she actually threw the blue mask down in the stairwell after running away from Sal and Walky on garbage roof, i guess she just never went to retrieve it.
One of them (light brown hair, glasses) is one of the guys who was beating up Danny reeeally early into the comic’s run, just before Amazi-Girl’s first appearance.
butts
A friend of Beef’s.
inqntrol
And by the looks of it he hasn’t learned his lesson the last time.
This is just…contrived. Really, really contrived. I can’t bring myself to like it because it breaks the barely-plausable veneer that willis usually maintains.
These two featured in a high-speed car chase storyline involving grappling hooks, hang-gliding skateboards, car-to-car jumping, fighting on the roof of a moving vehicle, and a mid-air motorcycle rescue, and *this* is what you’re complaining about?
Many alt-Earth settings have escalated frequency of things like acts of violence, disappearances, etc, to fit the narrative. Heck, one D&D campaign I ran had silver-coated weapons available at every shop ’cause lycanthropy was considered an everyday concern.
Given what we’ve seen so far, it’s easy to excuse Willis’ narrative quirks just by stating that open violence is more easy to come by in Dumbiverse than in the real world. Based off that, there’s no inconsistency and, thus, no contrived elements or reduction of plausibility.
Similarly, giant man-shaped mecha fighting each other is ludicrous in the real world, but we accept that as something normal for oh, oh so many narratives out there. In short, stories just have to be consistent within themselves, not necessarily to our real world expectations; In fact, it’s in their offering contrast to the real world that stories typically shine the most.
That said, my first thought upon reading today’s comic was “Gods, how many fights does this campus have, none of the multiple campuses I’ve been on over the years never had any of note”. So yeah, I do get where your perspective is coming from.
If nothing else, does lean Dumbiverse a bit more toward Walkyverse’s exaggerated tones, and that may not necessarily be beneficial for future immersion in this more grounded narrative.
thejeff
I’m not even sure what the Unusually Angry Hippie finds contrived about it.
That there’s the fight at all?
That Sal’s holding her own against three bigger guys?
That Amazi-Girl swings in at the right dramatic moment?
It all boils down to: She’s a super hero. She gets to play by superhero tropes. She always has. Hell, Amazi-Girl’s first appearance was jumping in just like this to stop 3 guys (including one of these 3) from beating on Danny.
BarerMender
That the three guys are standing around letting her talk instead of swarming her and taking her to the ground?
HeySo
“She gets to play by superhero tropes. She always has”
Oh, don’t forget this elaborate chase sequence, where she was hoping across rooftops and treetops like a squirrel on meth. Yeah, I think she jumped the shark.. I mean, truck, a good while back.
lightsabermario
Makes sense that the Dumbing of Age universe is alt-Earth with slight differences like escalated fighting situations. We’ve already seen other examples of differences. For instance, in the DOA universe, parents have a ridiculously high chance of being awful human beings.
coru
…I don’t find that part to be terribly unrealistic based on my experiences.
King Daniel
Also, the math’s been done and it only comes out to be half the known parents with some flavor of awful. Not a “ridiculously high” number.
HeySo
Actually, tallying things up it still appears to be the minority of parents in DoA that are awful, it’s just that those parents are highlighted in the narrative. Likewise, as King Daniel noted, even among parents we’ve gotten a good look at, they’re still not the majority.
And as far as the real world goes, awful parents have overwhelmingly surpassed DoA in both quantity and magnitude. I’m honestly not entirely sure that decent parents aren’t just a Hollywood myth.
If your experiences in real life differ, then you’ve been blessed with fortunate circumstances- or haven’t been looking close enough. Frankly, humans are pretty darn awful, and I’ve seen very few fictions that come even remotely close to what I’ve seen in my own life. To me, DoA just seems normal and realistic. Like, what you’d find in normal, not extremely bad life circumstances.
So, y’know- pick at the superheroes and two-bit villains, but don’t mistake everything in the comic as being exaggerated against real life. :/
Why?
Based on the dialogue, I get the impression that Sal and AG are “patrolling” the campus Buffy style. Not sure what these guys did, but presumably this is an in medias res situation where Sal saw them committing some sort of crime and put a stop to it.
The weirder part is how Sal and AG seem to be patrolling buddies now – Sal just smiled to see her like they’re good friends.
Unusually Angry Hippie
Dare I say….timeskip?
King Daniel
Timeskips have always been noted in the comic before now.
Redhead’s a recurring bully. He started off beating up Danny in the first storyline, then he was beating up someone at the party where Ryan was attacking Joyce (that’s why AG was at the party) and now apparently he’s decided to move on to attempting to bully Sal apparently.
I sure hope that kid wasn’t too fond of having teeth.
Not necessarily. “Sorry I lost my mask in the aftermath of you interrupting me with your brother” would kind of give away her identity in front of Sal and a few random people.
My assumption was she could have easily found it again if she remembered where she threw it. Unless someone took her mask, it should still be at the bottom of that stairwell.
Alanari
Or she didn’t have the time to go back, or it got so dirty it needs to be washed first.
Anyway, that “getting rid of ag” didn’t really work.. which itself is worrisome.
227 thoughts on “Goin’ down”
toby
“and I had to wash some kind of sludge off of it that I think might have been toxic”
Inahc
she’s wearing a yellow mask instead of blue, so… maybe she didn’t find the blue one? :/
or it’s still wet from washing off that sludge 🙂
toby
Oh dang, didn’t even catch that!
Yossarianduck
Amazi-girl is ALWAYS prepared, so I bet she has a spare.
Rowen Morland
I wonder if Amber knew that Amazi-Girl had a yellow mask (perhaps AG had to make one.)
Wright
She had to dimension-hop and steal it from Lucy, clearly.
Felix
Her alter ego has evolved and the change in mask color is an indicator of that perhaps? Just a thought.
Ya Girl
she actually threw the blue mask down in the stairwell after running away from Sal and Walky on garbage roof, i guess she just never went to retrieve it.
thejeff
And Amazi-Girl probably doesn’t remember that.
Plasma Mongoose
She’s the new Toxic Avenger now?
Sunny
Best super hero ever.
Ana Chronistic
uh-oh
slow costume shift to Shortpacked!Amazi-Girl
GoldStarz
It’s actually Walkyverse!Amber crossing over into the Dumbiverse.
King Daniel
If so, I expect to see her wielding a corn popper in tomorrow’s strip.
skittylover3
PLEASE
reed
…that and i had to beat up some crippling depression first
AndroidDreams
i hope she didnt beat up Walky, such a nice boy
Cute Carla
Unless he’s into it
Defensor
Um, who are these guys exactly?
Gizen
Judging by their lack of tags, nobodies.
King Daniel
One of them (light brown hair, glasses) is one of the guys who was beating up Danny reeeally early into the comic’s run, just before Amazi-Girl’s first appearance.
butts
A friend of Beef’s.
inqntrol
And by the looks of it he hasn’t learned his lesson the last time.
Yumi
Jagweed Brigade.
Agemegos
Well, I doubt they are harmless enthusiasts of amateur boxing, and I think that leaves muggers, rapists, or a would-be lynch gang.
Unusually Angry Hippie
This is just…contrived. Really, really contrived. I can’t bring myself to like it because it breaks the barely-plausable veneer that willis usually maintains.
Durandal_1707
These two featured in a high-speed car chase storyline involving grappling hooks, hang-gliding skateboards, car-to-car jumping, fighting on the roof of a moving vehicle, and a mid-air motorcycle rescue, and *this* is what you’re complaining about?
HeySo
Many alt-Earth settings have escalated frequency of things like acts of violence, disappearances, etc, to fit the narrative. Heck, one D&D campaign I ran had silver-coated weapons available at every shop ’cause lycanthropy was considered an everyday concern.
Given what we’ve seen so far, it’s easy to excuse Willis’ narrative quirks just by stating that open violence is more easy to come by in Dumbiverse than in the real world. Based off that, there’s no inconsistency and, thus, no contrived elements or reduction of plausibility.
Similarly, giant man-shaped mecha fighting each other is ludicrous in the real world, but we accept that as something normal for oh, oh so many narratives out there. In short, stories just have to be consistent within themselves, not necessarily to our real world expectations; In fact, it’s in their offering contrast to the real world that stories typically shine the most.
That said, my first thought upon reading today’s comic was “Gods, how many fights does this campus have, none of the multiple campuses I’ve been on over the years never had any of note”. So yeah, I do get where your perspective is coming from.
If nothing else, does lean Dumbiverse a bit more toward Walkyverse’s exaggerated tones, and that may not necessarily be beneficial for future immersion in this more grounded narrative.
thejeff
I’m not even sure what the Unusually Angry Hippie finds contrived about it.
That there’s the fight at all?
That Sal’s holding her own against three bigger guys?
That Amazi-Girl swings in at the right dramatic moment?
It all boils down to: She’s a super hero. She gets to play by superhero tropes. She always has. Hell, Amazi-Girl’s first appearance was jumping in just like this to stop 3 guys (including one of these 3) from beating on Danny.
BarerMender
That the three guys are standing around letting her talk instead of swarming her and taking her to the ground?
HeySo
“She gets to play by superhero tropes. She always has”
Oh, don’t forget this elaborate chase sequence, where she was hoping across rooftops and treetops like a squirrel on meth. Yeah, I think she jumped the shark.. I mean, truck, a good while back.
lightsabermario
Makes sense that the Dumbing of Age universe is alt-Earth with slight differences like escalated fighting situations. We’ve already seen other examples of differences. For instance, in the DOA universe, parents have a ridiculously high chance of being awful human beings.
coru
…I don’t find that part to be terribly unrealistic based on my experiences.
King Daniel
Also, the math’s been done and it only comes out to be half the known parents with some flavor of awful. Not a “ridiculously high” number.
HeySo
Actually, tallying things up it still appears to be the minority of parents in DoA that are awful, it’s just that those parents are highlighted in the narrative. Likewise, as King Daniel noted, even among parents we’ve gotten a good look at, they’re still not the majority.
And as far as the real world goes, awful parents have overwhelmingly surpassed DoA in both quantity and magnitude. I’m honestly not entirely sure that decent parents aren’t just a Hollywood myth.
If your experiences in real life differ, then you’ve been blessed with fortunate circumstances- or haven’t been looking close enough. Frankly, humans are pretty darn awful, and I’ve seen very few fictions that come even remotely close to what I’ve seen in my own life. To me, DoA just seems normal and realistic. Like, what you’d find in normal, not extremely bad life circumstances.
So, y’know- pick at the superheroes and two-bit villains, but don’t mistake everything in the comic as being exaggerated against real life. :/
HeySo
*by my experiences, awful parents
LeslieBean4Shizzle
Why?
Based on the dialogue, I get the impression that Sal and AG are “patrolling” the campus Buffy style. Not sure what these guys did, but presumably this is an in medias res situation where Sal saw them committing some sort of crime and put a stop to it.
The weirder part is how Sal and AG seem to be patrolling buddies now – Sal just smiled to see her like they’re good friends.
Unusually Angry Hippie
Dare I say….timeskip?
King Daniel
Timeskips have always been noted in the comic before now.
Shadlyn
Amber has been losing time. I think we’re seeing what it is she’s been losing. This also explains why Sal was looking for Amazigirl on Garbage Roof.
BBCC
Redhead’s a recurring bully. He started off beating up Danny in the first storyline, then he was beating up someone at the party where Ryan was attacking Joyce (that’s why AG was at the party) and now apparently he’s decided to move on to attempting to bully Sal apparently.
I sure hope that kid wasn’t too fond of having teeth.
Daisy
Literal redshirts. B) guy seems to be a recurring punching bag
Kathleen
Yeah definitely not sharing memories anymore. Not good.
Alanari
Not necessarily. “Sorry I lost my mask in the aftermath of you interrupting me with your brother” would kind of give away her identity in front of Sal and a few random people.
Kathleen
My assumption was she could have easily found it again if she remembered where she threw it. Unless someone took her mask, it should still be at the bottom of that stairwell.
Alanari
Or she didn’t have the time to go back, or it got so dirty it needs to be washed first.
Anyway, that “getting rid of ag” didn’t really work.. which itself is worrisome.
thejeff
Well, we pretty much knew it wouldn’t.
svata
Probably has Taco Bell all over it
Lieutenant Dan
Probably has doorstop all over it.
Yumi
That last panel got me feeling some SalXAG.
That’d be fun for drama.
DailyBrad
It would, but I don’t think Sal’s into gals, amazi or otherwise.
I don’t recall if it’s come up if Amber is any.
BBCC
AG might be, even if Amber’s not.
Mr D
….Jesus how WOULD you deal with that?
jeffepp
Wait for it…
Dara
oh, gods
I like it but
Going to bed with Amazi-Girl, waking up with Amber.
Quickly, Robin – to AO3!
Rabid Rabbit
Amber blearily blinks, trying to work out why Walky’s hair is longer.
Sal tries to get out of it by saying there was a Canada-related gender-swap.
Ruth, passing by, overhears and beats them both to death with their femurs for besmirching for blaming Canada.
Koms
The mental image is funnier than it ought to be. I just also got an image of Ruth beating drums with femurs.
King Daniel
My only question would be, how did those drums get femurs in the first place?
Marsh Maryrose
The same way that an elephant got into Captain Spalding’s pajamas?
Geneseepaws
Because: Tuscaloosa? Mebbe?
Dean
Walky and Sal would need to have some kind of tag-team arrangement.
Kensou
Holy identity crisis, Batman!
Larkle
Huh. Has this become a regular thing that they do now? And is Amber aware of this?
Danielle
i dont think amber is aware of this
Nikolai Geier
I don’t think Sal is aware that Amber isn’t aware of this.
MatthewTheLucky
Sal has no idea that Amber is AG or the girl who stabbed her.
Departure_Dave
A whole general lack of awareness at this college XD
Dana
I was unaware.
acher4
Lacking of Aware
lol
Remmington Steele
So dumb, so very … ha-ha!
Sunny
Does Marcie know?
tyranidswarm