Teenagers, however, do tend to be more prone to recognizing their approach doesn’t work or whoops! Turns out they didn’t know shit. They’re still developing their frontal lobes and figuring out how the world works and what they care about. I hold more hope for them than actual adult adults, and even they can sometimes surprise you.
A lot of people are just perennially disappointing, but college is formative because meeting new people with different experiences while your brain’s still developing in key ways does often change how you view the world. There is still hope for these kids. Most of them aren’t even 20 yet.
What you’re seeing is Bad Decisions Made By Teenagers. It very often prompts the selfsame teenagers to wish that they themselves caught fire and died, when they look back on it years later once they’re no longer teenagers.
Honestly, thank god. I Am A Mature Grownup Jennifer was surreal. ‘Unnecessary drama? Hook it directly into my veins!’ Jennifer may be awful, but she’s an awful we’ve come to enjoy watching from a safe distance before it inevitably explodes in her face.
Oh. Well there goes any and all possibility of this Jennifer change being genuine. This is “Billie” all the way…
…..
…Also yeah, I still don’t trust Asher.
I’ve suspected that her “change” wasn’t genuine for a while now, and this confirms my suspicion. And yeah, I really don’t trust any of these four, and I especially distrust Asher and Raidah.
Particularly given her reaction when Sal told her Walky stood up to Linda, which was one of no small amount of shock, or her not giving the Walkertons the naive benefit of the doubt Walky was on the topic of the microaggressions they kept visiting on Sal. She knows how toxic a household it is.
She can both not want it (in that her parents are kind of horrible and the kind of person they’d actually approve of and not selectively see or be trying to mold their children into would ALSO suck) and want it (in that it would be really fucking nice if they were the kind of people who would accept their kids as they actually are) simultaneously! Unfortunately, that is the way of many bad parent-child relationships, especially if the parent does occasionally have moments of not being a complete trashfire.
She probably doesn’t actively want their approval any more now but at the same time, that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t sting to have them actually like and see someone else as more befitting of being their child and that she doesn’t have parents that will love her for who she is.
It absolutely has extra barbs that it isn’t just ‘we don’t approve of you’ but ‘we don’t approve of you and would absolutely replace you with this friend you have in a heartbeat and love her as she is, she is our favourite daughter’ when Sal is well aware that Jennifer is barely functional as a human being and has a mess of a life she is always trying to paper over.
Mary would be Neutral Evil! Neutral Good is the alignment for Messiah types (Which is why you have Joyce in the NG slot), and DOA usually presents Mary as the Anti-Joyce. Thus NE.
Being an authority figure has absolutely nothing to do with morals, the laws of the land or even having an internal code. see the previous administration
Being Lawful has nothing to do with morals, either. It’s about playing by (and knowing how to abuse) the rules. Ruth, being an authority, knows which rules she can get away with breaking , thus Lawful Evil. Billie, like the previous administration, generally believes that the laws don’t apply to her, which slots her more into Chaotic Evil than any other alignment.
Personally, I’d switch Billie and Ruth. Ruth has standards, rules that she holds herself to (generally). Billie just does whatever benefits her most at any given moment.
Honestly I don’t think so. Amber and Amazi-girl have picked fights, cheated on walky’s grades for him and done other stuff. Like they’re genuinely good but they’re definitely one of the more wildcards of the DOA cast.
Right, but she does those things because she’s right to do them, according to her. She creates all these rules and regulations for Amazi-Girl’s job and then ardently sticks to them until she can find a way to make herself more miserable.
This is still what I’d consider chaotic though. Sure she’s got a sense of justice and you could make an argument for her being more Lawful, but I definitely think she is just as much chaotic while still being seen as “good”.
I agree. By the way, I’d rate Joyce as lawful good along with Dorothy. She’s equally rule-driven, or neuroses-driven. Roz is politically correct. Her sister Robin is Daffy Duck.
I say, this thing does a rather fantastic job at demonstrating the fact that lawfulness and moral standing are NOT related whatsoever.
However, this chart seems to suffer from a similar problem to the tier lists in Tier Zoo; there seems to be some kind of unspoken “need” to make the characters evenly distributed throughout the quadrants here, without reckoning that some characters are better off sharing the same quadrant so that we could better predict (instead of project) character outcomes (as well as we could ever do that with two independent variables).
If this only intends to be funny, however, it does a pretty nice job. But I we could take this kind of thing SO much further.
How dare you besmirch Tierzoo’s good name. His meta advice is what led me to choosing my new main! I was using bottom tier trash like Black Widows and Kiwis until he came along.
Having watched that video I’ll echo what some of the comments are saying. Tier Zoo is coming from the perspective of a player maining that character, not the species as a whole. For example, Salmon, while they are at no risk of dying out, would be a really hard character to play single player campaign with because of how they’re griefed. i think the spread on the list feels fair. Besides having too much concentration in tier list makes them harder to read.
I guess here, it is instructive to note that ALL models and research have their limitations. Only so long as we actually respect those limitations and preserve that essential context in their redistribution (unlike most news reporters, who really have no business interpreting the results of scientific research), there should be no problem.
Considering the sheer amount of garbage out there that results from cutting off context like that, this is easier said than done, at least for now.
And NOW I understand where Kubrick got the word “droog” for the members of Alex’s gang in “A Clockwork Orange”. (…and just a side note, before someone pops in to say something like ‘What? It was explained in the film’ … I’ve never seen the movie; that sort of thing didn’t appeal to me then and still doesn’t now. I figured it was just a made-up word like the Eloi in H.G. Wells’ “The Time Machine”, or the Navi in James Cameron’s “Avatar”)
Oh dear. No words at all are made up in A Clockwork Orange, they’re all Russian words adapted to the English sound system and English grammar.
That includes horrorshow, which is хорошо, meaning “good”.
The whole backstory is that the action is set in a fairly distant future a good long while after the USSR has won the Cold War or something (it’s never made explicit).
…also, Eloi is in the Bible: in one gospel, Jesus ends up saying eloi, eloi, lema sabachthani, Aramaic (filtered through Greek) for “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me” as the text promptly explains.
The language in Avatar is made up out of whole cloth, though.
Neat. On looking it up, Na’vi is created, but (as expected for film) it is still built on linguistic concepts that exist in earth languages. So yeah, whole cloth, but still earthling cloth.
Oh I was just being coy because the internet is chiefly where we share unasked for opinions. And I mean no disrespect, the matrix is intriguing, but the archetypes on display don’t resonate with me so I am not a good condidate to offer an oppinion on the aesthetic of your piece.
Sal’s Chaotic Neutral because she honestly doesn’t give a shit about anything lofty and mostly just wants to do right by herself and the people around her that she cares about.
Carla believes in things improving because she has directly seen how things need to improve, and she will do this through sweet pranks and abolishing of harmful systems.
Carla’s also the heiress to a big tech company and doesn’t seem to have grappled with the ethical implications of her parents being billionaires yet, probably in part because her parents are rock stars TO HER and she needed that money and privilege to smash through the transphobic walls society put in her way. (For instance, getting a room in the women’s hall, probably a thing the Ruttens threw money and influence at the school to ensure.)
Don’t get me wrong, Carla is great and I am a bug, but I wouldn’t be shocked if she DOES eventually have to consider the fact that that money was probably through exploiting Ruttech workers. (If not, it would have to be explored that Ruttech is seriously unusual for a big tech company on basically every level, and Carla’s parents aren’t actually as rich personally as we’ve been led to believe. Given Willis’s periodic tweets about Batman and Scrooge McDuck’s ludicrous riches and the social implications there, I strongly suspect it’ll come up one way or another at some point. Both ‘genuine rockstar parents to their kid, but not great PEOPLE’ and ‘behold, ethical businesspeople’ would be new ground for this comic, since all the other known rich parents are some variety of awful* personally – Linda and Clint go without saying, Billingsworth Sr. substitutes money for affection and forced out the city homeless population, and Dargon Chesterfield, Cruel Captain of Industry may actually be a literal supervillain, plus the mobsters – but realistically, the Ruttens are probably professional assholes.)
* Dean McHenry seems to be fine, but neither he nor Tony is a character of any note.
Yeah, they’re clearly extremely successful. ‘You’ve heard of Ruttech, right? Of course you have,’ Carla being on magazine covers for being their kid and being trans, these suggest they are in fact Big Tech. (Given they make motorcycles and Zoomer was a car type in the Walkyverse, I headcanon they make cars here too but we don’t have more than secondhand evidence. But even with just smartphones and motorcycles, that’s some noticeable diversity of products there so they’ve got to be big.)
You don’t get to be a billionaire without exploiting a lot of people along the way, not on a personal level. (Maybe, MAYBE, if the company itself is worth billions but the owners do not have that personal wealth, not an expert there.) So Carla’s parents are most likely really good to her and supportive of causes that impact them and her, but still professionally ruthless and don’t pay nearly enough in taxes.
Yeah, it’s possible to earn millions by yourself (say with art or a really successful bestseller or product or something) but by the time you get to billions, you tend to be looking almost, if not entirely, universally at exploitation – either of workers or the environment – somewhere in the line.
Didn’t Carla once offer to give Lucy a drone for no real reason because her parents just had warehouses full of them? That’s not something I think an average generic tech millionaire would have so much stock of their daughter could give them out on a whim.
I do remember her being ready to pay anyone willing to hug Ruth in stock options, which also likely disqualifies them from being average generic tech millionaires.
Carla’s parents funded striking down anti-Trans laws in Indiana in the backstory. I think they’re on the up and up.
There’s even a strip where Carla goes “damn all your parents suck but I love mine, that makes me a rebel” and that one strip where Carla clearly fondly talks about how they couldn’t find Ultra Car toys so they just built her one themselves.
I just kinda figure given their only story presence in the series has been about how Carla loves them to pieces, the most characterization to them is that they’re Fun Rich like Hannelore’s dad.
Like yeah there are no good billionaires, because to amass that much money means you exploited your workforce and the system in the name of your profit, but there are two answers to that for the Ruttens; they either aren’t billionaires because they pay fair wages and taxes, or they are billionaires but they don’t exist, but I should tread carefully saying that because I am fearful of the potential Batman argument I am going to invoke.
Roz isn’t evil! She’s just loud and impolite. She has tactics that annoy people around her, but her lefty political alignment is often a good cause. (Bodily autonomy, safer sex, hoping her republican sister loses, etc.) She does a lot of performative allyship, but she’s learning, and at least she tries to back it up with action. For example, when she realized early-Joyce might have been assaulted at a party, she went out of her way to give her a resource, even though she and Joyce didn’t get along at all.
She’s good at the macro, and hit-or-miss on the micro, and she’s learning.
Plus, Billie’s done a lot of underage drinking for somebody lawful, and thinks that breaking and entering is terribly romantic.
I’m sorry, for the Evil tier you’ll have to dip into the actual badguys and dead people. Lawful Evil Clint or Ross (using the rules to harm people, or totally aligning himself with evil laws), Neutral Evil Blaine (he doesn’t care how, as long as Amber gets hurt), Chaotic Evil Mike (mainly wants to cause pain and chaos).
No, I can see Billie as Lawful – remember, Lawful isn’t NECESSARILY about the “law”, it’s about believing in hierarchical systems, which Billie definitely does.
And Ruth IS solidly Neutral Evil, though obviously not as much as Blaine.
Since when was law/chaos about hierarchy? Hierarchy is a manifestation of power control, lawfulness is about having a code of rules that is adhered to. Can there be venn overlap? For sure, as it’s easier to maintain a power hierarchy with codified rules, but belief in the rule of law does not imply belief in hierarchy.
Belief in the rule of law isn’t necessary to make you Lawful, which is why 3.X Paladins can go into a country where slavery is legal, not turn in escaped slaves to the authorities, and not immediately fall.
Neither does a code of rules make you Lawful – check out the 3.X Barbarians, which COULDN’T be Lawful, but could certainly have a code.
Also worth remembering that while her performative allyship has gotten a lot of play here, because she’s a minor character and the comic has focused more on LGBTQ issues, her main concern is reproductive rights and there she’s not an ally, but part of the oppressed group.
I went with protagonists on the cast page only as a rule, since including villains would make it boring and also I don’t know where I’d find thumbnails for them. The Evil parts are kind of exaggerated but I think they fit for the characters’ negative attributes (well I think I fudged the details a bit for Ruth, mostly just that she did her job unless she had an opportunity to harass Jennifer).
Jennifer’s all about exploiting power through social hierarchies, while Roz’s worst aspects of her allyship tend to manifest as lashing out for failing her standards and doing immoral shit like parading her sister’s outing for her own benefit, so I thought that fit for the idea of recklessly doing wrong to get out from Robin’s shadow.
The eight minutes was not wasted, but will be amply rewarded with pages and pages of discussion, analysis, and nit-picking for your amusement.
The primary problem is with your bottom left and bottom right. Jennifer is not remotely lawful and Roz is not evil. Mary is certainly not lawful, being willing to employ blackmail, but while evil, is not very chaotic. Sydney Yus is a much better exemplar of chaotic evil, even if fortunately not very effective. If you consider her political actions as evil without taking into account subsequent personal behavior, Robin owns the chaotic evil spot.
For lawful evil, I would personally go with Raidah, though I see room for argument. The discussion on where to put Amazigirl/Amber to me seems to miss the main point, that they are two separate personalities belonging in different positions. Amazigirl is lawful good and Amber is chaotic neutral. Again there is some room for argument as vigilantes are not legal and Amber can too readily enjoy slicing up people who threaten her friends, but I think the main point still stands.
The real takeway though is that Willis’s characters, much like real people, are too complicated to be put in neat little boxes that define them.
I don’t think Sydney Yus is Chaotic, actually – remember, their goal is to climb the hierarchy and take Galasso’s place, and after getting fired they still shared their tips with the staff, because that’s the agreed-upon social norm. I’d go with Ryan for Chaotic Evil.
Everyone else is accurate (or, at the very least, accurate ENOUGH)*, but Roz is solidly Chaotic Good and Carla pretty much EMBODIES Chaotic Neutral.
*At present, I’d refrain from putting Joyce anywhere, she’s currently figuring some very alignment-relevant things right now; the alignment-equivalent of a Magic-8 ball – “reply hazy, try again later”.
I have some quibbles about a few of your slot decisions, which have been well covered by others, however I most definitely disagree with your placement of Roz. However, I cannot think of anyone who fits that slot in the main cast. My best nominee would be Robin, but even that is weak. If he wasn’t dead (or in witness protection) it would be Mike.
Jennifer is not a monster. She’s a broken little girl in a teen body, with no moral compass who was broken by indifferent parents, and sort-a adopted by Linda. She so wants what Sal has, even as little as Sal has, it’s still more than Billie ever got, unless it was from Linda.
Jennifer is not a monster, but she’s still a jerk gleeful to have power over her sister who she already knows had been screwed over by her own parents a hell of a lot and that literally love her more.
And she does have a moral compass. We saw with Ruth that she was perfectly capable of being sweet, caring, loving, gentle, supportive, reliable and organised. But she doesn’t value those traits as much as being popular at any cost and only believes you can be popular if you have power and things other people want and blah blah blah high school drama logic of:
Step 1: Create Drama.
Step 2: Backstab until the Drama ends.
Step 3: ???
Step 4: Profit and proclaim yourself a problem-solver, instead of a problem-causer.
I feel like in GENERAL this seems to be something she would do, but why about Sal? She basically slipped right into her family as the New Daughter and New Sister after Sal was sent away. And she could have Walky back into her life whenever she wanted; she’s the one rebuffing him. I don’t recall Sal and Jennifer having bad blood (I think they both brushed off the kiss thing) about anything until now, so either I’ve forgotten something (likely) or this is…weird and petty. but also as a sapphic I can see her having a baby crush on sal and thinking that it must be hatred/a competition.
Jennifer/Billie has hit on Sal at least once when drunk, plus tried to kiss her, again while drunk. I think that there’s the resentment of Sal being cooler and how Sal dragged out the roommate agreement by never being around, getting on Billie’s nerves, but there’s also some attraction.
Of course, I don’t know Billie even remembers the attempted kiss, and I also haven’t seen any indication of an attraction after A. Jennifer started getting, umm, personal attention from Ruth and now Asher, and B. Walky more openly treating Billie like family and both Sal and Walky involving her in stuff like trying to get Linda off of Amber’s back. That “it’s family, don’t make it weird” vibes would probably be stronger now.
Yikes, indeed, but it fits perfectly with Billie’s high-school, cliquish, arrested-development way of judging people. When she’s at her best, she’s great, but when she’s at her worst, she is still a teenaged bully.
It’s jealousy. Very simple. “Billie” has had this Sal complex since the start of the comic because Sal at least superficially has everything she values and has obtained it easily. Sal’s popular, respected, her peers idolize her (ironically against her wishes). Guys flirt with her and offer her free drinks at bars even though she’s under age. These are things Billie wants. After all the talk of her growing up she still has the shallow values of a high school cheerleader at heart.
Now that Jennifer has something she perceives Sal wants the power dynamic has reversed. Now Sal knows how it feels.
You’re right, though these past few strips do show what she said she wanted when she first moved in. She tried very hard to get sophomore friends in the mall scene, and now she is friends with one of said sophomores. She also has a boy who is very into, which she also complained about. Just think it’s strange.
All this, plus as pointed upthread Jennifer has at least a little attraction to Sal as evidenced by that time she was drunk. I don’t think she’d act on it now and sober because, yeah, they’ve known each other since they were like five, Walky treats her like a sister, and Jennifer acknowledges she’s the surrogate daughter Linda wanted, but Sal being gone for most of their adolescence and their not actually being related seems to have left part of her brain going ‘Sal hot.’ Which for someone who’s kind of a complete disaster in the attraction, recognizing and expressing it department, may be manifesting as even more jealousy of Sal’s coolness.
Nonono you’re spot on. There was a drunken, rebuffed attempt at a kiss and then they both forgot about it. And Billie actually has defended Sal from the past. There was no on screen bad blood.
But also, Bille was convinced Sal was AmaziGirl for the longest time because, who else on campus could be THAT cool?
So Yumi is right, but so are your sapphic instincts. Mine are pinging too :’3
No more than one pair of tennis shoes, dress shoes, work shoes and boots, which I do not wear 90% of the time. I used to just have tennis shoes but people keep gifting me other shoes or requiring me to buy more.
I still have that hat from my profile picture, it belonged to my great aunt. Otherwise I don’t have a lot of hats cuz my head is big and my hair is big too.
This is not a good look for Billie/Jennifer, especially considering how “adult” y’all were claiming to be. If Sal did have any feelings for Asher before, I doubt it lasted long after he betrayed her.
Also, I didn’t get the idea that she was posessive of Asher; more likely she was simply angry at the idea that he could hurt someone else that she knows.
Sal’s being “possessive” in the sense that it’s clear as day she’s lonely and isolated from the kind of emotional connection she wants (and I feel, at the moment, Sal does want some brand of intimacy with a guy).
So she’s on-panel with Jason again and she thinks he slept with Ruth, so she gets angry. Then she goes to see Asher and starts looping around the building a whole bunch instead of just going to see him, where Asher kind of affirms that he’s super into Jennifer, so much like she did with Jason, Sal starts talking about stuff that happened that, seemingly, she had previously seemed to have dealt with.
Go do an archive dive back to her talk with Amazi-Girl at the start of this story. Sal’s really clear that she “wants Asher with someone like her, but just not her, specifically.”
I don’t think she believed Jason slept with Ruth, especially after seeing him handcuffed to the door…maybe if he was cuffed to the bed…
And she’s known since the semester started that Asher was with Billie, if not before that, so I doubt she went there to double check if he was into her. She probably wanted to warn him privately and in a less confrontational way to “be good to Billie, til he’s not”, but then that train wreck of a conversation happened.
Historically, Sal does not have good taste in men. Her and and Asher have a nice moment together before the timeskip where she and Asher share a nice moment smoking together, but feelings are complicated! And while this is probably going to be a love V teeing up, I’m going to see it as Sal looking out for Billie rather than her wanting Asher herself.
I think you’re really giving Sal a bit too.much credit when she’s spent a bunch of strips insinuating she’s the only one suitable for Asher because of how “dangerous they both are”, and has just flipped out at him having a girlfriend in her presence, right after flipping out about Jason and Ruth *maybe* being a thing when prior interactions with him post The Grades Drama have been relatively civil.
Sal absolutely usually has relatively altruistic intentions but this is pretty clearly an exception.
I said I’m going to see it as her looking out for Jennifer, though I know it’s because she currently wants him, or at least someone. And maybe it specifically being Jennifer (already having her parents’ love, as stated by herself) kinda rubs it in. Feelings are complicated! I don’t condone Sal’s outburst but I’m not surprised by it.
It’s been too long since Sal took the Disaster Ball from another member of the cast and just RAN with it. Picking the fights with AG and then Amber was too justifiable by the unresolved feelings mess and AG’s stalking. This is just a COMPLETELY bad idea, and honestly, good. Everyone on the cast needs a turn or twelve making absolutely terrible decisions they will remember at 4 AM three years from now and cringe over!
Some that very night going ‘wait, SHIT,’ even! (Amber deeeeefinitely has some kind of anxiety issue among her various traumas.)
Three years was an arbitrary period in the future, but it’s just enough ahead that most of them will probably have figured out a few things that make them think some aspect of their past self was terminally embarrassing.
I hope we eventually get to see what happened during the timeskip to completely undo all of Billie’s character growth, because as it is now she’s inexplicably a toxic waste dump for no clear reason. It kinda drags down any strip she appears in. Which especially hurts when she was one of my favorite characters pre-skip.
The breakup with Ruth was evidently not great, and set them both back. Then she got enough therapy to justify her latest attempt at reinvention as being Better and Changing and Dumping Bad Habits without maybe examining how this is itself a bad habit she’s done before, which will inevitably come crashing down once again at some point, and is once again trying the Normal Cool Girl routine. Surely, THIS time it will stick and be healthy.
Hopefully when it inevitably crashes and burns once again we’ll get the disaster bisexual we all know and love back, and she’ll acknowledge that the real her isn’t the villain from a teen movie. She’s way, way messier, while still desiring the status and drama said villain thrives off of. … She can work on ‘having non-adversarial relationships with people you do actually love’ again after ‘continually seeking an ideal of normalcy has not actually resulted in mental health or solved my problems.’
That we know of, Jennifer has tried to reinvent herself:
– Definite: High school, in which she stopped hanging out with Walky because she thought he was uncool. Ended when the DUI occurred near the end of senior year, prompting Alice to distance herself over the summer. (I’m certain this timeline was made more explicit but am not up for a full archive binge.)
– Fringe but counting it: Start of college, where yeah sure she did get kicked off the cheer squad at the end of high school but she’s SURE she’s prime to start anew in college! Resulted in the Sexy Sapphic Suicide Pact, preceded by some obvious depression that she tried to downplay since, hey, she wasn’t in as bad shape as Ruth.
– Definite: Forest Quad, where Jennifer deliberately presented an idealized version of herself (no glasses, sure she banged her RA but it wasn’t anything serious, especially not a relationship born out of their mutual depression and alcoholism,) and proceeded to be uncomfortable with JUST HOW MUCH they were idealizing her. When she tried to call a hall meeting asking them to please stop, she ended up oversharing as she realized for the first time that wait, shit, that car crash was REALLY BAD, no wonder Alice didn’t want anything to do with her.
– And now, this. I’m not counting redefinitions like ‘trying with Forest Quad again as an actual person’ because the issue with this particular trend is that it’s always a really artificial conception of coolness and who she ‘should’ be, not who she is. So we’re at four known attempts since adolescence, three in the last six months or so. Only the high school one seemed to have anything resembling staying power, and frankly I would not be at all shocked if there were a mini attempt or two in there (that all looked the same ‘cool girl’ to Walky), or an attempt from before Sal got sent away.
Nah, Jennifer is Mike. He tried to pull a classic kill-and-replace on Billie, but couldn’t quite get the character down and decided to come up with a new identity altogether.
That’s obviously a lie! Mike doesn’t smile – except Possibly when he’s drunk.
And Jennifer doesn’t drink – except probably when she smiles…or frowns…or simply breathes…basically when she’s Billie.
I’m kidding of course. It’s clear now that her intoxication of choice is drama.
I could arrange for that! What flavor would you like, “Jennifer”? We’ve got cherry, bubblegum, popcorn, cookie dough, COVID vaccine, energy-flavored zesty bar, beer, steroids….. Salvia Divinorum? What’s that doing here?
I initially needed some practice with HTML tags on this site, but you get the hang of them in no time!
By the way, I JUST made pedre for the first time! Technically it wasn’t “real” pedre because I used regular olive oil and sweet pepper instead of jalapeños, but other than the slight overpowering of vinegar, it tasted great! Especially on Pan de Queso!
Eheheh! I’m glad you enjoyed it! And don’t worry much about having to make some tweaks – Every Chilean family tweaks theirs a little AND you might not find our specific chilis. My special move is to use both sweet pepper and jalapeños, and substitute vinegar for a squeeze of lemon or lime :3 If you can find Merkén flakes (a smoked variety of a long red spicy one, we call it “goat’s horn”/”cacho de cabra”, and coriander seeds) you’ll be in for a treat if you add some, too ^^
Plus, your pairing there is a great choice. Latinoamerican solidarity! Happy you had a good dinner ;w;
Not going to lie, I like Billie more than I like Jennifer.
Not saying she doesn’t have toxic traits, she obviously does, but she has been so goddamn repressed every time we see her, compared to how things were back around October.
Asherkage Kira has to change is face after Dannyichi Hirose manages to expose his identity, giving time for Joycetaro, Joesuke and Okuyasal to catch up and pummel him.
Yeah, I was so mad at her that for a second I forgot she’s friends with a super super ableist bully! (yes, I will always hate Raidah for the way she treated and acted around Dina)
I just notice that Jennifer said she derives more enjoyment from her Sal is jealous scenario if the ambiguity of the proposed relationship stays intact. So if I’m not mistaken Jennifer’s actually getting pleasure from the idea of Sal and Asher banging and I think that really adds a lot to this Jennifer has a repressed sort of psuedo-crush, hate boner, attraction or whatever for Sal.
Everyone’s talking about Jennifer, but I cannot believe Asher is choosing to say “Look, I don’t know” about if Sal and Asher have history!! Confirms that they didn’t *really* talk about Asher’s grandfather, because I seriously doubt he’ll hide what he did with/to Sal, but somehow think revealing the family mob situation is safer / lower on the backstory tree. Get real. Asher more like ash… tray…
Asher and Jennifer just introduced Sal to Raidah and Carl by saying Asher and Sal were friends and robbed convenience stores together. I’m not sure what other history you are talking about? Unless you mean specifically that Asher called the cops on Sal, in which case Jennifer might know but Raidah and Carl were just introduced to Sal and probably know nothing on the subject. Asher is responding to Raidah here.
I also consider that “Look, I don’t know” to basically mean “it’s complicated.” It’s the sort of thing someone says when they don’t have a brief answer prepared and need to unpack a lot of things themselves. I would usually expect it to be followed with anecdotes, but Jenn interjects.
When you say, “they didn’t really talk about Asher’s grandfather,” does “they” mean Asher and Jennifer? Because Asher is talking to Raidah, and Jennifer and Raidah are different people.
If Asher hasn’t openned up about the mafia stuff to Jenniferno, this should give him *serious reservations* about telling her more. Jenn’s sharing criminal history information tge (apparently) first chance she gets is not a good sign for keeping secrets.
Yes, Asher, she is one of the crazy ones. Yes, this means that you should be running away as fast as you can and refuse to spend any time around her again. This is for your own safety!
Okay…
So Billie has always been jealous of Sal and trying to one-up her? Despite all the shit in Sal‘s life and her success with being the better Walkerton daughter?
She‘s in an even more sad and dangerous state than I though.
Sal is cool.
Jennifer was supposedly cool…in high school.
Jennifer wants to be cool again.
So yes, since Sal turned up on her motorcycle looking fit and tattooed and bad ass, Jennifer has felt inferior.
Just look at the time they all went to the beach after the Ryan incident if anyone needs a visual reminder.
I suspect if she changes back to the nickname, the tag will change again, but doing separate tags would be… uncomfortable. Since the other example where a tag changed retroactively like that was Jocelyne, after the reveal she was trans – she’s been consistently tagged as such since, even when everyone else in the scene doesn’t know.
Also, it would be a nightmare to check archives against each other.
Yeah, ‘Billie’ was excised from the tag search, like the Egyptian Queen Hatshepsut and history. It’s all good, nothing bad ever came of erasing history.
I’ve already gone on about my opinion of Ms Billingsworth’s name business at length, so I won’t further retread that ground here.
Regarding history, the bit where historical searches to find comics that featured ‘Billie’ no longer work seems relevant. It’s not an IRL big deal, because it’s a comic. The point this time is that it’s inconsistent to have to search the archives using one word, for a character that was tagged, named, called, and introduced themself as another. That there are problems introduced by changing history is (an obviously grossly exagerated) simile. When Ms Jenner changed her identity, it didn’t change her medals to be in women’s events. When Jennifer stopped acknowledging ‘Billie’ as an acceptable form of address, it didn’t retcon 10 years of comics where she did accept it. I don’t honestly expect Willis to double tag the character to support both searches for that time period, it’s just a matter of opinion on how to handle data consistency, and there are issues with how it was handled, but there are issues with doing nothing too. The character’s behaviour, reasons for the change, and disassociation from the effects of her actions make honouring her name change less palatable.
BELATED THOUGHT: Welp, now we know why this chapter gets its name from Bad Romance.
This “Getting married to raise 2.5 kids” thing was so so so annoying, and Billie is back to remind us she’ll always be ready to throw herself into a potential love triangle with her estranged sister from another mister, whom she envies for her coolness and closetedly lusts for; and the grandson of the local Korean mafia that’s on the run from them and will be forced to choose his path and his girlfriend at some point.
This is what she lives for. Drama, disease, love, revenge, and EVERYTHING as long as she doesn’t have to “pay” for it.
The “2.5” kids bit confuses me. Are you supposed to have 2 kids and then tragically miscarry/abort the other one, then treat the living pair worse than you could because you’re hung up on the loss in an unhealthy way? Seems very WASPy.
the actual answer was “an artifact of statistics and averages”.
but people have been making that joke (and variations thereof) for a good sixty years now, since slightly after the figure was first published.
If you have not spent an afternoon avoiding the doldrums, and jumping to conclusions, I Very Highly recommend a pleasant afternoon reading it. It is the wake-up call almost every 12-14 year old needs to hear.
It is from a statistical average amount of kids a typical family has that came out at some point. Which came out as 2.5 i.e. most families that have children will have 2 or 3 with the ones that have only 1 child and the ones with very large families either pulling the average down from 3 or up from 2 to such a degree that it is right in the middle between 2 and 3.
There’s many ways to find enlightenment! But Billie wasn’t drinking to boost creativity or like, self-medicating because she couldn’t afford something better, or to find Answers about herself. She drank, therefore she was (the party girl persona she clung to) and that was never going to work on her.
Salvia is great, I’d suggest herbal vaping to manage certain things, and most def Peyote so she throws up some of that toxicity away (not like she’s unused to vomiting either, hey!). Unnecessary Drama, though? IVing it?? She’s playing with dangerous forces there :’)
Yeah, Jennifer has spent a lot of the strip 100% Actively Depressed, but she can pass off her issues as not that bad because she’s not suicidal or yeah, sure, she likes drinking, but it’s fine, right?
It is not fine, and while therapy seems to have handled her depression for the moment, I would bet another episode isn’t far from flaring up again.
It’s hard to tell because we haven’t seen that much of her and she’s usually been able to fake it, except at the worst points.
I’m still not completely convinced she’s not drinking again.
She was in a positive place pre-time skip where she had stopped. We don’t know yet if that has changed – quitting drinking might be the one healthy thing that actually stuck but it could also have been what degraded everything in Halloween if she had been lying about that AGAIN.
She did stop. There was an entire plot arc about it, which always seems to get forgotten. Even when she was drinking, she routinely went days without blacking out – she was mostly more of a maintenance functional drunk.
She went at least a few days before the timeskip without anything. We saw her go through withdrawal and there’s been no clear sign of drinking since then. Even after the timeskip.
If she did start again offscreen, I think it would have to be linked to Halloween and the breakup. Nothing else would make sense narratively. Something like that, following a big arc about her stopping, would need to tied to some kind of narrative purpose, not just undone with a “yeah, it only lasted a few days and she went back to it like normal.”
I did a quick archive trawl, and it turns out that arc was like two years ago. A lot has happened since then, so it sorta slipped my mind. She was also continuously a shithead to Ruth during that part, so I guess I just assumed she was lying about not doing the big drink anymore. If she has stayed sober since then, good on her, but I’m not prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt on that.
She was a shithead to Ruth in the lead up because she was trying to drive Ruth away so Ruth could be healthy without her. When that failed, she sucked it up and made a good effort to change, reconciling with Ruth and also revealing herself to the girls in her new dorm. Basically wrapping up all her main character arcs in a good place.
It’s certainly possible she lapsed, but I’ll wait for evidence. I’d rather she not have thrown away all her character development off stage.
And likely just as comedically inept with Asher being the token sane one (like poor Lex Luthor is), trying to get this particular herd of cats all going in the same direction.
Asher finally appears to see the real Jennifer and appears to be rightfully concerned and a bit disgusted… YES! Go Asher, run away from her! She’s gorgeous, but a danger to herself and others and she really seems unable to change. Go with someone less crazy, even the questionable Raidah is less of a disaster. But don’t go with Sal, because she really deserves to change her life for the better.
In this moment, poor Asher is actually trying to a good reassuring boyfriend which actually makes me feel a little bad for him that he seems to actually want a quiet life and to be a good partner, and Jennifer is out here being like ‘I thrive on drama, bongo! More drama! MORE!’ Like geez, go on a fandom forum if you need a drama fix, don’t be happy about an actual potential drama vortex you can’t walk away from that could destroy your romantic relationship or sisterly relationship or both.
Well, see, when you believe that you are an inevitable, toxic maelstrom that will inevitably and uncontrollably destroy everything you come into contact with, there isn’t logically much else to do but enjoy the ride for what it is, since obviously you don’t have any actual agency over your behaviors, or the consequences thereof. Her life isn’t the result of choices she makes, it’s a thing that happens, and the core purpose of the exercise is that no matter what it remains novel and validating. What’s she gonna do, think about anything but getting the next fix of freedom that comes from treating life like a driverless car?
Reading this in parallel with J&W I cannot stop thinking that this group are the aliens of DoA. Jennifer may think she belongs with them, but Billie definitely is one of us (and she’s not dead).
Personally, I feel like Blaine was probably the closest thing to Head Alien in DoA, especially once he put on the Purple Armor and Mask, but he didn’t have the right sense of humor for it— and whatever his strength, Ross didn’t have the brains to be Monkey Master.
Considering Willis has suggested elsewhere that the Alien-JFO-SEMMF-Martian Gambit Pileup is really a metaphor for being gaslit by your parents, it’s probably more accurate to say that all of the bad parents in this comic are collectively the DoA equivalent of all of those factions.
I still hold out hope for the day Willis gives into their desire for evil quipping and nonsense, and Head Alien finally makes his glorious entrance into the Dumbingverse proper.
And this was the moment Asher found out that, despite being raised in the actual, literal mob, he was still the less fucked-up character to show in the past, like, 10 strips.
Good on you Asher for realizing the situation needed to be defused and deescalated. You immediately sought to clarify the limits of your relationship with Sal.
…Unfortunately, your girlfriend believes being a Housewife of X is the pinnacle of achievement. And it is a goal she actively strives for.
Jealousy and desire to be better than Sal in some way as her popularity since Day One has been higher and everything she has craved. Malaya already (unwarranted as this belief may be) thinks she is better than Sal and doesn’t need a real reason to think so, she just makes up her own reasons on the spot. Jennifer used to be Alpha Bongo Cheerleader therefore thrives on drama, toxicity and the idea of being better than others and having things they want.
I had hoped Jennifer was genuinely becoming a better person, despite appearances. So much for that. Asher seems to be a decent dude in this strip, though.
Sal does have a History with Asher. One that involves being arrested, punished through her teen years and being kidnapped and nearly killed. Don’t think Asher is eager to spread that story around.
I do not believe that Sal was one of the people who got kidnapped – she showed up after the fact and helped Amazigirl with the second chase sequence, IIRC.
Sal was the cavalry, yeah, woken up by Ruth after AmbG showed up warning Becky and was clearly Not Okay. (Along with Malaya and Carla.)
The intentionally kidnapped were Joyce, Sarah, Amber, Dorothy, and then Walky was mistaken for AG and taken by the kidnappers (so not an original target, but a conscious one). Dina saw the others and snuck in the van using her stealth powers, and Becky wasn’t onsite to be kidnapped and had guards, prompting Ross to release Amber per the AG deal. (So, intended victim but not initial.) For reference!
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so much for that whole Growing Up thing
To repeat myself, “People tend to remain who they are, or more often, become worse versions of themselves.” Characters often more so, because drama.
Teenagers, however, do tend to be more prone to recognizing their approach doesn’t work or whoops! Turns out they didn’t know shit. They’re still developing their frontal lobes and figuring out how the world works and what they care about. I hold more hope for them than actual adult adults, and even they can sometimes surprise you.
A lot of people are just perennially disappointing, but college is formative because meeting new people with different experiences while your brain’s still developing in key ways does often change how you view the world. There is still hope for these kids. Most of them aren’t even 20 yet.
Like I said, people
(whispered the dark voice)
There’s the Jennifer we know and love.
… 1 out of 2 ain’t bad.
There’s the Jennifer we love with unfamiliarity?
Book 11:Everything’s Mostly the Same, But Just Different Enough
Don’t take the wrong way, but sometimes I want the entire cast to catch fire and die. Is that wrong?
What you’re seeing is Bad Decisions Made By Teenagers. It very often prompts the selfsame teenagers to wish that they themselves caught fire and died, when they look back on it years later once they’re no longer teenagers.
Ah yes the proverbial GRINGE we all occasionally feel…
I love the consistent irony of Asher being the only person who has grown up, or at least tried to.
Now *that’s* the girl we all know
Honestly, thank god. I Am A Mature Grownup Jennifer was surreal. ‘Unnecessary drama? Hook it directly into my veins!’ Jennifer may be awful, but she’s an awful we’ve come to enjoy watching from a safe distance before it inevitably explodes in her face.
Mature Grownup Jennifer is so fake…
*Malaya pops out of a nearby garbage can like Oscar*
“A-HA! FAKEY! I KNEW IT!”
Yeah, I honestly like this look more for her. Hate the behavior IRL, but it sure do drive a stories good. Gremlin Jennifer is fun.
It also reminds me of a character from an old Pixie Trix, but I can’t figure out which one.
That’s the real Billie showing up! Good.
Jennifer no
Billie yes
(please note that the name here is intentional as part of a counterpoint to Jennifer no and I would otherwise adhere to the namechange)
Jenniferno
i like how that kinda sounds like “inferno”
A good derby name, if she were to participate.
That sounds like a very specific brand of hot sauce.
A good name for the disaster movie that could be made about the dumpster fire that’s her life.
Oh. Well there goes any and all possibility of this Jennifer change being genuine. This is “Billie” all the way…
…..
…Also yeah, I still don’t trust Asher.
Billie was always waiting inside for her moment to burst forth.
Asher had no idea what he was exposing himself too.
Panel 4: My precoius!
Trust him to do what? I’m not sure what “trust” means in this context?
I’ve suspected that her “change” wasn’t genuine for a while now, and this confirms my suspicion. And yeah, I really don’t trust any of these four, and I especially distrust Asher and Raidah.
Yeah we been knew
“Besides, of course, the adoration of her parents.”
Just rub it in, why don’tcha.
Lets be honest here that’s not really a prize.
I would consider being approved of by Linda a good cause for reevaluating my life.
Particularly given her reaction when Sal told her Walky stood up to Linda, which was one of no small amount of shock, or her not giving the Walkertons the naive benefit of the doubt Walky was on the topic of the microaggressions they kept visiting on Sal. She knows how toxic a household it is.
Or her manipulation of Linda after the shooting.
She’s got their number.
Dunno if that’s something Sal still wants. She definitely doesn’t think it’s a realistic outcome
She can both not want it (in that her parents are kind of horrible and the kind of person they’d actually approve of and not selectively see or be trying to mold their children into would ALSO suck) and want it (in that it would be really fucking nice if they were the kind of people who would accept their kids as they actually are) simultaneously! Unfortunately, that is the way of many bad parent-child relationships, especially if the parent does occasionally have moments of not being a complete trashfire.
She probably doesn’t actively want their approval any more now but at the same time, that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t sting to have them actually like and see someone else as more befitting of being their child and that she doesn’t have parents that will love her for who she is.
It absolutely has extra barbs that it isn’t just ‘we don’t approve of you’ but ‘we don’t approve of you and would absolutely replace you with this friend you have in a heartbeat and love her as she is, she is our favourite daughter’ when Sal is well aware that Jennifer is barely functional as a human being and has a mess of a life she is always trying to paper over.
I’m reposting this because I spent an entire eight minutes putting it together and I will not allow that effort to go to waste.
https://i.imgur.com/AcnaubN.jpg
I just want to know why Mary isn’t in the bottom right corner
Cast page only.
Besides, not Lawful Evil for her?
Of the cast page, surely Robin for CE?
Mary would be Neutral Evil! Neutral Good is the alignment for Messiah types (Which is why you have Joyce in the NG slot), and DOA usually presents Mary as the Anti-Joyce. Thus NE.
Jen is probably also more on the chaotic side than the lawful side
How is Billie Lawful and Ruth Neutral when Ruth is the one who’s an Authority figure?
Jennifer’s rich and Ruth’s just kind of spiteful.
She doesn’t know how to play that wealth into actual influence though
Aren’t they both rich (insofar as they were both raised by someone who is stinking rich)?
Being an authority figure has absolutely nothing to do with morals, the laws of the land or even having an internal code. see the previous administration
Being Lawful has nothing to do with morals, either. It’s about playing by (and knowing how to abuse) the rules. Ruth, being an authority, knows which rules she can get away with breaking , thus Lawful Evil. Billie, like the previous administration, generally believes that the laws don’t apply to her, which slots her more into Chaotic Evil than any other alignment.
Agreed, but that is the /heart and soul/ of why D&D introduced the two-axis alignment system.
Personally, I’d switch Billie and Ruth. Ruth has standards, rules that she holds herself to (generally). Billie just does whatever benefits her most at any given moment.
Spot on with the others, though.
I feel like Mary would be Lawful Evil.
Carla is absolutely Chaotic Neutral.
I think Amber/Amazigirl is a better fit for Chaotic Good.
The rest are fine.
Amber was my first pick but then I figured she’s too devoted to ideals of rigid black and white morality to really count.
Honestly I don’t think so. Amber and Amazi-girl have picked fights, cheated on walky’s grades for him and done other stuff. Like they’re genuinely good but they’re definitely one of the more wildcards of the DOA cast.
Right, but she does those things because she’s right to do them, according to her. She creates all these rules and regulations for Amazi-Girl’s job and then ardently sticks to them until she can find a way to make herself more miserable.
This is still what I’d consider chaotic though. Sure she’s got a sense of justice and you could make an argument for her being more Lawful, but I definitely think she is just as much chaotic while still being seen as “good”.
But amber cant follow those rules and Amazigirl must
I was going to say the same thing about Carla. The posterchild for Chaotic Neutral, really.
I agree. By the way, I’d rate Joyce as lawful good along with Dorothy. She’s equally rule-driven, or neuroses-driven. Roz is politically correct. Her sister Robin is Daffy Duck.
Amber might be Neutral, but Amazi-Girl is DEFINITELY Lawful Neutral.
I say, this thing does a rather fantastic job at demonstrating the fact that lawfulness and moral standing are NOT related whatsoever.
However, this chart seems to suffer from a similar problem to the tier lists in Tier Zoo; there seems to be some kind of unspoken “need” to make the characters evenly distributed throughout the quadrants here, without reckoning that some characters are better off sharing the same quadrant so that we could better predict (instead of project) character outcomes (as well as we could ever do that with two independent variables).
If this only intends to be funny, however, it does a pretty nice job. But I we could take this kind of thing SO much further.
Allow me to demonstrate.
How dare you besmirch Tierzoo’s good name. His meta advice is what led me to choosing my new main! I was using bottom tier trash like Black Widows and Kiwis until he came along.
As accurate as a few of his videos may be, it is only good practice that scientists double-check each other’s answers.
As unconducive a platform YouTube is for the process of peer review, here’s a video of a real fish biologist criticizing TierZoo’s tier list of fish.
Having watched that video I’ll echo what some of the comments are saying. Tier Zoo is coming from the perspective of a player maining that character, not the species as a whole. For example, Salmon, while they are at no risk of dying out, would be a really hard character to play single player campaign with because of how they’re griefed. i think the spread on the list feels fair. Besides having too much concentration in tier list makes them harder to read.
I guess here, it is instructive to note that ALL models and research have their limitations. Only so long as we actually respect those limitations and preserve that essential context in their redistribution (unlike most news reporters, who really have no business interpreting the results of scientific research), there should be no problem.
Considering the sheer amount of garbage out there that results from cutting off context like that, this is easier said than done, at least for now.
What does the Cyrillic text mean?
It is Russian for “friend”.
And NOW I understand where Kubrick got the word “droog” for the members of Alex’s gang in “A Clockwork Orange”.
(…and just a side note, before someone pops in to say something like ‘What? It was explained in the film’ … I’ve never seen the movie; that sort of thing didn’t appeal to me then and still doesn’t now. I figured it was just a made-up word like the Eloi in H.G. Wells’ “The Time Machine”, or the Navi in James Cameron’s “Avatar”)
Oh dear. No words at all are made up in A Clockwork Orange, they’re all Russian words adapted to the English sound system and English grammar.
That includes horrorshow, which is хорошо, meaning “good”.
The whole backstory is that the action is set in a fairly distant future a good long while after the USSR has won the Cold War or something (it’s never made explicit).
…also, Eloi is in the Bible: in one gospel, Jesus ends up saying eloi, eloi, lema sabachthani, Aramaic (filtered through Greek) for “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me” as the text promptly explains.
The language in Avatar is made up out of whole cloth, though.
Neat. On looking it up, Na’vi is created, but (as expected for film) it is still built on linguistic concepts that exist in earth languages. So yeah, whole cloth, but still earthling cloth.
Fascinating!
But still, what did you think?
I think the internet is no place to share opinions that have been asked for. 😉
I’m sorry, it’s just my first time making something like that. Feedback is optional, but rather appreciated!
Oh I was just being coy because the internet is chiefly where we share unasked for opinions. And I mean no disrespect, the matrix is intriguing, but the archetypes on display don’t resonate with me so I am not a good condidate to offer an oppinion on the aesthetic of your piece.
I see what you mean. It’s just one of my favorite memes ever since I started looking into them, but it is a rather old meme, isn’t it?
Huh. I might switch Carla and Sal, but I could be persuaded otherwise.
Sal’s Chaotic Neutral because she honestly doesn’t give a shit about anything lofty and mostly just wants to do right by herself and the people around her that she cares about.
Carla believes in things improving because she has directly seen how things need to improve, and she will do this through sweet pranks and abolishing of harmful systems.
Carla’s also the heiress to a big tech company and doesn’t seem to have grappled with the ethical implications of her parents being billionaires yet, probably in part because her parents are rock stars TO HER and she needed that money and privilege to smash through the transphobic walls society put in her way. (For instance, getting a room in the women’s hall, probably a thing the Ruttens threw money and influence at the school to ensure.)
Don’t get me wrong, Carla is great and I am a bug, but I wouldn’t be shocked if she DOES eventually have to consider the fact that that money was probably through exploiting Ruttech workers. (If not, it would have to be explored that Ruttech is seriously unusual for a big tech company on basically every level, and Carla’s parents aren’t actually as rich personally as we’ve been led to believe. Given Willis’s periodic tweets about Batman and Scrooge McDuck’s ludicrous riches and the social implications there, I strongly suspect it’ll come up one way or another at some point. Both ‘genuine rockstar parents to their kid, but not great PEOPLE’ and ‘behold, ethical businesspeople’ would be new ground for this comic, since all the other known rich parents are some variety of awful* personally – Linda and Clint go without saying, Billingsworth Sr. substitutes money for affection and forced out the city homeless population, and Dargon Chesterfield, Cruel Captain of Industry may actually be a literal supervillain, plus the mobsters – but realistically, the Ruttens are probably professional assholes.)
* Dean McHenry seems to be fine, but neither he nor Tony is a character of any note.
Carla’s parents are generic tech people. I don’t think Willis intends them to be any kind of analog to Jeff Bezos or such.
Except that they seem to have made the iconic smartphone in this world.
Along with at least motorcycles and probably other things.
A bit more than generic tech people.
Yeah, they’re clearly extremely successful. ‘You’ve heard of Ruttech, right? Of course you have,’ Carla being on magazine covers for being their kid and being trans, these suggest they are in fact Big Tech. (Given they make motorcycles and Zoomer was a car type in the Walkyverse, I headcanon they make cars here too but we don’t have more than secondhand evidence. But even with just smartphones and motorcycles, that’s some noticeable diversity of products there so they’ve got to be big.)
You don’t get to be a billionaire without exploiting a lot of people along the way, not on a personal level. (Maybe, MAYBE, if the company itself is worth billions but the owners do not have that personal wealth, not an expert there.) So Carla’s parents are most likely really good to her and supportive of causes that impact them and her, but still professionally ruthless and don’t pay nearly enough in taxes.
Yeah, it’s possible to earn millions by yourself (say with art or a really successful bestseller or product or something) but by the time you get to billions, you tend to be looking almost, if not entirely, universally at exploitation – either of workers or the environment – somewhere in the line.
Didn’t Carla once offer to give Lucy a drone for no real reason because her parents just had warehouses full of them? That’s not something I think an average generic tech millionaire would have so much stock of their daughter could give them out on a whim.
I do remember her being ready to pay anyone willing to hug Ruth in stock options, which also likely disqualifies them from being average generic tech millionaires.
Carla’s parents funded striking down anti-Trans laws in Indiana in the backstory. I think they’re on the up and up.
There’s even a strip where Carla goes “damn all your parents suck but I love mine, that makes me a rebel” and that one strip where Carla clearly fondly talks about how they couldn’t find Ultra Car toys so they just built her one themselves.
They funded a charitable cause that was personally significant to them
That isn’t contradictory with them having exploitative or unethical business practices
Yeah, they may have shady business practices (we don’t know) but they’re clearly excellent parents to their little girl.
I just kinda figure given their only story presence in the series has been about how Carla loves them to pieces, the most characterization to them is that they’re Fun Rich like Hannelore’s dad.
Like yeah there are no good billionaires, because to amass that much money means you exploited your workforce and the system in the name of your profit, but there are two answers to that for the Ruttens; they either aren’t billionaires because they pay fair wages and taxes, or they are billionaires but they don’t exist, but I should tread carefully saying that because I am fearful of the potential Batman argument I am going to invoke.
That was literally my first thought.
Roz isn’t evil! She’s just loud and impolite. She has tactics that annoy people around her, but her lefty political alignment is often a good cause. (Bodily autonomy, safer sex, hoping her republican sister loses, etc.) She does a lot of performative allyship, but she’s learning, and at least she tries to back it up with action. For example, when she realized early-Joyce might have been assaulted at a party, she went out of her way to give her a resource, even though she and Joyce didn’t get along at all.
She’s good at the macro, and hit-or-miss on the micro, and she’s learning.
Plus, Billie’s done a lot of underage drinking for somebody lawful, and thinks that breaking and entering is terribly romantic.
I’m sorry, for the Evil tier you’ll have to dip into the actual badguys and dead people. Lawful Evil Clint or Ross (using the rules to harm people, or totally aligning himself with evil laws), Neutral Evil Blaine (he doesn’t care how, as long as Amber gets hurt), Chaotic Evil Mike (mainly wants to cause pain and chaos).
No, I can see Billie as Lawful – remember, Lawful isn’t NECESSARILY about the “law”, it’s about believing in hierarchical systems, which Billie definitely does.
And Ruth IS solidly Neutral Evil, though obviously not as much as Blaine.
Since when was law/chaos about hierarchy? Hierarchy is a manifestation of power control, lawfulness is about having a code of rules that is adhered to. Can there be venn overlap? For sure, as it’s easier to maintain a power hierarchy with codified rules, but belief in the rule of law does not imply belief in hierarchy.
Belief in the rule of law isn’t necessary to make you Lawful, which is why 3.X Paladins can go into a country where slavery is legal, not turn in escaped slaves to the authorities, and not immediately fall.
Neither does a code of rules make you Lawful – check out the 3.X Barbarians, which COULDN’T be Lawful, but could certainly have a code.
You have heard of lawful evil?”
It can be the difference between an army and a mob.
Roz is pretty much the DEFINITION of Chaotic Good.
Also worth remembering that while her performative allyship has gotten a lot of play here, because she’s a minor character and the comic has focused more on LGBTQ issues, her main concern is reproductive rights and there she’s not an ally, but part of the oppressed group.
I went with protagonists on the cast page only as a rule, since including villains would make it boring and also I don’t know where I’d find thumbnails for them. The Evil parts are kind of exaggerated but I think they fit for the characters’ negative attributes (well I think I fudged the details a bit for Ruth, mostly just that she did her job unless she had an opportunity to harass Jennifer).
Jennifer’s all about exploiting power through social hierarchies, while Roz’s worst aspects of her allyship tend to manifest as lashing out for failing her standards and doing immoral shit like parading her sister’s outing for her own benefit, so I thought that fit for the idea of recklessly doing wrong to get out from Robin’s shadow.
The eight minutes was not wasted, but will be amply rewarded with pages and pages of discussion, analysis, and nit-picking for your amusement.
The primary problem is with your bottom left and bottom right. Jennifer is not remotely lawful and Roz is not evil. Mary is certainly not lawful, being willing to employ blackmail, but while evil, is not very chaotic. Sydney Yus is a much better exemplar of chaotic evil, even if fortunately not very effective. If you consider her political actions as evil without taking into account subsequent personal behavior, Robin owns the chaotic evil spot.
For lawful evil, I would personally go with Raidah, though I see room for argument. The discussion on where to put Amazigirl/Amber to me seems to miss the main point, that they are two separate personalities belonging in different positions. Amazigirl is lawful good and Amber is chaotic neutral. Again there is some room for argument as vigilantes are not legal and Amber can too readily enjoy slicing up people who threaten her friends, but I think the main point still stands.
The real takeway though is that Willis’s characters, much like real people, are too complicated to be put in neat little boxes that define them.
I don’t think Sydney Yus is Chaotic, actually – remember, their goal is to climb the hierarchy and take Galasso’s place, and after getting fired they still shared their tips with the staff, because that’s the agreed-upon social norm. I’d go with Ryan for Chaotic Evil.
Also, AG is Lawful Neutral.
Excuse you, BECKY should be Chaotic Good thanks.
Becky’s Chaotic Neutral, same as Carla.
Everyone else is accurate (or, at the very least, accurate ENOUGH)*, but Roz is solidly Chaotic Good and Carla pretty much EMBODIES Chaotic Neutral.
*At present, I’d refrain from putting Joyce anywhere, she’s currently figuring some very alignment-relevant things right now; the alignment-equivalent of a Magic-8 ball – “reply hazy, try again later”.
Well that was enlightening in a very satisfying way. Well done! That actually helps crystallize some thoughts.
What you guys are actually revealing here is the sort of D&D campaigns you’ve been in.
( nerds all the way down )
I would swap Carla & Sal and swap out Roz for Mary.
Alternatively Roz is a good case in point of Good =/= nice. I could see her as CG.
I have some quibbles about a few of your slot decisions, which have been well covered by others, however I most definitely disagree with your placement of Roz. However, I cannot think of anyone who fits that slot in the main cast. My best nominee would be Robin, but even that is weak. If he wasn’t dead (or in witness protection) it would be Mike.
How is Sarah not good?
Her first onscreen action was going out of her way to save Joyce.
Aaaaaand Billie is still a monster
Jennifer is not a monster. She’s a broken little girl in a teen body, with no moral compass who was broken by indifferent parents, and sort-a adopted by Linda. She so wants what Sal has, even as little as Sal has, it’s still more than Billie ever got, unless it was from Linda.
The stable caring person in her life is Linda. That’s gonna have effects.
Jennifer is not a monster, but she’s still a jerk gleeful to have power over her sister who she already knows had been screwed over by her own parents a hell of a lot and that literally love her more.
And she does have a moral compass. We saw with Ruth that she was perfectly capable of being sweet, caring, loving, gentle, supportive, reliable and organised. But she doesn’t value those traits as much as being popular at any cost and only believes you can be popular if you have power and things other people want and blah blah blah high school drama logic of:
Step 1: Create Drama.
Step 2: Backstab until the Drama ends.
Step 3: ???
Step 4: Profit and proclaim yourself a problem-solver, instead of a problem-causer.
Yeah I can feel it now, this is going to boil down to some really annoying sibling rivalry type business.
This is certainly…a weird thing for Jennifer to think, but also not?
I feel like in GENERAL this seems to be something she would do, but why about Sal? She basically slipped right into her family as the New Daughter and New Sister after Sal was sent away. And she could have Walky back into her life whenever she wanted; she’s the one rebuffing him. I don’t recall Sal and Jennifer having bad blood (I think they both brushed off the kiss thing) about anything until now, so either I’ve forgotten something (likely) or this is…weird and petty. but also as a sapphic I can see her having a baby crush on sal and thinking that it must be hatred/a competition.
Kiss thing?
Jennifer/Billie has hit on Sal at least once when drunk, plus tried to kiss her, again while drunk. I think that there’s the resentment of Sal being cooler and how Sal dragged out the roommate agreement by never being around, getting on Billie’s nerves, but there’s also some attraction.
Of course, I don’t know Billie even remembers the attempted kiss, and I also haven’t seen any indication of an attraction after A. Jennifer started getting, umm, personal attention from Ruth and now Asher, and B. Walky more openly treating Billie like family and both Sal and Walky involving her in stuff like trying to get Linda off of Amber’s back. That “it’s family, don’t make it weird” vibes would probably be stronger now.
Billie tried to kiss Sal once when Billie was drunk. This was way back like, before she even started dating Ruth.
I part of it is that Sal is Cool, recent strip notwithstanding. And if a Cool person is jealous of you, that’s Power, babeh. Or something like that.
*I THINK part of it
I honestly hope that’s what it boils down to ’cause if it’s not…yikestown.
Yikes, indeed, but it fits perfectly with Billie’s high-school, cliquish, arrested-development way of judging people. When she’s at her best, she’s great, but when she’s at her worst, she is still a teenaged bully.
It’s jealousy. Very simple. “Billie” has had this Sal complex since the start of the comic because Sal at least superficially has everything she values and has obtained it easily. Sal’s popular, respected, her peers idolize her (ironically against her wishes). Guys flirt with her and offer her free drinks at bars even though she’s under age. These are things Billie wants. After all the talk of her growing up she still has the shallow values of a high school cheerleader at heart.
Now that Jennifer has something she perceives Sal wants the power dynamic has reversed. Now Sal knows how it feels.
You’re right, though these past few strips do show what she said she wanted when she first moved in. She tried very hard to get sophomore friends in the mall scene, and now she is friends with one of said sophomores. She also has a boy who is very into, which she also complained about. Just think it’s strange.
All this, plus as pointed upthread Jennifer has at least a little attraction to Sal as evidenced by that time she was drunk. I don’t think she’d act on it now and sober because, yeah, they’ve known each other since they were like five, Walky treats her like a sister, and Jennifer acknowledges she’s the surrogate daughter Linda wanted, but Sal being gone for most of their adolescence and their not actually being related seems to have left part of her brain going ‘Sal hot.’ Which for someone who’s kind of a complete disaster in the attraction, recognizing and expressing it department, may be manifesting as even more jealousy of Sal’s coolness.
Nonono you’re spot on. There was a drunken, rebuffed attempt at a kiss and then they both forgot about it. And Billie actually has defended Sal from the past. There was no on screen bad blood.
But also, Bille was convinced Sal was AmaziGirl for the longest time because, who else on campus could be THAT cool?
So Yumi is right, but so are your sapphic instincts. Mine are pinging too :’3
This is one of the few instances where I have actually disliked her.
Congratulations on making Asher look better by comparison.
Hmmm
Jennifer/Sal/Asher threesome.
hmm…
Jennifer, Sal, Asher?….Danny is that you?
I definitely have a powerful inner Danny. I am probably most easily somewhere between Danny and Walky.
So how many shoes do you own? And what kind of hat?
No more than one pair of tennis shoes, dress shoes, work shoes and boots, which I do not wear 90% of the time. I used to just have tennis shoes but people keep gifting me other shoes or requiring me to buy more.
I still have that hat from my profile picture, it belonged to my great aunt. Otherwise I don’t have a lot of hats cuz my head is big and my hair is big too.
I keep clicking the text but it doesn’t link.
Click “Jennifer/Sal/Asher threesome.” harder.
It might work.
Let me know if it does.
But Asher likes Wally, and he and Billy will never happen.
never say neverI vote yes.
And specially if Sal is into both :3c
Well that’s gonna be all I’m thinking about for the next 12 hours
Yes, Jennifer, they have a History. No, it’s not the sort you’re thinking of.
I appreciate that the alt-text, comments, and me are all on the same page about this.
Tomorrow we can drive around this town
And let the cops chase us around
The past is gone, but something might be found
To take its place
Hey Jealousy
One of my favorites!
Unnecessary? That’s the best kind of drama!
This is not a good look for Billie/Jennifer, especially considering how “adult” y’all were claiming to be. If Sal did have any feelings for Asher before, I doubt it lasted long after he betrayed her.
Also, I didn’t get the idea that she was posessive of Asher; more likely she was simply angry at the idea that he could hurt someone else that she knows.
Sal’s being “possessive” in the sense that it’s clear as day she’s lonely and isolated from the kind of emotional connection she wants (and I feel, at the moment, Sal does want some brand of intimacy with a guy).
So she’s on-panel with Jason again and she thinks he slept with Ruth, so she gets angry. Then she goes to see Asher and starts looping around the building a whole bunch instead of just going to see him, where Asher kind of affirms that he’s super into Jennifer, so much like she did with Jason, Sal starts talking about stuff that happened that, seemingly, she had previously seemed to have dealt with.
Go do an archive dive back to her talk with Amazi-Girl at the start of this story. Sal’s really clear that she “wants Asher with someone like her, but just not her, specifically.”
I don’t think she believed Jason slept with Ruth, especially after seeing him handcuffed to the door…maybe if he was cuffed to the bed…
And she’s known since the semester started that Asher was with Billie, if not before that, so I doubt she went there to double check if he was into her. She probably wanted to warn him privately and in a less confrontational way to “be good to Billie, til he’s not”, but then that train wreck of a conversation happened.
Historically, Sal does not have good taste in men. Her and and Asher have a nice moment together before the timeskip where she and Asher share a nice moment smoking together, but feelings are complicated! And while this is probably going to be a love V teeing up, I’m going to see it as Sal looking out for Billie rather than her wanting Asher herself.
I think you’re really giving Sal a bit too.much credit when she’s spent a bunch of strips insinuating she’s the only one suitable for Asher because of how “dangerous they both are”, and has just flipped out at him having a girlfriend in her presence, right after flipping out about Jason and Ruth *maybe* being a thing when prior interactions with him post The Grades Drama have been relatively civil.
Sal absolutely usually has relatively altruistic intentions but this is pretty clearly an exception.
I said I’m going to see it as her looking out for Jennifer, though I know it’s because she currently wants him, or at least someone. And maybe it specifically being Jennifer (already having her parents’ love, as stated by herself) kinda rubs it in. Feelings are complicated! I don’t condone Sal’s outburst but I’m not surprised by it.
It’s been too long since Sal took the Disaster Ball from another member of the cast and just RAN with it. Picking the fights with AG and then Amber was too justifiable by the unresolved feelings mess and AG’s stalking. This is just a COMPLETELY bad idea, and honestly, good. Everyone on the cast needs a turn or twelve making absolutely terrible decisions they will remember at 4 AM three years from now and cringe over!
and some of those in ten years, and some in twenty…
Some that very night going ‘wait, SHIT,’ even! (Amber deeeeefinitely has some kind of anxiety issue among her various traumas.)
Three years was an arbitrary period in the future, but it’s just enough ahead that most of them will probably have figured out a few things that make them think some aspect of their past self was terminally embarrassing.
Yeah. I don’t like Jennifer.
I hope we eventually get to see what happened during the timeskip to completely undo all of Billie’s character growth, because as it is now she’s inexplicably a toxic waste dump for no clear reason. It kinda drags down any strip she appears in. Which especially hurts when she was one of my favorite characters pre-skip.
The breakup with Ruth was evidently not great, and set them both back. Then she got enough therapy to justify her latest attempt at reinvention as being Better and Changing and Dumping Bad Habits without maybe examining how this is itself a bad habit she’s done before, which will inevitably come crashing down once again at some point, and is once again trying the Normal Cool Girl routine. Surely, THIS time it will stick and be healthy.
Hopefully when it inevitably crashes and burns once again we’ll get the disaster bisexual we all know and love back, and she’ll acknowledge that the real her isn’t the villain from a teen movie. She’s way, way messier, while still desiring the status and drama said villain thrives off of. … She can work on ‘having non-adversarial relationships with people you do actually love’ again after ‘continually seeking an ideal of normalcy has not actually resulted in mental health or solved my problems.’
no, no, it’ll totally work the fourth… fifth… are we up to sixth time yet?
That we know of, Jennifer has tried to reinvent herself:
– Definite: High school, in which she stopped hanging out with Walky because she thought he was uncool. Ended when the DUI occurred near the end of senior year, prompting Alice to distance herself over the summer. (I’m certain this timeline was made more explicit but am not up for a full archive binge.)
– Fringe but counting it: Start of college, where yeah sure she did get kicked off the cheer squad at the end of high school but she’s SURE she’s prime to start anew in college! Resulted in the Sexy Sapphic Suicide Pact, preceded by some obvious depression that she tried to downplay since, hey, she wasn’t in as bad shape as Ruth.
– Definite: Forest Quad, where Jennifer deliberately presented an idealized version of herself (no glasses, sure she banged her RA but it wasn’t anything serious, especially not a relationship born out of their mutual depression and alcoholism,) and proceeded to be uncomfortable with JUST HOW MUCH they were idealizing her. When she tried to call a hall meeting asking them to please stop, she ended up oversharing as she realized for the first time that wait, shit, that car crash was REALLY BAD, no wonder Alice didn’t want anything to do with her.
– And now, this. I’m not counting redefinitions like ‘trying with Forest Quad again as an actual person’ because the issue with this particular trend is that it’s always a really artificial conception of coolness and who she ‘should’ be, not who she is. So we’re at four known attempts since adolescence, three in the last six months or so. Only the high school one seemed to have anything resembling staying power, and frankly I would not be at all shocked if there were a mini attempt or two in there (that all looked the same ‘cool girl’ to Walky), or an attempt from before Sal got sent away.
Asher is the new Walkyverse!Danny.
Complete with fucking the artist formerly known as Billie.
Somehow, “to Asher things up” doesn’t really roll off the tongue.
You need a nickname. Danny is for Daniel, after all.
Ashers gotta Ash, so… “To Ash things up” becomes then “Wow he’s Ashing it up again” rolls better off the tongue 😀
To me that sounds like he is wandering around catching pokemon.
Well, crap, Sal Ashied it up again. ??
Works for me.
Ahhh, the more things change. There’s the Jennifer we know and love.
Ohhh, sisters.
And there’s Billie. There she is. Welcome back.
You can take the Jennifer out of Billie…
Is Jennifer Malaya?
Nah, Jennifer is Mike. He tried to pull a classic kill-and-replace on Billie, but couldn’t quite get the character down and decided to come up with a new identity altogether.
That’s obviously a lie! Mike doesn’t smile – except Possibly when he’s drunk.
And Jennifer doesn’t drink – except probably when she smiles…or frowns…or simply breathes…basically when she’s Billie.
I’m kidding of course. It’s clear now that her intoxication of choice is drama.
“Inject it directly into my veins!”
I could arrange for that! What flavor would you like, “Jennifer”? We’ve got cherry, bubblegum, popcorn, cookie dough, COVID vaccine, energy-flavored zesty bar, beer, steroids….. Salvia Divinorum? What’s that doing here?
[Politely borrows your Voxola]
Most definitely bubblegum< fam.
Man, my html is rusty. But the link works B)
Nice choice!
I initially needed some practice with HTML tags on this site, but you get the hang of them in no time!
By the way, I JUST made pedre for the first time! Technically it wasn’t “real” pedre because I used regular olive oil and sweet pepper instead of jalapeños, but other than the slight overpowering of vinegar, it tasted great! Especially on Pan de Queso!
Eheheh! I’m glad you enjoyed it! And don’t worry much about having to make some tweaks – Every Chilean family tweaks theirs a little AND you might not find our specific chilis. My special move is to use both sweet pepper and jalapeños, and substitute vinegar for a squeeze of lemon or lime :3 If you can find Merkén flakes (a smoked variety of a long red spicy one, we call it “goat’s horn”/”cacho de cabra”, and coriander seeds) you’ll be in for a treat if you add some, too ^^
Plus, your pairing there is a great choice. Latinoamerican solidarity! Happy you had a good dinner ;w;
I’ll have to try that next time! Thanks!
By the way, at the time I’m eating this, this is more like a midnight snack! He he he….
*plays “Mahalageasca” by Mahala Rai Banda on Voxola PR-76*
Oh! Sorry if that counts as cultural appropriation or something! I just thought it went well with a Latin-american dinner, that’s all.
Pom-pom, you forgot Pom-Pom flavor.
I don’t believe I’ve ever ate a pom-pom before. What does it taste like?
There she is. Hi Billie 😀
Not going to lie, I like Billie more than I like Jennifer.
Not saying she doesn’t have toxic traits, she obviously does, but she has been so goddamn repressed every time we see her, compared to how things were back around October.
Billie is kind of honest in her own way; Jennifer is friends with Raidah.
Like, I am glad that she’s being less impulsive, but the queen bee shit isn’t good for her, either.
Oh hey, Billie’s back. Couldn’t see you behind all that fake.
In my head,I heard this in the Hellsing Ultimate Abridged voice and it makes the comment doubly awesome.
So how was Asher’s last sentence going to conclude?
“If there’s unnecessary drama, I’m kicking you to the curb. Goddammit, I got out of the Mob for a peaceful life.”
Asher just wants to live a very quiet life.
He should get a dog. That always goes well.
But of course. What kind of monster would kill the dog of someone who’s just doing their best to get out of the murder scene, and live an honest life?
and what kind of mobster would kill a dog?Asherkage Kira has to change is face after Dannyichi Hirose manages to expose his identity, giving time for Joycetaro, Joesuke and Okuyasal to catch up and pummel him.
Bravo!
“Sarah Platinum, The World!”
Jennifer… buddy… you are managing to be the least likable person in a strip that features two [moderately/heavily?] disliked characters. Geez.
I can’t wait to find out what happened to her during the timeskip. Just so I’ll at least understand the reason behind… whatever she’s doing right now.
Yeah, I was so mad at her that for a second I forgot she’s friends with a super super ableist bully! (yes, I will always hate Raidah for the way she treated and acted around Dina)
Ttly Not Still A Mobster at least is having the decency to try to reassure “Jennifer” and looks WORRIED in that last panel.
On the other hand I’d bet actual cash Raidah is having a blast with EVERYTHING about this, but we aren’t getting to see her yet.
So yeah, Billie is having a stellar return after being repressed for god knows how long.
I’ll take it over weird changeling “Jennifer”
How long has she been in…withDRAMAl?
Have an internet
“uh oh…your Billie is showing”
Where!?
And here we see how a name change and a bit of superficial acting doesn’t actually equate to a qualitative difference in who you are as a person.
Gaining maturity and growing as a person requires just that, not ‘acting mature’.
wow, what an incredible metamorphosis into a whole new person you’ve undergone, Jennifer.
Yep. Certainly growing up and settling down. The very epitome of Maturity.
I am pretty sure Jennifer’s “adult” friends won’t appreciate that wanton disregard for maturity.
Haha!
Hey, everyone! Billie’s back!
…Sorry, just couldn’t help myself.
I just notice that Jennifer said she derives more enjoyment from her Sal is jealous scenario if the ambiguity of the proposed relationship stays intact. So if I’m not mistaken Jennifer’s actually getting pleasure from the idea of Sal and Asher banging and I think that really adds a lot to this Jennifer has a repressed sort of psuedo-crush, hate boner, attraction or whatever for Sal.
She tried to kiss Sal while drunk several months (them)/years (us) ago.
………what the fuck, jennifer?
It’s more of a who, and the answer is Sal.
looks like Asher is getting the short end of the stick in this relationship lmao
Yeah, that seems healthy.
It’s gonna be a loooong wait until Jennifer snaps out of it and breaks up with Asher. Maybe by the end of Book 12.
If she continues like this, Asher might break up with her.
I’m open to either option. Anything that breaks up this relationship of madness!
I wish for Jennifer to stop lying to herself and go back to being Billie!!
[The monkey paw closes.]
[Jennifer is now Billie again!]
[… It’s Volume 1 Billie.]
Welcome back /)_-
Why did it open back up just its middle finger?
All this talk about Asher being dangerous for Jennifer and not nearly enough about the other way around
Everyone’s talking about Jennifer, but I cannot believe Asher is choosing to say “Look, I don’t know” about if Sal and Asher have history!! Confirms that they didn’t *really* talk about Asher’s grandfather, because I seriously doubt he’ll hide what he did with/to Sal, but somehow think revealing the family mob situation is safer / lower on the backstory tree. Get real. Asher more like ash… tray…
Asher and Jennifer just introduced Sal to Raidah and Carl by saying Asher and Sal were friends and robbed convenience stores together. I’m not sure what other history you are talking about? Unless you mean specifically that Asher called the cops on Sal, in which case Jennifer might know but Raidah and Carl were just introduced to Sal and probably know nothing on the subject. Asher is responding to Raidah here.
I also consider that “Look, I don’t know” to basically mean “it’s complicated.” It’s the sort of thing someone says when they don’t have a brief answer prepared and need to unpack a lot of things themselves. I would usually expect it to be followed with anecdotes, but Jenn interjects.
When you say, “they didn’t really talk about Asher’s grandfather,” does “they” mean Asher and Jennifer? Because Asher is talking to Raidah, and Jennifer and Raidah are different people.
If Asher hasn’t openned up about the mafia stuff to Jenniferno, this should give him *serious reservations* about telling her more. Jenn’s sharing criminal history information tge (apparently) first chance she gets is not a good sign for keeping secrets.
He’s talking about romantic history, not the convenience store incident. Walky said they had feelings for each other but didn’t exactly date.
wow Jennifer, your Billie is showing. She goes from “wow I’m so mature” so enjoying the thought of Sal being jealous of her. What a fake.
Yes, Asher, she is one of the crazy ones. Yes, this means that you should be running away as fast as you can and refuse to spend any time around her again. This is for your own safety!
Okay…
So Billie has always been jealous of Sal and trying to one-up her? Despite all the shit in Sal‘s life and her success with being the better Walkerton daughter?
She‘s in an even more sad and dangerous state than I though.
Sal is cool.
Jennifer was supposedly cool…in high school.
Jennifer wants to be cool again.
So yes, since Sal turned up on her motorcycle looking fit and tattooed and bad ass, Jennifer has felt inferior.
Just look at the time they all went to the beach after the Ryan incident if anyone needs a visual reminder.
Nope, still tagged “Jennifer” and still behaving as a child of privilege.
Noticed that, too. Willis, maybe start tagging ‘Jennifer’ and ‘Billie’ separately, like you do with Amber/Amazi-Girl?
Because they’re not actually different people. Or even personas.
She’s just going by Jennifer now.
I suspect if she changes back to the nickname, the tag will change again, but doing separate tags would be… uncomfortable. Since the other example where a tag changed retroactively like that was Jocelyne, after the reveal she was trans – she’s been consistently tagged as such since, even when everyone else in the scene doesn’t know.
Also, it would be a nightmare to check archives against each other.
Yeah, ‘Billie’ was excised from the tag search, like the Egyptian Queen Hatshepsut and history. It’s all good, nothing bad ever came of erasing history.
What erasing history?
It’s a name change. All the stuff she did when she was calling herself Billie is still there.
I’ve already gone on about my opinion of Ms Billingsworth’s name business at length, so I won’t further retread that ground here.
Regarding history, the bit where historical searches to find comics that featured ‘Billie’ no longer work seems relevant. It’s not an IRL big deal, because it’s a comic. The point this time is that it’s inconsistent to have to search the archives using one word, for a character that was tagged, named, called, and introduced themself as another. That there are problems introduced by changing history is (an obviously grossly exagerated) simile. When Ms Jenner changed her identity, it didn’t change her medals to be in women’s events. When Jennifer stopped acknowledging ‘Billie’ as an acceptable form of address, it didn’t retcon 10 years of comics where she did accept it. I don’t honestly expect Willis to double tag the character to support both searches for that time period, it’s just a matter of opinion on how to handle data consistency, and there are issues with how it was handled, but there are issues with doing nothing too. The character’s behaviour, reasons for the change, and disassociation from the effects of her actions make honouring her name change less palatable.
BELATED THOUGHT: Welp, now we know why this chapter gets its name from Bad Romance.
This “Getting married to raise 2.5 kids” thing was so so so annoying, and Billie is back to remind us she’ll always be ready to throw herself into a potential love triangle with her estranged sister from another mister, whom she envies for her coolness and closetedly lusts for; and the grandson of the local Korean mafia that’s on the run from them and will be forced to choose his path and his girlfriend at some point.
This is what she lives for. Drama, disease, love, revenge, and EVERYTHING as long as she doesn’t have to “pay” for it.
The “2.5” kids bit confuses me. Are you supposed to have 2 kids and then tragically miscarry/abort the other one, then treat the living pair worse than you could because you’re hung up on the loss in an unhealthy way? Seems very WASPy.
the actual answer was “an artifact of statistics and averages”.
but people have been making that joke (and variations thereof) for a good sixty years now, since slightly after the figure was first published.
in The Phantom Tollbooth (1961), for example, the protagonist meets the fractional child in – where else? – the realm of the Mathemagician.
This sounds amazing omg
If you have not spent an afternoon avoiding the doldrums, and jumping to conclusions, I Very Highly recommend a pleasant afternoon reading it. It is the wake-up call almost every 12-14 year old needs to hear.
I could’ve gone “white picket fence”, but the coldly statistic “2.5 kids” fits the creepiness better, ahaha
It is from a statistical average amount of kids a typical family has that came out at some point. Which came out as 2.5 i.e. most families that have children will have 2 or 3 with the ones that have only 1 child and the ones with very large families either pulling the average down from 3 or up from 2 to such a degree that it is right in the middle between 2 and 3.
You are meant to team up with another couple. So 5 kids total. Swapping optional.
She definitely should have chosen the Salvia-Divinorum-flavored injectable drama.
If there’s any psychological deck of cards that at least somewhat deserves a “mulligan” (bearing some risk of course), it’s her.
And that’s assuming she doesn’t destroy those drama-addicted brain cells herself with only her relapse into excessive drinking.
There’s many ways to find enlightenment! But Billie wasn’t drinking to boost creativity or like, self-medicating because she couldn’t afford something better, or to find Answers about herself. She drank, therefore she was (the party girl persona she clung to) and that was never going to work on her.
Salvia is great, I’d suggest herbal vaping to manage certain things, and most def Peyote so she throws up some of that toxicity away (not like she’s unused to vomiting either, hey!). Unnecessary Drama, though? IVing it?? She’s playing with dangerous forces there :’)
More she was self-medicating because she couldn’t admit there was anything wrong that needed treatment, but also couldn’t stand her life sober.
Yeah, Jennifer has spent a lot of the strip 100% Actively Depressed, but she can pass off her issues as not that bad because she’s not suicidal or yeah, sure, she likes drinking, but it’s fine, right?
It is not fine, and while therapy seems to have handled her depression for the moment, I would bet another episode isn’t far from flaring up again.
It’s hard to tell because we haven’t seen that much of her and she’s usually been able to fake it, except at the worst points.
I’m still not completely convinced she’s not drinking again.
You say “again”, but did she ever actually stop? Going a few days without blacking out on moonshine doesn’t count.
She was in a positive place pre-time skip where she had stopped. We don’t know yet if that has changed – quitting drinking might be the one healthy thing that actually stuck but it could also have been what degraded everything in Halloween if she had been lying about that AGAIN.
She did stop. There was an entire plot arc about it, which always seems to get forgotten. Even when she was drinking, she routinely went days without blacking out – she was mostly more of a maintenance functional drunk.
She went at least a few days before the timeskip without anything. We saw her go through withdrawal and there’s been no clear sign of drinking since then. Even after the timeskip.
If she did start again offscreen, I think it would have to be linked to Halloween and the breakup. Nothing else would make sense narratively. Something like that, following a big arc about her stopping, would need to tied to some kind of narrative purpose, not just undone with a “yeah, it only lasted a few days and she went back to it like normal.”
I did a quick archive trawl, and it turns out that arc was like two years ago. A lot has happened since then, so it sorta slipped my mind. She was also continuously a shithead to Ruth during that part, so I guess I just assumed she was lying about not doing the big drink anymore. If she has stayed sober since then, good on her, but I’m not prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt on that.
She was a shithead to Ruth in the lead up because she was trying to drive Ruth away so Ruth could be healthy without her. When that failed, she sucked it up and made a good effort to change, reconciling with Ruth and also revealing herself to the girls in her new dorm. Basically wrapping up all her main character arcs in a good place.
It’s certainly possible she lapsed, but I’ll wait for evidence. I’d rather she not have thrown away all her character development off stage.
so much for “maturing” eh billie
OHHHH OKAY THEY’RE A WHOLE VILLAIN TEAM NOW, like the Legion of Doom
And likely just as comedically inept with Asher being the token sane one (like poor Lex Luthor is), trying to get this particular herd of cats all going in the same direction.
Asher finally appears to see the real Jennifer and appears to be rightfully concerned and a bit disgusted… YES! Go Asher, run away from her! She’s gorgeous, but a danger to herself and others and she really seems unable to change. Go with someone less crazy, even the questionable Raidah is less of a disaster. But don’t go with Sal, because she really deserves to change her life for the better.
I’ve just noticed that the speech bubbles use two spaces after full stops and I’m going to need some time to process this.
Wait until you notice that it’s lettered in Comic-Sans.
Yeah, this is group is definitely more “mature” than their fellow college students.
I can hear Jennifer say that in Yogi Bear voice.
Beside, of course, the adoration of her parents is such a big ouch. You already have that, then what more could you possibly want <_<
In this moment, poor Asher is actually trying to a good reassuring boyfriend which actually makes me feel a little bad for him that he seems to actually want a quiet life and to be a good partner, and Jennifer is out here being like ‘I thrive on drama, bongo! More drama! MORE!’ Like geez, go on a fandom forum if you need a drama fix, don’t be happy about an actual potential drama vortex you can’t walk away from that could destroy your romantic relationship or sisterly relationship or both.
Well, see, when you believe that you are an inevitable, toxic maelstrom that will inevitably and uncontrollably destroy everything you come into contact with, there isn’t logically much else to do but enjoy the ride for what it is, since obviously you don’t have any actual agency over your behaviors, or the consequences thereof. Her life isn’t the result of choices she makes, it’s a thing that happens, and the core purpose of the exercise is that no matter what it remains novel and validating. What’s she gonna do, think about anything but getting the next fix of freedom that comes from treating life like a driverless car?
That’s the Billie we know
Reading this in parallel with J&W I cannot stop thinking that this group are the aliens of DoA. Jennifer may think she belongs with them, but Billie definitely is one of us (and she’s not dead).
Personally, I feel like Blaine was probably the closest thing to Head Alien in DoA, especially once he put on the Purple Armor and Mask, but he didn’t have the right sense of humor for it— and whatever his strength, Ross didn’t have the brains to be Monkey Master.
Considering Willis has suggested elsewhere that the Alien-JFO-SEMMF-Martian Gambit Pileup is really a metaphor for being gaslit by your parents, it’s probably more accurate to say that all of the bad parents in this comic are collectively the DoA equivalent of all of those factions.
I still hold out hope for the day Willis gives into their desire for evil quipping and nonsense, and Head Alien finally makes his glorious entrance into the Dumbingverse proper.
Same. I mean it won’t happen but its good to live with a purpose.
And this was the moment Asher found out that, despite being raised in the actual, literal mob, he was still the less fucked-up character to show in the past, like, 10 strips.
‘Holy fuck, I am alarmingly desensitized to death but these people are dysfunctional weirdoes.’
Isn’t it great that we’re all grown up, without the need for any further personal growth?
So much for “growing up!”
Good on you Asher for realizing the situation needed to be defused and deescalated. You immediately sought to clarify the limits of your relationship with Sal.
…Unfortunately, your girlfriend believes being a Housewife of X is the pinnacle of achievement. And it is a goal she actively strives for.
Every day I somehow grow to loathe Billie just a little bit more…
Dr. Jennifer and Ms. Billie
You deserve props for this one
Are we talking a full flying buttress here, or like, just a stick jammed into a corner?
I can understand this kind of reaction from Malaya, but why Billie
She was insanely jealous of Sal’s popularity back at the beginning of the comic.
Jealousy and desire to be better than Sal in some way as her popularity since Day One has been higher and everything she has craved. Malaya already (unwarranted as this belief may be) thinks she is better than Sal and doesn’t need a real reason to think so, she just makes up her own reasons on the spot. Jennifer used to be Alpha Bongo Cheerleader therefore thrives on drama, toxicity and the idea of being better than others and having things they want.
Ah, the Jennifer respray finally cracked and flaked off. Now we get to see the true Billie underneath.
There’s the Billie we all know and “love.”
Always nice to be reminded of why you honestly dislike a character.
I had hoped Jennifer was genuinely becoming a better person, despite appearances. So much for that. Asher seems to be a decent dude in this strip, though.
This is what makes it hard to take her seriously
Now that’s a part of Jennifer I wish stayed under lock and key forever, yikes
And, suddenly, Asher thought, “whoa, I didn’t sign up to be in a relationship with a teenager. This just got annoying.”
Sal does have a History with Asher. One that involves being arrested, punished through her teen years and being kidnapped and nearly killed. Don’t think Asher is eager to spread that story around.
The problem with that is only the kidnapper and Asher’s contact know that Asher was involved with the kidnapping.
I do not believe that Sal was one of the people who got kidnapped – she showed up after the fact and helped Amazigirl with the second chase sequence, IIRC.
Sal was the cavalry, yeah, woken up by Ruth after AmbG showed up warning Becky and was clearly Not Okay. (Along with Malaya and Carla.)
The intentionally kidnapped were Joyce, Sarah, Amber, Dorothy, and then Walky was mistaken for AG and taken by the kidnappers (so not an original target, but a conscious one). Dina saw the others and snuck in the van using her stealth powers, and Becky wasn’t onsite to be kidnapped and had guards, prompting Ross to release Amber per the AG deal. (So, intended victim but not initial.) For reference!
I mean, the question was more implying history of a romantic or sexual nature
Oh good I’m glad Billie is still Billie
Hey there’s the Billie we know and love
Wait, Sal’s parents adore her now?
Sal’s parents have always adored Jennifer. She’s the reasonably-white-passing daughter they always wanted, after all.
You know, I’m fine with counting this as the Toxicity bomb exploding.
eh, maybe. Might be premature to call it. Doesn’t seem as severe. Feels more like letting pressure out of a volcano.
(considering Demoted Oblivious’s posts about it in the last comic)
THEEEEEEERE SHE IS, I KNEW SHE COULDN’T HIDE FOR LONG
Jennifer, you really should have those issues looked at by a professional.