Seeing that reminds me that James Bond movies suffer from a shitty image of women.
There was a compilation film “chlichees, lesbians in film’ made in the middle to late eighties which made me realize that James Bond movies were part of what taught me to know that being a lesbian was not ok.
‘Stereotype’ gets much less in trouble with my autocorrect that doesn’t deal well with me being multilingual and not often bothering to switch the language setting.?
I’m assuming you avoided the books then! I’m not anywhere in your “alphabet,” and I found myself getting creeped out by Fleming’s take on lesbians! “Goldfinger” was the last one I read after becoming an adult. (I’d read all the books in my late teens, but the sociological aspects of Fleming’s writing went over my head!
James Bond’s image of men is pretty shitty, too. Amoral, violent, ends justify the means, use women, dispose of women, kill without qualm. I never did like James Bond. He’s be right up Blaine’s alley, though.
I’m kind of hoping these two never get anywhere near the rest of the cast and they just end up snapping and taking each other out.
You just know Blaine can only go so long before he snaps and openly condescends at Ross. And Ross is going to go berserk when he finds out he’s being used.
Willis said nobody dies, but… “alive” is a broad category
King Daniel
“You’d be surprised what you can live through.”
timemonkey
Nobody dies because the comic would be stuck dealing with it basically forever. Two assholes everyone hates kill each other where the cast never finds out? Totally doable.
thejeff
As long as they never find out. Otherwise the celebrations will last for years of real time.
Sunny
Wouldn’t both Amber and Becky have to be informed if their fathers turned up dead?
TFW you’re a shitty person because you’re a nihilist who only wants power and you don’t know how to deal with someone who’s shitty because they believe strongly in something repulsive
Responsible gun owners use ear protection for that reason. Of course, a responsible gun owner would never try to abduct someone with it anyways, so it would not surprise me if Ross never used ear protection.
woobie
Surely Ross sees himself as a responsible gun owner.
thejeff
All gun owners are responsible gun owners. It’s an article of faith.
Until they get caught doing something to egregious to deny, like an accidental discharge that wounds or kills someone.
Then they never were and their failure can’t be used to say anything about responsible gun owners.
Even beyond that, there’s often a conflation between “responsible” in the sense of following gun safety rules and “responsible” as in “not deliberately committing violent crimes with your gun”. I’m not at all convinced there’s any connection there.
Ross could quite well have been fully conscientious about gun safety – worn ear protection, kept his gun safely locked away, etc and still decide that his attempt to abduct his daughter was justified.
BBCC
There was one article going around a while ago about a woman who was a member of the NRA who said that almost everyone she knew who said they were a responsible gun owner was going against at least one safety rule (like pointing it at things they did not intend to shoot, not keeping the gun, the clip, and ammo stored in separate locked areas, etc.)
DudeMyDadOwnsADealership
Annnd and legit family patriarch….Annnnd someone who’s on the mental and emotional level of a normal man his age….Have fun playing along with him, Blaine…
My ex-neighbors never let their kids watch TV outside of the news because acting violated the fourth commandment,
Some1
I am not entirely sure what acting has to do with keeping the sabbath.
Rei
I think They meant “Thou shalt not lie” which just makes my head hurts.
nobilis
The fourth commandment is the “no images” one.
nobilis
Wait. No, it isn’t. But that would be the only one to make sense.
It’s either keep the Sabbath or honour your parents … So don’t watch Saturday morning cartoons when your parents have fotbidden it ??
LiamKav
I think different denominations have slight variations in the Ten Commandments.
BarerMender
The Catholic numbering is different from the Protestant. The Catholics compress the worship commandments into 3 instead of 4, and split the coveting commandment into 2.
thejeff
There are a couple of other variants I think, but none of them make the 4th relevant to acting, unless I’m missing something.
Agemegos
There’s a table in Wikipedia setting out the eight different systems for dividing the fourteen commandments into Ten. I have to say that the difference between the Septuagint ordering and the Reformed Christian ordering is not very substantial.
Kyrros
(Also, the best TV series of all time, IMO… even if it IS pre-Google.
There’ve been a few times when I was getting particularly heated where I’ve debated a name switch to “Wrath” and using Joyce’s red-eyed “BECAUSE I AM” face.
The thing we need to keep in mind is that every abhorent act we saw him perform and every hurtful word he said during that whole stalking-and-threatening-and-gun-wielding-and-kidnapping-and-almost-getting-daugther&friend-killed thing were seen out out context.
Because when we read that we didn’t know that Becky’s mother was dead, that she died of suicide, that it would be a VERY long stretch to assume that her suicide wasn’t at least in part caused by a life with ToeDad, that when Becky talked about ‘the extent of her danged aspirations’ that was what she was talking about, that the hints of ToeDad building up to suicide by cop were not lost on Becky at all and that the last thing – the VERY last thing he did to his daughter was to blame her for ‘destroying their family’, i.e. blaming her for her mothers death.
We have been way too soft on the fucker all this time. He is a way worse piece of shit than we realised.
I dunno, I don’t know that context adds much to the picture of someone’s waving a loaded gun at kids and kidnapping a child to force them into “conversion therapy,” more accurately called torture.
Blaine might be an unmitigated pr1ck but Ross is worse. I hate people like Ross with the heat of a thousand suns, nuance or no nuance.
I think that is a perfectly reasonable response, and I fully share it.
all I’m saying is that we have even MORE reasons to despise the asshole than we first realised.
Charles Phipps
From what we saw, Becky’s mom wasn’t driven to suicide. She was suffering from untreated depression. I think it’s probably more accurate it was medical rather than mental abuse. Indeed, that seems to have helped drive Ross into his current state of insanity.
Not that he wasn’t a bigoted nutjob ala Carol before.
ischemgeek
Who abused her and prohibited her from getting treatment for the depression, thus making it worse, though?
Charles Phipps
Its an interesting question as to what their homelife is as he’s an unflinching religious fanatic but its possible that she was “happy” in it (as we see Becky and Joyce in similar nutty homes) until her condition killed her.
Did we know Ross was involved in her not being able to get treated? I ask because of the oddity that plenty of fundamentalist households don’t prohibit psychological medicine and in fact encourage it.
TemperaryObsessor
There is no definate proof in this comic that it was Ross’s fault and unless Willis actually decided that and wants to drive the point home I’m guessing there will never be. But the thing about depression is while its not always anyone’s fault it can be the result of abuse. The man religiously believes a man is above his wife and went after his daughter with a shot gun for being herself.
BarerMender
Authoritarian Christians are all about power. Ross lost power over his wife, and now he lives to reassert power over Becky. He’ll do well in prison, because he also knows how to bow to those who have more power than he.
Ronnie
What state of insanity? He drove all the way there with a gun. That’s premeditated. He believed in bigoted shit his entire life, and I think it’s safe to assume that it includes some very worrying ideas about women’s place in society.
He thinks his daughter BELONGS to him. That’s not insanity. That’s abuse.
CJ
Actually, it’s both.
Charles Phipps
Ross is indoctrinated to a cult and clearly doesn’t understand any other value. I actually question how much he is able to make decisions as well since his reactions are not of a particularly functioning adult. These are not defenses, FYI. Ross is clearly a danger to himself and others.
BBCC
First of all, people in cults are still culpable for their choices and behaviour. Second of all, whether or not Joyce’s church is a cult os highly, highly debatable.
We all know Ross isn’t above physical abuse and coercion, so I’m not sure why we’d believe that never came into play with Bonnie.
243 thoughts on “Days Inn”
Ana Chronistic
I’d torture Blaine some more by sending him this thread but I bet he doesn’t know how to Twit
CJ
Seeing that reminds me that James Bond movies suffer from a shitty image of women.
There was a compilation film “chlichees, lesbians in film’ made in the middle to late eighties which made me realize that James Bond movies were part of what taught me to know that being a lesbian was not ok.
Jon Rich
Chlichees?
CJ
‘Stereotype’ gets much less in trouble with my autocorrect that doesn’t deal well with me being multilingual and not often bothering to switch the language setting.?
LiamKav
Ironically, “cliché” itself is a French word.
Ed Rhodes
I’m assuming you avoided the books then! I’m not anywhere in your “alphabet,” and I found myself getting creeped out by Fleming’s take on lesbians! “Goldfinger” was the last one I read after becoming an adult. (I’d read all the books in my late teens, but the sociological aspects of Fleming’s writing went over my head!
BarerMender
James Bond’s image of men is pretty shitty, too. Amoral, violent, ends justify the means, use women, dispose of women, kill without qualm. I never did like James Bond. He’s be right up Blaine’s alley, though.
Doctor_Who
Plot twist: Ross is watching this.
ian livs
I clicked expecting a RickRoll. Still glad I clicked it.
Slartibeast Button, BIA
Ross thinks Sam the American Eagle is the Hero.
Bob
I was expecting one of these.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54zEDJl0Rss
ian livs
I gotta admit, I like seeing Blaine suffer even if it’s in this small way.
Danielle
me too
tim gueguen
I’m sure his suffering from Ross is just beginning.
timemonkey
I’m kind of hoping these two never get anywhere near the rest of the cast and they just end up snapping and taking each other out.
You just know Blaine can only go so long before he snaps and openly condescends at Ross. And Ross is going to go berserk when he finds out he’s being used.
He Who Abides
I still think Ross is going to be mad when he figures out that Blaine wrks for the Korean mob. And that will be the end of Blaine.
Do not ruin my headcanon.
Vulcanodon
Willis said nobody dies, but… “alive” is a broad category
King Daniel
“You’d be surprised what you can live through.”
timemonkey
Nobody dies because the comic would be stuck dealing with it basically forever. Two assholes everyone hates kill each other where the cast never finds out? Totally doable.
thejeff
As long as they never find out. Otherwise the celebrations will last for years of real time.
Sunny
Wouldn’t both Amber and Becky have to be informed if their fathers turned up dead?
Stephen Bierce
Full Disclosure: I used to work for a hotel that used to be a Days Inn. Luckily the television situation was the least problematic side of the job.
paleotectonics
Used to be a Day’s Inn?!?
Ominous foreshadowing.
Stephen Bierce
Someone always playing
Corporation games
Who cares? They’re always changing
Corporation names…
Moon
Would you mind sharing with the class what the hell happened at that Days Inn? (unless you don’t feel like it which is cool)
Sporky
TFW you’re a shitty person because you’re a nihilist who only wants power and you don’t know how to deal with someone who’s shitty because they believe strongly in something repulsive
Charles Phipps
He knows, I think. It’s just Ross requires a LOT of management in that department.
ValdVin
How many times is Blaine gonna mutter things under his breath until Ross asks him “What was that?”
Mollyscribbles
He has mild hearing loss; hearing aids are a liberal conspiracy to convince you that the loudest news arguments aren’t the most valid.
King Daniel
I mean, Ross owns/owned a gun. Guns are loud.
Jon Rich
Responsible gun owners use ear protection for that reason. Of course, a responsible gun owner would never try to abduct someone with it anyways, so it would not surprise me if Ross never used ear protection.
woobie
Surely Ross sees himself as a responsible gun owner.
thejeff
All gun owners are responsible gun owners. It’s an article of faith.
Until they get caught doing something to egregious to deny, like an accidental discharge that wounds or kills someone.
Then they never were and their failure can’t be used to say anything about responsible gun owners.
Even beyond that, there’s often a conflation between “responsible” in the sense of following gun safety rules and “responsible” as in “not deliberately committing violent crimes with your gun”. I’m not at all convinced there’s any connection there.
Ross could quite well have been fully conscientious about gun safety – worn ear protection, kept his gun safely locked away, etc and still decide that his attempt to abduct his daughter was justified.
BBCC
There was one article going around a while ago about a woman who was a member of the NRA who said that almost everyone she knew who said they were a responsible gun owner was going against at least one safety rule (like pointing it at things they did not intend to shoot, not keeping the gun, the clip, and ammo stored in separate locked areas, etc.)
DudeMyDadOwnsADealership
Annnd and legit family patriarch….Annnnd someone who’s on the mental and emotional level of a normal man his age….Have fun playing along with him, Blaine…
Maxy
This is… Frighteningly close to some people I’ve met.
Maxy
(The “TV/Movies are lies and therefore evil” thing.)
Pink Freud
This is frighteningly close to some people I’m related to.
Tom Speelman
My ex-neighbors never let their kids watch TV outside of the news because acting violated the fourth commandment,
Some1
I am not entirely sure what acting has to do with keeping the sabbath.
Rei
I think They meant “Thou shalt not lie” which just makes my head hurts.
nobilis
The fourth commandment is the “no images” one.
nobilis
Wait. No, it isn’t. But that would be the only one to make sense.
It’s either keep the Sabbath or honour your parents … So don’t watch Saturday morning cartoons when your parents have fotbidden it ??
LiamKav
I think different denominations have slight variations in the Ten Commandments.
BarerMender
The Catholic numbering is different from the Protestant. The Catholics compress the worship commandments into 3 instead of 4, and split the coveting commandment into 2.
thejeff
There are a couple of other variants I think, but none of them make the 4th relevant to acting, unless I’m missing something.
Agemegos
There’s a table in Wikipedia setting out the eight different systems for dividing the fourteen commandments into Ten. I have to say that the difference between the Septuagint ordering and the Reformed Christian ordering is not very substantial.
Kyrros
(Also, the best TV series of all time, IMO… even if it IS pre-Google.
Schpoonman
I hate Ross so fucking much.
brumagem
#gravatarappropriatecomments
Schpoonman
There’ve been a few times when I was getting particularly heated where I’ve debated a name switch to “Wrath” and using Joyce’s red-eyed “BECAUSE I AM” face.
ValdVin
Where is your gravatar from? I thought it was in that scene in the restaurant with John, Jocelyne, and Becky, but no luck.
Delicious Taffy
It’s from when Dina offers Joyce money for swearing.
ValdVin
Ahh. Thanx.
Delicious Taffy
Sorry, I fibbed slightly. It was probably Sarah, not Dina. Or maybe I’m wrong entirely and no money is being offered.
He Who Abides
Joe offered the money. Sarah just got a kick out of it.
ValdVin
Nah, no prob. This is about the best indexed webcomic around, and I searched it up easily.
BarerMender
Sarah offered Joyce $20 after Becky was kidnapped and recovered.
He Who Abides
Okay. I was thinking of the bit in the cafeteria.
Bagge
The thing we need to keep in mind is that every abhorent act we saw him perform and every hurtful word he said during that whole stalking-and-threatening-and-gun-wielding-and-kidnapping-and-almost-getting-daugther&friend-killed thing were seen out out context.
Because when we read that we didn’t know that Becky’s mother was dead, that she died of suicide, that it would be a VERY long stretch to assume that her suicide wasn’t at least in part caused by a life with ToeDad, that when Becky talked about ‘the extent of her danged aspirations’ that was what she was talking about, that the hints of ToeDad building up to suicide by cop were not lost on Becky at all and that the last thing – the VERY last thing he did to his daughter was to blame her for ‘destroying their family’, i.e. blaming her for her mothers death.
We have been way too soft on the fucker all this time. He is a way worse piece of shit than we realised.
BBCC
We did know Becky’s mom died. He mentioned it to Dina.
Bagge
True. But we were missing some rather important nuances.
BigDogLittleCat
I dunno, I don’t know that context adds much to the picture of someone’s waving a loaded gun at kids and kidnapping a child to force them into “conversion therapy,” more accurately called torture.
Blaine might be an unmitigated pr1ck but Ross is worse. I hate people like Ross with the heat of a thousand suns, nuance or no nuance.
Bagge
I think that is a perfectly reasonable response, and I fully share it.
all I’m saying is that we have even MORE reasons to despise the asshole than we first realised.
Charles Phipps
From what we saw, Becky’s mom wasn’t driven to suicide. She was suffering from untreated depression. I think it’s probably more accurate it was medical rather than mental abuse. Indeed, that seems to have helped drive Ross into his current state of insanity.
Not that he wasn’t a bigoted nutjob ala Carol before.
ischemgeek
Who abused her and prohibited her from getting treatment for the depression, thus making it worse, though?
Charles Phipps
Its an interesting question as to what their homelife is as he’s an unflinching religious fanatic but its possible that she was “happy” in it (as we see Becky and Joyce in similar nutty homes) until her condition killed her.
Did we know Ross was involved in her not being able to get treated? I ask because of the oddity that plenty of fundamentalist households don’t prohibit psychological medicine and in fact encourage it.
TemperaryObsessor
There is no definate proof in this comic that it was Ross’s fault and unless Willis actually decided that and wants to drive the point home I’m guessing there will never be. But the thing about depression is while its not always anyone’s fault it can be the result of abuse. The man religiously believes a man is above his wife and went after his daughter with a shot gun for being herself.
BarerMender
Authoritarian Christians are all about power. Ross lost power over his wife, and now he lives to reassert power over Becky. He’ll do well in prison, because he also knows how to bow to those who have more power than he.
Ronnie
What state of insanity? He drove all the way there with a gun. That’s premeditated. He believed in bigoted shit his entire life, and I think it’s safe to assume that it includes some very worrying ideas about women’s place in society.
He thinks his daughter BELONGS to him. That’s not insanity. That’s abuse.
CJ
Actually, it’s both.
Charles Phipps
Ross is indoctrinated to a cult and clearly doesn’t understand any other value. I actually question how much he is able to make decisions as well since his reactions are not of a particularly functioning adult. These are not defenses, FYI. Ross is clearly a danger to himself and others.
BBCC
First of all, people in cults are still culpable for their choices and behaviour. Second of all, whether or not Joyce’s church is a cult os highly, highly debatable.
We all know Ross isn’t above physical abuse and coercion, so I’m not sure why we’d believe that never came into play with Bonnie.