“Won” in the sense of someone rationally pursuing a tactical objective, rather than a hate-filled rage man getting battered around by barely-adult girls.
She’s failing to prevent him running away. That’s a point in his column, since if she succeeded, a talk with the cops is the best case scenario for him. (Worst case is a continued beating THEN a talk with the cops, followed by a 8X6 cell and further ass-kickings by the other inmates.)
A talk with the cops is likely no matter what, he was told to leave and refused, verbally assaulted a student, and if his name is on the “approved family member” list he is tresspassing…
The trespass is unlikely to be followed up on by itself – too much effort for too little payoff. (Actually, on doing a little research, that might not be the case – apparently trespassing is (or can be) a felony in Indiana, so it might, in fact, be worth following up on.)
The assaults likely will be, but that depends on how Amber reacts now that Blaine is gone – which I can’t even begin to guess – and how everybody else responds to that. If, like Joyce after the near-rape, or, like me after I’ve had to call 911 on a family member (not a parent) and falls back onto ‘he’s gone, I just want to forget about this’, and everybody else decides to respect that (unlikely, since Ruth is there, a victim in her own right, and likely able to get enough of Blaine’s info to sic the cops on him without forcing Amber to talk), the cops might not even be called – and if they already were, he’s liable to be long-gone by the time they show up, and if Amber and Ruth decide not to push the matter, they’re likely to stick to ‘well, we can keep a car outside the building in case he comes back’, since we come back to ‘too much trouble with not enough payoff’ if the victims are reticent.
(Also, we come back to the possibility I raised yesterday that they might get unlucky with the cop, and draw one that doesn’t feel it’s worth giving his full effort to what he considers nothing but a ‘family squabble’.)
Well, at least Ruth bought Amber some time. And now she’s out of Blaine’s sight somewhere in her home territory. Unfortunately, her Spider-Car suit is still in her room.
I’m just going to point out that Faz is still in the dorm room, as he did not follow Blaine. So I don’t think his dad will run away from the school without him, or he’ll likely be in big shit, or will need to come back anyways. And the police/campus security could hold onto Faz until he is picked up, either because he is under age, or if he’s not, under the pretense of trespassing.
Fights – real fights – are frequently “draws” in the sense that nobody really wins. Both parties usually lose, in that they ended up all busted up.
Full disclosure: In my foolish youth, I was what you might consider a “rough character.” Never in my life started a fight, but I sure as hell ended a few, and was the comeuppance for a few bullies.
Graduated high school and took two jobs – bouncer in a biker wannabe bar on the weekends, repossessing cars during the week. Repo work got me into Chicago, Gary once, Detroit once, a few other places. Bad neighborhoods, you know? Got shot at three times.
Joined the Army figuring it’d be safer. Ended up in an infantry unit whose regimental history included North Africa, Anzio and Monte Cassino, and we were expected to live up to that. It gave me some mental discipline to go along with the big, tough farm-boy physical side.
I’ve been shot once, stuck once, had my nose broken three times, busted four ribs, and had a pool cue busted across the back of my head. (Yes, it hurt.) So I’ve seen a few scraps.
Nobody really wins. You might be the last guy standing, but you’ve still lost.
That doesn’t work. Normal can’t hit for super effective
This looks more like Submission: A fighting type attack. Amber’s Dad is CLEARLY a normal type, making the attack super effective. Submission also hurts the user
Yeah, especially since I’m pretty sure “Dark type” actually refers to fighting dirty or evil or somesuch (Hence why there’s no Light type- Fighting, with its emphasis on fairness and the like, is its equivalent opposite). I’d say it counts.
Blaine didn’t really look that much damaged from Ruth’s attack.
Seismic Toss has fixed damage based off your level. Highly effective against lower lv enemies [ruth is older than Billie], not so damaging against someone with higher lv. Circle Throw kind of fits too, since it is a throw and it ends the fight, but is has negative priority, so Blaine should have attacked first. Unless he also used a negative priority move, of course.
I’m going under the assumption that Ruth used some type of Judo throw. Judo is big on using your adversary’s momentum against them and she did look to be falling backwards while in a combat stance in the last panel of yesterday’s strip, then follows through with a quick lift and pull to slam that bastard.
And a belly to belly suplex starts with what’s basically a low-grip bear hug, which was definitely not the case here.
It could be a rear sacrifice throw (i.e. you fall onto your back as you toss your opponent), which are fairly diverse in judo — but since the hand positioning doesn’t match anything I know of and you can’t see what her feet are doing, it’s impossible to say. Most rear sacrifice throws use the feet to push the opponent over one’s body, which panel 2 only vaguely suggests. The only one I know of that doesn’t use the feet like that involves taking the opponent from their side, not the front. (Not that precise hand to hand combat accuracy is required, of course.) In either case, you can generally roll into the mount position from a sacrifice throw, but Ruth is probably a bit too drunk for that.
Actually looks more like a back body drop, I.e. the standard flipping a guy by bending over after they rebound off the ropes from an Irish whip then standing up that’s been a wrestling staple since the 60’s. Ruth just blew the spot by falling over:-P
Judging by the positioning of her arms, it’s actually a double-underhook belly to belly suplex. The ‘back’ in back body drop indicates that the opponent is dropped onto their back, which would have left Blaine in the same position as Ruth was, albeit on top of her (which she could have translated into a rear naked choke).
Being the fastest isn’t always the best superpower.you might warp reality into something sinister because you want to have one person back. You might cause Bruce Wayne to not be batman!
Sadly, Ruth and Billie never got to snu-snu…this to me was the result of her hitting Howard’s leg or hitting the floor hard both of which could cause a concussion(I know I have had a couple this way…)
For me, it’s (Japanese)curry & terriaki sauces – although it’s been a long time since I’ve had the curry, and it didn’t occur to me (untill just now, as I’m writing this) to combine them.
I mean, in middle school that’s obviously not cool. But if you have sex with a consenting adult, why’s it matter if they’re your student or not? Doesn’t seem that different from a boss screwing an employee.
That is entirely a matter of perspective. Anyone closer to my oldest daughter’s age than they are to mine is pretty much automatically a kid. Which is a probably why the bulk of internet porn seems to get creepier and creepier the older I get…
They’re in their physical prime and he’s way past it. So from the perspective of a fight, it definitely doesn’t make sense to say he should have won because they’re kids.
That action. “Run away.” I want you to be famous for that exact action. I want people to call you Daddy Runaway. I want children laughing outside your door, ’cause they’ve found the house of Daddy Runaway. And when people come to you and ask if trying to get into this dorm through the people you pretend to love … is in any way a good idea, I want you to tell them your name. Look, I’m angry, that’s new. I’m really not sure what’s going to happen now.
Now would be an excellent time for the Saruyamas to reveal their behind-the-door teleportation skills are genetic so they can stop him. Or for Falyn and Sierra to have run ahead, let Amber escape, and block the doors when he gets there.
Blaine bumped his head but good in the second panel. So although it looks like he’s going to escape, at least his violent assholery may have bought him a good, long headache.
OH MY GOSH, I just remembered! Billie is no where to be found. Meaning that she left to get the papers and now Blaine is headed right for her!
Billie will see that her lover has fallen in battle and will her ultimate attack on the despicable one.
Joe: I will teach you all I know about ladies, kid.
Faz: Between your skills and my persistance, we will bang every woman in the campus!!!!
*they both laugh maniacally*
Yotomoe, so much of what you come up with is awesome and epic, but this has compelled me to declare you the winner of today’s episode of the interwebz!
“Wait she is smaller then me and threw me over her head… My god Amber was right! ….Wait a minute they’re all smaller then me, damn them with their low centre’s of gravity! Must flee!”
I owned pokemon yellow when I was ten. Out of boredom at my grandmother’s house, I played. I was excited when I caught a Snorlax. It turned out to be really strong, and quickly outpaced my normal poke team. It got to the point where I was simply using the Elite Four as training for this one Snorlax. Out of all its moves, I only needed two, psywave and body slam.
I used body slam on all the pokemon save Agatha’s.
Everytime it would say,
Snorlax used body slam.
.
,
.
…But it was ineffective.
X fainted!
I guess what I’m trying to say is this.
Just because it’s ineffective doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a meaningful effect.
Also, I hope Blaine faints. And then the authorities don’t have to rush.
American Sex Ed is more a theoretical concept than a reality.
When I went to school it basically consisted of an apathetic “you probably know more than I do about this, so here’s an informational sheet I downloaded off the internet about condom use, no, I’m not going to demonstrate on a banana. Now let’s watch some Lifetime Original Movies and episodes of Intervention”.
At my school it was like “Look kids, don’t be stupid. If you want sex don’t ask prostitutes, wear protection and babies are really gross. If you can’t figure that out on your own, I don’t know what to tell ya.”
My school was “Draw a piece of paper out of this bag. Congratulations, to those of you who drew a blank piece of paper, you’re STD free. The rest of you have a horrible disease. Now, let’s talk about condoms.” I’m not making that up.
Wow, American sex-ed sucks ass. I’m Canadian and we had diagrams and extensive talks and videos and prop demonstrations. There was even a humourus moment with the overhead projector, a pen and a picture of a penis.
Mine was actually called Health class. We had one unit on sexual reproduction that told us nothing useful after sixth grade. We went over STDs and the very basics of the anatomy. We had to take this for half a semester every year from sixth to eighth grade, and one semester in high school. I learned a bit about drugs, but absolutely nothing about sex ed.
Can we just marvel at the fact that Ruth lifted a large man who is several inches taller than her (and probably quite a lot of pounds heavier than her) OVER HER HEAD and FLIPPED HIM? Nausea or not, do not mess with Ruth.
There is a judo maneuver a bit like that–tomoe nage. However, it involves the thrower rolling backward and hoisting the throwee with a stiff leg to the waist. If properly done (it’s hard to pull off) the throwee lands somewhat like Amber’s dad just did, and a very skilled thrower might roll back upright, landing on top of the throwee and pinning him. You’d have to be lot bigger than your opponent to do what Ruth just did without the stiff leg. Otherwise the throwee ends up on top of the thrower, which is . . . awkward and undesirable, obviously.
There’s also a few sacrifice (sutemi-waza) throws that work like tomoe. If Ruth had more control of the head, it would look like tawara gaeshi, if there’s an arm lock she’d be doing hikikomi gaeshi. But to my eyes it looks more like a yoko ura nage or an ude gaeshi, if one wants to add a real name to an obviously made-up throw.
Well, on the one hand he got his ass kicked and is running away, and I know it looks all bad for him, and that people will call him a snivelling bullying coward, but — and this is an important “but” — he’s running away as a snivelling bullying coward who still has femurs. To run away with.
Offtopic: Please don’t take away the registration free comment section at this site too. It’s one of the things I’ve enjoyed about DoA & SP! over many other comics — the ability to comment freely and whimsically without a gatekeeper.
DoA’s not being moved out of WordPress, for one thing, so there’d be little reason to change it. Besides, it’s much harder to moderate a dang comment page with the threads moving around all willy-nilly, so I don’t think I’d allow it here anyway.
I gotta admit, I’m confused why one of your comics is changing format dramatically and not the other. Does it have something to do with Shortpacked doubling as your toy blog?
For reasons related to 9-week-buffer-maintenance, nothing but ComicPress will really do for DoA. Shortpacked!, though, I upload the day of or before, so that’s not really a thing. And so I let Hiveworks do what they want with it. DoA’s my bread an’ butter anyhow.
Did anyone else notice howard and blain have a unique recemblence?… nothing says family like remembering wresteling manuvers…. blain could be hurt or could have sum 1+frumph+pesonality and hair he could have recognized Ruth.
I noticed as soon as Blaine showed up (the resemblance wasn’t really there in Shortpacked), but I didn’t mention it because Howard gets enough crap as it is.
To be honest, I hated Ruth. She was cruel and angry. But seeing her in these last few storylines, I am definitely starting to get why everyone loves her.
Ruth’s been dead for over a decade. Long story, heavily involves Danny, largely at his most dickishness. Bring Back Roomies hasn’t gotten to it yet, but it has alluded to it. You could get to it from the old website, but it’s a pain in the ass to navigate. Suffice to say her death was a major plot point in the Walkyverse that went on to be referenced for years after, and is probably one of its defining moments. (Also, the storyline that immediately followed was the real start to the lead-in for It’s Walky, so there is that as well.)
Blaine, on the other hand, died last year after having a heart attack. That arc was probably at or near the climax of Amber’s character arc, but since he only made about three on-screen appearances in the comic, one of them in flashback and one as a corpse, and the other two hadn’t been for years, his death was largely met with a resounding “Yeah, fuck that guy.” Mike wore a party hat and Hawaiian shirt to the funeral and brought one of those little paper party blower things, and no one whatsoever had a problem with this. He was an asshole and we’re all glad he’s dead, and the only good thing about him showing up again here is that he’s finally getting some much-deserved trans-universal comeuppance.
I just thought about that, that maybe amber is actually leading him to a dark alley in which she can properly dole out the vigilante justice i know and love 😀
Personally I’d like to see him raging obsenities at Amber and while he’s crossing the street, and get hit in the face, with Walky’s truck, that drops a nickel…
Wait. Ruth is…sick? She clearly is expressing feelings of sickness. Did she hit her head and get a concussion?
Because that would be, like, bad.
Is she drunk? She seemed awfully composed until she slammed herself onto the ground. She didn’t seem to have definitively hit her head, although it IS possible…
Whether she is drinking again or has a concussion, things are not looking good here.
Also Blaine is getting away. And that is super not a good thing.
I read the alt text, and thought, “Willis sure is getting lax on Rule 3.” 🙂 I don’t mind, though. I wanted to point that out, because I thought it was funny, but I also didn’t want to be an ass about it.
When I see the panel where Blaine is running away, my mind can’t help but think that he’s actually just standing there dancing for some reason while Bille fetches the papers.
What, exactly, does Blaine think (I know, I know, assuming facts not in evidence) he’s going to do, running after Amber? She’s evidently already well through that door at the far end of the hall, and there’s an entire campus for her to not be found by Blaine in. There’s essentially no chance of him catching up to her if she doesn’t want him to.
I don’t know what’s more surprising: that Ruth picked up a guy who was significantly taller than her and, chances are, weighed significantly more than Billie does (And also threw him over his head, even if she fell in the process), that Blaine came crashing down on the ground INCREDIBLY hard and yet managed to get back up and run immediately, or that Howard is really THAT dumb to call something “lesbian pregnant?”
Yea, I figured that was the case. But his momentum helps with moving him over, not the actual act of lifting him over her head. That still requires a lot of physical strength, which is why I’m surprised and impressed. Though his body spins in the air too, so that also helps.
Ruth uses Canadian Politeness!
…it’s not terribly effective ó_ò
Well, I sure hope this is only due to alcohol withdrawal: I don’t want to think what a move like that could do to your hip or your vertebrae if you botch it.
And in the meantime, Blaine is running away like a little bongo! MWAHAHAHAHA! XD
OK, looking at panel 1 again, maybe Ruth actually had her foot up in his abdomen and did a tomoe nage throw on him. In which case it’s actually pretty realistic that she could use his momentum against him and that he would land just about like that. Surprised he didn’t at least get the wind knocked out of him, though. So Ruth is like a judo black belt on top of her other accomplishments?
I just have to note, since somebody mentioned Pankration yesterday, that, depending on the rules, it’s entirely possible to die during the fight, and still win.
Huh saw the first panel and actually thought Ruth was going to break Blane’s spine on her knee, wrestling style, for a second. 🙂
Although this solution makes sense too.
Wait, that’s it? Aww, I was hoping for something a bit cooler, like maybe punching him in the face, or maybe kicking him in the groin, or something. Still, that was a pretty great feat for someone suffering from withdrawal symptoms from alcohol.
“Howard, go into my room. Under my bed, you will see a bundle of sharpened human bones. These are my Femur Spears, fashioned from the remains of…problem residents. Bring them out to me, and then avert your eyes and plug your ears. There are certain acts of violence in this world that you are not capable of processing, lest you go mad from the revelation.”
Is Blaine going after Amber, or just running away? It’s hard for me to decide, as the look on his face in panel 4 is more of surprise, not anger. Then again, in panel 5 it looks like he’s running with his fists balled up, so maybe he is still going after her.
Yeah, I get the feeling that being suplexed only managed to knock some of his mindless rage out of him; now he’s still pissed, but clear-headed enough to continue pursuing Amber.
Hope I’m wrong here and that he’s actually just fleeing like the coward he is.
David: these multi-hundred comment threads are making it difficult (slow) to actually re-read the comic. Be nice if there were a way to separate comic view and comments view.
Dumbing of Age is the only Willis comic I’ve read, but reading over the comments section over the last couple of strips, I am almost tempted to dive into the others. (Stay at home mom, autistic 4 year old – what is this spare time others speak of?)
I do wonder if the Great Blain Beating of 2013 ends with Sarah standing over his with a baseball bat though. I mean, is every girl in the strip going to get a chance to take a whack at him? Cause that would be lovely.
I hate saying this, but I really don’t think this is going to go well in court if he gets away. Especially if he never catches up to Amber, which it might well be that he is just running at this point. I hate the guy, and he deserved being punched for sure, but I still think that since he didn’t physically threaten Amber that might even be her at fault for that part. Aggravated assault committed by Amber. He said terrible things, but he wasn’t trying to hit her yet. Then after that she ran when he threatened, he chased but I’m not sure it’s illegal to chase someone who just clocked you in the face. We all know he would have hurt her if he caught her but he can easily lie about his reasons for going after her.. I definitely think he would lie in court and probably so would Faz and Dina no matter how much I love her is probably one of the worst people you could have on your side recounting events in court. Her parents haven’t shown themselves to even talk at all, and again if Amber was technically in the wrong anyway as far as the law is concerned I don’t think it’s going to end well.
This mess with Ruth is different, but once again Blaine didn’t actually harm Ruth. He broke free of people holding him back from chasing after his daughter, and if he lied about how he “fell forward” after doing so I’m not sure anyone could prove he was trying to hurt Ruth. His hands were not balled up in fists so he never made as if to strike her. Again we all know he is an evil bastard, but what happened physically is ambiguous and caused no harm to Ruth. If Blaine’s defense is some kind of sob story about how he just wanted to make amends with his estranged daughter or some such bs, I could see this all turning out very differently than we all would want.
Everyone seems to forget who the writer is sometimes, not to mention his twitter moniker.
The key there would likely be his previous record. If he’s got domestic abuse priors, even if not convicted, things will look very bad for him in a courtroom. Extra bad if he’s not on the “approved list” when Billie gets back with it.
Re: Amber v. Blaine – There was nothing ‘aggravated’ about Amber’s assault/battery of Blaine. Aggravating factors tend to be things like …using a brick instead of your fist, or if that punch broke his jaw causing injury classed as ‘serious bodily harm’. And Amber has a plausible self-defense plea – especially if there’s no duty to retreat in the DoA world. Blaine’s looming over Amber, attempting to intimidate her, yelling in her face, has a history of family violence and has already refused to back down when asked. And I can’t keep track of the way the dorm is set up, but he may be between her and the door? He didn’t verbally threaten Amber with violence, but it would be absolutely reasonable (and therefore acquit-able) for Amber to feel that her actions were necessary and in self-defense.
Let’s not even get into all the weird and exciting possible permutations of the effect of the castle rule.
What’s more, putting someone in reasonable apprehension that you’re going to touch them is assault in and of itself (battery is the part where you actually touch someone, but the two offenses are often just lumped together these days). So there’s the argument to be made that Blaine is also guilty of assaulting Amber.
Re: The chase! – What Blaine is doing is escalating the situation. And there are a metric tonne of witnesses to say that Blaine was piiiissed, violent, and hell-bent on catching up with Amber. He can say what he wants about his motivations, but that doesn’t mean he can convince a judge/jury that he’s telling the truth. He doesn’t clearly have a defense here, and
Re: Ruth – Ruth was definitely assaulted by Blaine. Yeah, he could argue he tripped. But that lunge is a pretty unmistakable act of aggression from where I – and probably the rest of the hallway – are standing. 2nd to last panel Blaine is leaning back, the next he’s hurtling towards Ruth. He just doesn’t have the evidence to back that kind of claim. Anyway, you don’t even have to touch someone to assault them, let alone harm them.
The long and the short of it is….Blaine has committed at least one assault. He’s only making things worse for everyone by pursuing Amber. Amber also committed assault, but she’s got a good shot at being let off if the thing ever gets to court. Amber should get herself a Protective Order, then she won’t have to deal with this bs for at least a year.
Thanks for writing out all the things I wanted to say, and some more things I didn’t even know I wanted to say. My initial, knee-jerk reaction to the commentor stating that Amber wouldn’t fare well in court was basically “What judge and what jury in what part of complete-and-utter-shitheadistan would convict an 18-year-old woman of aggravated assault for punching her threatening, abusive father who – remember – was trespassing?“
This is gonna be a pain when it comes to the paperwork. Someone has to go write up the injury book, there’ll probably be a use of force form to fill out. I assume the university has a standing order to always press charges when it’s staff are assaulted so there’s that to do….
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OH DEAR
OH MY
OH SNAP
*crashes through wall* OH YEEEEAH!!
OH NO! My wall!
Oh no! My liquo- I mean, Kool-Aid stash!
OH…KLAHOMA WHERE THE WIND COMES WHISTLIN’ DOWN THE PLAINS!
Then it goes whislin thru Dixie (as most fronts travel from west to east in N. America).
Dixie kinda that.
I hope I never have to fly over Oklahoma.
I’ve never been to Oklahoma, I just imagine it being exactly like the musical “Oklahoma”.
(Sweeping down the plain.)
O, CANADA!
MY CABBAGES!
SPACE SWORD!
TIGER DRIVER!
“Okay, now I see why people get so pissed when I smash through their walls.”
And it’s a draw.
A draw? Blaine is running away with his tail tucked between his legs. If anything, Ruth won by forfeit.
He got past Ruth and is continuing his pursuit of Amber. I think he won that round. Of course, he might be about to encounter Billie again.
Yeah, by choosing to throw him, Ruth fucked up.
Should’ve just hit him. Now she’s out with nausea due to quitting booze cold turkey, and Blaine’s got a chance of catching up to Amber.
Amber can still kick his ass, but since he’s in pursuit, Blaine might be able to get a couple good blows in before she does.
Again, Ruth just plain fucked up.
Best move would have been to step aside and help redirect his energy so he went face-first into the wall.
“Won” in the sense of someone rationally pursuing a tactical objective, rather than a hate-filled rage man getting battered around by barely-adult girls.
Also, called it.
He strikes me as more of a rage-filled hate man…
Why won’t he encounter Amazigirl?
She’s failing to prevent him running away. That’s a point in his column, since if she succeeded, a talk with the cops is the best case scenario for him. (Worst case is a continued beating THEN a talk with the cops, followed by a 8X6 cell and further ass-kickings by the other inmates.)
A talk with the cops is likely no matter what, he was told to leave and refused, verbally assaulted a student, and if his name is on the “approved family member” list he is tresspassing…
Basically, he is in deep shit already.
He assaulted two students, actually
Likely, but not guaranteed.
The trespass is unlikely to be followed up on by itself – too much effort for too little payoff. (Actually, on doing a little research, that might not be the case – apparently trespassing is (or can be) a felony in Indiana, so it might, in fact, be worth following up on.)
The assaults likely will be, but that depends on how Amber reacts now that Blaine is gone – which I can’t even begin to guess – and how everybody else responds to that. If, like Joyce after the near-rape, or, like me after I’ve had to call 911 on a family member (not a parent) and falls back onto ‘he’s gone, I just want to forget about this’, and everybody else decides to respect that (unlikely, since Ruth is there, a victim in her own right, and likely able to get enough of Blaine’s info to sic the cops on him without forcing Amber to talk), the cops might not even be called – and if they already were, he’s liable to be long-gone by the time they show up, and if Amber and Ruth decide not to push the matter, they’re likely to stick to ‘well, we can keep a car outside the building in case he comes back’, since we come back to ‘too much trouble with not enough payoff’ if the victims are reticent.
(Also, we come back to the possibility I raised yesterday that they might get unlucky with the cop, and draw one that doesn’t feel it’s worth giving his full effort to what he considers nothing but a ‘family squabble’.)
If he sticks around, however, it’s a sure thing.
Why does everyone think Blaine is gone?
Ruth THREW HIM IN THE VERY DIRECTION AMBER RAN.
He’s still fucking going after her.
Ruth. Fucked. Up.
Several people have already mentioned that Blaine is still pursuing Amber in this thread.
Well, at least Ruth bought Amber some time. And now she’s out of Blaine’s sight somewhere in her home territory. Unfortunately, her Spider-Car suit is still in her room.
I’m just going to point out that Faz is still in the dorm room, as he did not follow Blaine. So I don’t think his dad will run away from the school without him, or he’ll likely be in big shit, or will need to come back anyways. And the police/campus security could hold onto Faz until he is picked up, either because he is under age, or if he’s not, under the pretense of trespassing.
I believe Willis said he was 17 either in the comments of an previous strip or on tumblr.
Fights – real fights – are frequently “draws” in the sense that nobody really wins. Both parties usually lose, in that they ended up all busted up.
Full disclosure: In my foolish youth, I was what you might consider a “rough character.” Never in my life started a fight, but I sure as hell ended a few, and was the comeuppance for a few bullies.
Graduated high school and took two jobs – bouncer in a biker wannabe bar on the weekends, repossessing cars during the week. Repo work got me into Chicago, Gary once, Detroit once, a few other places. Bad neighborhoods, you know? Got shot at three times.
Joined the Army figuring it’d be safer. Ended up in an infantry unit whose regimental history included North Africa, Anzio and Monte Cassino, and we were expected to live up to that. It gave me some mental discipline to go along with the big, tough farm-boy physical side.
I’ve been shot once, stuck once, had my nose broken three times, busted four ribs, and had a pool cue busted across the back of my head. (Yes, it hurt.) So I’ve seen a few scraps.
Nobody really wins. You might be the last guy standing, but you’ve still lost.
Wow , that speech sounded precise and wise D:
That’s because Animal IS precise and wise. And awesome.
Good to see you ’round these parts, Animal. Been wondering if you read this one or not. 🙂
Well, I’m precise, anyway.
I’ve been around. Busier than I was back in the Keenspot/Nightsar days.
Your screen name is very apropos, as you, sir, are a beast.
a beast, maybe……………………but one with honor.
It doesn’t really count if something unrelated to the fight hinders you. Notice how the guy also looks surprised and/or scared.
D’OH!
FRUMPH!
Ruth uses body slam, hurts herself in the confusion
See?! That’s why only trained professionals should do it!
If by “trained professional” you mean “13-year-old kids” then America is doing great by now…
Naw:
Ruth uses strength.
It super effective.
Ruth is hurt by alcohol poisoning.
Blaine got away safely.
Howard is confused!
Howard made himself look stupid in his confusion!
That doesn’t work. Normal can’t hit for super effective
This looks more like Submission: A fighting type attack. Amber’s Dad is CLEARLY a normal type, making the attack super effective. Submission also hurts the user
i’d say he’s more a poison type
Wouldn’t work; Fighting moves do 1/2 damage to Poison types. Maybe if what Ruth pulled out was a Bulldoze attack- her Speed stat IS obvs lowered.
He could totally be Dark-type, though, in which case Super Effective Submission still works?
Yeah, especially since I’m pretty sure “Dark type” actually refers to fighting dirty or evil or somesuch (Hence why there’s no Light type- Fighting, with its emphasis on fairness and the like, is its equivalent opposite). I’d say it counts.
Is there such a thing as asshat-type Pokemon or is that just for some of the trainers?
Blaine didn’t really look that much damaged from Ruth’s attack.
Seismic Toss has fixed damage based off your level. Highly effective against lower lv enemies [ruth is older than Billie], not so damaging against someone with higher lv. Circle Throw kind of fits too, since it is a throw and it ends the fight, but is has negative priority, so Blaine should have attacked first. Unless he also used a negative priority move, of course.
Ruth was badly poisoned by Withdrawal Symptoms!
Blaine Fled with Runaway.
That’s not a body slam, that’s a belly-to-belly suplex.
Can’t even remember the last time I saw that done in a wrestling ring.
Didn’t Brock pull one of those on Punk at Summerslam on Sunday? It was outside the ring, I think.
I’m going under the assumption that Ruth used some type of Judo throw. Judo is big on using your adversary’s momentum against them and she did look to be falling backwards while in a combat stance in the last panel of yesterday’s strip, then follows through with a quick lift and pull to slam that bastard.
And a belly to belly suplex starts with what’s basically a low-grip bear hug, which was definitely not the case here.
I’m pretty sure Ruth learned that move from playing Taki.
She screwed it up, though. (Probably because of the alcohol withdrawal.) She’s supposed to flip back to her feet afterwards.
It’s actually a secret Canadian martial art: you throw your for, then hurl.
foe, not for
It could be a rear sacrifice throw (i.e. you fall onto your back as you toss your opponent), which are fairly diverse in judo — but since the hand positioning doesn’t match anything I know of and you can’t see what her feet are doing, it’s impossible to say. Most rear sacrifice throws use the feet to push the opponent over one’s body, which panel 2 only vaguely suggests. The only one I know of that doesn’t use the feet like that involves taking the opponent from their side, not the front. (Not that precise hand to hand combat accuracy is required, of course.) In either case, you can generally roll into the mount position from a sacrifice throw, but Ruth is probably a bit too drunk for that.
…this might actually be a Tomoe-Nage, a Judo move.
Can’t see if she used her leg or no, so I can’t tell for sure.
Actually looks more like a back body drop, I.e. the standard flipping a guy by bending over after they rebound off the ropes from an Irish whip then standing up that’s been a wrestling staple since the 60’s. Ruth just blew the spot by falling over:-P
Judging by the positioning of her arms, it’s actually a double-underhook belly to belly suplex. The ‘back’ in back body drop indicates that the opponent is dropped onto their back, which would have left Blaine in the same position as Ruth was, albeit on top of her (which she could have translated into a rear naked choke).
No no no! Body slam won’t hurt yourself, it just has a 30% chance of paralyzing the opponent!
I would suggest a recoil move, like Take Down or Double Edge, though those are far better if Ruth had the ability Rock Head.
Or to fit the wrestling mood, Submission.
But she wasn’t hurt by recoil. She was confused and hurt herself in her confusion.
I think it was poison damage from a previous battle… Should’ve used an antidote before battle.
Geminia999 uses Awesome Comment! Wonder Wig is stunned.
Wonderwig uses COmpliment, Geminia999 is confused
Squall uses Substitute!
Mr. Random used Metronome.
.
Mr. Random used Metronome.
.
Mr. Random used Sleep!
Have to blame Howard for that one…looks like she hit her head off his leg.
Damn it!
You guys are fast! :p
That’s why my Ex dumped me…
NO, YOTOMOE, NO. Whenever discussing these sorts of things it’s YOU that dumped HER! You weren’t too fast–she was too slow!
YOU’RE TOO SLOW!!!
Personally, I prefer your mom.
For a nickle
With Mike
I can’t help it if I have stamina, Yotomoe. Your being too fast is why I dumped you.
Yotomoe the Hedgehog. DRAW IT! BECOME ONE WITH THE 12 YEAR OLDS.
I have FAR too much self respect.
Bet you never thought you’d get to say that.
Being the fastest isn’t always the best superpower.you might warp reality into something sinister because you want to have one person back. You might cause Bruce Wayne to not be batman!
Or if you’re Lego Flash, you may just be more of a pain in the ass to steer than it’s worth. 😛
Well now we know who Amazi-Girl REALLY is!
Yeah, Rick Steiner.
Round one goes to Ruth!
Round two goes to alcohol withdrawal!
Well she could have at least vomited all over him.
Poor thing. Billie should give her a hug to cheer her up.
…and a lap to throw up in. 😀
Billie’s lap is the only lap worthy of Ruth Bile.
iiiick
Could have head-butted Blaine in the nutz, then hurled on his lap…
Run bongo, run.
Run while you still have femurs!
i love that you both have the same gravatar
haha and i have it too
The invasion has come!
BOW BEFORE THE GALLASSO COLLECTIVE!!!
Eh, still better than an invasion of Fazes.
Withdrawal symptoms! Ruth’s only weakness!
Well, unless you wanna count trucks as well.
And alcoholic cheerleaders.
Too soon.
No, really, BringBackRoomies! hasn’t gotten there quite yet.
Think that was a concussion, rather than alcohol.
Man, Billie is ROUGH in the sack.
Danny’s actually lucky he turned her down. Poor guy wouldn’t have been able to handle it.
Death by snu-snu!
Sadly, Ruth and Billie never got to snu-snu…this to me was the result of her hitting Howard’s leg or hitting the floor hard both of which could cause a concussion(I know I have had a couple this way…)
Oh no! Ruth has a funcussion!
FINISH HIM!
Maybe Ninja Rick will appear out of nowhere and stab him…
Wow Howard before i thought you actually made a joke you telling you your that naive
…I’m gonna need you to reword that…
Wow Howard before i thought you actually made a joke you telling mr your that naive
Wow got the same post wrong twice in a row that tells me i need sleep stat
Well I suppose this just means Amazi-girl is going to kick his ass next strip. Damn it Ruth, lay off the sauce.
But spaghetti sauce is delicious.
Chili sauce is the best sauce.
Champignon sauce.
Chocolate sauce.
Body sauce!
Hot sauce is my personal favourite.
Tabasco Chipotle
Followed by Cholula’s
Sriracha! Great on pizza.
For me, it’s (Japanese)curry & terriaki sauces – although it’s been a long time since I’ve had the curry, and it didn’t occur to me (untill just now, as I’m writing this) to combine them.
Howard, now is not the time! Go watch Star Trek while the grown ups tear each other apart.
Panel 4 says it all.
What a weasel….
In Soviet Russia, the Ed sexes you!
In Indiana the TA sexes you!
And the RA, for that matter. Jury’s out on the Professors.
Alan/Dina. I ship it now.
Any prof who sexes with one of their own students SHOULD be on the street. Which is where Jason SHOULD be.
Except he isn’t a prof.
…why?
I mean, in middle school that’s obviously not cool. But if you have sex with a consenting adult, why’s it matter if they’re your student or not? Doesn’t seem that different from a boss screwing an employee.
Blaine better run.
Bastard be gettin’ his ass kicked by KIDS. Can’t be good for his poor, frail ego. >: D
Or his poor frail bones.
We still haven’t seen the effect of attacks on his poor frail FAAAAAAAACE.
We must attack ALL of his face, not just the upper lip…for science, of course!
They’re not kids…
That is entirely a matter of perspective. Anyone closer to my oldest daughter’s age than they are to mine is pretty much automatically a kid. Which is a probably why the bulk of internet porn seems to get creepier and creepier the older I get…
They’re in their physical prime and he’s way past it. So from the perspective of a fight, it definitely doesn’t make sense to say he should have won because they’re kids.
Goddammit, Howard, start trying to make “lesbian pregnant” a thing!
Also, I got my corpse. Anyone else got their corpses? Let’s do this thing.
But lesbian pregnancy is already a thing.
Dibs on Dina.
Dibs on Big Boss.
I guess I’ll just use Boss’s corpse then…
Dib dib dib, dob dob dob.
Ahem … That is supposed to be…
dyb dyb dyb, dob dob dob
YIS – Rikki Tikki Tavi / Hawkeye
I got Grace here.
I’d say I got Mike, but I think he’s disqualified fer being a zombie.
Dibs on Ruth!
I call Pamela.
Howard wants it to be a thing so much he’s pushing it on ruth to admit it exists.
I have a feeling he does that for a lot if things.
“Being a Trekkie is totally cool.”
“Howard, no it isn’t-”
“Dammit, Ruth, just do this for me!”
Naw man, our corpses should just hang out. Have a corpse party. Just without any Sachiko to ruin everyone’s fun.
Don’t know what to love more, the comedy or the suplex…
I hereby dub this “The second-greatest suplex in all of fiction.”
First is, of course, Sabin suplexing the Phantom Train in FF6.
That’s on my “Greatest application of wrestling move in non-wrestling related fiction”…next to Mike Haggar piledrivering Odin.
Yeah, that one’s pretty much untoppable.
I think you are forgetting about the Greatest Teacher that ever was. His was the greatest suplex of all times. He was even hired for that one.
I bet ruth is related to him, but she’s better at using peoples blody femurs to hit them in the face…while mike does their moms for a nickel.
He is my hero. I someday hope to be a teacher as great as he is.
So you intend to lust after your students?
It’s not a requirement, but if my students are like his, there’s no avoiding it.
I suppose the Hulk taking out the space worm thing wasn’t really a suplex, just momentum.
Ruth, I am disappointed. Also, why aren’t any of the other parents running after him in the final panel?
They probably got caught off guard by that wicked suplex.
Man, Ruth is so awesome she gets a reaction out Amber’s dad. That’s somethin’.
But has apparently been poisoned by the exposure
THAT’S RIGHT FOOL! FLEE, FLEE AND NEVER RETURN. AND FROM NOW ON, YOU SHALL BE CALL MR RUN AWAY.
Wonder how long it’ll take Doctor Who to comment on this…
Three minutes!
18 actually.
You could travel back in time to 3 minutes after it was posted.
But that would cross the timeline!
Not unless he posted the original seed comment here, under Aizat’s name.
That action. “Run away.” I want you to be famous for that exact action. I want people to call you Daddy Runaway. I want children laughing outside your door, ’cause they’ve found the house of Daddy Runaway. And when people come to you and ask if trying to get into this dorm through the people you pretend to love … is in any way a good idea, I want you to tell them your name. Look, I’m angry, that’s new. I’m really not sure what’s going to happen now.
Thanks for the Doctor Who reference!
Captain Jack. You need this gravvy.
http://squallloir.tumblr.com/post/58911993455
Everyone needs that gravitar. My eagle is sad he isn’t as awesome.
It is the best gravvy ever. This is because of the juxtaposition of so much awesomeness.
Wow, can’t believe I forgot about that. Seriously though, hands up to whoever forgot her current condition too.
His face says it all. Don’t fuck with that girl.
DAMMIT!
Now would be an excellent time for the Saruyamas to reveal their behind-the-door teleportation skills are genetic so they can stop him. Or for Falyn and Sierra to have run ahead, let Amber escape, and block the doors when he gets there.
Dina teleports on the ground in the middle of the hallway floor. Blaine trips over her like a log.
So Dina is a Naruto style ninja?
No because she’s an actual ninja, not a wizard that wants to be a ninja.
Ninja-Wizard?
http://i206.photobucket.com/albums/bb301/BFGTR/mortor.gif
Oh man, that would be so frickin’ AWESOME! :-p
That is the most inconveniently specific DT I’ve ever seen.
Also, wow, Howard, way to out your sister to her hall.
I’m sure noone listens to howard. I can barely get myself to READ his lines.
Howard has lines?
Who’s Howard?
Isn’t he that guy who’s friends with Joe?
I think he’s that one guy who likes Joyce?
What…what is Blaine’s plan here? Keep running until he finds the Jerkass Ex-Husband coalition to back him up?
Fairly certain he’s going after Amber. He’s looking to pay her back for that punch, most likely.
Right, she kept going that way. Still terrible plan, but slightly more ominous.
I hope they run into Joe’s dad and he uses his bone doctor power to break his femur!
I’m personally hoping that he runs into Sarah and she get’s to go Old Testament on his ass.
Welp. Now we now what Blaine’s Pokemon ability would be. Liquid Ooze. Just being in physical contact with him causes severe poisoning.
It’s clearly, Run Away.
Someone picked the wrong week to stop drinking.
Looks I picked the wrong week to give up amphetamines…
Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit sniffing glue…
Looks like I picked the wrong day to start drinking dish detergent.
I picked a helluva day to quit drinkin’
I picked the wrong day to give up Tek.
I picked the wrong day to stop snorting cocaine off of hookers.
You didn’t read that.
You too?
I didn’t?!
Shit, here are the DTs, then…
Phone. 911. Now.
Blaine bumped his head but good in the second panel. So although it looks like he’s going to escape, at least his violent assholery may have bought him a good, long headache.
Or a cracked skull. Oh please let him have a cracked skull.
He probably will have difficulty with coordination for a bit depending on how hard he was hit.
I’m hoping he gets amnesia and forgets how much of an asshole he was. Which would be a seriously specific case of amnesia, but still.
He has nice guy eyes now!!!
http://squallloir.tumblr.com/post/58936900386/blaine-with-sexy-eyes
She just did a brainbuster UNAIDED.
That’s physically impossible.
Therefore, Ruth is a super hero.
I am very disappointed that Blaine has yet to have his jerk ass handed to him. Nice throw, though.
He did manage to get his head handed to him.
only he won’t be able to wake up and try again.
(video game referencessssssss)
Heh. Nice onomatopoeia in panel two.
Blaine: Arrogant Douchebage, Agressive Parent, Giant Pussy
You forgot Pansy Asshole 1st Grade.
Also Fuckin Dickweed and Massive Jerkwad
http://books.google.com/books?id=_3e2lx-UsiAC&pg=PA56&lpg=PA56&dq=smellshit+mozart&source=bl&ots=s_PWMcweC-&sig=smMaa-JYy65QTHh4kbIqhlIDITw&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Y3cUUp-yK6KbygHSqYC4Dw&ved=0CCMQ6AEwBA
OH MY GOSH, I just remembered! Billie is no where to be found. Meaning that she left to get the papers and now Blaine is headed right for her!
Billie will see that her lover has fallen in battle and will her ultimate attack on the despicable one.
He will run into her and bounce back like hitting a bowl of gelatin.
Or he will be absorbed into her cleavage. never to be seen again.
Picture that. Picture that sequence in your brain. It is creepy. Thanks for the nightmare. It’s creepy. Really creepy.
Too good of a fate for him.
You make that sound like a bad thing.
I can only hope. I don’t imagine Billie does any fancy throws or anything. She seems like a straight-up ball-kicker.
Oh? Do you mean she will transform him into a Balchinian?
Wow! Are we sure there aren’t enhanced SEMME agents running around this continuity?
Women 2. Blaine 0
Blaine is the biggest 0.
Calling Blaine a 0 is an insult to 0s everywhere.
^this^
Blaine is a -1.
Blaine is not even a number.
So, Blaine is running away, leaving Faz to be raised by college students? What could *possibly* go wrong?!
Joe: I will teach you all I know about ladies, kid.
Faz: Between your skills and my persistance, we will bang every woman in the campus!!!!
*they both laugh maniacally*
^THIS EVEN MORE!^
Yotomoe, so much of what you come up with is awesome and epic, but this has compelled me to declare you the winner of today’s episode of the interwebz!
Going through Blaine’s head:-
“Wait she is smaller then me and threw me over her head… My god Amber was right! ….Wait a minute they’re all smaller then me, damn them with their low centre’s of gravity! Must flee!”
Ruth used Seismic Toss, it was ineffective. Blaine ran away
I owned pokemon yellow when I was ten. Out of boredom at my grandmother’s house, I played. I was excited when I caught a Snorlax. It turned out to be really strong, and quickly outpaced my normal poke team. It got to the point where I was simply using the Elite Four as training for this one Snorlax. Out of all its moves, I only needed two, psywave and body slam.
I used body slam on all the pokemon save Agatha’s.
Everytime it would say,
Snorlax used body slam.
.
,
.
…But it was ineffective.
X fainted!
I guess what I’m trying to say is this.
Just because it’s ineffective doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a meaningful effect.
Also, I hope Blaine faints. And then the authorities don’t have to rush.
Seismic Toss does damage based on level, it’s impossible for it to be ineffective.
American Sex Ed is more a theoretical concept than a reality.
When I went to school it basically consisted of an apathetic “you probably know more than I do about this, so here’s an informational sheet I downloaded off the internet about condom use, no, I’m not going to demonstrate on a banana. Now let’s watch some Lifetime Original Movies and episodes of Intervention”.
At my school it was like “Look kids, don’t be stupid. If you want sex don’t ask prostitutes, wear protection and babies are really gross. If you can’t figure that out on your own, I don’t know what to tell ya.”
My school was “Draw a piece of paper out of this bag. Congratulations, to those of you who drew a blank piece of paper, you’re STD free. The rest of you have a horrible disease. Now, let’s talk about condoms.” I’m not making that up.
It’s arguably more risky to have sex with a stranger who isn’t a prostitute…at least where it’s legal.
Wow, American sex-ed sucks ass. I’m Canadian and we had diagrams and extensive talks and videos and prop demonstrations. There was even a humourus moment with the overhead projector, a pen and a picture of a penis.
And that was just the first one we had.
It really, really does.
Mine was actually called Health class. We had one unit on sexual reproduction that told us nothing useful after sixth grade. We went over STDs and the very basics of the anatomy. We had to take this for half a semester every year from sixth to eighth grade, and one semester in high school. I learned a bit about drugs, but absolutely nothing about sex ed.
Man, I am so lucky to have gone to a good school in a blue state. We got a pretty thorough explanation of all the types of birth control…
…but no banana 🙁
Can we just marvel at the fact that Ruth lifted a large man who is several inches taller than her (and probably quite a lot of pounds heavier than her) OVER HER HEAD and FLIPPED HIM? Nausea or not, do not mess with Ruth.
Yeah, there’s only one rule: DON’T FUCK WITH RUTH.
That’s just jujitsu, used his own momentum against him. That’s also why he wasn’t terribly shaken up by it.
It’s just a matter of leverage, momentum, and technique. Blaine provided the first two, so all she had to come up with was the last.
What everyone else said. She did the same thing to Billie (which I guess was a week or two ago in-story time?).
That said, there’s little doubt she’s uncommonly strong for a woman of her size.
There is a judo maneuver a bit like that–tomoe nage. However, it involves the thrower rolling backward and hoisting the throwee with a stiff leg to the waist. If properly done (it’s hard to pull off) the throwee lands somewhat like Amber’s dad just did, and a very skilled thrower might roll back upright, landing on top of the throwee and pinning him. You’d have to be lot bigger than your opponent to do what Ruth just did without the stiff leg. Otherwise the throwee ends up on top of the thrower, which is . . . awkward and undesirable, obviously.
There’s also a few sacrifice (sutemi-waza) throws that work like tomoe. If Ruth had more control of the head, it would look like tawara gaeshi, if there’s an arm lock she’d be doing hikikomi gaeshi. But to my eyes it looks more like a yoko ura nage or an ude gaeshi, if one wants to add a real name to an obviously made-up throw.
Well, on the one hand he got his ass kicked and is running away, and I know it looks all bad for him, and that people will call him a snivelling bullying coward, but — and this is an important “but” — he’s running away as a snivelling bullying coward who still has femurs. To run away with.
No, he’s continuing after Amber.
Ruth fucked up.
Run, man! If a THIRD girl under the age of 20 beats you up today it’s just gonna get EMBARRASSING.
Offtopic: Please don’t take away the registration free comment section at this site too. It’s one of the things I’ve enjoyed about DoA & SP! over many other comics — the ability to comment freely and whimsically without a gatekeeper.
DoA’s not being moved out of WordPress, for one thing, so there’d be little reason to change it. Besides, it’s much harder to moderate a dang comment page with the threads moving around all willy-nilly, so I don’t think I’d allow it here anyway.
I gotta admit, I’m confused why one of your comics is changing format dramatically and not the other. Does it have something to do with Shortpacked doubling as your toy blog?
For reasons related to 9-week-buffer-maintenance, nothing but ComicPress will really do for DoA. Shortpacked!, though, I upload the day of or before, so that’s not really a thing. And so I let Hiveworks do what they want with it. DoA’s my bread an’ butter anyhow.
9-week buffer is mind-blowing. I think that counts as a superpower. Or did you soul to the devil?
That is so weird to hear, because in my head this is still somehow the side project you just started. Time passes way too fast when you get older.
Poor kid. He doesn’t know you can’t get lesbian pregnat until you have lesbian sex.
Be fair, he doesn’t -know- they haven’t had lesbian sex yet.
That’s when their boobs touch, right?
That’s just phase one lesbian sex. You can’t get pregnant until phase five at least.
It’s the strap-ons, isn’t it? Damn, those things are full of masculine potency.
I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that Howard doesn’t know much about any kind of sex ….
Except the one handed variety, anyway.
I’m pretty sure that’s stage three.
Hmm seems Texas sex ed has failed me again. Now you’re gonna tell me lesbianism isn’t caused by rock music.
It’s caused by Billie.
And Ruth. And Sal. And Leslie. And Amber. Damn, IU is a friggin’ lesbian conversion camp.
Did anyone else notice howard and blain have a unique recemblence?… nothing says family like remembering wresteling manuvers…. blain could be hurt or could have sum 1+frumph+pesonality and hair he could have recognized Ruth.
I noticed as soon as Blaine showed up (the resemblance wasn’t really there in Shortpacked), but I didn’t mention it because Howard gets enough crap as it is.
Blaine is everyone’s dad. Even yours. You can scream now.
Now THAT would be an unpleasant plot twist.
Goddammit, Blaine. Stop being an asshole.
To be honest, I hated Ruth. She was cruel and angry. But seeing her in these last few storylines, I am definitely starting to get why everyone loves her.
Ruth Rocks!
Also, they’re dead in your original universe?
Ruth’s been dead for over a decade. Long story, heavily involves Danny, largely at his most dickishness. Bring Back Roomies hasn’t gotten to it yet, but it has alluded to it. You could get to it from the old website, but it’s a pain in the ass to navigate. Suffice to say her death was a major plot point in the Walkyverse that went on to be referenced for years after, and is probably one of its defining moments. (Also, the storyline that immediately followed was the real start to the lead-in for It’s Walky, so there is that as well.)
Blaine, on the other hand, died last year after having a heart attack. That arc was probably at or near the climax of Amber’s character arc, but since he only made about three on-screen appearances in the comic, one of them in flashback and one as a corpse, and the other two hadn’t been for years, his death was largely met with a resounding “Yeah, fuck that guy.” Mike wore a party hat and Hawaiian shirt to the funeral and brought one of those little paper party blower things, and no one whatsoever had a problem with this. He was an asshole and we’re all glad he’s dead, and the only good thing about him showing up again here is that he’s finally getting some much-deserved trans-universal comeuppance.
Whoa, she’s so sick one of her eyes reverted back to a black dot.
And Blaine still has his femurs… for now.
Blain just got tossed by a sick girl, so he runs like the coward he is. How much longer does he stay alive in this universe?
I just thought about that, that maybe amber is actually leading him to a dark alley in which she can properly dole out the vigilante justice i know and love 😀
Personally I’d like to see him raging obsenities at Amber and while he’s crossing the street, and get hit in the face, with Walky’s truck, that drops a nickel…
Wait. Ruth is…sick? She clearly is expressing feelings of sickness. Did she hit her head and get a concussion?
Because that would be, like, bad.
Is she drunk? She seemed awfully composed until she slammed herself onto the ground. She didn’t seem to have definitively hit her head, although it IS possible…
Whether she is drinking again or has a concussion, things are not looking good here.
Also Blaine is getting away. And that is super not a good thing.
This is still the same day where Billie came to Ruth’s room and Ruth was complaining of withdrawal symptoms.
Also, she maybe shouldn’t have taken Howard’s cookie.
Howard drugs his cookies? Holy crap.
Oh yeah I forgot about that. Whew! I was worried that Willis was gonna go all Batiuk on us and give Ruth cancer cancer.
OH. Sometimes I forget that days in this comic are weeks and weeks long.
The look on Blaine’s face is the look of a man who has realized: this is the moment he loses control of his life.
His face in panel four cracks me up.
He’s all ‘The hell just happened?’
And it’s Ruth off the turnbuckle with her signature move, the Ginger Poutine-maker!
Amazigirl comet.
I meant, the amazigirl cometh.
The vomit comet heralds the Amazigirl cometh.
I read the alt text, and thought, “Willis sure is getting lax on Rule 3.” 🙂 I don’t mind, though. I wanted to point that out, because I thought it was funny, but I also didn’t want to be an ass about it.
When I see the panel where Blaine is running away, my mind can’t help but think that he’s actually just standing there dancing for some reason while Bille fetches the papers.
Say what you want about Blaine, you gotta admit his ability to get up after taking a hit is impressive. I hope he gets to practice it often.
These last few strips have been the greatest thing i have ever read.
I should have stopped at “spoiler alert” but I didn’t, I have none to blame but myself, but AHHHHH REALLYYY??? AHHHHH
I mean I knew about blaine cos SP! but ruuuuuth toooo????
“Act with integrity. No regrets.” 🙁
Can someone knock that dude the hell out. First he tries to beat his daughter and then comes at Ruth? Jesus can he have his come up soon
So much focus on the toss by Ruth. I am shocked, shocked I say to not see more posting about the “lesbian pregnant” comment by her brother.
I do hope that our Billie makes an honest woman Ruth.
(Does a quick google search; apparently you can be arrested for gay marriage in Indiana.)
Well, hell.
…is NO ONE worried about Dina being trapped with Faz?
She’s not trapped in there with him, HE’S TRAPPED IN THERE WITH HER!
-10 for quoting Dominic Deegan, lol. 😛
She’s got her parents with her and if he tried anything, she’d probably do something quite painful to him involving her teeth.
And he would enjoy it.
I GOTTA ADMIT
I WAS KIND OF THINKIN’ IT lol 😀
What, exactly, does Blaine think (I know, I know, assuming facts not in evidence) he’s going to do, running after Amber? She’s evidently already well through that door at the far end of the hall, and there’s an entire campus for her to not be found by Blaine in. There’s essentially no chance of him catching up to her if she doesn’t want him to.
In order for him to realise that he’d have to acknowledge that he can’t control her.
I don’t know what’s more surprising: that Ruth picked up a guy who was significantly taller than her and, chances are, weighed significantly more than Billie does (And also threw him over his head, even if she fell in the process), that Blaine came crashing down on the ground INCREDIBLY hard and yet managed to get back up and run immediately, or that Howard is really THAT dumb to call something “lesbian pregnant?”
Well since he charged/rushed her. im thinking momentum played a not insignificant part in this.
Yeah, Blaine was already supplying most of the velocity, Ruth just redirected it a smidge.
In my head, she did tomoe-nage, or as I call it, the Jim Kirk maneuver (link my name)
Yea, I figured that was the case. But his momentum helps with moving him over, not the actual act of lifting him over her head. That still requires a lot of physical strength, which is why I’m surprised and impressed. Though his body spins in the air too, so that also helps.
Dat Ruth, counter spamming. Blaine ragequitted.
His own fault for telegraphing his moves…
RE Mouse-over text: “Over my dead body”
Theres always the baseball bat 😉
Ruth uses Canadian Politeness!
…it’s not terribly effective ó_ò
Well, I sure hope this is only due to alcohol withdrawal: I don’t want to think what a move like that could do to your hip or your vertebrae if you botch it.
And in the meantime, Blaine is running away like a little bongo! MWAHAHAHAHA! XD
OK, looking at panel 1 again, maybe Ruth actually had her foot up in his abdomen and did a tomoe nage throw on him. In which case it’s actually pretty realistic that she could use his momentum against him and that he would land just about like that. Surprised he didn’t at least get the wind knocked out of him, though. So Ruth is like a judo black belt on top of her other accomplishments?
That wasn’t apparent when she tossed Billie across the room like she was a matchbook? 😛
omg is that his eyebrow way up there in the second to last panel?? YES
god please let her vomit on his shoes to boot
Out in the real world, every fight is between people who are going to end up dead eventually. Not all that remarkable.
In the mean time, here’s to hoping for discontinuity between the continuities.
Not really. Some people only fight when it’s necessary. That probably isn’t the kind of fight you meant though.
Pretty sure every participant in every fight ever will end up dead sometime after the start of the fight.
Might not be during the fight, though.
I just have to note, since somebody mentioned Pankration yesterday, that, depending on the rules, it’s entirely possible to die during the fight, and still win.
Owned, he should realy quit wile he’s ahead
That implies that Blaine was ever ahead.
Huh saw the first panel and actually thought Ruth was going to break Blane’s spine on her knee, wrestling style, for a second. 🙂
Although this solution makes sense too.
Wait, that’s it? Aww, I was hoping for something a bit cooler, like maybe punching him in the face, or maybe kicking him in the groin, or something. Still, that was a pretty great feat for someone suffering from withdrawal symptoms from alcohol.
It is a bit disappointing that Ruth failed in her offer to add more blood to his face.
Hey, there’s always time for her to catch up to him, isn’t there?
“Howard, go into my room. Under my bed, you will see a bundle of sharpened human bones. These are my Femur Spears, fashioned from the remains of…problem residents. Bring them out to me, and then avert your eyes and plug your ears. There are certain acts of violence in this world that you are not capable of processing, lest you go mad from the revelation.”
You know, Mike hasn’t punched any face recently…
You make an excellent observation, sir/ma’am.
GAZE INTO THE FLOOR OF RUTH!
Howard instantly is now more likeable than Amber’s sperm supplier (I refuse to call him a “Dad”).
honestly its a lot harder to name a character that is less likable then blaine
Ryan maybe?
We use “Chad” for those guys…
I thought it was Chet?
Faz? He’s like Blaine, but subtle and pervy.
Yeah, it’s all a matter of context.
I’ve heard the term “ex-father” used before, that might be appropriate.
Friggin’ WHOA. Blaine’s so impressed (taken aback? Having new information pounded into his beast head?) that one of his eyebrows flew right off.
Is Blaine going after Amber, or just running away? It’s hard for me to decide, as the look on his face in panel 4 is more of surprise, not anger. Then again, in panel 5 it looks like he’s running with his fists balled up, so maybe he is still going after her.
Yeah, I like to think he’s doing that “I’ll get my revenge’ fist-in-the-air thing villains tend to do.
I had my mouse in a position to read that as “fish-in-the-air” …
Impressive suplex… especially if she completely avoids her brother who is standing almost directly behind her. That’s some WWF-skills right there.
That self-defense throw worked better on Billie…
Yeah, I get the feeling that being suplexed only managed to knock some of his mindless rage out of him; now he’s still pissed, but clear-headed enough to continue pursuing Amber.
Hope I’m wrong here and that he’s actually just fleeing like the coward he is.
test comment to see how off sync server time is
…Why can’t I see the new comic yet?
And nvm, I’m being stupid and flipping my am and pm. Being in Australia makes things confusing.
David: these multi-hundred comment threads are making it difficult (slow) to actually re-read the comic. Be nice if there were a way to separate comic view and comments view.
once you catch up you actually have to press the comment button to read the comments so there’s that
Abusive dads? Manipulative conservative parents? This comic is getting a little too real for comfort.
Blaine got an surprise of an life time. That’s not his day. (does a little happy dance)
Also, random button is back in Shortpacked. Yay! Thank you!
Re: the Alt Text. Ruth only feels like death right now.
Holy snickies!!! She flip punched the shit out of him…
Oh, that’s why he runs so odd way.
Dumbing of Age is the only Willis comic I’ve read, but reading over the comments section over the last couple of strips, I am almost tempted to dive into the others. (Stay at home mom, autistic 4 year old – what is this spare time others speak of?)
I do wonder if the Great Blain Beating of 2013 ends with Sarah standing over his with a baseball bat though. I mean, is every girl in the strip going to get a chance to take a whack at him? Cause that would be lovely.
~GQGZ
My name is Rex Hondo, and I approve of this message.
He knew her parents, didn’t he? That expression says “I know you…but that’s impossible”.
Looks more like, “Oh shit this small girl flipped me over whaaaaaaaaaaa”
*hopes Blaine gets hit by a door*
*goes back to his dive in Questionable Content*
AND THIS IS THE COMIC ON WHICH MY ARCHIVE BINGE ENDS. OF COURSE.
I hate saying this, but I really don’t think this is going to go well in court if he gets away. Especially if he never catches up to Amber, which it might well be that he is just running at this point. I hate the guy, and he deserved being punched for sure, but I still think that since he didn’t physically threaten Amber that might even be her at fault for that part. Aggravated assault committed by Amber. He said terrible things, but he wasn’t trying to hit her yet. Then after that she ran when he threatened, he chased but I’m not sure it’s illegal to chase someone who just clocked you in the face. We all know he would have hurt her if he caught her but he can easily lie about his reasons for going after her.. I definitely think he would lie in court and probably so would Faz and Dina no matter how much I love her is probably one of the worst people you could have on your side recounting events in court. Her parents haven’t shown themselves to even talk at all, and again if Amber was technically in the wrong anyway as far as the law is concerned I don’t think it’s going to end well.
This mess with Ruth is different, but once again Blaine didn’t actually harm Ruth. He broke free of people holding him back from chasing after his daughter, and if he lied about how he “fell forward” after doing so I’m not sure anyone could prove he was trying to hurt Ruth. His hands were not balled up in fists so he never made as if to strike her. Again we all know he is an evil bastard, but what happened physically is ambiguous and caused no harm to Ruth. If Blaine’s defense is some kind of sob story about how he just wanted to make amends with his estranged daughter or some such bs, I could see this all turning out very differently than we all would want.
Everyone seems to forget who the writer is sometimes, not to mention his twitter moniker.
I’ve been worried about something similar.
The key there would likely be his previous record. If he’s got domestic abuse priors, even if not convicted, things will look very bad for him in a courtroom. Extra bad if he’s not on the “approved list” when Billie gets back with it.
Allow me to disagree.
Re: Amber v. Blaine – There was nothing ‘aggravated’ about Amber’s assault/battery of Blaine. Aggravating factors tend to be things like …using a brick instead of your fist, or if that punch broke his jaw causing injury classed as ‘serious bodily harm’. And Amber has a plausible self-defense plea – especially if there’s no duty to retreat in the DoA world. Blaine’s looming over Amber, attempting to intimidate her, yelling in her face, has a history of family violence and has already refused to back down when asked. And I can’t keep track of the way the dorm is set up, but he may be between her and the door? He didn’t verbally threaten Amber with violence, but it would be absolutely reasonable (and therefore acquit-able) for Amber to feel that her actions were necessary and in self-defense.
Let’s not even get into all the weird and exciting possible permutations of the effect of the castle rule.
What’s more, putting someone in reasonable apprehension that you’re going to touch them is assault in and of itself (battery is the part where you actually touch someone, but the two offenses are often just lumped together these days). So there’s the argument to be made that Blaine is also guilty of assaulting Amber.
Re: The chase! – What Blaine is doing is escalating the situation. And there are a metric tonne of witnesses to say that Blaine was piiiissed, violent, and hell-bent on catching up with Amber. He can say what he wants about his motivations, but that doesn’t mean he can convince a judge/jury that he’s telling the truth. He doesn’t clearly have a defense here, and
Re: Ruth – Ruth was definitely assaulted by Blaine. Yeah, he could argue he tripped. But that lunge is a pretty unmistakable act of aggression from where I – and probably the rest of the hallway – are standing. 2nd to last panel Blaine is leaning back, the next he’s hurtling towards Ruth. He just doesn’t have the evidence to back that kind of claim. Anyway, you don’t even have to touch someone to assault them, let alone harm them.
The long and the short of it is….Blaine has committed at least one assault. He’s only making things worse for everyone by pursuing Amber. Amber also committed assault, but she’s got a good shot at being let off if the thing ever gets to court. Amber should get herself a Protective Order, then she won’t have to deal with this bs for at least a year.
Thanks for writing out all the things I wanted to say, and some more things I didn’t even know I wanted to say. My initial, knee-jerk reaction to the commentor stating that Amber wouldn’t fare well in court was basically “What judge and what jury in what part of complete-and-utter-shitheadistan would convict an 18-year-old woman of aggravated assault for punching her threatening, abusive father who – remember – was trespassing?“
bongoes here can fight!!!
SUPLEX
Pretty Weak Suplex tho…Blaine just gets up like it was nothing!
Now if only it was a Sabin Suplex….
Anyone else curious as to what happened to Faz?
He’s digging it, if you know what I mean.
is that the opposite of corpse party
This is gonna be a pain when it comes to the paperwork. Someone has to go write up the injury book, there’ll probably be a use of force form to fill out. I assume the university has a standing order to always press charges when it’s staff are assaulted so there’s that to do….
Clearly someone forgot to tell Ruth that you can get lesbian pregnant, just ask Leslie and Robin.
Well, Howard is right about one thing. This situation is totally babies.