellow and blue costume with a cape.
If you click the comic right before the one I linked, you’ll find that he brings up Amazi-Girl in the context of “Yes, I have a girlfriend, too, but no, you’re wrong, it’s not Amber.” (Ah, even more enjoyable and painful to read in retrospect.)
Wrt the interview, I guess we will never know what info he would and wouldn’t have included, but from what he divulged as a precursor – that she didn’t just save him the once, that they hang out all the time, etc. – I felt like he was entirely too willing to give information to a girl Amber-as-Amazi-Girl ran from.
Fortunately for Amber, Dorothy turned down the interview opportunity and did not proceed to stake out Danny’s hang-outs or stalk him in her spare time to make another stab at that Amazi-Girl article. Even so, it doesn’t change that Danny was offering that interview in the context of being Amazi-Girl’s boyfriend, not a by-stander or rescue victim, and that first feels very different to me than the latter two.
Pfft, I need to get more sleep or caffeine to compensate. I only just noticed that I phrased part of that first sentence all wrong and implied either that Walky is a girl or that Dorothy also picked up Joyce somewhere in the bargain. Belay that “girlfriend” and replace with “new significant other.”
Considering that a change in outfit renders her completely unrecognisable to Danny, it’s possible that he honestly doesn’t know who Amber is.
It’s too late to ‘pologize. It’s to laaaaaaaaaaaate
No. No question mark. You damned idiot. YOU DON’T USE A QUESTION MARK IF YOU’RE REALLY SORRY.
YOU’RE NOT SORRY.
Argh.
And why should he be? Amber was being manipulative and trying to make him act like her boyfriend. If he doesn’t know that she’s Amazi-Girl (and at this point we can reasonably assume he doesn’t) then he ABSOLUTELY did the right thing. But since he does have feelings for Amber, he’s feeling guilty about it for stupid reasons while still understanding that he did the right thing, so he’s confused, and so his apology comes with a question mark attached.
He didn’t have to go along with the manipulation, though. Let alone bust out a heartfelt speech about why she made such a great “girlfriend.”
You’re right, if he’d just said “No, you’re not my girlfriend” to his parents, people wouldn’t TOTALLY be hating on him for embarrassing her when she was emotionally vulnerable! Nope. Not at all.
He meant it though. And that was the problem. He felt that because he meant every word he would be cheating on amazi-girl.
He was a bit harsh yeah, but so is anyone when there emotions run wild.
Come on Danny. You know as well as I do, “No takesies Backsies!”
Are you sure you’re sorry? Doesn’t seem like it if it’s a question
Oh just put him out of his own misery. Damn fool.
…god fucking DAMMIT, DANNY NO MORE HALF MEASURES
YES THIS THIS RIGHT HERE AUGH
DANNY
DANNY
STOP IT
AMBER
YOU ALSO STOP IT
JUST
BE HONEST WITH EACH OTHER YOU GUYS LIKE ACTUALLY HONEST
yessssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
COME ON GUYS JUST STOPPET
I wonder if Amber and Riley will end up sharing a street pass tag.
I wonder if Amazi-Girl and Riley will end up sharing a street pass tag.
(Or does Amber delete info from the thing every time she switches persona?)
…and only after reading all the comments do I finally check out the alt-text. I guess that answers my question. Looks like I was right, though.
*gets popcorn and a soda* This is gonna be gooooooood.
indeed.
As far as I can recall, Danny’s not connected to anyone who currently drinks. So it’ll be a bit before there’s any character growth. Though that assumes that his growth will be similar to ‘Roomies’ Danny. If not, then we might be seeing some shortly.
He rooms with someone who drinks, actually. But given how that went last time, I’d prefer a different method of growth.
” But given how that went last time, I’d prefer a different method of growth.”
Yes, please. I cannot take [spoilers] happening again.
He’s already said the spoiler in question’s safe this time around. I seem to recall it being something like “I already killed off x and y, I don’t want to do it again.” And then saying he’s not really interested in killing people he already killed in the old universe unless they’re really boring.
(Saunters in wearing sunglasses and a tie around his head)
It’s you, Danny! You’re my favourite! You are the best, you know why? Cause you’re so thick! You’re mister thick thickity thick face from thicktown thickannia. And so is your Dad!
Damnit, I am going to have to take back his name privileges just so he can stop giving the other Dannys a bad name!!!!
Future Danny:
Man why is Amazi-Girl suddenly mad at me…did I do something wrong?
Ok , trying to make let’s see where it goes
Also come one everybody, give him one more chance and hear him out
Maybe he should come two.
Danny you can not apologize enough. You are the fail.
But I mean that on the nicest way possible. Honest.
I bet Amazi-girl has all the puzzle pieces in streetpass
What will you say?
A: “I can’t talk now.”
B: “I forgive you.”
C: “Go fuck yourself, you tactless douchebag!”
ccccccccccccccccc
D: *Do a little dance*.
C: Make a little love
E: Get down tonight
THAT’S NOT WHAT C MEANS, THERE ARE RULES DAMMIT!!
I’m pretty sure it isn’t Amber playing a Dating Sim right now.
Danny, on the other hand, just consulted a multiple choice list of responses, puzzled over them long enough that he almost lost the chance to make any response, took a desperate stab at the one he hoped would keep himself on the Amazi-Girl path w/o writing his friend Amber out of his personal story (even though they can’t hang out until his current drama with her resolves, not sure if he’s thought that part through, yet, but I digress), and THEN let his uncertainty overwhelm his reading of his chosen line, engulfing it in a question instead of the declaration.
Gottawonder if that is the entire essence to Danny…Sorry with a question mark.
Gottawonder how long he’s going to wait before he realizes he’s never going to see Amazi-Girl again?
Gottawonder-now that I think about it, IS he ever going to see Amazi-Girl again?
Does Danny even know why he is apologizing to Amber? I think he needs to take Amber aside and explain to her exactly what he is apologizing for. He may find that he is entirely off-base (well, we know that he is since Amber = Amazi-Girl), and it gives Amber a perfect opening to take Danny into her confidence.
Exactly.
She owes it to him to at least hear why he’s apologizing. From there hopefully we will not see a friendship fail.
I can’t tell how I feel about this comic.
I mean, on the one hand, if you’re going to cut someone out of your life, don’t jerk them around with half-hearted not-quite apologies as though you’d never said you couldn’t be friends anymore. If you don’t want them to be unhappy with you or not talk to you in respect of your decision to never speak again – then don’t tell them you want to cut them out of your life. What is Danny trying to achieve here?
The whole situation is due to them both making bad decisions, but if Danny’s looking for reconciliation, this isn’t the greatest way to go about it. How is Amber supposed to react to this but to keep on walking?
(Or, y’know, sending Danny a message with her DS (is that a thing you can do?) and having an open and clear conversation about a) her role as Amazi-Girl and b) everything that happened during Family Weekend, but c’mon. This is Dumbing of Age, not Age of Honest Talks and Good Decisions.)
Well I think he only said that because he was angry and he felt like he was cheating on a girl he really cared for. And it made him feel like shit, so I’m guessing he put some of that into making amber feel a little shit.
He certainly could have done it better but people seem to forget that you say things when you’re angry without really thinking. Your emotions not your brain is making you think this is the best way to handle the situation. And most everyone does it. When our emotions get the better of us we say things we don’t truly mean or can’t take back. Or they have a small truth to them, but we blow it out of proportion because “fuck I’m angry”.
I’m sure he understands what he said was a bit drastic, but sometimes your emotions just get the better of you.
I guess my biggest reason for feeling “?????” over this comic is that I can’t tell, due to his apology having a question mark and only being delivered after they’d passed each other, whether he genuinely wants to talk it out and be friends again or if he just wants to make himself feel better about having upset someone who was once a friend. (I could understand even the latter considering his age and that he doesn’t seem to deal well with conflict.)
I definitely agree that sometimes people say things they don’t mean, even to the point of “I never want to see you again,” when they’re angry and hurt and afraid (and I personally think Danny was at least a little afraid in addition to being angry when he said all of that). I just can’t tell if Danny is rethinking things or . . . what, exactly.
His thought process and motivation here is a mystery to me. I guess I am going to have to wait and see what tomorrow’s comic will hold.
I think the question mark is he is saying it but he isn’t completely sorry.
I mean he feels what he said was mostly right. And I agree, Amber did use him, but if he truly didn’t care for her at all any more he wouldn’t have said anything. But he saw she was hurting and felt he should at least try to make it better.
I think the “?” means “you made me feel like i was cheating on someone i really cared for and that isn’t okay, but I don’t want you to feel so hurt for what i said.”
Ya know… reading these comments I have to wonder how many people have bothered to read the title of the current chapter.
We don’t know for sure that it applies to these two.
Danny isn’t wrong here. If anything, Danny is acknowledging that someone he was friends with is hurting and while clumsy about it, is fishing around to see if he can stop the hurt or offer a little sympathy.
I get that Amber’s childhood was horrific and that the girls has issues, but a bad childhood doesn’t make her any less wrong. She shoehorned herself into Danny’s time with his parents, she told the lie about them dating, she put emotional pressure on him to try to force him into a relationship with her despite knowing that he is in another relationship that he takes seriously (and no it doesn’t matter the we know they are the same person – he doesn’t. He has to work with the information he has.) She could have fixed this with the truth at any time, and she chose not to.
I also don’t understand how every other character gets cut slack because of their crappy parents, except Danny. Everything we’ve seen so far shows that his parents don’t place any value on him at all. If he isn’t dating someone they approve of, attached to someone they make clear is superior to him, he is a waste of their time and a disappointment. His obliviousness is probably a learned skill to protect himself from that.
True, and I agree, Danny was just trying his best to be faithful to amazi-girl even if he didn’t know the girl he was sitting with WAS Amazi-girl, amber came in and make things really difficult for the poor man.
BUT I do also recall that she was at the time running from her father, and while I agree a bad childhood does not excuse a person from doing bad things at the time she needed a way out, and Danny was the best way and the person she seemed the most comfortable with.
Given the circumstances I don’t blame either of them.
I was wondering how long before someone brought Amber’s father (Blaine?) into it. She had just punched him; he was chasing her through the dorm; she needed to be somewhere, in public, where Blaine couldn’t continue to act like an asshole without doing it in front of witnesses (I believe the term is ‘hiding in plain sight’); and Danny and his parents were the first people she came across. If she had come across Asma and her friends heading over to Galasso’s for pizza instead of the Wilcoxes, she’d have tagged along with them instead. Any port in a storm, dont’cha know?
“and no it doesn’t matter the we know they are the same person – he doesn’t. He has to work with the information he has.”
In fairness, she -does- know, and if we’re talking about her emotional turmoil, that’s a fair point. He doesn’t know, we can’t blame him, but she -does-, and that excuses her behavior. Sure, she could be honest about her secret identity, but there are a few snags to that plan. 1) He told Amazigirl he didn’t want to -know- her secret ID. 2) It is not an illegitimate concern for her that he might change the way he feels about both of them if he finds out they’re the same person. He might feel like he’s been played a fool by both women that he cares for, which could lead to feelings of betrayal and embarassment. and 3) She’s a COSTUMED VIGILANTE. That’s kinda illegal, and opening up to anybody about her identity could have consequences.
“In fairness, she -does- know, and if we’re talking about her emotional turmoil, that’s a fair point. He doesn’t know, we can’t blame him, but she -does-, and that excuses her behavior.”
I wasn’t talking about her emotional turmoil though. I was talking about how very few people seem to want to acknowledge that she is in the wrong, and in a much greater degree than he is.
Also, I believe that while it explains her behavior, its doesn’t excuse it – IMO naturally. Believe me, I know from abusive parenting and self esteem issues and wanting to hide your problems from the world. Just because you did something to protect yourself – and in this case getting the hell away from her father was definitely protecting herself, it doesn’t mean you’ve done the right thing. She holds all the cards here. She has all the information. And if telling the truth means she has to take the consequences of her actions, that’s kind of how the world works.
My point is that the onus is on her to fix this, and so many people blaming Danny for Amber’s choices – no matter why she made them – just baffles me. Then again, I only read DOA. Maybe there is residual hate from other ‘verses that I’m just not getting.
I totally blame him for not knowing. He has all the information we have except actually seeing Amber put the mask on, plus more that we have no way of having from this side of the fourth wall, and, stupid running gag aside, if there’s anyone in the audience who honestly couldn’t tell that Amazi-Girl was Amber before the strip where we saw her put the mask on, I’ll go out and buy a hat so I can eat it.
Best case scenario here, the one that all the Danny apologists keep pushing, is that Danny is honestly oblivious. Which makes him not only ludicrously stupid, but also translates to “not paying enough attention to the girl he alleges to care about, has spent hours hanging out with in both guises, has made out with, to be able to recognize her when she changes clothes”.
Alternately, he does subconsciously recognize her, but just isn’t letting himself consciously think about it. Which means that he’s created this whole mess just because he values his Lois Lane fantasy more than he does Amber/Amazi-Girl herself. (This is my preferred scenario.)
Or he does consciously recognize her, and is just pretending he doesn’t. Which makes him just a complete fucking asshole.
And for all the people going, “Oh, Amber should just tell him!”: Well, maybe from a relationship perspective she should. But Amazi-Girl is, at best, dancing right along the edge of legality. This is why she tries to get the bad guys to throw the first punch, because then she can claim self-defense. If she throws the first punch, that’s assault and battery, and she’s a violent criminal. (She may be anyway; I’m not sure what Indiana’s laws on vigilantism are like.) If the wrong people find out who Amazi-Girl is, she could be in very serious legal trouble, the cops and jail time kind. Does telling this guy that she’s known for three weeks, that doesn’t seem to be able to lie to save his life, is completely oblivious about everything, and who just acted like a complete jerkwad to her after claiming to care about her, the secret that could get her into that trouble still seem like such a great idea?
If she tries to get them to throw the first punch, that already means she has no claim to self defense. It’s going there with the intention to get into a fight, and then getting into a fight.
She might be in for a very bad surprise.
Regardless of the desire to start a fight, the responsibility for escalating things falls on the person that throws the first punch. It doesn’t matter how badly person A may want person B to start a fight beforehand, if Person B throws the first punch, person B started the fight, and person A is (legally) blameless for the altercation. There is no law on the books for “goading with intent to get assaulted”.
Actually, there is. It’s not illegal to start a fight verbal, but it *IS* illegal to defend yourself if you start the fight that way. If you insult someone and provoke them to the point where they punch you, they’re going to jail, but if you punch them back in ‘self defense’, so are you. Sometimes, laws are written to plug obvious exploits ahead of time. At least, in some jurisdictions and in some cases!
This.
Self-defense has an actual legal definition. If you could have easily avoided the fight – for example by not causing it, or by running away instead – then you have no claim to self-defense.
The police hear “but it was a self-defense” all the time, and they will not believe it, because it’s almost always a delusion or an outright lie.
People see what they want to see. It’s the reason Superman can get away with only using glasses. It’s also the classic suspension of disbelief of comic books. In addition, while from our side of the wall, it’s obvious, the same may not be true for our beloved characters. Amazi-girl is Amber’s height (not particularly tall or short), white, with brown, middle length hair. That’s about as average as they come. There’s no way, in a real world scenario (which it would be, for them) you could pin Danny not knowing that they’re one and the same on him.
P.S As a further example, celebrities have sometimes dressed up as normal people and gone to their own events, and it takes much longer than you think for people to recognize them.
Forget all this Danny hate. Sure he can be a prick at times but hey none of these characters are saints, even the Christian ones and Danny hasn’t done anything worse than say….oh a girl who goes all “you’re whiter than me!” crybaby on her brother (racial hatred is 20 times worse).
How about this: She turns and runs into his arms and sobs. Then forgives him and tells him about her ugly and screw up past, opens up and bears her soul to him and then…if he still rejects her, okay he’s a prick. If not I think she also owes him another little confession at an appropriate time when he will accept the truth of it (if she told him now he’d just think she was screwing with him).
“oh a girl who goes all “you’re whiter than me!” crybaby on her brother”
Being frustrated that your sibling has always gotten it better than you with your parents due to circumstances outside your control and that said sibling has always remained not only oblivious to this, but has actively blamed your poor relationship with your parents on you is completely different than . . . whatever it is you’re trying to frame this as.
Except we still have no proof that it’s not just a childhood resentment that has no actual backing in reality. Kids do that sort of thing all the time, they pick what they’re insecure about (in this case making Sal the racist one who feels not ‘good enough’ because she’s not ‘white enough’) and say that’s why their parents always hated them and preffered their other sibling. Anyone who has never said ‘you were always mom’s/dad’s favorite’ is an only child.
And if you’re lucky you can make a career out of it.
“Mom always liked you best!”
Comments from the author imply that there is an actual thing there. And at the very least we have seen that Sal’s mom has absolutely no problem COMPLETELY IGNORING HER after a protracted absence.
We haven’t seen enough to know if they always ignored her, or if they only started ignoring her after her robbery.
Regardless of whether you buy Sal’s reason (and I do), she explicitly tells Walky it started before the robberies, hence her major frustration with him constantly bringing that up.
I approve of your avatar, but I kinda wanna hit you in the arm right now. What Sal has towards Walky isn’t “racial hatred”. She resents the fact that their parents play favorites with him. And they do, pretty obviously. (In the case of their mom, downright heartlessly.) Racial bias is just one of her suspicions of why.
Be that as it may the concept behind it is narrow-minded and thoughless.
Uh, no. “Narrow-minded” doesn’t make sense here, and “thoughtless” is obviously wrong. Children usually grow up admiring and respecting their parents. Sal is fucking DESPERATE for their love and approval. For her to love them THAT MUCH, wonder why they don’t love her, and then still accuse them of something “taboo” is the result of many hours of thought.
“oh a girl who goes all “you’re whiter than me!” crybaby on her brother (racial hatred is 20 times worse). ”
You kind of have no idea what ‘racial hatred’ is if you think “You’re being treated better than me because you’re whiter” is it.
Amber, honey, to quote Jeanie from Disney’s “Aladdin”:
“Tell Him The….TRUTH!”
I dream of Genie ?
Genie from Aladdin. Robin Williams.
It shouldn’t be a question, but a sympathetic statement.
I honestly don’t quite undertand the hate danny gets.
What did he even do that was so horrible i cant even rememember by this point.
I think quite a bit of it is also carryover hate from the Walkyverse Danny. That is the reason a lot of the other characters get the pass as well. Danny pretty much is one of the bottom tier characters people like to hate.
It’s less a thing he’s done wrong and more an ongoing series of mild irritation at how he does everything in just the wrong way.
The ? Apology is perfect. Is he truly sorry? Is he kinda sorry and still kinda mad? Is he very sorry but unsure if saying so right now will make things better or worse? Is he sure that Amber will never want to talk to him again? Does he want to keep Amber as friend but can’t handle the mixed feels?
The? apology is just perfect for an 18 year old.
It’s too bad Lois Lane and Superman never had a 3ds
I must be old because it never occured to me that her 3DS or 2DS would give her away. Next I’ll be asking what Amber’s high-score in Wow is.
That’s like saying her iPhone would give her away. A 3DS isn’t all that rare, is it?
But if Danny has his with him he’ll have a street-pass with Amazi-Girl.
An iPhone might give her away if Danny called Amazi-Girl and Amber’s phone rang, in front of him. Preferably with caller id where he could see it clearly.
Heh! I just realized after reading the comic a second time that Danny did notice the 3DS and I then remembered that Amazi-Girl and Danny were playing on their 3DS’s at one point. Odd he would recognize that but not that Amber was Amazi-Girl. Little late for the apology mind but both of them are at fault here.
It’s Jem and Rio all over again.
Though this goes the other way around here.
I have actually never read anything but DoA and Shortpacked and I still can’t stand Danny, so it definitely isn’t carryover from anything else. He’s self-centered, self-righteous, and obnoxious. I hated him the second he tried to force Dorothy to choose between getting shoes and information because he was still upset with her for not being into him and having different priorities than he did, and from what I’ve seen from him in this comic, he still doesn’t think about anyone but himself with any kind of depth or interest. Yeah, I’m hoping this thing with Amber gets him to start doing that, and yeah, he thought he was doing the right thing, but he was harsh and cruel to Amber while doing it and until there’s a decent apology this guy can just rot.
I think a lot of people have been like him or thought like him before recognizing it and correcting it. He is a pretty solid character with believable flaws and I like that. I would be willing to bet he grows out of it eventually, recognizing and overcoming ingrained character flaws like that is sort of a huge part of college. and a major theme of DoA.
So true
Just because people are like him in real life, it does not mean I need to appreciate him as a character. I don’t like him. As soon as he shows signs of change, I’ll start appreciating him more? Until then I’m going to stay disliking the guy.
I think Danny has the right to put any silly conditions he like on the use of his shoes, since they’re his, so he’s automatically blameless.
And the different priorities Dorothy had were that she was too busy with schoolwork to have a boyfriend. She came for the shoes, of course, to borrow them for her new boyfriend that she’d dumped a week after dumping Danny because she was too busy to have a boyfriend. Clearly being unsympathetic to the ironclad unchangeability of that priority of hers shows that he is unable to think about anyone but himself.
In conclusion: I read your post and parse it as “Dorothy is infallible, so Danny is a bastard for not completely supporting her. Also Amber is infallible so he’s doubly-proven in his bastardry.”
“She was too busy with schoolwork to have a boyfriend” is absolutely not the reason she broke up with him, nor even why she told him she broke up with him.
First point: They’re his shoes. So if he was against lending her the shoes, he could have said ‘no, I don’t want to lend some random guy my shoes.’ He deliberately played a stupid game like a petty douche out of his resentment for her. I’m not saying he’s evil, I’m saying I don’t like him because he’s petty and self-centered. It wasn’t about them being his shoes, it was about the terms he put on her borrowing them, point blank.
Point two: I don’t even have to refute this apparently, because Willis showed up and did it for me.
Point three: You reading in the idea that I’m saying Amber is infallible (she isn’t) and Dorothy is infallible (my god she isn’t), is amazing, seeing that I literally said nothing about them aside from mentioning the fact that Dorothy broke up with Danny. I could very easily go into how Amber screwed up and Dorothy’s ideas about relationships, but I’m not talking about them, I’m talking about Danny. Be that as it may, yes, I think Amber messed up. I think the situation she messed up in gives me more sympathy to her- she was being chased by her abusive dad who was literally out to attack her. She put Danny in an awkward situation- that he agreed to, even though it was still unfair to him, but none of her words or actions towards Danny reached the same level of intentionally cruel that he used towards her.
Basically: Amber screws up because she omits information and hides her motivation because she can’t express herself openly out of fear. Danny screwed up because he is literally so self focused that he harms people out of callousness even if he’s trying to do the right thing, and also strikes me as petty. One is a character flaw I can forgive more than the other. You’re welcome to disagree, but I’m hardly going to accuse you of putting Danny on a pedestal because of it.
Well, let’s see you walk up to your ex and ask him to lend your current boyfriend some shoes. Especially after you dumped your ex (all reasons aside, getting dumped is going to leave your ex with all kinds of bad, torn up feelings) Regardless of reasonings, Dorothy dumped him, and then proceeded to hook up with another guy less than two weeks later. That shit hurts, no matter the spin or angle you put on it. And THEN brings said guy over, asking for help. That’s just not tactful, even within the bounds of general disbelief established by fiction.
Next, Danny wasn’t harsh, or cruel, but he WAS angry. And aggressive with it. You can be that way, without being cruel or harsh. And he just “laid down the law” so to speak. While Amber’s reasons are somewhat justifiable, and she has her own issues, Danny can’t really know that, because she doesn’t let him in. All he sees is a nice girl he likes, but doesn’t want to get too close to, for fear of cheating on his current girlfriend and/or hurting himself, or either of said ladies. So his reaction was quite justified.
This.^^^^
Beat up Sal for stealing your boyfriend, Amber!
Amber doesn’t need to reveal her heroic identity.
She doesn’t need to reveal that the person who was putting her in danger was her dad.
She should say something like,
“Amazi-Girl wasn’t there to save me, yesterday, Danny. You were. Thank you for letting me hang out with your family in a very public place. I’m sorry for acting weird. I was scared. Somebody was trying to harm me. No, I don’t want to talk about it. BUT, while I know we can’t hang out anymore, if you ever break up with Amazi-Girl… Um, after the things you said, you can’t just… Oh, never mind. Goodbye, Danny. Best of luck with Amazi-Girl.”
Yeah, ‘should’ being the operative term, here. It’s going to be much more entertaining if things stay awkward between them for a bit, while he overhears from other sources something of what went on.
The neat thing about him hearing about the Blaine thing after the fact is that he’ll join the readers in incorrectly blaming himself for failing to act on knowledge he didn’t have!
Well, of course. Danny is supposed to have psychic powers, obviously, and be omniscient.
And I’m sure if he’d told her in front of his parents that, no, she wasn’t his girlfriend, everyone would have been hunky-dory with that and not pissed at him.
[Speaking as if he was a real person, not a webcomic character.]
I don’t find Danny to be especially dislikeable. He is overtly blinkered enough that in real life I wouldn’t spend time with him unless he changed the way he approaches things. But so far as I can see, Danny is a pretty ordinary guy.
He’s also still very young. Chances are high that he’s going to change a hell of a lot over the next few years. He’s also in with a generally good crowd of people, which offers even better odds that he’ll develop for the better.
I think it’s easy to forget how much people can change, or how hard-earned life lessons can be. Sure he gets on people’s nerves now, but it’s not as if he has someone with experience or good insight to point him in the right direction when he messes up. He’s figuring this stuff out on his own. Most people learn from their mistakes. Give Dan time to learn from his.
Yeah, few characters have made really good decisions. Ethan’s been dating a woman even though he’s gay, Billie still hasn’t given up alcohol, Amber’s been beating up criminals for a hobby and being a total shut-in the rest of the time, and Walky and Dina are still learning social skills. When Joe, Roz and Dina seem to have made the least mistakes,
there is a problem
great page
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