114

Ninety-nine
Posted on October 9, 2022 by David M Willis

114 thoughts on “Ninety-nine”

  1. Ana Chronistic

    those who clear their history are doomed to repeat it

    1. True Survivor

      Thank you for making my day.

    2. Cholma

      Truer words were never typed?

  2. Doctor_Who

    Secret Bonus Panel.

    1. shadowcell

      at the risk of an almost certain Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor

      1. Wack'd

        Fun fact: Harvey Korman did actually win an award for Best Supporting Actor in 1974!

        It was an Emmy for his role in The Carol Burnett Show.

        1. Roborat

          Watching Korman and other cast members completely loose it in a skit when Conway starts adlibbing are my favourite memories of that show.

  3. TrueVCU

    P H O N E

    1. TrueVCU

      Seriously love the parallel of Amber and Booster both being terminally distracted by their phones

      1. Wack'd

        Booster’s got an actual camera, it looks like.

        1. TrueVCU

          *devices

  4. Sirksome

    Meh, Booster was kind of a jerk too. This one ain’t worth worrying about.

    1. Clif

      You know who else was kind of a jerk? Mike was kind of a jerk too. And we know how that turned out.

      1. Reltzik

        I dunno. I think his whole redemption arc fell pretty flat.

        1. Freemage

          golf clap

        2. Max Void

          You’re crushing it with that joke.

        3. Someguy

          I think I saw mike underneath that joke

        4. Schpoonman

          Haaa, it’s funny because he’s dead.

        5. Taffy

          If he didn’t wanna be dead, he shouldn’t have died.

        6. Bryy

          It did and he did.

  5. Reed

    amber you don’t have to decide things like morality for yourself anymore, that’s what twitter polls and internet comment sections are for.

    also i think she was valid for being mean.

  6. The Wellerman

    That last panel being the cutest Amber pic to date really offset the sadness of the one before it. ?

  7. Thag Simmons

    At least in this instance Booster probably needed to hear that

    1. Regalli

      Yeah, I’m inclined to go ‘this was the occasion you’re allowed to lash out a bit, if you crossed the line it was only barely and they’ve been pretty bad at not crossing them on their part.’

  8. Regalli

    I want to give Amber a blanket and some soup.

    And a good plurality-friendly trauma-informed support group.

    Alas.

    1. The Wellerman

      I should make her her own comfy place in a virtual world…

      if only I didn’t also have a plate to deal with ?

      1. Clif

        Don’t worry. There’ll be more plate later.

  9. Bicycle Bill

    You may think it’s significant now, Amber, but I guarantee you that within two weeks (in real-world time) it will have been completely forgotten by both yourself AND Booster.

    1. Leorale

      Amber’s anxiety may include running over various embarrassing stuff she’s done ages ago, especially when she’s trying to sleep.

      (This particular instance wasn’t actually embarrassing, of course, but the anxiety doesn’t care.)

      Booster has a sadness-selfie to remember it by, but you’re right, they’ve probably learned nothing from it. Hooray!

      1. Needfuldoer

        Insomnia by self-doubt. FUN. 😐

        I think Booster buried their feels even deeper than Amber.

  10. True Survivor

    I think Amber might need help when it comes to screens. I get it I do too, probably. They take all the worry away and replace it with hours of sweet distraction, which of course inevitably just puts you further behind and thus more worried forming the genesis of a terrible positive feedback loop. Its way the Youtube icon looks like a sideways recycle symbol.

    1. Ari

      In that situation, isn’t the anxiety itself more of a problem than the coping mechanism? People do the same with like, reading books or going out in nature or plenty of things that are generally regarded as really healthy. I guess it’s easier to dick around with your phone because it’s always there, though, and other sources of escapism have more of an access barrier…

      1. True Survivor

        Yeah anxiety’s the root cause, but the easy access of the screen escapism is why its main problem – everything is always a click away.

        1. True Survivor

          *ignore the “why” – I can’t type today.

  11. Sajuuk-Khar

    brain chemicals good, amirite folks

    1. not someone else

      gimme that sweet sweet dopamine hit

      1. Sajuuk-Khar

        dopamine machine broke

        1. StClair

          dopamine comes and goes, cortisol is always there for you.

        2. mrnoidea

          Nothing like cortisol to get you up in the morning.

      2. True Survivor

        Hey don’t ignorepinephrine.

        1. True Survivor

          Really, nothing? Come on guys that was a great pun.

        2. Laura

          Huzzah!

  12. C.T. Phipps

    This reminded me of, strangely, how it was so hard to talk about FALLOUT 3’s flaws on the old NO MUTANTS ALLOWED (A fallout) page. Everyone hated everything about the Bethesda era so it was just pure hatred.

    So, ironically, I couldn’t talk about the flaws of the game because they would have to be taken individually as part of a game and since they hated everything, there was nothing to discuss.

    Okay, maybe that makes no sense.

    1. StClair

      No, that makes perfect sense. It’s why it’s impossible to have actual critical discussion about some many movies and television shows these days.

      1. C.T. Phipps

        Yeah, poor Amber has the same problem. She can’t deal with issues because full misanthropy means that the people who are actually flawed get the same reaction as everyone else.

        You can’t run the engine at full capacity all the time.

        1. misanthropope

          this one goes to eleven.

    2. Thag Simmons

      I mean if I remember right No Mutants Allowed was like that about literally every Fallout game that wasn’t the original. Not the sort of place that fosters compelling nuanced discussion

  13. Stephen Bierce

    Strength in Numbers

  14. Wraithy2773

    Booster was being an ass, but you could’ve handled it better Amber.

    Face it, you’re on the upper end of it, but you’re still teenagers, 90% of the time everyone sucks at least a little >_>.

    Amber: “So, it gets better when you become an adult?”

    ……….sure, why not?

    1. Sporky

      The only way she could’ve handled it better is by shutting Booster down earlier. She was 100% right to call out their bullshit, and the fact that she entertained their creepy ass as much as she did doesn’t reflect well on her

      1. Dara

        ABSOLUTELY. I thought she handled that fine.

        I wish Amazi-Girl was around more often, I think she’d approve too.

        1. Leorale

          Bonus: the main reason she even left her comfort zone and entertained Booster was that she wanted to make a new friend for her depressed pal. And once she felt that Booster was basically objectifying people’s pain, her motivation switched to protecting herself and Ethan from them.
          Amber does not always make good choices, to put it mildly, but these ones seem pretty solid to me.

        2. Joy

          I agree.

      2. Wraithy2773

        I mean, I’d say that she vaulted over the line of good taste by trying to hook up Booster with Ethan, something that’d probably be good or healthy for neither of them…

    2. anon

      hm, well i’ve seen 30-35 year olds seem to display the same amount of maturity as an 18 year old but hopefully amber’s actively improving. rather than doubling down on being an asocial shutin that’ll be basement dwelling for most of adulthood but it shouldn’t get that bad hopefully lol

    3. Proxiehunter

      Could people please stop implying that the ADULT (although young) characters in this comic are somehow not adults? It’s creepy and it’s infanatilising to adults in that age group.

      1. Wraithy2773

        Yeah, that’s fair, sorry. They’re adults, just really, really young adults, with all the chaos that implies, that’s all I was going for there.

      2. StClair

        Except that calling them adults (with all that implies, or is supposed to) simply because they’re a certain calendar age actually IMO points out how incredibly arbitrary that label is and says nothing about how mature, functional etc they are. For practical and legal reasons a line has to be drawn somewhere, sure, but it’s a process, a continuum, and a lot of “adults” take several more years to get there or never do.

        (Another take I’ve seen lots of places, and which may be equally valid, is that there are very few “adults” who are actually entirely put together, and most of us are just “faking it” with varying degrees of success.)

    4. Needfuldoer

      That would fit the Anakin/Padme meme template.

      Anakin: “Everyone our age sucks a little.”
      Padme: “It gets better as we get older, right?”
      Anakin: :j
      Padme: “It gets better as we get older, right??”

      1. a/snow/mous/e

        Oh definitely fits that

  15. Clif

    You do you, Amber.

  16. newlland(Henryvolt)

    Maybe that type of coping mechanism would help if Amber had no sense of guilt or a conscience but despite all her faults she does.

    1. newlland(Henryvolt)

      That aside maybe a bit of that did needed to be said. I don’t think Booster meant to do anyone one any harm but still.

      1. Clif

        It may not be a perfect coping method, but inadequacy can be a great comfort.

  17. RassilonTDavros

    …Yeah, that was probably the one time out of 100 that it was justified, Amber. Booster may have been fun to watch, but they were being invasive and a creep.

    1. Azu

      Seconded.

  18. BBCC

    Oh no, thinking over everything you’ve ever done forever and ever ad nauseam.

    AMBER NO IT’S A TRAP

  19. anon

    time to post about it on r/AITA on a throwaway account lol

  20. Florence

    As much as I will defend booster, booster absolutely earned how they were treated their. Sucks when you feel bad for doing the right thing

    If my theory of booster being autistic is true then yea there’s a whole other conversation about how they’ve been treated and how they’ve acted, but also boundaries are a thing that should be respected

    It does make me sad that amber is still pushing her feelings aside like this though

    1. Joy

      I mean Amber is strongly autistic coded, I think. So is Ethan.

  21. Pocky

    Honestly; we can only hope Booster took any of that to heart. But knowing their shtick, they probably thought the whole thing was funny.

    But real talk; this is the killer here. Do something reasonable; spend the whole rest of the day feeling guilty about it, even when you really just did something normal.

  22. Wereg

    Yeeaaahhh Amber didn’t solve this with the usual violence, and she verbally lashed out at Booster after they had made Amber uncomfortable multiple times so… This one was pretty justified.

  23. Steelbright

    Worrying whilst clutching phone to chest…. Relatable

  24. Council

    Eh, Booster seemed to be able to cope with it pretty okay. Almost creepily well, actually. Psych majors, man.

    – Psych Major

  25. Keulen

    In this case I think Amber was justified, since Booster was being a creep and a jerk.

  26. Leorale

    Usually we go way too hard into judging the characters and whether their actions were morally right. The temptation may be even stronger than usual today.

    1. Florence

      Yea, feels like another Becky situation where some people don’t seem to consider their might be other reasons for why they feel so aggressive to this one character in particular

      As I said above, Amber had the right response and shouldn’t feel bad, but also some of the commenters describing Booster as an inhuman monster are making me uncomfortable. Not saying you have to like Booster, but consider that maybe them being non-binary is intensifying how you feel about them

      1. v.gay.person

        It’s one of those times when the comment section’s vitriol towards a character hits a little too close to home because I can see so much of myself in them- Booster, who I relate to as a know-it-all, socially ill-equipped, over-compensating nonbinary with big Autism energy, and Becky, whose attempts to navigate sexuality, attraction and friendships mirrored my own.

        The meaner comments echo a lot of the abuse that I copped from myself and other people over my fumbling, so it feels like I’m 18 again with no friends and alcoholism living away from any family in a shitty prison-like dorm.

        (which was also where/when/why I started reading this comic 20ish years ago)

        1. Joy

          That’s a lot to deal with, I hope you’re okay now.

        2. Opus the Poet

          It just seems like 20 years because of the 45th president Voldemort in the middle, actual start date was 2010-09-10. That’s just a month over 12 years.

        3. Florence

          Sorry the comments are making you go through that. Definitely feeling some of that

      2. Freemage

        I don’t regard Booster as an inhuman monster. I regard Booster as an all-too-human creepster. The best defense I’ve heard for Booster’s behavior boils down to, “We don’t know them very well yet, and it might all be explained.”

        But here’s the thing–boundary-crossing behavior, no matter how well-explained, is still crossing other people’s boundaries. I get that Joe was raised by a horndog father with no model of human intimacy–that doesn’t excuse the “do” list. I get that Joyce is autistic–that doesn’t excuse the I’m-Jacob’s-girlfriend shenanigans. I know damned well Amber is dealing with a lifetime of physical and mental abuse–that doesn’t make her physically assaulting Walky at the Halloween party okay.

        Knowing where the bad behavior comes from does not excuse it; it merely offers a reason to accept sincere efforts to change.

        The difference between all of these and Booster’s creepiness, as I’ve said, is that we’ve seen no attempt by Booster to even acknowledge the bad behavior, let alone try to correct it. And as a character, this is the first time Booster’s had any kind of consequence for the toxic behavior, in-story.

        1. Florence

          Not saying Booster isn’t being creepy, I’m just saying that Booster being non-binary might be intensifying negativity

    2. Leorale

      I more meant it would be harder to avoid judging the characters and whether their actions are morally right, because Amber is looking at the ceiling and literally asking whether her actions were morally right. And then y’all said good and interesting things.

  27. darkoneko

    that’s how you get ulcers, in various ways

  28. Amós Batista

    Doomscroll sucks after midnight. Only bots and drunk people post things in Twitter.

    1. darkoneko

      …midnight in which country’s timezone ? 😀

      1. Amós Batista

        I guess it’s a universal thing, for anyone.
        In any case, I’m doomscrolling from UTC-3 timezone.

  29. Lone Duck

    Got 99 problems, but a Booster ain’t one.

  30. bagge

    at least she has a process…

  31. Steve C.

    This feels like the most healthy Amber has seemed for a while. That’s probably not a good thing.

  32. Dot

    Booster fucking sucks so

    1. Opus the Poet

      No, they’re just maladjusted differently than most of the rest of the cast. Ain’t nobody in this cast “normal”.

      1. Derek

        one doesn’t have to be normal or abnormal to suck.

      2. Dot

        I didn’t say they were abnormal. I said they sucked.

  33. Rabisch

    Good that Amber is realising how wrong was with Booster. Wrong how she decided to not think that’s a problem anymore. I’m afraid the Ambooster I dream will stay stay dream because Amber can’t accept constructive criticism, truth and that someone in this world could be so mad to fund her attractive and interesting.

    1. Derek

      I don’t think it would be good for Amber to be with someone who fetishizes mental illness

      1. Leorale

        Amber knows that people have been attracted to her. She didn’t like that Booster was specifically titillated by her pain/trauma/illness. That made her feel creeped out and objectified. And even before that, I don’t recall any indication that she wanted to date Booster… When somebody creeps you out, and/or when you don’t want to date somebody, you definitely shouldn’t date them. Sorry about the sinking of your ship. ⚓️

      2. Joy

        I don’t think it would be good for anyone to be with someone who fetishises mental illnesses tbh

  34. Stephen Nedland

    Amber, you were totally in the right, to put Booster in his place, after what he suggested.

    1. Wack'd

      They.

  35. Sarah

    Honestly, Amber, you probably just look more attractive to Booster. Cuz they seem like that kind of weird.

  36. mrnoidea

    I’m glad Amber stood up to Booster. They’re not terrible, per se, just lacking proper social skills. Booster may get to a point where they realize making friends is better than viewing everyone as images to study.

    As for Amber…this strip’s pretty accurate in showing guilt. So much time gets spent pondering “What could’ve been different? Why did I do what I did? Should I make up my mind about this person already or give them the benefit of the doubt?”, followed by trains of thought that lead to such random, emotionally-charged scenarios that you forget where you started. So it feels easier to *not* think about the problem in a productive way.

    1. mrnoidea

      *I say “terrible” as an equivalent for violent behavior, but that’s my own issues showing through. It was still not acceptable for Booster to ignore Amber’s request to meet Ethan and instead overtly lust over Amber.

  37. Azhrei Vep

    I don’t understand the alt text. Is she getting into shooters now, or something?

    1. spriteless aunty

      Doomscrolling is a term for looking at anger inducing news, especially as served up by engagement driven algorithms, such as twitter and facebook.

    2. The Wellerman

      It’s a modern human internet term for getting caught in an endless loop of scrolling down content feeds on platforms like YouTube and Twitter, created by algorithms to keep you in this spiral like the fucking endless staircase from SM64, hence, “DOOM-scrolling”

      1. True Survivor

        “RIP AND TEAR!!!!!” … up your schedule.

  38. Laura

    OK, new game, anyone?

    Q: What is your favorite online distraction?

    Mine is Tetris.

    1. Laura

      (I got 99 problems but critical self reflection ain’t one.)

  39. Victor Riley

    Well, Booster has been callously mean to other people with their so-called “psycho-analyses”, and doesn’t seem to have given their meanness much thought afterwards. So I’d say Amber was justified.

  40. LordCirce

    Were you mean to Booster? Yes, right after they did the “psychoanalytical” equivalent of ripping your clothes off.

    So yeah, no sympathy for the psycho.

  41. Meagan

    Relatable.

  42. AndysDrawings

    Wild that she’s sleeping on Danny’s sweater though

Leave a Reply to v.gay.person Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

*

*

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.