Grrl Power #531 – The gang’s all here
I wanted to quickly establish that Cooter is fundamentally dislikable, and the easiest way to do that is to hit up those stereotypes, but I have to admit, he’s kind of fun to write. Maybe I should write more jerks. Grrl Power tends to lack a lot of interpersonal antagonism among the main characters certainly. It’s usually good if there’s some friction there. McCoy sparring with Spock all the time for example. Or even Ron Swanson trying to stonewall one of Leslie Knope’s initiatives. Yeah, Dabbler and Maxima occasionally get into it, but it’s pretty lightweight stuff most of the time.
Cthillia would be easy to impersonate if you had a pair of lizard gloves and risers in your boots. And gargled with a cup full of broken safety glass. You know, cause she never takes her head wrap off. The Evil Overlord’s Top 100 List says henchmen shouldn’t have masks that cover their face, because the good guys can klonk them on the head and walk around the Death Star with impunity. That rule should extend to the main bad guys as well – not that the good guy get a drop on Vader usually, but it happens to mini bosses like Phasma occasionally.
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This guy is probably the son of a Cantor and has a doctorate in particle physics from Princeton….
Like Fiddleford McGucket!
(Well, the doctorate part anyways…)
2 doctorates cambridge and mit mythology and enginering
That would still be far better than Bill Nye, the Science Guy. He’s got nothing more than a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering. Yep, he’s full of B.S. & that’s it.
;)
So how old is Sciona then? Kind of real hazy when it comes to their personal timelines so far. Could have met Cyth 5 years ago or 500.
She’s 29 plus an undisclosed number of years more.
A lady is always 20 something.
But that aside, there are likely to be two different ages here. The age of the brain and most of the head, versus the age of the body. The brain, of course, being the pertinent one for most issues, especially the one in question.
Although the line of the cut does seem to be rather high on the skull. There may be bits of orc/troll brain still working too. A human-like brain arrangement would make that the cerebellum (and brain stem), which controls balance and co-ordination, rather than memory.
But whether an orc or troll would have those in the same place, is another matter. Presumably it would have been important to be in the same place as a drow’s (or whatever her head’s species is). Although brains are adaptable, so it may have been able to repurpose part of the brain which was designed for a different purpose if ending up with two versions of one area, and none of another.
It would be a bit weird though, if she does remember meeting him, as an orc. Even stranger if she remembers meeting her drow self. Especially if that memory, from her drow self, was in a bit of the brain which got chopped off! There would be a girl with quite an identity crisis!
When a woman near or over 50 asks how old I think she is I always say 35, over 60 I say 50. 40’s or below I say 20’ish. But I deal with tense situations a lot so if I’m not a convincing sweet talker things can go bad very quickly.
Your technique requires estimating the age. Which is fraught with peril, if getting it wrong! Twenty-something, across the board is far safer. Besides which, older the lady is the happier she is to hear that, regardless that it gets less believable.
The other trick is never to do it tongue-in-cheek. That runs the risk of it being felt to be mocking or teasing. I adjust my mindset to ‘this lady is twenty-something’, then nothing in my tone can be picked up the wrong way.
It worked unexpectedly well earlier in the year. I was talking to one of the ladies in the village about her daughter. And she kept trying to correct me on something that my pigeon-Bulgarian was not following. Eventually she got across the fact that she was not her daughter but her grand daughter!
I genuinely had not considered the prospect I treat it as being rude to estimate a woman’s age, so deliberately do not attempt it. Sometimes it is obvious mind. But all her aging cues were very subtle ones. Easy enough to spot if making an assessment. Not doing that though absolutely made her day! I genuinely was surprised, and she could tell the sincerity.
We always got on well before mind, but since then I can see her visibly brightening up anytime she sees me.
Getting a smile, from the habit, is always nice. But getting such a long-lasting heartwarming result is most satisfying. If I make people happy, it makes me happy. If I make them sad, it makes me sad.
I recall my mother celebrating the 30th anniversary of her 21st birthday.
It isn’t just women with a “thing” about their age. I remember seeing on TV (a commercial, I think), that Life Begins At Forty. Based on that, I’m twenty six.
Nah, it was an old kiwi song :D
What a coincidence! I’ll be turning 29 for the 4th time in a couple of weeks!
And here I am just turned 30 last month…. and I look like so much shit that they’re not even carding me for alcohol anymore. Guess I’ll look like the crypt keeper at 50 then.
Really you will grow a mark from where an ID10tango hit him with a humvee? And scar tissue from the 2 lightning strikes? Yes I met him and hope there hasn’t been much added to the list in the 9 years since we last talked.
Something tells me this guy is not real, either a shapeshifter or an illusion, or at the least that is not his real personality because I doubt anyone of them could stand to be near him long enough to discuss a plan.
Having been watching Naruto: Shippuden recently he could be pulling a Tobi (if I’m remembering the name correctly), pretending to be way less powerful and using a disarming personality in order to manipulate people. Pretend to be an ignorant, redneck stereotype so people instantly rate his IQ and general ability to do anything at the bottom of the list so that if/when he feels like it he can devastate them due to their being completely offguard.
I’ve watched Rocket City Rednecks. That and the fact that Cooter from the Dukes of Hazzard was apparently able to to fix the General Lee after EVERY SINGLE SUSPENSION DESTROYING JUMP they did. (Actually not true, the cars were basically wrecked after every stunt, and by the end of the series the producers were combing the country for ’69 Chargers to use)
That said, I wouldn’t be surprised if those shotgun shells of his have a few nanograms of fullerened antimatter in them “for that extra kick”.
If his last name is Andressyn, I’m outta here.
I t ‘s A r m e d
By the end of the series they were using using nothing but stock footage of the same jump.
Fortunately, for the purposes of filming the Blues Brothers movie, cop cars were fairly common to obtain (Only cost them $700 each)…So they could wreck 70 of them.
Gosh, it’d be nice if this was the case instead of using the ‘insert overused awful redneck stereotype here’ trope. Next thing you know, we’ll be told that he’s a racist, trailer trash drunk who beats his wife. Didn’t have to mention him being a sexist gun nut since that’s already been demonstrated.
Unfortunately, the stereotype is disturbingly accurate. I fled as quickly as I could, but I have a bunch of cousins who fit this stereotype darned near perfectly, except they’re still in their twenties and thirties. Both the “knee buckler” term and that gesture are fairly common where I grew up.
I wonder if our illustrious artist grew up in this sort of environment and is doing the classic “write what you know” in this instance. I wouldn’t expect anyone to know that particular hand gesture combined with that term outside some VERY hick and redneck areas.
There have been mention of Tex-mex and the like…
Dave is a Texan and a keen social observer.
In another thread I came to the realisation that we need to be careful about referring to ‘the stereotype’ mind. Here you are using it in the context of ‘the stereotype of the worst kind of redneck’.
Thanks to the Dukes of Hazard though, as one (comical) example, and something that I am into, namely country music, as another more general example, even people outside of America are aware that it is simply a subset of ‘redneck’, which is itself a subset of ‘southerner’ (and beyond that American, of course).
But, that is the curse of stereotypes, in that the worst can be applied to the broader community.
Here we hit a conundrum. Dave is talking about a truth, even if it is a stereotype (that is part of another stereotype). Unlike other kinds of stereotypes (such as Nazi propaganda) which can be pure fabrication (or overlay some truths to conceal a fabrication). Of course Dave is compiling a lot of the worst, into a single character, but Dave does personify the extremes in his characters (Sexuality for Dabbler and Crazy Nerd for Sydney).
Should political correctness prevent light being shone on a truth? Should it stop fun being poked at it, when that truth turns out to be an ugly truth?
Because I listen to a lot of interviews with country singers I know those with Southern routes are proud of that. Likewise some identify as being rednecks and are happy to do so. When dealing with people who know the distinction mind. Other times they find the need to distance themselves from the more disreputable stereotype.
I think this is a healthy route to take. Show the worst as villainous. And, just in case anyone has not realised it, Sydney is likely a Southern gal, if Archon is indeed in Dallas. As such the best is being shown as.. ahem… mostly heroic. (Discreetly ignoring her eccentricities.)
I don’t think Sydney will bond with Coot, like she did with Vehemence.
I would think that anyone in that group, who as a whole seem long-lived and powerful, would be quite aware that the very fact that he is in the group and apparently unfazed means that he is probably packing some serious mojo.
Half of them have probably used the same tactic at least once in their long-lives.
Interesting theory. So he is basically the foul mouthed tween being allowed on a mature team because they needed 1 more person and couldn’t find anyone with skill that had grown out of the ‘crude behavior means your mature’ phase. If that is the case hopefully one of the centuries older characters will straighten him out.
Yes…I’m familiar with the concept.
Indeed, my own “signature tagline” reads, “I love it when I’m seriously underestimated.”
I’m calling him being a unknowing final sacrifice.
Or unwitting vessel for a demonic creature who cannot reside for long in our world without a host.
Not many people would have their personality improved by being inhibited by a soul sucking demon on a quest to rid the world of the human race, but I think we have an exception.
Oh Jeez, if I were some kind of Extra-Dimensional Eldritch Horror From Beyond Time & Space, he would be the sacrifice that would make me puke my guts out.
O.o
He is definitely not exactly what he seems to be.
Unless DaveB is throwing us a fast ball, and they really did just recruit Super Redneck (Captain Redneck?)
He’s the counter to Maxima, similair powerset and level, and incredibly misogynistic. She’sgoing to blow him to kindom come.
Blow him to kingdom come.
…I wonder if it was a deliberate choice of words…
Can only imagine the snorting derisory comment he would make at it before becoming a scorched mark on the ground courtesy of Max.
I think Max’ll cry out of joy for the opportunity to blow Coot worse than she blown the tank.
If only Dabbler could hear you now, she’d be weeping with joy that Max has decided to start blowing Cooter.
UP! BLOW UP! Wait, that’s probably worse. And here I thought Portuguese was a tricky language…
Nao. O portuguese e facil.
Sim, mas pode ser muito traiçoeiro se nao tens cuidado.
And now you know the truth.
I’m going with him being so overwhelmingly powerful he can get away behaving like this.
Behaving like this against an ancient vampire. That takes either balls, or extreme confidence in your skill indeed
and with him doing the “knee buckler” gag AT an ancient vampire* I’m sure that he also has extreme confidence IN his balls…
* i’d consider anyone that swears in what i would assume to be their native/first language of Old Norse to be “An Ancient” no matter how young they look.
Obviously never met many rednecks.
https://www.onecountry.com/13-things-you-didnt-know-were-invented-by-southerners-1647842240.html
Some enlightenment for you mental lightweights on redneck ingenuity.
There is also
https://www.toptenz.net/top-10-things-you-didnt-know-were-invented-by-rednecks.php
for you to ruminate on.
You missed the ‘g’ from ‘fucking’ in the futhark version…
“Fuckin’ Gross!”
No, he did not. The futhorc is phonic and the rune ᛝ is the sound “ng” as seen in the last two letters of “sing” (or most anything ending in “ing”) in English. Ah, the things you learn when you played a lot of Ultima 7 as a youth. (Most of the signs and some of the books in the game used the Futhorc alphbet)
ᚠᚢᚳᛁᛝ ᚷᚱᚩᛋ is how I’d transcribe it (again, phonic in nature, so gross would be spelled gros) although it might also be ᚷᚱᛟᛋ – I’m not enough of a linguist to know which of the Norse futhorc runes is closest to the current (american) English ‘o’ as used in gross. The descriptions of their sounds are bellow for any passing linguist.
ᚩ represents a close-mid back rounded vowel, or high-mid back rounded vowel
ᛟ a open back unrounded vowel, or low back unrounded vowel
It would make me very happy if the runes were changed to this:
ᚠᚢᛚ ᛏᚱᛟᛋ
It’s not exactly “fucking gross” (since that is a modern vernacular), but it has pretty much the same meaning :)
these two comments are funny on my mobile, since all I see are little boxes, not runes. “XXXX XXXX” is how I’d transcribe it” “But XXXX XXXX would be funnier!”, etc.
That’s weird. I’m on my phone and the runes show up fine.
Are you reading the comic on a Samsung Summoner 6?
That sounds like a cyberpunk mage’s app for conjuring spirits.
Just a normal cybermage summon based on the krona code in shareware forum. Banish is not so common to find and why most only use the summon once.
Why I keep a pistol loaded with Banisher rounds. Costs a lot of creds but nothing better for dealing with a summoned elemental.
I apparently don’t have the right fonts loaded (android 4)
I’m gonna be “that guy” (I’m allowed in this case, I’m Norwegian). Futhorc is Anglo-saxon and used in Old English, Old Frisian and sometimes in Latin. This is supposed to be Old Norse, which would mean it is the Futhark alphabet. Or more specifically, the Younger Futhark. (Both Anglo-Saxon/Old English Futhorc and Younger Futhark come from Elder Futhark, though.)
However…DaveB is apparently using the Proto-Germanic Elder Futhark here though. To represent the ‘k’ sound he is using ᚲ (*Kaunan) – this is Elder. In Futhorc it would be ᚳ (Cēn aka “torch”), whereas in the Younger Futhark aka. Old Norse it would be ᚴ (Kaun aka “ulcer”).
times like this are why i love this webcomic. the readership is so incredibly diverse, i wind up learning something from the comments section on a fairly regular basis.
I have said it before: We got some educated people around here.
Yay! I’m not alone! However, I most definitely do not share your knowledge of the language of our ancient forefathers. :-D
I came here to say exactly that, both strange and awesome to find another scandinavian pointing it out.
Just noting, (if my understanding of the old language is right, which is only moderately likely as best), that if she actually said those sounds in old Norse, those aren’t (to my knowledge) actually make Norse words. As a result, she might be interpreted as having a foreign accent and she could easily be mistaken as saying “Flikki Hringr Hross” which means “piece of meat – round trip – old mare” or a fast way of saying “Hey, Piece of meat, try round trip on this old mare.” or ᚠᛚᛁᚲᚲᛁ ᚺᚱᛁᚾᚷᚱ ᚺᚱᛟᛋᛋ if translation serves me.
As corroborated by the line underneath the comic:
Using Runes to spell an English phrase is rather obviously not Old Norse :p My comment was meant to be on the use of the “appropriate” (as if there is such a thing in this context) runic alphabet to represent the language. And to “correct” the one who called it futhorc – unnecessary nitpickery amuses me :p
Calling it now: Coot is a super.
And his theme is Super Redneck.
Not sure what his super name would be though…
And what powers does he have?
Being utterly aggravating and pulling ammo from his arse?
His powers aren’t activated until someone else holds his beer.
THAT is a full WIN!
Award ye one internet
Immortality, I would imagine.
Kill him, he will rise again…
That would certainly explain why Sciona or another hasn’t killed him yet —- succesfully anyhow.
The power of stupidity.
“Stand in the centre of this circle and don’t move while we make our chant.”
Don’t knock it. After all, very few people ever lost money betting on stupidity. If you could harness it….
You joke but people bottle the stuff, it’s called ‘beer’.
He is conditionally invulnerable: triggered by someone ‘holding his beer’.
I always figured you lost the invulnerability when you handed off the beer. Also giving it away results in a sudden loss of strength/dexterity that gets you slammed around like a midget in a mosh pit.
At least going by the HMB’s I’ve seen.
Pull his finger to find out.
He’s another emotion-feeder. He feeds off of people being offended. Hence his choice of attire, personality, and intro. He’d offend anyone put-off by the redneck stereotype and offend any redneck for doing it wrong. He literally feeds off of triggering as many people as possible at once.
… That power sounds amazing. There’s so many pretentious fuckwits in the world to make so angry they devolve into a frothing, stupid mess. He’d be practically unstoppable.
Trigger powers OP pls nerf.
Mind you, it can work with anyone.
You’re right, his power can even work on Elliot of EGS. He’s unstoppable. O_O
Would it work on Mr. Rogers?
Modern society has a name already for people who feed from the negative emotions of others; Psychic Vampires. You’ve probably even met a feww during your life. You know the type, who says anything & everything to get you upset, outraged, apprehensive, or whatever, and they enjoy making people miserable.
A bit too much of an Americanism, for me. I prefer to use the German term “schadenfreuder“. Although they are not synonymous as one describes the person (in terms of their emotions), whilst the other is purely the emotion.
He already said he is called “The Knee Buckler”. Makes me think he would be using chop blocks as a primary attack mode.
um… NO… that is NOT why he is calling himself the “knee buckler”… um… how to put it in a NON X-Rated way… um ya know… no just go with that, yeah… martial arts moves, yeah, yeah that’s it…
Oh just say “Oral Sex.”
Just what kind of reputation does “Oral” Roberts have? Is it always a religious experience?
Non X-Rated way? “He has a thing for eating out. And likes to brag about it.”
Ooorrr… “He is quite proud of his cunning lingus”
(As a pun it’s a bit of a stretch, but it made *me* grin at least.)
He’s a cunning lingust
Martial arts moves, marital arts moves, why not use both?
I wanna know what up with the poser in white standing behind Captain Redneck.
I suspect the figure in white is the ‘Doc’ that Wyrmil is talking to when referring to Coot as being awesome. As others have said, Coot is probably intended for sacrifice.
He is wearing a white coat that looks like it has medical tools poking out of the breast pocket. Add that to his exaggerated smile and he may be the second cliche for today, the ‘Evil Dentist’.
Was wondering about them as well
No, ‘Doc’ is Coot, Doctor Cooter Jones, archaeologist and part-time gynaecologist
Unfortunately, sometimes there seems to be an overlap between those two professions, particularly among his patients who are, shall we say, fanatically chaste…He wears a filter mask to avoid breathing a lot of dust.
I suspect Hilda is still in her new thong. It makes her testy.
Do you think Krona had it set to ‘burlap’?
Choose one:
a) sandpaper
b) macrame
c) heavily starched cotton
d) shrink wrap
e) barbed wire
f) dental floss
g) guitar G-string (for pickin’ and a grinnin’)
h) leather, with or without metal studs
i) other (specify)
(i) scour pads if you don’t think those things are easily equivalent irritants, i’m sorry. i’ve personally taken enough material off of a stainless steel shelving unit to stain the water gunmetal grey whilst cleaning with one.
Like soap-impregnated steel wool? SOS(TM) pads? Nah, cause I doubts that Hildy foregoes the pleasure? of a Scandinavian carpet to match her drapes, so it’d just be two scour pads nestling against each other. Instead of irritating her, it might just improve her hygiene.
Just sayin’.
Maybe rotating through all those options? Subtly morphing, from one to another, so the type of discomfort only changes gradually.
With i) being Random Guy‘s burlap option. Those medieval monks had hundreds of years practice. I am sure they will have perfected continuous low-grade self-flagellation!
Hee! If it;s going to morph, than one of the steps should be Brazilian Bikini Wax, to accomplish what I’m guessing Polysanity had in mind. After the wax has done its job, scouring pads could be rotated into the line-up. And camel hair, too (hi, Adamas!)
i) camel hair.
For g) Well, Hee Haw!
:D
Translated from old Norse…
It’s just the English text transliterated into a runic alphabet.
That’s still more effort I’d put into a throwaway joke.
Specially when you consider that Marvel had a saga (Fear Itself) full of characters who speak in runes only which used nothing but gibberish on their bubbles.
Not even “oh, it’s another language” but “just smash a cat into the keyboarakçfnmapgiGG”.
I dunno. Giantitp had a character speaking gibberish for like two hundred pages or something. However it wasn’t gibberish, just a really long game of letter substitution.
At times her word bubble had the same letter spacing as someone else, letting the reader figure out what the letters were supposed to be.
Clever technique. Reminicent of one of the biggest breaks that allied code-breakers got, in WWII. I think in the Pacific arena. A lengthy message sent in code. But the receiving station indicated that they had not got it all clearly, and requested it be resent. With some idiot officer deciding that they could not waste any more time, going through the encryption process again, so ordered it sent in plain!
When you have a letter-for-letter encrypted version versus an unencrypted one, it does not take much to figure out the code! Even with part of it being lost to interference.
It’s partially how they broke the Enigma code. The Nazis would always send the weather update or something encoded, and always ended with the same salute. So they had a baseline to start decoding around
Hence the added comment at the bottom of the page about it not really being old Norse.
How does Vyrmil breathe? His nose ends on his upper lip, there are no nostrils.
Hmm… at the sides of his nose, right below the eyes? Through his skin? Or not at all?
…through his mouth?
I do see some nostrils though, on the closeup panel. They’re not really prominent.
Yeah on the side of his “nose” ridge just under his eyes.
Worms and insects breath through their skin. They don’t have lungs.
Worms, yes, breathe through their skin. Most insects’ skins are too hard to breathe through; they have tiny holes in their abdomens called spiracles that allow them to breathe. Due to their small scale, they do not need lungs to get the oxygen to the cells and carbon dioxide out, but use a series of air sacs to convey the air directly.
Also why bugs got so big in the Carboniferous period. insanely high oxygen content meant it was easier for Spiracles to collect oxygen, hence why we ended up with eagle-sized dragonflies and three-meter long Millipedes.
And it’s just fine by me that that fact limits their size today.
somewhere on that list the genius who wrote it mentions seeing a shrink to deal with any exploitable mental issues. I would assume that wearing a halloween costume full time would be among those. besides, a well chosen bespoke suit conveys menace all on its own.
I always see a well tailored suit and think, “Wow, that person is easily manipulated.”
You must love Washington DC.
Pretty good example of it, yea.
My thought is this…
If someone can be talked into to spending 50 times as much money on something that can be ruined by a car driving by and hitting a puddle, instead of just buying a cheap one and having it taken in to fit them for a twentieth of the price at worst for the same end result and less investment of time, they can be talked into anything.
I kind am amused by sciona’s dork friendships.
Though I am oddly fond of mr or ms mckshy-horror-maybe-immortal-face
Cthilla is female
To quote the CGI Lorax… “That’s a woman?!”
Yes, yes she is, go on up and get a closer look
Sciona just tried & had her hand knocked away (first panel)…
I get that that’s the one lazy, shitty stereotype that’s still permissible in polite society. It’s still disappointing as hell to see turn up here.
I’m hoping for this not to be the case and, as someone noted above, for this just to be a more enlightened being hiding under this guise to trick people into a false sense of security, but somehow, I doubt it.
Or maybe someone with a lifespan of 3 more panels. A creature so repugnant that even the bad guys want nothing to do with him alive. Though a few more pints of blood may finish off that drawing on the floor.
It would be tolerable if this guy had the super disadvantage of always appearing to be whatever you’d find to be most obnoxious (which helped pay for his super advantage of being immune to damage).
Oh god, him, nyah nyah cant hit me man, and achilles would be the most aggravating trio of super villains in the world to fight. One ticks you off every time he opens his mouth, one you cant manage to connect with so much as a single hit, and the third has no reaction to anything you try.
cooter vs math. aka Asshole Victim versus the Chivalrous Pervert! i wouldn’t mind seeing that fight, personally. Math going all professorial mode and max is just standing off to the side, begrudgingly agreeing with the “lesson”.
It’s not even nearly the only stereotype that still exists. Example: Big Bang Theory is a sitcom that routinely mocks smart people.
Yea, Big Bang theory annoys me a lot. Completely goes with the common perception of Nerds and not the reality (which is even more comical.)
I always like to use this one smbc as an example of the difference…
https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/biology-2
For example… people think nerds are socially awkward. Thing is, it’s actually the “social awkwardness” of a parent trying to embarrass their kid. When it’s important, most are actually pretty good at fitting into social conventions -when they want to-. But the fact of the matter is, society bores them, and they just don’t care, and so find it more interesting to try and screw with people’s perceptions.
For example, my friends and I (I consider myself a nerd and a geek), would, for one example, knowing Wal-Mart doesn’t staff enough people to actually manage their stores, underpays everyone, and so the managers need a good excuse to have to hire more people, making them a good “prank target” would just go in and start rearranging the store – putting was fruit in with the real fruit, rotating all the food items so you could only see the nutritional information, putting fish-fry items in the pet department, the list goes on. You could check a week later and the items might often still be there (well, except the wax fruit among the real fruit.)
Or in short, it’s not social awkwardness, it’s social trolling.
That’s not true for everyone either, trolling isn’t a sign of high intelligence.
That’s not really “nerd” behavior.
Nerds/geeks tend to obsess over particular fandoms or hobbies, and when those hobbies are not considered “cool” by mass media and society, they get treated as weird. Social awkwardness has a lot to do, I think, with the fact that they want to share their interest and that people who do not share it feel uncomfortable being exposed to something not considered socially acceptable.
I think a fair portion of “nerd abuse” comes from the fact that it is made socially acceptable by the teachers and administrations at most schools. They were not the hyper-intelligent students when THEY grew up, and they considered such people amongst their peers weird, so they find it “understandable” when those kids get picked on. Add in that the jocks of yester-year are now Hollywood producers and the like, and you get the image of the cool kids being the jocks and the outcasts being the good students.
When I was in elementary school, the gym teachers ran the place. I don’t know why, but they did. Presidential physical fitness awards were treated as high honors, and school resources went towards supporting the most fit kids doing well in these and towards training us for them. Presidential academic achievement awards, however, were not even applied for, because the administration claimed “it made children uncomfortable to be called out for academic excellence.” Well, yeah, when you allow the gym teachers to encourage bullying the unathletic, and you treat the academically gifted as weird nerds to be segregated but not actually given any laud…you wind up with kids being embarrassed for being “smart.”
There’s also a lot of projection; everybody FEELS like they were the outcast, so whatever the writer was in to that wasn’t overtly popular becomes an interest of the “nerds” that we’re supposed to sympathize with.
As to stereotypes, it’s still pop culturally acceptable to insult white males, and even white females if they’re blatantly conservative or (better yet) Christian. Frankly, the only stereotype aspect I find particularly irritating about Coot is the confederate stars-on-bars on his shirt, and that’s not even personally annoying as I have never been a fan of the Confederacy and don’t share the “national pride” that many in the South have for it. But I know a great many people who are fine, upstanding, pro-American citizens who would find Coot’s behavior reprehensible and be disgusted to be associated with him, who nevertheless feel a historical pride in the Confederacy’s secession (even if they don’t agree with the racial slavery that motivated it…and many have a historical selective memory that lets them claim it was for other reasons). (There were other reasons, but that was the biggie, which is why it’s understandable that people would prefer to pretend it wasn’t. Because they do feel a shame over that aspect.)
Slightly less pop culturally acceptable, but probably not going to offend the majority of real people (as opposed to pop culture mavens who think they’re the majority), you could probably use stereotypes surrounding know-nothing college student protestors, particularly if they’re of the rioting sort who spew the worst of the slogans without ever thinking about them.
That said, because it’s not pop culturally acceptable, you’d get more visible backlash for it.
It always fascinates me how you can actually tell which stereotypes of violent jerkwads are least accurate by how socially acceptable it is to portray them: people seem to like feigning fear of groups they feel safe assaulting as an excuse for outrage, but feigning outrage over attacking the groups they really fear as an excuse for their cowardly refusal to call out such groups’ bad behavior.
Once, on a late night shopping excursion into the Mart of Wall I got bored and put a can of Skippy dog food into the peanut butter aisle to see if anyone would notice.
They won’t. Normal, non-troll customers will plunk any item down in any location if they decide they don’t want it. Something like that is just visual white noise after awhile.
There’s a whole “A Choice Was Made” meme (ish) where people show images of items left on shelves because they decided to get the thing on the shelf instead (eg apple left in candy bar rack).
And so I sit here and watch people wish death on a character for being part of a stereotype that isn’t the stereotype that they themselves fall into. One could say ‘oh it’s just a character’, but when the reason you want them to die is because you don’t like their stereotype due to the real people who create and perpetuate it… does no one see this as mildly wrong?
Seems like both sides of the coin really are the same if you dig deep enough.
If he has a long beard, and is kind of scruffy & oily, and goes huntin’ & muddin’, that’s not offensive. If he introduces himself with a cunnilingus reference as an awkward attempt to aggrandise himself, he could be dressed by Savile Row and still seem irritating, offensive, & juvenile.
A similar, though not quite as blatant, example would be the Frenchman in the Matrix movie. He loved to curse in French because it was like “wiping your ass with silk.” Just as offensive & manipulative as anyone in the stereotype of “the excesses of the privileged class” was how he was “programmed.”
Im just gonna say this. No clue why, but as soon as i saw coots face Sydny flashed through my mind. Like, he’s related to her. Somehow. My immeditate reaction was as dad, but having thought about it that’s probably not the case. It does bring up an interesting question though, have we ever met her parents? Seen any of her family?
Who am i kidding, we probably have and i just forgot
All we know, IIRC, is that she inherited her name from her dad.
They did a phone call in the restaurant but we only heard one side.
Her dad might be a bit of a nerd, she promised him an action figure of herself.
Or it could be that he’s proud of what his daughter is doing & wants to have a “display trophy” in the house.
:)
Ron never really stonewalled any of Leslie’s projects so much as he would just not do anything to help them because of his hatred for government projects. But even for Leslie, because she was a good friend and he respected the hell out of her, he might, on occasion, very reluctantly lift that finger and do the bare minimum he could to help her. And of course even the little he did had excellent results because he’s Ron fucking Swanson.
Always wondered what would have happened if Ron had woken up one morning and said You know, I should be fixing things on a higher level.
I read this comic … lifted my coffee to my lips and said.. , ” This Fogg Horn Leghorn MotherF*#Ker is just missing a confederate flag on is hat…” Then my eyes catch site of it hidden behind his shotgun ammo belt across his chest… sipped my coffee ” ..well played….”
Oh, I see it now. That was subtle, Dave.
Earth Wyrmil Jim? o_O
And they haven’t horribly murdered this guy why exactly?
Utter unkillability, at the cost of being the most annoying entity possible.
Oh. So, Achilles 2.0, then…
… Or… Maybe Coot was the *prototype* for Achilles… >.>
Coot is Achilles pappy,
Thought you said ‘puppy’ for awhile (still seems funner :P)
Okay then, so why has no one stuffed him in an oil drum, filled it with concrete, and sank it in the Marianas Trench yet?
They did.
He got out.
If Hilda is Norse… hasn’t she seen FAR worse? One would assume so, if she wasn’t some prim and proper princess/chieftain’s daughter. Even then, she’s old enough where this shit shouldn’t phase her anymore. But sure, why not.
Cooter’s name is hillarious, and so is he, in a socially inappropriate manner. Hopefully he actually has some personality besides the redneck shtick.
Cthillia is actually somewhat attractive to be honest. Granted, in an androgynous sort of way and mostly due to her goofball personality coupled with mercenary badass background, but still. The spiky bits would be an issue though – I penetrate easily.
Wyrmil doesn’t look too bad from a distance either.
She have some of that femme fatale charm.
I was thinking the same. If she was part of a viking tribe at any point she’s DEFINITELY seen worse, been subjected to worse, and by now probably DONE the same or worse. She’s old and powerful, can’t tell me she hasn’t tried being the sexist one before.
“hasn’t she seen FAR worse”
Yeah, probably. She just still thinks it’s disgusting.
Vikings were probably generally a little cleaner than Dr Jones here. Norsemen were known for their grooming, of all things.
Yes, but the rest of Europe not so much. Given the Norse propensity for raiding and travel, one would assume she’d have seen more uncouth peoples for centuries before modernity struck relatively recently. Even if she stayed relatively close to home for all that time, war-captives would have been present and a relatively normal sight.
Yeah, but the way they groomed themselves wasn’t much improvement.
Picture a line of warriors arranged highest to lowest status. Mr. High Status scrubs himself clean, which includes spitting and blowing out his nose into the water, then passes the bowl of nasty to the next in line. Who repeats the process.
You did NOT want to be the last in line at bath time.
Or so I’m told.
And Dabbles grins knowingly at the last three words :D
So these are the ‘Legion of Doom’ to Archon’s ‘Justice League’.
I think Archon is going to need all the help it can get. These guys are too strange not to be very dangerous.
Ok, im going with the general crowd reaction here. Coot is either destined to be very short lived, they grabbed the most obnoxious loser they could find to be a sacrifice for something, (maybe another robot?) or he is doing something like pulling a tobi here and pretending to be a redneck idiot hick to annoy everyone around him for his own amusement, and make them underestimate him despite being powerful enough to hang with this crew. Or he is trolling them super hard right now and next comic he will shapeshift into some sort of supernoble sephiroth looking dude and set off bishonen alerts across three counties.
i’m personally going with a version of the latter, just because without a moral compass, it’s totally what i’d do. to a degree i already do, since i live near philly and the perception is that polite, goofy, and hard working equals dumb.
I think that if Cooter was brought to be a sacrifice, then he wouldn’t be allowed to keep his guns up to this point. There’s got to be more to him than just enjoying the disgusting stereotype he’s portraying.
Can’t help but think Coot is just messing with everyone, possibly a powerful wizard that got his own form of immortality and afterwards decided to be a jerk to people for kicks. And eventually decided nothing is more annoying then that a really stereotypical southerner. Or maybe he’s a shape shifting magical being who is possibly a hop skip and a jump away from being Omnifarious.
Team Evil is definitely more numerous than I’d realized. My big question now is whether Deus is a member. It seems like he wouldn’t be, just due to style differences, but needs must when the devil drives and all that.
Deus seems to be pragmatic enough to not be too evil.
I don’t think Deus is working with anyone in the persuit of evil. Or against anyone, for that matter.
He’s only working for himself, and against anyone that tries to stop himself.
You know you need to brush up on your manners, if a room full of monsters feel that your presence has lowered the tone dramatically.!
Fus Ro Dah!*
(how I heard it)
Oh my god, it’s my dad with an American accent. FUCCCCK
Yeah I know everyone’s mind is in the gutter, but “COOTER” is actually the name of a southern dwelling turtle. So that’s really “Turtle Jones”. Call him “Turt” (sounds like ‘Turd”) for short.
It is *also* the name of a turtle, as Stephen Colbert found out years ago.
“There’s a sign on the wall, but she wants to be sure ’cause know sometimes words have two meanings…”
You know one thing I like about this comic? Even the villains seem pretty human. They make mistakes, they have hobbies and things they enjoy outside of supervillainy, and they are comfortable just chatting and goofing off about stuff like “who has the ugliest face in the room”. It’s a refreshing change from the standard “I’m a megalomaniac who’s going to destroy the earth and that is literally all there is to know about me” kind of villains in fiction.
How is that a refreshing change? Doing a good ol’ proper supervillain like that hasn’t been in style in over twelve years. The fiction scene has been absolutely over-saturated with ‘relatable’ villains for over a decade, to the point that people consider the original style to be ‘bad writing’ when it was good enough since the 40s.
Problem is, people keep going ‘oh it’s new and fresh’ when that’s just objectively not true. I actually want to see a return of well-written supervillains who are just plain EVIL. No sob backstory, no ‘I was almost a good guy’, no ‘I’m evil but for a good reason’, and definitely no ‘I’m just like you except some times I try to take over the world’. Give me friggin’ Lex Luthor of yesterday. Give me the well-written smarmy murderous bastard or psychotic megalomaniac chick who lives a life out of touch with the common human being. Bring me back people I can hate but still respect because of their skill and aptitude instead of ‘villains’ that I’d like to kick back with and talk out of villainy so we could just hang all day.
Because it’s very unrealistic to have every antagonist be completely evil and for your character to always have the moral high ground.
Besides, most people don’t respect villians no matter how skilled or powerful they are.
Frieza! Frieza! Frieza! Frieza!
Or in other words an amalgamation of Japanese sleazy Landsharks who defiantly hurt people financially while buying up and flipping residential properties.
I was always a fan of the mayor from buffy. He wasnt some flash gordan era megalomaniac mustache twirling villain. He was evil, he didnt even try to hide it, but he was like a souless mr rogers. Always trying to cheer up his underlings, offering them cookies, full of those pithy saying like how the children are our future and such. And he meant all of it too! It wasnt an act, and yet he also planned to devour the entire graduating class of sunnydale high school in order to complete his ascension ritual and become a greater demon or whatever. He wasnt some sort of relateable redeemable bad guy who you could sympathize with, but he was also more than a one note MWAHAHAHA bad guy.
Yeah, the likes of Lex Luthor as of the old days was quite human, especially during the Silver Age of DC comics when he & Superboy lived in Smalllville. Ha actually wanted to be the scientist who benefits humanity as a whole. In the late part of the Silver Age, he had grown & had made his mistakes, became disillusioned with humanity as a whole & developed his hatred for Superman. He was a criminal & freely acknowledged it as a fact, he just didn’t care about it.
Similar to Dr. Doom of Marvel comics, we know his history from when he was a child. His early works were first to aid his gypsy tribe, but he grew bitter against outsiders when his mother was burned as a witch & even more so when his physician father had to take Victor & flee from an unjustly vengeful royalty. Granted, Dr. Doom isn’t the sort of person that would be well-disposed to just sitting down & “chatting” with other villains though…
The irony of having a confederate villain today is noted.
I git yer drift.
Is that… the GRRL Power version of… old man Henderson?
https://1d4chan.org/wiki/Old_Man_Henderson
Skip to the directors cut if you can stomach the awesomeness of it all.
Well that sucked up 45 minutes of my time yesterday. (And that’s because it wasn’t my first time at Old Man Henderson’s rodeo.)
Mother of God.
That was some of the best legit munchkin BS I’ve ever read.
>2Henderson is the terrifying one.
I cannot adequately express my shame at not having read this before and my gratitude to you for bringing it to my attention.
He seems similar to the Grandpa in the movie, The Lost Boys. He knew about vampires all along. And he even left me wondering if he was a vampire himself also…
Naa. Pretty sure we saw him in daylight a couple of times. And we saw the older brother smoking (in the non-cigarette sense) when exposed to daylight. Besides which he clearly disliked vampires too much.
I can see where your wriggle room is though, in that he expressed it as (something like) “That is the problem with this town. There are too many darned vampires!” Which could leave your possibility open (barring the daylight thing).
Coot is to be voiced by Matt Hullum (RVB Sarge). This is not negotioable.
Shouldn’t Cthillia be in whos who?
Yes. And Gunnhildr. For the second page.
Clearly she must be an illusion, or a shapechanger, or some other variety of impostificator.
To really drive the joke home Gunnhildr’s entry should be spelled out in runes.
+1
Anyone notice the doctor in the background kind of looks like The Joker? The mouth, the smile, the skin color. The clothes do not match of course.
Oh..and the guy has never met them before, based on his comments. I would assume he is the “victim” as someone said before.
Maybe. But he seems awfully confident. Your run of the mill victim would not be that self-assured when fist meeting a room full of monsters!
My Yorpie Snax™ go on him being a representative of the preacher, from panel 2 of the rogues gallery.. We already have half of them represented here. And the summoning circle could be indicative of yet another.
again unlikely to be a summoning circle and more likely to be a ritual circle since blood is a very bad material to use in summoning circles since it is a liquid and as of such are prone to vaporization, meaning that summoning of abyssal or infernal beings, the only one you would summon from the rogues gallery is a Demon, is a very bad idea, not to mention that once it dries it turns incredibly brittle and tent to crack, as of such won’t do much to stop whatever the circle is meant to contain if they try to crush through, as of such its more likely to be used for some kind of ritual.
Good points.
I thought Arianna’s role in the comic strip was to provide friction with Maxima. At least in a Doylist sense.
Maxima’s skin is very slippery. So I don’t think she would be creating friction with Cooter Jones! Amongst other reasons.
However his chauvinism will doubtless create friction with her, but of the feminist variety, rather than the Doyalist.
I thought I would sit back and let other folks jump in with identifying the guy in white. Figuring there would be a lot of references to one particular character. But apparently no one else was mad enough to make this visual connection!
He (?) does seem to be a lightly colored variant of X. Kind of surprised that no one has talked about whom I shall for now dub WhiteX.
I did have an uncle Cooter many years ago. Don’t recall much other than he lived in the sticks and raised chickens.
Cooter is also the best character from The Dukes of Hazzard.
gotta disagree with you there Dave, Cooter is not fundamentally dislikeable. he has a deplorable excess or personality, but he is trying to be funny and dissolve tension. In today’s world where most folks are scared to offend anyone and come across with the depth of a sheet of paper for a personality, it’s refreshing to see someone who really doesn’t give a fuck and goes for the laugh. besides he likes guns, that gives him at least +5 points on the likeability scale. You sure he’s a bad guy?
I’m really curious why any vampire would want The Veil destroyed. Vampires benefit the most from it.
They could wipe out/”embrace” an entire city in the name of “Self-Defense” and Boom! Their own Nation.
But… that doesn’t make sense on nearly every level. More vampires means less food to go around. Once cryptids are revealed vampires are most vulnerable due to them dying to pretty much everything except old age. Vampires already seem to have the most say in The Council.
It’s just bad all around for all vampires. I suspect they’re being mind controlled like how Vehemence had manipulated everyone.
Agreed.
That will change mind, as the leadership chair rotates to another faction. It is interesting to note though that, when a leader is chosen, they get to take their fellow delegates along to the central table (note both Crimson and Scarlet were with Ingsol). In addition though, they also get to replace the vacated seats, in the delegate’s box.
Hence why you are correct in saying that presently vampires do have a dominant voice.
It is a sensible arrangement though, as the leader has to speak for the greater community, and should attempt to be impartial when it comes to conflicts of interest. Hence why it is necessary to have fresh delegates, to speak for their faction, in the leader’s absence.
Which is quite a problem for Krona mind. Being the only one in her faction!
Sydney seems to have enough similarities that Krona could potentially extend her an invite to join. But then they would have the issue of deciding whether Halo would join Krona at the leader’s table. Or sit in the delegate’s box, as the leader of the nerd’s faction?
Or fly between the two, depending on what she wants to talk about. :-D
The rest of your comments are all insightful, and I would agree.
Although toned down to ’embrace enough of a city to control it’ it would then make sense. Although would really need to do that to the whole country if wanting to have a nation, rather than a very-short-lived nation which would soon be overwhelmed by a big army and super heroes.
I hope you are OK with me replying to your insightful comments? They are both interesting and thought provoking, despite us disagreeing on some points, at times.
Really do hope you have a better plan for this guy than just “obvious southern stereotype”. Spinnerette already did that and it was more than disappointing when the character turned out to really be one-dimensional.
Who’s the obvious southern stereotype in Spinny?
Roberta Lee
To be fair the entire point of her was to be the very worst combination of those stereotypes Krow could make. I’m from the south and I just had to laugh at just how absurd she was.
I hope no one is implying that Ron Swanson is unlikable. Because Ron Swanson is totally likable.
Ron Swanson is awesome. Ron Swanson is better than awesome actually.
Ron Swanson is RON SWANSON. That’s the highest praise ANYONE can ever get.
If I go up to you and say ‘That was very RON SWANSON of you’ then I have basically given you the pinnacle of compliments.