Looking foward to the comments making this into a joke/second hand embarassment and/or trying to justify it. :/
At least Ethan will be appropiately mad about this.
Honestly, this goes beyond “danning it up” and goes straight into “being an asshole”. More than that, this is arguably far worse than anything Mike himself has said within the comic. At least the worst of Mike’s comments could still be taken as being critical, Danny’s comment here is just flat out spiteful (regardless of whether one views it as warranted it or not) and inappropriate (given that it’s to one of Mike’s best friends, however awkward such friendship may be).
We all have horrible fleeting inner thoughts from time to time. We just usually realise them and think ‘no, that’s horrible’ internally. If you could hear everyone’s thoughts (like in British comedy Peep Show) people would appear much less nice seeming individuals.
The Danning it here is speaking that thought out loud before he’s had time to think about it and reflect on how it’s horrible.
He could still also really easily save this by saying something like “because wouldn’t it be better for everything to calm down a bit so he wakes up in a calm supportive environment rather than having everyone and their parents stressed up to a hundred? “
“We all have horrible fleeting inner thoughts from time to time. ”
Well, I don’t [at least, not within the format in question], but I’m also neuroatypical, so I guess that doesn’t mean much relative to your point.
That said, your point does still fall through (if it’s intended as any kind of argument against my points), given that 1: It’s an act of “assholery” by common interpretation once it has left his mouth and 2: It’s still “out-Mikeing Mike”.
So if we acknowledge your point, the only difference is that he’s now not only being an OverMiked Asshole, but he’s also Danning it up. Which really just makes it worse, I think. 😛
That said, the fact that he’s no doubt going to stumble and make things worse [y’know, by not using your suggested recovery or any of the others commenters on this page have provided] immediately after this is definitely where “Danning it up” will become a certain attribution. So we’ll definitely get to that, even if we haven’t already. So for now, I think we can just focus on the assholery, without the danning getting “left out” any. 😛
And to avoid any sort of miscommunication, do reread my original post and note that I wasn’t intentionally attributing anything towards Danny’s character, as my focus was on the interpretation of his actions. Though once on the topic, I can’t argue the attribution to character either, given how unfamiliar the premise is to me.
From my perspective, your agument would boil down to “everyone’s an asshole sometimes”. Well, though I guess if we put it that broadly, I can’t argue it regardless of whether we’re focusing on normative or abberational states.. 😛
Oh, hey, no, I got this:
“Everyone’s a little bit
Assholeish, sometimes.
Doesn’t mean we go around committing
to Dannyish paradigms“
My argument was more on the lines of that we all have thoughts that we don’t say out loud because we don’t want to upset people. You *must* have had those before right? Those of us with ASD might struggle a little, but there’s generally a filter between thoughts arising from the subconscious and which of those we articulate. Very few of us will openly vocalise everything we think without filter.
Whether its thinking that a person who won’t stop talking about something you’re not interested in would shut up, that a person you don’t like deserved something bad that happened to them etc. we do all have thoughts occasionally we know aren’t the nicest and wouldn’t actually vocalise. None of us are saints – it’s our actions, not our thoughts we should be judged on.
Mike has been an ass to Danny in the past, and Danny is very jealous and annoyed by his relationship with Ethan (which was supposedly actually what Mike what aiming to do) so it’s clear why this thought went through his mind.
But he clearly had no intention of vocalising it. The look of surprise on his face in the last panel clearly shows that. That’s why I think this is Danning it rather than being an asshole. It wasn’t deliberate, he didn’t intend to upset anyone, his filter just broke at the worst possible moment in true Danny fashion and he’s as shocked by it as Ethan.
It’s the difference between deliberately running down someone in your car, and accidentally screwing up and slamming the gas rather than the brake when you see them. Neither are great, but the latter makes you an idiot rather than a villain.
I’m nor sure it’s spiteful. Danny isn’t intending to be mean (even to mike) he’s just, stupidly, stating his initial thought. While not wishing harm on anyone I think most people know one or two people they wish they just didn’t have to be around anymore.
The comment itself is spiteful, that just can’t be argued.
You can argue his inner rationality, but if we were to factor that in, then we’d also have to excuse anything Mike has ever said as being entirely okay- after all, unlike with Danny here, we’ve actually seen implication that Mike has constructive purposes for at least some of the things he’s said.
Or at the very least, is annoyed enough with hypocrisy that he has some form of justification. In other words, Danny’s comment ends up being harder to justify than anything Mike has presented, while coming across far worse than anything Mike has presented.
And, again, regardless of the intentions of either individual, their comments have had/will have negative consequences because of how the comments are interpreted. There’s no arguing that this comment isn’t readily interpretable in a very, very bad way.
I have longed for some people to fall into comas or even die, because their personal bullshit seemed to require my involvement somehow and they would not take “You are a colossal ass and you exhaust me with your relentless assishness, go away” as an answer. I didn’t hate them. I didn’t want them to be in pain. I just wanted them to STOP, and it seemed to me that they would never stop unless something stopped them.
Now, actually letting that come out of my mouth? Baaaad idea.
“Now, actually letting that come out of my mouth? Baaaad idea.”
Exactly? Are you confusing sentiment and statement? The statement is inherently “bad”, regardless of the sentiment behind it. Once we factor in context [ie, Ethan being his friend] we get a rather problematic situation which, again, far exceeds anything we’ve seen Mike himself do within the comic itself.
Rather, if Mike is annoyingly poking people with verbal needles, then Danny just splashed verbal urine into Ethan’s face. Unless Ethan is into that kind of thing, it doesn’t really matter if Danny can attribute it to a cognitive bladder issue or not- it’s still likely to “rain on” their friendship.
Mike himself realized while listening to Blaine in the fight that his “constructive purposes” were still harmful. That he sounded like Blaine.
Danny’s comment was really bad, though I’m not sure “spiteful” is the best description. Unlike Mike though, there was no plan behind it, it wasn’t calculated, it wasn’t aimed at manipulating someone or taking advantage of a weakness. It was a just a shitty thing that slipped out and Danny himself is horrified that he said as soon as he heard it come it.
The comparison to Mike pretty much ends with “said a shitty thing”.
” it wasn’t calculated, it wasn’t aimed at manipulating someone or taking advantage of a weakness. ”
In other words, unlike Mike, it didn’t have any intelligence behind it. Add in that it was “more shitty” (if only due to context, though I’d argue inherent format as well), and you’ve got a worse outcome.
Nevermind that a friend who could justify or benefit me with their negativity would be much more preferrable to me than someone who just says mindless nasty things [towards one of my best friends and lover, no less] out of the blue, within one of the worst contexts possible.
Again, Danny can justify the sentiment all he wants- much like Mike can with his comments- but once we analyze the comments themselves, Danny clearly just crossed a line (that Mike has yet to have crossed).
” though I’m not sure “spiteful” is the best description ”
When a comment is spiteful, it holds to a structure which gives a clear intent of being rude/offensive, hurtful, aggravating, or malicious, and such comments are most strongly characterized as being spiteful when presented in a petty manner.
When an intent is spiteful, the same holds true internally, but the comment itself may be far more subtle than a a spiteful comment, meaning that it’s possible to have a spiteful intent without a spiteful comment [thanks to subtext].
Once again, this isn’t about sentiment, so let’s focus on the comment itself: Something which reads as “I hope they never wake up” strikes me as being extremely petty, and with having a rather clear intent to be offensive, rude, or hurtful.
If you’ve got a better word, please do recommend it, but this is pretty much exactly what “spiteful” is generally associated with [at least, by definition and by my personal experiences] and, at the very least, is going to be similar enough to whichever word one eventually goes with that there’s a clear association of intention, meaning that there’s no basis for vocabulary correction [as there woud be if a given phrasing is confusing or misleading as to a writer’s actual intention].
I keep just saying “this is a mindblowingly awful thing to say, will be interpreted extremely badly by a typical mindset given its structure”, and I’m really confused as to why anyone would argue against that. Rather, anyone who would most certainly would not be someone I’d want to be friends or even acquaintances with.. that sounds like a rather toxic framework by which to be interacting with others.
“I keep just saying “this is a mindblowingly awful thing to say, will be interpreted extremely badly by a typical mindset given its structure”, and I’m really confused as to why anyone would argue against that.”
I agree with this phrasing of what you’re trying to say. People clearly feel differently about what the term “spiteful” conveys. As to some of your other points:
“In other words, unlike Mike, it didn’t have any intelligence behind it”– or, unlike Mike, it was an accident. I think it makes sense that many people (such as those in the audience) would be more forgiving of an accident than intentional cruelty.
There’s also Danny’s immediate reaction of “Oh shit, bad bad bad” that probably wins him sympathy here (from the readers). Accidentally saying something you wish you hadn’t and the immediate regret is relatable to many people.
“this is pretty much exactly what “spiteful” is generally associated with [at least, by definition and by my personal experiences]”– a basic definition of “spiteful” is “showing or caused by malice.” A basic definition of “malice” is “the intention or desire to do evil; ill will.” So for me, based on definition and experience, something can be hurtful without being spiteful, and that’s where I’d put this comment. Yes, because “sentiment,” because yes, sentiment matters to the accuracy of the word.
For the purpose of spiteful, malice is just considered a shorthand for the “rude/offensive, hurtful, aggravating, or malicious” I detailed above. I already detailed the distinction between statement [ie, reading comprehension] and sentiment [ie, concious will] above.
As I already noted, a statement can be spiteful even if the intent is not, and a statement may not read as spiteful even if the intent was for it to be such. Note also that spiteful is characterized by pettiness and ill will, while malice (on its own) is generally a word less associated with pettiness.
Again, if you can find another word that fits better [for the statement, we’re ignoring sentiment for this discussion], shoot for it, I’m all ears. Malice is definitely off the table, though. 🙂
Vocabulary discussion aside, I’m fully aware the intelligence vs foolishness is going to be subjective. But the very fact that it is was part of my point, in that we can’t really say Danny’s statement [again, statement, not sentiment or intent! ..though given the next comic, that doesn’t seem to be all that great, either] is less harmful or more excusable than anything Mike has ever said.
Which definitely gives the statement a sort of hypocritical vibe, given that it was both unnecessary and uncalled for [there’s nothing hypocritical about feeling aggravated, upset, disdainful, petty/spiteful, or so forth towards someone one is incompatible with, but this clearly goes beyond basic reactionary dislike and straight into active hostility.
Though one could argue that’s due to the phrasing (which humans can easily fumble with, relative to their intentions), as ‘I’d personally be glad to be free of Mike for a while’ carries much the same meaning, but has a rather different tone. Though even that would be inappropriate given the context].
Again, that’s sentiment not statement. I’m just approaching reading comprehension/Ethan’s reaction. Never once focused on Danny’s underlying psyche, except as a response to others bringing it up. ^.^
I disagree with your understanding of the word “spiteful.” I think others do as well. I also think you’re setting a lot of rules for people to engage in discussion with you without allowing for people to disagree with those rules.
It’s not out-Miking Mike. It’s a horrible thing to say, but it’s not at all a Mike thing to say. This isn’t aimed at anyone, it’s not targeting a weakness, it’s just a stupid passing thought blurted out in Danny’s confusion. Which we saw precedent for yesterday.
Danny can still do a Dan-pirouette into a millenialist standby, a-la “I meant, things really suck right now anyway, is a coma really that bad by comparison?”
But he might still wind up with one foot in his mouth. Hm…
I…completely agree that this is a stupid thing to say and a terrible thing to think…
I just find it surprising it’s being so broadly condemned (granted, in the first 20 minutes of comments), given it seems a fair bit of the commentariate expressed similar sentiments throughout much of the last chapter as well as the first strips confirming Mike’s coma status. Feels…jarring.
I mean, it’s complicated, and probably partly just different people making the comments. But I do think there is a difference in judgement about how real people talk about fictional characters, vs how a (fictional) person talks about another person. Like, me saying “hopefully Mike doesn’t wake up” is different than Danny saying that because from Danny’s (fictional) perspective, Mike is a real person. As is Ethan, who is the person likely to be actually “hurt” here.
Yeah, it’s kind of like how the Wilcox parents were EXTREMELY deprecating of him during family weekend, not far removed from what comments said about Danny at the time… but that reads dramatically differently and dramatically worse coming from people inhabiting the same universe as him, especially when they’re his PARENTS.
I think that the skew in the comments comes from the fact that we know Ethan has feelings for Mike and Danny doesn’t. How dare he act based on things he has no way of knowing. At this point, blaming Danny for what he doesn’t know is a time honored tradition. Don’t fight it, embrace it.
…Danny is 100% aware Ethan has feelings for Mike. He’s seen them together. He’s heard the stories
the fact he wants mike to stay in a coma is probably strongly related too that
and this isn’t blaming him for ‘something he doesn’t know’ – this is reacting to him telling someone he hopes one of their oldest friend and person they have expressed affection and attraction to before (things danny does know) and who is clearly very, very upset about it…. that he hopes they never wake up?
and even without all the other context, even if he didn’t know all the above, going into a hospital to tell someone visiting soomeone in a coma you hope the person doesn’t wake up? there’s no way thats not fucked up
I think what’s worth noting here- I don’t think Dan meant to say that out loud. If that last panel there, of immediate ‘what the fuck just came out of my facehole’ is any indication, that was his mouth acting on autopilot- Ethan makes question noise, out comes what’s in head. He’s already trying to keep something else from slipping out- and when you’re trying not to think of elephants, sometimes you get a rhino instead.
Does that make it okay? No. But we shouldn’t attribute malice, where stupidity is the likely answer.
Ugh. Got position-sniped, and the structure of this comment section is a disaster. ^This @beige, not at Shadow.
Rather, @Shadow:
If you’re thinking we’re attributing malice, then I think you’re misinterpreting, since I’m not getting that impression from the comments I’m reading, nor did I intend that with my own comments. People can make mistakes or act poorly without malice.
Heck, one could argue that most drunken mishaps (up to and including abuse) are done without malice- a dark inherent nature akin to malice for some, perhaps [eg, mood disorders], but nothing conciously willful. But even with the jutification that malice wasn’t intended, it doesn’t mean that an action can’t be destructive and poorly-received.
No matter how little malice was involved, we can’t avoid the fact that, as beige so aptly put it: “there’s no way [that behavior isn’t] fucked up”
**To be clear, referencing individuals who are abusive/otherwise problematic exclusively while drunk, and even there only intending to indicate that some may perhaps be able to attribute their actions to things other than malice. Others may perhaps just use the alcohol as an excuse.
Just noting this lest anyone interpret some sort of “alcohol-based actions can’t be based in malice” sentiment from that section.
I think it’s less about Mike for most people and more that he said it to Ethan. ETHAN. Who despite all the fuckery that Mike was doing… still considered him a good friend. Hell, they were even lovers for a time. And I hear for some people even when it’s mindless sex, it can somehow bring them closer together and further cement a friendship.
Like… you don’t just say that to a person. Especially not a person who clearly has been as this hospital for days to be with said comatose person. It’s more that Dan has probably irrevocably fucked up what little progress of a friendship with Ethan that he had.
I don’t know. It’s certainly painful for Ethan to hear, but I think you could make a good case for Danny basically being right and maybe this being a time to say it. An intervention, if you will.
Sure, Ethan’s emotionally attached to him, but even Ethan’s acknowledged he’s not at all sure Mike’s really a friend. While sex can cement a relationship, that’s not a good thing if the relationship is abusive, which this one arguably has been. Some time without Mike’s presence might well be the best thing for Ethan, even if this is a horrible way to get it.
Mind you, I don’t think Danny’s actually ready to make that argument and I doubt he was even thinking about it consciously. It also doesn’t take into consideration the revelation Mike had during the fight and how that might change him – which Danny certainly doesn’t know anything about.
I’m gonna say when someone is in the hospital outside the person’s room (and the person is in a coma after heroically sacrificing himself for someone’s other best friend), then no, it is really, really not the right time to say it. Even if Ethan genuinely needed an intervention, doing it now would be guaranteed to make him defensive and even more attached to Mike. Also, suggesting that maybe it would be better if Mike didn’t wake up is also a great way to get Ethan defending Mike, so if it was an attempt at an intervention, it would backfire hugely. Honestly, if it was an attempt at an intervention it would be *worse* than whatit actually is, which just is Danny saying something dumb without thinking.
I feel the same way, like what, this comments section hates Mike. But it might not be the same people as I don’t keep track. I think people just like criticizing certain characters no matter what they do.
I can’t speak for everyone, but here’s my two cents:
Mike is a horrible person to everyone, consistently. Danny’s not obligated to forgive or forget that.
However, wishing serious harm on someone real is not really something I’m generally comfortable with and to Danny, Mike is not only real, he’s saying this to one of Mike’s best friends. I’d be more understanding if this was a horrible thought he said in a moment of emotionality to someone else, but saying it to his best friend? Beyond out of line.
We’re not saying it about a real person to their friend’s face… There’s a difference between talking shit about a bad person where it only hurts them (or hurts nobody) vs. where you manage to hit a decent person with the blowback.
I mean the ‘stop being AG’ argument right before his breakup with Amber was also unknowingly more or less advocating someone die, and it was his actual girlfriend, but there he had no realization whatsoever that there WAS a dissociative split and the gap between the two alters was steadily widening as the relationship had been going on, because *gestures to Amber’s Many Sources of Trauma*. So I’m willing to put that as something he had virtually no context for or way of knowing that WAS what he was saying.
Here? Yeah, no, straight to the Upside Down is merited.
Should we start calling it “his break-up with Amazi-Girl” at this point? I mean, since we’re now 100% sure that Mazi is a wholly different person than Amber at this point.
The only way out of this I can think of is to cover with something else embarrassing like “I was thinking about asking you out and arguing with myself about whether now is a good time, sorry, I was so in my head that I didn’t hear anything you said for the last little while, could you repeat yourself?” It might not work, but could be worth a shot.
But since this is Dumbing of Age I doubt Danny will be able to think of that in time.
To be quite honest, this was so very tone deaf and mean that you’d expect it to come right out of Mike’s mouth at his most assholish.
I think Danny needs to handle the consequences this time.
That was just cold, I know Mike was an Asshole, but condemning someone to a brain damaged coma of which you do not know if or when they would recover from, that’s something I would reserve for Ryan the Rapist. And he said that to Ethan, who despite Mike’s assholeishness considered him a friend since middle school.
Holy shit, I’m legitimately shaken IRL, this is a level of second-hand mortification I didn’t even realize I could reach in regards to a fictional character’s fuck ups.
If Danny was anywhere near this in Shortpacked, it explains the long-term commentariat’s low opinion of him. I’d always wondered why the SP readers seemed to almost despise him.
I didn’t read Roomies or It’s Walky while it was happening, so my perspective could be off, but my impression is that this strip is worse than anything he said or did there. (He had many more cringe-worthy moments there than he has here overall, but today’s strip is pretty bad.)
The big tonal difference between here and the Walkyverse is that then Danny had authorial approval, especially in Roomies!. His cringe-worthy stuff there was mostly not challenged, but rewarded.
How, HOW do you come back from a comment like that???? You can’t defend it because other than the strangeness of invasive thoughts, there’s not a moral defense for having that sort of thought.
I think maybe the best thing would be to say, “Oh my god, my brain just went to a weird place and I said that thought out loud but of course my immediate answer is yes! Yes that would be terrible! Because then Ethan and Amber would lose a longtime friend and I care about them and I don’t want them to go through that.”
some other comments say he embarrassed himself, but embarrassment isn’t what I would be feeling in this situation. Regret certainly. But embarrassment is usually for when you make yourself look stupid, not callous.
Shame’s the better term, but I can buy ‘oh god you know how sometimes you look down a flight of stairs and wonder what it would be like to go over the railing, even though you’re immediately horrified?* Yeah that is exactly what happened and I am so sorry my mouth started moving before my brain could catch up because that was awful.’ Which has an element of embarrassment wedged between the shame and regret.
*… Intrusive ‘call of the void’ thoughts are more or less normal, right? Like not GOOD or WANTED but common? Because if not then damn, I knew I was a depressive anxious mess young but that’d be ‘since I was, like, four or five’ young.
You are not alone, my acquaintance. You are not alone in this. Still an anxious and depressive mess, but you’re not alone in that either.
The worst part about the intrusive call of the void club is the lack of free cookies to encourage us that this doesn’t mean we’re inherently horrible, because we don’t act on them.
Yep, completely normal. I think the allure of cliff edges is famously the most common example.
Also, I believe thinking terrible thoughts unbidden is also completely normal, it’s just most of the time we brush them aside and move on with the life we want to live. That didn’t happen here.
My 2 year old daughter learnt to cut paper with scissors then non-verbally asked if she could cut her hand with them. Her response to me explaining she could not, that would hurt, WE ONLY CUT PAPER WITH SCISSORS was a disappointed exclamation of “Oh” (but she didn’t attempt to cut her finger off so I can live with that).
Holy Fuck Dude, I know might was outwardly a total asshole to most people, and you wernt his friend, but that was one of the worst things anybody has said in this comic, straight up villain talk. I didnt expect that to come from Danny boi over here.
Well, Danny-Boy, The Danny Zone is callin’,
from hall to hall, and back from the O.R.
Your canon’s fired and now your ship is sinking.
So find a raft, and something for an oar.
There’s doctors here, and some very well trained nurses;
To help with feet stuck half way down your throat,
So grab your hat, and hide your face with in it.
Your hope is gone, you’re left here to remember
Ethan is gone and You now know that is that.
Unless Ethan takes it unexpectedly well and kinda has that “I have to laugh so I don’t strangle someone” kinda reaction. Like Mike is Mike and that’s a prime brain fart moment. I guess especially since Danny hasn’t seen the reality of Mike in the hospital so his last recollection of Mike was at the party which was a kind of “oh my god what I would do to never interact with you again” interaction. Which is how most of Mike’s interactions end up.
But I feel like if Danny didn’t have the more abstract concept of “Mike is hospitalized in a coma” and the reality of Mike right now in front of him, that thought wouldn’t have come to him so fast. I feel that though, something heavy and serious is going on and someone says something and just… such a good punchline or joke springs to the front of my mind and at times it’s taken everything in me not to say it.
Yeah, the abstract concept of ‘asshole dude my friends tolerate for whatever reason because he hurts them is in a coma’ and the reality of seeing him in that coma, and seeing how BAD it is are two very different things.
“Oh gawd, that came off as terrible! I meant that with everything that happened after he got hurt a bit more time away from knowing everything might be good.”
When Danny first ran off to find Ethan my immediate thought was, “He’s going to Dan it up.” But everyone in the comments both here and on Patreon were so optimistic that I convinced myself I’d overreacted.
Nope, I’d say if anything I underestimated how bad it would be.
I have no clue what you’re talking about, I sensed shit was about to hit the fan. Especially with these guys. Also you know what, I feel like it’s just the tip of the iceberg. It’s only going to get worse from here.
What I like is that he knew he shouldn’t say it, he said it anyway, and then he continued knowing he shouldn’t have said it.
I’ve give you ‘Danning it up’, and it’s fair for Ethan to be upset/angry, but I think it’s pretty understandable to have the brain/mouth filter slip every once in a while and it doesn’t make him a villain/asshole.
Here’s the problem I have with this: what he said and when he said it is so bad that if Ethan takes it predictably, there’s not going to be any further interaction between these two characters for a prepostrous length of time in universe, which means for us, years. And Danny lacks consistent chemistry or rapport with anyone other than Sal, Mike or Ethan. Sal is tied up in her storyline and Mike is in a coma.
There’s either gotta be a cushion or this is Danny’s effective coda.
How… how do you even manage to fuck up that badly?
Also, even when ignoring Danny’s lack of a brain -> mouth filter, am I wrong in thinking that this is an extremely fucked up thing to even THINK? I mean, Mike’s in a coma. He might never wake up, and he’s currently hooked up to an IV while his parents grieve over him. Even if you don’t like the dude, saying he’d be better off dead is… a step too far.
To be fair, he just said it wouldn’t be so bad if he didn’t wake up for a while, not forever. Still totally horrible but not quite wishing death on him.
The reality of non-medically induced comas is the longer Mike’s in it, the less likely he is to wake up at all and the worse the effects if he does will be. And even medically induced, the less time spent is generally better. A lot of people don’t REALIZE just how bad it is, but any injury that forcibly knocks you out for any length of time is Not Good. It does not take long for brain injuries to become traumatic. (And hell. My brother had a minor concussion four years ago. Stayed totally conscious! Has had intense chronic migraines since.)
Doctors saying ‘might not wake up for a while’ isn’t a ‘oh maybe next week, when everything dies down a bit and it’ll be fine.’ It’s ‘they’re not sure he’ll wake up at all.’
Comas can be recovered from still but this usually happens within the first two to four weeks if it will happen. They can’t say with full certainty that Mike will or won’t wake up since it has only been a few days, but after a month, the chance is really not great, so a while here might mean ‘after his injury has had a couple of weeks to heal, he *might* wake up but it seems unlikely he will before then and he still might not even then’ because Mike’s injury is pretty serious.
So they’re not necessarily at the ‘he might never wake up at all’ stage yet, but ‘he might not wake up for 2-3 weeks while his injury heals if he is going to and there are more likely to be issues the longer it takes’ is still not great! And while he could still come out of it perfectly fine, the anxiety of waiting and not knowing would be dreadful!
And if Danny said this to me about someone I care about, I would probably be thinking about yeeting him out a window.
But Danny isn’t a doctor using “for a while” as a euphemism for “not at all”. Danny’s thinking “for a while” means “for a while”.
How that hits Ethan depends on how well Ethan knows what the doctors really mean.
Mike is an awful person who bullies him at every opportunity. Wishing he’d stay out of action for longer isn’t the most horrid thing on earth. Especially as Danny’s understanding is there’s no difference between mike waking up now or later except time.
People are being really harsh on Danny. Most people feel a great sense of relief when an abusive person in their life die. This is a lesser version of that understandable feeling. Mike is truly awful to Danny, wanting him to be gone for a little longer is understandable.
Mike hasn’t actually done very much to Danny over all except annoy him – while it is fair for Danny to dislike him for his treatment of Ethan and Amber and general attitude, Mike hasn’t bullied Danny. He even gave up on his plan of making Danny jealous (though Danny went and got jealous on his own anyway and Mike found this relatable due to also feeling jealous over Ethan), there are plenty of people with more reason to hate Mike like Walky who he actively deceived and was much more malicious to.
So saying ‘Mike bullies Danny at every opportunity’ is kind of a reach, especially when they’ve barely interacted. Hell, their main interaction was at the damn party before Mike got hurt and Mike tried to kind of get along with him and then annoyed him.
This is just about one of the worst things Danny could have said to Ethan in this situation though when Ethan is clearly expressing 1) that he feels emotional, 2) that he wants Mike to be okay. Danny doesn’t need extensive medical expertise or knowledge to understand that it taking a while is not something Ethan would want, and it is a VERY HARSH thing to say to someone actively rooting for the person’s recovery even if it is someone you dislike.
Nah, I completely understand thinking it; there are people out there I would be thrilled if they dropped dead. Would I show that while talking to their loved ones? Wow, no, that is horrible, those people are going through enough.
Honestly, if Danny had waited and said it to Joe, for example, when they were alone, I’d be wincing a bit but still, fair enough.
So… Many ppl have horrible fleeting thoughts, called intrusive thoughts. Trying to suppress them and& shame yourself for having them is a ticket to any number of mental health conditions. OCD and a lot of anxiety disorders have anxiety around intrusive thoughts as a component.
For those with intrusive thoughts, part of our brains remain kind of like a drunk asshole edgelord – with no filter and no concept of what is or isn’t appropriate. Mine is obsessed with thoughts of disaster, maiming and self-harm.
The more I try to suppress those thoughts the more they happen. It’s like if you tell a kid NOT to think of a purple hippopotamus or that game that used to be popular in the 00s (you just lost btw). The more you try to not think of something the more you’ll think of it. And if you respond to thinking of it more by trying to suppress it more you get into a feedback loop and that way lies hours crouched under a long cold shower yelling at your brain to shut up. I know cuz I have been there.
All of which is to say I have had those sorts of thoughts probably a good dozen times today and it’s only 9:30 AM here. And today is a light day for it. I am still a decent person. I volunteer. I don’t actually want to hurt ppl. My brain just has a drunk asshole edgelord in residence.
Nah, it’s a totally normal thing to think. Everyone has less than ideal thoughts. Saying it (and specifically saying it to Ethan) is the problem, and honestly, given that he clearly knows he done effed up, I’m inclined to cut him a little slack (though I don’t think Ethan is required to).
Objectively yes. However, Danny seems consistently written as hard to like. While I don’t care for Amber at all, she has many good qualities. Danny doesn’t have many at all imo.
He’s well meaning and always looking for love, he’s a bit hapless sometimes but besides that the only other issues are Danny ability to always make a situation even worse for himself.
Honestly, I actually feel really bad for Danny. It doesn’t make me dislike him- it was a terrible thing to say, but he obviously knows it was terrible. I’ve said things I wished I hadn’t plenty of times (though tbf, never quite on this scale.)
I was thinking last night that the Law of Narrative Conservation of Empathy tells us that if Joyce’s father and Faz and Walky are becoming better people, and Mikeis out of commission, that two or more have to become worse people.
Joyce’s mother is one of the two, and I wondering who the second would be.
Some might suggest Linda, but while Linda is controlling she is not obviously malicious (though I doubt she is thinking much about what is good for Amber.)
I didn’t have Danny down, and he seems a bit weak to sustain revenge. Not out of the question that someone like Joyce’s mother could use him as a tool though… he’s pretty naive and likes attention.
Okay, Danny, this is salvageable. Just explain that you’ve seen how cruel Mike is to Ethan and Amber, and you hate seeing Ethan in particular hurt, and MAYBE the two of them could use a few days respite. Be cool and suave like that’s what you meant all along.
But yeah, like others have sorta said this seems like one of those invasive thoughts that come into your head and a second later you actually think through it and you’re like “What? No! Shut up brain what the heck.” It’s just that Dan’s mouth moved too fast for his conscience to stop it.
Unfortunately when you are generally seen as a Nice and Polite and Milquetoast sort of person, letting that side of you out can have a… disproportionate reaction.
And the proportionate reaction to this bullshit is already pretty big.
Danny’s mean side is a lot more callous than mine because this is not even something that was in the radar of things in my mind that a person could say in this situation but we do know Danny can be a bit petty and bitter when it suits him. But I guess Ethan is learning that now too.
I have a hard time agreeing with that sentiment, mostly because (as a reader) I’ve seen Mike 1) beat up Joe because of a long-debunked urban legend about male thought patterns, 2) try to sabotage Dorothy and Walky’s romance because Walky farts, and 3) sleep with Ethan BECAUSE HE WANTED TO HAVE SEX WITH ONE OF ETHAN OR DANNY TO HURT THE OTHER ONE, AND ETHAN TOLD MIKE TO LEAVE DANNY ALONE, among many other things. In the context of occupying the same universe as Mike and not being omniscient then, yes, what Danny said was objectively horrible. As an outsider looking in, however, I can’t help but feel a bit proud of Danny for saying what I’ve been thinking.
The problem is less Mike’s character and more that Danny said this to Ethan, who is invested in Mike as a person and is in a lot of pain because Mike is badly injured.
Honestly, if Danny was really ready to make the argument that “it might be better because Mike is really bad for Ethan”, I’d get behind it. Pretty sure Danny’s not going there though.
Dan has moved from a nice guy to a Nice GuyTM. He’s not here to comfort Ethan about his best friend being in a coma, he’s here to hit on him during a moment of vulnerability. He’s actually slimier than Joe at peak do-list.
Nah, Danny’s not doing “Nice Guy” stuff at all. Yeah, he’s thinking about hitting on Ethan when Ethan’s vulnerable, but that’s more because of his reaction to the kidnapping: “I almost lost him forever” from a few strips back.
Not taking advantage of the vulnerability.
I’m confused. Mike’s in the hospital, right? I thought we were back in the dorms. Where are Ethan and Danny standing? (Besides the eternal pit of mortification)
The hospital hallway. I don’t know how you thought this was the dorms when Faz and Amber said Blaine was upstairs getting ribs taken out. I know Ruth talks about femur removal, but I don’t think she has approval for ribs too.
(Looks at comments section) Well, I still like Danny! Lots of characters in this comic get away with being awful to each other (example early Ruth) and since Danny wasn’t with Amber all he knows about Mike is he appears to be a consistently awful person to everyone he claims to be friends with. People hate Danny for being a doormat but also don’t want him to be mean.
(Just to be clear I do think him blurting this out is unacceptable and he totally has to apologise, just surprised at the lack of charity for him in the comments section when people will allow characters like Amber to exist under the “complicated people” banner. Danny is complicated too! He’s sometimes too nice and sometimes too selfish and petty. It’s a balance he needs to find, he’s still growing up. Like with people attacking Walky for not taking action to fight a grown man trying to hold them hostage….these characters are still basically teens. I know this comic has seen us grow up and mature several years, but Danny is still a teen and has only had a month or two at this point in the comic to mature.)
I don’t necessarily hate the lad, he just had moments like these where he does or says things outrageously dumb. Atleast last time he did he managed to come back from at the right time and saved face…. don’t know how he comes back from this though.
I like Danny, and I generally dislike Mike, but this was DEEPLY out of line because he’s saying this to Ethan. Right after Ethan’s been in the room to see Mike, and is expressing deep concern about Mike.
Odds on it being an intrusive/impulsive thought of some sort are decent, and if so saying so while apologizing profusely can probably salvage things. But it’s an extremely callous thing to say out loud to a grieving, already-traumatized friend. The time to have that talk about how Mike treats his friends is NOT here and now.
We thought the Good Ship Danneth was headed for wet-dock (cause a dry-dock hurts too much) but Damn it! One simple does not fire a canon at one’s own deck and sink the ship yourself, you wait for someone external to do that, … OramIwrongagain?
“…. is what he’d say if our situation was reversed, am I right? Ah haha what a rascal! Then he’d go and have sex with my mother or something ha ha ha! C’mon Mikey wake up already, because I’m really bad at trying to recreate your unique brand of humor to comfort your childhood friend! HAHA”
I think the other comments hit it with his only potential recovery options are “wait, you caught me on another train of thought, here’s an actual response to what you said” or “I mean, he needs a lot of recovery time right”, but both have a well-deserved high chance to fail
because holy shit Danny
Also for everyone happy Danny said it or thinking this was deserved, the problem is more that it was said to Ethan than that it was said.
Okay Danny to sum up years of psychology there’s an Inner Voice and an Outer Voice and the Inner Voice is the source of ideas and emotion and it’s raw and unfiltered and the Outer Voice is the self we project to the world and its job is to filter and protect the Inner Voice and Rule Number f’in One is Never Give The Inner Voice Control Of The Mouth ‘cuz…
Holy shit Danny, you’re not supposed to say the quiet part out loud.
Best chance he has to salvage this is major backpedaling, maybe that he meant “is that really bad” (as in “is that mean his injuries are extremely severe”).
Well, he has a point but, holy shit, that was the worst possible moment to say this out loud and the worst possible person to say it to.
Mike, who generally lets out every mean or dark thought, would probably appreciate this. But Ethan? Not so much.
At least he didn’t wish him dead, just out of order for a while longer (and I would agree that this isn’t the worst thing that could happen). We will see how this will spiral down from here.
The only way I see to screw this up even further is getting his feelings for Ethan out too, right now, thus making Ethan connect this information with his (probably) felt outrage forevermore.
Hmm, I kind of thought that word would have gotten around by now about how Mike tried to lead Blaine and Ross away from the party and helped AG fight them … but maybe not, if Danny still has such a low opinion of him. (Holy SHIT, Danny!!!)
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“WELP, TIME TO JOIN MIKE IN THE ABYSS” *digs the biggest hole and jumps in and pulls all the dirt behind him*
He’ll have a hard time digging that hole with one of his feet lodged in his throat.
He’s highly skilled. He doesn’t need feet to Dan it up.
Or femurs.
You say one like he didn’t just manage to wedge both all the way in there
He had a good run not doing it for a while, but it looks like once again he (say it with me now) Danned it up.
This…
You know, I almost thought we could retire it for Dumbingverse Danny, and Walkyverse Danny’s through most of his truly Danning moments in the reruns.
WELP.
Looking foward to the comments making this into a joke/second hand embarassment and/or trying to justify it. :/
At least Ethan will be appropiately mad about this.
To paraphrase Mike post “hail Satan” – like you weren’t thinking it.
Mike (yes, still in coma): Sick burn, man. I acknowledge that.
Hahahahahah he won’t even get to get broken up with this time.
Honestly, this goes beyond “danning it up” and goes straight into “being an asshole”. More than that, this is arguably far worse than anything Mike himself has said within the comic. At least the worst of Mike’s comments could still be taken as being critical, Danny’s comment here is just flat out spiteful (regardless of whether one views it as warranted it or not) and inappropriate (given that it’s to one of Mike’s best friends, however awkward such friendship may be).
You right, he might have just out Miked Mike. It’s Quite a feat but not really a victory to be cherished considering what it might cost him.
We all have horrible fleeting inner thoughts from time to time. We just usually realise them and think ‘no, that’s horrible’ internally. If you could hear everyone’s thoughts (like in British comedy Peep Show) people would appear much less nice seeming individuals.
The Danning it here is speaking that thought out loud before he’s had time to think about it and reflect on how it’s horrible.
He could still also really easily save this by saying something like “because wouldn’t it be better for everything to calm down a bit so he wakes up in a calm supportive environment rather than having everyone and their parents stressed up to a hundred? “
“We all have horrible fleeting inner thoughts from time to time. ”
Well, I don’t [at least, not within the format in question], but I’m also neuroatypical, so I guess that doesn’t mean much relative to your point.
That said, your point does still fall through (if it’s intended as any kind of argument against my points), given that 1: It’s an act of “assholery” by common interpretation once it has left his mouth and 2: It’s still “out-Mikeing Mike”.
So if we acknowledge your point, the only difference is that he’s now not only being an OverMiked Asshole, but he’s also Danning it up. Which really just makes it worse, I think. 😛
That said, the fact that he’s no doubt going to stumble and make things worse [y’know, by not using your suggested recovery or any of the others commenters on this page have provided] immediately after this is definitely where “Danning it up” will become a certain attribution. So we’ll definitely get to that, even if we haven’t already. So for now, I think we can just focus on the assholery, without the danning getting “left out” any. 😛
And to avoid any sort of miscommunication, do reread my original post and note that I wasn’t intentionally attributing anything towards Danny’s character, as my focus was on the interpretation of his actions. Though once on the topic, I can’t argue the attribution to character either, given how unfamiliar the premise is to me.
From my perspective, your agument would boil down to “everyone’s an asshole sometimes”. Well, though I guess if we put it that broadly, I can’t argue it regardless of whether we’re focusing on normative or abberational states.. 😛
Oh, hey, no, I got this:
“Everyone’s a little bit
Assholeish, sometimes.
Doesn’t mean we go around committing
to Dannyish paradigms“
My argument was more on the lines of that we all have thoughts that we don’t say out loud because we don’t want to upset people. You *must* have had those before right? Those of us with ASD might struggle a little, but there’s generally a filter between thoughts arising from the subconscious and which of those we articulate. Very few of us will openly vocalise everything we think without filter.
Whether its thinking that a person who won’t stop talking about something you’re not interested in would shut up, that a person you don’t like deserved something bad that happened to them etc. we do all have thoughts occasionally we know aren’t the nicest and wouldn’t actually vocalise. None of us are saints – it’s our actions, not our thoughts we should be judged on.
Mike has been an ass to Danny in the past, and Danny is very jealous and annoyed by his relationship with Ethan (which was supposedly actually what Mike what aiming to do) so it’s clear why this thought went through his mind.
But he clearly had no intention of vocalising it. The look of surprise on his face in the last panel clearly shows that. That’s why I think this is Danning it rather than being an asshole. It wasn’t deliberate, he didn’t intend to upset anyone, his filter just broke at the worst possible moment in true Danny fashion and he’s as shocked by it as Ethan.
It’s the difference between deliberately running down someone in your car, and accidentally screwing up and slamming the gas rather than the brake when you see them. Neither are great, but the latter makes you an idiot rather than a villain.
I’m nor sure it’s spiteful. Danny isn’t intending to be mean (even to mike) he’s just, stupidly, stating his initial thought. While not wishing harm on anyone I think most people know one or two people they wish they just didn’t have to be around anymore.
The comment itself is spiteful, that just can’t be argued.
You can argue his inner rationality, but if we were to factor that in, then we’d also have to excuse anything Mike has ever said as being entirely okay- after all, unlike with Danny here, we’ve actually seen implication that Mike has constructive purposes for at least some of the things he’s said.
Or at the very least, is annoyed enough with hypocrisy that he has some form of justification. In other words, Danny’s comment ends up being harder to justify than anything Mike has presented, while coming across far worse than anything Mike has presented.
And, again, regardless of the intentions of either individual, their comments have had/will have negative consequences because of how the comments are interpreted. There’s no arguing that this comment isn’t readily interpretable in a very, very bad way.
tl;dr version: The comment is spiteful, the intention likely isn’t.
Is the comment spiteful, or is it tired?
I have longed for some people to fall into comas or even die, because their personal bullshit seemed to require my involvement somehow and they would not take “You are a colossal ass and you exhaust me with your relentless assishness, go away” as an answer. I didn’t hate them. I didn’t want them to be in pain. I just wanted them to STOP, and it seemed to me that they would never stop unless something stopped them.
Now, actually letting that come out of my mouth? Baaaad idea.
“Now, actually letting that come out of my mouth? Baaaad idea.”
Exactly? Are you confusing sentiment and statement? The statement is inherently “bad”, regardless of the sentiment behind it. Once we factor in context [ie, Ethan being his friend] we get a rather problematic situation which, again, far exceeds anything we’ve seen Mike himself do within the comic itself.
Rather, if Mike is annoyingly poking people with verbal needles, then Danny just splashed verbal urine into Ethan’s face. Unless Ethan is into that kind of thing, it doesn’t really matter if Danny can attribute it to a cognitive bladder issue or not- it’s still likely to “rain on” their friendship.
Where is this implication though
Mike himself realized while listening to Blaine in the fight that his “constructive purposes” were still harmful. That he sounded like Blaine.
Danny’s comment was really bad, though I’m not sure “spiteful” is the best description. Unlike Mike though, there was no plan behind it, it wasn’t calculated, it wasn’t aimed at manipulating someone or taking advantage of a weakness. It was a just a shitty thing that slipped out and Danny himself is horrified that he said as soon as he heard it come it.
The comparison to Mike pretty much ends with “said a shitty thing”.
” it wasn’t calculated, it wasn’t aimed at manipulating someone or taking advantage of a weakness. ”
In other words, unlike Mike, it didn’t have any intelligence behind it. Add in that it was “more shitty” (if only due to context, though I’d argue inherent format as well), and you’ve got a worse outcome.
Nevermind that a friend who could justify or benefit me with their negativity would be much more preferrable to me than someone who just says mindless nasty things [towards one of my best friends and lover, no less] out of the blue, within one of the worst contexts possible.
Again, Danny can justify the sentiment all he wants- much like Mike can with his comments- but once we analyze the comments themselves, Danny clearly just crossed a line (that Mike has yet to have crossed).
” though I’m not sure “spiteful” is the best description ”
When a comment is spiteful, it holds to a structure which gives a clear intent of being rude/offensive, hurtful, aggravating, or malicious, and such comments are most strongly characterized as being spiteful when presented in a petty manner.
When an intent is spiteful, the same holds true internally, but the comment itself may be far more subtle than a a spiteful comment, meaning that it’s possible to have a spiteful intent without a spiteful comment [thanks to subtext].
Once again, this isn’t about sentiment, so let’s focus on the comment itself: Something which reads as “I hope they never wake up” strikes me as being extremely petty, and with having a rather clear intent to be offensive, rude, or hurtful.
If you’ve got a better word, please do recommend it, but this is pretty much exactly what “spiteful” is generally associated with [at least, by definition and by my personal experiences] and, at the very least, is going to be similar enough to whichever word one eventually goes with that there’s a clear association of intention, meaning that there’s no basis for vocabulary correction [as there woud be if a given phrasing is confusing or misleading as to a writer’s actual intention].
I keep just saying “this is a mindblowingly awful thing to say, will be interpreted extremely badly by a typical mindset given its structure”, and I’m really confused as to why anyone would argue against that. Rather, anyone who would most certainly would not be someone I’d want to be friends or even acquaintances with.. that sounds like a rather toxic framework by which to be interacting with others.
“I keep just saying “this is a mindblowingly awful thing to say, will be interpreted extremely badly by a typical mindset given its structure”, and I’m really confused as to why anyone would argue against that.”
I agree with this phrasing of what you’re trying to say. People clearly feel differently about what the term “spiteful” conveys. As to some of your other points:
“In other words, unlike Mike, it didn’t have any intelligence behind it”– or, unlike Mike, it was an accident. I think it makes sense that many people (such as those in the audience) would be more forgiving of an accident than intentional cruelty.
There’s also Danny’s immediate reaction of “Oh shit, bad bad bad” that probably wins him sympathy here (from the readers). Accidentally saying something you wish you hadn’t and the immediate regret is relatable to many people.
“this is pretty much exactly what “spiteful” is generally associated with [at least, by definition and by my personal experiences]”– a basic definition of “spiteful” is “showing or caused by malice.” A basic definition of “malice” is “the intention or desire to do evil; ill will.” So for me, based on definition and experience, something can be hurtful without being spiteful, and that’s where I’d put this comment. Yes, because “sentiment,” because yes, sentiment matters to the accuracy of the word.
For the purpose of spiteful, malice is just considered a shorthand for the “rude/offensive, hurtful, aggravating, or malicious” I detailed above. I already detailed the distinction between statement [ie, reading comprehension] and sentiment [ie, concious will] above.
As I already noted, a statement can be spiteful even if the intent is not, and a statement may not read as spiteful even if the intent was for it to be such. Note also that spiteful is characterized by pettiness and ill will, while malice (on its own) is generally a word less associated with pettiness.
Again, if you can find another word that fits better [for the statement, we’re ignoring sentiment for this discussion], shoot for it, I’m all ears. Malice is definitely off the table, though. 🙂
Vocabulary discussion aside, I’m fully aware the intelligence vs foolishness is going to be subjective. But the very fact that it is was part of my point, in that we can’t really say Danny’s statement [again, statement, not sentiment or intent! ..though given the next comic, that doesn’t seem to be all that great, either] is less harmful or more excusable than anything Mike has ever said.
Which definitely gives the statement a sort of hypocritical vibe, given that it was both unnecessary and uncalled for [there’s nothing hypocritical about feeling aggravated, upset, disdainful, petty/spiteful, or so forth towards someone one is incompatible with, but this clearly goes beyond basic reactionary dislike and straight into active hostility.
Though one could argue that’s due to the phrasing (which humans can easily fumble with, relative to their intentions), as ‘I’d personally be glad to be free of Mike for a while’ carries much the same meaning, but has a rather different tone. Though even that would be inappropriate given the context].
” or, unlike Mike, it was an accident.”
Again, that’s sentiment not statement. I’m just approaching reading comprehension/Ethan’s reaction. Never once focused on Danny’s underlying psyche, except as a response to others bringing it up. ^.^
I disagree with your understanding of the word “spiteful.” I think others do as well. I also think you’re setting a lot of rules for people to engage in discussion with you without allowing for people to disagree with those rules.
It’s not out-Miking Mike. It’s a horrible thing to say, but it’s not at all a Mike thing to say. This isn’t aimed at anyone, it’s not targeting a weakness, it’s just a stupid passing thought blurted out in Danny’s confusion. Which we saw precedent for yesterday.
Danny can still do a Dan-pirouette into a millenialist standby, a-la “I meant, things really suck right now anyway, is a coma really that bad by comparison?”
But he might still wind up with one foot in his mouth. Hm…
but that was what he was hoping for, amiright?
I think the “save” is “if he spends longer in the coma then he doesn’t need to deal with the pain of his broken bones, right?”
It certainly has been a while since we got a new Danning of Age.
Danny put his foot in his mouth so hard that the force of the kick breached dimensional walls and sent him to the Phantom Zone.
…aaand this.
I…completely agree that this is a stupid thing to say and a terrible thing to think…
I just find it surprising it’s being so broadly condemned (granted, in the first 20 minutes of comments), given it seems a fair bit of the commentariate expressed similar sentiments throughout much of the last chapter as well as the first strips confirming Mike’s coma status. Feels…jarring.
I mean, it’s complicated, and probably partly just different people making the comments. But I do think there is a difference in judgement about how real people talk about fictional characters, vs how a (fictional) person talks about another person. Like, me saying “hopefully Mike doesn’t wake up” is different than Danny saying that because from Danny’s (fictional) perspective, Mike is a real person. As is Ethan, who is the person likely to be actually “hurt” here.
Yeah, it’s kind of like how the Wilcox parents were EXTREMELY deprecating of him during family weekend, not far removed from what comments said about Danny at the time… but that reads dramatically differently and dramatically worse coming from people inhabiting the same universe as him, especially when they’re his PARENTS.
I think that the skew in the comments comes from the fact that we know Ethan has feelings for Mike and Danny doesn’t. How dare he act based on things he has no way of knowing. At this point, blaming Danny for what he doesn’t know is a time honored tradition. Don’t fight it, embrace it.
…Danny is 100% aware Ethan has feelings for Mike. He’s seen them together. He’s heard the stories
the fact he wants mike to stay in a coma is probably strongly related too that
and this isn’t blaming him for ‘something he doesn’t know’ – this is reacting to him telling someone he hopes one of their oldest friend and person they have expressed affection and attraction to before (things danny does know) and who is clearly very, very upset about it…. that he hopes they never wake up?
and even without all the other context, even if he didn’t know all the above, going into a hospital to tell someone visiting soomeone in a coma you hope the person doesn’t wake up? there’s no way thats not fucked up
I think what’s worth noting here- I don’t think Dan meant to say that out loud. If that last panel there, of immediate ‘what the fuck just came out of my facehole’ is any indication, that was his mouth acting on autopilot- Ethan makes question noise, out comes what’s in head. He’s already trying to keep something else from slipping out- and when you’re trying not to think of elephants, sometimes you get a rhino instead.
Does that make it okay? No. But we shouldn’t attribute malice, where stupidity is the likely answer.
^ This.
Ugh. Got position-sniped, and the structure of this comment section is a disaster. ^This @beige, not at Shadow.
Rather, @Shadow:
If you’re thinking we’re attributing malice, then I think you’re misinterpreting, since I’m not getting that impression from the comments I’m reading, nor did I intend that with my own comments. People can make mistakes or act poorly without malice.
Heck, one could argue that most drunken mishaps (up to and including abuse) are done without malice- a dark inherent nature akin to malice for some, perhaps [eg, mood disorders], but nothing conciously willful. But even with the jutification that malice wasn’t intended, it doesn’t mean that an action can’t be destructive and poorly-received.
No matter how little malice was involved, we can’t avoid the fact that, as beige so aptly put it: “there’s no way [that behavior isn’t] fucked up”
**To be clear, referencing individuals who are abusive/otherwise problematic exclusively while drunk, and even there only intending to indicate that some may perhaps be able to attribute their actions to things other than malice. Others may perhaps just use the alcohol as an excuse.
Just noting this lest anyone interpret some sort of “alcohol-based actions can’t be based in malice” sentiment from that section.
I think it’s less about Mike for most people and more that he said it to Ethan. ETHAN. Who despite all the fuckery that Mike was doing… still considered him a good friend. Hell, they were even lovers for a time. And I hear for some people even when it’s mindless sex, it can somehow bring them closer together and further cement a friendship.
Like… you don’t just say that to a person. Especially not a person who clearly has been as this hospital for days to be with said comatose person. It’s more that Dan has probably irrevocably fucked up what little progress of a friendship with Ethan that he had.
This exactly.
I don’t know. It’s certainly painful for Ethan to hear, but I think you could make a good case for Danny basically being right and maybe this being a time to say it. An intervention, if you will.
Sure, Ethan’s emotionally attached to him, but even Ethan’s acknowledged he’s not at all sure Mike’s really a friend. While sex can cement a relationship, that’s not a good thing if the relationship is abusive, which this one arguably has been. Some time without Mike’s presence might well be the best thing for Ethan, even if this is a horrible way to get it.
Mind you, I don’t think Danny’s actually ready to make that argument and I doubt he was even thinking about it consciously. It also doesn’t take into consideration the revelation Mike had during the fight and how that might change him – which Danny certainly doesn’t know anything about.
I’m gonna say when someone is in the hospital outside the person’s room (and the person is in a coma after heroically sacrificing himself for someone’s other best friend), then no, it is really, really not the right time to say it. Even if Ethan genuinely needed an intervention, doing it now would be guaranteed to make him defensive and even more attached to Mike. Also, suggesting that maybe it would be better if Mike didn’t wake up is also a great way to get Ethan defending Mike, so if it was an attempt at an intervention, it would backfire hugely. Honestly, if it was an attempt at an intervention it would be *worse* than whatit actually is, which just is Danny saying something dumb without thinking.
I feel the same way, like what, this comments section hates Mike. But it might not be the same people as I don’t keep track. I think people just like criticizing certain characters no matter what they do.
I can’t speak for everyone, but here’s my two cents:
Mike is a horrible person to everyone, consistently. Danny’s not obligated to forgive or forget that.
However, wishing serious harm on someone real is not really something I’m generally comfortable with and to Danny, Mike is not only real, he’s saying this to one of Mike’s best friends. I’d be more understanding if this was a horrible thought he said in a moment of emotionality to someone else, but saying it to his best friend? Beyond out of line.
We’re not saying it about a real person to their friend’s face… There’s a difference between talking shit about a bad person where it only hurts them (or hurts nobody) vs. where you manage to hit a decent person with the blowback.
Sounds two-faced and like a double standard to me.
Oh shit Danny…
Oh Danny, you’ve justed Danned it up like you never have before. How is he going to backpedal out of this one?
Time for Danny to find a sword so he can fall on it.
On a unicycle!
I mean, with the hat and the ukulele, it’s probably only a matter of time before he’s got a unicycle.
Just no bagpipes. There’s a guy in Portland who’s already working that side of the street.
Meet the Unipiper
TERRORIST!
He just leaps into the lion pit at the zoo.
DAMNY.
DAMNY YOU WILCOX!
Oh jeez, the good egg broke all over his face.
Welp… time to be hittin’ the old Dusty Trail…
done dand
Oh, so this is going to be a cringe week.
Oh boy.
OMG
Is it just me or is this the first time Danny has actually messed up anywhere near this bad?
His reaction to the Dorothy breakup and ‘stupid Yale’ wasn’t great.
But was it THIS bad? No. No, and at least this time, he recognizes immediately how bad it is.
The fact that saying it immediately transported him to the Upside Down was probably a clue.
Also true.
I mean the ‘stop being AG’ argument right before his breakup with Amber was also unknowingly more or less advocating someone die, and it was his actual girlfriend, but there he had no realization whatsoever that there WAS a dissociative split and the gap between the two alters was steadily widening as the relationship had been going on, because *gestures to Amber’s Many Sources of Trauma*. So I’m willing to put that as something he had virtually no context for or way of knowing that WAS what he was saying.
Here? Yeah, no, straight to the Upside Down is merited.
Should we start calling it “his break-up with Amazi-Girl” at this point? I mean, since we’re now 100% sure that Mazi is a wholly different person than Amber at this point.
True. The ambiguity there of course is that he thought he was dating Amber, so force of habit kicks in.
Fair enough.
Eh, I’m pretty sure he was dating both of them, even if he didn’t realize it.
Nah, Amber was always telling him that they (Amber and Danny) weren’t a couple.
Except when she wasn’t. Even when they first had sex, she was Amber by the end.
The two alters were much closer then.
Yep, because “they” weren’t totally split yet. Like thejeff said, during the sexytimes we saw the lines get blurred quite a lot.
Sweet flipping christmassy dinglehopper, Danny boy, you dun goofed.
Is there any worse thing he could have said at this moment?
“Isn’t Transformers just a rip-off of Go-Bots?”
…No, this still wins.
Normally I hate cutting away to another scene right after a big moment but this hurts so much I’d welcome it.
Oh, for fuck’s sake, Danny!!!!! What did you just do!?!?!
Danned it up, what else?
*Well, off to the plant!*
Then to the Duff Brewery…
Oh for fucks sake Danny
Oh Danny… you just went and ruined it forever…
Well R.I.P Ethan/Danny probably
The only way out of this I can think of is to cover with something else embarrassing like “I was thinking about asking you out and arguing with myself about whether now is a good time, sorry, I was so in my head that I didn’t hear anything you said for the last little while, could you repeat yourself?” It might not work, but could be worth a shot.
But since this is Dumbing of Age I doubt Danny will be able to think of that in time.
To be quite honest, this was so very tone deaf and mean that you’d expect it to come right out of Mike’s mouth at his most assholish.
I think Danny needs to handle the consequences this time.
That was just cold, I know Mike was an Asshole, but condemning someone to a brain damaged coma of which you do not know if or when they would recover from, that’s something I would reserve for Ryan the Rapist. And he said that to Ethan, who despite Mike’s assholeishness considered him a friend since middle school.
It’s worth a shot, but it’d also be totally fair if it didn’t work….
Holy shit, I’m legitimately shaken IRL, this is a level of second-hand mortification I didn’t even realize I could reach in regards to a fictional character’s fuck ups.
Like……… holy shit, Danny.
Agreed. I want to hurl myself into the Empty Void Of Mortification and I only READ that sentence.
Seconded!
You put my emotions into words!! I’m still reeling.
Right?????
its over danny..you eff up
I’m not an unforgiving person but this would be the end of the relationship* were I in Ethan’s place.
*at least temporarily and pending Danny’s response
Damn Danny, I know Mike was an asshole, but that was cold. Ethan has been hanging out with him since he was 15.
13. They’ve known each other five years.
Seriously I. Just. Wooooooow.
I bet 5th panel Danny wishes he can break through the 4th wall to tackle 4th panel Danny to stop himself.
Danny, you’ve found a way to out-Danny yourself.
Cerberus! <3 How are you?
Confirmation that Cerberus is alive and commenting!!! Today is a good day. Even if not for Danny.
Holy shit, you’re back! Long time no see, what’s new with you?
No one Dans like Danny
Even Danny has never Danned this hard. This is Danbreaking material here.
This isn’t your everyday Danning.
This is… advanced Danning.
The hat could only contain it so long.
Cerberus! 🙂 How have things been?
Youuuuuuu! <3 How's everything? Y'know, considering.
In case it weren’t obvious… we missed you, Cerb. Hope… all this… is treating you well. Okay, gently? Probably not well, but, it’s the thought, i hope?
Why would you say that, Danny?
I see Danny is attempting to speedrun the demise of this relationship.
Today he finally achieved classic Danny status, I see.
I think this might actually be worse.
If Danny was anywhere near this in Shortpacked, it explains the long-term commentariat’s low opinion of him. I’d always wondered why the SP readers seemed to almost despise him.
That one was always mean to Joyce….so of course fans hated him.
Joyce was openly stalking him, despite a stated lack of interest in her.
Danny only appeared in a handful of SP! strips… It’s Roomies! and It’s Walky! that he really Dans in.
I didn’t read Roomies or It’s Walky while it was happening, so my perspective could be off, but my impression is that this strip is worse than anything he said or did there. (He had many more cringe-worthy moments there than he has here overall, but today’s strip is pretty bad.)
I’d say this is second after getting Ruth killed.
The big tonal difference between here and the Walkyverse is that then Danny had authorial approval, especially in Roomies!. His cringe-worthy stuff there was mostly not challenged, but rewarded.
How, HOW do you come back from a comment like that???? You can’t defend it because other than the strangeness of invasive thoughts, there’s not a moral defense for having that sort of thought.
I think maybe the best thing would be to say, “Oh my god, my brain just went to a weird place and I said that thought out loud but of course my immediate answer is yes! Yes that would be terrible! Because then Ethan and Amber would lose a longtime friend and I care about them and I don’t want them to go through that.”
some other comments say he embarrassed himself, but embarrassment isn’t what I would be feeling in this situation. Regret certainly. But embarrassment is usually for when you make yourself look stupid, not callous.
Shame’s the better term, but I can buy ‘oh god you know how sometimes you look down a flight of stairs and wonder what it would be like to go over the railing, even though you’re immediately horrified?* Yeah that is exactly what happened and I am so sorry my mouth started moving before my brain could catch up because that was awful.’ Which has an element of embarrassment wedged between the shame and regret.
*… Intrusive ‘call of the void’ thoughts are more or less normal, right? Like not GOOD or WANTED but common? Because if not then damn, I knew I was a depressive anxious mess young but that’d be ‘since I was, like, four or five’ young.
You are not alone, my acquaintance. You are not alone in this. Still an anxious and depressive mess, but you’re not alone in that either.
The worst part about the intrusive call of the void club is the lack of free cookies to encourage us that this doesn’t mean we’re inherently horrible, because we don’t act on them.
Yep, completely normal. I think the allure of cliff edges is famously the most common example.
Also, I believe thinking terrible thoughts unbidden is also completely normal, it’s just most of the time we brush them aside and move on with the life we want to live. That didn’t happen here.
They are very normal, moreso in overly anxious brains. usually it’s the brains way of overcompensating so you step away from the edge or something.
My 2 year old daughter learnt to cut paper with scissors then non-verbally asked if she could cut her hand with them. Her response to me explaining she could not, that would hurt, WE ONLY CUT PAPER WITH SCISSORS was a disappointed exclamation of “Oh” (but she didn’t attempt to cut her finger off so I can live with that).
I mean, it’s a much better introduction to the concept that scissors hurt us than some she could have had.
Quick add “Is what Mike would say” and turn it into a joke!, gah you’re screwed.
HOLY SHIT, DANNY.
Sorry that was supposed to stay in the thought bubble
Holy Fuck Dude, I know might was outwardly a total asshole to most people, and you wernt his friend, but that was one of the worst things anybody has said in this comic, straight up villain talk. I didnt expect that to come from Danny boi over here.
siiiiiggh. I really dunno why I bother getting my hopes up for these two when Willis is always pullin stuff like this with them
Whow that was quick
Oh… No… God…
God Damn IT, DANNY. That is… why did you give it words?!
Well, Danny-Boy, The Danny Zone is callin’,
from hall to hall, and back from the O.R.
Your canon’s fired and now your ship is sinking.
So find a raft, and something for an oar.
There’s doctors here, and some very well trained nurses;
To help with feet stuck half way down your throat,
So grab your hat, and hide your face with in it.
Your hope is gone, you’re left here to remember
Ethan is gone and You now know that is that.
*Sheds a single tear* Beautiful.
*applauds*
What is this parodying?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZ3E7kIYtR0
Or, the definitive version:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OCbuRA_D3KU
(Sorry, can’t resist once an actual link’s up.)
Holy shit, Dan.
I mean, I get it. Intrusive thoughts, and all that. But holy shit. Of all the things to accidentally say out loud.
And that was when he knew he fucked up.
Unless Ethan takes it unexpectedly well and kinda has that “I have to laugh so I don’t strangle someone” kinda reaction. Like Mike is Mike and that’s a prime brain fart moment. I guess especially since Danny hasn’t seen the reality of Mike in the hospital so his last recollection of Mike was at the party which was a kind of “oh my god what I would do to never interact with you again” interaction. Which is how most of Mike’s interactions end up.
But I feel like if Danny didn’t have the more abstract concept of “Mike is hospitalized in a coma” and the reality of Mike right now in front of him, that thought wouldn’t have come to him so fast. I feel that though, something heavy and serious is going on and someone says something and just… such a good punchline or joke springs to the front of my mind and at times it’s taken everything in me not to say it.
Yeah, the abstract concept of ‘asshole dude my friends tolerate for whatever reason because he hurts them is in a coma’ and the reality of seeing him in that coma, and seeing how BAD it is are two very different things.
Quick, follow it up with “Because he would be in pain right now and in a few days it would probably be better.”!
“Oh gawd, that came off as terrible! I meant that with everything that happened after he got hurt a bit more time away from knowing everything might be good.”
You only learn from your mistakes.
And Dan, my man, you’re about to learn a lot from this one.
wow i’ve never seen someone put their own foot so far into their mouth it came out of their ass.
QUICK FAKE A SEIZURE
I was not expecting to see a main character die
DANNY NO.
Well if Dan isn’t just the danniest Dan to ever dan.
D’oh!
God fucking dammit, Danny
what the hell, danny
Quick! Time for a bout of glossolalia!
When Danny first ran off to find Ethan my immediate thought was, “He’s going to Dan it up.” But everyone in the comments both here and on Patreon were so optimistic that I convinced myself I’d overreacted.
Nope, I’d say if anything I underestimated how bad it would be.
I have no clue what you’re talking about, I sensed shit was about to hit the fan. Especially with these guys. Also you know what, I feel like it’s just the tip of the iceberg. It’s only going to get worse from here.
WOW DANNY
What I like is that he knew he shouldn’t say it, he said it anyway, and then he continued knowing he shouldn’t have said it.
I’ve give you ‘Danning it up’, and it’s fair for Ethan to be upset/angry, but I think it’s pretty understandable to have the brain/mouth filter slip every once in a while and it doesn’t make him a villain/asshole.
Mmm, I’d definitely agree that it doesn’t make him a villain, but in this moment in particular? He is kind of an asshole.
Yeah, like- it was an asshole thing to say, but I don’t think it makes him irredeemable by any means (especially since he *immediately* regrets it).
Hey Danny WHAT THE EFF
Danny is uncouth
What on earth, Danny?!?! Well, so long to Ethan for a while.
Oh Danny you poor poor schmuck.
Here’s the problem I have with this: what he said and when he said it is so bad that if Ethan takes it predictably, there’s not going to be any further interaction between these two characters for a prepostrous length of time in universe, which means for us, years. And Danny lacks consistent chemistry or rapport with anyone other than Sal, Mike or Ethan. Sal is tied up in her storyline and Mike is in a coma.
There’s either gotta be a cushion or this is Danny’s effective coda.
Ethan might forgive for that maybe, even so that might to a while and romance might be off the table till then.
Coda, sure, “shoulda-Coda-woulda Said something better”, OR maybe it’s his Swan Song. (Hums leitmotif from Swine-Lake).
He’s not gonna say you’re a good egg, Danny!
lol what the hell Danny? ~<3
I feel mortified.
(GASP) DANIEL!!!
How… how do you even manage to fuck up that badly?
Also, even when ignoring Danny’s lack of a brain -> mouth filter, am I wrong in thinking that this is an extremely fucked up thing to even THINK? I mean, Mike’s in a coma. He might never wake up, and he’s currently hooked up to an IV while his parents grieve over him. Even if you don’t like the dude, saying he’d be better off dead is… a step too far.
To be fair, he just said it wouldn’t be so bad if he didn’t wake up for a while, not forever. Still totally horrible but not quite wishing death on him.
The reality of non-medically induced comas is the longer Mike’s in it, the less likely he is to wake up at all and the worse the effects if he does will be. And even medically induced, the less time spent is generally better. A lot of people don’t REALIZE just how bad it is, but any injury that forcibly knocks you out for any length of time is Not Good. It does not take long for brain injuries to become traumatic. (And hell. My brother had a minor concussion four years ago. Stayed totally conscious! Has had intense chronic migraines since.)
Doctors saying ‘might not wake up for a while’ isn’t a ‘oh maybe next week, when everything dies down a bit and it’ll be fine.’ It’s ‘they’re not sure he’ll wake up at all.’
Comas can be recovered from still but this usually happens within the first two to four weeks if it will happen. They can’t say with full certainty that Mike will or won’t wake up since it has only been a few days, but after a month, the chance is really not great, so a while here might mean ‘after his injury has had a couple of weeks to heal, he *might* wake up but it seems unlikely he will before then and he still might not even then’ because Mike’s injury is pretty serious.
So they’re not necessarily at the ‘he might never wake up at all’ stage yet, but ‘he might not wake up for 2-3 weeks while his injury heals if he is going to and there are more likely to be issues the longer it takes’ is still not great! And while he could still come out of it perfectly fine, the anxiety of waiting and not knowing would be dreadful!
And if Danny said this to me about someone I care about, I would probably be thinking about yeeting him out a window.
But Danny isn’t a doctor using “for a while” as a euphemism for “not at all”. Danny’s thinking “for a while” means “for a while”.
How that hits Ethan depends on how well Ethan knows what the doctors really mean.
Mike is an awful person who bullies him at every opportunity. Wishing he’d stay out of action for longer isn’t the most horrid thing on earth. Especially as Danny’s understanding is there’s no difference between mike waking up now or later except time.
People are being really harsh on Danny. Most people feel a great sense of relief when an abusive person in their life die. This is a lesser version of that understandable feeling. Mike is truly awful to Danny, wanting him to be gone for a little longer is understandable.
Mike hasn’t actually done very much to Danny over all except annoy him – while it is fair for Danny to dislike him for his treatment of Ethan and Amber and general attitude, Mike hasn’t bullied Danny. He even gave up on his plan of making Danny jealous (though Danny went and got jealous on his own anyway and Mike found this relatable due to also feeling jealous over Ethan), there are plenty of people with more reason to hate Mike like Walky who he actively deceived and was much more malicious to.
So saying ‘Mike bullies Danny at every opportunity’ is kind of a reach, especially when they’ve barely interacted. Hell, their main interaction was at the damn party before Mike got hurt and Mike tried to kind of get along with him and then annoyed him.
This is just about one of the worst things Danny could have said to Ethan in this situation though when Ethan is clearly expressing 1) that he feels emotional, 2) that he wants Mike to be okay. Danny doesn’t need extensive medical expertise or knowledge to understand that it taking a while is not something Ethan would want, and it is a VERY HARSH thing to say to someone actively rooting for the person’s recovery even if it is someone you dislike.
When did Mike give up on his plan to make Danny jealous? The plan certainly worked, even if Mike got his own feelings involved.
Nah, I completely understand thinking it; there are people out there I would be thrilled if they dropped dead. Would I show that while talking to their loved ones? Wow, no, that is horrible, those people are going through enough.
Honestly, if Danny had waited and said it to Joe, for example, when they were alone, I’d be wincing a bit but still, fair enough.
This sums it up pretty well for me – the problem is less that Danny had the thought or that Danny said it, but that he said it to Ethan specifically.
Exactly.
So… Many ppl have horrible fleeting thoughts, called intrusive thoughts. Trying to suppress them and& shame yourself for having them is a ticket to any number of mental health conditions. OCD and a lot of anxiety disorders have anxiety around intrusive thoughts as a component.
For those with intrusive thoughts, part of our brains remain kind of like a drunk asshole edgelord – with no filter and no concept of what is or isn’t appropriate. Mine is obsessed with thoughts of disaster, maiming and self-harm.
The more I try to suppress those thoughts the more they happen. It’s like if you tell a kid NOT to think of a purple hippopotamus or that game that used to be popular in the 00s (you just lost btw). The more you try to not think of something the more you’ll think of it. And if you respond to thinking of it more by trying to suppress it more you get into a feedback loop and that way lies hours crouched under a long cold shower yelling at your brain to shut up. I know cuz I have been there.
All of which is to say I have had those sorts of thoughts probably a good dozen times today and it’s only 9:30 AM here. And today is a light day for it. I am still a decent person. I volunteer. I don’t actually want to hurt ppl. My brain just has a drunk asshole edgelord in residence.
I’ve been losing The Game since the late 80’s / early 90’s. I will lose it again.
Nah, it’s a totally normal thing to think. Everyone has less than ideal thoughts. Saying it (and specifically saying it to Ethan) is the problem, and honestly, given that he clearly knows he done effed up, I’m inclined to cut him a little slack (though I don’t think Ethan is required to).
Danny uh, finds a way.
Willis really must hate Danny is he keeps making him unlikable aqnd clingy. Does Willis really hate his past behaviors encarnated in Danny?
I keep saying Danny is Willis punching bag.
You do know Danny has had it a lot easier than some of the other characters right?
Objectively yes. However, Danny seems consistently written as hard to like. While I don’t care for Amber at all, she has many good qualities. Danny doesn’t have many at all imo.
He’s well meaning and always looking for love, he’s a bit hapless sometimes but besides that the only other issues are Danny ability to always make a situation even worse for himself.
Honestly, I actually feel really bad for Danny. It doesn’t make me dislike him- it was a terrible thing to say, but he obviously knows it was terrible. I’ve said things I wished I hadn’t plenty of times (though tbf, never quite on this scale.)
I was thinking last night that the Law of Narrative Conservation of Empathy tells us that if Joyce’s father and Faz and Walky are becoming better people, and Mikeis out of commission, that two or more have to become worse people.
Joyce’s mother is one of the two, and I wondering who the second would be.
Some might suggest Linda, but while Linda is controlling she is not obviously malicious (though I doubt she is thinking much about what is good for Amber.)
I didn’t have Danny down, and he seems a bit weak to sustain revenge. Not out of the question that someone like Joyce’s mother could use him as a tool though… he’s pretty naive and likes attention.
Okay, Danny, this is salvageable. Just explain that you’ve seen how cruel Mike is to Ethan and Amber, and you hate seeing Ethan in particular hurt, and MAYBE the two of them could use a few days respite. Be cool and suave like that’s what you meant all along.
Cool and suave, Danny. Cool and suave.
…..
Goddannit.
No….no that doesn’t salvage it, Danny has fucked up very deep here lmfao
oh fuck
like the more i think about it the more im just
“bruh”
Well that’s the end of that ship
I hereby dub this ship… the USS Ethanny!
*throws bottle of champagne against the prow*
“bottle cracks hole in ship, immediately sinks to bottom, all hands lost*
Pretty much this yeah.
It’s a sad day for the USS Seecox. 😥
noooo i was rooting for them to be a couple
So, Dan, you came here to see Ethan and ask him out while his best friend is in a coma.
In retrospect, Dan’s entire being here is shitty.
Run Danny, RUN!!!!
But yeah, like others have sorta said this seems like one of those invasive thoughts that come into your head and a second later you actually think through it and you’re like “What? No! Shut up brain what the heck.” It’s just that Dan’s mouth moved too fast for his conscience to stop it.
Bad Danny. No biscuit!
ethan is so moe in this strip what the fuck i want to reach in and squeeze him like a squeaky toy
Dan gonna Dan.
“…I mean, just look at the world right now!” might be the only possible recovery
OH F*CK
oh dang you forgot to quicksave before chosing this dialogue option
When Danny realised something: He has a significant mean, selfish and callous side. The thing is? I’m pretty sure that we all do.
Unfortunately when you are generally seen as a Nice and Polite and Milquetoast sort of person, letting that side of you out can have a… disproportionate reaction.
And the proportionate reaction to this bullshit is already pretty big.
Hey. Some of us have an inner Mike.
Like Amber. Amber has an inner Mike. Who else would I have been talking about.
Your mom can have an inner Mike too, for a nickel.
ba-dum tss
Danny’s mean side is a lot more callous than mine because this is not even something that was in the radar of things in my mind that a person could say in this situation but we do know Danny can be a bit petty and bitter when it suits him. But I guess Ethan is learning that now too.
Would that be so bad?
….I mean, he has a LOT of healing to do and sleep is supposed to help!!
Hahahahahahaareyoubuyingthis?
Hard pivot!
Make it seem like you don’t want him in pain as he recovers!
Man, I would actually try to throw myself off the roof to avoid the consequences of this.
Shitting fuck, Daniel Wilcox. You apologise for that comment right now, young man.
I have a hard time agreeing with that sentiment, mostly because (as a reader) I’ve seen Mike 1) beat up Joe because of a long-debunked urban legend about male thought patterns, 2) try to sabotage Dorothy and Walky’s romance because Walky farts, and 3) sleep with Ethan BECAUSE HE WANTED TO HAVE SEX WITH ONE OF ETHAN OR DANNY TO HURT THE OTHER ONE, AND ETHAN TOLD MIKE TO LEAVE DANNY ALONE, among many other things. In the context of occupying the same universe as Mike and not being omniscient then, yes, what Danny said was objectively horrible. As an outsider looking in, however, I can’t help but feel a bit proud of Danny for saying what I’ve been thinking.
The problem is less Mike’s character and more that Danny said this to Ethan, who is invested in Mike as a person and is in a lot of pain because Mike is badly injured.
Honestly, if Danny was really ready to make the argument that “it might be better because Mike is really bad for Ethan”, I’d get behind it. Pretty sure Danny’s not going there though.
Dan has moved from a nice guy to a Nice GuyTM. He’s not here to comfort Ethan about his best friend being in a coma, he’s here to hit on him during a moment of vulnerability. He’s actually slimier than Joe at peak do-list.
Nah, Danny’s not doing “Nice Guy” stuff at all. Yeah, he’s thinking about hitting on Ethan when Ethan’s vulnerable, but that’s more because of his reaction to the kidnapping: “I almost lost him forever” from a few strips back.
Not taking advantage of the vulnerability.
plus, Danny isn’t pretending to be Nice. Danny is being very not-nice to a scared person right now.
Damn it Danny, some thoughts are best kept to yourself.
Oh boy…
I heard that ps2 sound effect reading this
Holy shit, Danny! I know your parents say that sort of thing about you, but you’re supposed to be taking them as a cautionary tale; don’t imitate them!
Damn Danny, you’re officially a bigger douchebag than Mike is, I didn’t know that was possible.
Apologize for underestimating Mike this instant!
No, Mike would say that, too, but people wouldn’t take it as seriously, because it’s Mike.
Mike WOULD say it, I don’t think mike would MEAN it.
Mike wouldn’t mean it, he’d be deliberately saying it to hurt. To strike at a weakness he’d carefully calculated.
I see the comic is now in All Trauma, All The Time mode.
Lmao!!!!! The dark humor is on point here
Why, Danny? Why?
Jesus Christ that is one of the grimmest comments this story has ever come out with and it’s NOT from a villain?
Ya done fucked up, Wonderbread.
Holy shit. He Danned it at a heretofore unimaginable level.
Continue with: “I mean, it would give his body more time to heal? Like a medical coma?”
Maybe not medically accurate, but at least NOT THIS
big yikes dan
danny: oh hey its been a while since I last stuck my foot in my mouth, I guess I’d better do it to a level hereto unseen by man
Danny best apply for a job at PartyCity ‘cuz he’s in fucking clown town.
*oofs into oblivion*
I don’t even know if I want to see the aftermath of this mess
I’m confused. Mike’s in the hospital, right? I thought we were back in the dorms. Where are Ethan and Danny standing? (Besides the eternal pit of mortification)
The hospital hallway.
The hospital hallway. I don’t know how you thought this was the dorms when Faz and Amber said Blaine was upstairs getting ribs taken out. I know Ruth talks about femur removal, but I don’t think she has approval for ribs too.
Thanks. I’m bad at this stuff.
oh no
Ouch.
You’re only supposed to burn bridges after you’ve crossed them, my dude. Doing it while you’re on them? Not advised.
Duuuuuuuuuuuuuuude…
(Looks at comments section) Well, I still like Danny! Lots of characters in this comic get away with being awful to each other (example early Ruth) and since Danny wasn’t with Amber all he knows about Mike is he appears to be a consistently awful person to everyone he claims to be friends with. People hate Danny for being a doormat but also don’t want him to be mean.
(Just to be clear I do think him blurting this out is unacceptable and he totally has to apologise, just surprised at the lack of charity for him in the comments section when people will allow characters like Amber to exist under the “complicated people” banner. Danny is complicated too! He’s sometimes too nice and sometimes too selfish and petty. It’s a balance he needs to find, he’s still growing up. Like with people attacking Walky for not taking action to fight a grown man trying to hold them hostage….these characters are still basically teens. I know this comic has seen us grow up and mature several years, but Danny is still a teen and has only had a month or two at this point in the comic to mature.)
I don’t necessarily hate the lad, he just had moments like these where he does or says things outrageously dumb. Atleast last time he did he managed to come back from at the right time and saved face…. don’t know how he comes back from this though.
I still like Danny overall. That said, he’s going to need to do a lot of work to fix this, because holy shit.
I like Danny, and I generally dislike Mike, but this was DEEPLY out of line because he’s saying this to Ethan. Right after Ethan’s been in the room to see Mike, and is expressing deep concern about Mike.
Odds on it being an intrusive/impulsive thought of some sort are decent, and if so saying so while apologizing profusely can probably salvage things. But it’s an extremely callous thing to say out loud to a grieving, already-traumatized friend. The time to have that talk about how Mike treats his friends is NOT here and now.
The worst part of making this comment is knowing Mike would be proud of you for it.
The ship was torpedoed… there were no survivors
We thought the Good Ship Danneth was headed for wet-dock (cause a dry-dock hurts too much) but Damn it! One simple does not fire a canon at one’s own deck and sink the ship yourself, you wait for someone external to do that, … OramIwrongagain?
How do you say something like that out loud?
Never go full Danny.
Danny, Danny, Danny…. Even if a world without Mike is not a bad idea You can think it but not say it! Now Hetan will hate you forever.
Danny boy, c’mon. At least try and observe the social niceties.
“…. is what he’d say if our situation was reversed, am I right? Ah haha what a rascal! Then he’d go and have sex with my mother or something ha ha ha! C’mon Mikey wake up already, because I’m really bad at trying to recreate your unique brand of humor to comfort your childhood friend! HAHA”
Option 1: Double down. What, Mike is allowed to be an asshole but we aren’t allowed to be assholes back at him?
Option 2: Ethan: Hahaha, yeah, that’s what Mike would say. You remind me of him with your honesty. Let’s make out.
It’s not really being an asshole at Mike is the problem. It’s mostly stomping your foot right on where Ethan is hurting.
-holy shit Danny-
I think the other comments hit it with his only potential recovery options are “wait, you caught me on another train of thought, here’s an actual response to what you said” or “I mean, he needs a lot of recovery time right”, but both have a well-deserved high chance to fail
because holy shit Danny
Also for everyone happy Danny said it or thinking this was deserved, the problem is more that it was said to Ethan than that it was said.
Noooo, bullshit excuses would definitely make this worse.
Okay Danny to sum up years of psychology there’s an Inner Voice and an Outer Voice and the Inner Voice is the source of ideas and emotion and it’s raw and unfiltered and the Outer Voice is the self we project to the world and its job is to filter and protect the Inner Voice and Rule Number f’in One is Never Give The Inner Voice Control Of The Mouth ‘cuz…
You blew it, son.
In think apologizing profusely immediately here is the only salvage and hope Ethan understands intrusive thoughts
Well. Thats one way of burning a bridge I guess.
Willis told us that he’d broken a cardinal rule, and we understood it to mean a major character would die. We didn’t expect two. Well played, sir.
I really hope Ross counts as a major character, because I can’t handle another death right now
Holy shit Danny, you’re not supposed to say the quiet part out loud.
Best chance he has to salvage this is major backpedaling, maybe that he meant “is that really bad” (as in “is that mean his injuries are extremely severe”).
Well, he has a point but, holy shit, that was the worst possible moment to say this out loud and the worst possible person to say it to.
Mike, who generally lets out every mean or dark thought, would probably appreciate this. But Ethan? Not so much.
At least he didn’t wish him dead, just out of order for a while longer (and I would agree that this isn’t the worst thing that could happen). We will see how this will spiral down from here.
The only way I see to screw this up even further is getting his feelings for Ethan out too, right now, thus making Ethan connect this information with his (probably) felt outrage forevermore.
First it was Dorothy, then it was Amber, and now, Ethan. He just cannot seem to get out of his own way, when it comes to relationships.
And then he jumped off the window and was never seen again
Welp, SOMEONE just lost his chance to fill Ethan’s Mike-shaped hole…
danny wilcox…..
Hmm, I kind of thought that word would have gotten around by now about how Mike tried to lead Blaine and Ross away from the party and helped AG fight them … but maybe not, if Danny still has such a low opinion of him. (Holy SHIT, Danny!!!)
Maybe Dan’s behaviour is more of a surprise to me than to other people because this is the only strip that I read with him in it.
Its been awhile since Danny showed us why “danning it up” was an appropriate verb.
I’m just going to hide under your comment.
I do wish there was a way to like comments, this would have so many…
Oof danny
Ugh, Danny. I had such high hopes for you. Ethan deserves better.
Please. Pleeeeaaase smash cut to Mary watching Ruthless suplex Carol.
It feels like this strip has been up for a month.
ooops.. wow …. thats rough ….