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I…think something like this happened to me? I’m a huge nerd but never had much trouble with bullies, probably because I was too spacey to be much fun to mess with. I also ended up giving a lot of relationship advice in high school, because I had a reputation for thinking a lot.
My own relationships were universally train wrecks in high school but that’s beside the point!
Danny graduated from being a bongo boy when he rebounded off the ex-girlfriend he followed into college after totally misjudging, to be with a superhero who looks exactly like a girl he won’t be with because she looks too much like his ex girlfriend.
Ethan was clearly saving up his conversational powers through the previous 2-3 strips in order to have plenty on reserve for just the moment when a piercing question would come in handy.
Also, is it brilliant, really? I mean, if anyone should know why someone might not want to center their identity around something they find unpleasant, it’d be Mr. “I don’t want to be gay at college” Siegel, shouldn’t it?
Well, she has a wider circle if we count people she has saved and/or been harrassed for an interview by as Amazigirl. Assuming ultra!!car doesn’t exist.
Give Joe time to get a car. Then we’ll see how good his engineering skills are in this timeline.
Even if the Dumbiverse UltraCar isn’t the full-on version from the Walkyverse, I can still see it being akin to KITT, with a rudimentary AI and a computer that can open/close/lock its own doors and eject people through the T-top.
Oh Ethan and Amber, are any of the other girls even familiar enough with Amber to have made an opinion of her? They probably forgot she existed five minutes after she was gone.
The only people who saw her do that were herself, her Dad, Faz, and Dina and her parents, although I suppose the story got around quickly enough. The people in the hallway got to see Ruth hand him a little ass-whooping of her own.
So, unrelated to this particular strip, except maybe for Amber reinforcing that she has the second-dirtiest mouth in the comic…
Remember how I said that I was pretty sure that Billie had said “fuck” more than everyone else in the comic put together, but I hadn’t actually counted? Well, I actually counted.
Turns out that while Billie says “fuck” far, far more often than anyone else, she doesn’t actually say it more than everyone else. Though she made a valiant effort, popping DoA’s cherry with its first “fuck”, and quickly pulling away from the pack, and in fact stayed ahead of the combined rest of the characters for most of the comic’s run to date, from around Marcie’s first appearance until cluster F-strikes by Naomi and then Sal pulled everyone else ahead. Billie’s been a little off her game lately, too… I think love has mellowed her out.
Other interesting facts: The ladies, in general, even leaving Billie out, swear a lot more than the guys. Of the 45 F-bombs dropped over the course of the comic to date, only 4 came from guys. Billie (20!), Amber (5), and Sal (5) all individually beat that, and Sarah ties it.
Three of the four male F-bombs were from obvious villain characters, leaving one instance from Joe (when he’d just been punched in the face by Mike) as the only exception.
Four of Sal’s five F-bombs have been in the last 12 or so hours of comic time. This may be reflective of a general shift in her speech.
While Joyce never actually swears, unless “Hell” used in literal reference to the afterlife counts, she uses bowlderized swears like “frigging” more than I’d realized. Her language is probably actually stronger than Danny’s.
The only thing that could make this better is a series of pie charts.
I lived this summer with a (super tolerant and liberal) Christian who could teach Joyce all kinds of creative non-swearing. I’ve forgotten most of what I learned, but there’s “son of a biscuit,” “son of a gun,” “fiddlesticks” and more.
I’m wondering if it should count if fuck was used as a verb (as in, practically every time Naomi says it?) instead of a generic curse (Billie! And Sal.).
After this post, whenever anyone says ‘spoilers’ in their post, everyone else will immediately hear it in River Song’s voice.
Mainly because 1) it won’t just be me hearing it when I read it and 2) it’s an awesome way to get everyone who’s not familiar with River to look her up THEN get them addicted to Doctor Who!
Yes, that’s not very evil. I guess I’m Phil, Price of Insufficient Light and this is my spork.
I actually almost overlooked Naomi’s cluster strike because she was using the word literally, which I think says something interesting about how language processing works. Billie uses it literally once, too, complaining about Danny shooting her down, but all other uses are just general expletives.
I won’t swear that I didn’t miss other instances.
And while I was only actually counting “fuck”s, I think Amber is in the lead for the other major swear words, with Sal as her closest competition. Billie likes mashing the F-button, but Amber (as seen in today’s strip) has a little more variety in her swearing. Sal until recently has mostly been bowlderizing her F-bombs, but has seemed to be fine with saying “shit” all along.
There’s also the fact that Billie’s just been in almost twice as many strips as Amber… and about a quarter of Amber’s strips have been as Amazi-Girl. Amber swears like a sailor; Amazi-Girl doesn’t at all.
I did consider putting Joyce down for 0.25, but according to the hovertext that was a “fffffffffffffffffffffartsticks”, so I didn’t. (It would’ve raised the question of some other possible partials, too, which I didn’t feel like answering, so I just went with only counting complete “fuck”s.)
My opinion on these poll results.
Dina (49%, 1,258 Votes) …This shouldn’t even be an option in the Vote. Dina is like the Mascot for this universe. Everyone likes her. I like her. I wouldn’t say she’s my favorite but I only want to see good things happen to her. I feel like I voted for her out of obligation.
Amber (29%, 737 Votes) Considering all she goes through. . . Not to mention in this universe she’s actually badass. . .
Billie (24%, 620 Votes) Lol I’m surprised Billie and Ruth aren’t neck and neck in this poll. Considering all of the fans of this lesbian ship.
Joyce (23%, 593 Votes) Aneurysm Moment here, but yeah she did recently stand up for Dorothy.
Ruth (21%, 536 Votes) I hate having to pick between Billie and Ruth, but if I had to I’d actually pick Ruth over Billie considering her recent actions against Blaine being so awesome.
Walky (19%, 491 Votes) …It’s Walky! Couldn’t resist.
Sal (19%, 487 Votes) One of my favorites here. I’m curious to see what events we’ll see that involve her.
Dorothy (19%, 477 Votes) I like Dorothy. I hope she get’s more serious about Walky. Seems like that’s happening all on it’s own.
Mike (18%, 472 Votes) Hahaha Mike. I can’t wait to see him drunk in this universe. It has to happen! I only didn’t vote for him because I kind of feel like we haven’t seen enough of him. He’s only there for random moments to say something nasty and then disappear.
Sarah (11%, 285 Votes) If I had a fourth vote it would have gone here. Sarah did rescue Joyce from the Roofie bastard as well all no doubt remember. Seriously we should see more of her.
Ethan (6%, 144 Votes) I like Ethan, I want to see Ethan stop doing the reprehensible things he’s currently doing, but I cannot even judge his actions. With parents like his it really isn’t surprising.
Danny (5%, 129 Votes) Holy shit why am I not surprised it’s this low. I’m here other 129 people! Hell it was my first vote! Yes he’s an idiot, but he’s OUR idiot! And no one here can REALLY make fun of him about not noticing Amber is Amazigirl because NO ONE ELSE ON THE ENTIRE CAST HAS NOTICED EITHER!
Joe (4%, 102 Votes) Joe’s good for a laugh now and then but I haven’t seen him do or say anything really meaningful or touching so he’s among my least liked Characters after Joyce.
Roz (2%, 51 Votes) Who again?
Jacob (1%, 31 Votes) Ditto.
Mary (1%, 19 Votes) Oh I remember this girl…wasn’t she the least bongoy among the group of girls who have refused to associate with Sarah?
Huh, “awaiting moderation” even though I’ve got about 7-8 comments already…is it the lowercase d? Was it clearing all my history/cookies/etc?
Well, I might as well use this space to mention that you were thinking of Radiah. Or Sarah. Neither of which was even an option in the poll…odd considering Radiah’s had roughly as much plot impact as Mary. Possibly more.
The only reason Mary has slightly more hits on her tag is because she lives in the same ladies dorm wing as everyone else and gets to be a background extra more often.
I’ve said it before, but I’ll blame Danny for not being able to identify Amber as Amazi-Girl, because while no one else has either, Danny is the one person in the entire comic who has no excuse for that. Danny’s spent a lot of time up close and personal with both of Amber’s personae, which no one else in the comic can say. (Maybe Ethan and Mike; we don’t know how much exposure they might have had to Amazi-Girl before college. But Ethan knows. I suspect that Mike, being Mike, does too.)
Most of the cast hasn’t had significant exposure to either Amber. As Ethan points out here, Amber doesn’t even talk to the girls on her floor. She goes to classes, hides in her room, and fights crime as a costumed vigilante. Danny sees her, Dina sees her, occasionally her high school friends see her.
As Amazi-Girl, she hasn’t stuck around for more than a brief chat with anyone except Danny. But Danny she’s sat around playing video games, eating doughnuts, and friggin’ making out with.
Yeah, Ethan has pointed out before that he knows what keeps Amber busy; he reads the newspapers. I always assumed that meant he knows that she is Amazi-Girl.
Mike would only know if you didn’t want him to know.
I hope Dina gets some better characterization eventually, because right now all she really serves as in the story is a break from the drama within everyone else’s lives. Not that it’s a bad thing, but I feel like she could use more development as a character. :\
She is, though. Maybe not actually punching him, per se, but she’s really worried about what the fact that she punched him – and enjoyed punching him – says about her as a person.
Tsk, Amber. You have yet to ascend to the upper ranks of the Social Outcasts. A true recluse would not even think about her image others have of her. You have much to learn yet, young one.
Amber’s unwillingness to reveal her shame to Danny is part of why she can’t salvage her friendship with him. Danny might cut her a little slack if he knew her distressed circumstance when she forced her way into his family get together. (The other part is her failure to keep her relationships in one identity compartmentalized from her relationships in the other. Not much she can do about that beyond hope that part blows over.)
I predict it won’t. If she won’t tell him, the rumor mill can. Imagine him, having a very late breakfast after staying up all night imagining what horrible things might have prevented Amazi-girl from showing up. He over-hears Dorothy, Joyce, and Ethan having their lunch, and Amber’s name pops up.
Dorothy knows from her roommate that Amber was running for her life from her father. Not even Ruthless and Sierra’s dad could stop the man. Ethan mentions that Amber’s embarrassed that anyone had to find out that her father exists, explaining to Joyce that he’s kind of a bad-guy and she’s just trying to live a normal live away from him. She’d probably prefer if everybody just keeps everything quiet.
The conclusion (for Danny) is obvious.
Amber is a super-villain’s daughter. Given how glib she has been about claiming to know what Amazi-Girl would approve of, Amazi-Girl probably stops his vile crimes all the time. That’s the only way Amber could have crossed paths with Amazi-Girl often enough to know these things. Gosh, if Amazi-Girl doesn’t show up, soon, that means Amber will be his only lead for freeing his girlfriend from an awful deathtrap! How awkward!
Sure, things might not play out exactly like this, but I look forward to the canon version.
I would wonder if there’s enough there to get 50k words, but Robert Jordan managed to make a 270k word book out of everybody going “Hey, what’s that thing over there?”
I had to Google to find out what NaNoWriMo even was. Sounds like a nonprofit worthy of a link, so here is one.
I wasn’t really planning to step in to the realms of fanfic. This was more of a social physics analysis of the trajectories of simulated-person-particles (aka fictional characters). So, Amber has social-inertia preventing her from changing her interaction state with Danny unless acted upon by an external force, but there’s lots of social-Brownian motion around them to provide that.
Sorry. I geek out without warning. Still, imagine Amber was some evil overlord’s beautiful daughter and see if her dialogue linked in my earlier post would have changed. Danny may not be too bright, but his head has enough comic book plot templates to seize upon that erroneous pattern match. This sort of analysis works for short-term predictions, but doesn’t work so well for longer term as it isn’t trying to influence the final state of the characters.
A useful writer’s tool, perhaps, but hardly a full toolbox.
I know, make more tools by participating. Fearlessly write bad stuff so you learn how not to, and don’t worry that your earlier efforts won’t be as good as your later ones. I’m not making excuses, and will think about it.
If I had time, I’d probably look at Jason’s need to successfully teach Sal what the dx of an equation is if he wants to save face should his affair get exposed. As I told David at SDCCI last July, he must think she’s a differentiable function because he sure likes being tangent to her curves.
I wonder if Ethan is going to point out that Amber is trying to do what he is trying to do: come to college and be someone new, not viewed in the same terms as they were in high school. (Ethan is doing it in a horrible way though, pulling Joyce into his hot mess of a life; Amber just wants people not to know about her dad and define her identity in relation to him.)
It’s not really the same, really. Ethan is denying one of his core traits in order to fit in with people who, honestly, would happily accept him for who he is anyway, While Amber was just trying to avoid letting people know her dad is an asshole. Her dad being an asshole doesn’t actually have any bearing on who -she- is. She’s not supressing a core aspect of her personality for the sake of it.
Argh how long will DoA book two continue to be a “coming soon” attraction in the store? I check every day and its always coming soon. This is possibly the greatest and most diabolical form of torture ever conceived.
Oh believe me the next time a kick starter comes up I am going to wing money at it (well as much as I can, I’m a college student and only have a part time job, BUT NONE THE LESS CASH WILL BE WINGED) to get the next book asap. I just randomly stumbled upon these comics about a month ago so I didn’t get a chance for the first two kick starters and now I am being mocked by the store every day with its taunt of “coming soon” I won’t let that happen for the third book.
You and me both, Plume — although you can wing some money at him by purchasing one of the posters in the meantime. I got the “Joyce’s Nine” poster when it first came available; put it into an $8.00 frame from Michaels and it’s on the wall above my computer desk right now.
And btw, Willis — I’m not in Australia. Next flimsy excuse? (;p)
But other people are. I don’t put up a pledge level for just you, dude. If we’re talking just you, you can buy a book from my store any time you please. You don’t have to wait for a Kickstarter.
Ah actually I did that recently since the second book is still coming soon (I swear that store mocks me) I went ahead and have started getting some of the Shortpacked! books I think I started with book 2. By the way just on the off chance anything I say sounds like ungrateful complaining (I’ve been told often I have no manners whatsoever) I would like to say that isn’t the case and I really enjoy these comic series and any rude tones are completely accidental (no seriously, just this past week at work I was talking with one of my shift managers and they told me I was always being overly mouthy and not giving them the respect they deserved. I seriously had no idea! I thought I was just talking casually with them and joking around but apparently it came off as disrespectful and rude)
Second book some time early this month, since I want it to be up and available before Christmas shopping season. I just want to get a larger chunk of the Kickstarters out the door first.
Because people were discussing Amber above, I felt the desire to share a thought I had for a future strip. Use it or not, Willis.
Amber: “I like Danny, and he likes me, but he like Amazi-Girl more, and….”
Dina: “And you won’t tell him of your teenage superhero secret identity crisis.”
Amber: “How did you…?”
Dina: “… I read _Runaways_ for the dinosaur.”
My head-canon says that Dina knows Amber is Amazi-Girl, and either
• doesn’t care,
• realizes it’s no one’s business but Amber’s, or
• has been sworn to secrecy by Amber.
Hey, remember Walky and his craving for Chicken McNuggets? Turns out he’s not alone; Usain Bolt also pigged out on McNuggets during the 2008 Olympics — http://nypost.com/2013/11/03/usain-bolt-dishes-on-sex-squabbles-and-mcnuggets/
Of course, this is being reported by the New York Post, so the quality of the source is subject to opinion.
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He is right. But I know how she feels.
So is she. She just wants to be left alone and be herself. No matter what, in some ways she is now defined by her father.
You’ve got a point there. Now grow some hair and cover it up.
toupee… err touche.
PM is your Gravatar Sam from QC?
I think that’s Emily. Emily is SO CUTE.
QC yes, Sam no, the girl in question is Emily the spacy one.
So, basically the embodiment of everyone on this forum?
Pretty much.
Seems legit.
Well, how long will it be until “Amber, the girl who is best-friends with Amazi-girl”?
As long as Danny becomes,” Danny, that dork that’s obsessed with Amazi-girl”
I think he’s already pretty much that.
I think everyone had their own family asshole issues to deal with, Amber
Yours was the only one that got punched.
Although not the only one who deserved it.
Why not both?
Amber: The social recluse with the asshole dad.
That should stick through about junior year.
Ahhh! Nothing’s better than getting what’s bothering you off your chest.
Especially if it’s a Leech.
Or an octopus. :/
Or a mare.
Or Faz.
Or a snake.
Or your he… a…..r……….t
If she only knew how common having asshole parents actually is.
Just in this room alone there’s two kids with asshole parents.
But she doesn’t… Because she doesn’t talk to any of the girls on the floor. Yeah, you should listen to Ethan Amber.
Does this mean that DINA is the more socially well-adjusted of the two.
We haven’t seen her family do anything terrible yet, so there’s that.
Did Amber go hang out with the cool kids at the beach at the beginning of the semester?? DINA did . . .
True that!
By accident, If I may add
She stuck around and actually talked to folks. That’s more than the social recluse would do.
Dina also went shopping at the mall and got Sarah to open up about her own freshman year.
Ergo, Dina is one o the cool kids.
I…think something like this happened to me? I’m a huge nerd but never had much trouble with bullies, probably because I was too spacey to be much fun to mess with. I also ended up giving a lot of relationship advice in high school, because I had a reputation for thinking a lot.
My own relationships were universally train wrecks in high school but that’s beside the point!
But amber knows first hand that Ethan’s parents are assholes.
Yeah, or she should probably know just from Ethan, since she knows Ethan’s asshole mom.
Amber, you’re not social enough for all those girl’s opinions tho ever get back to you.
Boom. Brilliant armor piercing question from Ethan the bongo-boy-no-longer.
I wonder when Danny will stop being a bongo-boy.
He’s been doing it since 1997.
Danny graduated from being a bongo boy when he rebounded off the ex-girlfriend he followed into college after totally misjudging, to be with a superhero who looks exactly like a girl he won’t be with because she looks too much like his ex girlfriend.
His new title is “Doctor Punk Ass bongo, MF”
*totally misjudging her personality
Okay, I have to ask. What does MF stand for?
Master of Forestry, of course.
Of the “can’t see the forest for the trees” variety, I’m assuming, this being Danny.
#6 on the Carlin list.
Ethan was clearly saving up his conversational powers through the previous 2-3 strips in order to have plenty on reserve for just the moment when a piercing question would come in handy.
“Ethan the bongo-boy-no-longer.”
Ahahahahahahahaha NOPE
Also, is it brilliant, really? I mean, if anyone should know why someone might not want to center their identity around something they find unpleasant, it’d be Mr. “I don’t want to be gay at college” Siegel, shouldn’t it?
Yeah I was thinking they’d come pretty full circle from here.
I have exceedingly low standards. Boychik always had that effect on people.
“Amber, the Chick with teh Asshole Dad.”
Describes about half the cast.
Almost half the rest are guys with asshole parents.
I’d still count Danny as a chick.
You shouldn’t insult chicks like that.
i agree no need to insult the female populous by including a fool that has the super power of ruining everything… lets just call Danny an it.
Danny is a league all his own.
Danny is a Danny.
Half the cast is NOT named Amber.
The other half is, however.
I hate it when Ethan makes a valid argument
Even stopped clocks are right twice a day.
That was beautiful.
Once every hour if we aren’t discriminating about time zones.
Only if the clock moves around the globe as the day passes.
Oh come on! Haven’t you ever heard the phrase “Its five o’clock somewhere”? Same principle applies.
Yes, but it’s not five o’clock -there-, which means the clock is wrong.
No no, it’s just one of those fancy clocks that tells you the time in other countries
But the clock may have a sign that changes to all the timeZone names above it stating which it’s currently reading
Are we counting those 1/2 hour time zones and those 1/4 hour time zones? Because that’s better than once an hour.
To be fair, spiders are jerks.
‘Cept the tiny jumping ones. They’re cool.
As long as they don’t decide to make a home in your ear canal.
I don’t think I trust your avatar enough to believe such an assessment.
Huh, come to think of it, Amber really doesn’t seem to interact much with the other girls.
Amber doesn’t interact with anyone but Dina and Danny.
She likes people with D names.
YOU COULD SAY SHE LIKES THE D.
And when two people with D names are on either side of Amber, when you take their the letter of their first names it spells out D-A-D. COINCIDENCE?
Amber’s subconciousely livning through her obsession dad!
Well, she has a wider circle if we count people she has saved and/or been harrassed for an interview by as Amazigirl. Assuming ultra!!car doesn’t exist.
Give Joe time to get a car. Then we’ll see how good his engineering skills are in this timeline.
Even if the Dumbiverse UltraCar isn’t the full-on version from the Walkyverse, I can still see it being akin to KITT, with a rudimentary AI and a computer that can open/close/lock its own doors and eject people through the T-top.
And “U l t r a C a r” is censored?
We’re not to mention her, ya fool!
That’s why things are censored!
I’ll mention the Car that is Ultra all I want! Fight the power!
Besides, given Joe’s proclivities (not to mention his father’s), a Trans Am would be totally appropriate!
Oh Ethan and Amber, are any of the other girls even familiar enough with Amber to have made an opinion of her? They probably forgot she existed five minutes after she was gone.
Agreed. All of these people have their own problems that they are wrapped up with. Putting it bluntly, Amber, they’re just not that into you.
Everything isn’t about Amber.
But everything does have six degrees of separation from Amber, at absolute most.
As much as she thinks it is.
Well, Joyce seemed to dislike her on the basis she was female and seemed to know Ethan well.
YESTERDAY?! Christ, following webcomics as they actually come out is bizarre.
What? Talking to people instead of jumping to conclusions? That’s crazy. You’re crazy, Ethan.
Do not shame here Ethan
Oh, Amber. if there’s anything we know from the alternative universe, it’s that Ethan is best at handling your dad. You should go to him all the time.
Mike is the best at handling her dad. He even gave him the business after the fact!
Amber, a hikikomori-wannabe who secretly goies around as a vigilante and Dina, a possible aspie ninja who like dinosaurs a lot, THEY FIGHT CRIME!
Amazi-Girl and Dino-Ninja…that sounds perfect to me
I think Saban has bought the rights!
i hope not
If we are lucky, Shaft will be the ones to pick up this series.
I hope not. amber would look wired in noodly shaft style
Is Dina just staring at that dinosaur poster behind Ethan for this whole conversation?
Yes, sounds like Dina!
“Someday…”
“If only that dinosaur could talk. It is much more interesting than this Evan person”
Probably more like Amber the badass who beat up her asshole dad.
The only people who saw her do that were herself, her Dad, Faz, and Dina and her parents, although I suppose the story got around quickly enough. The people in the hallway got to see Ruth hand him a little ass-whooping of her own.
A bunch of people saw him bloody, and could infer it was Amber’s doing. But yeah, rumours and stuff will get around.
And she only got in one punch. Not exactly what I’d call a full-on beatdown.
She made him bleeed! She ruptured his face!
Blaine: “MY CLAVIN! You’ve ruptured my clavin!”
Wow, Amber skyrocketed in the polls after this strip. Also, massively disappointed that Walky is beating Sal now.
I’m happy for Amber and sad for Sal too. They were my first and second choice respectively, third one being the obvious Dina.
He was the more popular one!
(not any more!)
So, unrelated to this particular strip, except maybe for Amber reinforcing that she has the second-dirtiest mouth in the comic…
Remember how I said that I was pretty sure that Billie had said “fuck” more than everyone else in the comic put together, but I hadn’t actually counted? Well, I actually counted.
Turns out that while Billie says “fuck” far, far more often than anyone else, she doesn’t actually say it more than everyone else. Though she made a valiant effort, popping DoA’s cherry with its first “fuck”, and quickly pulling away from the pack, and in fact stayed ahead of the combined rest of the characters for most of the comic’s run to date, from around Marcie’s first appearance until cluster F-strikes by Naomi and then Sal pulled everyone else ahead. Billie’s been a little off her game lately, too… I think love has mellowed her out.
Other interesting facts: The ladies, in general, even leaving Billie out, swear a lot more than the guys. Of the 45 F-bombs dropped over the course of the comic to date, only 4 came from guys. Billie (20!), Amber (5), and Sal (5) all individually beat that, and Sarah ties it.
Three of the four male F-bombs were from obvious villain characters, leaving one instance from Joe (when he’d just been punched in the face by Mike) as the only exception.
Four of Sal’s five F-bombs have been in the last 12 or so hours of comic time. This may be reflective of a general shift in her speech.
While Joyce never actually swears, unless “Hell” used in literal reference to the afterlife counts, she uses bowlderized swears like “frigging” more than I’d realized. Her language is probably actually stronger than Danny’s.
I have way too much free time.
The only thing that could make this better is a series of pie charts.
I lived this summer with a (super tolerant and liberal) Christian who could teach Joyce all kinds of creative non-swearing. I’ve forgotten most of what I learned, but there’s “son of a biscuit,” “son of a gun,” “fiddlesticks” and more.
What we need now is a link to George Carlin’s “Seven Dirty Words” sketch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbZhpf3sQxQ
Faz, is that you?
I guess I’m short and Asian. :/ But I’m not a creep! I just like graphs.
That’s how it begins.
Congratulations, a graph: http://itswalky.tumblr.com/post/65868315889/john-campbell-went-through-and-counted-all-the
I’m wondering if it should count if fuck was used as a verb (as in, practically every time Naomi says it?) instead of a generic curse (Billie! And Sal.).
The graph is John’s. He linked it and I screencapped it.
Anyway, SPOILERS: Sarah will be playing catchup in the next 12 weeks. Amber a little bit.
I’m not sure how I missed that… Yay Sarah though.
After this post, whenever anyone says ‘spoilers’ in their post, everyone else will immediately hear it in River Song’s voice.
Mainly because 1) it won’t just be me hearing it when I read it and 2) it’s an awesome way to get everyone who’s not familiar with River to look her up THEN get them addicted to Doctor Who!
Yes, that’s not very evil. I guess I’m Phil, Price of Insufficient Light and this is my spork.
I actually almost overlooked Naomi’s cluster strike because she was using the word literally, which I think says something interesting about how language processing works. Billie uses it literally once, too, complaining about Danny shooting her down, but all other uses are just general expletives.
I won’t swear that I didn’t miss other instances.
And while I was only actually counting “fuck”s, I think Amber is in the lead for the other major swear words, with Sal as her closest competition. Billie likes mashing the F-button, but Amber (as seen in today’s strip) has a little more variety in her swearing. Sal until recently has mostly been bowlderizing her F-bombs, but has seemed to be fine with saying “shit” all along.
There’s also the fact that Billie’s just been in almost twice as many strips as Amber… and about a quarter of Amber’s strips have been as Amazi-Girl. Amber swears like a sailor; Amazi-Girl doesn’t at all.
I did consider putting Joyce down for 0.25, but according to the hovertext that was a “fffffffffffffffffffffartsticks”, so I didn’t. (It would’ve raised the question of some other possible partials, too, which I didn’t feel like answering, so I just went with only counting complete “fuck”s.)
My opinion on these poll results.
Dina (49%, 1,258 Votes) …This shouldn’t even be an option in the Vote. Dina is like the Mascot for this universe. Everyone likes her. I like her. I wouldn’t say she’s my favorite but I only want to see good things happen to her. I feel like I voted for her out of obligation.
Amber (29%, 737 Votes) Considering all she goes through. . . Not to mention in this universe she’s actually badass. . .
Billie (24%, 620 Votes) Lol I’m surprised Billie and Ruth aren’t neck and neck in this poll. Considering all of the fans of this lesbian ship.
Joyce (23%, 593 Votes) Aneurysm Moment here, but yeah she did recently stand up for Dorothy.
Ruth (21%, 536 Votes) I hate having to pick between Billie and Ruth, but if I had to I’d actually pick Ruth over Billie considering her recent actions against Blaine being so awesome.
Walky (19%, 491 Votes) …It’s Walky! Couldn’t resist.
Sal (19%, 487 Votes) One of my favorites here. I’m curious to see what events we’ll see that involve her.
Dorothy (19%, 477 Votes) I like Dorothy. I hope she get’s more serious about Walky. Seems like that’s happening all on it’s own.
Mike (18%, 472 Votes) Hahaha Mike. I can’t wait to see him drunk in this universe. It has to happen! I only didn’t vote for him because I kind of feel like we haven’t seen enough of him. He’s only there for random moments to say something nasty and then disappear.
Sarah (11%, 285 Votes) If I had a fourth vote it would have gone here. Sarah did rescue Joyce from the Roofie bastard as well all no doubt remember. Seriously we should see more of her.
Ethan (6%, 144 Votes) I like Ethan, I want to see Ethan stop doing the reprehensible things he’s currently doing, but I cannot even judge his actions. With parents like his it really isn’t surprising.
Danny (5%, 129 Votes) Holy shit why am I not surprised it’s this low. I’m here other 129 people! Hell it was my first vote! Yes he’s an idiot, but he’s OUR idiot! And no one here can REALLY make fun of him about not noticing Amber is Amazigirl because NO ONE ELSE ON THE ENTIRE CAST HAS NOTICED EITHER!
Joe (4%, 102 Votes) Joe’s good for a laugh now and then but I haven’t seen him do or say anything really meaningful or touching so he’s among my least liked Characters after Joyce.
Roz (2%, 51 Votes) Who again?
Jacob (1%, 31 Votes) Ditto.
Mary (1%, 19 Votes) Oh I remember this girl…wasn’t she the least bongoy among the group of girls who have refused to associate with Sarah?
Technically, using the stat that you yourself posted, Dina is not in a majority of readers’ Top Three.
A bunch of people saw him bloody, and could infer it was Amber’s doing. But yeah, rumours and stuff will get around.
Huh, that wasn’t supposed to go there.
I’m not surprised Billie’s more popular than Ruth. A lot of people still dislike Ruth for how she behaved for most of the comic.
Mary is this person:
http://www.dumbingofage.com/tag/mary/page/2/
And the biggest role she’s played in the story so far is this:
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2012/comic/book-2/02-choosing-my-religion/avoid/
Not at all surprised she got bottom of the list. Hell, I remember her being a terrible person in the walkyverse too.
Huh, “awaiting moderation” even though I’ve got about 7-8 comments already…is it the lowercase d? Was it clearing all my history/cookies/etc?
Well, I might as well use this space to mention that you were thinking of Radiah. Or Sarah. Neither of which was even an option in the poll…odd considering Radiah’s had roughly as much plot impact as Mary. Possibly more.
The only reason Mary has slightly more hits on her tag is because she lives in the same ladies dorm wing as everyone else and gets to be a background extra more often.
If you post multiple links, comments get flagged as potential spam until I come along to okay them.
I think it’s the links in the post that require it to wait for moderation.
I’ve said it before, but I’ll blame Danny for not being able to identify Amber as Amazi-Girl, because while no one else has either, Danny is the one person in the entire comic who has no excuse for that. Danny’s spent a lot of time up close and personal with both of Amber’s personae, which no one else in the comic can say. (Maybe Ethan and Mike; we don’t know how much exposure they might have had to Amazi-Girl before college. But Ethan knows. I suspect that Mike, being Mike, does too.)
Most of the cast hasn’t had significant exposure to either Amber. As Ethan points out here, Amber doesn’t even talk to the girls on her floor. She goes to classes, hides in her room, and fights crime as a costumed vigilante. Danny sees her, Dina sees her, occasionally her high school friends see her.
As Amazi-Girl, she hasn’t stuck around for more than a brief chat with anyone except Danny. But Danny she’s sat around playing video games, eating doughnuts, and friggin’ making out with.
Yeah, Ethan has pointed out before that he knows what keeps Amber busy; he reads the newspapers. I always assumed that meant he knows that she is Amazi-Girl.
Mike would only know if you didn’t want him to know.
Joe is not my favorite character either, but I can list at least two Joe moments that, while not touching, are definitely meaningful:
“Casual Bang” (http://www.dumbingofage.com/2012/comic/book-2/02-choosing-my-religion/casualbang/), and
“Manhood” (http://www.dumbingofage.com/2013/comic/book-3/01-if-the-shoes-split/manhood/).
I hope Dina gets some better characterization eventually, because right now all she really serves as in the story is a break from the drama within everyone else’s lives. Not that it’s a bad thing, but I feel like she could use more development as a character. :\
In my old MMORPG it was Boars.
Boars all the way down.
*sob*
Actually, I feel like Dina’s statement is only half true. Amber’s upset because her dad was here. She doesn’t seem too upset about punching him.
She is, though. Maybe not actually punching him, per se, but she’s really worried about what the fact that she punched him – and enjoyed punching him – says about her as a person.
Hope she gets with Mike here too.
I hope she sees the irony of wanting to leave behind something that coloured everyone’s perceptions of her back in her home town…
*Reads Alt Text*
When she’s not killing spiders she’s eating lasagna and shipping kittens to Abu Dhabi.
Amber: “I am no longer Amazi-Girl. I am… The Point.”
I missed The Point.
yo.
This is my comment. Not much else to say.
That was Random. (points)
Tsk, Amber. You have yet to ascend to the upper ranks of the Social Outcasts. A true recluse would not even think about her image others have of her. You have much to learn yet, young one.
Dina can be her sensei.
Amber’s unwillingness to reveal her shame to Danny is part of why she can’t salvage her friendship with him. Danny might cut her a little slack if he knew her distressed circumstance when she forced her way into his family get together. (The other part is her failure to keep her relationships in one identity compartmentalized from her relationships in the other. Not much she can do about that beyond hope that part blows over.)
I predict it won’t. If she won’t tell him, the rumor mill can. Imagine him, having a very late breakfast after staying up all night imagining what horrible things might have prevented Amazi-girl from showing up. He over-hears Dorothy, Joyce, and Ethan having their lunch, and Amber’s name pops up.
Dorothy knows from her roommate that Amber was running for her life from her father. Not even Ruthless and Sierra’s dad could stop the man. Ethan mentions that Amber’s embarrassed that anyone had to find out that her father exists, explaining to Joyce that he’s kind of a bad-guy and she’s just trying to live a normal live away from him. She’d probably prefer if everybody just keeps everything quiet.
The conclusion (for Danny) is obvious.
Amber is a super-villain’s daughter.
Given how glib she has been about claiming to know what Amazi-Girl would approve of, Amazi-Girl probably stops his vile crimes all the time. That’s the only way Amber could have crossed paths with Amazi-Girl often enough to know these things. Gosh, if Amazi-Girl doesn’t show up, soon, that means Amber will be his only lead for freeing his girlfriend from an awful deathtrap! How awkward!
Sure, things might not play out exactly like this, but I look forward to the canon version.
NaNoWriMo is RIGHT NOW. Get on it. You have enough material!!!!
I would wonder if there’s enough there to get 50k words, but Robert Jordan managed to make a 270k word book out of everybody going “Hey, what’s that thing over there?”
I had to Google to find out what NaNoWriMo even was. Sounds like a nonprofit worthy of a link, so here is one.
I wasn’t really planning to step in to the realms of fanfic. This was more of a social physics analysis of the trajectories of simulated-person-particles (aka fictional characters). So, Amber has social-inertia preventing her from changing her interaction state with Danny unless acted upon by an external force, but there’s lots of social-Brownian motion around them to provide that.
Sorry. I geek out without warning. Still, imagine Amber was some evil overlord’s beautiful daughter and see if her dialogue linked in my earlier post would have changed. Danny may not be too bright, but his head has enough comic book plot templates to seize upon that erroneous pattern match. This sort of analysis works for short-term predictions, but doesn’t work so well for longer term as it isn’t trying to influence the final state of the characters.
A useful writer’s tool, perhaps, but hardly a full toolbox.
I know, make more tools by participating. Fearlessly write bad stuff so you learn how not to, and don’t worry that your earlier efforts won’t be as good as your later ones. I’m not making excuses, and will think about it.
If I had time, I’d probably look at Jason’s need to successfully teach Sal what the dx of an equation is if he wants to save face should his affair get exposed. As I told David at SDCCI last July, he must think she’s a differentiable function because he sure likes being tangent to her curves.
This is perfect
I approve
I wonder if Ethan is going to point out that Amber is trying to do what he is trying to do: come to college and be someone new, not viewed in the same terms as they were in high school. (Ethan is doing it in a horrible way though, pulling Joyce into his hot mess of a life; Amber just wants people not to know about her dad and define her identity in relation to him.)
It’s not really the same, really. Ethan is denying one of his core traits in order to fit in with people who, honestly, would happily accept him for who he is anyway, While Amber was just trying to avoid letting people know her dad is an asshole. Her dad being an asshole doesn’t actually have any bearing on who -she- is. She’s not supressing a core aspect of her personality for the sake of it.
It could be worse Amber. They could think of you as the girl who’s asshole dad resulted in her dissociative disorder.
Or the girl with the asshole dad and a creepy half-brother….oh wait.
Slaying spiders? Bah! I SLAY GIANTS!
Argh how long will DoA book two continue to be a “coming soon” attraction in the store? I check every day and its always coming soon. This is possibly the greatest and most diabolical form of torture ever conceived.
But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but Willis only.
sooooooon
I’m waiting for the next Kickstarter when one of the level rewards will probably be that you get all three books.
Crazy like a fox, that’s me.
I wouldn’t. I can’t fit three Dumbing of Age books into a flat-rate priority envelope.
Flat-rate priority box?
If the level was high enough, I bet you could find a way around it.
A priority flat rate box to Australia is $60.
Oh believe me the next time a kick starter comes up I am going to wing money at it (well as much as I can, I’m a college student and only have a part time job, BUT NONE THE LESS CASH WILL BE WINGED) to get the next book asap. I just randomly stumbled upon these comics about a month ago so I didn’t get a chance for the first two kick starters and now I am being mocked by the store every day with its taunt of “coming soon” I won’t let that happen for the third book.
You and me both, Plume — although you can wing some money at him by purchasing one of the posters in the meantime. I got the “Joyce’s Nine” poster when it first came available; put it into an $8.00 frame from Michaels and it’s on the wall above my computer desk right now.
And btw, Willis — I’m not in Australia. Next flimsy excuse? (;p)
But other people are. I don’t put up a pledge level for just you, dude. If we’re talking just you, you can buy a book from my store any time you please. You don’t have to wait for a Kickstarter.
Ah actually I did that recently
since the second book is still coming soon (I swear that store mocks me) I went ahead and have started getting some of the Shortpacked! books I think I started with book 2. By the way just on the off chance anything I say sounds like ungrateful complaining (I’ve been told often I have no manners whatsoever) I would like to say that isn’t the case and I really enjoy these comic series and any rude tones are completely accidental (no seriously, just this past week at work I was talking with one of my shift managers and they told me I was always being overly mouthy and not giving them the respect they deserved. I seriously had no idea! I thought I was just talking casually with them and joking around but apparently it came off as disrespectful and rude)
Second book some time early this month, since I want it to be up and available before Christmas shopping season. I just want to get a larger chunk of the Kickstarters out the door first.
That’s fair.
By the way do you have to mail all these things out yourself?
yup
Geez that must take forever O_O. Ok I promise to be more patient.
Because people were discussing Amber above, I felt the desire to share a thought I had for a future strip. Use it or not, Willis.
Amber: “I like Danny, and he likes me, but he like Amazi-Girl more, and….”
Dina: “And you won’t tell him of your teenage superhero secret identity crisis.”
Amber: “How did you…?”
Dina: “… I read _Runaways_ for the dinosaur.”
Dina: “Besides, I know about your…emm..”nightly activities”…”
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2011/comic/book-2/01-pajama-jeans/gone/
My head-canon says that Dina knows Amber is Amazi-Girl, and either
• doesn’t care,
• realizes it’s no one’s business but Amber’s, or
• has been sworn to secrecy by Amber.
Dina knows Amber is Amazi-Girl, but hasn’t figured out this is something unusual, since she doesn’t understand *anything* other people do.
Hot-damn, that rack. It’s like Velma with attitude.
Damn it, Sigurther. You just had to say that, didn’t you?
velma has attitude
I was just about to say, “Isn’t ‘Velma with attitude’ just regular Velma?” And then I saw what you wrote, Willis. Stop using your psychic powers.
Amber looks like she’s almost ready to punch Dina in panel 1. I hope she never does.
Hey, remember Walky and his craving for Chicken McNuggets? Turns out he’s not alone; Usain Bolt also pigged out on McNuggets during the 2008 Olympics — http://nypost.com/2013/11/03/usain-bolt-dishes-on-sex-squabbles-and-mcnuggets/
Of course, this is being reported by the New York Post, so the quality of the source is subject to opinion.
You know what we never saw amber’s mom again or she would be known as the daughter of the mom who did the walk of shame of freshman family visit day