Now Let’s Go Commit Something Mildly Subversive Which, at Worst, Will Serve as a Humanizing Anecdote and Not as Anything Truly Threatening to the Power Structures at Hand, aka Dumbing of Age Book 9 is now up for Kickstartering!
Book 9 is 216 pages! It’s got the usual strip commentary! It’s got bonus art and rejected strips! It’s got 24 Patreon-only strips! It’s got a foreword by Dork Tower‘s John Kovalic!!!
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Becky just wants to shoot the messenger
alt-text just wants to JINX *punch*
f’real tho, feels incoming =C
Shields up, red alert!
becky <3< the messenger
homestuck illegal
Otterboy1 c3< becky – the messenger
At this point I don’t understand why Becky isn’t suddenly concerned about Joyce.
Yeah that was my thought too
’cause they’d be WAY more wrecked if it was Joyce. This feels like bad news, not tragic news. (Face it, none of them care ’bout their kidnapper XD)
Get ready for some waterworks.
There Willis, I waited until after midnight so you didn’t have to update your post.
bless
Is Diane, Ana? Lol
Lol, no. I’ve been debating doing it, then I saw Willis’s post of “Hey, we’re this far away…can we not make it before midnight please?” And decided, “Yep, I accept this as my sign, but I’ll pretend I’m nice and wait.” Second I saw it was officially up, went and pledged.
I feel like I need context
On Willis’s twitter, an hour before update time last night, he posted that we were $117 away from unlocking Becky magnets. He then begged for us to not get past this milestone so he didn’t have to suddenly write an update post. I obliged in waiting, but also accepted it as the “you really wanna back this, you keep coming back to it, you know you want it…” devil whisper in my ear.
Walky is conspicuously absent
He’s probably at the front doorway, watching for any moronic activity.
Neither are Joyce and Amazi-Amber. Joyce is probably in the basement with Ross, and Amazi-Amber is standing guard over Blaine and the rest of the mooks.
Walky is probably raiding the pantry, looking for Nachitos.
He started to leave, but then he hung back and stayed inside. We haven’t actually seen him on-panel after he said he was leaving, but Amazi-Girl asked him a question after that.
About what happened to Ross when Joyce couldn’t explain.
Or she just went downstairs to look herself. We saw her coming back up.
Never mind. Misread.
Huh, kinda thought they’d go further than the porch. Though I notice Walky isn’t in the strip; I imagine he’s just continuing to high tail it out of there.
Either that, or he’s writing a very long negative review for this Airbnb.
Walky ran his ass all tbe way tk the library to get on a computer and start writing it.
Walky knows where the library is?
Why yes! (Note the name on the building)
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2019/comic/book-9-comic/04-vote-for-robin/whoareyou/
Good call.
Honestly, not too too surprising, all told. Ethan’s gotta be super-worried about Amber, Sarah and Dorothy about Joyce, and Dina knew Becky was on her way. And if they have called 911 by now (since the immediate threat’s resolved,) they’ll probably be needed there for statements. (Not that Walky’s not worried about them either, I’m sure. Wouldn’t be surprised if we see him next strip.)
Yeah, I have a feeling Walky’s just inside the door, helping Amazi-ber keep an eye on the goons.
Walky stopped leaving after Joyce pointed out that Becky was on her way. That’s how AG was able to ask him in the next strip what happened to the mustache guy.
That’s fair, but I’m going to keep imagining him angrily typing on a library computer until he shows back up in-comic.
Oh, that’s confusing. Your avatars, that is. I thought you were talking to yourself for a moment.
Unfortunate side effect of the random avatar thing.
It’s made worse by the fact that I can’t ever remember which email I used when I post, so you will sometimes see two different Dr. T’s.
Maybe someone did finally call 911 and they were told by the 911 dispatcher to wait there until the officers/paramedics arrived?
Carol and the Church probably thought of Blaine as a literal godsend when he covered the remainder of the bail. I wonder how they will react when they learn that they got Ross out only to be murdered by the one they hd relied on.
Obviously it’s Becky’s fault.
Oh, yeah, this is far from over. Plus, we don’t know the whereabouts of Blaine.
Laſt we ſaw him, he was duct-taped on the floor with Amazi-Girl’s cape over his head (and alſo duct-taped to his head), and Sarah was wondering if he was even still breathing.
Amazi-Girl has him held with her cape taped over his head.
Damn straight. The only thing fundangelicals are better at than avoiding personal responsibility is blaming others for their own faults.
“Now everyone, sometimes people seem like they were a gift from god only to turn into false prophets. It’s easy to blame or scorn them but that’s when you have to support the false prophets the most because the alternative was a female president who wouldn’t have immediately banned people from scary foreign places. So cheer up while we look through the necronomicon to resurrect Ross to have him kidnap Becky again”
-church group probably on day one of when this news breaks
Hey, they can excuse kidnapping a teenager at gun point but they draw the LINE at necromancy and other witchcraft!
But Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead (John 11:1-44), as well as the son of the widow of Naim (Luke 7:11-17) and the daughter of Jairus (Mark 5:21-43). So as long as they can convince themselves they are following the teaching of Christ (and trust me, they could!) they would be OK with doing it by whatever means were necessary.
Jesus is the son of god, he’s allowed. Pretty sure them trying is blasphemy or something.
In their eyes, it’s only blasphemous if it’s not them doing it.
That’s right. They’re doing it FoR tHe RiGhT rEaSoNs!
If you’re that wrapped up in partisan politics you DESERVE what you get. the moment electoral politics gets to the point of being as extreme as sports-fandom or religious fundamentalism, it’s time to stop.
We past that stage LONG ago
Yeah, a half-asleep kid and an emotionally traumatized kid, unsupported by their friends in that house… did anyone count the bros this time? Who wants to bet on whether Becky runs in to find Joyce held at knife-point?
I ſuppoſe I’ll take that bet; how many internets are we talking here?
Something has happened to your “s” key Daniel. On my computer your post looks like “I luppole I’ll take that bet”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_s
It looks too much like an f and I keep finding Daniel’s comments hard to read because of it.
Becky’s going to need a bat in case the psychos are alert.
Luckily Sarah still has one.
Amazi-Girl is there. So fat chance of that happening.
Why would you take bets when patrons can just read tomorrow’s comic? Seems like a good way to lose money.
Panels 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 as the backside teaser for the book version? I don’t know.
This feels like it’s going to be a “we lose Becky forever because she inherits her house back in La Porte, Indiana which is like, three and a half hours away” storyline.
Yeah, Becky’s just begging to go back to La Porte, Indiana and to that house in particular.
#ſarcaſm
She can sell the house and not have to go into debt to go to college…including moral debt of being Robin’s campaign manager. Or even better, rent it out for now and then sell it later when she’s ready to settle down somewhere else. Now imagining Becky the landlady.
Aw yes, I do want to see that.
Maybe she could sell it, and afford college and an apartment without needing to work for Robin?
^ THAT would be nice.
Nah, if it hasn’t foreclosed yet she’s definitely selling it. Nothing there but ghosts, remember?
And, you know, a good amount of neighbors who think she’s going to hell because she likes chicks. Not all neighbors, not everyone’s in their cult, but enough.
At least if she sells it she can get any legal documents and other personal items she wants back.
Bearing in mind Willis’s own real-life history — what are the odds Ross’s will gives his house to his church?
Better than the odds of him leaving it to Becky. She’s probably not even in his will anymore.
I seriously doubt that Ross even has a will. That requires a little foresight and thoughtfulness, which I don’t see coming from a sentient toe.
If anyone has given their house to the church, I would say it would be Carol. If nothing else, she probably did so to use as collateral to bail Ross out. In fact, we might see that be another source of conflict in this story.
You’re right about it requiring foresight but he might have given it a little thought after his wife died. I also am probably still giving him too much credit.
Holy crap- did that happen to Willis?!
Where has Willis shared these details of his life? I was really startled when others said that Carol is essentially his mother, that she was the driving force. Like, how do these people know this? Patreon or because they’ve been reading for 20 years?
Been reading for years, mostly.
Some stuff’s come out on Twitter over time as well. Occasional comments here.
He’s shared a lot of his personal life, especially as it relates to DoA, first on Tumblr back when that was a thing, and now on Twitter. (Warning: 90% of his twitter is transformers and/or his toy collection, 3% is cute things his kids do.)
One of the things he shared was that his mom gave his childhood house to her church. Not in her will, she literally donated her house to the church. The church eventually went bankrupt, the house apparently went to creditors.
Thanks and yikes! Fundagelical christianity brings out the worst in people.
I’m glad Willis found a life that he doesn’t need her house. Instead he has personal satisfaction and a bazillion people who care about him.
Thanks again.
Uhmm no one has called the cops yet?
The sun was rising in the last strip, which was only a couple minutes after AG cleared the house. Sun’s still rising here. Even if Dorothy or Walky took the cellphone and called while AG went down to check, I’m not sure they’d have arrived yet.
We don’t necessarily know they didn’t, but I imagine they will when it’s time to go. They did know Becky was on her way.
Asking about it every single day makes it more likely to happen.
Like what happened to Mike, right??
Mike’s due to show up with the police any second now.
Not judging from the condition he was in in the poſt-fall flaſhback, he’s not.
That was before enough questions were asked.
True.
I’m guessing they have or will shortly, they just haven’t mentioned it yet. They’d probably want to tell her about her dad probably being dying in the basement (and whether or not they’ve called an ambulance) first.
No one is calling the cops. No one is EVER calling the cops. Sarah said not to.
It’s no bad news, Becky!
It’s only dad news!
Ok, I’ll show myself out…
it’s bad dad news
Hopefully not dead dad news.
It’s Toedead news!
In Becky’s case, that’s a subset of bad news.
So I have to imagine that Amazi-Girl and Walky are still in the house together, likely watching over the goons and Blaine, tying them up and what not, while Joyce is in the basement with Ross.
I pity pretty much everyone involved here. Well of the innocents I mean. They’re going to all need therapy or counseling of some kind after witnessing a murder as well as the complicated feelings to knowing that one of the kidnappers ending up holding off the Murderer long enough for them to more or less escape in the first place.
have they called an ambulance or the police already?
Have you?
Several times. They’ve blocked my number and I’m due in court.
But did you ask them about Mike while you were at it?
Why would Becky come without the calvary? That seems like really bad judgement on her part
Hey, in her defenſe, it’s rather difficult to lug around Calvary without the aid of heavy machinery.
Now, as for cavalry…
Your majesty, stop trying to make long s happen. It’s not going to happen.
You say that like I haven’t been quietly hissing to myself each time it’s been used tonight.
Apologies, brain do weird things when it’s been up for a day and a half w/o basically sleep (semester finals week on top of everything else going on – including, possibly, having to move by June – just now getting a chance to doze off for real).
This is a less sinister reason than I’d hoped was motivating that. 😛
Sleep well and I hope everything seems a bit more manageable in the morning (because sometimes sleep makes a difference even if nothing else has changed)!
Becky wants people to not get hurt. She went with Ross the last time because it was the only way she could de-escalate the situation and make sure that no one got hurt.
She thinks her dad is going to try to church the gay out of her. She has no way to know that she was just a pawn in the scheme of someone she doesn’t even know exists.
So of course she’s not going to call in the cavalry, because that’s how people get hurt and she doesn’t want that.
She had all those guards but amazi-girl beat them up
Their inexistent rivalry grows by the day
If Becky can tell there is bad news but can’t see Joyce, she would likely start freaking that something happened to her. Worrying about Dads is less likely; they are supposed to be indestructible.
Oh, sweetie. That wacky shield is gonna break in a big way at some point today I’m guessing.
Comedy isn’t a reliable source of coping in a healthy way. It is just to deal with pain, like aspirins.
Oh Becky, comedy isn’t going to protect your heart.
It has so far
We still don’t know about Mike by the way.
Sure we do. He’s in the hospital being guarded by some nice Korien gentlemen.
Koreans as well.
There’s a nice Corian countertop, too.
Becky gets the truth straight, Dorothy gets to be the responsible one. Everyone wins*.
*)Except the ones who are dead
But it’s no use crying over every mistake.
Now I want cake…
Know that science is fun, glad their are no shot guns on the people who are still alive.
oh man this is gonna suck
Becky stop antagonizing Dorothy, dammit
You know, right now I don’t begrudge her any coping mechanism, no matter how petty
That’s basically how I felt. I initially was “For Real Becky?!” then thought about all that’s happened, and what’s about to happen and decided, ya know, naw, you can have this.
Sarah: Yeah, Dorothy, stop being so mean to Becky.
Dorothy: But… I… we don’… she… RRRGH! *storms off*
Becky: Dang, that girl’s got some anger issues.
I still don’t get why Becky keeps pushing this idea that her and Dorothy don’t get along. It makes no sense, they clearly do get along just fine.
It’s more of a joke to her I think, because Joyce adores Dorothy it was a jealousy/nemesis issue. She may think she’s a perfectly nice person, but she’s still competition for Joyce’s attention.
Jealousy over Joyce. At least that’s where it started. Hard to tell if that’s still it, or if she just thinks it’s funny now.
Is a joke
She just can’t help it lol. Poor Dotty
Obviously there’s a physical explanation for everyone but Becky being in shadow (she’s the only one facing east soon after first light), but I can’t help but find it symbolic as well.
Becky hasn’t really seen how the situation’s going to affect her yet.
This is getting increasingly epilogue-y. Is Willis going to end DoA and start another strip? More probably, he will reboot DoA after Book 10. But, which way will he go?
The conventional way: with Blaine and Ross out, other parents will take the role of main villains (Carol & Linda very probably).
The Star Wars way: somehow the Head Alien, Monkey Master and scifi hijinks will appear and please Walkyverse fans.
The Shortpacked! way: Rose and the new Slipshine character leave college and go to work somewhere with Mike. The rest of the cast reappear gradually later. The strip writes itself from the daily news, because no fiction can be wackier than current reality.
The comic buffer is still growing(Now going to August) so I don’t think it’s that, unless THAT’S the length of the epilogue…
This chapter is a “season finale”. We’re seeing some of the major conflict from the first 10 years wrap up, and we might see a time skip, but there’s still plenty we haven’t really dug into yet.
Ruth and Billie still need to recover.
Amber and Stacy still have legal matters to deal with.
Most notably, there will be repercussions back in La Porte as the Browns deal with the fallout of this whole affair. Hank, Joyce, and Carol will have conflict to sort out. Becky is likely to be the executrix of her father’s estate and will have to deal with that if he dies in this arc.
Blaine has the law and Gramps to answer to.
Is Fuckface okay?
And Joyce doesn’t know she has a sister, yet!
In plot points going forward after this season finale and its fallout, we still have:
– Amber and Sal joining roller derby (if Willis has been sitting on models for as long as they implied when it happened, there are Plans, and at least Sal’s not going to leave even if Amber’s in some way sidelined)
– Walky’s grades, Sal’s grades, and the related drama of Linda Walkerton’s expectations for the twins (or lack thereof) and emotional/financial abuse.
– Ruth and ‘Sir’, who was DEFINITELY not set up to only appear in the fallout of Ruth’s depression being revealed.
– The fallout of Joyce and Sarah’s manipulation of Jacob to get back at Raidah.
– Malaya’s continuing gender questioning and, also on the Malaya axis, Mary’s one-sided rivalry with Malaya.
– The ongoing arc of Dorothy’s overfocus on studying and academics as a way to her goals at the expense of leisure time (which appears to be relaxed, but I’d be surprised if she’s at equilibrium now,) and her eventual transfer to Yale, successful or not.
– Stacy and Richard (Joe’s dad) were ‘getting pretty serious’ and he’s helping out with their legal fees. Joe is damn certain Richard doesn’t know how to do monogamy and that insistence that Stacy’s different, THIS time will work out screams of magical thinking Joe’s probably seen before to me. (Once again, I give that one til Thanksgiving at latest to get Incredibly Awkward.)
– Joe’s continuing arc of Learning To Respect Women, But Also Himself. He’s backslid, but I don’t think that’s gonna last forever. Especially since he’s going to be damn concerned about Joyce once he finds out.
– Robin DeSanto’s election – even if Becky gets to resign after becoming executor of Ross’s estate (and that shit takes MONTHS to resolve, my grandfather passed away at the beginning of January and we still haven’t closed his estates, and we’d already dealt with his house,) her BEING involved means that if Robin somehow wins, there will be angst.
– Dina, Becky, and developing intimacy when one of you is gray-ace, and the other’s still sorting through what parts of your faith need discarding and what parts you take value in. A much softer arc, but hey, we needed some fluff here.
– Ethan and Danny (and Mike, if he survives) and the love triangle with a side of Concern For Amber.
So yeah, there’s a fair bit for season two just focusing on established plot threads.
On that note about the grades – Mama Walkerton’s coming to visit tomorrow, comic time.
Won’t that be nice? 🙂
I can hear the “SALLY HOW COULD YOU LET YOUR BROTHER GET KIDNAPPED?!” already…
My eye is twitching in anticipation.
I would love her to be also mad at Dean McHenry for letting Walky be kidnapped in HIS campus. She could threaten to re-marry him.
TBF, *I’d* be cowed by that threat.
The New Comic is Dumbing of Age, After Mid-terms
Becky’s a charm here. Going into the old, practised rhythms of conversation can be quite the balm when times are troubled.
Okay, what about Blaine? Did he get captured by or did he escape?
He’s hog-tied and has Amazi-Girl’s cape taped over his head, on top of all his other injuries. If only from oxygen deprivation, he’s not going anywhere.
“Why do you hate her?”
“She refuses to admit that we’re enemies!”
Bikkerin is like Bufferin, but specifically formulated to work against headaches that follow arguments with friends.
Does that house/retaining wall/steps look familiar to anyone? DW is usually pretty accurate with his use of local visuals, but I’m stuck.
Maybe he didn’t want to make the location of the murder house too obvious.
Coma stairs, no problem, that was a public place. As is, kinda, Robin’s/Becky’s place.
But actual people are probably living at the murder house, so maybe he made it a bit more generic.
It looks like a generic craftsman-style house to me. Millions of them went up after WWII. You could even mail-order one through Sears in the ’30s!
That’s why you’re supposed to capitalize Craftsman, it’s a Brand Name.
I’m hoping ToeDad’s comatose so he can wake up one day and realize the error of his fundie ways. But that’s very likely a pipe dream at this point.
Ross’s head injury causes him to lose 75% of his brain power.
The current Administration hears about this and puts him in charge of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
I just spit my lunch all over my screen. Heehee!
“Just give it to me straight, Dot. Y’know the opposite of me.”
I love how everyone is sad for Becky. She has good friends.
Panel 7 Dina expressionless as usual, but her hat looks VERY concerned.
Dina’s hat should copy her expressions, like the little duck head on Wade’s life preserver on Garfield and Friends.
“your dad was secretly bailed out of prison by a mafioso who duped him into kidnapping a bunch of college students, then he was killed with a hammer by that mafioso trying to defend us.” The good news is this proves that he wasn’t BAD, just insane and stupid…so…there’s that…
Ross wasn’t trying to defend the kids. Blaine ballpeened Ross out of fury because Ross let Amber go in the belief that she was AG, and using AG to bring in Becky was their plan. The only person Ross was trying to defend was himself.
I trust Amazi-Girl will be smart enough to hide the costume and become Amber again before the police finally show up?
Did anyone call a cop? A doctor?
Again, I think the fact no one is calling the police is a storybreaker for a lot of people.
Even with Sarah’s justification.
Fun fact: I’m assuming Blaine’s bail money for Toedad will exceed the entirety of Amber’s college fund.
Which will be forfeit now.
The bail is to insure you show up for your court date, but I’m reasonably sure being dead obliviates that requirement, so the bail should be returned. Not a lawyer and don’t play one on TV but would be really surprised if bail was forfeit. The cost of Blaine’s lawyers will exceed the bail though.
Just thinking Amber no longer having money for college seems like a reasonable twist.
I shouldn’t be so emotionally invested – I guess that’s a testament to Willis’ storytelling and art – but I hope there’s further fall-out coming for both Joyce’s church and her mom. But I’m bitter lie that.