Grrl Power #107 – Dabbler’s green card says “Super duper skilled alien”
Here’s a quick link to page #96. I didn’t draw the phone actually going in but this is where it happened.
There have been a lot of discussions around about the failings of alien invasion movies, so I can’t take credit for Dabbler’s observation. Obviously the idea is new to Sydney though.
Sandy’s arrival puts the headcount in the room at 9, but also marks the end of the interview, so we’re almost ready to move on to a new setting finally.
I’ve updated the vote incentive with the inked version of Dabbler vs. Zintiel (of Flaky Pastry – I linked to the homepage but I recommend immediately hitting the beginning of the archive.)
Oh, and I’ve updated the cast page a bit. It’s probably not all 100% sorted out but at least I finally have Math, Achilles and Mr. Amorphous. And I just realized I misspelled Amorphous. Son of a!
SuperheroThey're super, thanks for asking!
Meatspace ComicSeriously these are awesome. Check 'em out!
Not UpdatingNo longer updating or only updates sporadically, but definitely worth reading.
SeriouslySeriously you guys. If you like Grrl Power the check these out.
"Mature"Mature subject matter and occasionally something explicit but usually safe. Can't guarantee the ads are safe though.
Dongs Ahoy!Full frontal and backal. Lots of skin, sex on some or all pages, explicit or otherwise.
Fourth panel, Dabbler looks amazing! X3
Hence, why I love her all the more every time she is in the strip.
And her being a demon/alien… Yea, I can live with it.
Anyone who’s read even a little of mainstream superhero comics is NOT going to find Dabbler’s origin that out there. In fact, it’s almost par for the course of the genre. ;-)
Actually, I just thought her player was a bit of a munchkin.
Meh, even if she has piercings on her tongue I still don’t like the look of any character that has piercings, or tattoos for that matter.
my thoughts exactly
I personally like Syd from panel 8 and both of Maxima’s appearances. Good facial expressions there.
Love Dabbler’s ear going up in panel 3.
I don’t know, I think I’d like her over my shoulder like in panel three…well I’d like her in a LOT of differing ways. ;)
Indeed. That shot needs to go into the random rotation at the top of the page.
Coming soon to a webcomic near you: A scene other than the Ballroom!
ai vin wind this morning’s Snot On My Keyboard award.
Take a bow.
Ewww…
And I’m going to be the first to point out one of Dave’s mistakes for this page: Panel 6 has a typo, “exiting” should be “exciting.”
Shoot, well at least it’s spelled correctly.
Fixed.
No, actually Dave got it correct. Most of those “alien invasion” movies make me want to be “exiting” the cinema. These it is mostly change the channel, but the idea is the same.
Oops, it’s supposed to be “These days,“
Quick, everyone activate “Spell-Check”. The misspell virs s spredding.
AAAAAAARRRG!
Bizmawck is doun!
URRRRGH!!
“Mr. X”?? As long as he’s not a telepath, I guess…
could hav been worse he could have been called mr E
…or, if the character turns out to be female:
“Miss Teri”
:P
(…groan…)
Mr. X shadowing Ms. XXXX. of course she’s way out of his league!
A bit late, but we have a second Snot On My Keyboard award for this week’s thread.
Or “Ms. X” or “Mrs. X”?
Hm. Shouldn’t Sydney be holding the Comm Ball rather than the flight orb?
And this week’s award for spotting the update’s drawing error goes to you, sir. :-)
My first – I’m so honored.
It’d also make sence if she’s holding the invernerability orb as well…? but perhaps Syd’s afraid of being tossed out the window or something?.
Reward retracted – it was explained below.
Yup, and I just noticed the comm ball floating in panel 4 of the last page. Whoops.
Nope, she had already released the comm orb on the last page, when X dropped the disguise (you can see it floating in panel 4).
I guess the flight orb is just a way for Sydney to show off and distract from her “porno sense” faux pas in the last page.
I think she’s flying over the table that X is standing behind. Otherwise shaking his hand would be awkward.
Also, Sydney is what? 5 feet tall. X appears to be in the 6 foot range, but Sydney is looking him in the eye. Flight orb is definitely handy for that.
^^^^^
Just love Ariana nodding in agreement with Sydney in pannel nine. Makes them seem more like a team, and not a bunch of people who are always arguing all the time.
Unless X’s mask goes as far as rendering his (I’ll get to that in a moment) uncloaked appearance genderless, I’m betting he’s a guy since even Sydney has a more noticeable bust than he does.
And that’s just downright friendly and polite of her to introduce herself to the guy who set off her ninja sense earlier. :-)
Judging by the outline under X’s trenchcoat a few pages back, s/he appears to be wearing body armor. Then again, it would be all kinds of painful to cram a metahuman bust into said armor, meaning if X is female, she’s probably a baseline.
I hope so. This series need more pettankos. We small bust fans have our needs too!
I wonder if X is just something he thought of now…
Sandy, that’s what you get for using your phone (for whatever) on the toilet.
Hey! The cast page got updated. Dave’s been busy.
Yay!
“Mr. Amorphous” is misspelled (“Amorphus”).
Holy cow! Math is a freakin’ 7!? o_O No wonder he’s got that ego of his.
Achilles bio has him quoting “You can drive off a plane and into an ammo dump so many times before it gets boring.”
“drive” should be “dive”
Unless of course he’s actually driving a car (or tank, Humvee, etc) loaded with explosives out of a C-130 into an ammo dump. Much more dramatic and likely to cause a earth-shattering Ka-Boom!
depends on if the plane’s left the ground does it not?
*Looks up* …BEAKER!!! =P
Yeah I change my avatar quite often. But I am the original Gamesman since before there was an internet. I started using the name when dialing up BBS’s was the high tech.
was meant to be because you aparaently beat my post by seconds. Ya just had Beaker as your gravitar at the time.
But Marvin likes the Big Ka-Booms especially earth-shattering ones.
See the A-Team movie. They drive a tank off a plane and go flying with it.
(or play Saints Row 3 for the added Zombie Invasion;))
Like Saint’s Row 3 doesn’t also have a mid-air battle between a tank and VTOL aircraft?
Not the first tank to go flying (like a rock). Wasn’t there one in one of the Indiana Jones movies?
Yeah it originally said “drive a car” but his history was too long so I did some editing. I’ll make a note to make that clearer in a future update.
On Sydney’s new bio. The Rank should be on its own line. Also, I think Sydney should be Private (Reserve). By designating her as a Reserve NCO, she can carry on her civilian life of comic shop owner, while still being on the team. She is too old to be a Cadet, unless you mean Officer Cadet, in which case she is training to become an officer.
Last paragraph/sentance:
should be:
Whoops, left out some line breaks there. I need to change her bio anyway, she’s the only one who has info mentioning future events in the past tense.
side effect of time travel, (that and treating strangers as old friends and old friends as strangers)
Try living backwards, than kissing your lover only to have her scream because she just met ya. o_O
Two words: River Song
(hot and dangerous)
Was thinking Piers Anthony’s Incarnation of Time He serves from his induction until his birth (or conception…that never was made clear). But he travels backwards along the timestream, which leads to awkward first meetings with the other Incarnations.
Been a while since I revisited that series. I did like how Death’s new incarnation was chosen.
“He who kills Death must become Death”. Yeah that was interesting. Or Ares’s sword choosing who is basicly the angriest person on the planet when the former’s term is done.
Nice that he thought of increasing Achilles’ strength.
Personally I would have thought he had a rating of 4, three or four combat trained mortals should be able to grab him and throw him into a hole filled with concrete. Just fix a steel plate over it until it hardens. :)
Well, his bio does indicate that he is not the best in fights, but his power makes him usefull to the team. I suppose the rankings are not solely based on fighting capacity.
The way I read it is that in a fight, his ONLY real advantage is being a human shield.
Oh ye of little imagination. Get some training on him and he’s actually a perfect commando. He could set explosives behind enemy lines, let alone creative bombing situations. Interrogation procedures would be great if the captive tries to go for a weapon. With his boosted strength he could pull bad cop very easily.
With sensitive information he’s the best person, I mean if captured what are they going to do? Torture him?
Really the list is endless with even a low level super like him.
They could just sex him into delirium. Or drug him. It hasn’t been mentioned if he’s immune to intoxication, but I’m assuming that he still has to eat and drink.
Or drop him in a hole he can’t climb out of.
Star Gate Atlantis, there was this little weasly conman that was tricking villagers into thinking he was a hero thanks to a personal shield device he found (Ancient/Alterran technology). An enemy human faction found him, he bragged that nothing could hurt him, so they said they’d just toss him a hole and bury him alive.
Wasn’t Peggy corded off in a “non-Supers” section before? Why is she in the Supers section now? o.o
Loving the cast update by the way, I’ve been waiting for a bio on Mathias for ages. :D
Yeah I decided that blocking off the non-supers didn’t make sense if Math is considered one. Peggy’s abilities aren’t flashy, she’s just a good shot, but Math can whoop nearly anyone else on the team. The ranks are supposed to be a combination of power level and viability in a fight relative to others. Peggy’s only got a 3 because she wouldn’t fare well in a stand-up fight, but give her the right equipment and half an hour to prepare and she could take out 90% of the team.
I’m not sure ‘supers’ is the correct label at this point then. It really seems to be ‘Archon Field Team’ vs. civilian/support characters. (And you only really have one civilian in there so far.)
Oh, and as a side note: Achilles’ info appears to continue pas the bottom of the pop-up box, at least in my browser. (Opera, Linux.)
You’re right, I should break it down by branch.
Yup. Or, at least, indicate the branch. Complications being those who work in more than one branch. Likewise, if there are any civilian personnel, who are not attached to any particular branch.
Looks like Dabbler was re-ranked a civilian expert instead of 2nd lieutenant, and Mathias is a civilian expert as well, making 2 of them.
If the Experts are given a separate category to the normal Baselines, I’d think you’d be looking at a three-tiered system: full-blown Empowered, Experts, and Baselines. Which simply creates a blurry boundary of when a Baseline gets considered an Expert, without really de-blurring the matter of heavy Augments (what can Peggy’s leg do?) or Power Tools (Sydney might be the expert in manipulating her orbs, but will they accept other users?).
The dialog in the last panel doesn’t flow right, IMO. I read it as:
Sandy: “I dropped my cell phone.”
Harem: “What? How is that my fault?”
Sandy: “Harem.”
Maybe you lost some detail, but Harem’s question seems like a complete non-sequitor. Sandy never accused Harem of anything, and doesn’t even seem to be looking at her. Nor does Sandy’s explanation make much sense.
Or is “Harem” meant to come before Harem’s question? If so, Sandy’s speech balloon needs to a single one, because right now its format indicates an exchange between the two characters. And maybe Sandy should say, “Thanks to Harem” as well.
Good catch, sir.
I read that as:
Sandy: “I dropped my cell phone.”
Sandy: “Harem.” (needs some icicles on the speech bubble though)
Harem: “What? How is that my fault?”
But I agree, a different positioning of the bubbles would help.
I would just tighten it up so that the “Harem” bubble coming directly out the side with no channel.
I followed it just fine.
I agree that the bubbles are poorly placed. I realized that the second Sandy bubble was before the Harem bubble only after re-reading the panel after saying to myself ‘that didn’t sound right…’
I read it more like Assistant: ‘I dropped my phone in the …’ – pointed look at Harem.
Harem: ‘What? How is that my fault?’
Assistant, with a voice saying don’t be silly: ‘Harem…’
Strictly speaking not how it was written, no. But it’s how it got stuck in my head the first time I read it.
*****In The Voice Of Carnack The Great*****
and this weeks “Mr Obvious Award” Goes to……….ai vin.
DaveB said he did some updating in his comments.
Just poking a jab at ya ;)
Oh, okay. Sorry ’bout that.
Also (I’ve already posted twice here, but this is on a different topic, so new post) I love how enthusiastic Sydney looks in panel 1.
Well what do you know, Sydney has an impressive level of sang-froid when she wants to. And her Mom said all that comic book and science fiction reading was worthless. =P
Arrianna’s ….NUMBER TWO! Cause she was on the toilet! GET IT? GET IT!?
*Lone cricket chirps in an empty stadium* =P
And a dusty wind blows across a couple of tumble weeds.
All that is seen, is akin to a bleak lunar scape at sunset.
*Curiosity rolls past beeping to itself* :P
And Opus drives by on Opportunity!
I don’t know why, but I was expecting X (A.K.A. “Tingles”) to be taller. Allowing for the hat, s/he looks to be about the same height as Sydney. Wow! Somebody who doesn’t tower over Syd.
He is taller, Sidney is hovering above the table – look at the orb she is holding.
The “other” cast members show up as squidged to about 1/4th their proper width.
Also Dabbler seems to have regrown her 2nd set of boobs in her bio pic. :)
Dabbler’s bio picture was an older design for her. Her eyes have changed colour (green and blue, and no longer yellow) and Dave removed a set of breasts because it made her look chunky in the comic.
What browser are you seeing them “squidged” in?
IE 8. I’m too lazy to port my bookmarks to something more modern.
All the modern browsers do that for you, unless you have some really weird configuration. Install chrome just to see. DO IIIIIIT.
You wont be sorry.
Quite liked the exchange in panels 5-6.
As someone very interested in the possibilities of getting resources from space (G K O’Neill’s ‘The High Frontier’ and so forth), that whole “Aliens Want Our Water” thing ALWAYS seemed @#$%^&* stupid to me.
Especially when you consider how many kinds of chemical reactions have water+(something else) as their end-result. Even a non-scientist such as myself would assume that H2O may very well be just about the Universe’s most common & widespread molecule. Isaac Asimov wrote a story wherein you needn’t even mine planets at all – you just harvest ice chunks from Saturn’s rings as needed.
This thinking could also extend to SETI.
As I understand it, the ‘Hydrogen’ radio frequency is the most-monitored because thinking is that this should be a frequency EVERYBODY knows. But that frequency gets a helluva lot of interference from natural stellar processes – and at least one book I read suggests that the ‘Water’ radio frequency should get more attention.
Monitoring the “water hole” (a quiet bit of spectrum between and including strong resonances of H2 at 1420 MHz and *OH at 1666MHz) also raises questions of observation bias. If everyone’s staying out of that band so that it’s clear for listening for others, then no-one’s going to hear anything. Maybe that’s why it’s so quiet!
By the way, what’s happened to all the yellow packing foam that was in Tubey? – or is it just out of shot?
On the floor, so they’re out of sight for now.
That’s just what ‘THEY’ want you to think….
Someone probably already said it, but: Harem Panel 4, that is all.
* Dabbler, I meant Dabbler.
alwaysgetlastnameseenstuckinhead
I love how Dabbler goes from sinister and attractive in panel 4 to adorably cute in chibi form.
And touché indeed, Sydney. That made me laugh.
By the way Dave B I noticed you updated yesterday when I was rereading some of the comics (and the comments). It was almost like a birthday present. If you haven’t done it yet folks try it you’ll remember some great laughs.
I love how Syd can screw up even the most simple interview. But I was wondering if exiting alien movies are as good as exciting ones.
Dabbler looks excellent in panel 4. Bravo. Also Sandy looks like she has a really thick neck. May be intentional I don’t know.
I think that is supposed to suggest she is a little overweight. Or at least stockier.
I’m trying to mix up the body type a little, but drawing heavier people is not my specialty.
No, you convey it just fine with what you’ve done here. Not as much in #96 though, although I notice the double-chin in retrospect on #98. Nice to see huskier without leaning into the ridiculously obese.
Man Dabbler is fast! From the background in panel 3 to right behind Sydney in panel 4.
It’s “Zintiel”, but never mind….
Huh, so it is.
BTW…I love Flaky Pastry too :)
That’s my girl!
Oooooo….you know…..you humans think in binary….why can’t X be…well, both?
Maybe X’s super power, which make hir a good shadow is s/he’s not only, basically, hermaphroditic, but can shape-shift.
:p
Laughs manically.
Some sort of FaceDancer?
TYPO: Should be a space between Face and Dancer.
OH MAN!!! Now that is an incredible idea!
Love DUNE!
Poor old list, laying abandoned on the floor in panel 6.
No sympathy for The List, folks? :(
For the record, comets may be mostly ices, but also contain trace minerals, including lethal concentrations of cyanide. Of course, filtering the cyanide out is probably still easier than invading a planet.
Of course, the particular aliens involved may need cyanide as a vitamin. Depends on the biology.
Or it might be their version of beer. :)
I think it would be funny if Milk turned out to be the deadliest biological substance in the universe. Hell even on Earth only mammals can metabolize it, its actually poison to most lifeforms here. In fact milk due to its effect on the environment is treated like a toxic chemical by the environmental protection boards for transport and spills.
Even if there were aliens that looked enough like us to be sexually attracted it could be a “Are you crazy man? their species leaks cyanide out of their tits!”
comets smell like pee found out when we had a probe land of a comet
On my comment of yesterday, I wonder what Halo really would say about NCSoft’s utter betrayal of their City of Heroes Customers and the dev team? We know she’s a gamer…
https://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-838027
May there be a special hell, all of their own, awaiting them.
I LOVE LOVE LOVE your site, so don’t get me wrong when I ask: Why does Dabbler have two breasts here, but on the character page, she has four?
She’s part succubus (Succubi are able to switch between male and female forms) and part Doppleganger (Normally full body shapeshifters, but she didn’t get that much control) – maybe she prefers the movement dynamics of two instead of 4? You could get some strange harmonics bouncing 2 sets of boobies…
I saw a program on television a few years back over here in the UK, there was these two structural engineers and each week they were given a different task, in the last episode they were given the task of designing a better bra (a task they discovered was more difficult then they first thought).
Just thinking, based on the problems they had designing a bra for a woman with two breasts imagine trying to design one for a woman with four.
For a great laugh, look up an old book called, “A Stress Analysis of a Strapless Evening Gown”.
It’s a collection of genuine scientific papers that have been published over the years by legit scientists who just felt like “letting their hair down” & trying something less stuffy for a change.
[Baker, Robert A. (1963), A Stress Analysis of a Strapless Evening Gown, and Other Essays for a Scientific Age, New York: Prentice Hall, ISBN 0-13-852608-7, OCLC 338410]
Extra breasts on women are rare but they do exist. I’ve actually seen a photo of a woman with three, in a row across her chest which is very rare. The middle one was larger but not excessively so. Also I’ve seen a photo of a woman with four, arranged like dabblers are supposed to be, Definitely odd.
its been adressed before the images of dabbles with four breasts were from an earlier character design iirc
Gotta loooooove the uber-ultra cute ear movement!!! (-;
Noticing for the first time: Ipod on the table a few pages back. Phone drop in progress a few more pages back. Also some corrections.
I’ll say it again: Gotta loooooove the uber-ultra cute ear movement!!! (-;
Also shouldn’t dabbler be in the who’s who section ?
I think the general is supercool, I know a few who would have blown a fuse with syd’s antics by the third page…..
Whoops, I added her.
You should also update her picture on her bio-popup, it’s the older character design.
wasn’t she holding the yellow orb last time? it’s now blue.
Yes, but in panel one she needs the flight orb to float over the table to say hi to the guy in the mask.
Hey Dave, I was expecting to see you at the Heart of TX bodybuilding champs on Saturday at Fair Park. I guess you didn’t know about it?
I didn’t. Also I basically don’t have time to do stuff on the weekends anymore. :P
Wait, why is Sydney holding a blue sphere while shaking hands? Isn’t the yellow one the one that allowed her to see X?
X decloaked on the last page, she’s using the “Fly Ball” to hover over the table.
If that’s the “Fly Ball” would the tentacle one be the “Screw Ball?” – Or is that Halo, herself?
The Tentacle ball is the the “Hentai” ball. Syd’s the Screwball.
“Forgettably generic”? How many people named “X” does she know? Is she not going to be able to remember which X s/he is out of all the other Xes she hangs out with? Is s/he a member of the X Continuum where they’re all named X? Or does everyone in this universe simply forget the letter X even e*ists sometimes? Do they recite the end of the alphabet “Q R S, T U V, W *short pause* Y and Z”?
Okay, I’m done.
Wait, one more! So in this world, X doesn’t mark the spot?
She’s refering to how many times in comics mysterious people are named X.
I swear, since the late eighties every other side charictor in Marvel was named X this and X that. I can understand X-Men offshootsb but PhantomX? They realy need to get some wrighters in there with some imagination.
I see it more as team names, often capatilized as the second letter in “Extreme”
Off the top of my head
X-men
X-Force
X-Factor
Generation X
Ex-Mutants
eXtreme
eXtreme Dinosaurs
eXtreme aliens
Gen X
X-Man (singular character)
Planet X
Xilians
Excalibur (I claim this British offshoot of the X-men is so named as its the most awesome british thing with an X in the name)
Technically, it never did. As I understand it, back in the Era of Tall Ships, both kinds of compass were used to navigate. The circle-drawing sort would let them make marks on their maps, to triangulate on some location. It’s those 2 crossed arcs that mark the spot – not the letter “X”.
—
(…you’ve now had your daily dose of trivia…)
:P
Well it’s seven letters higher than Q, wonder if he’s related?
How many people named “X” does she know?
She co-owns a comic book store. . . goes with the territory.
X he (or she) may be named, but for a certain subset of readers he (/she) will be forever known as Tingles.
And a bit of involuntary name-splicing leaves me wondering what it looks like if someone gets extingled. I’m guessing not pleasant, and rather permanent.
With regard to the Cast Page: if Harem can get a Notable Appearance for her Pain Reaction, thus establishing that being on the receiving end of a move qualifies, shouldn’t Mr. Amorphous get one for Tongue-Fu? (Also credited to Sydney as “Unconventional Judo”.)
(Apologies for double post.)
Yeah I’m pretty bad about updating the Notables. Though since we didn’t know that was Mr. A at the time, I think I’ll leave that off.
Good idea, he looks compleatly diffrent at the time so there is no need to confuse new readers.
Fair enough. Now I come to think of it, that’s not really an incident specific to him anyway – only Harem could do the Pain Reaction, but Sydney could probably Tongue-Fu anyone in the same position.
Dave, if Math is supposed to be a rank of “Civilian Specialist” on the cast page, why does he Have the same Rank Symbol as Seargent Achillies?
Yeah I forgot to update that when I was doing his character badge.