No, he says: “Bruce Wayne said that. I didn’t” and even Alfred says things like: “Bruce Wayne has a party to attend, maybe you could learn more about this Cobblepot fellow there.”
When Batman refers to Bruce Wayne in the third person, it’s more of a tongue-in-cheek, throwaway line, meant more for the audience than for himself. When Amber refers to AG in the third person, she’s serious.
I know, that’s subjective, but it’s how it seems to me.
Depends on who’s writing it, of course, but I’ve always seen that take as being Batman is the real person, Bruce Wayne is just the mask. He refers to Bruce Wayne in the third person because Bruce Wayne is a role he plays.
Distinct from most superheroes, where the secret id is the real person and the mask is the hero, but also distinct from Amber because “Bruce Wayne” has no mind of his own.
It’s worth noting that those close to him, Dick & Tim in particular, often try not to let him make this distinction – calling him Bruce in private.
Different writers, and fans, have lots of different takes on this. Personally, I’m fond of the interpretation that the “real” Bruce is who we see sitting the cave in his “working clothes” but with the cowl off/down, showing his face, and with his family present. No masks, no secrets.
Eh, that was easy. “emo clown” just means a Sad Clown in an Iron Lung. From there, you just have to question whether a particular trait needs further on-screen representation. Given that they’re in an iron lung, we can safely say sexuality doesn’t need representation at this time (If you’re in an Iron Lung, I suspect you have other things on your mind.)
Gotta say, always a bit weird when it comes to those reviled Marvel movies. I was a fan of both Nic Cage Ghost Riders films, and the Affleck Daredevil, though with that one the director’s cut. Fan4astic? Couldn’t even finish that one.
I enjoyed both Ghost Rider movies for reasons clearly not intended by their creators.
I was super made about the second Fantastic Four though. I was expecting a GIANT PURPLE MAN IN A HELMET BEING TREATED LIKE A SERIOUS GRITTY VILLAIN, DAMNIT
I did enjoy the Ghost Rider movie as one does any bad movie. That doesn’t make him the fun Ghost Rider.
My main beef with F4 movies is that they try to cram origin stories and character delelopment for the team and Doom into one movie. Obviously each of those stories need more time to be done right.
…and this would be the second time I started my “Doom needs a solo film” rant on the internet, so I’ll quit while I still can.
The question is, is Amber lying to Ethan about how her and Danny broke up to cover up what really happened or does Amber actually believe that’s what happened?
See that’s the part that scares me. It would be better if Amber was just covering for what Amazi-Girl did, but if she truly believes it then Amazi-Girl might be hiding memories from Amber or at least part of a memory. Heck, it might have been Amazi-Girl posing as Amber who told Ethan that he was not to talk to Danny anymore after they broke up since Amber doesn’t jump on Ethan here for going against her request not to speak to Danny anymore.
(hmm, well I’m gonna have to look for the comic where she asks Ethan not to speak to Danny to see the tags, but from what I remember it said Amber so I dunno.)
I doubt Amazi-girl hid memories from Amber though. It’s very highly likely that Amber could access Amazi-girl’s memories(I know a few people who’re like that) since it seemed to be that way from the comic (I dunno, I could be reading it wrong).
But yeah, The both of them are kinda a mess right now in regard to that relationship… :\
Ethan mentioned being told that Danny was now “persona non grata”, though I don’t think that means she told Ethan not to talk to him, only that she’s not talking to him.
Or even that she doesn’t want to talk ABOUT him or for Ethan to talk to her about him, which normally would be a reasonable request for a painful breakup. Considering how much she’s isolating herself, this concerns me though.
I looked up the definition
In non-diplomatic usage, referring to someone as persona non grata is to say that he or she is ostracized. Such a person is for all intents and purposes culturally shunned, so as to be figuratively non-existent.
Yes, it does, but she could also be being colloquial – as in, referring to not wanting to bring him up. It could also mean she doesn’t want Ethan talking to him though, and he definitely seems like that might be the case, which is soooooo not okay I can’t even begin to describe it.
”This boyfriend is no more! He has ceased to be! He’s passed on! Bereft if life, he rests in peace! He’s shuffled off ‘is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisibile!!
Also, I’m honestly basing the memory hiding issue on what Cerberus has said on previous strips as she has personal experience with DID and all I have is a neighbor from many years ago who was not even close to integrated. From what I understand, when they are integrated they can talk to each other and share memories, but when they are not they can start doing stuff like hide memories from each other especially if an alter is scared of being destroyed. Hopefully Cerberus will see my clunky explanation and help put it better than I possibly could.
There’s been speculation that their divide will go far enough that they won’t share memories, but there’s been no real evidence of it so far. A couple things like this that might be hints, but nothing close to definite.
There’s no memory hiding, I don’t think. It’s just a very tortured interpretation. There’s a reason her phrasing is deliberately cryptic.
“Things could have gotten dangerous. Amazi-Girl has to let him go before someone got hurt.” Amazi-Girl was seethingly angry at Danny and could have hurt him. She was extremely jealous that he preferred Amber to her. Also/alternatively, Danny was apparently not going to support Amazi-Girl anymore, and Amazi-Girl is essential for Amber’s wellbeing, so Amber would have gotten hurt had she listened to Danny. Or, taking the revelations from the midnight rally into account: Danny was talking with Amber’s arch nemesis and Amazi-Girl had to take over to prevent Amber from freaking out. And Danny did not seem to agree to stay away from her.
The point is, what she said can be true from many points of view. It’s why she was being vague. There’s no reason for Amazi-Girl to be hiding what happened for her to say what she said.
Amber sees Amazi-Girl as the one who broke up with Danny, but anyone else who doesn’t… you know, have access to the tags, would think that it was Amber who broke up with him.
Amber might be stretching the truth when it comes to WHY she broke up with him, but which she’s not lying about WHO did.
^^^this
Amber didn’t break up with him because of her trauma with Sal; she had to ‘hide’ and let Amazi-girl handle the situation. Since Amazi-girl was fueled and “created” by that trauma… it wasn’t handled well. (Truthfully it’s way better than staying together and continuing to be toxic towards her boyfriend)
Either Amber’s lying, or amazi-girl is (to amber). There’s no ‘stretching the truth’ here. “I’m protecting someone” is starting to sound like Amazi-girl’s go-to justification for hurting people.
I think in this case, she may have had slightly different reasons for breaking up, but I think that seeing herself as a physical threat to Danny may be why they remain broken up.
That’s plausible, but it’s not really what Ethan’s asking either. Seeing as he doesn’t know to ask, because pretty much only the audience has a remote understanding of that.
And tbh, given that we have implicit evidence that Amber expected Ethan not to talk to Danny, I suspect that it ranks beneath anger even to herself.
Amazi-Girl isn’t always in touch with reality. Her vision of Sal as a villainous corrupting force out to get her colours all the interactions. She saw it as Sal manipulating Danny to get to her.
Hm. I rather took her comment as being wise after the event. As long as she was seeing Sal as an arch enemy, she was likely to hurt either Sal or Danny bodily for “conspiring against her”. Breaking up with Danny made space for her not to physically hurt him, and she leaned there was no real reason to hurt her in the meantime.
At the moment she broke up, she was not protecting Danny, though, but lashing out, though not physically.
I /could/ assume absolutely tortured mental gymnastics, but given this is someone for whom lying is second nature, even when unnecessary, and this is true of both alters, on a regular basis, it’s more parsimonious to say ‘she’s lying’. I’m not sure whom, to whom, so there’s htat, but I /would/ hedge my bets on AG being the liar.
Given that she steers the conversation away from that the minute Ethan calls her on her lying bullshit, chances are she’s just running with AG’s narrative.
It is pretty worrisome. I think I lean into the ‘this is what she actually believes’ territory, because I really think in her own headspace she wouldn’t see the point in lying or what went down as wrong. Because she was ‘right’.
Granted things may have… shifted since the Sal team up.
Idk. Like sometimes memories or are we interpret events shift a lot for our own favour but: Amber hates herself and this is less a ‘slightly twisted interpretation of actual events you could see someone taking from it’ and more ‘flat out not what happened at all’.
Maybe she /is/ fully dissociating. Idk, I know very little about DID. Most of what I’ve learned has been from the comment sections of this comic.
Amber can hate herself but not her AmaziGirl persona so maybe puts ‘her’ in the best possible light. Which is slightly concerning: I mean AmaziGirl is the unreasonable one if anything, Amber, while she takes it too far at points, can criticise herself and actually is upset when she treats Danny terribly. Amber is the version of her which can grow and change. AmaziGirl is basically near on ‘inflexible’ as it were. She keeps talking about being consistent in earlier comics when it came to the drinking too.
He does.
You have to search the other comic.
(Mostly this post is an answer to the suggestion that Thad was mis-spelled.
Mis-dressed, yes. Mis-spelled, no).
Yep this is practically clear as day where this situation is going, let me fast forward to the part of the conversation we always have. * cough* *cough*
It’d be one thing if you were annoyed at him for what you complained about, but this level of vitriol is bizarre.
If you could articulate what you think was wrong (and the reasoning for it) beyond “those times when Ethan was gay at someone and clearly only just barely restraining himself from jumping them”, I’d be more open to your opinions.
I’ve found that everyone has that one character that sends them into this ball of pure hate. Arguing how they’re wrong, or perhaps ‘wrong’, is just a lesson in futility.
I can see that, but she’s an “evil” character. The type of hatred I speak of is for the “good” characters. The common ones I’ve seen are, aside from Ethan and Amber these last few days, Sarah, Walky, Becky, and Carla, though with the last two, the comments can really spiral out of control, resulting in deletions and bans. Though those could happen with the others too, they just may not be as noticeable.
“I’ve found that everyone has that one character that sends them into this ball of pure hate. Arguing how they’re wrong, or perhaps ‘wrong’, is just a lesson in futility.”
I think that for a lot of people, that character is Hillary Clinton.
I think that’s what makes me uncomfortable about this person’s weird stance on Ethan, is Ethan seems like a very responsible guy. But somehow, Ethan noticing Joss was cute = he’s just gonna pounce on her the moment he finds out Joss could be gay? Is it because Ethan is a gay man that he suddenly has no control over his libido in that commenter’s opinion? Because as far as we know, Ethan is likely a virgin who, being inexperienced as a gay man, would probably be tentative instead of divebombing onto a guy dick first.
Well, I think Ethan went beyond “noticing Joss was cute”. I absolutely agree he would be tentative about actual sex, but you can be unfaithful without actually having sex. Even more so when the relationship in question is also not physical.
I think Ethan is very repressed (and was even more so at the time) and since he had no real romantic attachment to Joyce, it was easy for him to slip straight into flirting with her cute brother. Almost certainly not expecting it to go anywhere – or really thinking much at all.
I doubt he’d do anything similar in a real relationship.
I like how Amber is trying to make it look like Amazi-Girl broke up with Danny as some noble gesture for his own good when it looked waaaay more like she just had an irrational abusive outburst at him. I mean, yeah, given that fact, the breakup was definitely to Danny’s benefit – but Amber’s being pretty self-serving and self-deluding if she thinks that was really how and why the breakup happened.
Right now it comes across as if, with hindsight (and having grown a little more self-clarity on her animosity towards Sal), Amber/Amazi-Girl realizes she was wrong to villify Danny the way she did – so now she’s trying to turn it into a “ohhh, ummm yeah Amazi-Girl was being SELFLESS. She broke up with him for HIS SAKE.” Feels like a case of unreliable narrator…
BTW, lest anyone think I’m whining about the writing here – I actually really like Amber from a writing standpoint. She’s probably my top “Love to Hate ‘Em” character, precisely BECAUSE the nature and facets of her shittiness as a human being aren’t absolute and have a lot of nuance. It’s super fascinating to see how Willis has has been developing her.
I agree, Amber is well written as a character. I think my primary qualm with her at this point though is that she kind of won’t improve her own life until she takes responsibility for herself. Continuing yesterday’s convo about good vs bad, taking responsibility for yourself means accepting the bad as well as the good, since no one is a completely perfect human. Life is much messier and stressful when we pursue this imaginary perfect version of ourselves, much like AG is Amber’s “perfect and moral” personality. But AG predictably isn’t that person.
People can love or hate a character for various reasons. Sometimes this is for entirely shallow reasons like shipping/getting in the way of ships.
But sometimes it’s because they’re deep characters who either remind us of ourselves or people we know or even just so nuanced we can almost see them as real people. Occasional superhero physics aside Amber is so realistic it kind of hurts.
Remember, AmaziGirl is immune to criticism, even from herself. She made a decision about Danny and it was right and always will be. In that way, she’s a lot like most humans. Double down and make memory conform to it.
Hm, I suppose it depends on how you count “times.” Is a single thread/argument “1” or is a single comment “1” what about the same topic/argument (and commenters) across multiple threads?
…I swear this just started as a joke about “only blah blah not enough blah lol” with a tie in to the times I’ve done the same :/
There’s the Ethan we all missed. It’s great that he gets more time to have relationships and problems in DOA, but I miss fanboy Ethan, I miss comedian Ethan.
But hey we’re about to get back Mike driving a wedge between him and someone else Ethan. This time it’s a boy and I don’t know if Mike is actually trying to make things worse.
I like this Mike his cruelty has a purpose beyond his own enjoyment. It’s even easier to get behind “kick’s you in the ball’s till you learn to wear a cup” Mike. 🙂
Agree. Mike in the Walkyverse always had a motive behind his ….cruelty is maybe not the word I’m looking for, but definitely his ability to nail your sore spot with a iron spike.
He always had a lesson behind the jab. He made you look at yourself harder than you would otherwise.
His sociopathic behavior was a bit understandable when his backstory unfolded.
Here in DoA, we don’t know yet why he is so stinkin’ mean. [not to say that makes it okay, but Willis has a habit of giving a character to annoy the Hell out of us, and then develop that character in a great way, ie: Becky.]
Wearing a cup is uncomfortable and people shouldn’t have to wear them just to go about their daily lives.
If Mike was doing this for situations where you’d be foolish for not wearing one I could almost buy that, but ”You must keep your guard up at all times so Mike doesn’t fuck you over” is not a helpful life lesson. It is only a lesson in living in proximity to Mike.
Hopefully, Mike will end up learning a lesson himself, about not being such a butt opening all the dang time
As much as I enjoy Mike’s cartoonish villainy (mostly because it’s cartoonish), agreed. If the only reason you need to keep your guard up all the time is “proximity to Mike,” then a better alternative to “keep your guard up all the time” is “make Mike go away.”
He hasn’t made enough of them in the Dumbiverse. In fact, I think he’s only made one…?
I’ve gotta say, the only thing I miss seeing from the comments during my archive binges are faaaaaace jokes and I don’t even know why.
I tried to get Dina’s “Stop the faces!” to catch on, but it never quite did. I think the faaaaace jokes were dying away around that point, which didn’t help.
It may be the lack of Mike in the comic that minimizes their appearances. When a low amount of money needs referencings, it’s usually a nickel. And seemingly anytime I reference a face, there’s a followup comment with “you meant faaaaaaaaces” or something like that.
Eh, close enough, imo. The poll, for me at least, implies only physical attraction, and Tenchan’s comment seemed to be some sort of sexual innuendo. Figuring that Tenchan was one of the people who voted for Amber, I subtracted one and posted what I did.
That really bugs me. She doesn’t want to talk about it now, but she should. Bottling up anger issues actually directly makes them worse. We have to accept and work on our flaws to accept our whole selves.
She definitely should talk about it at some point, but if she can’t talk about it now without getting angry and blowing up at Ethan about it, then not talking about it now is absolutely the right call.
Yeah, but I kinda feel sorry for whatever criminal she uncorks that bottle on instead.
Not, you know, a lot, but there is some sympathy, and hopes that nothing breaks.
Honestly, I’d rather see her blow up at more people close to her than keep kinda “getting away with it” by blowing off steam via Amazi-Girl.
She’s in a bad place. The longer this goes on, the more it builds up, the more toxic she’s going to become to her friends. She’s just as in need of help as, say, Ruth, but since she takes out most of her rage via her superhero identity, she does a better job at maintaining this very unhealthy balancing act. The one time she’s been pushed by someone as Amber she went nuclear; she can’t keep holding all that in.
The problem is that her blowing up at people as Amber will further her need for Amazi-Girl. She doesn’t think of her anger as a problem to be addressed through support and therapy; it’s just proof of Amber’s inherent vileness as a person, and that any expression of it is a mortal sin on her part.
So instead of saying “I treated Danny like dogshit, I should strive to not do that” she instead continues the same thought processes because she already thinks she’s the worst.
I think Amber views her “whole self” as being just like her dad, and as such works on ways to actively avoid that, to the point of being harmful like her dad.
If only she had less crappy coping mechanisms though. If she had some kind of help, then trying not to be like her dad probably wouldn’t be leading her down this road.
Yeah. Though I feel confident saying that at least a third of the commenters would find her boring then, and whine about how mush screen time she was getting.
Look how she treated Danny. She barked threats and accusations without even attempting to understand him, decided that disagreeing with her for the first time was him stepping out of line, and Danny himself realized how pointless, abusive and doomed to failure his relationship was five minutes later.
Amber is replicating her father’s abuse onto her partners but finds ways to morally justify it to herself. She is simply too toxic and abusive to contribute to any kind of relationship and anyone she tries with she’ll drag down.
I was a bit confused by that. I figured you were writing it from Amber’s perspective, because that seems like a very plausible read of how how she sees herself.
Every time I come here I just get into arguments and spew vitriolic bullshit and I’m making a fucking embarrassment of myself and treating people like dogshit and throwing my stupid bullshit up here like it even fucking solves anything and what i am even doing anymore
I don’t agree. I’ve got you in my vague category of “commenters who sometimes produce useful stuff” rather than my own category of “commenters who make lots of lame jokes hoping one of them will hit someday”.
I sucks that you’re feeling that way but I can’t agree, and I hope you’ll believe me when I say you’ve done nothing here that you need to beat yourself up over.
I’ve seen you be impressively calm and civil in heated discussions about things like this that I know hit you personally. Losing your temper on occasion doesn’t make you a bad person, it just makes you human.
Not sure her way of taking the conversation is all that great.
She is definitely talking about 2 people and the fact they are both her is not showing good signs that she is getting herself together. So to speak.
I think I know the guy Ethan argued with. He’s all the war should never have ended, Megatron should always be the (two dimensional cackling) villain of the original cartoon, anything else is (somehow) uninspired hack work.
I only saw the original cartoon (and caught some episodes of Beast Wars, but I didn’t care for those): Starscream was the best character, Soundwave and his cassette friends were the coolest.
I was always confused how Megatron changed his size when he turned into a gun, though. I mean, Bumblebee was small and turned into a small car, Optimus was big and turned into a truck – how come Megatron could turn into a tiny gun?
Most of them could probably benefit, ngl. A few of them I think would be generally mentally healthy without it. I have to wonder how many would take it up though.
That’s how I read panel 2, but panel 3 could also just be that she didn’t expect that they talked to begin with. They’d originally only knew each other through her, so it’s entirely possible she had no idea they ever hung out together when she wasn’t around.
At least, if she was mad at Ethan for talking to him, I would have expected more emphasis on “his” (“FROM HIS END”?), unless she was deliberately trying to hide that she was upset by it.
Yeah, that’s how I see it as well. Everyone keeps saying “surface rage” which is something I see absolutely nothing of.
Like seriously, trust me on this one people, if she was mad about it we’d know for sure.
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“That’s different–that was a RANDO!”
He was speaking in memes! Memes!
I take exception to that.
But you’re Random, not Rando. There’s a difference. You got ‘M’. Think of all those gadgets…
I don’t think Batman tries to distance himself from his alter-ego as much as Amber does
Sure he does. Bruce Wayne is just the place where Batman goes to do the stuff that he absolutely can’t do as Batman.
Yeah, but Bruce can have a conversation with Alfred without saying “No, Batman said that.”
I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a one-off where he did, though.
That’s because Alfred is aware there’s only one real identity. Bruce is a mask, nothing more.
That’s because Batman doesn’t disassociative identity disorder. (At least, I’m not aware of any evidence that he does.)
No, he says: “Bruce Wayne said that. I didn’t” and even Alfred says things like: “Bruce Wayne has a party to attend, maybe you could learn more about this Cobblepot fellow there.”
But do they really mean it?
To me they were just playing roles
When Batman refers to Bruce Wayne in the third person, it’s more of a tongue-in-cheek, throwaway line, meant more for the audience than for himself. When Amber refers to AG in the third person, she’s serious.
I know, that’s subjective, but it’s how it seems to me.
Depends on who’s writing it, of course, but I’ve always seen that take as being Batman is the real person, Bruce Wayne is just the mask. He refers to Bruce Wayne in the third person because Bruce Wayne is a role he plays.
Distinct from most superheroes, where the secret id is the real person and the mask is the hero, but also distinct from Amber because “Bruce Wayne” has no mind of his own.
It’s worth noting that those close to him, Dick & Tim in particular, often try not to let him make this distinction – calling him Bruce in private.
Different writers, and fans, have lots of different takes on this. Personally, I’m fond of the interpretation that the “real” Bruce is who we see sitting the cave in his “working clothes” but with the cowl off/down, showing his face, and with his family present. No masks, no secrets.
* sitting in
“He thought Dreamwave handled the license better than IDW! This shall not stand!”
“And you don’t even want to hear his thoughts on you Shockwave/Longarm slashfic!”
“I mean, his favorite episode of the G1 cartoon was B.O.T., for crying out loud!”
So many people dumb about toys, probably didn’t like new rewind cuz they don’t like MTMTE
Oh dear. It begins.
It’ll be “Goodbye Florida” all over again.
Amazigirl is more about gleefully pursuing PEOPLE that make Amber angry.
i never break up with anyone, it’s always my alter ego Sodomy-Sam the homosexual emo clown breaking up with them
Good grief, the last thing we need right now is more clowns.
My brain melted due to conjuring the image of an emo clown who could possibly be called Sodomy – Sam
I just pictured a clown.
I pictured a clown with a sad and sinister face, monochromatic outfit and makeup, and black styled uneven hair with a giant strap on.
Terrifying. Still stand by my statement though.
he does that a lot
Eh, that was easy. “emo clown” just means a Sad Clown in an Iron Lung. From there, you just have to question whether a particular trait needs further on-screen representation. Given that they’re in an iron lung, we can safely say sexuality doesn’t need representation at this time (If you’re in an Iron Lung, I suspect you have other things on your mind.)
Named Mr. Frump?
I just outsource the visualization to Randy Millholland.
s/Millholland/Milholland/
Can you imagine if this leads to stress eating?
“Amazi-Girl did not eat the donuts! That was Amber! Amber is weak!”
This image tickles me. ^_^
And just more fuel for the fire for Amazi-Girl to hate Amber, really.
Agreed
“Amber ate five donuts today… tonight, I train for an extra hour.”
I’m picturing a vicious cycle. (and not in the fun Ghost Rider way.)
But what about the Nic Cage way? I bet bees would be involved.
I said the fun Ghost Rider!
Wait… I also said not… so Nic Cage would be an alternative.
Gotta say, always a bit weird when it comes to those reviled Marvel movies. I was a fan of both Nic Cage Ghost Riders films, and the Affleck Daredevil, though with that one the director’s cut. Fan4astic? Couldn’t even finish that one.
I enjoyed both Ghost Rider movies for reasons clearly not intended by their creators.
I was super made about the second Fantastic Four though. I was expecting a GIANT PURPLE MAN IN A HELMET BEING TREATED LIKE A SERIOUS GRITTY VILLAIN, DAMNIT
I did enjoy the Ghost Rider movie as one does any bad movie. That doesn’t make him the fun Ghost Rider.
My main beef with F4 movies is that they try to cram origin stories and character delelopment for the team and Doom into one movie. Obviously each of those stories need more time to be done right.
…and this would be the second time I started my “Doom needs a solo film” rant on the internet, so I’ll quit while I still can.
“Amazi-Girl does not EAT donuts.”
…
“However, she can be FED donuts.”
Looks like Shortpacked Ethan has returned.
He was always here, just waiting dormant in DoA!Ethan’s subconscious, ready to take control should anyone express a stupid opinion about Transformers.
I wonder if he’s talking about Shortpacked Willis here.
Headcannon till Willis bans my comments otherwise.
Interesting how exactly Amber’s phrasing this all.
Hmm, on the bright side, this frees up Danny to date Amber. Since they’re TOTALLY DIFFERENT PEOPLE and all.
By that logic, Danny is also free to date Ethan. After all, why would she be mad about some random guy from her comp-sci class dating her ex?
Well, maybe Danny and Amber were friends, but AG doesn’t want them hanging out anymore, because she sees it as a betrayal of their, friendship?
“Yeah, who does he think he is, creator of the universe or something?”
Amber is carefully not mentioning that Amazi-Girl was the primary source of danger for Danny.
I dunno, the time he got kidnapped was because he knew Amber, not Amaz-Girl.
Well that time. I think the next time was the future possibility, given his association with that vile heathen of a miscreant.
Which is odd because Amazi-girl feels the same way about amber, is this still part of that self loathing issue she has.
The question is, is Amber lying to Ethan about how her and Danny broke up to cover up what really happened or does Amber actually believe that’s what happened?
Coming from someone who’s familiar with dissociation, I don’t think she’s lying.
See that’s the part that scares me. It would be better if Amber was just covering for what Amazi-Girl did, but if she truly believes it then Amazi-Girl might be hiding memories from Amber or at least part of a memory. Heck, it might have been Amazi-Girl posing as Amber who told Ethan that he was not to talk to Danny anymore after they broke up since Amber doesn’t jump on Ethan here for going against her request not to speak to Danny anymore.
(hmm, well I’m gonna have to look for the comic where she asks Ethan not to speak to Danny to see the tags, but from what I remember it said Amber so I dunno.)
I doubt Amazi-girl hid memories from Amber though. It’s very highly likely that Amber could access Amazi-girl’s memories(I know a few people who’re like that) since it seemed to be that way from the comic (I dunno, I could be reading it wrong).
But yeah, The both of them are kinda a mess right now in regard to that relationship… :\
I think it came up when Danny talked to Ethan about the breakup.
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-6/03-when-god-closes-the-door/personanongrata/
Ethan mentioned being told that Danny was now “persona non grata”, though I don’t think that means she told Ethan not to talk to him, only that she’s not talking to him.
Or even that she doesn’t want to talk ABOUT him or for Ethan to talk to her about him, which normally would be a reasonable request for a painful breakup. Considering how much she’s isolating herself, this concerns me though.
I looked up the definition
In non-diplomatic usage, referring to someone as persona non grata is to say that he or she is ostracized. Such a person is for all intents and purposes culturally shunned, so as to be figuratively non-existent.
Yes, it does, but she could also be being colloquial – as in, referring to not wanting to bring him up. It could also mean she doesn’t want Ethan talking to him though, and he definitely seems like that might be the case, which is soooooo not okay I can’t even begin to describe it.
cf Taboo, Ixnay. She’s trying not to think about it, is all.
”This boyfriend is no more! He has ceased to be! He’s passed on! Bereft if life, he rests in peace! He’s shuffled off ‘is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisibile!!
THIS IS AN EX-BOYFRIEND!!”
This thread is the last place I would expect a Monty Python reference.
No One expects the Monty Python Reference!
Here’s the comic
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-6/03-when-god-closes-the-door/personanongrata/
Also, I’m honestly basing the memory hiding issue on what Cerberus has said on previous strips as she has personal experience with DID and all I have is a neighbor from many years ago who was not even close to integrated. From what I understand, when they are integrated they can talk to each other and share memories, but when they are not they can start doing stuff like hide memories from each other especially if an alter is scared of being destroyed. Hopefully Cerberus will see my clunky explanation and help put it better than I possibly could.
There’s been speculation that their divide will go far enough that they won’t share memories, but there’s been no real evidence of it so far. A couple things like this that might be hints, but nothing close to definite.
Nah, not all systems work the same in regards to memory sharing, even those officially diagnosed with DID.
There’s no memory hiding, I don’t think. It’s just a very tortured interpretation. There’s a reason her phrasing is deliberately cryptic.
“Things could have gotten dangerous. Amazi-Girl has to let him go before someone got hurt.” Amazi-Girl was seethingly angry at Danny and could have hurt him. She was extremely jealous that he preferred Amber to her. Also/alternatively, Danny was apparently not going to support Amazi-Girl anymore, and Amazi-Girl is essential for Amber’s wellbeing, so Amber would have gotten hurt had she listened to Danny. Or, taking the revelations from the midnight rally into account: Danny was talking with Amber’s arch nemesis and Amazi-Girl had to take over to prevent Amber from freaking out. And Danny did not seem to agree to stay away from her.
The point is, what she said can be true from many points of view. It’s why she was being vague. There’s no reason for Amazi-Girl to be hiding what happened for her to say what she said.
Feels like a bit of both for me.
She’s not lying 🙁
Amber sees Amazi-Girl as the one who broke up with Danny, but anyone else who doesn’t… you know, have access to the tags, would think that it was Amber who broke up with him.
Amber might be stretching the truth when it comes to WHY she broke up with him, but which she’s not lying about WHO did.
^^^this
Amber didn’t break up with him because of her trauma with Sal; she had to ‘hide’ and let Amazi-girl handle the situation. Since Amazi-girl was fueled and “created” by that trauma… it wasn’t handled well. (Truthfully it’s way better than staying together and continuing to be toxic towards her boyfriend)
Either Amber’s lying, or amazi-girl is (to amber). There’s no ‘stretching the truth’ here. “I’m protecting someone” is starting to sound like Amazi-girl’s go-to justification for hurting people.
I think in this case, she may have had slightly different reasons for breaking up, but I think that seeing herself as a physical threat to Danny may be why they remain broken up.
That’s plausible, but it’s not really what Ethan’s asking either. Seeing as he doesn’t know to ask, because pretty much only the audience has a remote understanding of that.
And tbh, given that we have implicit evidence that Amber expected Ethan not to talk to Danny, I suspect that it ranks beneath anger even to herself.
Amazi-Girl isn’t always in touch with reality. Her vision of Sal as a villainous corrupting force out to get her colours all the interactions. She saw it as Sal manipulating Danny to get to her.
Hm. I rather took her comment as being wise after the event. As long as she was seeing Sal as an arch enemy, she was likely to hurt either Sal or Danny bodily for “conspiring against her”. Breaking up with Danny made space for her not to physically hurt him, and she leaned there was no real reason to hurt her in the meantime.
At the moment she broke up, she was not protecting Danny, though, but lashing out, though not physically.
Yes, there is. Her statement is intentionally vague. It seems that all of you guys jumped to what she was hoping Ethan would think.
There is no lie. There is just getting in her head. I posted above three different ways that what she said could be true from her point of view.
I /could/ assume absolutely tortured mental gymnastics, but given this is someone for whom lying is second nature, even when unnecessary, and this is true of both alters, on a regular basis, it’s more parsimonious to say ‘she’s lying’. I’m not sure whom, to whom, so there’s htat, but I /would/ hedge my bets on AG being the liar.
Also, again, that surprise that Danny is talking to Ethan speaks to a much more surface level of rage than justifies that kind of logic.
Given that she steers the conversation away from that the minute Ethan calls her on her lying bullshit, chances are she’s just running with AG’s narrative.
It is pretty worrisome. I think I lean into the ‘this is what she actually believes’ territory, because I really think in her own headspace she wouldn’t see the point in lying or what went down as wrong. Because she was ‘right’.
Granted things may have… shifted since the Sal team up.
Idk. Like sometimes memories or are we interpret events shift a lot for our own favour but: Amber hates herself and this is less a ‘slightly twisted interpretation of actual events you could see someone taking from it’ and more ‘flat out not what happened at all’.
Maybe she /is/ fully dissociating. Idk, I know very little about DID. Most of what I’ve learned has been from the comment sections of this comic.
Amber can hate herself but not her AmaziGirl persona so maybe puts ‘her’ in the best possible light. Which is slightly concerning: I mean AmaziGirl is the unreasonable one if anything, Amber, while she takes it too far at points, can criticise herself and actually is upset when she treats Danny terribly. Amber is the version of her which can grow and change. AmaziGirl is basically near on ‘inflexible’ as it were. She keeps talking about being consistent in earlier comics when it came to the drinking too.
It’s not really a good way to be.
Has Thad Guy shown up in DoA yet?
Well Thad doesn’t ping in a tag search.
Are we positive Dave didn’t just misspell That Guy?
Haven’t there been a few of those before those?
I most definitely did not!
He does.
You have to search the other comic.
(Mostly this post is an answer to the suggestion that Thad was mis-spelled.
Mis-dressed, yes. Mis-spelled, no).
Yep this is practically clear as day where this situation is going, let me fast forward to the part of the conversation we always have. * cough* *cough*
Me: FUCK YOU ETHAN !
Commenter: Ethan did nothing wrong.
Me: NO FUCK HIM!
Commenter: Why are you yelling?
Me: NOT ENOUGH YELLING!
It’d be one thing if you were annoyed at him for what you complained about, but this level of vitriol is bizarre.
If you could articulate what you think was wrong (and the reasoning for it) beyond “those times when Ethan was gay at someone and clearly only just barely restraining himself from jumping them”, I’d be more open to your opinions.
I’ve found that everyone has that one character that sends them into this ball of pure hate. Arguing how they’re wrong, or perhaps ‘wrong’, is just a lesson in futility.
Hm… I can’t think of who that character is for me. Maybe Mary?
I can see that, but she’s an “evil” character. The type of hatred I speak of is for the “good” characters. The common ones I’ve seen are, aside from Ethan and Amber these last few days, Sarah, Walky, Becky, and Carla, though with the last two, the comments can really spiral out of control, resulting in deletions and bans. Though those could happen with the others too, they just may not be as noticeable.
Yeah, that’s kind of what I was thinking. I can’t think of any “good” characters who inspire rage to well up within my heart…
They’re not bad, they’re just written that way?
Hell, even Lucy got hated on (albeit mildly), despite showing up in only 2 strips and being both the most polite person ever and adjacent to Malaya.
Well that might have been her problems then. Malaya must still have some detractors floating around, too.
If she doesn’t, she’s not Malaya’ing hard enough.
I do believe that according to Sarge, Malaya can never Malaya enough.
I’m guilty as charged on the Walky front, although I’ve walked back from the total hate moment …
“Damn you, Willis-written character that I see as the antithesis of myself!”
-Paraphrase of “everyone”
For me that’d probably someone who’s funny.
“I’ve found that everyone has that one character that sends them into this ball of pure hate. Arguing how they’re wrong, or perhaps ‘wrong’, is just a lesson in futility.”
I think that for a lot of people, that character is Hillary Clinton.
I think that’s what makes me uncomfortable about this person’s weird stance on Ethan, is Ethan seems like a very responsible guy. But somehow, Ethan noticing Joss was cute = he’s just gonna pounce on her the moment he finds out Joss could be gay? Is it because Ethan is a gay man that he suddenly has no control over his libido in that commenter’s opinion? Because as far as we know, Ethan is likely a virgin who, being inexperienced as a gay man, would probably be tentative instead of divebombing onto a guy dick first.
Well, I think Ethan went beyond “noticing Joss was cute”. I absolutely agree he would be tentative about actual sex, but you can be unfaithful without actually having sex. Even more so when the relationship in question is also not physical.
I think Ethan is very repressed (and was even more so at the time) and since he had no real romantic attachment to Joyce, it was easy for him to slip straight into flirting with her cute brother. Almost certainly not expecting it to go anywhere – or really thinking much at all.
I doubt he’d do anything similar in a real relationship.
I think “divebombing onto a guy dick first” is going to be my favorite phrase for a while
I like how Amber is trying to make it look like Amazi-Girl broke up with Danny as some noble gesture for his own good when it looked waaaay more like she just had an irrational abusive outburst at him. I mean, yeah, given that fact, the breakup was definitely to Danny’s benefit – but Amber’s being pretty self-serving and self-deluding if she thinks that was really how and why the breakup happened.
Right now it comes across as if, with hindsight (and having grown a little more self-clarity on her animosity towards Sal), Amber/Amazi-Girl realizes she was wrong to villify Danny the way she did – so now she’s trying to turn it into a “ohhh, ummm yeah Amazi-Girl was being SELFLESS. She broke up with him for HIS SAKE.” Feels like a case of unreliable narrator…
BTW, lest anyone think I’m whining about the writing here – I actually really like Amber from a writing standpoint. She’s probably my top “Love to Hate ‘Em” character, precisely BECAUSE the nature and facets of her shittiness as a human being aren’t absolute and have a lot of nuance. It’s super fascinating to see how Willis has has been developing her.
I agree, Amber is well written as a character. I think my primary qualm with her at this point though is that she kind of won’t improve her own life until she takes responsibility for herself. Continuing yesterday’s convo about good vs bad, taking responsibility for yourself means accepting the bad as well as the good, since no one is a completely perfect human. Life is much messier and stressful when we pursue this imaginary perfect version of ourselves, much like AG is Amber’s “perfect and moral” personality. But AG predictably isn’t that person.
People can love or hate a character for various reasons. Sometimes this is for entirely shallow reasons like shipping/getting in the way of ships.
But sometimes it’s because they’re deep characters who either remind us of ourselves or people we know or even just so nuanced we can almost see them as real people. Occasional superhero physics aside Amber is so realistic it kind of hurts.
Remember, AmaziGirl is immune to criticism, even from herself. She made a decision about Danny and it was right and always will be. In that way, she’s a lot like most humans. Double down and make memory conform to it.
Ethan’s the real hero here, daring to crusade against the endless tides of people who are wrong on the internet.
Everyone give praise the Second Eaton
Eh, he’s alright.
Shit, I was still loudly pretending that never happened.
How dare you! Ethan is far from a hero, his shirt annoys me, and he is afraid of things!
His eyes are too far apart! It’s weird!
“This is important. Someone is wrong on the Internet.”
+1
+1, and plus another one for every time I’ve blown up in the comments. 😀
So like, what, at least +5?
Good reads, though.
Haha, at least SOMEONE enjoys them.
Well you are one of the few that talks with me here, so it’s the least I could do.
Hm, I suppose it depends on how you count “times.” Is a single thread/argument “1” or is a single comment “1” what about the same topic/argument (and commenters) across multiple threads?
…I swear this just started as a joke about “only blah blah not enough blah lol” with a tie in to the times I’ve done the same :/
Orion: Eyyyyyyyyy
ety: Etyyyyyyyyy
Yeah, I was figuring post at around the same time, being able to span threads, and days, if applicable.
We should all have a group hug.
Certainly, just no touching.
Even Christian side-hugs are too intrusive?
No surprise hugs, and you need to ask first, and every time. A handful of people don’t need to, specifically, the missus and our kids.
NOT SURPRISED ENOUGH
I was going to post this exact same thing.
I for one have never argued for days on end with some rando about something meaningless. Then gave a barbaric yawp when I thought I’d “won.”
Oh, no sirree. Not me …
There’s the Ethan we all missed. It’s great that he gets more time to have relationships and problems in DOA, but I miss fanboy Ethan, I miss comedian Ethan.
But hey we’re about to get back Mike driving a wedge between him and someone else Ethan. This time it’s a boy and I don’t know if Mike is actually trying to make things worse.
I like this Mike his cruelty has a purpose beyond his own enjoyment. It’s even easier to get behind “kick’s you in the ball’s till you learn to wear a cup” Mike. 🙂
Yeah, but it’s also easier to hate him because his cruelty is more… cruel, in the Dumbiverse than in the Walkyverse.
Agree. Mike in the Walkyverse always had a motive behind his ….cruelty is maybe not the word I’m looking for, but definitely his ability to nail your sore spot with a iron spike.
He always had a lesson behind the jab. He made you look at yourself harder than you would otherwise.
His sociopathic behavior was a bit understandable when his backstory unfolded.
Here in DoA, we don’t know yet why he is so stinkin’ mean. [not to say that makes it okay, but Willis has a habit of giving a character to annoy the Hell out of us, and then develop that character in a great way, ie: Becky.]
Wearing a cup is uncomfortable and people shouldn’t have to wear them just to go about their daily lives.
If Mike was doing this for situations where you’d be foolish for not wearing one I could almost buy that, but ”You must keep your guard up at all times so Mike doesn’t fuck you over” is not a helpful life lesson. It is only a lesson in living in proximity to Mike.
Hopefully, Mike will end up learning a lesson himself, about not being such a butt opening all the dang time
As much as I enjoy Mike’s cartoonish villainy (mostly because it’s cartoonish), agreed. If the only reason you need to keep your guard up all the time is “proximity to Mike,” then a better alternative to “keep your guard up all the time” is “make Mike go away.”
‘Make Mike go away’ is still a fairly good moral…
I’m just wondering why all the maternal nickle jokes have gone out of fashion in the comments.
He hasn’t made enough of them in the Dumbiverse. In fact, I think he’s only made one…?
I’ve gotta say, the only thing I miss seeing from the comments during my archive binges are faaaaaace jokes and I don’t even know why.
I tried to get Dina’s “Stop the faces!” to catch on, but it never quite did. I think the faaaaace jokes were dying away around that point, which didn’t help.
What if it actually just revitalized both at once?
“Stop the faaaaaaces!”
It may be the lack of Mike in the comic that minimizes their appearances. When a low amount of money needs referencings, it’s usually a nickel. And seemingly anytime I reference a face, there’s a followup comment with “you meant faaaaaaaaces” or something like that.
Well, Amber does have quite the “amassment” if you know what I’m saying. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
At least 1,223 people do.
Assuming that’s the only reason anyone would vote for a character like Amber in a poll about “hotness.” Pffff, fine. *dramatic eye roll*
Eh, close enough, imo. The poll, for me at least, implies only physical attraction, and Tenchan’s comment seemed to be some sort of sexual innuendo. Figuring that Tenchan was one of the people who voted for Amber, I subtracted one and posted what I did.
Amazzi-ment.
Ouch
That really bugs me. She doesn’t want to talk about it now, but she should. Bottling up anger issues actually directly makes them worse. We have to accept and work on our flaws to accept our whole selves.
She definitely should talk about it at some point, but if she can’t talk about it now without getting angry and blowing up at Ethan about it, then not talking about it now is absolutely the right call.
That’s a good point.
Yeah, but I kinda feel sorry for whatever criminal she uncorks that bottle on instead.
Not, you know, a lot, but there is some sympathy, and hopes that nothing breaks.
Honestly, I’d rather see her blow up at more people close to her than keep kinda “getting away with it” by blowing off steam via Amazi-Girl.
She’s in a bad place. The longer this goes on, the more it builds up, the more toxic she’s going to become to her friends. She’s just as in need of help as, say, Ruth, but since she takes out most of her rage via her superhero identity, she does a better job at maintaining this very unhealthy balancing act. The one time she’s been pushed by someone as Amber she went nuclear; she can’t keep holding all that in.
The problem is that her blowing up at people as Amber will further her need for Amazi-Girl. She doesn’t think of her anger as a problem to be addressed through support and therapy; it’s just proof of Amber’s inherent vileness as a person, and that any expression of it is a mortal sin on her part.
So instead of saying “I treated Danny like dogshit, I should strive to not do that” she instead continues the same thought processes because she already thinks she’s the worst.
I think Amber views her “whole self” as being just like her dad, and as such works on ways to actively avoid that, to the point of being harmful like her dad.
Wait…
If only she had less crappy coping mechanisms though. If she had some kind of help, then trying not to be like her dad probably wouldn’t be leading her down this road.
Yeah. Though I feel confident saying that at least a third of the commenters would find her boring then, and whine about how mush screen time she was getting.
So to avoid being like her dad she has to avoid sexual relationships?
Look how she treated Danny. She barked threats and accusations without even attempting to understand him, decided that disagreeing with her for the first time was him stepping out of line, and Danny himself realized how pointless, abusive and doomed to failure his relationship was five minutes later.
Amber is replicating her father’s abuse onto her partners but finds ways to morally justify it to herself. She is simply too toxic and abusive to contribute to any kind of relationship and anyone she tries with she’ll drag down.
Why would I even say that. I don’t even think it. What the fuck is wrong with me.
I was a bit confused by that. I figured you were writing it from Amber’s perspective, because that seems like a very plausible read of how how she sees herself.
*Hugs* regardless
Every time I come here I just get into arguments and spew vitriolic bullshit and I’m making a fucking embarrassment of myself and treating people like dogshit and throwing my stupid bullshit up here like it even fucking solves anything and what i am even doing anymore
im so sorry for everything
I don’t agree. I’ve got you in my vague category of “commenters who sometimes produce useful stuff” rather than my own category of “commenters who make lots of lame jokes hoping one of them will hit someday”.
I sucks that you’re feeling that way but I can’t agree, and I hope you’ll believe me when I say you’ve done nothing here that you need to beat yourself up over.
I’ve seen you be impressively calm and civil in heated discussions about things like this that I know hit you personally. Losing your temper on occasion doesn’t make you a bad person, it just makes you human.
Hang in there.
NOT HUGS ENOUGH
This happens in Willis’s other comic, Smarting of Age.
…
What do you mean, “that’s not a thing”?
It’s happening right now on Second Earth, the one we can’t see.
There’s a second Earth? That’s nice, considering that this one doesn’t look like it’s going to be inhabitable for much longer.
But it suffers from a zeerust aesthetic, so your miles may vary.
Ethan’s on a mission.
If he is caught or killed, will IU will deny any knowledge of his actions?
This webcomic will self destroy in 5… 4… 3…
Man, the stupid movies almost make me hate the whole franchise. I guess it’s time to see if I can scrounge up the TV show somewhere.
I’m the same way with Lord of the Rings and the rest of the Arda universe, so I understand your zeal Ethan.
My brethren!
Mellon!
Strawberry!
Speak, friend, and enter.
NOT FRIENDLY ENOUGH!
So Danny is the guy with the “wrong” opinion on Transformers, right?
He’s either just referring to a random dude, or potentially an in-joke to Ethan’s GREAT BATTLES with DAVID WILLIS HIMSELF in Shortpacked!.
Is that why he’s pointing upwards?
“I fought god and I won” lol, gg ethan
Wouldn’t Ethan basically be Willis’s Jesus, though, because he’s expressing Willis’s ideas on Transformer toys?
Will Mike be the one who betrays him?
Mike will betray him for 6 nickels.
Now picturing Ethan saying to Naomi “You know, sometimes Ma, you really piss me off!”
Didn’t he mention being online all night because of this dude at the start of this conversation?
Indeed he was, so the rando theory is much more likely haha.
It could be just me, but Amber seems to take this conversation quite well (maybe due to certain cooperation)
Not sure her way of taking the conversation is all that great.
She is definitely talking about 2 people and the fact they are both her is not showing good signs that she is getting herself together. So to speak.
Progress with Sal yes. Personally, not so much.
I think I know the guy Ethan argued with. He’s all the war should never have ended, Megatron should always be the (two dimensional cackling) villain of the original cartoon, anything else is (somehow) uninspired hack work.
Get him Ethan.
I only saw the original cartoon (and caught some episodes of Beast Wars, but I didn’t care for those): Starscream was the best character, Soundwave and his cassette friends were the coolest.
I was always confused how Megatron changed his size when he turned into a gun, though. I mean, Bumblebee was small and turned into a small car, Optimus was big and turned into a truck – how come Megatron could turn into a tiny gun?
It was something about how the metal could shrink and expand, a bit like Pym particles, if you follow Marvel at all.
Also, is it wrong I was a bit surprised that your comment still exists?
Wait nevermind, I reread it, and I think you saved yourself.
I would very much like Carla to barge in, grab Amber by the collar, and throw her in a room next to Ruth’s right now.
”Your stupid little problems are serious, and everyone is concerned!”
You need therapy,
(puts mask on Amber)
and SO DO YOU!!
You get therapy. And you get therapy. AND YOU get therapy. EVERYONE GETS THERAPY!
Especially after Volume 3.
Most of them could probably benefit, ngl. A few of them I think would be generally mentally healthy without it. I have to wonder how many would take it up though.
“Your problems are serious and you should be serious!”
“You can’t take the world serious!”
“Show me the serious!”
Word
Alright. I do not like this version of Amber.
“I got irrationally angry unjustified and told him to fuck off” = “I let him go for his sake”.
Oh, you fucked up little girl, you.
It’s what she thinks now. At the time of their breakup it was definitely “Danny betrayed me”, but now she’s realized that he’s better off without her.
The alt text made me laugh more than the strip.
Something’s gotta give with Amber. I hope Ethan doesn’t back down on this.
Backing down is what Ethan does best.
He just needs to imagine that Amber is Wrong About Transformers
He made her, now he must undo her?
Ethan as Thulsa Doom?
I’d read that.
So that second panel is definitely “I am dangerous to him and needed to let go of him for his safety” right?
The following panel is really worrying though. I guess Amber did want Ethan to stop talking to Danny. That’s… well that’s fucking awful.
That’s how I read panel 2, but panel 3 could also just be that she didn’t expect that they talked to begin with. They’d originally only knew each other through her, so it’s entirely possible she had no idea they ever hung out together when she wasn’t around.
At least, if she was mad at Ethan for talking to him, I would have expected more emphasis on “his” (“FROM HIS END”?), unless she was deliberately trying to hide that she was upset by it.
Yeah, that’s how I see it as well. Everyone keeps saying “surface rage” which is something I see absolutely nothing of.
Like seriously, trust me on this one people, if she was mad about it we’d know for sure.