146

Alter ego
Posted on July 4, 2014 by David M Willis
HEY GUYS DANIELLE CORSETTO (girls with slingshots) IS LIKE DRIVING ACROSS THE WHOLE DAMN COUNTRY AND SHE’S GONNA BE IN COLUMBUS, OHIO, ON SUNDAY, JULY 6,  AT THE LAUGHING OGRE (comic book store) WITH ME, DAVID WILLIS (dumbing of age) AND ALSO KATIE VALESKA AND LORA INNES THAT’S JULY 6 4 TO 8 PM JUST SO YOU KNOW also i'll be at the ogre again on july 13 from noon to three, but without danielle and the others

146 thoughts on “Alter ego”

  1. Stevecharb

    “Can you read my mind” plays softly in the background

    1. Aeron

      One of my favorite songs from my childhood.

      They will become lesbians together so Walky and Joyce are free to be a couple as the multi-verse demands!

      1. Bill

        Is this some sort of side-effect of passing the Bechdel Test?  Whenever two female characters are interacting over something other than men, someone tries to force them into the ‘lesbian’ pigeonhole?

        Seriously.  Name me any two characters in this strip — including Dina — that someone on this board has not pitched as a lesbian pairing.

        1. Leorale

          In fairness, this board consistently tries to pair everyone with everyone. Not saying that this isn’t a side effect of the Bechdel Test in other works, just that it may be too muddy to do an experiment here.

        2. Sam

          We pair everyone with everybody. Sal x Marcie, Billie x Ruth, Dorothy x Joyce, Joyce x Walky x Dorothy, Amber x Danny, Jacob x Ethan, Mike x Your Mother, Jacob x Sarah, Joyce x Billie, Joyce x Sal, Amber x Sal, Joe x Roz, Robin x Leslie. It is much easier to ship female characters when there are a) more of them than male characters, b) some characters that are known to be bisexual/homosexual, and c) lots more conversations between females which makes them seem compatible and shippable because people love love. XD

        3. Stevecharb

          I was just making the reporter-superhero connection

  2. LiaHansen

    Damn that’s a heroic thing to say.

  3. Yotomoe

    Didn’t you go through the vigilante phase?
    No, I just…cut my hair different for a while.

    1. Doctor_Who

      I wore lots of black for a while and played RPGs starring vampires.

      Vampires are not quite superheroes, but both are associated with capes. So maybe there’s just a cape phase you go through.

      1. newllend

        Dorothy: “Did you spin your entire life training in a verity of different forms of martial arts,weaponry, and detective skills?”

        Amazi-girl:”Dude I’m not Bruce Wayne, I learned how to fight on the streets.”

        1. Nono

          New character on Street Fighter: Amazi-Girl.

        2. Jackson

          I hear they’re adding her to the roster for Capcom vs. #$%ing Everything 2.

          In all seriousness, though, that would be awesome.

        3. Bill

          “What are you?”
          “I’m …. complicated.”

        4. nothri

          If you go by Batman Begins continuity, so did Bruce Wayne. The streets of mainland China, that is.

      2. Swerve

        If that RPG is the RPG I’m thinking of, most of those vampires do not wear capes. They wear suits, punk or grunge influenced clothing, or just black. But no capes! (Don’t make me call Edna Mode; you just know she worked as a consultant for White Wolf’s art department. 🙂 )

        1. Kryss LaBryn

          You may be right. XD I still have my fangs somewhere, but I mostly only haul them out at Hallowe’en these days. Back in college my two roomies and I were all pretty much vampires, though. One roomie saved up and got a black Aussie Drover’s coat. He went for a walk in it one night, and came stomping back about half an hour later.

          “What’s wrong?” we asked.

          “You know that tree down the road?” he asked in reply. There was a very large fir tree just a couple of feet back from the side of the road. “I was just leaning against it, hanging out, when these two kids came by, and stopped right in front of me, and just hung out there talking. After a few minutes one of them says to the other, ‘Doesn’t it kind of look like there’s a guy there?'”

          We laughed. “That’s awesome!”

          “You don’t understand. I didn’t have my fangs in!!”

          Man, can you imagine how that would have ended if he had? Heh heh heh…

          –Wow. I’m a vampire hipster. XD Me and my friends were all into vampires before it got cool, and all these new fans came along and ruined it. Stupid Twilight…

        2. Yotomoe

          You thought it was a tree…but it was I, DIO.

        3. tinfoil theory

          I blame Buffy for ruining vampires.

          Twilight is just the logical consequence of Angel.

        4. Cybersnark

          Please. Twilight was the sort of thing Angel parodied before it was even a thing.

          “Kiss me!”
          “Bite me!”
          “. . . Why don’t you both bite me.”

      3. Roborat

        But didn’t she learn her lesson from the Incredibles? Capes are dangerous.

      4. gwalla

        When my friends and I played WoD, it was definitely in the “vampions” mold.

  4. Doctor_Who

    Oh, Amber. Having a normal life is what the Sims is for.

    Granted, a copy of Arkham City could probably help fulfill your other compulsions.

    1. Plasma Mongoose

      A normal life for the Sims is having to deal with a god-like being who makes their pool ladders disappear without warning.

      1. -Sentinel-

        Hey, at least MY Sims have an awesome sex life!

        1. Plasma Mongoose

          But were they bisexual?

        2. -Sentinel-

          The women are.

      2. Yotomoe

        At least it’s not like Roller Coaster Tycoon where a god like hand just drops people into the lake.

        1. Doctor_Who

          And hands out free soda but charges $20 for the toilets.

        2. Plasma Mongoose

          And I thought the printer/ink cartridge thing was a scam…

        3. deathjavu

          And eventually gets bored and builds metal death coasters that hurl passengers into the air before crashing to earth in a flaming pile of tragedy.

          This is the type of behavior that should alarm any person who believes in a god who made humans similar to itself.

        4. Gigafreak

          The point of (fatal) impact is in the competing park next door. So the deaths technically take place in THEIR park and THEY deal with the bad press, so that more victi– GUESTS flock to YOUR park instead because nobody died on YOUR property!

          Roller Coaster Tycoon was clearly invented by a supervillain

        5. etybolik

          Or does stuff like this.

        6. tinfoil theory

          We’re programmed to receive.
          You can check out any time you like.

      3. Roborat

        Is there anybody who didn’t do that?

      4. Anarchy 101

        I’m not sure that should be considered a normal life, unless vampire, plant sims are normal things. On another note, they are the most hilarious sims because they have to, yet cannot go outside.

  5. Swerve

    I say “Embrace eccentricity!” Seriously, nobody on my ship is normal, with the exception of Hoist. That’s kind of what makes Hoist stand out: he’s not a psychopath, he has no anxieties, he doesn’t pull elaborate pranks, and he doesn’t look like Prowl.

    1. Aizat

      Yeah, that’s made everything unique. If everything’s the same, it’s bland.

      1. Swerve

        Sometimes bland is good. Like when you’re working on a weapons development station on a satellite, where creative weapons engineers are making explosives and dangerous chemicals for a living. In cases like those, bland, or even boring, is good, very good. You don’t want someone like Sixshot or Cyclonus doing a fly-by, blasting the place up.

        1. Aizat

          But don’t you want guys like Sixshot on your side? Dude’s basically a one man army.

        2. Swerve

          Apparently Prowl thinks like that. And Prowl thinking like that got Pipes and Rewind murdered by Overlord.

          Besides, we have Metroplex on our side. He’s a one Titan army. 🙂

        3. Aizat

          Yeah, that’s not a smart idea putting a monster like Overlord on the ship without any backup plans to pacify him. Seriously, for a strategist, Prowl didn’t think these things through.

  6. Aizat

    Well, Batman wanted a normal life….but circumstances wouldn’t allow it.

    1. Swerve

      He’s Batman. When circumstances took away his family, he built a new, Bat-Family. With Alfred as his foster father, Robin as his foster son, Robin II as his more surly foster son, Robin III/Red Robin as the cute kid the writers bring in when the older Robins are either being Nightwing and leading the Titans, or dead, Batgirl as his neice (since Jim Gordon is almost like a brother to Batman), Spoiler/Batgirl III as his foster daughter, and Damien and Terry as his actual sons that he learned about later in life.

      1. MrSirk

        What’s with Batman having illegitimate son’s anyway? They should have a Batman episode of Maury.

        1. Aizat

          Well, it’s not like he wants to have Terry but CADMUS is doing it behind his back. As to Damien…I don’t know.

        2. Swerve

          Terry (and Matt) are Bruce’s sons because of shenanigans Amanda Waller pulled. She replaced the DNA in Warren McGinnis’ reproductive organs with Bruce Wayne’s DNA, without the consent of either Wayne or McGinnis.

          As for Damien… Talia never told Bruce about him. He was created artificially in a lab, and raised by the League of Assassins to replace Ra’s al-Ghul, if necessary.

        3. Aizat

          In other words, Bats didn’t even know about any of it.

        4. Gigafreak

          …So wait, Abby/Gabby/Tabby’s origin in the Walkyverse is a Batman reference? Cool!

        5. PeterW

          Terry I didn’t know about… Damien was the result of Talia kind of date-raping Bruce. Though they later retconned consent into it, I think.

        6. Swerve

          Terry’s true origin is revealed in the “Justice League Unlimited” episode “Epilogue”.

        7. MrSirk

          Maury: In the case of Terry McGinnis, Matt McGinnis, and Damien Al-Ghul…… Batman, You ARE the father!

          This has to have been done before.

          Also Catwoman doesn’t et to hhave an illegitimate bat baby?

        8. Gigafreak

          Batman get all the pussy except the literal pussy

        9. Anon

          http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huntress_(Helena_Wayne)

  7. Jen Aside

    “Do normal, happy human beings ever cosplay?”

    1. Plasma Mongoose

      Is that a comment on people who frequent the comic-cons?

      1. Aizat

        I never been to a comic-con before. How is it?

        1. Plasma Mongoose

          I do wish that more people would shower before going to these events.

        2. Doctor_Who

          Agreed.

          And FYI, Axe Body Spray is not a substitute for a shower.

        3. deathjavu

          So it smells just like a middle school locker room.

          The only positive interaction I’ve had with axe is around campfires, because it is extremely flammable.

          It gave me some (unfortunately unrealistic) dreams of warding off oversprayed axe users with a march.

        4. Kryss LaBryn

          John Philip Sousa for preference?

        5. Wack'd

          I’ve always assumed most people do and there’s simply a serious ventilation problem in most convention halls.

          You can take twenty showers before arriving and still be sweating like mad within five minutes of entering an 85-degree room packed with hundreds of people.

        6. Plasma Mongoose

          Maybe but fresh sweat isn’t as sickening as several day old stale sweat.

        7. slicedtoad

          also, deodorant. It works, for real.

        8. thatindianguy

          Don’t know about the bigger american ones,but at the Delhi con i went to
          everyone was pretty well groomed.

        9. gwalla

          It only takes a few who aren’t to make the place smell nasty.

        10. Jen Aside

          It’s not so much “before” as “in addition to while being there over the course of many sweaty days in crowded areas” =p

          [though “before” is also nice]

      2. Jen Aside

        It’s mostly a comment about the direction she’s going to pursue this dream, but IF YOU LIKE

    2. Catullus

      Howard did, so…

      Nope. Not one.

  8. Wonder Wig

    That said, Amber really liked the last Dark Knight movie.

  9. MrSirk

    I wonder if she’ll continue to be a masked vigilante after she graduates?

  10. JessWitt

    ~ And I can feel / That dreams are real ~

    http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MwOjC_Bk4e0

  11. Aizat

    But Dorothy, some stories aren’t meant to be told.

  12. -Sentinel-

    It’s kinda sad that Dorothy doesn’t have any short-term dreams. What if she fails to obtain a high-status position? Will she think her entire life has gone to waste? I have nothing against ambition, but you gotta have a plan B.

    1. Aizat

      I prefer not to have a plan B. I do however prefer a plan 2.

    2. Swerve

      That’s part of the tragedy that was Dorothy’s life before she fell in love with Walky. She’s planned out her whole life, but already parts of the plan have gone awry. She didn’t get accepted to Yale, so she’s already on Plan B: working her tailpipe off to get a transfer from Indiana U. to Yale. What is her fallback if that doesn’t work? Will she blame herself for not working hard enough? Will she blame Walky or Joyce for distracting her?

      Dorothy needs to learn to either accept disappointment or adapt to plans not working out to the letter.

      1. Bagge

        To be fair, she handles her plan B with good grace. She found a fun boy, she made friends and she is not bitter about having to take to long route to Yale

    3. Wack'd

      I don’t think she doesn’t have short-term dreams, only that her short-term dreams are just as short term as those of anyone going to a four-year school–namely, not obtainable inside the next four years. She’s smart, so I assume she knows she has to work her way up through a number of local and state positions before anyone ever considers her for President, but even those local positions are a ways away.

  13. Kernanator

    There are superheroes, teleporting dinosaurs, and sharks on this campus. I don’t even think they even have the same definition of normal as the rest of the world.

    1. PeterW

      Teleporting dinosaurs? Only if you count Dina’s talent for being just off-panel at any moment, I think.

      1. Kernanator

        That is exactly who I am referring to, yes.

      2. Bill

        And was this was you were referring to by‘sharks’?

        1. Kernanator

          Yes it was.

  14. T Campbell

    I’m finally starting to see Dorothy the way she sees herself. Early stories focused so much on her struggles and stumbles that while I never doubted her RIGHT to dream big, she seemed to be headed toward being crushed by the weight of her expectations. She’s still a long way from where she wants to be, but what she says here feels very like what a future President might say.

    1. newllend

      I respect that, people focus so much on the future they forget about the here and now. But it can also go the other way also.

    2. Kodra

      I kinda get the sense that Dorothy is projecting her own aspirations onto Amber to mask her own sense of helplessness in the face of her dreams. She wants to believe that Amber is the hypercompetent badass that she appears to be, because that means that maybe one day she could become the hypercompetent badass that becomes the president.

      Also, man Jason, you told the wrong student they needed therapy. I mean, sure Sal could use some too but boy does Amber need someone safe and trained that she can talk to.

      1. timemonkey

        Is Amber even in that class?

      2. Bagge

        She most definitely is projecting, and she’s building up Amazigirl to someone she isn’t. Easy done since she doesn’t have Ethan’s or Danny’s perspective on just how destructive Amazigirl is for Amber.

        On the other hand, she knows SOMETHING went down between Amber and her father, and here she shows her support. That is important

    3. Scott

      what she says here feels like something a future president might say? Thinking a college student running around dishing out vigilante “justice” for misdemeanors is important and should persist is presidential?

      1. Bill

        Of course!!  Someone who is doing things in the public good, but for whom you can still maintain plausible deniability.  Sort of like Mr. Phelps and the Impossible Missions Force (“the Secretary will disavow any knowledge of your actions”).

      2. gwalla

        It does in the “buttering ’em up” sense. Very politicianny.

  15. newllend

    And costume and mask is her way of trieing to find personal strength, to bring out her other side.

  16. Plasma Mongoose

    I’m waiting for the moment that one of one of them utters those important three words, “Les be friends”. 😉

    1. newllend

      That might be a rocky friendship since Dorothy best friend is at the moment one of Ambers enemies and Dorothy’s boyfriend is her other enemies brother.

      1. Wack'd

        …which best friend of Dorothy would that be?

        1. timemonkey

          Joyce is currently Ethan’s beard and justifying trying to un-gay him using the bible. Amber has taken these events poorly.

        2. Swerve

          Dorothy and Sal aren’t friends. Dorothy’s boyfriend is Sal’s brother, Dorothy’s friend Joyce is one of Sal’s groupies (much to Sal’s annoyance), and Dorothy’s friend Billie is roommates with Sal. I’m not sure Dorothy has met Sal other than on visiting day.

        3. timemonkey

          It wasn’t a referral to Sal but Joyce.

        4. John

          I don’t think Dorothy and Billie are really friends. They just have friends in common (Joyce and Walky). Dorothy and Sal were both on the lake trip, though Sal didn’t spend much time hanging with the others.

        5. Gigafreak

          They’ve had a grand total of one conversation, unless you also include the time Sal called Dorothy “Lisa Simpson” during roll call at the beach

  17. Wack'd

    “I want Amazi-Girl to persist. I think she’s important. I mean, granted, my first interaction with her caused my friend’s rapist to get away. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever properly established, in-story, why I want to talk to you so badly, seeing as I’m already fixated the first time I’m shown being involved with journalism.”

    1. Scott

      Apparently Joyce isn’t the only one repressing that memory.

  18. Joebo

    Thank you sir! Before your alt text in this comic I had no idea what this: http://xkcd.com/100/ comic was talking about. (I never read much Family Circus growing up.)

    1. Kryss LaBryn

      Now I’m wondering if the “friend David” he mentions in the alt text is Willis…

  19. Bagge

    I really like Dorothy. I’m glad that she has ambition, but I’m also glad she allows herself to have some fun now as well.

  20. timemonkey

    Dorothy may come away from this conversation disappointed. She seems to have made some assumptions.

    1. Aizat

      And you know what they say about assumptions.

      1. Catullus

        They make an ass out of you and… mption…?

      2. Gigafreak

        You clearly don’t, since your statement clearly assumes that we do.

    2. newllend

      Depends, does she respect her for what she stands for or for what she does?

  21. Ancestral Hamster

    There are odd spots on Dorothy in panels 3 and 5. Are they supposed to be freckles, or has she been bitten by clumsy vampires?

    1. Nono

      Freckles. Just look at the banner for Slipshine just below the comic.

      1. Ancestral Hamster

        Okay, thanks. Can’t see the banner though.

  22. allaces14400

    Now kiss!

  23. Megatron

    I once started a four million year war just because the ruling elite wouldn’t let me be a doctor.

    Sometimes, you gotta take the long way.

  24. WingedBeast

    Amber, Amazigirl, whichever. Just give up on the “normal” part. Happy, well adjusted, these things are nice goals. But, normal was best defined in a line in the cartoon Xmen Evolution (an otherwise not all that good cartoon) “Normal is whatever everybody else is and you are not”.

    1. tinfoil theory

      That’s one way of looking at it.

      Another way is that normal is whatever you are and everybody else isn’t. I don’t think it’s healthy to see it that way.

      Me, I prefer to see it as “perpendicular”.

    2. Nono

      I loved that cartoon but I haven’t seen it from years. What episode was that?

      1. WingedBeast

        I don’t remember much about it. I remember that Mystique had, I think, that one that makes spikes, hostage and she was discussing using him as guinea pig to cure her of some advanced mutation (I think?).

        She asks him “don’t you want to be normal?” He responds with one of the classic 90s responses (which is trite but true, I think) that nobody’s really normal and what is normal anyway?

        She responds in a way that is intended to be cruel but, I think, really reinforces his point “normal is what everybody else is and you are not”. Well, the thing for me is that that applies to everybody, no matter who you’re talking to, so there’s nothing to worry about.

    3. timemonkey

      X-Men Evolution was pretty good.

  25. Badeyes

    Have fun with Danielle. Maybe draw her an awesome Amazi-Teddy for her Grandpa’s widow.

  26. Idon'tcarenomore

    Aw. They’re bonding.

    Been said that Dorothy would make a great Lois Lane to Amzi-girls amazi-person. I think I agree.

  27. begbert2

    I WANT TO READ TOMORROW’S COMIC RIGHT NOW. AND THE NEXT ONE AND THE NEXT ONE AND THE NEXT ONE FOR THIS WHOLE CONVERSATION. RIGHT NOW. AAUGH WHY IS TIME MOCKING ME AND HATING ME AND MAKING ME SUFFER ON AND ON WITH IT’S SLOWNESS??

    1. David M Willis

      well you can read tomorrow’s comic on patreon at about noon

      1. Camachri

        Willis you are a cruel, cruel pornlord.

        1. Gigafreak

          The alternative is being a hungry, hungry pornlord

          And that’s one game the world just isn’t ready for

        2. Roborat

          Now you have me trying to picture what that game would look like. All I can get is a spinning naked woman on her hands and knees (or back, I suppose) in the centre, and the players frantically pounding on the handles to try and insert their plastic penis into the vagina. With a successful entry allowing a marble to be removed from their reservoir.

        3. A

          The fuck is wrong with people on here.

      2. thatindianguy

        I certainly don’t want to seem rude,but do people actually pay just to read the strip a few hours earlier. Then again I’m a cheap bastard so what do I know.

        1. Deanatay

          I prefer to think of it differently. There are some people out there with extra money to spend, who like what Willis does, but who just can’t quite justify donating money. By offering just a small compensation, it can be enough to justify their expenditure. Patreon and Kickstarter are based on this psychology.

        2. David M Willis

          Mostly I think they enjoy supporting me financially for the content they otherwise get for free, and they see the early strip as a bonus.

  28. Pyr05

    The grass is always greener, isn’t it?

  29. Darnel

    (Smile)

  30. Lawzlo

    …I should say that referring to your alter ego as if she’s a different person sounds kinda crazy (has she done this before? It seems like she has, but I’m not certain).

    1. pendrake

      No more crazy than Batman, for whom Bruce Wayne is his “mask” to the public, rather than who he is in truth.

      But then, Batman does not exactly qualify for “sane” either, it just happens that his brand of crazy has strong morals.

    2. Daibhid C

      Talking about your alter ego as though it were a separate person is what alter ego means. Otherwise it’s just another name you call yourself. Clark and Bruce have alter egos, Wally West just has a dual identity, because he doesn’t act any differently when he’s out of costume.

    3. Clif

      I may be crazy, but at least I have each other.

  31. pendrake

    Tim Drake (Robin III) said it best during a camping trip with his team of Young Justice…

    “Would I ever give up the mask & cape to live a normal life? In a heartbeat. Because if I could, then it would mean the world has become a better place where someone like me is no longer *made*, and no longer needed…”

  32. Stranger

    Yes, the college campus NEEDS some random chunky girl in spandex to run around and prevent minor misdemenours!

    1. Daibhid C

      (Must resist urge to say “She’s not the hero they need, but…”)

      1. Jerden

        …she’s the hero that Dorothy admires!

  33. OmegaDez

    I always wonder how we’re supposed to “read” dark blue speech bubbles.
    Does she sound like Batman or something?

    1. timemonkey

      It indicates she’s deliberately altering her own voice so as to sound different. Probably deeper.

      1. thatindianguy

        Or a ridiculous falsetto.

        1. Chris

          … and heavy Brooklyn accent?

    2. WeezerLuvr3030

      Since the colour is what we might call “Adam West Blue” I thought it could be to denote how the Amazing Girl world was super-cartoony. It is the magical realism element of this webcomic. Campy, campy, magical realism. Biff bang pow, with so many real deep feels.

      …Although, speaking of which, I sort of expect a long description of some character’s Transformers collection that mirrors the passage about all the animals that live in Fermina Daza’s home at the start of “Love in the Time of Cholera.” Only Willis could pull that sort of thing off and make it seem natural. “Love in the Time of Cliffjumper” or something like that.

  34. Regalli

    Aww, Amber, sweetie.

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