Grrl Power #774 – Polymaybe
There’s probably a bit more to polyamory than what Harem says, but that’s got to be a pretty good starting point. Obviously things get more complicated when people start talking about marriage, but that’s almost entirely because the laws in most countries don’t deal with that sort of thing. Things get really bonkers when a marriage of 3, or more people breaks up and you have to start dividing assets. Image a five-way when three people stay in and two leave or something. Yikes.
Please ignore the weird, counter-high table that Harem is laying on. I may have messed up the framing a bit and even with how short Sydney is, I needed to elevate Harem so everyone fit in the frame along with the word bubbles.
Tables are supposed to be slightly lower than countertops. It’s one of those things we all know even if we don’t think about it. There’s actually a lot of things we “know” until it comes time to draw them. Like how high doorknobs are. Or how high the bottom part of cabinets are. Not the ones on the floor. Upper cabinets. The ones on the wall over the countertops. I don’t know if they have their own name. I’m sure they do, actually, but I don’t care enough about cabinets to google it.
So I said Michael-Scott Earle is back online. You can get his back catalog of books at his website, but now the Kickstarter for the next Tamer book is up. It’s doing okay – It got funded in under 3 hours, and as of when I’m writing this, it’s only $5K from the $50K stretch goal of increasing the word count of the story from 80K to 100K. (Most of the rest of his novels are around 80K for comparison.) The nutty thing about MSE is that’s like 2 extra days of writing for him.
Anyway, if you’re not familiar with Tamer yet and only listen to audiobooks, there’s good news. MSE has decided to redo the Tamer audiobooks because he’s thinking he probably can’t get back the guy who did the first few now a year later. The great thing about this is the new narrator is actually 2 narrators. There’s a guy doing narration and male dialog, and a woman doing all the female dialog, and man, is it so much better than listening to a guy read female dialog in falsetto. The other great thing is the first book is free, and the second book might be free, but they’re both pay what you like, and I chipped in a few bucks so I’m not sure. Actually I think the second book is $1 to download cause it costs him a little bit each time, but still free to stream, so check them out.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like!
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.
Jeez – one night in the hot tub with Space Dog and she’s all ready for anything and stuff….
My guess would be that it was the “I was almost disintegrated by Giant Robotic Space Whales of Mass Destruction” that acted as the catalyst here, as opposed to Space Furries.
I blame a combination of things
Space furries
Kicking space ass in a near death experience
Surrounded constantly by hot men and women
Blatant corruption by her favorite succubus & the Spaceship Captain
Living a comic book fantasy as a real life superhero
Actually liking them both
Aside from having had a few brief interactions with Krona, such as being amazed by the reveal of her powers and working/fighting together at the Wars warehouse, Sydney doesn’t seem to have had much time with Krona. And the same goes for Leon, as he explained it just a comic or two ago.
So yeah, prudish Sydney who wears 7 towels to walk through a girls-only shower room suddenly looking to jump into a polyamorous relationship seems like lousy character development. And this page is also quite redundant, because Sydney has already asked Krona and Leon if they wouldn’t mind if he dated both girls, and Krona’s response was a fairly tepid “I dunno, I’ll have to think about it.” So what’s she going to say to Krona? “So, have you had enough time to think about it? Because I’m more horny than I thought so I’ll be needing that answer now.”
How is it ‘lousy’ character development? I mean, it’s ‘character development,’ but not necessarily lousy. It’s adventurous for her. She’s trying to break out of a shell she has when it comes to her body image and persona.
Which is probably going to be helpful since she will be working with and being close friends with some of the hottest men and women on the planet, apparently. Not to mention a frickin’ literal succubus. :)
I also think she’s not repeating what she asked during the last ‘meeting’ with Krona and Leon. This time I think she’s meaning she just wants to be Krona’s friend and hang out with her more often. The ‘group’ involved the fact that she’s already friends with at least one other girl – Harem. The ‘group’ would be Sydney, Harem, and Krona.
Correction, the group would be Sydney, Harem, Krona, Harem, Harem and Harem (the last Harem will be ‘On Duty’ at Archon so can’t join in) :D
Remember, all ‘character development’ is lousy if doesn’t develop the character in the way the poster wants or demands
I guess the Harem on duty would be the girly one :)
Or perhaps if it isn’t paced in anything even remotely like a realistic way consistent with the realism of pacing elsewhere in the comic.
Dave is trying to be fairly realistic about some of this (as evidenced by a day or two away from Harem and the jump-scare reflex is back.)
We’re still not that far into the flashback. If we skip time forward a bit, then it might be different.
It’s lousy character development because of the ham-handed approach. The speed at which Sydney is changing things that were well established aspects of her character is far too fast. People rarely change this dramatically across the period of a few days.
In DumbingofAge a character made a joke about the repressed religious girl: One day she’s going to snap and then suck a million dicks. It’s funny because it’s a joke: Ridiculous. A sexually repressed person who begins to have sex may have a lot of sex with that partner, because they’ve just learned exactly how much fun it can be, but they rarely just “snap and suck a million dicks.” It just isn’t a reasonable or rational pace of change for the character.
And this same unreasonable and irrational pace of change in Sydney is why this “character development” is lousy character development.
What part, of his entire comics run, has been either ‘reasonable’ or ‘rational’? Let alone both
You’re not making a point. But that’s you in a nutshell…
May be a nutshell, at least not a nutjob
Yeah, well, people rarely get superpowers and are lost on a dead planet many light years from home and had to risk their lives fighting alien kajius (and winning) and visit a space station and befriend a cyborg spaceship captain before they can come back home, so there is that, too.
So you’re saying that “getting superpowers and being lost on a dead planet many light years from home and having to risk their lives fighting alien kajius (and winning) and visiting a space station and befriending a cyborg spaceship captain” just naturally makes someone just want to suck a million dicks even though before she was so shy that she wore 7 towels in the girls locker room?
I mean, yeah, I’ve seen this in a pile of lousy fan fic. But damn…
Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IepnA7YFeQ
SPACE…
DAAAAAAWWWWWWWGGGGGGG!!!
Is that a reference to a certain dog in a boat?
Cora? Seriously Cora is she trying to decide how serious she is about her space Wolf boyfriend?
I think she’s calling Krona to try and do some of that communication and make sure she’s actually okay with the prospect of being part of a polycule.
If that is all she is doing her experiment has already failed.
They need to be actual friends apart from interrelationship with Leon.
Can you elaborate? If you mean everyone in a polycule must be friends with each other, that’s not true. As long as everyone respects each other, you should be safe for poly.
Pretty much, it can help if you’re all friends, but it’s definitely not a requirement for a healthy or functional relationship, especially in larger groupings where it’s not always practical to have a barbecue every weekend together as a group. Got to give Dave props here, he treated it better than most come even close to realising regarding the group dynamics involved.
By “group thing”, I took it to mean a “girl’s night out” with Krona and Harem, because she needs more female friends. And the poly thing is on hold for now.
I read this as a polycute…
Well, Sydney and Krona would make it cute :D
Where, did you get that from?
I was asking this: Cora? Seriously Cora is she trying to decide how serious she is about her space Wolf boyfriend?”
From e_voyager.
Not sure if the comic was updated or if I simply read it wrong originally but when I first read this a couple minutes after the comic loaded I’m pretty sure I was reading Cora not Krona
Nope, always had Kronachrome (unless DaveB corrected it within a few hours of original post, it was Kronachrome for me by the time got here)
As I said it was within a few minutes of the comic update when I checked it I have a habit of doing that on days when I remember that the comic is update because the updates at 5 a.m. and typically on break during that time
What does Cora have to do with this? o_O
I just realized that not only did Punk Rock Harem shave the sides of her head, she also moved the pink tuft to the middle. The pink used to be asymmetric. To be honest I preferred it the old way. I never much cared for the side shaving that seems to be so popular these days.
Same here! I liked the old hairstyle more too. And the art, I think it fit the absurdist/anime-like humour more.
I concur. The new art style looks super polished and nice. Buuuuut I loved the original 100 pages of art for the more cartoony, wacky style. Looking between the two, I kinda prefer the old style.
*le sigh*
“these days” being the last 20-30 years? Seriously, I’ve known women (straight ones, even) who shaved (or closed buzzed) the sides for at least 2 decades. Heck, a noticeable number did that, then kept the top long enough that it looks almost like a bowl haircut – seems to be much more comfortable in hot climates (less hair to insulate your head).
Go back to the 80s, or maybe even 70s for Grace Jones as one example of a woman that definitely rocked the look.
I thought Annabella Lwin looked cute with her shaved sides.
I’ve literally never heard that group before and I know a lot of obscure 70s and 80s bands.
Actually for a while there in the 80’s they weren’t actually obscure. Bow Wow Wow got a lot of airplay in the early days of MTV. Highly visual bands did pretty good for themselves back when the concept of a music video was still new.
Oh, you mean Jailbait Anna
Not sure if she ever qualified as jailbait for me as we are the same age. Pretty normal for a 15 year old boy to lust after a 15 year old girl. People did get pretty upset however for her homage to Manet’s Dejeuner sur l’Herbe on the cover of See Jungle! See Jungle!
I have no idea who ‘Jailbait Anna’ is. And I really desperately do not want to google to find out, because of what sort of pictures might show up. Please explain instead.
At the time of this video, she was only 15 years old (oh, it’s the same clip as Wellington‘s second link)
I would never have guessed. She looks older than 15. Weird music video. I’m guessing it’s an 80s thing. Also not a flattering haircut on her :) Actually not a flattering haircut on any of them. Her hairstyle is like punk Harem’ new hairstyle and Xoctwhateverhername’s hairstyle had a baby.
WARNING!!! +++Nekkid Lady Alert+++ WARNING!!!
The link in this posting is pretty tame by today’s standards, but may be NSFW in some of the more repressive locations
She was 14 when she posed for the cover of See Jungle! See Jungle! Her Mom went to Scotland Yard to have the photographer investigated for child pornography.
The entertainment/political complex was fully invested in covering for Jimmy Saville and his cohorts at that time, so nothing was done.
Yeah, interesting how all those claims happened after he died and couldn’t defend himself, or happened so long ago no one can correctly recall the events
Always sounded to me, to be either groupies regretting their actions when they become grannies, or just trying to slander someone (remember the claims against Sir Cliff?)
And as for the mother going to the cops, just recall what sort of songs she was performing and that will be probably be a big reason for the mothers complaints (also note how no one ever mentions the woman in the water)
Many of the claims about Jimmy Saville were originally made when they happened .
Years later society was no longer willing to tolerate that crap anymore and old allegations were finally actually investigated.
Pretty much the same as Sandusky in the United States.
What was rich was the BBC covering for their paedophiles while they condemned the Catholic Church for doing same.
I’ve had a few female friends and one girl cousin who shaved under their hair. As in you couldn’t tell by looking that they had shaved, but underneath they had shaved a couple inches of scalp. All of them had the same reason: Much cooler, even though none of them wore their hair really long.
Personally, I have my own take on the undercut hairstyle. I have really long hair, but instead of shaved on one side, I just have it parted in a way where all my hair is on the left side of my face. It achieves almost the same exact look, but it’s done without shaving half my scalp. I quite like the look.
The new hairstyle is a little offputting admittedly. On men OR women, honestly, I’m not a fan of it, but especially not on women.
Harem’s just fortunate to have a cute face to be able to pull off that hairstyle. Plus a lot of guys probably wouldnt be looking immediately at her hair.
Yeah, it moved from being above her left eye to being between her eyes, whether that’s because when she changed the cut she moved the patch, or DaveB made an art error (going to go with the deleberate change on Bodie’s part :P )
This sounds like Sydney is willing to give up on dating Leon, or at least put the thought on hold for a while, and first see how things go when hanging out with Krona. Which is for the best in case she decides she does want to go through with this polyamory dating thing.
Longtime reader, but I generally don’t have much to add to the discussion. Thought I’d point out the typo in panel one, which should read either “all you need to know about polyamory is it’s only going to work…” or “all you need to know is polyamory is only going to work…”
Then again people DO speak un-grammaticallu all the time.
Whoops. I’ll get that fixed.
Did you see the two typos on Monday’s comic?
I guess I didn’t. And now I’m annoyed that I don’t see them even after a careful reread.
To avoid such pitfalls you either need a copy editor or a nit-picky fan-base that will catch those “DuhOh” moments that happens to everyone that self edits.
The human brain is fallible that way and can fool itself into reading what it meant to put down on paper instead of seeing what it did put down on paper.
Good thing Dave has the lots of the second option. :)
Well, they’re not fixed yet so…
Panel two – multiple is misspelled mulitple
Panel three – “It’s old fashion” should be “it’s old fashion*ed*”
Also in panel 1 in the comic – “involvedis” needs a space to be “involved is”
Thanks! I’ll get those fixed.
thinking of going back to see if the one with the spider alien got fixed, but I’d rather say keep up the good work, and I really wish I could afford to Patreon!
Came here to say exactly that.
The way Harem looked at Sydney would ‘ve made Sydney say to herself: “I need to learn not to say that in front of Harem!”
Was going to say something, butt that would be an open invitation for a personal attack on me
This is going a weird direction. I’d like to wonder how the Wolf boy feels about it. Not like he staying on planet.
Maybe this is “Experimentation” Harem, and she’ll be something different every time.
Or maybe this is a new look for a different Harem, and there’s just 2 similar hairstyles. It’s hard top say without regular group selfies.
Gothamer and Bodie were the one’s with the two-toned hair: Gothamer with black hair and purple ‘Sydney-bangs’, and Bodie with the purple hair and pink patch
The only thing (that we can see :wink: ) with Bodie, is she shaved her sides and back, moved the patch and changed her lipstick colour (from dark red to purple)
DaveB: “Sydney will…eventually pass the psychopath test.”
Dear God, I hope not! If she ever passes that test as “positive,” the whole frickken’ world will be endangered!
But will Harem ever pass the Bechdel test?
Ask her gynecologist?
I’m just sitting here wondering if there’s an actual test people are referring to.
Life is an ongoing psychopathic test if you think about it.
There are several that test for different things, the internet famous one is about meeting a potential partner at a family funeral..k
The Bechdel Test is a sort of a litmus test for how women are treated in fiction. Its basis is to ask if there are two named women in a work of fiction,and that their dialog not be about a man. Apparently the requirement that they be named is optional. You would be surprised at how many modern offerings don’t pass. AKA The Bechdel-Wallace Test.
So when the girls of the Big Bang Theory had an extended discussion about who can lift Thor’s hammer, does that pass the Bechdel Test? They were talking about the hammer but Thor, who is male, owns it. And Thor is a god rather than a human so for the purposes of the test, does he count as a man?
There are plenty of scenes in the Big Bang Theory series that pass.
Whether or not that scene would pass, if it were the only one in the work, is probably more of a Rorschach test about the reviewer.
IMO, it passes for two reasons:
1) it’s about a hammer, ostensibly belonging to the thunder-god named Thor, and thus is about a genderless object, and
2) JANE FOSTER WAS THOR FOR MORE THAN A YEAR.
It’s limited, though, by the assumptions it makes about the setting. The most obvious being that the context of the conversation would automatically be personal rather than professional, but there are many others. In short, it can be a flag, but it’s neither necessary nor sufficient to ‘convict’ of poor gender balance on the writer’s part.
Many works fail the ‘test’ through no fault of the writing: the setting itself doesn’t have many female characters for legitimate setting-based reasons, don’t have many characters present at the same time regardless of gender, or are written to accurately reflect an unequal historical setting. In none of these cases is the Bechdel ‘test’ an accurate reflection of writing quality – although there are certainly cases where a writer has evidently shoehorned in a conversation to pass the ‘test’ despite it being significantly out of keeping with the rest of the setting. Comparing the results of the Bechdel and reverse-Bechdel (between male characters) ‘tests’ helps to flag up the few-characters and relationships-everywhere fail cases (fails for ‘no conversations’ and ‘relationship conversations only’ respectively), but it doesn’t do much for cases where the setting itself is skewed.
If you want an example of how absurd the ‘test’ is if taken rigidly, consider that a conversation between Doctors Chevy and Frost to co-ordinate treatment for a shared patient would either pass or fail depending on which patient they were discussing, even if the conversations were functionally identical!
My personal opinion is that if you have to think about it, you shouldn’t do it; romantic relationship are difficult enough when only two parties are involved and the difficulty increase exponentially (literally) with the number of people involved
One should also consider where they would personally draw a line between tolerance & acceptance. It’s less of a problem for one to tolerate something that someone else does, but could be a whole different matter to accept it for themselves.
And that’s where self-introspection & soul searching comes into focus.
To me, Sydney seems to be willing to take time to gather opinion & evidence (ie-find out if she & Krona can or can’t reconcile the idea into some workable form) before she makes an actual decision. Open discussion is the only way forward.
My personal opinion is that regardless of how many people involved, you should think about your relationships; romantic relationships are really difficult when you don’t think about them.
Anybody here read Weregeek? It is in the midst of an exploration-arc of how not to do polyamory.
I used to, but the main character, (and most of the side characters) became such a predictable trope and walking stereotype that it became unreadable.
Didn’t help that I was invested in the ‘anonymous government agency hunting weregeeks’ storyline that turned out to be a huge meta-game mindfuck. After that, my interest in the comic overall kinda of just sputtered out.
Loved the sci-fi and fantasy elements, utterly bored to death with the geek and nerd drama soap opera. I got enough of that nonsense in high school.
That being said, Harem’s explanation in the first panel holds true.
+1.
That whole hunters plot thing was what made it fun.
Kinda like how “Supernatural” was great in the first seasons, when it was just the Damn Winchester Boys hunting down monsters, butt when they introduced the whole Angels and Demons crap it started to go down the predictable Hersey’s Highway (although, Crowley and Cas were great additions to the cast :D )
It’s a combinatorial sequence. Not an exponential one.
> People. Relationships
>. 2. 1
>. 3. 3
> 4. 6
> 5. 10
If you have to think about it, it means you care about the other person involved
On HGTV, I’ve heard those cabinets referred to as “uppers”.
They’re generally referred to as cupboards.
Although, there’s a big argument (as usual, US English v British English) about the precise definitions of cabinet, closet and cupboard when referring to storage & display furniture. But a general rule of thumb is usually, a cupboard is a fixture, while a cabinet is freestanding (stability issues aside).
Generally free standing kitchen storage is either a hutch, a sideboard, or a china cabinet.
It’s dangerous to be prescriptive. My Concise Oxford Thesaurus has 30 synonyms for “cupboard”.
Different dialects of English vary widely in the terms used for different kinds of cupboard. “Closet”, “cabinet”, or “cupboard” are all recognised, but may describe very different things.
To make it more complex, some terms are used only locally. Thus, in Ireland a cupboard may be called a press. A British “airing cupboard” is an Irish “hot press”.
“Hutch” is not universally understood to be a cupboard. It may be used for a small wooden enclosure for a pet – e.g. a rabbit hutch.
Funny, in my house the upper level cabinets are named “microwave cabinet, coffee pot cabinet, slow cooker cabinet, and sink drainer cabinet”
Harem? Did you forget your eyeshadow in that first panel?
Yes she did. I’ll get that fixed too.
I hate to nitpick but the color of Harem’s collar seems off in panel eight.
Yeah, she lost the blue
…not sure I like where this is going. Really don’t care about Sydney’s love life. Really care even less about how Leon fits into it. It’s unfair to Krona to put her into the situation to begin with and generally I just hate the Harem anime/hentai trope being in the silly cheese/beef cake superhero story. But I get that I might be in the minority here
Well, that makes two of us. Which is still a minority of course.
So she gets Krona on the phone and you hear in the background, “Beep beep beep boop beepola.” The Sydney says, “Oh! Never mind.” She hangs up and says to Leon, “You’ll probably make a good friend.” Then she just leaves, while Harem and Leon look at each other.
More than two. Two pages without a decent punch line. If no one “breaks in with a gun” by the end of the next page, I’ll probably take a break.
I’m with you too. It’s more than I needed to know.
Generally, since Sydney got back there has been a LOT of exposition. I get the need for the human-ET explanation, though it went on about one page too long for me. This on top for (How many pages now?) feels like an eternity with two pages a week, no action, no comedy, and getting “woker” by the page. It doesn’t even work for Marvel, and they deliver 20+ pages at a time.
Not just two, I posted above about how this complete left turn from the girl who wears 7 towels in a same sex shower room just doesn’t feel anything like a natural character development.
The author likes harem writers, he has said his favorite author is a guy who writes harem fanfiction. So I guess it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone if and when he starts introducing it into his own story.
What I object to isn’t really the idea itself, it’s the ham-handed approach. Sydney went from a fairly sexually repressed girl, not asexual as we saw with her admiration of the Archon guys with their shirts off and earlier Olivia’s half-brother/cousin Tony, but still repressed (“Ew” and “Stupid hormones” to Peggy when she said she occasionally likes a male partner, etc. etc. etc).
Then cute space woof and *bam* she’s fucking in the hot tub.
Then home again and *bam* “Leon I’ve decided we will go out!”
Then Leon is with Krona and *bam* “Maybe Leon can date us both?”
It’s utter crap.
I agree with you that the sudden change in Sydney’s behaviour seems out of character for her. However, and I must stress that I know little on the subject, but couldn’t PTSD manifest itself as a rather stark shift in personality?
She was stranded on a devastated planet that was hundreds of light years away from home, and then faced imminent death from the alien squidbillies that had just wasted the planet. She escaped from that scenario, only to find herself on a space shopping mall where she knew none of the local language. Finally finding a friendly face in Cora, she boards a space ship where the crew is all hunky beefcake studs.
It just seems to me that all of that could result in some PTSD like residual effects. I suspect Sydney needs Dr. Frost’s services far more than she is aware of right now.
PTSD if she develops it wouldn’t have set in yet, she would still be displaying shock most likely.
Mayhaps not PTSD (yet), butt having near-death experiences could have her re-evaluate her life and decide life is too short (even shorter now she is facing life-threatening events), she needs a boyfriend, who does she know on earth she would like to date?
For some reason we don’t know Noel wasn’t an option, which left Leon as the prime candidate (remember, she already placed him in her Book, and not in the bad section)
And one thing we do know about Sydney: she is impulsive and doesn’t tend to think before she acts
Except, Buttheadicus, she didn’t have near death experiences. Her response to that suggestion was “I don’t give a fuck about that! I kicked their asses!”
She went on to describe what the anxiety she was feeling was actually about, but I’ll leave that for you to go and re-read since you’ve managed to once again apply the exact opposite meaning to things very clearly shown in canon, as is your habit.
Regardless of how she coped, she literally had near-death experiences
She came close to dying after Squidward started blowing up buildings around her (she barely got Mr Buble deployed in time and a piece of flying debris still got inside, bunched around and hit her, if it wasn’t for her protective jacket, she could have been seriously injured, if not outright killed)
Then there was the explosion that was powerful enough to weaken Mr Buble (one more hit, and flash-fried Sydney, and everyone else)
Look, Buttheadicus*, as usual you’re going for the “cake and eat it, too” approach. You can’t on the one hand claim that Sydney has PTSD and then on the other turn around and acknowledge that she is coping with her combat experiences just fine.
.
.
And let me tell you just how much I love that fact that Rich Morris’ nickname for you spells ‘butt’ correctly while also pointing out your idiotic and deliberate misspelling of the word ‘but’. I had never even heard of his comic before the forum posts on TMI pointed it out to me, but I might have to see if it is any good. I mean, clearly the author and I share a lot of things in common: We both like the fantasy genre and pointing out what an idiot you are.
No, dipsnorter, the first line clearly states that she “Mayhaps not (have) PTSD”
And point out where ever said that Sydney was coping fine
A greater man than you called me ‘Buttheadicus’, and it had no more impact on me other than the dribble from a childish rant
As for “YAFGC”, yes, you should read it, why you haven’t yet show how ignorant you are: it is, and has, been a fantastic comic, and have been trying to get people to read it for years
By the by, can’t see how you missed mention of “YAFGC” as mentioned it right in this comic prior to that moron attempting to stir up shit on “TMI”
That’s interesting, since the author Rich Morris seems to think that you are a waste of space. as his posts clearly describe.
Congratulations with your interactions with other human beings. It seems that the ones over at YAFGC have no use for you.
Again, how Mr Morris feels about me has not changed how feel about the comic: which is, that is a great comic and have been reading it for over ten years
And again, one author’s (and a bunch of followers, plus two moronic fuckwags trying to stir up shit) opinion out of numerous others doesn’t mean much
At the time of that meltdown, posted on several webics basically the same message: apologies for any disturbance presence has caused and will be leaving. And not one other author told me to go, in fact, most of them said they would be sad to see me go and that they liked reading posts from me, only two posters from other webics had anything negative to say: you (not surprisingly) and that Randomguy person (if you bothered to read the full “TMI” posts that you so love to trot out, you will see people rubbishing those claims)
Since Sydney seems to be so suddenly interested in Polyamory, maybe she should date both Leon and Noel. Nothing like a pair of palindromic boyfriends.
Well this stuff gets stale when it is done to death.
I would rather see at least as much nerd Sydney with comic books, games, movies, renaissance fairs, etc….
Beefcake and cheesecake stuff on the internet isn’t even a dime a dozen anymore. Its more like thirty giant compilations for a nickel. It does seem to be veering towards everything else apart from sexuality and the Alari plot being lost.
I mean, Sydney gets back and we haven’t seen her back at the comic shop.
Or met her parents, which really should have been at the welcome home party.
Yes, her parents. Didn’t she phone them after her return? Perhaps they are used to her antics and her disappearing without a trace for two months is par for the course in their eyes?
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-190-newhart-phonecall/
I got the impression from the previous call (and how frantic Sydney was to make it) that the parents were close, but just lived far away. That would mean staying in touch by phone and social media.
I rather imagine Maxima as Sydney’s C.O. had to inform them she was missing but that they hoped to recover her.
Thanks for the reminder. I definitely prefer the original Leon. Lately he has been looking like a doofus.
Yes, he looks a bit to gaunt now, like he’s malnourished instead of just lanky.
The cover story was that Sydney was sequestered for intensive training. That was probably what her parents were told. Since they knew that Sydney had been sent ~52 days forward in time, and Dabbler had called Cora to arrange to pick Sydney up very close to when the portal closed, they thought it was basically a matter of waiting until Sydney was alone on the planet so they could pick her up without risking a time kerfuffle. Cora was late due to the encounter with the Fel. Otherwise, Sydney’s ride would have showed up (from Sydney’s perspective) almost immediately.
So, Sydney wasn’t “missing” from Archon’s perspective. They just had to wait until she arrived in order to pick her up and bring her back home.
Recruits are not sequestered incommunicado without warning.
There would be a phone call if something like that happened, ergo
the sequestered story fails because Sydney hasn’t graduated bootcamp and her parents are not ignoramuses.
1. How recruits that are normal humans with access to normal human weapons that can be locked away from them are treated in a real world branch of the United States’ military doesn’t necessarily apply with perfect symmetry to how a recruit in a military branch composed mostly of superhuman beings would be treated, especially since even she doesn’t know the extent of her own abilities.
2. I didn’t say it was a story that would pass the whiff test or that it was a good idea. It is, though, the story that Arianna told to the press on page, and she said at the time that it was the same thing she had told the press repeatedly on previous occasions.
3. Sydney was on an decimated alien world (“sequestered”) while fighting Mega-Nega-Squidwards, Redshirt-Drone-Fighters, and a Giant-Twisty-Space-Penis (“an intense training regimen”). So, by Obi-Wan standards, Arianna wasn’t lying. What she said was true . . . from a certain point of view.
Oh the military would lie to the press on something like this, just not the families because it wouldn’t fly. The press typically knows about as much about the military as guesticus
Have actually served two years in the military, back in the 80’s
Don’t be an Oberon
And yet you never learned that rank is not tied to security clearances.
I served three tours collecting class A schools, seeing the world, and chasing wars.
2884, 30451, and 2171.
Yeah, because never needed any clearances
We supposed to guess what those numbers mean? Or impressed?
And what the fronk does ‘collecting class A schools’ mean? o_O
Is that anything like class A drugs?
Numbers are not to impress. Merely MOS numbers.
Class A schools are long MOS schools. I got the military to pay me to learn things I was already familiar with so I could spend a lot of time playing Champions and Star Fleet Battles.
And MOS is…
Didn’t you just claim to have served two tours?
There are some terms used in all branches. MOS is one of them.
To be fair to it, the claim was two years, not two tours. Which either means not US since that isn’t a tour length in any service, or an early discharge for reasons.
I did pretty much as you, but only for one tour and it was a quiet 4 years so I never saw anything near a combat zone. But I had them train me in things that it would be expensive to get trained on outside, to try to make my time in more worthwhile to the rest of my career.
Yes, served two years in the Kiwi Air Force (yes, Kiwi’s do know how to fly, we have been doing so since before the Wright Brothers :P )
And, as has been pointed out numerous times: not a USAsian!
Oh, and when someone asks what something is, it usually means they don’t know and could the person who mentioned it explain what it is
Guys, I have never served in the armed forces but I own the collectors edition of CoD Modern Warfare 1, 2, and 3. Not 4 yet because the game stories are actually pretty boring after 1. Does that count?:)
For anyone who’s not ex-US-military and doesn’t have time to look it up, the MOS code is basically a shorthand for the type of job a particular person is doing. Apparently the Doctor was in the Marines, as the other Services use alphanumeric rather than purely numeric codes. In that case 2884 and 2171 correspond to Ground Radar Repair and Electro-Optical Ordnance Repair respectively; the 30451 isn’t on Wikipedia’s list but would probably be somewhere on the Supply Administration side. Feel free to correct/clarify, anyone who actually has direct experience rather than just time and curiosity!
Eh, I get it man – I’m here for the sci fi, action and hot babes too, but a little character development never killed anyone, and I’m sure the topic is a draw for an increased audience.
Now, if the interpersonal relationships and drama become the primary focus, and the sci-fi ass kicking falls to the wayside, I’m outta here on the last train to Clarksville.
Same here, honestly it just feels shoehorned in, like maybe DaveB is going through some shit and is just smashing it into the comic… like we have no explanation as to why Sydney wants to be with leon despite the fact she’s only known him for how long? A few weeks at best unless I missed a time jump that wasn’t caused by space travel?
I’m pretty sure character development killed lot of characters.
Characters, yes. Audience members, I sincerely doubt it. I mean, maybe there’s some emo kid out there that went down the street, not across it over their personal ship failing to set sail, but DaveB exploring character’s relationships isn’t going to jump off the page and drive a blade through your sternum.
As a Poly person I’m enjoying the hell out of this arc. And the only thing worse than trying to make all the relationships in a polycule work is trying to make a Mono relationship work when you’re a Poly person. It’s like watching a dog missing both legs on one side trying to walk.
Hmm, it looks like Harem got anime eyes in panel 8. Very very big.
“Like how high doorknobs are. Or how high the bottom part of cabinets are. Not the ones on the floor. Upper cabinets. The ones on the wall over the countertops.”
If you were as short as I am, ans Sydney is, yopu would have intimate association with them. :)
Thta was supposed to say “intimate knowledge” with the subject.
Kitchen cabinets are all the same height…a quarter inch too low to fit the new mixer/keurig/blender/appliance you bought under so they have to sit in the middle of the counter instead of being tucked neatly away.
Hey there! I love the direction this comic is going – I really appreciate the mix between personal drama and action. Your exploration of polyamory is pretty awesome to see- it’s rare to have positive representation in a respectful and thoughtful way :)
That’s because society has tried it many times over the millennia, and it’s not really a good way to go, societally speaking. The benefits are rare and personal, the costs are common and both personal and social.
Of course, with modern birth control methods, some of those costs come down… we’re in untested waters, historically speaking. Going to be interesting to see how the wisdom of the ages fares in this new era.
So far, I’d say “pretty well”, but it’s very early yet (from a historical perspective).
I shall refrain from giving a more heated answer other than stating that you couldn’t be more wrong, Deoxy.
Harem’s still teasing Leon I see (panel 6), though I’m not sure if it’s intentionally this time.
The old boobsquish distraction. Works most of the time.
I get a laugh out of watching Leon’s eyes track.
I’m a long time polyamourous. Reading the judgments in the comments is funny.
Similar on my end. It’s amazing how many people just get it absolutely WRONG with their thoughts on it based on their…whatever. Prejudices. Misunderstandings. Misconceptions. Who knows. But a whole heck of a lot of people don’t really seem to know what they’re talking about when they go over anti-polyamorous reasoning.
Or their personal experience that went horribly, horribly wrong.
But its best to accuse them of ignorance, because judgementalism isn’t wrong when the correct people engage in it.
I guess I don’t understand those personal experiences because I had a polyamorous relationship go horribly, horribly wrong but that experience didn’t magically turn me off of polyamory. The fault lied in the person who was a part of the relationship, not in the nature of the relationship. Which…happens in monogamy just as much, if not moreso?
Imagine someone being like “I had a straight relationship go wrong, so I figured I must be gay.”
There… actually have been more than a few people do that, sometimes it works out and they ‘stay gay’, or they realise that that is not for them afterall and go back to being straight (or simply bi, doubling their options of having a relationship go wrong :P )
That happens fairly often.
Human sexuality is not immutable.
Tell that to religious leaders and the media
O.K. Just to keep it straight. Table tops are 30″ high. Counters are 36″ high. Work benches are 42″ high. All these heights are plus or minus an inch or so.
So is Harem inserting herself into this potential more-sum relationship? Sure seemed like she was doing a fair bit of near flirting to me…
No, Sydney said she needs more female friends, Daphne is five females
I’ve heard that the whole “pretends to be okay with it to stay with the partner who insists on being ‘poly'” is fairly common, and a big part of why a lot of poly relationships don’t last.
Given the scope for jealousy with the inclusion of even one more person (particularly if someone isn’t bisexual), I think I’ll content myself with monogamy as my own ideal.
I can truly identify with him in panel six.
Of course, so can every sexual being on the planet, to various degrees, so the throwing of stones hoarded inside glass houses would be unnecessary at least, hypocritical at most.
Harem would argue it’s rude to not stare when she’s showing off so much.
Considering she refused to quit flashing her panties to Mr Amorphous until he made an inappropriate remark, I would say you are correct.
No. She slept at that until the incident with Heatwave.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-92-thats-ok-heat3wave-you-can-try-again-later/
Kept.
Evil spell corrupt doesn’t remember kept is a word.
I also truly identify with your frustration with spellcheck.
At this point in history, the relationship I have with it is less love and more hate.
Thumbtyping on mobile phones is akin to a spellcheck slot machine. Or maybe spellcheck Russian roulette.
With a revolver or a Glock? :P
A flamethrower.
This.
Have actually seen a movie or a TV show where someone actually played Russian Roulette with a semi-automatic (even Oberon should be able to figure the outcome, and maybe he could demonstrate)
You first, Buttheadicus. Show me, prove to me, that you actually know how to do something right.
And then, if you manage that, I’ll have a guide to follow.
Do you even read yourself? You want me to prove know how do to something right, by playing Russian Roulette wrong? o_O
Do you even know how a semi automatic works? Clearly not if you can’t see the obvious flaw!
If she didn’t want people to look, she wouldn’t be going out of her way to show it.
Can’t tell if passes Bechdel test or not…
Yes I know the Bechdel test isn’t a serious test and only serves the purpose of setting a comically low bar to point out how often even such a low bar isn’t met, and no I don’t think such a test matters that much, I just find it amusing how you can even have edge cases like this despite the test being supposedly straight forward.
It’s not like the comic never passed the Bechdel Test before. It doesn’t require there to be no conversations between developed female characters about something other than a male character, just that there be any conversations between developed female characters about something other than a male character.
I’ve been installing commercial and industrial cabinets and countertops for the past decade. The “correct” term for the cabinets that go above is “top” cabinets and the ones on the floor are “bottom” cabinets. I know, complicated stuff here.
I’ve worked in two different cabinet shops. At both shops, they were called “upper” and “base” cabinets. Except for the “floor-to-ceiling” cabinets, which weren’t called either…they were called “floor-to-ceiling” cabinets, oddly enough.
I know lots of people signifying here… but … (stifles yawn)…
…if this doesn’t get interrupted soon, I’ll take a break and wait for rain….of bad guys.
There’s exactly one het couple in this comic at the moment, and I don’t give a crap about their love life either.
I don’t personally have any trouble relating to characters simply because of polyamory. I feel like anything that’s relevant to maintaining a healthy het is going to be similarly relevant to a non monogamous relationships. This is starting to seem like a doomed experiment though, since Leon seems far more interested in boggling at harem’s rack than the current proceedings.
That said, take a break. I had a similar reaction to a show I started to watch the other day. First episode the MC grabs the idiot ball and gets rope-a-doped into a beat-down and lawsuit by a mouthy twelve year old and I just found myself thinking “I don’t care about any of these idiots idiot problems.” I couldn’t relate to idiots, and I did something else.
Pretty sure Sydney is het also. She’s been prett explicit about that when she was throwing a boot at Leon a while ago.
That was in Leon’s imagination. Sydney didn’t throw anything.
How did you come to this assumption? I don’t see any indication that it was in his imagination.
If you are looking for a lot of action, you came to the wrong damn comic, this comic, right from the start, has always been about the everyday stuff in between the action
In other words: relationships will come before action
Well…. except for the year long Restaurant Rumble. and 6 months of Vehemence fight. :) And the fight with Sciona. And the fight with the Squidward.
But I get what you’re saying. The comic is primarily about super tropes more than the actual fights, and how supers react to their daily lives is the primary draw of the comic :).
And the webic has been going for how many years now? Two years’ worth of action is tiny (plus, you still had the slice-of-life stuff happening during those events)
Like I said, the comic is mostly about superhero TROPES and discussions on them, by the supers themselves…. with occasional rather long diversions into superhero action from time to time. I like the format of it :).
Was actually agreeing with you, and putting things into a little perspective
Ahhhh okay :)
1. I’m kind of wondering, what is the psychopath test?
2. Doorknobs are either 3 feet off the ground, or sitting at the Golden Ratio, about 38% of the way up the door. I’m not sure which.
3. Overhead cabinets are usually just above my eyeline, so I’d say the standard is roughly 6 feet off the ground. Another tough one is how high off the floor the bottoms of the lower cabinet doors go.
Overhead cabinets are hung 18″ above the countertop so between 5’4″ and 5’6″ off the ground.
I must be thinking of the cabinets over the stove, that sit higher, then.
The overhead cupboards in our old house were around six feet off the ground (can remember as a kid, if wanted to get something out of even the bottom level {ours had three levels, both overhead and ground cupboards}, would have to open a bottom cupboard and two of the top cupboards, grab hold of the wood in between the top doors and climb up onto the counter. Getting down was always s fun :P )
Correction: just checked with mum, and she says they were around five and a half feet off the floor, with the space between the counter and the cupboard between one and a half to two feet
The door handles (not knobs) were at least five feet up the door, us kids were usually stuck in whichever room we were placed in… until we learnt how to climb and jump :D (the new house is the first one mum has seen with low-set handles)
Also, there’s something off about Harem’s facial structure in the last four panels. In panels 6, 7, and 9 the lower half of he face and jaw are oddly elongated, almost simian. In panel 8 the shape of her mouth makes her look like she has a Glasgow smile.
Relationships are complicated. Let us asume they can be described as X.
Now Polyarmory? The complciation is more like X^Y (X to the power of Y. With Y being the number of participants).
Nah, it really depends on the people involved, sometimes it actually alleviates the stress because you have someone else to shoulder some of the load. Like any relationship YMMV.
My brain was slow switching gears between math and language and for a second I was trying to figure out what variables of polyamory were being represented by M, Y and V in that formula.
See my note re number of people and number of relationships.
As a tall person who has painfully walked into both, if you’re about 6 feet tall cupboards come down to nipple height and the shorter ones (above stoves and sinks and such) reach lip-level.
If I had harem like powers I’d be tempted to get a voltron tattoo that would combine when I did. I know her powers don’t work like that, but if they did.
He sure has eyes everywhere lol. Also. Apparently goggles tan
Few things:
-This polyamory thing is a very unnecessary distraction in an already cluttered series.
-Max is overpowered, to the point of removing all tension from any given crisis (excluding Vehemence fight and Sydney lost in space), she needs to lose a fight due to a bad skill match-up so that Dabbler can save/seduce her.
-This comic would fail a reverse Bechdel test (not necessarily a bad thing, just an observation; the men on the superhero team look like the supporting cast of Dragonball Z to me: bulky and irrelevant).
-An injection of drama would go a long way, specifically someone getting hurt for real to raise the stakes of a given situation.
-Further to the previous point, those ooblek uniforms are as OP as Max if they can stop a piece of shrapnel like this: https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-660-armored-on-the-inside/
Aaaand finally:
-Sydney’s zany personality, while awesome, can only carry the failings of this series so far. I’m out. Sad face.
The suit might not be overpowered, as the shrapnel was probably losing a lot of energy with each bubble bounce.
Max being powerful is fine, since she DOES have limits and there’s only one of her. Also, the debuff DID work on her, even if she was still impressive even under the effect.
I do agree that the poly line slows down story progression too much. For those who care, maybe a personal journal comic separate from the main series, for her personal and psychological breakthroughs and problems?
Even when the plot veers away from the parts I like the best, I still come around to read it just for the art. I think Dave is an incredible artist.
As it says in the about page, “I wanted a comic that focuses mostly on those interstitial scenes I enjoy so much. So the comic is largely “day in the life””. Sorry the comic is not meeting your needs, but I really enjoy it.
– Meh. It’s 4 pages, and while I’d rather watch them sift alien wreckage or something while they talk it’s not like this is any more of a distraction than the fan service stuff.
– That path leads to the Worf effect. Also heatwave lost a toe, Jiggs lost some hearing and Max got blindsided and nearly injured by that bolo-bomb. Maybe he could have played up the importance of the ground pounders in their role defending the press from space Zalgos more? It’s not like every enemy has to be an existential threat to everyone always. Sometimes you get attacked by a level 2 slime.
– It wouldn’t fail. Off the top of my head, there was that convo between those police officers commenting on the parking lot fight.
– I think the stakes are already pretty high what with the civilization destroying aliens Sydney poked in the eye. Or Sciona becoming zombie drug queen of space ghosts. Whatever Deus is doing. These don’t stop being part of the story when the focus is off of them. Doing all drama all the time is exhausting and usually just robs the impact from actually dramatic occurances.
– . . .after it bounced multiple times? Inelastic collisions rob momentum. Also they don’t cover the face or hands. Or work against masers, probably. Would you rather the armor be completely ineffective?
IDK man, you don’t gotta hang around, but you also don’t need to burn your copy of Grrl Power on a pyre of Nike shoes in protest or w/e. . . . But if you do that please record it and link it here because I kinda want to see that.
She did already lose a fight. Against Vehemence. If not for Sydney, Maxima would definitely be dead. She also was losing a fight against the Super Mannekiller until Hiro ripped off the panel which caused it to explode.
And while she did not lose a fight against Sciona, he hasnt WON a fight against Sciona either. Which is pretty impressive for Sciona, considering that Maxima IS decidedly more powerful than she is. First time they fought, Sciona got away (and apparently managed to scratch her while doing so). The second time, the fight was sidelined by Dabbler shooting Sciona’s leg off with the railgun, but Sciona still managed to get her plan enacted and got back to her homeworld.
With the Squidward, Maxima did not fight at all – she made a very expedient tactical retreat.
With Death Toll, Sydney pretty strongly alluded to the idea that if Maxima HAD fought him, he would have been able to beat her because his power is specifically to beat any power used against him. Maxima only one that fight in coordination with several other supers, using Sydney’s tactical planning.
The only times we’ve seen Maxima definitively win any fights, on her own, were during the first half of the restaurant rumble, and with the Fel ship. Yes, she’s overpowered (it’s part of her character makeup to be overpowered, basically as a Superman/Supergirl expy), but DaveB has been able to still make it work for the story quite well. Also when she was fighting the Guardian, but again – that was specifically to show how powerful she was, even when 95% de-powered.
Also, Hiro has been most definitely useful, especially at the Mars Factory where he essentially saved Maxima who was under a mesmerizing gaze and barely able to keep the Super Mannekiller from getting her blood.
only one that fight=only won that fight. I wish there was an edit feature.
Also the Ooblek uniforms are not OP. It still really hurt Sydney (she literally stated so) – it just did protected her from being impaled. It’s the same way with a normal bulletproof vest. If you’re shot with a normal bulletproof vest and the kevlar stops the bullet, it’s still going to bruise and hurt. Ooblek is the same, but just a bit better. Ooblek also does not protect the face, the hands, or the feet or anywhere that the ooblek packs are not put in.
Have you not read the recommendations Dave has shared? Michael-Scott Earle and M Tefler both write harem stories. Tefler’s 120+ chapters of Marty Stu (the male Mary Sue) wish fulfillment fiction has a harem so magical that they sparkle, or glow in the dark. Did you think he wouldn’t be influenced by that crap?
I don’t seek eroticism for it’s own sake in my reading.
I was going to give MSE a try because the blurbs for the books sounded like the atmosphere might be similar to Peter F. Hamilton’s early Greg Mandel books, but the whole “Dragon Slayer” nonsense has ensured that I will never bother.
Technically, what hit Sydney inside Mr Buble was not shrapnel, it was debris from and exploded building
@DaveB I don’t know if it’s just me but the 2 bottom panels look like they’ve been cut in half, anyone else getting this?
The bottom left panel looks like that because of the unfortunate placement of the corner behind them (where two slightly different coloured walls meet), bottom right matches panels six and seven (with minor alterations)
Counter high tables are not all that weird, especially in a break room if the actual intent is no one make themselves comfortable for long. A place to stand and eat vs sit and eat might lead to more productivity.
Extremely common in game stores where chest high tables you don’t sit at are used for miniature war gaming. Miniature generals don’t like to sit.
Polyamory – you mean, just like chakats doing it with many denmates and many lifemates? Or maybe like catians with prides with up to six wives on one man? I don’t think it can work with plain genetically unmodified humans.
It absolutely can, and does, and has throughout history. Perspectives thinking otherwise are, simply put, mistaken. Just because you don’t understand how it works and just because you don’t get the logic/reasoning behind why it works doesn’t mean it doesn’t.
Historically speaking, polyamourous relationships tend to be many women to one man, not the other way around. Usually because of how, if you have few men and many women, the species is more likely to survive than if you have few women and many men.
In modern and industrial societies however, monogamous relationships tend to make the civilization admittedly more stable over the long term of the civilization, for both child-rearing and for a more cemented family structure. It’s not that a polyamorous relationship CAN’T be stable for a civilization (sort of a redundancy system, I guess, in case one relationship in the polyamorous relationship fails), it’s just a lot more difficult (most likely the failure of two people in the relationship can spiral out of control to the extended relationship).
As with ANYTHING, the more complexity you add to anything, the easier it is for that thing to fall apart. The more tiny, interconnected parts there are in a machine, the more likely you can have a critical failure of the entire apparatus.
Many, many relationships throughout history have been non-monogamous. Typically, one person in it just doesn’t know.
Non-monogamous when one person does not know, and polyamourous are different things. One’s just called cheating :)
The counterargument to that is, if food is plentiful, then pair bonding is not strictly necessary… and ZERO permanent bonds is much simpler than one. There are several matrilineal societies on record. If I recall correctly, Cherokee women owned the home, property descended in female lines, and the woman’s older brother had the sort of relationship to kids that a “father” does in Western society. After all, a woman can have many lovers, but only one eldest brother.
Footnote: The European system is called the “Eskimo” or “Inuit kinship system” for some historical reason.
Cherokee is one version of the Iroquois kinship system, where your relationship to various people depends on the sex of the person through whom you are related. (Your mother’s sisters and your father’s brothers are closer related to you than your mother’s brothers and your father’s sisters, and so on.)
Then there is the “Hawaiian kinship system”, which is a generational system that’s the third major option. Everyone of each generation above or below you has the exact same relationship to you as each other. All of your birth mother’s sisters and her husband’s sisters are all your “mother”. Your mothers’ brothers and husbands are all your “father”. Their wives and sisters are all your “mother”, however far it goes. Your brothers and male cousins use the same word; your children and your siblings’ (including cousins’) children are all your children.
Yes, they do know the difference between bio mom/bio children and others, but it’s not as big a difference as it is elsewhere.
Oh I’m not saying there are not counterexamples. I’m just saying that the evolutionary benefits of ‘one man, many women’ tend to destabilize a civilization the more industrialized and modern it gets. Hawaiian culture and most other indigenous cultures in the Americas were nearly as modernized as the Europeans – many were still very nomadic, usually not that huge in comparison to Europeans and early American settlers, and the concept of ‘it takes a village to raise a child’ was more on point for them. Also I’m familiar with the Hawaiian kinship system. It’s just monogamy works better for the stabilization of large, complex societies, since you can simplify it down to an easily defined family unit. Especially in a large, complex cultures (which is not to say there wasn’t complexity in native civilization in its own way – it’s more of a comparative thing to European civilization).
BTW, when i say complex, I tend to mean technologically.
Not to belabor the point, because I haven’t said anything about it yet but…
We only have one example of a complex technological society to draw from and it coincidentally happens to be primarily structured in nuclear family units for the convenience of capitalism.
We don’t know that other social arrangements would not work, and would not work better. In fact given the way the American system is working, nuclear families are actually struggling harder to survive than the occasional cooperative-group models.
Or it was organized to maximize healthy children reaching adulthood, and alledged conections of that to capitalism are intellectually tenuous at best.
Um we (Americans) are not the only technologically complex civilization to exist on Earth in all of history.
Is it just me or is the line (Sydney will… eventually pass the psychopath test eventually.) extremely worrying? Does it mean she will eventually be cleared as not a psychopath? Or will they find out she is Psychopathic?
Dun dun dun!!!
Sydney has too much of a moral foundation to be a psychopath. Psychopaths actually understand the difference between right and wrong – they just do not CARE about that difference. Sydney does care about that difference. Case in point – her helping the Alari refugees once she saw she’d be able to, and not doing anything when she did not know if her interference would just make things worse. Plus she has a whole hero complex which generally is the opposite of being a psychopath :).
No, that’s the difference between a psychopath and a sociopath: the socio knows the difference between right and wrong, and does it anyway, the psycho doesn’t (butt probably wouldn’t care anyway)
A sociopath would still help the Alari refugees, if they felt like it, specially if it ingratiated the Alari to them
There are plenty of sociopathic heroes (look at Bruce Wayne, and it could be argued that he is, in fact, the greatest villain of them all, actively training Gotham’s psychopathic criminals)
And now we see why I’m a lawyer and not a psychologist or psychiatrist.
:)
PS – although I do not think Batman is a sociopath. Even a ‘highly functioning sociopath’ as Sherlock would put it. There’s been way too many examples of him actually being caring and having emotional connections with people to make me think he does not have a strong conscience.
I just read up a bit on this so… I’m gonna try again:).
Apparently the difference is this. The psychopath does not have a conscience. The sociopath has a conscience, but it’s weak. Batman has an overblown conscience – it’s one of the reasons he won’t use a gun, and won’t ever kill (the other reason is that, as he said to Jason Todd, he is worried that he’d be unable to stop). But again, that seems to me like… he has a conscience BECAUSE he’s worried about how easy it would be to kill. He won’t even kill someone who any reasonable person would say needs to die – ie, the Joker.
That thing about Blatman not using a gun, or killing, is a modern bullshit reversion of the character
One of the earliest stories has Blatman flying around the city dangling some helpless criminal from below his Blatplane until said criminal stopped moving (ie they was dead)
He also killed Joker when Joker first appeared, butt Joker proved to be a popular character so they came up wit some Blat-shit crazy explanation for why he wasn’t dead (and now the world can’t get rid of the psychopath… or Joker :P )
Also, look at the Keaton Blatman movie, take a swig every time he kills someone (and check into rehab after getting your stomach pumped, if you don’t die of alcohol poisoning first)
And that’s basically what said: a psycho has no conscience to listen to, the socio chooses if or when they will listen
In a way, even the Joker is more of socio than a psycho: he won’t kill someone if it’s not funny, a psycho wouldn’t care
The reason Blatsie won’t kill Joker is because he needs Joker, because without a certifiable loony like him, Gotham doesn’t need Blatsie to protect it
It’s not a ‘modern’ revision of the character. It’s a revision of the character for one year after the character’s creation (1939-beginning of 1940). That’s not ‘modern.’ Batman hasnt used guns since a year after his initial creation, with VERY few exceptions – like when he used gun with a radion bullet to mortally wound Darkseid in order to save the universe. And he even specified why it was a unique situation, seconds before Darkseid’s omega sanction hit him, and a second before Darkseid is beaten by Batman. The RARE amount of times aside from 1939-1940 when Batman ever has a gun in his hand, it’s never used against a PERSON to kill. Like the guns on the batmobile, which never actually shoot any person.
And I won’t even get into the Dawn of Justice movie because Zack Snyder is an idiot who has no clue about Batman at all.
So… it’s a bit of a stretch to call that a ‘modern revision.’ Batman from his first year is practically a different character from Batman
So, all those goons in the factory weren’t killed by the Blatmobile? o_O
Or that clown that had the bomb shoved down his pants didn’t get blown up and die? O_o
Actually no, the clown that had the bomb shoved back at him and was kicked offscreen did not die :) That’s from Director Tim Burton’s own words :) And if you did not see any goons in the factory die, then no, the goons did not die. :)
Although lets be honest, the movies are different creature altogether from the comics anyway. And in the comics, Batman simply does not kill ANYONE after 1940, one year after his creation, because Bob Kane and Bill Finger decided that it worked better for the character. And clearly it did, since we’re talking about Batman as a still-relevant cultural icon 80 years later.
So, the big guy with bomb down his shorts didn’t blow up? o_O
And all the goons in the factory managed to get out before it blew up? O_o
If we did not see any run away, then they were still in there when it blew (unless you are going to go “technically, it was the building bowing up that killed them, not the Blatmobile”)
Yep. No one died, according to the director of the first Batman movie. Including the clown with a bomb. Argue with Tim Burton, not me :)
I have often wondered if it were more of a calculated marketing strategy driving the character concept rather than sudden inspiration.
In the pulp era, there were a whole lot more characters like The Shadow and The Spider than there were duplicates of Doc Savage.
As the art conventions for comic heroes began to drive a formulaic divergence from established pulp tropes did Bob Kane simply see an open void and evolve his creation to fill it?
Also, you’re using Joker logic with why Batman doesn’t kill the Joker. His reasoning was explained in Under the Red Hood pretty aptly. It’s not because he needs the Joker. He doesn’t want to be Batman, in fact. He just promised it as part of his mission to the grave of his parents that he would war on crime until there was no more crime, which is obviously an impossible task to complete.
Especially when you’re not killing anyone. Flashpoint Batman had a slightly different take on it, but he kills. And uses guns regularly. But that’s Thomas Wayne, not Bruce. And he wouldn’t kill his Joker because his Joker was Martha Wayne, his wife.
Yes, putting an end to crime is an impossible task, if one continually lets inveterate criminals get away, time and time and time again
Yes, Tommy Wayne wouldn’t kill his wife, butt had no problems killing Yo-Yo (only thing that saved her, was Cyborg showing up just before impact) or Reverse Flash for that matter, with… what was it again? oh yeah, a gun! (butt, that didn’t happen, right? because Bazza went back an prevented Flashpoint from happening)
Remember, Tommy’s primary weapon was a pair of guns (and, unlike Green Arrow, doubt those were non-lethal trick rounds)
Flashpoint Batman is not Batman. He does use a gun. And bombs. And lethal force all the time, with the exception of against his wife Martha, the Joker in his timeline (where Bruce Wayne is the one that died in the alley, causing both Thomas and Martha to snap mentally in different ways).
Batman is Bruce Wayne, who does not use a gun. There’s no point in calling both Batman, as in the Batman that does not use a gun and does not kill, Bruce Wayne, any more than you’d call Justice Lord Batman (who does kill, just like all the other Justice Lords kill) the real ‘Batman,’ or Crime Syndicate World Owlman ‘Batman’ (who is Bruce Wayne’s older brother Thomas Jr. in his timeline, where Bruce Wayne also died, along with his parents).
You were the one to bring up Flashpoint, not me
And they are all real Blatman, just different versions or ‘alternate reality’ Blatman (Owlman is working for the other ‘tribe’, so to speak, so isn’t even a Blatman at all)
Oh, and the main point was, as a counter to all the claims that Blatsie doesn’t kill or use guns
Yes, he doesn’t kill now, butt he has killed, in the past, and the guns may be non-lethal (mostly), butt he has used guns in the past, and still does (like your example against Darkseid)
Oh, and Brat Wayne uses lethal force all the time as well, just look at the Batfleck movies (which is what started this whole “Blatman doesn’t kill or use guns” crap to start with)
Technically Owlman is the Batman of Earth-3 (Crime Syndicate Earth). Just like Ultraman is the Superman of Earth-3, Johnny Quick is the Flash of Earth-3, Superwoman is the Mary Marvel of Earth-3 (although sometimes people think it’s Wonder Woman – but Wonder Woman of Earth-3 is Olympia and lower down in the Crime Syndicate), Power Ring is Green Lantern of Earth-3. The only member of Earth-3 that is the same person as New Earth and Earth-1 is Martian Manhunter :) (although he is blind and missing an arm that can’t be restored for some reason on Earth-3).
Also, as I said, the new Batman movies with Affleck are stupid. Batman uses guns, kills people, Superman kills people and doesnt care about collateral damage, etc. The only characters in the new movies that’s even remotely similar to how they are through their entire comic and movie and TV history are Wonder Woman and Aquaman, which is probably why those two movies were good, while the Superman and Batman movies suuuuuucked.
Aquadork? Look again, not once has he ever, previously, not been a blonde English dude, not some heavily tatted Polynesian
Superwoman is Mary Marvel (SHAZAM!)? Really? Hmm, did not know that, would have figured her to have been either Wonder Bewbs or, well, either PeeGee or Supergirl (technically they are the same person)
And yes, do know a little of Earth-3 (thank you for eight years, DCUO)
I don’t mean appearance – I mean attitude. And Aquaman is badass after the Superfriends era ended.
Btw yeah. Superwoman is Mary Marvel. And her underlings are Billy, Freddy, and Uncle Dudley as her primary made men :). It’s sort of surprising, since most people would have assumed it would be a criminal version of Wonder Woman – but Wonder Woman is definitely a different person (who also has an amazonian theme). I used to be convinced it would be Wonder Woman until I found out otherwise in a comic book where the creator outright stated it’s Mary Marvel, then in the DC animated movie Crisis on Two Earths, they pretty much doubled down on it by showing that her lieutenants (made men) were, in fact, Captain Marvel, Captain Marvel Jr, and Uncle Dudley. Then to further put a stamp of ‘And we mean it!’ onto the fact of Superwoman being Mary, they had Wonder Woman fight Olympia.
PeeGee isnt in Earth-3 at all, which makes sense since PeeGee isnt actually from New Earth either (she’s actually the sole survivor of Earth-2, who escaped to New Earth with Earth-2’s Huntress/Robin, who then died – and New Earth is different than Earth-1, which would be Silver Age Earth). Supergirl is Ultragirl in Earth-3, and occasionally betrays the Crime Syndicate if she feels like it (sort of like how Supergirl has a tendency to get brainwashed in New Earth, except with Ultragirl it’s voluntary because she gets bored). DC multiverse is weird.
Got the DVD, just haven’t seen it in years
Didn’t say PeeGee was Earth-3, was just saying how figured, if Superwoman wasn’t Diana, then, for me, the more obvious candidate would have been either E-3’s version of PeeGee or Superbrat (who, are, technically, the same person, just from different other Lost Worlds :D)
Butt then again. neither of them have black hair…
And let’s not get into the whole “Arrow-verse” versions of things (mainly because they stopped showing any of them after the season where Ollie got his son back butt watched the island blow up with all his friends still on it, which meant missing out on the whole Evil Supergirl arc)
The point remains that Sydney is neither. She has empathy for critters with a face, and so is a pescetarian. Her first reaction to IGetStronger getting his arm blown off was something like “I’m very sorry for my part in this” when all she had done was hang a few loops of the Lightbee in front of his eyes so his vision was obscured (“Not touching, can’t get mad!”)
Wasn’t saying Sydney was either, was simply explaining the difference between socio and psycho
Which then devolved into an anti-Blatrant, because Blatsie is the largest Marty Fucking Stu ever invented!!
as someone in a poly relationship I can tell you the two most important things are trust and communication. Me my wife and my cohusband have been together for 5 years now. It is NOT for everyone and not something to enter into if you are a very possessive person or a very Jealous Person.
I’d argue that the most important aspects of ANY type of relationship–business, romantic, friendship, family, whatever–would be trust and communication. A relationship simply can’t work without them, and yes, polyamory is an example of exactly that; it needs trust and communication to work.
The longer I look at Sydney here, the more she starts reminding me of Maxima.
Is Harem’s head either ginormous or does she have the tiniest hands? i can’t figure out which one it is.