184

Hang
Posted on April 26, 2021 by David M Willis
It's the final 48 hours for the Dumbing of Age Book 10 Kickstarter!  And look, it's Eric Schuptenstein, the twelfth (and final??? probably) character magnet! Let's go over the stats for the second-to-last time:  This book will collect "Year Ten," spanning the four storylines that start on August 18, 2019, and complete on September 9, 2020. This includes new commentary, behind-the-scenes artwork, and new character designs into an 236-page tome with luxurious glossy paper all bound up into a sturdy presentation.  Our biggest book yet!  And there will be a foreword by Seanan McGuire!
The book is titled Renounce Magical Thinking and Embrace Empirical Evidence, and it's the culmination of a full decade of Dumbing of Age stories!  This is the big one!  With kidnappings and van chases!  The Ending With A Huge Timeskip one!  

184 thoughts on “Hang”

  1. Ana Chronistic

    and now she won’t look at it again, ever

    …ironically I haven’t seen Pidgeys in months, it’s Trubbish for some reason

    for EARTH DAY (week)!!

    1. ReverendJ

      Yes, pick up the garbage pokémon to beautify the area.

      1. Delicious Taffy

        Hey, be nice to Garbodor and Trubbish and Muk and Grimer and Mewtwo and Koffing and Weezing.

        1. He Who Abides

          And Lickylicky, that’s on that list too.

    2. Dr Sharks

      Yeah, and it’s not like catching three pidgeys would be a bad thing, anyway. I’d just call that “catching 300 stardust.”

      1. Knuf Wons

        Pidgey are just cheap exp that you gather to evolve lots of Pokémon at the same time when you crack a lucky egg!

    3. Carrie

      Don’t forget Trubbish is 750 Stardust!

      1. Merbrat

        You can get a shiny Trubbish, too!

  2. Sirksome

    And another one falls!

    1. Sirksome

      Also I just got to rant on this but Eric??? Eric made it into the magnet club?! We scraping the bottom of the barrel with that dude.

      1. Doctor_Who

        We’re getting Conquest though, which I like even though she hasn’t had a single appearance in over 5 years.

        You’ll know Willis is underneath the barrel when we get Guns.

        1. CorporateDronesDontHaveMissiles

          You gotta shoot the fish somehow

        2. Thag Simmons

          I mean, we know there’s a Roller Derby plotline coming up, and Guns would work pretty well in the role of a jackass rival player.

          I could see it happening. If it does I’ll have to scrounge up a replacement avatar.

        3. Lingo

          My theory is that Guns was Agatha’s original, never-seen, evicted roommate.

        4. Thag Simmons

          Willis has indicated that that was his intention.

        5. Clif

          Agatha’s ex roommate can perfectly well play Roller Derby. It isn’t either/or.

        6. Lingo

          Yes, we agree with you.

        7. He Who Abides

          I was thinking that too.

        8. Reltzik

          Well we got Eric, and Eric does finger guns, so halfway there?

        9. Lumus

          He does? Next slipshine there then.

      2. Bicycle Bill

        It could have been worse — he might have done “Professor DeSanto”, complete with window-pane glasses and fake pipe.

        Personally, I still think we needed a small, ‘Fudge-Face’-sized “Hompk!” voice balloon to go with the Raptor-Attack Dina from a couple of Kickstarters ago.

        1. Thag Simmons

          Nah that’s next kickstarter.

        2. Clif

          Odd definition of worse.

      3. Nono

        I wanted Drew, but alas.

    2. RassilonTDavros

      Only one remains: Danny.

      1. Lokitsu

        We’ll get magnets of Danny’s hat and banjo first.

  3. Srancamon

    Fuck, I can see it now. Walky is very hot rn.

    1. DailyBrad

      Yeah, I admit, I do get the appeal, but I mean, a ton of the cast are pretty hot if we’re being real.

      1. butts

        stupid sexy co-eds

      2. Giguioto

        With the exception of Dina (no offense to Becky) and *maybe* Danny, I’m yet to find a character my bisexual person doesn’t find hot

        1. RowenMorland

          Ha! You’re into Mary!

        2. Ryek Hvek

          them’s praying words!

        3. thejeff

          I’m not into Mary, but physically she is hot. I like her style of dress as well.

        4. Sirksome

          I get it but sometimes the cost is too high. Malaya is hot and Joe is indeed a stud but the personality cost for enjoying them is steep. Same goes for Mary.

        5. thejeff

          Oh hell yeah. I’m happy appreciating her aesthetic from a distance (especially the distance of fiction.) I wouldn’t want to hang out with her or anything.

        6. Giguioto

          I reserve the right to find people hot and still despise their personality v:

        7. Madock345

          Danny is so much my type I almost wonder if there’s some causation there. I’ve been reading this comic long enough…

  4. RassilonTDavros

    …okay but why shouldn’t they though?

    1. Yotomoe

      It’s unfair to all the other people to have 2 of the hottest people in the school date. 😛

    2. Sirksome

      Realistically there might be a few viable reasons. One was that Walky was and maybe still is holding feelings for Dorothy. Two, is Amber has never really been very emotionally available, she was looking at her phone basically until just now. Three, their whole ship was about how they were both terrible people. But honestly they do seem to understand each other pretty well so I’m not sure why it didn’t work.

      1. Clif

        Dorothy had Joyce and Sarah to remind her who she was. And so she is probably going to pass, even if she doesn’t want to.

        Amber knows she is garbage (even if she isn’t) so this should be interesting.

      2. Segnosaur

        Why it didn’t work?

        Although they had the mutual self-hatred going, its not exactly something to build a relationship on.

        Plus, what else did they have in common? Although they both like ‘cartoons’, the interests of Walky centered on Dexter and Monkey Master, while Amber was more into the super-hero sub-genre. Amber seemed to have at least some dedication to her studies, Walky had almost none. Amber’s field of study was computers, Walky probably knew little about the field.

    3. BarerMender

      I get it now. Amber & Walky did the do, and Amber is freaked. But now she’s forgotten to be freaked.

      1. Sirksome

        I don’t see how them banging would’ve freaked her out. We know they’ve at least dry humped and survived. It was probably something really petty and they both have personalities where small things can cause tension. Walky did breakup with Dorothy over pajama pants and Amber is well…Amber.

        1. thejeff

          I’d argue that was more petty on Dorothy’s side than Walky’s. The pajama jeans are silly, but the point of that arc was Dorothy trying to control how Walky dressed, which isn’t a good sign in any relationship.

    4. Regalli

      Previously, it was the Sal issue (even if that was more than a little self-inflicted, since Sal cares less so long as they SHUT UP ABOUT IT.) Since Halloween, hard to say if Sal’s still a factor or if it’s something else, like Mike, or Dorothy, or Sal realized she wasn’t as heterosexual as she previously assumed and hooked up with AG and suddenly it was all Very Awkward. (Which would still be Sal, but ‘we can’t date because my sister’s dating your alter and it’s weird!’ is different enough from the previous issue to count separately. Sal and AG would beat Walky and Amber’s dating seniority by actually saying outright they wanted to date and not have an awkward dance around each other for weeks again, or maybe a coin toss.)

      … I don’t THINK it’s that last one, and I don’t actually ship Sal/AG per se, but like. It COULD be that.

    5. Reltzik

      Halloween, apparently.

      1. Clif

        Can we hear a half hearted Damn You Willis?

        1. I am Nothing

          Darn you, Willis.

        2. Demoted Oblivious

          Oh will.

    6. Heather

      Apparently something happened at Halloween. Personally I still think some other group of students made some tasteless reference to the kidnapping or Mikes death or something (because Halloween and college students/people who barely have entered adulthood and a taste of freedom have an even higher likelihood than others of just being stupid/thoughtless like that) and Amber was hurt while Walky shrugged it off. Like idk someone walked around dressed as dead Mike or something. It wouldn’t surprise me anyway.

      1. Fuse

        I’m still convinced it has something to do with Walky either showing up in his Nightguy outfit or asking Amber about where her AmaziGirl outfit was during Halloween. It seems like the quickest way for Amber to shut somebody out has been to (in her mind) disrespect the Amber/AmaziGirl barrier.

  5. Doctor_Who

    The slow transformation of DoA into a Harem Anime claims another victim.

    1. Clif

      Slow? How many weeks did it take the League of Evil Dads to start chasing Mike to the point they were both dead, and you call this slow?

      At this point, it was a mere three weeks ago that Walky noticed people were staring at him and well over half that time has been spent with Robin and Ruth and Daisy and Dina on other plot threads.

      So I dispute the “slow.”

      1. Andy

        People who irrationally hate Walky and want him out of the comic (I don’t like him much either, I see too much of the old me in him and cringe, but he has an important role in Willis’ vision here) have to complain about something, and any time spent on Walky is too much.

        1. Doctor_Who

          I don’t have anything against Walky, I’m just joshing.

        2. Spencer

          I’ll have you know it is completely rational.

          Walky bad.

        3. KJ

          I find this hilarious considering the fact that there are predecessor comics such as the one literally titled “It’s Walky”

    2. Yotomoe

      Hey! That’s MY job!

  6. ReFlex76

    *WAP starts playing in Amber’s head.*

    1. Doctor_Who

      Wet-Ass Pidgey.

    2. Delicious Taffy

      Specifically the Kidz Bop version.

      1. Mydnyt

        Please tell me that this is the thing that really exists

        1. Vabolo

          “Yeah ur drinkin’ up some WAT-ER-BOTTLES
          Bring a bucket and a mop for that WAT-ER-BOTTLE
          Cause it fell right on th’a floor! Look at WAT-ER-BOTTLEs”

      2. Keulen

        There are some songs where I don’t understand why they even bother to make them “kid-appropriate”, since you’d have to pretty much change the entire meaning of the song to do so. WAP is definitely one of those.

        1. Demoted Oblivious

          Yeah, those aren’t kid-appropriate. Kids may not understand the full implications of why the song is dirty, but they figure out damn fast what the mask lyrics are covering up.

          The songs are produced so that a version can be heard for better more air-play time on radio stations, restaurants and elevators.

          WAP can’t play after church in the local ihop/waffle house, waterbottles though… that’s ok.

  7. Octopus Ink

    Pidgeys are like AOL disks from the days of yore – you get like, SIX of ’em every 3 days whether you want them or not.
    Amber is a Pidgey magnet!

    1. Needfuldoer

      It was better when they were actual floppy disks, because you could erase and reuse them.

      1. StClair

        ah, the memories.

    2. Reltzik

      … but how do you use pidgeys as drink coasters?

  8. Yotomoe

    NOBODY LOVES PIDGEYS.

    1. ian livs

      I love Pidgeys… ^_^’

      1. Doctor_Who

        Me too.

        But I was never into Pokemon growing up, and I always like the unfashionable ones best. Bulbasaur 4 Lyfe.

        Also, my favorite Pokemon in general is Eevee. Not any of its evolutions, just Eevee. All the evolutions are less cute than the original.

        1. Svata

          everyone loves bulbasaur and eevee nowadays, honestly.

    2. Kyrik Michalowski

      I will say, of all the normal/flying types, pidgey(and by extension pidgeotto and pidgeot) is my favorite.

  9. MrSmith

    I dunno about this.

    Its reminding me of the trope in movies where the girl takes off her glasses and suddenly shes hot.

    As a story line “Walky is suddenly hot” isn’t one of his better ones but then I prefer the more grounded, realistic story lines

    1. Clif

      I have faith that we’re going somewhere with this. I’m just not sure where yet.

      1. MrSmith

        Yeah hopefully

    2. Sirksome

      I don’t know if this is really that he’s suddenly hot as much as everyone is discovering the hotness that he’s had all along. Especially since he hasn’t changed in any visible way since the start of the semester. I do admit it feels a little abrupt, but each girl has had plausible reasons not to notice until now. Joyce was blind, Amber never looked up from her phone, Sarah is antisocial and not really Walky’s friend, Lucy was thirsty from the start, Dorothy…doesn’t really have an excuse…and Sal and Jennifer are essentially related either by blood or circumstance.

  10. Suet

    *plays Justin Timberlake’s True Blood on the hall speakers*

    Love is in the air, and it’s all coming from Walky.

    1. Stephen Bierce

      Beat me to the draw. :/

      1. Demoted Oblivious

        Apparently he was feeling lucky, punk.

  11. Stephen Bierce

    *plays 10cc’s “I’m Not In Love” on the hacked Muzak*

    1. Geneseepaws

      Excellent choice.

  12. Bagge

    amber and Dorothy should form a Walky’s exes support group

    1. Maikeruu

      That’s how the plot to Scott Pilgrim started.

      1. Fist_of_Life

        and?

      2. Deanatay

        We’ve already had a League of Evil Dads, you want to start a League of Walky’s Evil Exes?

  13. Hamwise Gamgee

    It occurs to me that Walky could use an actual, factual friend these days. Lucy is kind of his only close friend right now.

  14. Clif

    Yes, thank you. alt text. We noticed.

    1. Demoted Oblivious

      Alt-text being all “we are helping” like … I think.. Megabytes minions in the original Reboot. (which is now a painfully oxymoronic thing to say.)

  15. Kyrik Michalowski

    So it’s affected Amber as well? Curious. Well the only thing left to do in a situation like this is gamble on who Walky will sleep with next.

    I’ve got 20 bucks on it being Amber.

  16. BBCC

    Sure, Amber, it’s the Pidgeys you love.

    1. Kyrik Michalowski

      Maybe she wants to turn into a bird pokemon trainer. With 3 pidgeys and a spearow.

      1. BBCC

        I don’t think it’s Pokemon that have her attention at the moment. 😉

  17. Vukodlak

    “Why do Pidgeys suddenly appear, every time that you’re near”

    1. DaveM

      And now I’ve got Shonen Knife’s version of “Top of the world” stuck in my head. 🙂

  18. The Aussie Bloke

    I think I figured it out.

    It’s the sideburns.

    Somebody get the clippers!

    1. Reltzik

      Nah, it’s because he cut off his bangs with his mom’s good meat scissors.

      I have no idea HOW that’s the secret to hotness, but genius is often mysterious.

  19. ADLegend21

    I’m still waiting for the shoe to drop on “attractive Walky”

  20. C.T Phipps

    I choose to believe that Walky is a vampire now. That’s my legitimate in-universe explanation for his sudden hotness.

    1. King Daniel

      Impossible – he hasn’t started sparkling yet, nor has he started draining everyone’s happiness to make himself more cheerful.

      1. Fist_of_Life

        Hey, he could be a sexiness vampire instead of a happiness one. Have any characters suffered a dramatic loss of attractiveness recently?

        1. Leorale

          Depends whether or not folks are into Joyce’s new glasses.

  21. Rainhat

    …And we edge closer to the entire campus bursting out in song about Walky…

  22. misanthropope

    hes not hot, he looks like a corgi

    1. Yotomoe

      You wouldn’t date a corgi?

      1. Delicious Taffy

        If you replaced every corgi-like quality of the corgi with something else, I might consider it. For example, replace the canine body with that of a semi-tallish freckly Canadian redhead, and replace the canine instincts/brain with that of an irritable recovering(?) alcoholic who’s also possibly got a soft spot for extreme underdogs. Just as an example of datable traits one might find in a corgi.

        1. King Daniel

          Sounds like the Queen’s corgis might be right up your alley, just so long as you’re willing to get them addicted to alcohol yourself and also you wouldn’t mind Welsh as a substitute for Canadian

        2. C.T Phipps

          Corgis are better than people.

          *snuggles his*

        3. Roborat

          I have trouble liking corgis, but that is likely because all the ones I have met were dumber that a fencepost.

        4. Demoted Oblivious

          Um… bearded ginger nordic Canadian raises his hand. Definitely known for being intense, but not necessarily /irritable/. Also light on freckles and not an alcoholic, though I have a fondness for scotch. And something tells me you’re not into people who can grow beards, even if it is a corgi-esque trait.

    2. Eldritchy

      So what you are saying is that he is irresistibly adorable?

  23. 0phidiophile

    Walky needs to get his hair cut.
    Strike that.
    Everyone else needs Walky to get his hair cut.

  24. BenRG

    I’m wondering if this chapter is going to be all about the downsides of being attractive?

    1. Delicious Taffy

      Aside from unwanted advances, what downsides are there to being attractive, though?

      1. Reltzik

        It’s like being a rusty and ill-maintained swing set.

        You know, an attractive nuisa- *vaudeville hook*

      2. Zaxares

        If you can manage to stay grounded, not a lot. 😉 The danger i find is that people who are attractive can let it go to their heads. They start finding it difficult to tell the difference between actual praise and brown-nosing because after a while, that’s just “the sounds people make when they’re in my vicinity.” People have a tendency to be nicer to you, to overlook your mistakes, and you can start to buy into your own hype after a while, believing that you can do no wrong and that your little entourage of yes-men are always correct. When you DO get actual criticism or pushback, it can then feel like a personal attack. This happens a lot to people who are rich and famous too, or any sort of social position where you have the benefit of prestige and clout.

        1. Nono

          You also have ‘getting promoted/opportunities based on looks and not merit’, ‘being considered a superficial person because of your looks rather than actually being talented’, and ‘may cause the occasional traffic accident’.

        2. Leorale

          It’s usually lucky to be considered hot. But here are some potential downsides:

          – You get a lot of attention, especially sexual attention, especially if you’re a lady. You may not like that attention, as it may be anywhere from reductive to personally dangerous, but you can’t really hide from it ever. Ever ever ever.

          – If you don’t realize that you’re usually considered hot (and it’s super easy not to realize this!), you’re likely to foolishly believe that everyone else gets the exact same attention, graces, and privileges that you’ve gotten.

          – If you DO realize that you’re usually considered hot, then you may feel that everything you get is because of your body, not through your hard work or other merits. (Others will definitely think this of you, whether it’s true or not.) For example, you may have imposter syndrome, or you may need to maintain your beauty lest you lose everything.

          – You may have seriously neglected developing other social skills (since you can subconsciously coast on your appearance, and people come to you). This is a major problem for forging deeper connections, as being hot probably won’t get you deep friendships and the like, and a problem again as age and gravity come for us all…

          – Once you *finally* get accustomed to how most people perceive you, aging hits you and suddenly you’re gonna be a whole lot less visible. (Though, my mom found her middle-aged invisibility relaxing, so your mileage may vary.) Hopefully you’ve developed enough other qualities that will outlast our culture’s obsession with your youth, because you’re about to find out whether you’re actually interesting or not.

      3. Clif

        Walky will have to put up with wolf whistles from the construction women and inappropriate comments from Robin.

  25. Needfuldoer

    [Careless Whisper intensifies]

  26. Disastroid

    I think Carla’s going to figure this out and show up with some hair clippers.

    1. Thag Simmons

      Nah. Blowtorch maybe, but honestly I doubt she’d care.

    2. Nono

      If Carla, of all people, joins the harem, I’m gonna call this a fever dream.

      1. King Daniel

        Carla’s canonically homoromantic sex-repulsed ace, so I think the chances of her joining in are about as high as Becky suddenly announcing that she’s straight and going back to Anderson.

        1. Clif

          Becky actually doing that, no. Announcing she is to freak Joyce out, maybe.

  27. Vaishino

    To be fair, catching and evolving pidgeys is a great way to level up in pokemon go

    1. BenRG

      I’ve always been an iconoclast who packs out his team with unusual species because I like the way they look. The Pidgey evolutionary chain is pretty much my original sin in that area.

  28. kira marie

    oh god I can see it too he’s too handsome

  29. Keulen

    Looks like the SS Garbage Scow is not as sunk as I’d thought.

    1. Throwatron

      She was sunk, yes. Now she’s been in the drink long enough, she’s a wreck worth excavating…

      1. StClair

        *waits for the previous song to end, then plays Stan Rogers’ Mary Ellen Carter on the muzak*

  30. Rabisch

    The return of a great couple? PLEASE YES!!!!

  31. foducool

    lmao by the end of the chapter, the whole world has turned Cronenberg

  32. Josh Spicer

    Oh so this really is the chapter’s plot.

    Great.

    1. Clif

      HOMPK!

  33. Amos Batista

    Finally Marigold has paid attention to Walky.

    1. Amos Batista

      *Amber

      1. Roborat

        They are pretty much twins anyway.

        1. Demoted Oblivious

          Amber is definitely more fit and has more assertive attributes. Marigold has come out of her shell some, but has a long way to go to be as socially adept as Amber.

  34. goggleman64

    LEARN THE TRUE POWER OF PIDGEY, AMBER, AND YOU WILL BECOME A GOD

  35. Varangian

    *cackles like a madman*

    “SHOULDN’T”, YOU SAY, AMBER, LIKE A FOOL

    WILLIS, I DEMAND SLIPSHINES. MULTIPLE. “AMBER LOVES PIDGEYS A LITTLE TOO MUCH.” LET THEM ALL GIVE IN TO THE HORNT.

  36. Ziggy78eog

    Good, good! Embrace the hotness, let it flow through you! Give in to the hotness, and your journey to the Harem will be complete. It is unavoidable.

  37. Calvsie

    You catch those pidgey! I recall having a small army of Raticates all named Spartacus.

  38. Ray Radlein

    It seems to me that Amber may be the character to finally tell Walky why everyone has been suddenly staring at him, rather than just, you know, not saying anything and then walking into lamp posts and the like

  39. Ashley

    I find Walky too annoying to find him attractive.

  40. poofdepoof

    Giving me these vibes: https://www.girlswithslingshots.com/comic/gws-chaser-34

  41. Blind Beholder

    Walky became attractive by turning into a mini-Asher.

    1. Demoted Oblivious

      Is that… is that a ‘stache?

  42. JA

    Well now I want to know why Walky and Amber broke up.

  43. Canary

    Gotta say, love the concept of Amber having a pidgey who she loves but always feels insecure about and then eventually it evolves into a super powerful pidgeot that pecks Blaine’s eyes out

  44. Jay

    Ok NOW I see it.

  45. K

    lmao, I just realized that the “I love pidgeys” is referring to when Amber and Walky were trading pokemon and all he had to give her was a pidgey. IDK if that was obvious and I was just dumb or not lol

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