3oranges: Not really. While in the early days of the Empire there were a lot of (multi-user-) dungeons, in the past couple of decades he’s taking us in a more bread-and-circuses direction.
Well, his predecessor, Emperor Norton 1 was rightful heir to the throne of the US/North Americas, and was widely recognized as such in the state of California. So technically that makes him emperor of you, as long as you are an American, Canadian, or Mexican citizen. Which is not to say the previous claim of Emperor of he Internet is wrong since the Internet belongs to the United States by Rights of Emmenent Domain, Manifest Destiny and First Discovery.
10. Faz showed up on the 9th. It was almost 2 weeks, but there were two strips of Amber and Becky alone in between that and Mike’s previous-to-yesterday appearance.
By claiming her skill to be a “gift”, she’s giving the credit for her talent to God. Or at least, that’s how I read it from my perspective growing up around that type of talk.
Isn’t there a webcomic with a girl who does that, freaks out every time? Doesn’t see male genatles, just tentacles? Daniel the Human just groans & shakes his head…
Menage a 3. Her father was a famous hentai artist known as the Tentacle King. IIRC, he modeled some of his characters on her. This left her with some serious issues.
If she’s legitimately improved, it might be an “I don’t ever want to acknowledge I care about outside approval” whatever – but she won’t acknowledge that either.
While I would be more than happy to drop Faz into a volcano and never, ever deal with him ever again, if this is to hint that Mary and Faz are going to be stuck alone together for a while I might not complain.
I thought about saying: “good work, as always” but for some reason that phrase feels… Off to me.
So instead I’ll say: “Whoa! What simple yet nuanced linework! This is excellent work, Yotomoe.” (I haven’t really been keeping track of your improvement, so I don’t want to lie.)
waitaminute, dbd!? shit, I suck badly and owe you email. dammit, from ages ago. also, bloody good to see you.
(if not dbd then no worries, just ignore this little intrusion into what you know as normality, you’ll know that the paradox has healed itself once the glow from your monitor subsides)
“Faz was asked to be a live model for this class. But Faz had to refuse, because he knew the women would all go crazy if they saw his supreme manliness.”
1) The instructor doesn’t have a tag. This may need to be rectified.
2) The model doesn’t have a tag. This may need to be rectified.’
3) What kind of instructor wanders around giving subjective ratings of each student’s work without giving any useful advice?
4) Given Willis’s background, I assume that this is yet another strip that is directly from his own experience, and that the answer to 3) above is: way too many of them.
I’ve taken a grand total of 2 art classes in my entire life, and both of mine gave their students at least decent advice along with their praise, but an art major friend of mine has definitely complained about a couple of profs who did #3.
Maybe the instructor is waiting until closer to the end of the class before giving anything useful. (So he can see how well the students have currently mastered the techniques, or so that he can see if the student had a specific goal in mind.)
In the instructor’s defence, he did point out specifically what he liked about Malaya’s drawing! (Linework is a specific thing!) That’s useful, since it can be hard to know what you’re doing right when you’re doing it. Some actual critique might be more useful, but he might be saving that for later.
In Mary’s case, it sounds like she’s just doing her normal thing. He’s probably already given critique in the past and has nothing new to say because she hasn’t improved or gotten any worse since then. In both cases, they’ll probably get a more in depth critique at the end of the lesson when everyone shows their work (that’s how it went when I was in art school, anyway).
a) Mary is being a suck-up
ii) Mary hasn’t done much improvement since last class/week/whenever, currently plateauing at “good work”. Which, you know, isn’t BAD, but you’re supposed to be here to learn & improve.
3) Malaya has talent, and is rapidly acquiring skill to go with it
quatre) Malaya thinks she could do better / sees more of the flaws in her work than the good points, which is common among artists; see also Sheldon’s art/drawing friend in that webcomic
-////-) Mary is not exactly happy that Someone Else Is Getting The Praise Here … and Malaya, who is concentrating on her work rather than eavesdropping, is blissfully unaware that she is now Target Acquired
tl;dr – character development and new drama hooks-n-eyes
–Dave, also I’m betting Mary’s face in this sequence is drawn better than Mary’s drawing is
I’m still surprized how someone with Mary’s mindset are ok doing an art major? ( ok granted I used to have very bigoted classmates at my college but not at the “fundamentalist” level of Mary’s)
Skadi stops playing with Danny and holds him up to her face.
Skadi: You say you have to meet with the Moon Goddess, why?
Danny: I was granted access to summon her avatar, and I need answers.
Skadi: Hmm, well I suppose I can be convinced to help you, but I would never allow anyone weak to enter my mother’s shrine.
Danny: What!?
Skadi: Shhh…tell you what, if you can slay one of those beasts I killed before I will help you climb the impassable ice wall that protects my mother’s shrine.
Danny: Okay.
Skadi: oh, and one more thing.
Skadi reaches down and lifts Danny’s ukulele from him. Placing it in her breast.
Skadi: No using my mother’s magic to help you.
Danny: Why not?
Skadi: This is your task, can’t have you relying solely on the power of gods now can we?
Danny: Okay I get your point.
Skadi places Danny back on the ground
Skadi: I know you can still hear me, so follow the tracks that lead out of here. Your lucky these beasts tend to be solitary creatures.
Danny sighed and ran off to follow a single pair of tracks. Luckily the blizzard wasn’t so bad here and he could see in front of him.
Maybe it’s because Mary is in the strip, but I’m being reminded of the parable of the Wayward Son.
For those unaware,
The parable goes roughly like this.
A farmer has two sons.
One doesn’t want to work on a farm for his whole life, so he asks for his inheritence so he can travel out into the world.
He leaves and basically becomes a drunk rich party dude for the next however many minutes it takes to blow your inheritence.
After pretty much being stupid for a while, he can’t afford food or a bed and sleeps with pigs in their pens, contemplating whether he should eat the slop they’re given to survive.
Then thinks, “I never really had this shitty of a life when I lived back home.”
And made the trek back home.
The dad, sees him, slaughters a cow, spends big bucks, hires a parade, and takes out an ad in the local newspaper, happy that his son is returning home.
Happy his son is alive.
The older brother is a little pissed about this, because he kid brother essentially got to leave, party hard, do nothing, and still his dad is happy to see him, while diligence and hard work has never gotten a party.
He never made his dad that happy by doing things right.
He never got a big parade for doing the right thing.
So he asks his dad, “What the hell? Why are you happy to see this deadbeat back in our lives?”
And the dad essentially says, “I thought he was gone forever. I thought I’d never see him again and he would have died and we’d never know. But he’s back. He’s alive. He’s here and safe. He’s still my son. And don’t worry, you’re still gonna get the farm when I’m gone. Just because you didn’t get a big party doesn’t mean you aren’t getting a reward.”
What I’m saying is, Mary’s the pissy older brother.
“I’m always great at art! Why are you heaping so much praise on someone who’s barely reaching passable LINES, now?”
Being the unfavorite kid, I always felt bad for the pissy older brother–but DAMN if that wasn’t my favorite telling of this parable ever. (And I’ve heard quite a lot of tellings, haha.)
I think the idea is that schools, teachers, and students would be judged not on the students’ end of term/ semester grades, but on how much the grades have improved since their last end of term/ semester assessment.
that sounds like it’d be great for the easy coursework, and then get really shitty as soon as you find material you don’t pick up quickly.
… kinda like walky right now. so… maybe it’d be better to get that over with early? provided the school did actually understand the challenges ADHD adds…
then again, it could also suck ass if you happened to have learnt the material beforehand, unless you were allowed to skip ahead easily and not be penalized for it. (I tended to get in trouble for this – like, oh we’re not supposed to know how this book ends? but, I accidentally the whole book overnight… and every time I switched schools there was something taught in a different order. I did roman&greek mythology at least three times that way, and I still don’t know what I could have been learning instead)
I mean, they should still get good grades, because they’ve demonstrated that they’ve learnt the material and can apply it well. Maybe there should be a balance between a improvement based system and an achievement based system? Perhaps an emphasis on improvement when your grades are fairly low and more emphasis on achievement the higher your grades are?
The system would work by encouraging the smart kids to start out each course by pretending to be complete incompetents so that by the end of the course they will show maximum improvement. This will allow the teachers to feel good about how much of an impact their teaching has had. So everybody wins really.
Except for the one who would have to make an actual effort at pretending to not know shit
– signed, someone who was better at English than his teachers, and has no intention of ever playing stupid
I think that system would cause me to completely give up on taking school at all seriously. If I have to pretend to be incompetent to get a good grade, I’d rather just not bother.
The basic idea would need to be highly individualized. Each student would have their own set of goals and be graded on their ability to meet those goals. There are also groupings of it that could be done, with say a project having three different rubrics given to students. If someone wanted to do this approach, this could be helpful because, hi, I’m really not sure I have time to create individual standards for 120-150 kids.
I’ve also heard the idea that, going off the “three different rubrics” thing, there could be different possible results. Like, say you read something as a class and now students are writing a paper. You could have the option that students who write a 400-word paper could earn up to a C on the assignment, students who write an 800-word paper up to a B, and students who write a 1,200-word paper could earn up to an A. That way students may be working toward different things and receive different amounts of credit for what they’ve done without outright failing, which is part of the purpose of a more-merit based system.
I would say that most of the the discussion of a full improvement-based system that I’ve seen in education is focused more on younger students, not so much high schoolers. Now, it could still have some of those same issues, but if you’re looking to critique it based on what you were like as a student, think of yourself as a third grader, not a high schooler.
I don’t think full improvement-based is a great system for everything, but neither is system most commonly used now. People advocating for changes are often met with what-if-we-take-this-to-the-extreme responses, even when that’s not really what’s being proposed.
Measuring only improvement is going to create all kinds of illusions.
If you start out not being able to read, being able to recite the alphabet and identify the letters on paper is an incredible improvement, but still zero reading skills.
So you’d need to scores: one for how much of the material to be learned in this course at this time you have mastered and one for individual improvement.
It’s those big brown eyes. You could fall into them and get lost forever — until the next time she says something truly awful, so, three, four minutes, tops. But what a dreamy four minutes.
Me too! I know she’s already picked fights with Carla, but I’ve always kinda been looking forward to the day Mary tried to fuck with either Sal, Marcie, or Malaya. Or all three. Just to take bets on how long it takes for either Mary to snap or to write a cheque her ass can’t cash.
Mary finding out Sal went to a Catholic boarding school might set her off depending on how anti-Catholic her denomination is. As for Marcie Mary strikes me as the kind of person stupid enough to tell someone their disability is punishment for sin.
She’s anti-Catholic enough to hate Robin for it and to have given Roz shit for it. I don’t think Sal cares much about Catholicism, but screechy ladies trying to give her a hard time? Yeah, that likely won’t end well.
And frankly, it really doesn’t matter what venue of shittiness Mary uses for Marcie, because the second either Sal or Malaya finds out, she’s getting wrecked (at the very least verbally).
Oh, yeah, I just remembered that Word of Willis is that Marcie’s Catholic too. And bi. And Mary’s probably enough of a jerk to insult people for being heavier than she is.
There’s a lot of things she could say to Marcie. Mary = Asshole Extraordinaire.
Malaya may not have the same emotional investment that Mary has. I suspect that Malaya is doing art so she can look at naked guys. I don’t think that she expected to have (or intended… or even cares) a talent in the field.
I think she’s only in this class because it seemed easy and requiring of little effort. She doesn’t seem big on sexual attraction, looking at her SP! history, and here too. People who we know she is sexually attracted to are Ultra-Car, and an unnamed person here in DoA (seen on Slipshine). That is unless she has sex with certain people even though she’s not attracted to them, just to experiment. I’m not sure about Leslie in SP!. Looking at naked guys doesn’t sound like her thing.
So, now that the comic if focusing on Mike, Mary, Malaya, and Faz… Who here thinks that Willis has gone fundie again, and is now using the comic to punish us all for our wicked and depraved sins?
I think that Mary is going to learn the torment of never being as good as someone who has a spectacular natural talent but (and this is the worst part) they are so used to being good that they don’t notice or care!
Coupled with that bit, I wonder if this is something that’s been the norm through the semester – the instructor putting down Mary’s drawing skills because she’s into doing a manga style. Trying to push her into “proper” art is something I’ve heard from people who have taken art classes.
To be fair, learning to work in different styles is a very useful skill and can even help you make your preferred style better when you come back to it.
Shouldn’t be putting students down anyway of course.
Style isn’t really a factor as it’s a technical class on building an accurate model
of the human body. Hyper-realistic to gestural drawing is acceptable. As long as all the parts are properly placed (or movement/weight of the body).
I wouldn’t be surprised if Mary is a decent first year figure drawer.
One of the issue with young Anime style students is the number of them that lack basic understanding of the human body and some of the basic rules to drawing. It doesn’t excuse an instructor for being an ass about their chosen style.
On the other hand, I’ve seen a few artist not understand that a basic drawing course is about learning technical skills and not about the style. Sometimes the student is the inflexible one in the mix.
Am I the only one not assuming they have a human model? My first college drawing class had no human models, nude or otherwise. We drew still life. Lots and lots and lots of still life, with different techniques. My best works were a plant on grey paper, drawing with black and white conté crayons, a pair of cowboy boots drawn in one continuous line, and a portrait with a magazine ad for model, as realistic as possible. Life drawing wasn’t an option for a couple of years.
In the first panel you can see the human model, but yeah life drawing is usually something added later (I presume it’s a cost thing as well as still life being an easier starting point).
Probably depends on the school. I had life drawing starting at freshman year and then every year after. I went to an art school though, I dunno if it differs at a large university/state school since art isn’t the only thing the school is focused on?
I took life drawing at my local community college when I was a freshman.
I think it often depends on how the student has set up their schedule. Plus what the faculty recommends as a overall schedule for ones degree.
So Mary doesn’t object to the model? I’m surprised she isn’t refusing to draw nudity.
Also Mary definitely strikes me as the type who will refuse to improve her artwork after a certain point, whereas I bet Malaya’s more open to experimenting just because she doesn’t give that much of a fuck.
Also does Indiana have like, normal art teachers? All my professors were either hippie-eccentric or scholarly-Doc-Brown-esque-eccentric.
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She’s probably just drawing Fuckface
So, how many days has it been without a punchable character in the strip?
All characters are punchable if you’re Mike enough.
Faz was in the comic on Saturday.
And?
So it has been one day without a punchable character.
Just one.
Fight. Me.
We don’t have to fight you. We can just throw you in Our Imperial Dungeons.
Hey quick question: What are you emperor of technically?
Internet.
All hail the Emperor.
So, in fact, most of the realm is dungeons.
@3oranges …though there could use to be more dragons.
3oranges: Not really. While in the early days of the Empire there were a lot of (multi-user-) dungeons, in the past couple of decades he’s taking us in a more bread-and-circuses direction.
@Reitzik: I think you’re forgetting the *other* kind of dungeon, here.
Well, his predecessor, Emperor Norton 1 was rightful heir to the throne of the US/North Americas, and was widely recognized as such in the state of California. So technically that makes him emperor of you, as long as you are an American, Canadian, or Mexican citizen. Which is not to say the previous claim of Emperor of he Internet is wrong since the Internet belongs to the United States by Rights of Emmenent Domain, Manifest Destiny and First Discovery.
Technically “Emperor of these United States and Protector of Mexico”, IIRC.
Naw, Mary’s plenty punchable. I do like Malaya, though. I’m channeling my inner Shortpacked! to ship her and Carla
Yeah, what i meant to write is not what I actually wrote. I meant to write:
“How many days since last time we had a strip without a character we wanted to punch?”
Sorry about the ensuing confusion.
10. Faz showed up on the 9th. It was almost 2 weeks, but there were two strips of Amber and Becky alone in between that and Mike’s previous-to-yesterday appearance.
Oh, unless you meant that the way you wrote it, not how I read it…
I meant it the way you read it. How the hell it ended up like I wrote it, I don’t know.
Are there still people who strongly dislike Becky?
We threw them in the dungeons.
What happens to those who dislike Dina?
He fed those to the dragons.
Is disliking Dina actually possible? If so, that is news to me.
THEY’RE NOT DRAGONS THEY’RE DINOSAURS DRAGONS ARE MYTHOLOGICAL CREATURES THAT DON’T REALLY EXIST AND ARE UNSCIENTIFIC AND
Agree to disagree.
I like Malaya in this universe though 🙁
Never have I gone to the tags so quickly to see if the model was an existing character.
(Checks tags)
Oh, so Willis finally got Reagan into this comic!
I like your alternate universe. Can we live there?
GENERALLY SPEAKING, college art classes hire models who don’t attend the college. So odds would be against them being someone we know.
At least Joe isn’t the model. 😛
Isn’t pride a sin, Mary?
We could ask that every time she appears, but we’ll never get an answer from her.
By claiming her skill to be a “gift”, she’s giving the credit for her talent to God. Or at least, that’s how I read it from my perspective growing up around that type of talk.
So is envy.
So if Mary exclusively draws in manga-style, and manga is censored, does that mean she puts black bars over the naughty bits when she draws nudes?
She pixelates it.
That actually sounds impressive.
She just replaces it with a tentacle.
Now that’s impressive
Isn’t there a webcomic with a girl who does that, freaks out every time? Doesn’t see male genatles, just tentacles? Daniel the Human just groans & shakes his head…
Menage a 3. Her father was a famous hentai artist known as the Tentacle King. IIRC, he modeled some of his characters on her. This left her with some serious issues.
I’m not sure whether to be concerned that you know that, or disappointed that I didn’t
Don’t worry, Yuki got over her phobia.
It’s Yuki in Menage a 3, I think.
Yes, that’d be her.
Yuki, in Menáge à 3.
(Adding to the general level of concern, I am among the folks here who know Yuki’s story.)
same, alas
Ditto.
Is that an “I don’t really care about art, I’m just here for the credits” whatever, or an “all I can see are the flaws in my work” whatever?
If she’s legitimately improved, it might be an “I don’t ever want to acknowledge I care about outside approval” whatever – but she won’t acknowledge that either.
Or it could be ‘I don’t care about your praise, my opinion is the only one that matters.’
I would put my money on this one
Malaya thinks caring about things makes people nerds.
She says this is a ‘dumb elective’ in the Patreon strips so it could be either.
Given her expression, I’d say it’s an “I can see all the flaws in my work” type whatever.
That’s my take.
I think I’m the only one wondering if Art 101 classes include live figure models.
They are visible in the left hand side of the first panel, so apparently so.
I phrased that poorly. I wonder if ‘real world’ 101 classes include live models. I’m told the human body is relatively difficult subject.
So how many comments will we have about what the nude model’s name should be?
Personally, I want to know the instructor’s name!
The instructor looks like my prime minister but with a bald head.
I’m impressed that you own a prime minister. Not everyone can afford one.
I’ve only got a time share in one, but I still tend to refer to him as mine.
He’s supposed to be a public servant. So…
He kinda looks like one of the pastors at Joyce’s church
Seedik N. Nutzak.
Aaron D. Ballzout.
Bob Bitz?
Harry Johnson?
Juan Commando
The black student in the first panel needs a name as well.
Larry. Larry Kenobi
While I would be more than happy to drop Faz into a volcano and never, ever deal with him ever again, if this is to hint that Mary and Faz are going to be stuck alone together for a while I might not complain.
Don’t tempt fate. They might actually form some kind of unholy alliance.
I’m honestly dreading Faz-Carla interactions.
https://imgur.com/a/jpoVH
Here’s a thing I never posted.
👌
While not their current subject, I’m sure some would prefer her, including in the comments section…
Very nice!
Indeed.
Yay, more Yoto art!
I thought about saying: “good work, as always” but for some reason that phrase feels… Off to me.
So instead I’ll say: “Whoa! What simple yet nuanced linework! This is excellent work, Yotomoe.” (I haven’t really been keeping track of your improvement, so I don’t want to lie.)
Yotomoe, when will we see you doing a Web comic?
Maybe sooner than you think 😛
How dare you not post your art, Yotomoe!
HOW DARE YOU
*plays T.A.F.K.A. Prince’s “Party Man” on the hacked Muzak*
He reverted back to Prince almost two decades ago.
But it’s not as fun to just call him that.
Well, technically he once again IS T.A.F.K.A. Prince…
–Dave, justin case
*double-takes*
waitaminute, dbd!? shit, I suck badly and owe you email. dammit, from ages ago. also, bloody good to see you.
(if not dbd then no worries, just ignore this little intrusion into what you know as normality, you’ll know that the paradox has healed itself once the glow from your monitor subsides)
yes. it is I, dbdatvic! formerly of panacea. Mua ha haaaa!!1!
–Dave, good to see you too! & to be visible
He’s still known as Prince, but he also used to be.
He’s The Former Artist Formerly Known as “The Artist Formerly Known as “Prince.””
Princeps quandam, Princepsque futurus.
Yeah, but he doesn’t spell it that way, anymore…
“Faz was asked to be a live model for this class. But Faz had to refuse, because he knew the women would all go crazy if they saw his supreme manliness.”
As an Art Major, can confirm this made me hate Mary even more! Congrats Willis, I didn’t think it was possible but you do it. Good on ya.
She’s always been pretty sketchy.
Your puns are great. Colour me impressed
I ‘unno, Mary seems like such a black-and-white character to me.
I wood cut out that kind of post.
what I wanted, but didn’t know I wanted
Yesterday, since we went from Faz to Mike, I predicted today’s would feature Mary…I have never been so upset to be right…
haha fuck mary
Your grav is simultaneously the least appropriate and the most appropriate grav for that comment.
I feel like there’s a hidden physics joke in that somewhere.
UNfuck Mary…
Fuck Mary kill?
*groan*
–Dave, it’s HARD to find someone nasty enough you want to Mary them
Nope, she’s right up there. Mary totally deserves to be Mary’d until she stops Mary-ing.
I think that’s called a divorce.
Fuck, Mary. Kill!
Punctuation is important!
Willis must love us going by the last few days.
Time to test who I hate most out of the two characters. Probably Mary. The choice is always going to be Mary
Oh, this is going to be an such and enjoyable exchange.
Yes, Malaya, ruin Mary’s life without even noticing.
1) The instructor doesn’t have a tag. This may need to be rectified.
2) The model doesn’t have a tag. This may need to be rectified.’
3) What kind of instructor wanders around giving subjective ratings of each student’s work without giving any useful advice?
4) Given Willis’s background, I assume that this is yet another strip that is directly from his own experience, and that the answer to 3) above is: way too many of them.
I’ve taken a grand total of 2 art classes in my entire life, and both of mine gave their students at least decent advice along with their praise, but an art major friend of mine has definitely complained about a couple of profs who did #3.
Maybe the instructor is waiting until closer to the end of the class before giving anything useful. (So he can see how well the students have currently mastered the techniques, or so that he can see if the student had a specific goal in mind.)
In the instructor’s defence, he did point out specifically what he liked about Malaya’s drawing! (Linework is a specific thing!) That’s useful, since it can be hard to know what you’re doing right when you’re doing it. Some actual critique might be more useful, but he might be saving that for later.
In Mary’s case, it sounds like she’s just doing her normal thing. He’s probably already given critique in the past and has nothing new to say because she hasn’t improved or gotten any worse since then. In both cases, they’ll probably get a more in depth critique at the end of the lesson when everyone shows their work (that’s how it went when I was in art school, anyway).
These two could be interesting together.
What am I supposed to be getting out of this normal classroom exchange?
Let’s see…
a) Mary is being a suck-up
ii) Mary hasn’t done much improvement since last class/week/whenever, currently plateauing at “good work”. Which, you know, isn’t BAD, but you’re supposed to be here to learn & improve.
3) Malaya has talent, and is rapidly acquiring skill to go with it
quatre) Malaya thinks she could do better / sees more of the flaws in her work than the good points, which is common among artists; see also Sheldon’s art/drawing friend in that webcomic
-////-) Mary is not exactly happy that Someone Else Is Getting The Praise Here … and Malaya, who is concentrating on her work rather than eavesdropping, is blissfully unaware that she is now Target Acquired
tl;dr – character development and new drama hooks-n-eyes
–Dave, also I’m betting Mary’s face in this sequence is drawn better than Mary’s drawing is
BONUS: We also see Mary attempt humble-bragging. She fails at this and makes it just plain bragging.
I’m still surprized how someone with Mary’s mindset are ok doing an art major? ( ok granted I used to have very bigoted classmates at my college but not at the “fundamentalist” level of Mary’s)
Majoring in art is ALSO how you get to be an art critic.
Oh look, two characters I despise. And a random extra in the first panel who needs a name.
Their classmate, or the model?
Why not both?
Dungeons and Dumbing Part 17
Skadi lifted Danny high into the air and held him up to her face.
Danny: Uh…hi? Please don’t eat me?
Skadi: You really think I would consume you? I am Skadi, Goddess of the Hunt! The slayer of demons and daughter of Luna and man!
Danny: Wait? Your Luna’s daughter?
Skadi: Yes, what about it?
Skadi starts casually playing with Danny, passing him through her fingers and flipping him upside down.
Danny: I…woah…have…waah….to…eee…meet…augh….with….ugh….her.
Skadi stops playing with Danny and holds him up to her face.
Skadi: You say you have to meet with the Moon Goddess, why?
Danny: I was granted access to summon her avatar, and I need answers.
Skadi: Hmm, well I suppose I can be convinced to help you, but I would never allow anyone weak to enter my mother’s shrine.
Danny: What!?
Skadi: Shhh…tell you what, if you can slay one of those beasts I killed before I will help you climb the impassable ice wall that protects my mother’s shrine.
Danny: Okay.
Skadi: oh, and one more thing.
Skadi reaches down and lifts Danny’s ukulele from him. Placing it in her breast.
Skadi: No using my mother’s magic to help you.
Danny: Why not?
Skadi: This is your task, can’t have you relying solely on the power of gods now can we?
Danny: Okay I get your point.
Skadi places Danny back on the ground
Skadi: I know you can still hear me, so follow the tracks that lead out of here. Your lucky these beasts tend to be solitary creatures.
Danny sighed and ran off to follow a single pair of tracks. Luckily the blizzard wasn’t so bad here and he could see in front of him.
Danny: I wonder what everyone else is up to?
oooohh Malaya v. Mary, this will be good. i hope they stuff each other in a dumpster.
here is kitty’s finnish word of the day!
Raamattu (Bible)
eeeh thats all i can think of so
have a nice day!
Maybe it’s because Mary is in the strip, but I’m being reminded of the parable of the Wayward Son.
For those unaware,
The parable goes roughly like this.
A farmer has two sons.
One doesn’t want to work on a farm for his whole life, so he asks for his inheritence so he can travel out into the world.
He leaves and basically becomes a drunk rich party dude for the next however many minutes it takes to blow your inheritence.
After pretty much being stupid for a while, he can’t afford food or a bed and sleeps with pigs in their pens, contemplating whether he should eat the slop they’re given to survive.
Then thinks, “I never really had this shitty of a life when I lived back home.”
And made the trek back home.
The dad, sees him, slaughters a cow, spends big bucks, hires a parade, and takes out an ad in the local newspaper, happy that his son is returning home.
Happy his son is alive.
The older brother is a little pissed about this, because he kid brother essentially got to leave, party hard, do nothing, and still his dad is happy to see him, while diligence and hard work has never gotten a party.
He never made his dad that happy by doing things right.
He never got a big parade for doing the right thing.
So he asks his dad, “What the hell? Why are you happy to see this deadbeat back in our lives?”
And the dad essentially says, “I thought he was gone forever. I thought I’d never see him again and he would have died and we’d never know. But he’s back. He’s alive. He’s here and safe. He’s still my son. And don’t worry, you’re still gonna get the farm when I’m gone. Just because you didn’t get a big party doesn’t mean you aren’t getting a reward.”
What I’m saying is, Mary’s the pissy older brother.
“I’m always great at art! Why are you heaping so much praise on someone who’s barely reaching passable LINES, now?”
Being the unfavorite kid, I always felt bad for the pissy older brother–but DAMN if that wasn’t my favorite telling of this parable ever. (And I’ve heard quite a lot of tellings, haha.)
And it’s more or less exactly why teachers want to move to an improvement based merit system for grades. At least to some extent.
And how would this system work exactly?
I think the idea is that schools, teachers, and students would be judged not on the students’ end of term/ semester grades, but on how much the grades have improved since their last end of term/ semester assessment.
that sounds like it’d be great for the easy coursework, and then get really shitty as soon as you find material you don’t pick up quickly.
… kinda like walky right now. so… maybe it’d be better to get that over with early? provided the school did actually understand the challenges ADHD adds…
then again, it could also suck ass if you happened to have learnt the material beforehand, unless you were allowed to skip ahead easily and not be penalized for it. (I tended to get in trouble for this – like, oh we’re not supposed to know how this book ends? but, I accidentally the whole book overnight… and every time I switched schools there was something taught in a different order. I did roman&greek mythology at least three times that way, and I still don’t know what I could have been learning instead)
So, what happens with people who don’t struggle with material and are scoring high all the way through?
I mean, they should still get good grades, because they’ve demonstrated that they’ve learnt the material and can apply it well. Maybe there should be a balance between a improvement based system and an achievement based system? Perhaps an emphasis on improvement when your grades are fairly low and more emphasis on achievement the higher your grades are?
One time in high school maths my report card read “Exam mark: 99%. Term work: 95%. Position in class: 1st of 73. Grade: C. Comment: can do better.”
What happens to us? We grow up resentful.
Yeah, I asked about this because I’m one of those students. I have been since I was little. I like school and I’m generally pretty good at it.
I don’t blame you for being resentful, I’d have been fucking pissed.
The system would work by encouraging the smart kids to start out each course by pretending to be complete incompetents so that by the end of the course they will show maximum improvement. This will allow the teachers to feel good about how much of an impact their teaching has had. So everybody wins really.
Except for the one who would have to make an actual effort at pretending to not know shit
– signed, someone who was better at English than his teachers, and has no intention of ever playing stupid
I think that system would cause me to completely give up on taking school at all seriously. If I have to pretend to be incompetent to get a good grade, I’d rather just not bother.
I don’t think I was capable of that level of deception in grade school. I didn’t even figure out how to lie at *all* until grade 7.
The basic idea would need to be highly individualized. Each student would have their own set of goals and be graded on their ability to meet those goals. There are also groupings of it that could be done, with say a project having three different rubrics given to students. If someone wanted to do this approach, this could be helpful because, hi, I’m really not sure I have time to create individual standards for 120-150 kids.
I’ve also heard the idea that, going off the “three different rubrics” thing, there could be different possible results. Like, say you read something as a class and now students are writing a paper. You could have the option that students who write a 400-word paper could earn up to a C on the assignment, students who write an 800-word paper up to a B, and students who write a 1,200-word paper could earn up to an A. That way students may be working toward different things and receive different amounts of credit for what they’ve done without outright failing, which is part of the purpose of a more-merit based system.
I would say that most of the the discussion of a full improvement-based system that I’ve seen in education is focused more on younger students, not so much high schoolers. Now, it could still have some of those same issues, but if you’re looking to critique it based on what you were like as a student, think of yourself as a third grader, not a high schooler.
I don’t think full improvement-based is a great system for everything, but neither is system most commonly used now. People advocating for changes are often met with what-if-we-take-this-to-the-extreme responses, even when that’s not really what’s being proposed.
Measuring only improvement is going to create all kinds of illusions.
If you start out not being able to read, being able to recite the alphabet and identify the letters on paper is an incredible improvement, but still zero reading skills.
So you’d need to scores: one for how much of the material to be learned in this course at this time you have mastered and one for individual improvement.
Mary is awful, so why do I think she’s so cute!?
Eh its probably the same as all those people who want to bang Mike.
Dating Bangability/Cuteness.
You can be physically attracted to someone but still repulsed by them as a human being.
The Northern Pikes have a song (from some years ago) of which the chorus was “She ain’t pretty, she just looks that way”.
At least with Mary, while she’s certainly awful, you don’t know her main motive in banging you is some scheme to hurt you or someone else.
With Mike, the best you can hope for is that you’re just part of a plan aimed at someone else. Like Eric was.
It’s those big brown eyes. You could fall into them and get lost forever — until the next time she says something truly awful, so, three, four minutes, tops. But what a dreamy four minutes.
I’m SO up for Mary trying to pick a fight with Malaya
I wish I could up vote this
Me too! I know she’s already picked fights with Carla, but I’ve always kinda been looking forward to the day Mary tried to fuck with either Sal, Marcie, or Malaya. Or all three. Just to take bets on how long it takes for either Mary to snap or to write a cheque her ass can’t cash.
Mary finding out Sal went to a Catholic boarding school might set her off depending on how anti-Catholic her denomination is. As for Marcie Mary strikes me as the kind of person stupid enough to tell someone their disability is punishment for sin.
She’s anti-Catholic enough to hate Robin for it and to have given Roz shit for it. I don’t think Sal cares much about Catholicism, but screechy ladies trying to give her a hard time? Yeah, that likely won’t end well.
And frankly, it really doesn’t matter what venue of shittiness Mary uses for Marcie, because the second either Sal or Malaya finds out, she’s getting wrecked (at the very least verbally).
Maybe Malaya and Sal can bond over wrecking Mary. 🙂
Yes, yes I like this plan.
Oh, yeah, I just remembered that Word of Willis is that Marcie’s Catholic too. And bi. And Mary’s probably enough of a jerk to insult people for being heavier than she is.
There’s a lot of things she could say to Marcie. Mary = Asshole Extraordinaire.
And losing, naturally.
I’d briefly forgotten that Malaya and Mary had recently met:
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2017/comic/book-8/01-face-the-strange/replacement/
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2017/comic/book-8/01-face-the-strange/introduction/
So they’re already off on the “right” foot (well, “right” in my eyes!).
Wait oh what, I forgot that they’ve already met!
I almost had a heart attack cause I was not expecting this but I am so GD ready
It does not seem to be lost on Mary that the instructor is praising Malaya’s work more highly than her own. It *does* seem to be lost on Malaya.
Malaya is improving; Mary is relying on her “gift”. We know how this goes.
everything is lost on malaya
Malaya may not have the same emotional investment that Mary has. I suspect that Malaya is doing art so she can look at naked guys. I don’t think that she expected to have (or intended… or even cares) a talent in the field.
I think she’s only in this class because it seemed easy and requiring of little effort. She doesn’t seem big on sexual attraction, looking at her SP! history, and here too. People who we know she is sexually attracted to are Ultra-Car, and an unnamed person here in DoA (seen on Slipshine). That is unless she has sex with certain people even though she’s not attracted to them, just to experiment. I’m not sure about Leslie in SP!. Looking at naked guys doesn’t sound like her thing.
When has Malaya ever shown an interest in guys, much less naked ones???
So, now that the comic if focusing on Mike, Mary, Malaya, and Faz… Who here thinks that Willis has gone fundie again, and is now using the comic to punish us all for our wicked and depraved sins?
… since when has he needed a *reason* to punish us all?
–Dave, rereading SP!, currently just past Amber’s big NOOOOOOOOO
I think that Mary is going to learn the torment of never being as good as someone who has a spectacular natural talent but (and this is the worst part) they are so used to being good that they don’t notice or care!
Actually, it seems like the opposite of that. Mary was told “good work, as always,” but Malaya was praised for her improvements.
Hey! Good news! Everyone who was unhappy with Faz, this comic doesn’t have Faz in it! Everything’s fine now!
It has Mary in it though…
Yes, but she’s frowning and unhappy so it’s all good
But she’ll start stirring trouble! Then again Malaya seems to have a hang of how to mess with her…
<33333333333333333
It’s so on.
This calls for a scowl-off.
Really, I’m all for Mary getting annoyed by new girl Malaya – and the latter’s nonchalance at her annoyance.
BTW, does anyone else believe that’s Bob Ross after losing his hair and faking his death? I do.
I hadn’t thought that…
Now, I’m living by it!
ask him to paint some happy little trees and see how he does it…
At last! The Sal and Mary team up we have all been waiting for!
All?
*gasp* he’s naked
God gave Mary the gift of drawing manga eyes. She can even draw them both the correct size, first try!
Amazing.
That gift is the way Mary draws, until art school beats it out of her.
Coupled with that bit, I wonder if this is something that’s been the norm through the semester – the instructor putting down Mary’s drawing skills because she’s into doing a manga style. Trying to push her into “proper” art is something I’ve heard from people who have taken art classes.
To be fair, learning to work in different styles is a very useful skill and can even help you make your preferred style better when you come back to it.
Shouldn’t be putting students down anyway of course.
Style isn’t really a factor as it’s a technical class on building an accurate model
of the human body. Hyper-realistic to gestural drawing is acceptable. As long as all the parts are properly placed (or movement/weight of the body).
I wouldn’t be surprised if Mary is a decent first year figure drawer.
One of the issue with young Anime style students is the number of them that lack basic understanding of the human body and some of the basic rules to drawing. It doesn’t excuse an instructor for being an ass about their chosen style.
On the other hand, I’ve seen a few artist not understand that a basic drawing course is about learning technical skills and not about the style. Sometimes the student is the inflexible one in the mix.
Is it just me, or does Malaya look SAD in the last panel?
To me it’s: “Be quiet. Am concentrating. Go hell.”
I too would be sad if I had to draw a guy in the nude with all the details on him 😉
Am I the only one not assuming they have a human model? My first college drawing class had no human models, nude or otherwise. We drew still life. Lots and lots and lots of still life, with different techniques. My best works were a plant on grey paper, drawing with black and white conté crayons, a pair of cowboy boots drawn in one continuous line, and a portrait with a magazine ad for model, as realistic as possible. Life drawing wasn’t an option for a couple of years.
In the first panel you can see the human model, but yeah life drawing is usually something added later (I presume it’s a cost thing as well as still life being an easier starting point).
And I am going blind in my old age, apparently, because I only Just Now saw the model in the first panel. Pardon my dimwittery.
We know they have a human model, from Patreon canon.
Probably depends on the school. I had life drawing starting at freshman year and then every year after. I went to an art school though, I dunno if it differs at a large university/state school since art isn’t the only thing the school is focused on?
I took life drawing at my local community college when I was a freshman.
I think it often depends on how the student has set up their schedule. Plus what the faculty recommends as a overall schedule for ones degree.
So Mary doesn’t object to the model? I’m surprised she isn’t refusing to draw nudity.
Also Mary definitely strikes me as the type who will refuse to improve her artwork after a certain point, whereas I bet Malaya’s more open to experimenting just because she doesn’t give that much of a fuck.
Also does Indiana have like, normal art teachers? All my professors were either hippie-eccentric or scholarly-Doc-Brown-esque-eccentric.
…Huh!
Oh man, no one who just started reading today can hear the loud “DUN DUN DUUUUUUUN!”
Art aside, I am a huge fan of naked men. 😛