The last Dumbing of Age Patreon bonus strip of the decade is here! Come learn more about Captain Julia Gray: Space Force!
And remember, you can up your pledge to see tomorrow's strip today, right away! It's a nice perk sometimes. Interloper
The last Dumbing of Age Patreon bonus strip of the decade is here! Come learn more about Captain Julia Gray: Space Force!
And remember, you can up your pledge to see tomorrow's strip today, right away! It's a nice perk sometimes.
180 thoughts on “Interloper”
Ana Chronistic
So much for this decade I guess
Ana Chronistic
Captain Julia, please send the Space Force to save us!!
Needfuldoer
*Kenny Loggins intensifies*
Stephen Bierce
Time for the Twenties to ROAR
LibertyRazor
Decade isn’t over until next year. There is no year 0.
vitalProximity
But… but it STARTS WITH A TWO now!!! ?
NelC
Decades don’t have to fit neatly into centuries. “The Twenties” plainly run from ’20 to ’29. Otherwise you have to figure out what to call ’21—’30, without some pedant asking why 2030 gets to be part of the Twenties.
Besides, the First Century only had 99 years, thanks to some monk forgetting to put in Year Zero.
King Daniel
I’m…pretty sure 100 CE is regarded as part of the first century.
(how I like to remember it: the number at the beginning of the last year of the century is the “number” of that century. So 100 was the last year of the first century, 1700 was the last year of the seventeenth century, 2000 was the last year of the twentieth century…)
Agemegos
It is. Has to be, or otherwise the First Century consists of only 99 years. But AD 100 isn’t one of the Nineties.
BigDogLittleCat
Well, 1582 calendar was short 10 days thanks to the change to Gregorian from Julian, so why not have a 99-year century? 😉
BrokenEye, the True False Prophet
It’s okay, guys. I’ve got a plan. I call it: Reverse Leap Year.
Needfuldoer
Quantum Leap Year. We just keep teleporting around to different time periods, and it’s directed by Donald P. Bellisario.
Adam Black
doesnt matter since there never was a “1st century” . NO year 0, no year 1.
The current calendar began in the 4 century.
King Daniel
Alright then. So in what century then would you say that, for instance, Mount Vesuvius saw its most infamous eruption? Or the Roman conquest of Britain began? In what century did the Han Dynasty collapse? Or a myriad of other examples?
(Also, the calendar you’re probably referring to was devised in the sixth century.)
Stifyn Baker
Decades don’t fit neatly into decades, either. What most people remember as ‘the sixties’ (miniskirts, swinging London, free love, Beatlemania) only really lasted from about 1962-67, while the fashion disaster of the ‘seventies’ actually kicks off in about 1965 and is more or less over by 1976-7 when post-punk and New Wave start to appear. Human culture tends not to fit into neat boxes, however much we want it to, and dates are ultimately arbitrary anyway. We owe our current calendar to St Dionysius Exiguus in 525AD, who made a massive mistake on it which wasn’t discovered until about a century ago… so all those of you who think that the new decade begins tomorrow ARE wrong, but all those of you who think it begins in a year’s time are wrong too, because it should actually really be 2026 right now.
Aletheia
Time is weird, dates even more so. Let people enjoy their celebrations of arbitrary milestones of arbitrary years. 😛
David
The 20s are not one of the numbered decades: they are just a name for a particular span of 10 years. 2021 to 2030 are the 203rd decade since 1 to 10 was the 1st decade. The numbers with lots of zeros at the end end decades, centuries, millennia, they don’t start them.
A dollar is spent when you spent the 100th cent, not when you spent the 99th cent. Zeros are overrated.
Matthew Evan Davis
I am outing myself as a fogey for saying this, but this conversation was had in 1999 and it was agreed that 2000 was still part of the 20th century, but that psychologically the flip from 1999 to 2000 was more important.
BarerMender
Give it up, LibertyRazor. You’re bucking a non-math-literate culture.
Emperor Norton II
It’s actually not math as much as it’s a different definition issue:
The nineteen hundreds started January 1900 and ended December 31st 1999.
The twentieth century started in January 1st 1901 and ended the 3st of December 2000.
Since decades are always defined in the first way (we never say it’s the 211th decade, but we like to refer to decades as “the sixties, the seventies, etc.), it is therefore correct to say that a new decade is starting.
Jamie
Nothing says “non-math-literate” so much as someone who claims math literacy has anything to do witht his.
nobilis
And this discussion is now a xkcd comic:
https://xkcd.com/2249/
Alaric
There’s a case to be made for centuries beginning with “01” and ending with “00”, because of the way we name centuries- “the 21st century”, etc. They specifically count from the year 1. However, we don’t name decades that way, we call them “the ’80s” or “the ’20s”. Since any 10 years is a decade, it’s pretty clear that when people say, for example, “the 50s”, they’re talking about the ten year period (or decade) when the penultimate number is a five. So, 2020 would be the beginning of the decade called “the ’20s”.
Clif
A decade is any 10 year period. The 202nd decade begins in 2021 but the 2020’s begins in 2020. So the ’20s are back. Roar!!
Alaric
Exactly.
David
The 202nd decade began in 2011 and will end when year 2020 is finished. It’s the 203rd decade that begins in 2021. The first decade began in 01 and finished after 10. Just remember that it is the finishing year of a decade/century/millennium where its number is clearly apparent. We are in the twenty-first century that will end after 2100.
Arianod
Yeah, only one year left to go.
Doctor_Who
“Time to commit some mur-diddly-urder!”
ValdVin
And this time it won’t be Maude’s ficus tree.
Stephen Bierce
“Ross wouldn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground.
FICUS–his ass IS a hole in the ground!” (after Michael Moore)
EvilMidnightLurker
“If that’s not Flanders, he’s done his homework.”
DarkoNeko
…what ? why ?!
Cattleprod
He became even larger by eating the other five.
Nono
JOEY DOESN’T SHARE FOOD!
shadowcell
of course, being a super-whatever is totally uncool once your dad starts doing it
well-played, Blaine!
jeffepp
You know, that’s a pretty common reason for people to become super-somethings.
vitalProximity
Hmm, nice, I’ll add that to my little book of things to remember for if/when I have kids.
Kalosec
I never expected Mike to be Amazi-girls sidekick.
vitalProximity
Tbh, he actually looks more like a citizen who is relieved their local superhero has shown up to save them. He doesn’t look like he’s expecting to have to back her up
Kalosec
After seeing Mike fight along side her Amazi-girl mistakenly thinks she can’t train him, mold him into a hero. But the darkness of his assholishness overwelms him ans mike beings his career as an antihero.
auroki
His alter ego. The Mother Fucker!
vitalProximity
Isn’t that just his regular ego? Might not grant him much anonymity…
… But his shield could be made out of nickels. Cool. ?
He Who Abides
If he uses them in place of a cape, he could be NickelBack.
I’ll leave now.
Jade
His signature move is to throw pictures of him and his enemy’s Mom in a private and intimate moment, shouting, “Look at these photographs!”
Roborat
Would be pretty heavy, however.
Shane Wegner
Speaking of concerned onlookers, we’ve seen some people in the background. Each action taken increases the odds of a 911 call. Seeing a dude ram a student on a scooter with a a car, some dudes threaten the scooter kid while he’s down and then someone jumpkicking someone else all roll the dice for someone getting on the phone with the authorities.
BBCC
Which is weird, because AG is Sal’s sidekick.
thejeff
It’s only fair. Sidekicks can have sidekicks too
David
This is a headfight, not a fistfight. Blaine thinks he is putting on a mask but he is losing it. And he is wearing an armor in front when his rearguard is falling apart.
Mike is not pulling his puns.
vitalProximity
Wait does Mike actually not know who AG is? Or is he just name-dropping her to preserve her identity? Also… He apparently *doesn’t* recognize Ross…
Nono
Mike doesn’t know who AG is. Also, he’s never met Ross before.
vitalProximity
Right but they showed that Ross’s campus stunt was all over the news, and I was figuring that Mike would have seen it, plus heard people talking about it.
Nono
Depends on if they showed his picture on screen. It’s possible, but also possible they hid his face to protect Becky. Or Mike only heard his name, never actually watched the news on screen, because who even watches the news these days, am I right?
vitalProximity
Haha yes, yes you are. If he’s like me, he skimmed the article on his phone but skipped the video. Like you said, he might recognize the name but not the face. I think Blaine referred to him as Ross at least once, but without the last name that might not have caught Mike’s attention unless he heard them specifically reference Becky… And i think they’ve only said “my/your daughter” since Mike showed up.
Clif
Mike doesn’t know Ross. He has a pretty good idea of who Amazigirl is or he wouldn’t have known who to call. On his knife.
foamy
That raises another question here: what the devil does Blaine think he’s about that he can kill two people in five minutes with that shitty little hammer?
I mean, yeah, respect the weapon and all, and he’s doing better here than ol’ Gashface, but come on.
Wizard
Talking when he could be killing? Yep, he’s a legit supervillain, alright.
John
A 24oz ball-peen is basically a warhammer. (Contrary to Hollywood’s common depiction of them as post mauls.) Killing two people with one in under a second is quite plausible, if you know what you’re doing.
However, by becoming the Belligerent Ball-Peen, Blaine has stepped into Amazi-Girl’s world, where he’s required to monologue first.
thejeff
He says right here that he just led them to Dunn Woods where she’s commonly seen. Which is why he was yelling for her. No reason to think he called her.
hof1991
Which means his talking sounds more and more like a 911 call. If he wasn’t calling AG, it looks like he was on the phone to someone. And heading to where AG hangs out is a very iffy plan. She could be elsewhere or take the night off.
thejeff
Didn’t say it wasn’t an iffy one, just that it seems to have been his plan. He pretty clearly wasn’t calling Amazi-Girl, at least.
That he’s on the phone to the police is possible, but I’m not sure I buy it. Feels too mundane for Mike. Regardless, the cops aren’t going to come sweeping in an solve this. Pick up the pieces after it’s over, perhaps.
vitalProximity
Also Mike’s pretty observant about people’s weak points, and AG is definitely Amber’s. I mean, they don’t remember what they do as their alter, that’s getting pretty seriously dysfunctional in terms of daily life. I guess Mike *has* been pretty preoccupied for the last few “days” though… Maybe he’s off his game. He’s only human and all
Charles Phipps
A lot of people were stunned that people didn’t recognize Amber was Amazi-Girl. I think people really need to accept it is actually hard to identify her in-universe.
Sazazezer
We tend to view Mike’s level of awareness as significantly higher than everyone else’s though. I figure if Dina is able to figure it out at a glance then Mike definitely should. It’s kind of a nice little twist to know that even Mike can be fooled.
thejeff
I’m still working on the theory that Dina was just in the room when Amber was changing clothes and Amber didn’t notice. That’s Dina’s super power, after all.
hof1991
Of course he knows AG and Amber share a body but he read the tags and saw the blue voice, so he knows it’s AG.
thejeff
If he knows, he’s never even hinted at it. No snide comments about her night work or anything like that.
vitalProximity
I mean he *can* hear us laughing at him from the comments section, so… That could be the true explanation. 😉
RowenMorland
I assumed he knows because he always knows. He’s giving her an alibi for the moment so Blaine doesn’t think about it. I assume despite what he said he wants Amber to have a chance to beat her father as a hero and complete her Amazi-girl ark and move on.
vitalProximity
That’s what I’m hoping, too. On the other hand, Amber specifically said she was trying to leave the party without saying goodbye to Mike, and he was pretty distracted scowling furiously at Ethan, Eric, and/or Danny at the time, so he may have genuinely not seen her leave.
vitalProximity
Also loving how he just reluctantly dropped Walky in there among the people he was worried about protecting. ❤️ Awww, your roomie’s growing on you, Mike?!!
I mean he could just be concerned because he knows Amber likes Walky, but… I’d like to think it’s more than that at least
vitalProximity
Hmmm, she knows Mike by name though and he doesn’t seem to think that’s weird
miri
He did enjoy being on the receiving end of her interrogation technique when she was determining who the Ding Dong Bandit was? So he and AG have met before and he knows she’s reasonably familiar with their floor?
But yeah, I thought he knew AG was Amber (although I think only Walky is aware of the dissociative split going on, and he doesn’t necessarily understand it or its seriousness yet)… P
vitalProximity
Ahhh, the ding dong bandit. They HAVE met; I had forgotten, thanks.