I like how Walky’s offhand remark in this strip accidentally reinforces everything Dorothy’s been hearing from HAII about Joyce being violent. I don’t particularly like Walkyverse Dorothy (or should it be “Stupid Jackass Dotty”?), but you can at least see why might have reason to think her concerns are genuine.
Oddly, she doesn’t actually know Walky that well. I guess she’s just really invested in the idea that their brief romance is something meaningful that she can salvage from her messed-up life…that, and the manipulation and guilt HAII is feeding her about preventing his death, of course
She’s jut a girl in love. She can’t be held responsible for her actions. She has no underlying issues to address. She’s certifiably cute and adorably obsessed!
Yeah, we the audience know that Walky is both as strong as Joyce and has had his own terrifying outbursts of violent rage. But I don’t recall Bart Ryan leaking the knowledge about Walky beating Mike half to death after Dina’s death, or actually accidentally killing the old Big Boss while trying to kill Head Alien. (That one probably wasn’t in the reports, for one thing.) When all Dorothy knew was sweet eighth grade Walky, and HAII is manipulating her (while also killing all her parents for max vulnerability), and Joyce’s lowest moment IS public knowledge… bit easier to see how she can get played like a fiddle there.
Yeah. As much as I dislike Dorothy being so… agency-less in this universe, her motivation does at least make sense. And again, it’s hard to condemn someone for falling for the mind games of Head Alien, the best mind game player in the universe.
Honestly, the agency thing has been my main issue with this Dorothy so far, moreso than her being an antagonist. A full-on evil Dorothy, while a massive departure from the character as we now know her, would at least be a lot more interesting a departure. (Yes, I know this Dorothy came first but ehh)
Oh yeah. DoA Dorothy is absolutely the only Dorothy who matters. Like, by now Willis has said most of the DoA characters have overtaken the Walkyverse ones as the definitive versions, but I still sometimes think of Shortpacked Robin and Leslie as the primary versions.
I totally think of Shortpacked Robin as the “real” one. Robin was created specifically to be over-the-top and zany, so she was never really going to translate well into a more realistic universe. This tends to push Shortpacked Leslie into “real” status in my mind as well, though there is the wrinkle of both of their DoA relationships with Becky, especially Leslie’s.
Honestly, DoA Robin just makes me kinda… sad, I guess? Like, I got into Willis through DoA first (just last year) and I liked Robin well enough as this morally-ambiguous figure who ultimately chose to help Becky at the expense of the position she’d done horrible things to maintain. But after reading Shortpacked, the DoA Robin just feels less than whole. I’m kinda hoping DoA Robin gets fleshed out a bit more now that she’s part of the main cast.
I can’t figure out which Mike is “real” for the life of me, which I’m certain is exactly how Mike would want it to be.
I hadn’t really thought about it before, but Mike is… uniquely unique in my mind. Unlike the other characters, who have a Walkyverse version and a Dumbiverse version, and they’re different and distinct, and usually one feels more real to me than the other… usually the Dumbiverse version, though I’ll agree that Shortpacked! Robin and Leslie are still the canonical ones.
But, I dunno if it has something to do with his resurrection in Shortpacked!, which went unexplained for years, or just his essential Mikeness, but there’s only one Mike in my head. It’s all the same Mike. Sometimes he dies. Sometimes he comes back. Sometimes it’s a different universe and he’s in college. Sometimes he’s drunk. Sometimes he kicks mailboxes. Sometimes he does your mom for a nickel. But it’s all the same Mike.
Yeah, neither Mike seems like a complete character on his own, but together you kind of get a fuller picture.
…Maybe Dumbing of Age happens in between <It's Walky! and Shortpacked! for him! Like, let’s say he dies in the Walkyverse and somehow gets reincarnated into the Dumbiverse. It doesn’t really matter why, the Cheese or the Soggies or what have you. Then his second life ends with him realizing that in his attempts at “tough love,” he’s been an abusive asshole to the people he thought he cared about, especially Amber, just like Blaine was, and tries to take both of them out. After he comes back to life again in his original universe, with the memories of everything he did in the Dumbiverse, he develops a deep sense of self-loathing over the realization of all the harm he’d done. He tries to revert to an over-the-top version of his original persona in an act of self-harm, tracking down the Walkyverse Amber and Ethan and acting like as much of an asshole as possible (but in sillier ways) to try to make sure they never form an emotional attachment to him they way their Dumbiverse selves did. That way, he’ll never really be able to hurt them, and in his mind, that’s the greatest service he can ever do. And it all comes crumbling down when Amber falls for him anyway, blackmailing him into a relationship by threatening to reveal his good side, which would allow people to get close enough that he’d inevitably harm them.
And he’s even more frightened at the fact that he loves her back– leading to him proposing in the most fucked-up way he can think of to try to “save” her from him. And even after that, she still loves him, and accepts the proposal anyway, on the condition that he makes amends to the people he’s harmed… and something clicks. He finally realizes that maybe he can have another chance. Maybe he can become a better person, while still being himself. And he learns he’s going to become a father, and vows to himself that he’ll never be like the masked supervillain who attacked his own daughter to get revenge. And he’s terrified that he’ll screw up, more terrified than he ever was while facing down aliens, or tackling a man down from a roof– but he’s seen abusive parenting, and he knows damn well that he never wants to see it again. He will force himself to do better.
…and somewhere in all of this he kicks a bunch of stuff while Bart O’Ryan laughs, who knows when
Either Walky somehow has enough intestines to fill a car, or Joyce would have to get those intestines from multiple Walkys across several alternate universes.
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Bowels? Did Joyce fall into another world once
Wow. Was not expecting a ReZero reference. Bravo. **tips hat**
If so, she suffered a crushing defeat while there.
*sees self out*
I like how Walky’s offhand remark in this strip accidentally reinforces everything Dorothy’s been hearing from HAII about Joyce being violent. I don’t particularly like Walkyverse Dorothy (or should it be “Stupid Jackass Dotty”?), but you can at least see why might have reason to think her concerns are genuine.
One would think Dorothy would know a dark joke when she hears one. Especially when it comes from Walky.
Oddly, she doesn’t actually know Walky that well. I guess she’s just really invested in the idea that their brief romance is something meaningful that she can salvage from her messed-up life…that, and the manipulation and guilt HAII is feeding her about preventing his death, of course
He makes her feel like glitter exploding insi-
**smacks self**
No. Stop. No more. I promised.
No, no… Glitter gets everywhere and never goes away.
She’s jut a girl in love. She can’t be held responsible for her actions. She has no underlying issues to address. She’s certifiably cute and adorably obsessed!
**basks in the glow**
MEET DOROTHY
She’s the coolest girl in the world
WAIT WRONG DOROTHY
It’s this one over here
Dorothy would’ve been better off if she’d moved to
West Covinaaaaa
Californiaaaaaa
Yeah, we the audience know that Walky is both as strong as Joyce and has had his own terrifying outbursts of violent rage. But I don’t recall Bart Ryan leaking the knowledge about Walky beating Mike half to death after Dina’s death, or actually accidentally killing the old Big Boss while trying to kill Head Alien. (That one probably wasn’t in the reports, for one thing.) When all Dorothy knew was sweet eighth grade Walky, and HAII is manipulating her (while also killing all her parents for max vulnerability), and Joyce’s lowest moment IS public knowledge… bit easier to see how she can get played like a fiddle there.
Yeah. As much as I dislike Dorothy being so… agency-less in this universe, her motivation does at least make sense. And again, it’s hard to condemn someone for falling for the mind games of Head Alien, the best mind game player in the universe.
Honestly, the agency thing has been my main issue with this Dorothy so far, moreso than her being an antagonist. A full-on evil Dorothy, while a massive departure from the character as we now know her, would at least be a lot more interesting a departure. (Yes, I know this Dorothy came first but ehh)
Oh yeah. DoA Dorothy is absolutely the only Dorothy who matters. Like, by now Willis has said most of the DoA characters have overtaken the Walkyverse ones as the definitive versions, but I still sometimes think of Shortpacked Robin and Leslie as the primary versions.
Dorothy? Not remotely.
I totally think of Shortpacked Robin as the “real” one. Robin was created specifically to be over-the-top and zany, so she was never really going to translate well into a more realistic universe. This tends to push Shortpacked Leslie into “real” status in my mind as well, though there is the wrinkle of both of their DoA relationships with Becky, especially Leslie’s.
Honestly, DoA Robin just makes me kinda… sad, I guess? Like, I got into Willis through DoA first (just last year) and I liked Robin well enough as this morally-ambiguous figure who ultimately chose to help Becky at the expense of the position she’d done horrible things to maintain. But after reading Shortpacked, the DoA Robin just feels less than whole. I’m kinda hoping DoA Robin gets fleshed out a bit more now that she’s part of the main cast.
I can’t figure out which Mike is “real” for the life of me, which I’m certain is exactly how Mike would want it to be.
I hadn’t really thought about it before, but Mike is… uniquely unique in my mind. Unlike the other characters, who have a Walkyverse version and a Dumbiverse version, and they’re different and distinct, and usually one feels more real to me than the other… usually the Dumbiverse version, though I’ll agree that Shortpacked! Robin and Leslie are still the canonical ones.
But, I dunno if it has something to do with his resurrection in Shortpacked!, which went unexplained for years, or just his essential Mikeness, but there’s only one Mike in my head. It’s all the same Mike. Sometimes he dies. Sometimes he comes back. Sometimes it’s a different universe and he’s in college. Sometimes he’s drunk. Sometimes he kicks mailboxes. Sometimes he does your mom for a nickel. But it’s all the same Mike.
Yeah, neither Mike seems like a complete character on his own, but together you kind of get a fuller picture.
…Maybe Dumbing of Age happens in between <It's Walky! and Shortpacked! for him! Like, let’s say he dies in the Walkyverse and somehow gets reincarnated into the Dumbiverse. It doesn’t really matter why, the Cheese or the Soggies or what have you. Then his second life ends with him realizing that in his attempts at “tough love,” he’s been an abusive asshole to the people he thought he cared about, especially Amber, just like Blaine was, and tries to take both of them out. After he comes back to life again in his original universe, with the memories of everything he did in the Dumbiverse, he develops a deep sense of self-loathing over the realization of all the harm he’d done. He tries to revert to an over-the-top version of his original persona in an act of self-harm, tracking down the Walkyverse Amber and Ethan and acting like as much of an asshole as possible (but in sillier ways) to try to make sure they never form an emotional attachment to him they way their Dumbiverse selves did. That way, he’ll never really be able to hurt them, and in his mind, that’s the greatest service he can ever do. And it all comes crumbling down when Amber falls for him anyway, blackmailing him into a relationship by threatening to reveal his good side, which would allow people to get close enough that he’d inevitably harm them.
And he’s even more frightened at the fact that he loves her back– leading to him proposing in the most fucked-up way he can think of to try to “save” her from him. And even after that, she still loves him, and accepts the proposal anyway, on the condition that he makes amends to the people he’s harmed… and something clicks. He finally realizes that maybe he can have another chance. Maybe he can become a better person, while still being himself. And he learns he’s going to become a father, and vows to himself that he’ll never be like the masked supervillain who attacked his own daughter to get revenge. And he’s terrified that he’ll screw up, more terrified than he ever was while facing down aliens, or tackling a man down from a roof– but he’s seen abusive parenting, and he knows damn well that he never wants to see it again. He will force himself to do better.
…and somewhere in all of this he kicks a bunch of stuff while Bart O’Ryan laughs, who knows when
She’s been interacting with HA2, so her sense of humor is somewhat off.
Car Salesman: *slaps roof of car* this bad boy can fit so much fucking ‘fiancé intestines’ in it
DOROTHY: “There was a reason why I was once attracted to this guy but, frankly, it escapes my mind now.”
Maybe Walky should have been working on his vowels. Look, I just finished a 14 hour day, gimme a break ok.
He can only chip away at the consonants until he can afford to buy a vowel.
Either Walky somehow has enough intestines to fill a car, or Joyce would have to get those intestines from multiple Walkys across several alternate universes.
Or grow more through Martian tech
Walky’s right about it being hard to write stuff down after spontaneously composing it in your head.
Walky’s intestines are a friggin’ Mobius strip.
All those Nachitos have to go somewhere.