Twelve days
Posted on October 22, 2025 by David M Willis


Tags: joe, sarah

522 thoughts on “Twelve days”

  1. NGPZ

    Never thought Sarah would be the one giving Joe a much-needed pep-talk :0

    that they’ve BOTH grown this much is incredible ;-;

    re: Willis,

    “wait… let him cook.”

    1. Clif

      Sarah is emotionally cheating on Tony!

      1. Clif

        Oh, yeah. /s

      2. Gbz

        I don’t think so. She’s just being a good friend. Not every emotional moment between people with matching sexual orientation is emotional cheating.

        1. Delavan

          They even added the /s after the fact. C’mon.

        2. Delavan

          Wow that is some A+ avatar selection there random comment thing. Good job!

        3. Arawn

          I thought for a moment it was an italics is. My sarcasm detector was off.

    2. Big Z

      I mean, Willis is cooking, certainly, but IMHO I want less “crock pot” and more “air fryer” at this time because I’m hungry now, damnit.

      1. NGPZ

        heck is kinda the reason I wanna make fan games, is to have stuff for the audience to snack on while the good stuff be cookin :9

  2. Megan

    no like i’ve been saying TToTT

    1. RASSILONTDAVROS

      Spent several seconds trying to work out what “TToTT” was an acronym for before realizing it was a face.

      1. Clif

        Two eyes and a nose? Looking down on a head and two shoulders?

        I really don’t see how you get a face out of it.

        1. Prince Mech

          Tears streaming down from both corners of each eye with an open mouth. It’s an exaggerated version of T_T

        2. Doctor_Who

          Huh, I never interpreted T_T as crying, I thought the tops of the Ts were eyebrows and T_T is more like a “…Really?” sort of exasperated and annoyed expression.

        3. Prince Mech

          Generally that would be the domain of :/ or :|, or even >_>>

        4. eh, whatever

          Nonsense. :-/ is doubt, 😐 is “well, that’s the way it is”.

        5. elebenty

          Huh. I’ve never used :/ as doubt. Usually I use it when I make that face. It’s sometimes “that’s the way it is,” often a derogatory “you know” or “right?” Kind of a Kermit-ish “Sheesh.”

          But at times I make it simply because it reminds me of Homestar Runner.

        6. Freemage

          Speaking of Homestar, have you seen that Viziepop has posted a pilot of an animated series version of the old classic?

          When I saw that, I went back to try to do an archive-trawl, but gave up, not because of the length, but because of the sheer number of dead links in the damned thing.

        7. MyBlueBox

          Or I think more frequently -_-

        8. Clif

          Far from being an expert here, but I always interpret 😐 as “said with a straight face.”

        9. Clif

          And it substitutes an emoji. Not a bad choice, tho. 😐

        10. Heavensrun

          I came her to post this one, but yeah, -_- is my deadpan smiley of choice.

        11. Heavensrun

          I think of >_> as avoiding eye contact for various reasons.

        12. Doribi

          it is closed eyes, a mouth and a couple rivers of tears

      2. someone

        The Time of Terrible Troubles

    2. Mild Lee Interested

      Lol. I guess there is a reason actual, somewhat unambiguous language exists rather than just emojis

      1. Nymph

        ????

      2. elebenty

        :/

  3. Bootshivers

    THATS MY FUCKING BOY ???♥️♥️♥️♥️

    1. Clif

      What you do with Joe in the privacy of your own domicile is your business.

      1. Steamweed

        *slow clap

    2. Pocky

      I love he’s actually taking this well; because while the readers are takin out their pitchforks and torches, Joe is refusing to be a woobie in this plot line.

      His growth has been great; and honestly this whole arc has been so interesting to read, drama and all.

      1. Jallorn

        I dunno, it kinda reads to me like Joe is trying not to feel his feelings. Like, he’s being honest about what they are, but he’s trying really hard to control them and that’s… well, he’s new to that, so I suspect he’s not going about it in the healthiest way.

        1. Samantha

          I actually think this is mad healthy for him give his father and hia previous issue. Hes not over reacting hes not lashingnoht and acting rashly its juat messy

      2. Steamweed

        Well, their dating span has, like he said, been under two weeks. A bit whirlwind, sure, but still pretty new.

  4. Liara

    This might be the nicest thing Sarah has said to anyone not named Joyce in this entire comic

    1. Liara

      Also, you know, good on Joe for not being a bongo about this. I still don’t like him, but credit where it’s due

  5. shadowcell

    two years out here converts to about twelve days in dumbingyears

    1. Yet_One_More_Idiot

      I know, right? I was thinking to myself “all that time they spent together and it translates into just TWELVE FRIGGIN’ DAYS? xD

      For context, that’s just over a million seconds. In the grand scheme of things, that’s practically nothing. xD

    2. Needfuldoer

      Each chapter is a day, and the chapters have been getting longer overall, so in-universe time has actually slowed down.

      (Chapters used to be about 66 strips each many years ago, now they hover around 90. This chapter is at 81 strips so far.)

  6. Prince Mech

    I think I get one little “I told you so.” to all the people who said that Joe was totally absolutely fine with a polyamorous relationship and that was not just him coping.

    I also think the guy deserves a hug.

    1. RASSILONTDAVROS

      I think basically everybody in this storyline except Joyce and Dorothy needs a hug right now.

      1. 3oranges

        Yeah, a hug would be a step down for Joyce and Dorothy at the moment.

        1. Yet_One_More_Idiot

          Maybe someone else could hug Joyce and Dorothy, while they are… slipshine-y? xD That would be a non-downward step, wouldn’t it? 😛

        2. Steamweed

          They are pretty slippery right now, yeah. Best to wait a bit to hug them.

        3. Yet_One_More_Idiot

          I dunno, there might be somebody who’d like a slippery hug. xD

    2. Erica

      I think it was very obvious from the get-go that Joe never actually wanted to be poly, he just wanted anything to not lose Joyce. I find it really frustrating because poly is great if all people involved are enthusiastic about it. But I have had so many friends in real life who have had a monogamous relationship where their partner then decided they want to be poly and they go along with it because they don’t want to lose them, and the partner who supposedly loves them seems to either not notice or not give a shit of how much they’re obviously not okay with it. If you want to normalize poly, advocate for healthy, happy, CONSENSUAL poly relationships, not coerced or desperate relationships where one person is clearly unhappy and the other person doesn’t care because they get everything they want. That’s why all of these comments about “oh my God yay poly!” with seemingly no regard for context really got under my skin

      1. Strain Of Thought

        I’m still intensely rankled that the discourse got away with redefining polyamory as just meaning an open relationship instead of being with people who love the same people you love.

        1. Ivkra

          But… both of those are polyamory? An open relationship is polyamorous, and so is a triad, and so is a V, and so is a one-sidedly open relationship (even if the vast majority of those are unstable and shitty).

        2. Benjamin Geiger

          As I understand the terms:

          An “open relationship” is where the people in a relationship have permission to engage in sexual activity (but generally not form relationships) with those outside the relationship.

          “Polyamory” is where people within a relationship are allowed to form additional relationships with others.

          It is absolutely possible (and I’d argue _common_) for a poly relationship to be open, but open relationships aren’t necessarily poly. Both open relationships and polyamory fall under the umbrella of ethical non-monogamy.

        3. Benjamin Geiger

          (I should clarify that “relationship” here refers to a romantic relationship, not friend-with-benefits/fuck-buddies.)

        4. Ivkra

          Oh, right, I forgot that people have been trying to expand that middle ground. I’d still call that polyamory, but I suppose it is a little closer to monogamy on the spectrum than most. All the ones I’ve seen have been initially-monogamous relationships in denial, either about one or both person’s tendency towards polyamory in nature, or about the fading desire between them.

          But I get what you’re saying; it is a gray area.

      2. Yet_One_More_Idiot

        For the record, I was in favour of Joe/Joyce/Dots being poly IF they were all on the same page about it.
        But Joe throwing it out there as a last-ditch attempt to not lose Joyce to Dots… that’s not a good place to be at for such a suggestion.

        1. thejeff

          It’s not good, but it’s messy.

        2. Mari

          And it’s good that it’s messy.

    3. Li

      I think that’s a bit of a mean attitude to have towards a bunch of people, many of whom specifically said they were excited and hopeful for polyamorous representation.

      1. Prince Mech

        I don’t think it’s a bit mean to express a little bit of exasperation when a lot of that excitement for poly representation blinded people to how *bad* that representation would be given the context of the strip in question, especially now that the comic has explicitly reasserted that it wasn’t good grounds for it.

        I can’t tell if you’re talking to me or Erica or both, but either way, the point stands.

        1. Li

          These are comments coming from self-described poly people.

          Assuming you’re poly yourself, your opinions on what constitutes “bad representation” are not universal (not everyone wants squeaky clean representation), and the condescension wasn’t really warranted.

        2. eskimolos

          It’s also ignorant of how many people come into polyamory, and it also seems to vaguely suggest that the V poly formation isn’t valid? I’ve been deep in the poly community for years, a joyce-hinge V poly dynamic where the initially hetero couple widened out to accept a same-sex paramour is like the most common scenario I saw throughout years of poly advice and discussion on social media. That was considered kind of the default? Especially when people are moving from monogamous to poly lifestyles.

          Yes, there would need to be discussions of boundaries vs rules, which I doubt Dorothy would cope very well with, she has also been shown to be intensely jealous throughout the run up to this arc so I do not think she could at any point comfortably allow Joe and Joyce time to themselves, while Joyce seems okay with Dorothy banging others, providing she doesn’t actually need to acknowledge their pajama-jean clad butts.

          Just because it isn’t ideal fantasy kitchen table poly development, fully realized polycule situation, doesn’t make it a real and relatable development of a polyamorous dynamic to many people reading.

        3. Prince Mech

          I never said V poly wasn’t valid there, it was entirely about Joe and his obvious actual discomfort with the idea.

        4. Li

          “Haha, you got your hopes up that an artist you liked might portray polyamory in a wholesome, positive light!” still seems like a mean thing to say, regardless of how “obvious” it was to you personally…?

          There’s also the part where the majority of pro-poly commenters were specifically hoping for it to be messy, but the minority of folks who did say they would love to see everyone enter into this happily and wholesomely… like, why did that annoy you so much? Why do they deserve to hear “I told you so”?

          idk, if you don’t like being told that your comment was a bit mean — if you don’t like the idea of hurting anyone’s feelings and weren’t looking to start any arguments — maybe next time keep the gloating to a less public venue? It’s one of those things that’s totally understandable to feel, but… a bit mean to say out loud when you know the people you’re talking about are within earshot.

        5. deliverything

          In fact, some of us were specifically hoping for “messy poly”. Sometimes in those exact words.

        6. Adeptus

          That would be very realistic and believable, with modern university students.

        7. Nymph

          Yep! Still am, in fact.

        8. Nymph

          People disagreeing with you (vis a vis what constitutes good/bad poly representation or whether it’s acceptable to root for bad poly rep when the alternative is no poly rep) doesn’t mean they were “blinded”. It just means they disagreed with your personal opinions about that situation.

          Like, I’m very down to see a poly relationship in the main cast in general but I actually really love the arc of starting off their first poly relationship TERRIBLY (you know, how most people do) and having to learn all the communication and wrangle the mono-centric ways they’ve all been raised. I want to watch them hammer that shitty polyamory into solid gold because they love each other and it’s worth working at and figuring out.

          Who the hell comes to this comic for perfect relationships of any kind?

    4. Amós Batista

      Danny was waiting for this hug. And now Joe needs it.

      1. Deanatay

        ”You take that back this instant and punch me in the shoulder.”

        1. Deanatay

          Gaddangit why don’t my links work anymore!

          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2023/comic/book-13/03-joementum/softy/

    5. Reflex76

      Any reason Joe hasn’t mentioned his poly plan to Sarah?

      1. Yet_One_More_Idiot

        I think he’s too embarrassed to mention it, he knows Sarah would say “What were you THINKING?”

        But really, Sarah, just give Joe the hug he clearly needs. He could do with another friend about now.

    6. Nymph

      Meh, I still think he’s genuinely completely and totally okay with the idea of being in a polyamorous relationship. So you can say “I told you so” if it makes you feel good, but I still disagree.

      I want to see DoJoJo for a number of reasons, mostly encompassed in the comments you’ve already received, and I’ve still got my fingers super crossed for it. If not DoJoJo, then I’d love to see Joe enter into a different polyamorous relationship (specifically with Walky/Asher/Ethan but I’m willing to give some wiggle room to include people outside my crackship).

      1. Clif

        I must admit I’m really puzzled by all the people saying it’s now obvious that Joe was never in favor of a poly relationship when, no, it isn’t obvious.

        1. Dot

          If he wasn’t open to a poly relationship he wouldn’t have suggested one!

        2. thejeff

          Open to yes, “genuinely completely and totally okay with the idea” maybe not.

          He could still be suggesting it even if he’s not really okay with it.

        3. Nymph

          He could be! But I don’t think that’s the case. I think maybe he’s nervous about it, which is fair and could happen to anyone starting their first forays into polyamory, but I honestly think it’ll suit him so well. I really hope he gets to explore it.

        4. thejeff

          Yeah, I think it’s possible.

          But mostly I was amused by the chain of comments going from “genuinely completely and totally okay with the idea” to “If he wasn’t open to a poly relationship he wouldn’t have suggested one!”

          Those aren’t the same claim at all.

      2. 0x2ba22e11

        I want to see two more people with names that start with “Jo” added to that, so we can have a ship called DoJo JoJo. Our ship will be obsessed with redundantly over explaining how much they are in love.

  7. Muttski

    Good on Joe. Manhoapocalypse 2025 has been canceled. Glad to see the character development wasn’t just temporary.

  8. ZombieKyrik

    Wow Sarah is actually on Joe’s side; I know this has been coming, but that doesn’t make it any less astounding.

    I’m hoping Joe doesn’t sit around, and hope that Joyce will want him, and Dorothy. I’m not saying he needs to find someone else, but finding something to do, or someone to hang out with, would definitely help him right now. Right?

    1. Coatl

      Sarah herself acknowledged that Joe genuinely tries hard, and yes, it’s great to see this support from her towards him.

  9. Joe Moose

    Okay, Joe needs a hug.

    I’d also say he also needs a drink and a talk, but dunno how old he is in comic. The sentiment is still there, though

    1. Prince Mech

      College Freshman so definitely not the legal American drinking age of 21.

      Not that that’s stopped a decent chunk of the cast at this point obvs!

      1. RASSILONTDAVROS

        Was gonna say he’s drank before, but upon checking the archives he was definitely abstaining during the party storyline a little over a (real-world) year ago.

        1. Thag Simmons

          He’s been hungover, so yeah he used to drink

        2. Effie

          Joe has admitted to Danny that he lied about having threesomes (and other things to prop up his image), so now I’m wondering if his claim to be hungover could also be fabricated for his image. But I’m not sure quite what image it projects, or what image he thinks it projects.

        3. thejeff

          One of the things that’s long annoyed me about old Joe’s portrayal is that we really have little idea what he was like. We know some of it was performative, like the threesomes and we saw him being pushy about hitting on the cast and getting shot down hard. We know he had sex with Roz and Penny (and later Malaya), but all of those likely either initiated or immediately accepted.
          Was he getting a lot more sex off camera? It’s implied, but not confirmed. Was he going to parties and drinking, and presumably hitting on drunk girls there? How did he respond to girls who were uncomfortable but didn’t start yelling at him like Sarah and Rachel? How bad was he really?

        4. Nymph

          “How did he respond to girls who were uncomfortable but didn’t start yelling at him like Sarah and Rachel?”

          This right here? I would LOVE to know the answer to this.

        5. Taffy

          I’ve decided he bought them a bag of carrot sticks, made a suggestive face, and left them confused.

        6. Nymph

          Wiggling his eyebrows so hard they jump up and off his face.

        7. Rand Brittain

          Joe has always been a weird character because he’s “the horny college boy” stereotype but has had the roughest edges of that stereotype sanded off to make him minimally acceptable to a liberal audience, and as a result he’s this weird human who is thoroughly briefed on the importance of consent and the female orgasm but doesn’t seem to have ever heard that women don’t like being catcalled or publicly rated.

        8. wetmonstersmell

          Idk, “good lay, bad manners” actually seems pretty coherent to me.

        9. thejeff

          Kind of, I guess, but that seem very reductive and not necessarily an accurate summary.
          Partly because we just don’t know.

      2. VicMortimer

        Nobody cares about the legal drinking age but pigs and the people they might arrest for selling. The rest of us know it’s idiotic.

  10. Smokeysis

    Sarah: Friendship ended with Joyce. Now Joe is my best friend.

    1. eskimolos

      Excellent use of the meme.

  11. Dot

    Ehhhhhh. I’ve said this before but those twelve days were several real world years. I don’t think the actual amount of time that passed in-universe matters for this sort of thing. You have to make allowances for comic book time.

    Good for Joe, though. It takes real strength of characger to get kicked in the teeth by life and refuse to make it an excuse to slide back into bad habits.

    1. Dot

      Character*

    2. Erica

      I agree. Logically, the in-universe amount of time matters to the characters but it’s perfectly reasonable for the real world amount of time to matter more to the readers. Joe is not wrong here but in the comments when people are like “it’s only been 12 days” it’s very dismissive of the two years of build up and feelings that the readers have had about characters and relationships they care about

      1. Shepsquared

        Exactly. Imagine if the next day something out of left field happens and Joyce decides to dump Dorothy. People won’t shrug it off and move on because it was a 1 day relationship, they’ll get mad because there’s been years of build up for Joyce and Dorothy.

        1. thejeff

          To take it farther, taking that approach basically means we shouldn’t get invested or take any of the relationships seriously. This is all short term drama and it shouldn’t really matter.

          Which is death for what is basically a romantic comedy story.

        2. Yet_One_More_Idiot

          Let’s face it – in a million years from now, we’ll probably* all be dead and it’s very likely none of this will matter anyway.

        3. Dot

          As John Maynard Keynes said, “in the long run we are all dead.”

    3. Megan

      this line of thought *fascinates* me. in what sense does canonical timeframe of events not matter? i’m not being snarky, I promise, I genuinely want to know what you mean by that

      1. Dot

        Because the comic is not progressing in real time. How many days, weeks, whatever have passed in-universe, that doesn’t matter. It has, or should have, no effect on the audience’s emotional investment or the emotional stakes at play. In a very literal sense, yes, it’s only been 12 days, but in an equally real sense it’s been two years, and I prioritize the latter when it comes to my emotional investment.

        1. AbacusWizard

          What if instead of being read one strip a day on the internets over the course of two years, the story is read in a day or two in book form? (Or as an after-the-fact internets archive binge?)

        2. Dot

          That is not the intended format of the strip.

        3. eskimolos

          Sure, which is why there is no sale of books, and nobody is allowed to binge the back comics. Every single person commenting here has visited every day religiously since the Inception of the comic, and no one has read entire storylines in bulk.

          In deference to your point though, we would not get invested in romance comedies if the amount of time either in real time or in the story really mattered at all. Joe and Joyce have gone through a roller coaster in 12 days, but in terms of slow burn build up and intensity of experiences, Dorothy and Joyce does still top that.

        4. thejeff

          Stories originally written in serial format are usually written for that form, even if they’re later collected into larger chunks.
          We see this as far back things like Charles Dickens novels.

        5. Li

          I mean, let’s set aside the word “usually”, because I think that’s a bit sweeping about serialized fiction, and just talk about this specific comic strip.

          Too many readers have specifically said “oh I thought the pacing on storyline x was really bad but then I reread it all at once and the pacing felt great” for me to think that’s a coincidence, rather than evidence that Willis sometimes serves up stories that are better read all at once.

          We can argue over whether or not it’s intentional, I guess? I’m sure they at least try to aim for a middle ground. But then, I’m not someone who usually has this complaint, so I’m just repeating what I’ve consistently heard from readers who do.

        6. Clif

          Personally, I would think time-binding would be a basic skill for reading serial fiction.

      2. NGPZ

        the logical brain knows that time moves much slower compared to IRL, but to the lizard brain reading strips released daily before a storyline is finished?

        it feels like time in-comic is moving both too fast and too slow at the same time

      3. Bittersweet

        There is a huge dearth of media where characters fall in love over like a span of 2-3 days. Deep love. “I would die for you” love. I don’t have a good solution for bridging the gap between a slow paced comic like this and the need to keep time in perspective, as I try very hard to keep my comic moving at a faster pace just to avoid that problem (as it will cover four in-universe years similarly). I feel like this and maybe the Walky/Lucy relationship are the only two where you really feel the friction though. Billie/Ruth were together like a month and a half and if they’d gotten married in Vegas over Thanksgiving Break I feel like we’d have bought it lol. Joeyce wasn’t fully explored when it was wrecked, Walky/Lucy was fully explored .2 seconds after leaving drydock. It’s a dilemma.

        [Also, I only mention my stuff because it’s my entire frame of reference for writing and plotting and whatnot, I’m not super familiar with the processes of other comic creators]

        1. not someone else

          I am confused- dearth means extreme lack, is that what you intended? If so, I’m not sure I understand your point.

        2. Bittersweet

          Ack, you’re right, idk how I got that mixed up or what word I was reaching for. Midnight uploads do not mix well with 5 am wake times lol

        3. Bittersweet

          Plethora I guess.

        4. AbacusWizard

          Thanks. That means a lot.

        5. elebenty

          Fine.
          claps

        6. Clif

          Bittersweet, which comic do you write?

        7. Cheshrin

          Maybe you were thinking of “wealth of media” or “breadth of media?”

        8. Prince Mech

          Just an incorrect word choice. Bittersweet clearly means abundance.

      4. Rogue 7

        For me it’s mostly got to do with how different the 12 days Joe and Joyce have had would compare to an average 12 days IRL.

        Like, there was no point in the comic where Joyce and Joe didn’t have time to hang out one day because they were both studying for an upcoming exam- something that happens a lot in college. Less than 2 weeks into the relationship and Joe was trusted enough to be introduced to Jocelyne and know about her transition. Heck, he even met Carol.

        There was a *ton* of interaction that was packed into those 12 days, whereas IRL, the first 12 days of most relationships tend to be “we met for coffee and texted a lot”.

        1. thejeff

          College relationships with someone living around the corner from your room tend be a little different, even in real life.

          And they knew each other quite well before the dating started, which also helps.

    4. Yotomoe

      Yeah if we’re gonna allow the slow timescale of this comic effect years worth of my time and investment it can be a little frustrating to see the characters talk with this grandiose significance of years having passed simultaneously as if time has NOT passed. This is probably one of the examples for why this format can hamper my enjoyment quite a bit.

    5. Andrusi

      Are you criticizing the characters for not being aware of the real-world time it takes for their fictional lives to happen?

      1. Otl1973

        I’m pretty sure it’s Willis that’s being criticized for this emotional disparity.

        1. Andrusi

          That criticism is being presented in the context of characters having a completely in-universe discussion in which they mention the amount of time that has passed for them. It’s part of a weird trend I’ve been seeing in the comments that I’m not really sure how to describe.

        2. Prince Mech

          On a Watsonian level, yes. The characters are just having a conversation about the length of time in universe.

          But a lot of people feel like this is also Willis, on a Doylist level, saying “It hasn’t been that long, stop being so emotional about this relationship” to the readers. I don’t actually think that’s the intent here, but Watsonian and Doylist interpretations of a story are always going to exist in concert, because stories are created by authors.

        3. perpetual summer

          Within the context of the comments existing I’m pretty sure Dot is talking about commenters who’ve brought this up (you can see some if you scroll up a bit) as a sort of argument for why the boyfriends didn’t react particularly strongly, or why the cheating isn’t a huge deal or whatnot. Both of which might be addressed in this conversation? Hm.

          I do agree with Prince Mech that that’s not Willis intent – telling an audience to essentially not get invested in anything because the comic progresses so slow would certainly be… A choice? – & also about the Watsonian/Doylist stuff. Personally I always really enjoy looking at that, especially with online/serial media. (Most recently was Raidah essentially turning to the camera and going “btw I’m a Muslim, in case you forgot”, or tbh any of the inserted Asma strips. Those are dripping with Doylist context.)

    6. Amós Batista

      The irony of all: a moment so intense can look an eternity.

  12. Yotomoe

    Joe hates himself so much, Gosh.

  13. BSD

    Good

  14. Dot

    Also, look, Willis, if you have to have the characters lampshade and paper over how the cheating isn’t really that big a deal guys, c’mon, then maybe having infidelity be a part of this storyline in the first place wasn’t a good idea.

    1. Dot

      The comic right now feels in conversation with the commentariat in a way that I do not think is narratively beneficial.

      1. Bittersweet

        Tbf, I don’t think this is one of the inserted pages (unless it’s written somewhere that it is, in which case I eat my words). I find it believable enough that Joe would say this to self-soothe. Even if the “I had months” line is just him hating himself more for stupid reasons. Waiting months to ask someone out does not mean it’s okay what’s happened to you, Joe. Given that Dorothy had her freak out and pushed for this immediately (and Joyce had zero qualms), this would’ve happened if you had asked Joyce out after Halloween too.

        1. eskimolos

          And frankly, I don’t think Joyce would have been willing to reconsider him earlier. It took him a while to work on himself and prove he was making an earnest effort to reform from his old sex pest ways.

      2. Lucretiel

        Which is weird because these strips are all written and published, what, 8 months in advance?

        1. Bittersweet

          I think we are catching up to where the strips were when the buffer imploded just after the protest, but afaik we don’t know if that was a site error or not. But it doesn’t *feel* suddenly inserted imo. On the nose maybe, but that happens a lot because Willis has been doing this for basically forever and can pretty well predict reader reactions for the most part. Though I’m unsure if they predicted quite this level of upset.

        2. Thag Simmons

          The Buffer was like a year long, I don’t think we’re even close to catching up outside of inserted strips (which I think have mostly been about giving Raidah and Asma more to do).

    2. Prince Mech

      I think this is the opposite of treating it like it’s not a big deal actually. The point of this exchange is that it pretty clearly *is* a big deal and has hurt Joe (and Walky but the narrative isn’t focusing on him right now) in a pretty big way.

      Joe is using “twelve days” as an excuse to downplay how hurt he is feeling, Sarah is telling him he’s justified in feeling that hurt.

      1. ProfNekko

        I think the issue more people are taking is that Joyce seems to be not suffering in the least for what she did and honestly her character growth is taking an expected but negative direction.

        She’s been granted true “freedom” in the sense that she’s not really shackling herself to others any more, be it the expectations of her family or faith. But as we’ve seen her growth has been becoming more… hedonistic as she has been expressing her freedom. Basically doing as she pleases when she wants without any thought or care to the feelings of others. She callously tosses a meaningful relationship with Joe where he seeks genuine romance and companionship to the wayside in favor of what has up to this point been a totally wild and carnal relationship with Dorothy. There hasn’t really been any expression of romantic love or understanding between the two. Just really making out, sex, and flaunting it as a rebellion against “the system”, her actions with Joycelyn have been quite selfish as well, defying the desire for her safety at the protest to flaunt her rebelliousness, and then defying her willingness to come out as trans to her father and throwing themselves in the line of fire to make her new sexuality the center stage to “protect” her sister.

        Really I know this sounds mean but I do kinda wanna see Joyce’s recent selfish actions catch up to her and cause a train wreck. Or at least have someone tear into her into how much of a brat she’s being, and I don’t mean Sarah’s disappointment from earlier I mean really RIP into her.

        Anyways point of that long rant is more that I think a few people are worried that Joyce’s bad actions are going to be treated very passively at best and even possibly as a good thing. Which I don’t think Willis would do but it is a bit of a fear.

        1. Prince Mech

          I’m not going to discount that Joyce has been really selfish lately, but Jocelyn was clearly coming out *under duress* and Joyce wasn’t being selfish by giving her the opportunity to do it on better footing.

          Describing Joyce and Dorothy’s relationship as exclusively “wild and carnal” is also pretty disingenuous, given they’ve been acting in excessively romantically coded ways and are already calling one another their girlfriends.

          Like look, I’m not a big fan of the relationship, but let’s criticise it for what it is instead of making up reasons to get angrier about it.

        2. ProfNekko

          yeah I’m probably being more bullish than I need to be but I am sticking to my guns on how Dorothy and Joyce’s romantic relationship at least still rings really hollow to me. Every encounter we’ve seen since they paired up has been heavily focused around sex or making out and has had a pretty big disregard for anyone else’s opinion on the matter. I just do not feel any real genuine romance in the pairing, just as other posters have put it: “horny freshmen being idiots”.

        3. Armadillo

          Yeah, narratively speaking the dynamic between Joyce and Dorothy hasn’t seen any meaningful change in dynamic besides “they have sex now”. Emotionally speaking them entering a relationship doesn’t actually feel like it’s made a difference. Contrast that with Joe and Joyce where them getting together felt like a significant character moment for the both of them which involved them making and declaring serious decisions about the kind of people they wanted to be. This feels weak in comparison, all the drama to Joyce and Dorothy getting together was not only external, it had absolutely nothing to do with them.

          Of course, the fact that Joyce and Dorothy started a relationship and basically nothing changed could also be considered telling in itself. It reflects the general attitude of fans of the ship that this was a long time coming. But that also means that if you didn’t already like their interactions there’s nothing here to change anybody’s mind.

        4. Holly

          “Emotionally speaking them entering a relationship doesn’t actually feel like it’s made a difference.”

          I find this comment interesting, because it seems to be being used as a negative, but I am not sure it actually is. I think you’re right in the final paragraph where you say that it’s because it’s been a long time coming – that’s not merely an attitude of fans, it’s part of the writing.

          I think it’s ‘the point’ here – Joyce and Dorothy were already living the kind of relationship/couple dynamic they wanted, just without the lust. Their coming-out story looks like a sudden explosion of lust because they both just realise and acknowledge it was also there and being repressed, and stopped repressing it.

          Joe and Joyce’s relationship did have a lot of character growth, which is narratively satisfying to read, granted – but in terms of a functioning relationship it was very exploratory and unstable (possibly still is, let’s see what Joyce says to Joe after she’s had her slipshine times and processed everything a bit more).

          Joe is full of self-recrimination here for being ‘too late’, but the fact is that he could never have been early enough, he could never have preceded Joyce forming a bond with Dorothy as it happened so early (which as a long-term reader means that most of the character development from Joyce/Dorothy is very vague and mostly forgotten compared to more recent examples with Joe).

        5. Random832

          Jocelyne had more than ample opportunities to come out after that strip. I think the only correct reading, now that the whole sequence is behind us, is that Joyce was absolutely 100% correct in her interpretation that Jocelyne did not actually want to come out at that time and was only doing so to protect her.

          I understand why people interpreted it that way at the time but I cannot understand how people who have been reading the same comic as me are continuing to characterize Joyce’s actions in this particular instance in this way.

        6. Astariel

          I think this is a ridiculous read on the Joyrothy relationship. The whole thing has been portrayed as incredibly romantic from the moment Joyce approached Dorothy at the protest reciting lesbian wedding vows.

          Joyce, like everyone else, has a right to be in a consenting relationship with whoever she wants. To say that she deserves to punished for preferring Dorothy to Joe because he’s ‘better’ for her in some nebulous way is frankly pretty gross and bordering on homophobic.

        7. Minivet

          Strips this year with unambiguous expressions of romantic love between Joyce and Dorothy:
          – July 13th
          – August 13th
          – September 3rd
          – September 8th
          – September 9th
          – September 12th
          – September 19th
          – October 17th
          – October 19th
          – October 20th

    3. Lumino

      People keep hoping this is going to go away, but I honestly think it poisoned Joyce and Dorothy for me.

      Now I ask the question: “What line wouldn’t Joyce cross if she thinks it is for ‘True Love’?”

      When I have that vibe, then it doesn’t feel like a healthy relationship. I’m going to wait and see if Joyce and/or Dorothy are capable of setting up boundaries between each other once the “Honeymoon” phase ends, since it seems painfully obvious this ship isn’t going anywhere, anytime soon.

      1. Nyzer

        Same.

    4. Megan

      i think the point of the story is that it *isn’t* that a big deal. getting cheated on in college isn’t gonna end someone’s life. it probably won’t do that even in a longterm relationship if you care enough about salvaging things afterwards.

      at the end of the day, its just being a shitty partner. worst case scenario: you break up and move on while not trusting *that* person again. it doesn’t need to absolutely destroy a person just because someone they fancied decided they wanted to kiss someone else instead. the comic isn’t endorsing it, willis is not saying you *should* cheat, just that it doesn’t need to be a cataclysmic event with biblical consequence like people are clamoring for.

      and that’s a GOOD message! even though i don’t think its in response to anything (most of these strips were written almost a year in advance), its a message most of the people reading this clearly need to hear. there are worse things a partner can do to you than what joyce did, and joe doesn’t need to implode back into a hyper-misogynist sex pest overnight because of it.

      it’s good writing

      1. Dot

        I do not read a comedy-drama webcomic with a heavy focus on interpersonal relationships for anodyne life lessons about the comparative ethics of college-age infidelity.

        1. Clif

          How will you feel about it when Joyce cheats on Dorothy with Joe?

        2. morleuca

          Pretty sure Joe will turn her down, and quite coldly too.

        3. eh, whatever

          Not coldly at all. More like desperately.

        4. thejeff

          Nah, because it’ll just be her accepting the poly he suggested, except that Joyce hasn’t told Dorothy yet. Or told Joe she hasn’t told Dorothy.

        5. BSD

          Yeah that would probably be maximum drama: Joyce comes by, they have a whole talk, Joyce says she wants to be with both of them and wants to try and see if it works, we get a JoJo Slipshine, and in the afterglow she says she just needs to tell Dorothy.
          Joe would probably take that worse than this, because he knows how Dorothy feels about him and wants Joyce to not be the monster he worries about himself being.

        6. thejeff

          I don’t actually expect it, but it would be a hell of a twist.

          The capstone being when Willis admits that when they talked about a cheating arc they didn’t mean Joyce kissing Dorothy.

        7. Dot

          “Finally some fucking drama”

        8. Shakes

          I think you may be putting too heavy a narrative burden on this slice of life gag-a-day college freshmen comic strip.

        9. Megan

          idk why a comic written by a human being having an intended message would be considered a burden. i think most if not all stories are of the nature of portraying a worldview of the author, intended or not

      2. NGPZ

        I… concur, even though the cheating part still yucks up the yum that Dorothy X Joyce is supposed to be :/

        horny idiot freshmen be horny idiot freshmen, they’re teenagers, they have a lot to learn in this comic, that’s the whole point, what else is new

        1. Megan

          i have this anecdote that’s stuck with me for basically my entire adult life in relation to this

          when i was in college, we were being shown some sort of story about king arthur finding out guinevere and lancelot had been having an affair. he sentenced them both to death and the story was mostly just guinevere desperately pleading for her life in front of a court of men. when the teacher stopped and asked the class if we thought arthur’s reaction was “justified,” most of the people in class said they did

          one boy raised his hand and said “Cheating is the worst thing you can do to someone, and I wouldn’t personally kill over it, but execution is still just a fair punishment for her.”

          that was probably the moment i became a polyamorus person. i was so horrified that all of these kids thought that murder was an appropriate reaction to cheating, that I seriously had to sit myself down and consider the ethics of cheating, why a person would do that, how trust in people actually works, and what cause such immediate, unquestioning hatred towards the perpetrator serves.

          the reason i’ve been so harsh on people here in the past (other than lack of access to medication) is because this is a conversation i was able to have with myself in my teens. that I came away realizing “oh, just being a bad gf/bf/partner shouldn’t ruin someone’s life forever” and was able to better handle the two(!) times i’d also had to deal with unfaithful partners (yes, polyamorous people can be cheated on =_=) without resorting to emotional or physical violence. but most of the people in these comments are in their twenties or thirties still agreeing with that kid who thought execution was excessive but fair.

          i think the lesson we *should* be taking from stories like this is that it’s okay to move on. your worth as a person, and your PARTNER’S worth as a person, are not dictated by your relation to one another. human beings can make bad judgements and hurt other people without being the indefinite villain.

          idk, maybe that’s just my punishment-abolitionist ass being sentimental, but the way this comic is written is healing for me in a personal way that I just wish more people could understand. Joyce cheated on someone, Joyce is also having a moment of beautiful self-awakening as a queer woman in a world where she is finally allowed to be herself without fear of retribution, and both of those things can be true and appreciated without attacks against the author or their ability as an artist, is all i’m saying

        2. Erica

          That reaction is psychotic and I would be horrified too

        3. Megan

          it was *most* of the class. some of the women, even! i felt like i was in the twilight zone TToTT

        4. Holly

          I was horrified to be a mature student in a class of young adults recently, where the majority thouht it would be a good idea to bring back the death penalty (truly archaic and flawed nonsense).

          This is even worse than that. Was there a follow up discussion from the teacher, or any kind of awareness raised to this classroom?

        5. Megan

          this was a long time ago and in rural PA, so no, the teachers weren’t exactly quick to argue with people being openly misogynist in their classrooms lmao

        6. Prince Mech

          While that story definitely is, like, awful. Saying “most people in the comment section” are agreeing with that perspective is a gross exaggeration, Megan. I’m not saying there aren’t a few weirdos (I’ve been responding to them myself even as a Paladin/Hater/Whatever), most people are seeing it on the much more normal level of “Yeah, beautiful gay awakening is great and all but it’s still hurting other people”, and there’s nothing wrong with that affecting their enjoyment of the relationship.

        7. Megan

          i meant most of the people here are waiting for some Consequence to come out of the woodwork and Punish joyce and dorothy, not that they want to kill them.

          which is, like… just true? “consequences” is the word I’ve seen most over the past 6 months, and like i don’t have literal stats to define “most” but its definitely prevalent enough to be somewhat concerning to me

        8. Erica

          Yes, you are correct. And Prince Mech is correct that when I, and I think most people, say consequence they mean like “The friend group being disappointed in them”, like we got to see with Sarah. And I can see why people calling for consequences would be triggering in light of that college experience

        9. Prince Mech

          If anyone’s got me during this arc, I know Erica’s got me.

        10. Big Z

          This is where I’m at, as an OG Paladin — the expectation I have is “oh, you cheated on your boyfriends in a really public way. Yeah, that doesn’t have a lot of good to say about how much we can trust you at this point in your lives”.

          Which is pretty much how it happened when two members of the friend group dated and then there was cheating in the couple of times it happened in my college experience. No one got a scarlet letter or ostracized, exactly, but people just stopped trusting them as much same as they would with anyone else caught in a lie that affected other folks.

        11. Li

          I think the obstacle to that kind of fallout has always been who Joe is.

          Which is someone not really integral to the friend-group, who a lot of characters still don’t know very well, and may have had experiences with in the past that make them assume Joyce and Dorothy kissing a protest would be okay with Joe even if they didn’t clear it with him ahead of time. Walky has loudly called Joyce his girlfriend’s girlfriend before, so that kind of goes double for him,

          So Dorothy and Joyce getting congratulations and thumbs up from the people on their dorm floor doesn’t necessarily mean any of those characters is okay with cheating.

          So far the only characters who both definitely know what happened AND have reason to suspect Joe/Walky wouldn’t be okay with it are Jennifer (who only really knows it about Walky, she and Joe haven’t interacted much), Amber (who’s mired in her own guilt after Booster asked if she was encouraging Dorothy to flirt with Joyce specifically in hopes of making Walky “available” for herself), and Sarah, who of course has expressed disapproval of the two of them and grudging sympathy for Joe that I hope will grow into more.

          This is all very Watsonian, of course, and honestly it only strengthens the argument from the other day that this was a bad pairing to explore a cheating storyline with if the goal was messy fallout: that Joe isn’t going to automatically garner a lot of sympathy from people who haven’t been privy to the last couple of months of character development (either because they assume he’d think it was hot or because they think he’s a jerk and deserves to be hurt) is definitely a bit of an obstacle to serious social fallout for Dorothy and Joyce.

        12. Li

          And I stopped talking about Walky again by accident, but it STILL all kind of goes double for him. Joe at least has Danny who we know will be unambiguously in his corner here once he knows. Walky REALLY doesn’t have any friends outside of Joyce’s circle at this point, though I welcome the return of Jennifer/Billie in his life.

          (I think she’s less “anti-cheating” than Danny or Sarah, though. It hasn’t completely come up, but I would currently bet that Jennifer’s feelings about cheating are more “crappy thing that happens sometimes because people get horny and stupid”, whereas Danny and Sarah are more the types to burn bridges over it? If you get me.)

        13. Li

          The massive TL;DR on all of this is:

          I think the #1 reason we are unlikely to see that kind of fallout here is that that kind of fallout happens when cheating occurs between two people who are kind of equally beloved by their friend group. It’s less likely when one of the two is the central pillar of the friend group, and the other is mostly just part of the group by the transitive property of being her boyfriend.

          (Dina is another potential big exception here for Joe’s side, especially since she doesn’t really like Joyce much and is herself a “part of the group bc she’s someone’s girlfriend”, but she doesn’t know any of the details yet.)

        14. Prince Mech

          Okay, but there is a big difference between: “In this story I am reading, I think it’s narratively fitting for there to be some degree of consequence for when a character acts in an unjustifiable way that causes pain” and “I think execution is justified”.

          Like, *I* want “consequences” for Joyrothy here, not because I think they must be Divinely Punished for the Sin Of Lust or anything, but because their actions have caused a lot of pain for people around them, and they need to be faced with that to grow as people.

          Joyce in particular is deliberately ignoring the fact that she’s hurting people she cares about, because she’s still figuring out the balance between not repressing herself out of fear of going to hell and not becoming a hot mess like Billie.

          “Consequences”, at least to me, just involves her having to come to terms with the fact that she’s hurt people who she cares about, for the sake of character development. I am assuming that generally speaking, that’s what most people *also* mean rather than, I dunno, Sarah hitting her with a baseball bat until her sluttiness is cured and she goes back to kissing Joe or whatever.

          (There probably are a *couple* of people who think along those lines though, unfortunately.)

        15. Jay

          I’m just going to refer people questioning my thoughts to your comments cause you’re saying everything I want to say with a lot less frustration and cursing.

        16. Megan

          see, thats a starkly different reading than a lot of people happy with the story have. Joyce wasnt acting “unjustified” or “to cause pain” to anyone (other than walky, who does the same to her), she was acting because she and dorothy were pushed together by almost everyone in their immediate circle (prominently including Joe and Walky!!!) over the course of this entire strip and she decided to finally be honest about her feelings. she then did her immature best to be honest with joe and cut things off, she’s just an emotional mess from years of cult-think and is struggling.

          this isnt malice, its not spite, its not even thoughtlessness. joyce and dorothy still do feel guilty, theyre just not miserable in each others arms on every panel they’re together. that’d make for pretty bad reading

          when the characters are getting yelled at by close friends, are being publicly outted and shamed by the local paper, are having to second guess themselves before every moment of intimacy and people are STILL yelling about there needing to be consequences, it reads as excessive and cruel.

        17. Yotomoe

          Sarah is the only one who yelled at them. Joe and Walky just kinda took it on the chin. Jennifer gave sort of a half hearted “whelp I guess I gotta deal with this now.” Daisy didn’t care about outing them(which I also don’t like)Becky is more upset.
          That they’re gay than any cheating. Then Hank shows up for Jocelyne and Joyce feels she has to come out to protect her sister. Again this has more to do with her being bi than cheating. Also Hank takes it relatively well. Jocelyne also has no issues with the cheating aspect despite having met Joe. And random minor characters will sometimes congratulate them. Raidah is mad about them being front page but talks to daisy about it, not them. Then they go back to their rooms and fuck.
          Most of the characters barring Sarah have had neutral to positive reactions to them getting together. Most of the anxiety was mostly centered around the newspaper and Becky’s reaction. And I don’t like counting Becky as a consequence for cheating since she wouldve been upset about joyce coming our as bi no matter what? Separate issue same moment? In fact I am a little annoyed how much focus Becky got in this storyline about them coming out. That is a consequence I don’t like and wish we didn’t get actually.

        18. Rand Brittain

          I feel like “consequences” has been completely ruined as a word in this context, yeah.

          I feel like a better way to express how I feel is “it seems like a lot of you guys think this relationship is cute, but to me it feels gross and self-destructive. Both of these girls have lost faith in their individual moral compasses and seized on this relationship as the one thing that feels right, but they’re actually consistently behaving terribly and I don’t know that them making out is going to make this problem any better.”

          It feels to me like Dorothy and Joyce are each at a lower point than they’ve ever been in their entire lives.

        19. Yotomoe

          Yeah I concur with Erica. “Consequences” is kind of a catch all that means different things to different people. When I call for consequences in particular it’s moreso that I feel like Joe and Walky’s reactions are just to retreat into themselves and fall into depression. Everyone else has more or less congratulated them. Sarah’s like the only one that chastised them for it. Jennifer seemed unnamused but wasn’t particularly upset with them. One could argue there have been no Consequences of the cheating. (Becky being sad is unrelated to the cheating and more to do with Joyce being gay at all.)

        20. deliverything

          I know it’s off-topic, but all this talk of consequences reminds me of that Key & Peele sketch.

        21. Erica

          I’m not sure that Megan is saying that most people in the comment section are coming at it from that perspective. I think Megan is just explaining the lens through which they are viewing the conversation and why some of it feels triggering even if the comments don’t hold the same intent of the psychos in that college class

        22. Prince Mech

          Megan’s exact phrasing was “but most of the people in these comments are in their twenties or thirties still agreeing with that kid who thought execution was excessive but fair.” viewing things through that lens is understandable given that experience but I’m gonna point it out when it seems to be giving a bit of a warped view of what the majority of people actually feel.

        23. Megan

          its what people seem to lean towards. again, ‘most’ might be hyperbole, but at least two people have proved me right in response to this comment alone. I’m not saying most people actually want joyce killed, just that they wouldnt be too upset if she was. “not what i would do, but justified” is the vibe i am reading from most people responding to me specifically.

          maybe a bad faith reading, but idk, all im trying to get people to do is reconsider how strongly they need to feel about things like this.

        24. perpetual summer

          That is in fact a bad faith reading! Generally those don’t tend to help if you’re actually trying to get people to reconsider anything.

        25. Jay

          She literally said just that

        26. Erica

          Oops

        27. Yotomoe

          I definitely think it’s a matter of magnitudes. I wasn’t in that class but I can’t really say I’d have said that punishment was appropriate or proportionate. I’m not even sure if I think a “punishment” is what I’m after so much as I want more fallout.
          If King Arthur had decided to just…stop talking to Guinevere and Lancelot. Their relationship forever ruined by the betrayal, then like yeah I would’ve said that’s fair. I don’t want Joyce to like…be struck by lightning or punched in the face or something. I just think it’s a big betrayal of trust and I think while forgiveness is good that the pain of that is real and should be taken seriously.

        28. eskimolos

          See, in principle I agree, but as has been noted, two weeks takes a long time in this comic, and how much that sort of reaction would intrude on the entire cast’s expanding storylines is just too much, unless the goal is either a time skip, or to decentralise the author’s self insert and the personification of their acceptance of non-fundie beliefs. It’s not that a blowback can’t happen, and in fact I have initially tried to cope hard with cheating o my to explode after a bit, so it would be realistic to see the boys trying to internalize their feelings initially.

        29. shepsquared

          Considering Guinivere’s love affair with Lancelot is generally a large part of the how Camelot descends into civil war and gets destroyed while King Arthur dies, that’s definitely an example of cheating that would deserve punishment. Execution might be a bit far, but depending on the legal mores involved he might not have a choice. Of course I doubt any of that stuck for you if your teacher even brought it up, but it shouldn’t be difficult to understand that people primarily repsond to examples of betrayal pretty badly.

          Americans still go on about Benedict Arnold, etc, etc.

        30. deliverything

          For what it’s worth, the whole “descending into civil war because two people cheated” thing could alternatively be interpreted as a warning not to react so strongly.

          On another note: while Megan’s description mentioned how people were debating the validity of Guinivere’s punishment… well, conspicuous by its absence is any mention of punishment for Lancelot. Admittedly, I haven’t actually read that part of the story, so don’t really have room to comment here.

        31. Shepsquared

          I’m pretty sure trying to punish Lancelot is moot in the story, as doing so just causes him to ignore the punishment and start the civil war. Guinevere and Lancelot getting caught dooms Camelot (alongside a bunch of other stuff) whatever Arthur does to Guinevere because it’s the betrayal that sets everything off.

          So you know, if you’re poly maybe tell your partner the relationship is open instead of cheating and don’t marry someone for whom being poly wouldn’t be an option, like a feudal king.

        32. deliverything

          First: I completely agree with your second paragraph; I had to emotionally disconnect from the whole DoJo thing not because of the initial kiss stuff but because they didn’t communicate with their boyfriends at the first opportunity (yes, it still wasn’t all that long, but it was decidedly longer than it needed to be, and <a href="https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/04-the-only-exception/moratorium/"they were going against their own morals).
          I know it’s easy for me to say as an aroace who never has to worry about this stuff, but… please, people, communicate with your relationship people about relationship stuff. Better to have whatever results sooner than later.

          Regarding the Arthurian stuff: as I mentioned, I don’t really know much about the context and will happily defer to others on the subject. My comment was partly a knee-jerk reaction to the implication that Megan’s classmates discussed how justified Guinevere’s punishment might or might not be, but didn’t address Lancelot’s part in the same misdeed (maybe they did but it just wasn’t relevant to the anecdote?), and partly a sort of flippant remark along the lines of “yes, it was bad, but was it really casus belli bad?”

          I’ve read a fair bit about relationship stuff, in an effort to understand some of what so much of humanity seems to be so obsessed with, and the main things I’ve come away with are “be honest with your partner(s); don’t cheat; if you do cheat or get cheated on, resolve things as soon as possible (likely by break-up, especially if the cheating was ongoing); if you break up, just move on” (though I probably didn’t summarise this very well).

        33. deliverything

          Ugh… Messed up that link somehow. Was supposed to be https://www.dumbingofage.com/2025/comic/book-15/04-the-only-exception/moratorium

        34. MordWa

          Arthurian nerd here:
          1. Betrayal of the King and potentially siring heirs ‘not of his blood’ is err, inarguably kind of a big f’n deal.
          2. It’s feudalism. Having trust in people and relationships is waaay more important than the belief in constitutions, institutions, and restitution is now. To use a hackneyed example, “The Godfather” is the best movie about politics and power relationships.
          3. Lancelot WAS punished. In most modern versions, he was driven mad with guilt, and lived in filth with intense self-loathing for many, many years.

          We can only hope Joyce follows that moral example.

        35. MordWa

          Oh, and to quote the amazing PJ O’Rourke – “Mordred had a point”.

        36. Astariel

          Christ, did Palpatine have a point too? Voldemort? Judas?

        37. eh, whatever

          Yes, feudalism is the mafia. The tithe is quite literally protection money.

          No, Joyce is not in a mafia.

        38. deliverything

          …as far as we know.

        39. thejeff

          It was also, at least in some more modern versions, Arthur being trapped by his own laws.
          Earlier in the story accusations of infidelity would have been dealt with by the accuser proving his truth by fighting the queen’s champion. Given that Lancelot was the best knight at court, that kept things pretty quiet.

        40. Astariel

          Gross.

        41. Megan

          I’m glad that when a bunch of people argued with me going “No one’s saying execution was a valid response to cheating in these comments!!!” there was someone to swoop in and immediately prove them wrong

        42. Nymph

          Yeahhhh “[Literally killing a woman for cheating] MIGHT be a BIT far, BUT…” is a wild thing to read. I’m not totally sure why I’m surprised, given the real world’s view on women at the moment (and throughout most of white history) but it still shocked me to see someone “well actually” the idea that a woman didn’t deserve death for cheating.

          I still do agree with people that this particular attitude is not the general vibe when commenters are requesting consequences. MOST people do seem to want narrative consequence (i.e. emotional fallout) for the narrative event, rather than punishment for two women who hurt two men’s feelings.

          Essentially: Apparently you’re not totally wrong, but I do think you’re mischaracterizing most people saying this into the worst version of what it might mean.

        43. shepsquared

          If you want to strip everything of context like the grand scale epic that changed over time as people added things to it and old plot points fell away (like how in earlier versions there wass no Holy Grail and it was Mordred who Guinivere married while Arthur was away) then yes, we’re all foaming at the mouth lunatics.

          But that also means you find nothing wrong with a woman cheating on her husband with one of his best friends, which is a pretty terrible stance.

        44. Li

          You literally said executing her “might” be a “bit” extreme, so like, I don’t trust your judgment on what is or isn’t a terrible stance…?

        45. shepsquared

          I said it might be a bit far because I was thinking of the societal mores at the time the story was written. Divorce wouldn’t be an option in a chivalric tale, and sticking her in a dungeon would be a set up to make Lancelot the hero again, when there was a lot of back and forth later on because people got sick of courtly love. And considering the reveal of the infidelity is part of the villainous scheme that literally leads to the downfall of the kingdom, what are you expecting? Camelot falls because everyone involved sets aside their virtues for selfish desire. If Arthur doesn’t pass judgement on Guinevere he’ll cause a civil war. If he does, he gets a different war because Lancelot is functionally an army on his own and has his own sworn knights.

          And for the record Guinevere doesn’t get put to death, she dies of heartbreak when Arthur or their son Kay dies.

          You can’t remove this from the wider context and say ‘anyone who even vaguely approves of this is a monster’ without completely missing the point.

          It’s like saying “anyone who disapproves of the narrative aorund Joyce/Dorothy thinks cheaters should be put to death”.

        46. Li

          “Without completely missing the point” — what point, though? What context do you think actually makes murder ever a justifiable response to infidelity?

          Feudal kings? I’m sorry, but there is no actual “need” to be sure the king’s heir is of his bloodline. His bloodline only matters to his own ego. His kingdom will get along equally well with a “bastard” on the throne, as long as the “bastard” has been taught how to rule the kingdom properly. The only way Guinevere’s affair with Lancelot destabilizes Camelot is if Arthur goes around TELLING everyone about it, or otherwise refuses to make the kid his heir.

          (Kings can literally just declare their heirs, you know, it doesn’t have to be their blood.)

          You’re arguing that it’s potentially a “necessary evil” to have Guinevere put to death, when no. It really isn’t. The necessary “evil” would be Arthur keeping his mouth shut if he finds out. Guinevere’s punishment at all is only necessary if you believe in the divine right of kings, and it could have easily stopped at something like banishment instead of needing to go all the way to murder, but you just keep cranking that dial in your replies.

      3. perpetual summer

        I think “uh oh my friends are mad at me” isn’t all that biblical, and it’s mostly what I’ve seen people want? but I’ve never read the damn thing, so who knows. (re: consequences)

        While I sort of agree with you re: cheating, and think your interpretation of Willis intent with this arc is interesting, I don’t particularly think he did a good job, if that’s really what they wanted to do. Though I’ll keep it in mind going forward! I admit I haven’t really been giving Willis much credit for their writing chops ever since the protest stuff.

        1. Megan

          i also think people’s reactions to the protest arc were deeply charged in troubling politics and unfair to everyone involved, especially when the main purpose of said in-universe protest was to show everyone in the main cast opposing said genocide, but i don’t have a mini essay prepared for that at the moment

          i just wish people were nicer and stopped throwing around “bad writer” and “bad person” because of this year’s strips. not saying you’re doing that, but several people have the past few days (at least on tumblr) and its been making me very upset. attacking an author because of a storyline not going the way everyone thinks is valid is just not acceptable imo.

        2. Yotomoe

          I get not liking to see people harshly criticize Willis personally. Especially when it’s an arc you like. That said it just sorta comes with the territory. Theres lots of writers I love that I see get called talentless hacks all the time. Heck, even Willis makes a habit out of poking fun at 9 chickweed lane.

        3. Megan

          9CL is a pseudo-incestuous rambling masquerading as a comic strip, and willis critiques it on things like shape language and unclear dialogue, being EXTREMELY fair to something that I personally would have discounted out of hand by sheer fact it exists in the first place. And willis is ALSO doing all that on a personal bluesky, not directly in the author’s comment feed.

          comparing that to people calling willis a biphobic, opportunistic infedelity-defender is not exactly fair! and even if that *was* the same thing, precedent isn’t exactly an excuse for bad behavior.

        4. Yotomoe

          I dunno much about 9CL but I’m sure if they had a public comment section or forum they probably would. But I agree its not nice for people to do that. My point is that a lotta people are just…really mean. In the same way I myself have been called homophobic and other bad things about me for not liking this arc. I wish people weren’t as mean in a general sense but I feel like it’s a side effect of modern online culture. All discourse is a moral issue.

        5. perpetual summer

          I don’t think there’s anything wrong with calling Willis a bad writer (I wouldn’t, outright – having criticism of recent storylines doesn’t like, disappear the rest of the comic that I generally like. But to each their own). That’s not a personal attack. Sucks to hear as an artist for sure, and can definitely feel mean-spirited depending on tone or other context, but I’m balking at equating it to genuine insults or attacks on a writers person.

        6. shepsquared

          Most of the cast wasn’t opposing the genocide though, they just generally didn’t approve of it. Even Dorothy wasn’t willing to attend the protest and oppose the genocide until she was there for other reasons and all her issues with her ambitions came to a head.

          The protest wouldn’t have had the same complaints leveled at it if it wasn’t a backdrop mostly attended by side characters.

      4. thejeff

        Like some others have said, most of us don’t want “biblical consequences”, whatever that’s supposed to mean – the campus destroyed by a flood? Joyce’s bloodline cursed for 7 generations?

        How about just Joe being upset by the cheating rather than just sad about losing his perfect girl? Like, if this strip was more of a “Well, glad I didn’t waste more than 12 days before finding out she’s a cheater”, that would be a thing.

        1. Dot

          Also, Walky finally having to really reckon with the fact that the first girl he ever invested his heart into has pretty consistently treated him inconsiderately and badly basically from the start and reacting in a way that, again, isn’t just being sad.

        2. Nymph

          This I would love. I want this. Gimme this.

        3. thejeff

          He needs to listen to Jennifer’s breakup advice this time.

          (Words I never thought I’d say.)

    5. Jay

      Literally so far the fact they’ve cheated has meant absolutely nothing to the story and that’s what im mad at more than anything else.

      Literally what was the fucking point

      1. MordWa

        *shrug*

        The ‘fucking point’ was to pull a [hidden in plain sight rug tug] that subverted audience expectations.

        Well, congratulations. It worked. Of course, now we think your main POV character is a fucking piece of shit.

        …Yay?

        1. thejeff

          I do think it was more of not being willing to commit to a real cheating arc because they’re still uncomfortable writing them. So make the cheating itself minimal, then minimize the consequences even more.

        2. Jay

          So they shouldnt have written one.

          Hard stop.

        3. Taffy

          Now it’s gonna loom over the narrative for who knows how long, which feels weird.

        4. Jay

          Hopefully after this arc ends we can just move on from it and have it be a nice small footnote of a few months in the story.

          oooor Willis can easily drag this out over essentially the entirety of the comic.

        5. Li

          Would you universalize that maxim? Do you think no one should ever attempt to write something they might not do perfectly, or is it just this specific topic?

          If the latter, how should we determine which topics are not okay for artists to tackle imperfectly?

        6. Jay

          If you’re not going to give a topic your all whether you’re comfortable or not with tackling it?

          No.

          This feels like a half baked “cheating” arc and if it’s half baked because Willis is “uncomfortable” writing it then they just shouldn’t have written it. Right now this just feels like Willis wanting to have their cake and eat it too.

        7. thejeff

          OTOH, that’s how you build your comfort writing about things. It might not have been a good choice for the central romance of your two main protagonists in your decade long magnum opus though. 🙂

        8. Jay

          This doesn’t feel like Willis “building their comfort” it feels like Willis wanting to write this as cleanly as possible which just…isn’t satisfying.

        9. Dot

          Not so much never attempt, but be more discerning about how, when, and with with pairings to attempt it. I don’t think this was the right couple to try out their first cheating arc with.

        10. Li

          That’s your stance, though, and apparently not the one Jay was expressing.

        11. StClair

          Agreed. Commit to the bit, or don’t do it.

        12. Astariel

          You think that. We don’t.

        13. Jay

          I certainly do

      2. Megan

        the cheating clearly has a lot to do with the storylines going forward and i also explained pretty thoroughly why said arc might be important to certain people the author probably cares about, so idk what else to say to this. there are lots of points to stories like this

  15. Animedingo

    Besties?

  16. C.T Phipps

    While I doubt it will happen, it’s kind of fascinating Joe can’t really confront who he DOES hate: his father. His father did a terrible traumatizing thing to his mother via his adultery but his father clearly does love him and is apparently loving Stacy as well as his stepdaughter.

    The good side of him makes Joe unable to simply divorce himself from his father completely who he sees too much of himself in.

    Even though Joe absolutely should be focused on someone doing the wrong thing: JOYCE.

    1. Clif

      Oh, I think Joe is focused on Joyce.

    2. Reflex76

      Joyce literally tried to break up with him, he’s the one who refused.

      1. Dot

        He did not refuse, he offered an alternative which she had not previously considered.

  17. Bittersweet

    Good on you Joe. Also good on you Sarah

    Also, absolutely outrageous Joeyce didn’t make it longer than Walky/Lucy. Those two were so awful to read.

  18. Shitbird

    Sarah being the *only* fucking person disappointed in Joyce is so frustrating. Joe deserves to be hurt and upset, even if it was only 12 days, it was still a horrible thing to do. But y’know, any criticism of Willis’ writing is just being a hater or whatever

    1. Dot

      As Big Z has said, it’s ludicrous that there isn’t more of a shitstorm in the friend group over this. Joyce and Dorothy are allowed to make stupid teenage choices, but the rest of the cast acts like mature adults who talk things through and make reasoned, logical responses to events? “Let freshmen be freshmen” cuts both ways!

      1. Doopyboop

        Joyce and Dorothy have also avoided the majority of the friend group since the news dropped, so I think in time (especially tomorrow, Monday and a school day), we’ll see more reactions.

      2. Shitbird

        I don’t even think it’s stupid teenage decisions. 13 year olds know cheating is wrong, there’s no excuse imo for 18 year olds to think it’s okay, *especially* considering how long Dorothy has known Joe, her thoughts of him and how she is very likely aware of his dad’s infedility and how critical she is of how him.

        1. Astariel

          Unlikely. The whole time Dorothy has known him he’s been a sex monster that she probably tried to avoid as much as possible while dating Danny. I don’t think they had any heart-to-heart talks about his childhood trauma.

      3. Prince Mech

        I mean, a lot of the people who would care just haven’t been seen reacting yet I think. We’ve gotten reactions from…Sarah, Billie, Becky, and Dina by proxy I think?

        Sarah is pissed. Billie doesn’t care beyond awkwardly attempting to comfort Walky because she’s still slowly assembling a moral compass herself, and Becky is Crashing the Fuck Out, which obviously is distressing Dina.

        Danny has already shown that he wouldn’t be happy with this, I think Sal will be pretty nonchalant but irritated it’s upsetting Wonderbread (and her brother)… And… I genuinely can’t think of who else recurring would have any real reason to give a crap, like. Ethan and Asher just plain Aren’t Involved, for example.

        1. Clif

          If Mike were still around, he would make things better.

          Or at least more entertaining.

        2. Jay

          More reason killing Mike off was a terrible decision

        3. Astariel

          Mike never made anything better.

        4. Fail Earnhardt

          I could see Sal getting angry with Dorothy specifically for stringing Walky along a second time

      4. Big Z

        Yeah, I’ll be clear that my statement of what I think SHOULD happen has thus far mostly been in response to two things:
        1) posters who will outright say there should be no in-story consequences to these two for their actions (for any number of reasons)
        2) the fact our dwell time on “anything but the fallout of these two’s decisions, and especially on these two being adorable without any apparent introspection” has seemed relatively long, and I personally find it kinda boring.

        It’s a call to get on with the rest of the friend group and folks reacting, not a call that should have already happened in comic time.

        1. Clif

          No nuance now. Remember, this is the Internet.

    2. Erica

      There’s still time. I bet Dina is gonna have feelings. Becky might also be disappointed in her once she gets over her own personal feelings about it.

    3. Coatl

      Joe and Walky took it too calmly, but they’re clearly in denial. Becky just wants to be alone, and that worries Dina.

      Hank promised he wouldn’t say anything. Jocelyne…oh god, far from being angry…she seems to be encouraging this.

      I wouldn’t be surprised if Sarah and Joyce’s relationship starts to falter.

      1. Prince Mech

        I don’t think Jocelyn knew that Joyce was dating a guy for the record. But we also just don’t really know enough about her to know whether she’d consider “It’s your first girl crush” an acceptable reason to cheat or not.

        1. Jon

          You can search the tags for Jocelyne+Joe to see the conversation they had about how Joe is Joyce’s boyfriend and how “down bad” he is for her. Also a second conversation about how being vulnerable is important even if it can get you hurt.

          So yeah I would say Jocelyne knows about Joyce’s (alleged) boyfriend Joe. They were introduced like three days ago, in comic time.

        2. Prince Mech

          Thanks for the correction!

        3. eh, whatever

          “Down bad” is here.

        4. Dawn

          Jocelyne actually met Joe and liked him. I think she forgot because she was so excited to not be the only queer Brown kid, though.

        5. Elf grrl

          Wrong. Jocelyn was 100% aware that Joyce was dating Joe. Joyce literally introduced him as her boyfriend (in-universe) a couple days ago; https://www.dumbingofage.com/2024/comic/book-15/02-the-one-where-jocelyne-returns/deadname/

        6. Prince Mech

          Hey now, no need to be so blunt about it. I’m assuming you didn’t see that someone already corrected me, but it was just a lapse of memory.

        7. Elf grrl

          Apologies Prince Mech, tone is hard to read in text. Was not being aggressive, also yes you are correct. My response was late ?

      2. Corey C.

        Don’t forget about Amber, guys. Amber ENCOURAGED Dorothy to go after Joyce (albeit not actually knowing it was her) and she seemed to admit she made a terrible mistake after seeing Dina’s reaction to Becky having a severe depressive episode after learning about it. The hover text even quoted the 10th Doctor’s world famous line about how HE was responsible for the death of his entire race, and that wasn’t a boast in context.

        1. Prince Mech

          Yeah, sorry. Meant to mention Amber being Amber and encouraging mess because she can’t meaningfully distinguish between real life and fanfic half the time but I.. I think I just thought everyone remembered that haha.

    4. Jay

      THANK YOU! THIS IS WHAT I’M SAIYAN!

      WHY IS SARAH THE ONLY ONE REACTING REASONABLY TO THIS

    5. Lee

      100% this. I don’t think this makes either Joyce or Dorothy irredeemably evil and ofc university and freedom from religious fubdamentalism is a mixing pot for mistakes. But given everything this friend group has been through, I want to see consequences/mistrust.

    6. Kyulen

      Even the two guys who were cheated on seem less upset than Sarah. Which makes no sense to me.

      1. Megan

        i think getting cheated on and going through great lengths to try and react maturely and evenly even though you’ve been hurt makes a lot of sense to me, personally.

        speaking from experience with both types of reaction, when someone hurts you as badly as you can imagine and you react with stone-cold sobriety, it tends to make you feel a lot better than if you’d blown up at them. my ex bf tried guilting me into getting back into his life after i’d cut him off for cheating *and* abuse, and when i simply responded with “I don’t think there’s anything either of us could say that would make this situation better,” he had a complete meltdown until i had to end up blocking him.

        taking that sort of high road has made me feel smugly superior ever since, and if Joe and Walky *are* hurt by these events, I’m sure they’d feel the same several years down the line when they remember how coolly they handled everything.

        Sarah, being someone defending a friend and not someone in the direct line of fire for these feelings, is someone who stands to gain a bit more on an interpersonal level from getting loud and angry than the boys do. She can feel like she’s protecting someone instead of just losing her cool. idk, it adds up pretty neatly in my brain

    7. DashWallkick

      Eh, most people don’t have a great view of Joe and thought she was being way too gay with Dorothy in the first place. In addition to that I think it makes for better daily comics if we see 3-4 people blow it off and you get the rolling reactions from other people over time. It’s just better storytelling if we’re allowed to absorb the shock and drama ourselves for now, Becky and Joe absorb all the disappointment and hurt, and the comedy bits go to Sal and co.

  19. Erica

    It’s an interesting dynamic going on here. It seems like Joe is angry at Sarah for feeling sorry for him. And my take on that is because he doesn’t want Sarah to feel bad for him because that means she thinks he was wronged by Joyce, and is he is so in love with Joyce/has such low self-worth that he would rather minimize his own feelings and put all the blame on himself than have anybody else blame Joyce

    1. Adam Black

      see the men are saved through their undeserved relationships with wholesome women ( Walky, Joe ) who fix them.

      but this makes them feel unworthy, (garbage ) until they put their faith … in jesus . Like Jacob did.

    2. Lumino

      Yeah, I certainly didn’t have “Joyce being the abusive partner in their relationship” on my Bingo card, but here we are.

      And no, I’m not saying Joyce is some irredeemable monster, but she DID wrong Joe and now Joe is taking responsibility for it.

      The saving grace being that at no point did Joyce imply that any of this was Joe’s fault. But Joe isn’t seeing it that way.

      1. not someone else

        While I want to emphasize that I blame modern culture and not you, as someone who lived through abuse, the use of the term to mean “anyone who was a jackass in any significant way” rather than “a pattern of emotionally or physically violent behavior undertaken in the context of an intimate or power relationship, either intentional or out of gross negligence” is kinda disturbing. Like, I know abusive people muddy the shit out of the waters but nothing Joyce has done remotely rises to the point of abuse.

        She was thoughtless in a way that hit some deep trauma of his, and that’s not cool, but she didn’t actually install the trauma.

        1. Big Z

          +1

      2. Corey C.

        Joyce is an idiot who let her inner romantic take the wheel when Dorothy did a Grand Gesture, but I never thought of her as abusive. She certainly isn’t physically abusive, and she never berated Joe on anything he didn’t deliberately deserve (I point to her reaction to learning of Joe’s “Do” list, which was warranted.) Dorothy, on the other hand, miiiight toe the line at being psychologically/verbally abusive to Joe, given that she thinks he’s no good for Joyce and most likely will be just as cruel to him as Joyce was to Walky when Dotty finds out that Joyce didn’t EXACTLY tell Joe “it’s over.” Dorothy is hyper possessive, and Joyce is too blinded by her Inner Romantic to see that she will NEVER allow her to even LOOK at Joe if they are to continue to date.

        1. morleuca

          Considering how much Dorothy enjoys feeling guilt, I think she’s likely to be horrified.

      3. Megan

        as someone who’s been abused by partners.

        no. no she isn’t. stop that.

        not every bad relationship is abusive.

      4. Dot

        Joyce has treated Joe terribly, but not abusively. Same goes for Dorothy and Walky. Let’s have some sense of proportionality, please.

    3. DashWallkick

      My read was that Sarah was snapping at him for throwing a pity party about himself and undercutting his self worth, and his response in the final panel is going, “I’m not saying I’m worthless,” because he doesn’t. He’s genuinely really, really hurt by this, and he’s trying to be strong so he doesn’t end up like his parents.

  20. MK15

    Joe has grown so much, but unfortunately he’s the one ‘losing out’ right now…

  21. Adam Black

    I dunno Joe.

    Dorothy had months also,

    she didnt have the courage to admit it until AFTER you made her extremely jealous,
    and urged her to tell Joyce ( what a fool you were )

    1. Erica

      Dorothy had way longer!

      1. Adam Black

        I dunno. You think Dorothys crush goes back before Halloween?

    2. Corey C.

      It took Joyce getting kidnapped by Blaine to make Dotty realize there was something more to her feelings than just friendship, and Joe and Joyce walking off together made her replay that memory and finally acknowledge “my god, I AM in love with her!”

      I don’t necessarily AGREE with Dotty wanting Joyce ALL to herself, but I at least get the trigger that caused these emotions to flood out all at once.

      1. Adam Black

        some people are saying its just …a trauma reaction

        I feel like this should be lyrics to a sleezy cheesy 70s rock song , but this is all i could find https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NIKU7LXiIw

    3. Shogeton

      I think part of the problem is that Joe’s self esteem is in the gutter and he’s pretty guilt-ridden about his less than great behavior in the past. So, he told Dorothy to go for it, because part of him thought Joyce would be happier with Dorothy than with him.

      And, well, when Joyce picked him over Dorothy, in a way, he was ‘proven right’. Or at the very least, Joyce wants Dorothy more than she wants him. And Joyce is not to blame for that, whatever other faults she’s made. But it’s not great for Joe’s self esteem either.

      1. Adam Black

        Interesting idea.

        I thought he felt very secure . TOO secure.

        and if he was sabotaging his relationship maybe he thought it would balance the scales when he cheated.

        or he just didnt think it through at all.

        Now Sarah can get her tall king

    4. Jon

      Dorothy also didn’t have the courage to dump her high school boyfriend until he’d whole-ass followed her to college.

      1. Ray Radlein

        tbf, I think she was not expecting him to be there?

        1. deliverything

          Their first in-comic conversation:
          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2010/comic/book-1/01-move-in-day/together/
          However, the next strip with both of them directly supports your point:
          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2010/comic/book-1/01-move-in-day/answer/

        2. eh, whatever

          Wishful thinking. She didn’t break up with him and assumed she could just remove herself from the situation forever by moving a few miles so they’d be broken up by default or something.

        3. Astariel

          I don’t know how a highschool couple could possibly not be aware of where they’re each going to college.

        4. Dot

          I mean that’s not really relevant to the point. Not being upfront and dumping Danny directly and instead ghosting him all summer and expecting him to take the hint is a dick move and cowardly on Dorothy’s part.

    5. Rowen Morland

      Dorothy had to do the additional LGBT unlocks, and the ditch all previous ambitions mission first. That’s not something Joe would hold against her, in fact to the extent that they are ‘friends’ he had a certain amount of, hey maybe you should think about this for your own welfare.

      1. Adam Black

        I think Dorothy Identity issues go deeper ( and she hasnt even started undoing all those locks ) . the Bi one is loose.

        shes been floundering for an identity and using relationships to fill the hole.
        Unless this comic ends soon, i dont think joyce fits it.

        Giving up her ambition for a relationship is EVERYTHING shes been against, and i think this will hurt her relationship with Joyce when she realizes she is now Danny. Or Miss Piggy.

        dropping Yale, trying to get herself beaten by cops, this isnt character growth.

        I see this is a bandaid. Not slagging off the shippers. I dont think either of them are ready yet. Maybe 18 days. Maybe 10.

  22. RacingTurtle

    Seeing Sarah be a good friend to Joe somehow reminded me that Danny is probably going to hate Joyce SO MUCH and now I can’t stop thinking about it

    1. Lux

      That’s going to be an interesting conversation.

      1. Astariel

        How can Joyce have a conversation with a hat?

    2. ProfNekko

      and Danny’s going to have his negative view of Dorothy grow as well. He already doesn’t like how willing she is to just discard partners for her own personal gain or pick up relationships just to boost her own self esteem. (take note how when she’s mentally duressed she goes back to Walky who is for all intents and purposes a hot mess who just kinda passively takes orders to avoid conflict).

      Now Dorothy butts into ripping apart the best thing that ever happened to his roommate and best friend all so she can have the friend instead. That just looks bad regardless of the full context of the circumstances

      1. Erica

        And they JUST had the cheating bisexuals talk

        1. Dot

          Right? From Danny’s perspective, Dorothy came to him for advice, then proceeded to completely ignore everything he told her and played a role in running a railway spike through his best friend’s heart in the bargain. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is what makes Danny sever all ties with Dorothy for good.

    3. Elf grrl

      Rubbing my hands together like a fiend awaiting for Danny’s reaction to this new development.

      1. deliverything

        Your Alice avatar is fitting.

      2. Holly

        Danny’s reaction will definitely be justified from his experience, what would be REALLY juicy though is if he has an outburst within earshot of Ethan, who perhaps has reason to see Joyce more positively and who is drawn to disaster.

        If Ethan gets it in his head to mess with Danny and Sal to prove a point, even while he is seeing Asher, things could get even more spicy.

        This probably won’t happen, but imagine the fan fic potential at least!

        1. Adam Black

          Mike should have slept with them both.

        2. Dot

          Ethan and Joyce have had one direct interaction this semester. I don’t get the feeling they’re all that close anymore, or that Ethan would feel particularly spurred into action by that. Even if he did, Danny’s just gonna reject him.

        3. Dot

          Because she’s subconsciously starting to realize her gender identity is incompatible with Ethan’s sexuali-

          *i am shot and carried off stage*

        4. Big Z

          We aren’t gonna shoot you but I DO have one of those huge shepherd’s crooks that the Muppet Show used to use.

    4. Big Z

      This is the reaction I’m really waiting for, honestly. Especially given Danny’s ability to both “ignore Joe’s performative aspects and cut straight to being a good friend” and “call out Dorothy’s (and thus, probably, Joyce’s) actions for being what they are”.

  23. EpochFlame

    Sarah valuing Joe is wild. I’m here for it.
    Those two weeks sure felt like years.

  24. Astariel

    Good for Joe! I really hope he means it.

  25. ADLegend21

    Not very valuable since she moved on so quickly.

  26. Bryy

    HALLOWEEN JUMPSCARE!
    The comic directly acknowledging the concept of TIME.

    1. NGPZ

      wibbly wobbly, timey wimey… stuff

      (69th comment XD)

  27. Amber

    Man, that second panel hit me. Me and my longterm partner broke up last week and we’d been living together across 3 different apartments for years with our cat. Bleh.

    1. Bryy

      I’m sorry.

  28. Taffy

    Okay, can Joe and Sarah go rob a bank or something now? Joyce and Dorothy are fucking right now, whatever. Let’s see some real transgressions.

    1. NGPZ

      Dina literally just stole drugs to help Amber!!!

      Have we forgotten that?????

      1. Taffy

        I actually did forget that, because it keeps getting sidelined for less interesting stuff.

      2. Lee

        If you see Dina commit property crimes whilst using her magic powers (sorry not sorry Dina they’re magic powers) for good, no you didn’t.

        1. NGPZ

          THEY. ARE. NOT. MAGIC. D:<

  29. Corey C.

    Really wish Mike were still alive. He was Joyce’s chaperone for her first date with Joe and punched him whenever he said/did something inappropriate (which left Joe a bloody mess by date’s end) so if he backed up Sarah’s observations then I think I could safely say that Joe has become a person worthy of Joyce… or rather, Joyce at the beginning of the comic. Current Joyce has swung to the opposite end of the pendulum, and I think, if the two went on a date right this moment with Mike again as the chaperone… well, I don’t think Mike would punch a girl, but I could see him smacking Joyce upside the head multiple times.

    1. 3oranges

      Worthy of Joyce at the beginning is a weird way to put it. She has grown a lot since then. Like I think this whole bit has been awful for her friends, but I’d still hate to have had Jocelyne try coming out to the sister that poked the first gay person she met to see if he felt different.

      1. MordWa

        She has regressed, not grown.

        1. deliverything

          She’s changed in many ways, some good, some bad.

          Pretty sure a big part of the problem is that, for most of her life, her moral code was tied up with her religion, and she didn’t untie them before throwing out the latter. Not that her religion had perfect morals, what with it claiming that everyone who doesn’t fit its cishet ideal is evil, but she’s yet to properly adapt to life without a rigid moral framework.

        2. MordWa

          Yeah, nah.

          She hasn’t changed. She had unthinking, un-nuanced obedience to one ideology. She swapped that for unthinking, un-nuanced obedience to a different one.

          No growth, no evolution, just a horniness induced polarity reversal.
          She’s the worst.

        3. eh, whatever

          What is the different one?

        4. Taffy

          Buddhism.

        5. Astariel

          That’s ridiculous. What ideology does she follow unthinkingly now? Saying Joyce hasn’t grown at all is just to ignore vast swathes of the comic.

        6. Cameron Stone

          Degenerate Atheism /s

        7. Taffy

          That does scan with the braindead birdfuckers who say shit like “The moment Joyce renounced Christianity, she started proving the stereotype that all atheists are immoral pieces of shit”. And while I’m not quoting anyone verbatim, that’s basically what’s been said about it.

        8. 3oranges

          You literally replied to an example of a positive way she changed. If accepting her sister is an example of unthinking, un-nuanced obedience to an ideology to you, well.

        9. Taffy

          Something about their post in general reads pretty cis to me, so accepting a trans person being viewed as “obedience to an ideology” would not be especially surprising. No accusations, it’s just that there’s a lot of that fence-sitting “both sides are pretty intense” thinking over in Cis Land.

    2. PedanticJerkass

      “I don’t think Mike would punch a girl”

      Going to briefly break my own self-imposed moratorium on commenting on this comic to point out that there is at least one universe in which Mike absolutely would punch a girl and has indeed punched a girl. Directly in the boob.

      Now back to my regularly scheduled “not commenting on this comic while it remains utter dogwater.”

      1. eh, whatever

        No, between the boobs, on the breastbone. And then he twists her arm while hitting her on the back.

        1. deliverything

          Looks like he’s pulling her hair in the last panel there, not hitting her on the back.

      2. Holly

        Thanks. I had a vague memory or impression that Mike was, in fact, an equal opportunities menace, but I would not have known where to start looking.

  30. Switchchris

    See this is what I was talking about when I was saying how Joe would react.
    Everybody thought this breakup would Crush him or something, but that really downplays Joe’s character and his strength. It pretty much ties his worth and happiness to Joyce as if she is responsible for it.
    They dated less then 2 weeks. Sure they were taking things kinda fast because they were both horny young adults, but thats still only 12 days of a relationship. That is barely past the “Seeing eachother” stage, they only had 1 date and it was barely a date. They had not slept with eachother outside of some foreplay level stuff and a apology blowjob. I don’t remember them saying the L word yet, but I might be wrong there, hard to remember.

    Joe is stronger now then he has ever been, he has more support then he has ever actually had. Yes Breakups are sad, but they are not always for the worse, in this case it could actually push Joe to work on himself further, to not focus on dating and to become his own person.

    1. Erica

      How was it barely a date? They went out to dinner, went to the gazebo under the snow and kissed at midnight, then had non-PIV sex

    2. Prince Mech

      “Get out of here with your attempted pity party over my cowardice.” is not the phrasing of someone who is taking this well. Joe *is* being negative about himself here by saying that it’s actually his fault for not confessing his feelings sooner rather than acknowledge that Joyce has betrayed those feelings.

      Yes, he definitely does seem to have a more stable foundation as seen in the last panel, but let’s not indulge his self-loathing by buying into the “twelve days” statement that he clearly does not actually believe in.

      1. Erica

        Let’s also not gloss over the fact that they may have only officially been dating for 12 days, but they had been steadily building a romantic relationship for months. He wasn’t just a stranger that came up to her 12 days ago and asked her on a date

        1. Yotomoe

          THANK.
          YOU.

        2. Jay

          People acting like it wasn’t *joe* she was texting for emotional support when she was at her parents

        3. Nyzer

          Not only that, but she was the first person Joe actually opened up to for literal years. Even his only real “friendship” had become a one-sided yearning for the past on Danny’s part while Joe was closing himself off.

          Joyce is probably the biggest reason Joe stopped building up his walls and started taking them down, and she knows that. And she couldn’t even be bothered to finish talking to him about their situation before running off to call Dorothy her wife and swoon over her and gush about all their ultra meaningful moments and have sex with her.

          I remember when I was cheated on with my best friend, and it honestly hurt a lot more to lose him than it did to lose the ex. And our friendship had been on the way out the door for a while due to some negative character development of his as it was. Joyce was both of those people at once to Joe.

    3. thejeff

      You’re glossing over the “It’s my fault for only having the courage to admit my feelings two stupid weeks ago. I had months.”

      Joe isn’t saying “It’s no big deal, it was only a couple of weeks.” He’s saying, if I’d tried sooner I would have had more time and might even not have lost her.

  31. Mal

    I like that Sarah is trying to be a good friend here. I like Sarah very much, I like the friendship or almost friendship or new found respect developing between these two. But also, if I may be slightly petty:

    Who gives a hoot if Joe deserves to value himself because JOYCE saw value in him? I get that that’s Sarah’s sort of frame of reference until recently, respect the man you tried to be for Joyce, but given the situation: Joyce’s opinion on this matter has somewhat burnt itself to the ground and Joyce has left the embers on Joe’s front step. Like, Joyce saw something good and valuable in him, to her, until she decided to completely undervalue him by cheating on him, basically distracting him from that by giving him oral sex, leaving him on hold when he confronted her about it and tried to have an honest talk, and now having sex with Dorothy without catching EITHER of them up to speed. Cheating, not cheating, stupid college thing to do, it IS a shitty thing to do to Joe and Dorothy. Could Sarah not say there just IS something to value in Joe, given their recent interaction in the gym?

    This strip feels like downplaying how Joyce treated and is treating Joe. Joe talks about how he was a coward so it’s all his fault–true in his mind, no doubt, but very uncharitable to himself– and Sarah still tries to make the silver lining about how Joyce found value in him, respect that value? Please. Respect your value as a person who improved himself, Joe. Respect your value as a man who tried to put his partner’s happiness first, very likely at his own expense, Joe. Respect your value as a person who is standing in a crappy situation and trying to make the best of it, Joe. Great that your relationship with Joyce helped you do that, and let other people see it, but Joe still chose to do it. Joyce’s assessment of his value can take a hike in this particular moment.

    1. Badgermole

      There’s a real problem when even Sarah, the character who is nominally critical of Joyce’s actions, still idealizes Joyce like this. I get that it’s an autobio comic and Joyce is its main character, but it feels like bad writing that she is also the main character in these other characters’ frames of reference.

      1. Corey C.

        I always thought that Sarah thought of Joyce as an almost saint-like figure pre-timeskip. Incredibly annoying, sure, but innocent enough for Sarah to look past her grumpy pessimism and see value in things and people she normally wouldn’t have. Pre-timeskip Joyce brought out the best in Sarah MOST of the time (Not counting the time she tried to “help” Sarah break up Jacob’s relationship with Raidah) and so Sarah is right in seeing that this new “screw everything, let’s just throw ourselves into our emotions” Joyce isn’t the best Joyce can be. She ditched her toxic religion, yes, but that doesn’t mean she should just pursue pleasure the moment it pops up. The problem with most “live for the moment” peoplw is that the moment always ends and there’s ALWAYS consequences, and Joyce is actually pretty lucky that Joe is TRYING to brush off her cheating as no big deal instead of being a vengeful stalker that wants to kill Dotty for stealing Joyce away.

    2. DashWallkick

      It’s not “Downplaying Joyce,” it’s being very direct about how actions cause reactions. Joyce pulled Joe’s best self out, she also is capable of hurting him twice as badly because of that betrayal.

  32. Shogo

    Some interesting feelings with this one. I’ve never really liked Sarah before, but I’m really glad she’s here and providing comfort for Joe. Because it really doesn’t matter that it’s apparently only been 12 days, cheating on someone is still a really shitty thing to do.

    As some others have said, this storyline has been pretty poisonous to me as far as Joyce and Dorothy being together is concerned. Moments that should be cute and endearing simply aren’t to me.

    I’m not even really mad about it anymore. Just disappointed.

  33. Lightweight Baybee

    alr it’s a lil fucked up to make this about joyce tho?

    This JUST happened let bro FEEL for a while ong
    I appreciate sarah’s sentiment but now is NOT the time xD

  34. EpochFlame

    https://www.dumbingofage.com/2014/comic/book-5/02-threes-a-crowd/cheating/
    this sure aged well

    1. ADLegend21

      11 years real time, 5 months ago in story xD

  35. Sirksome

    To be fair Joe had the courage to ask Joyce out the first day he met her.

  36. Jay

    Have I said fuck Joyce yet?

    If not, fuck Joyce.

    I’m kinda glad she left Joe now because it means he can find someone who wont stab him in the fucking back and disregard him entirely as a person

    1. ReFlex76

      Dorothy’s doing that right now.

  37. Nathan

    There’s an AI ad that makes it so that I can’t read the comments

    1. nadamás

      Honestly that might be for the better

  38. Yotomoe

    The moral of the story is to never open your heart up to anyone. Just gives you a better chance to have it broken.

    1. Taffy

      And if you’re a man, people will cheer when it breaks, regardless of circumstance.

      1. Jay

        I mean if you’re a guy you probably already know this, its engrained pretty young our feelings are worthless.

        1. Taffy

          I’m not one, but I know the drill.

        2. eh, whatever

          A fine example of how patriarchy hurts men, too.

    2. Sirksome

      I think the real moral is if you weren’t a jerk the first time you met her maybe you’d still be with her now. I feel really bad for Joe here because he doesn’t value himself and I think it’s because he knows he blew his chances early out.

      1. Yotomoe

        The moral of the story is that there’s no such thing as a redemption story. Nobody will ever love you for the sins of your past. You’d be better off dying or starting over in a new place because nobody will ever forgive you ever forever.
        Even if they tell you they love you they’ll still secretly hate you forever for what you’ve done. You don’t deserve love. You never will. Stop trying. You don’t deserve love. You never will. Go away. Nobody likes you. Nobody will ever like you.

        1. Sirksome

          I think we’ll all be surprised by how fast Joe rebounds.

        2. Prince Mech

          I have no way to say this without risking sounding condescending, but maybe you should take a little bit of a mental health break man.

          Willis has definitely not been writing this with the intent of saying that Joe cannot make up for his past behaviour. We’ve had lots of proof that he really is becoming a better person.

          I know we don’t know one another personally, but I’ve been reading for a long time so seeing you so down in the dumps here made me reach out, sorry in advance if it was uncalled for.

        3. Yotomoe

          I’m just depressed in a general sense. Just a general sense of Ennui in general. Sometimes it’s nice to be in a place where being mad at a webcomic is the worst thing I’m experiencing at a given moment.

        4. Prince Mech

          Yeah, I understand. I genuinely hope you start to feel better soon, I can tell there’s a lot of people in this community who like you and would want that for you too.

        5. Sirksome

          Yeah, feel better. I consider you a friend of sorts. Like a comment friend if that makes sense.

        6. Yotomoe

          I appreciate the sentiment but I won’t feel better for the foreseeable future. Everything sucks and it’s getting worse and worse and worse. I’m not even particularly depressed right this moment. This is just the new normal. If anything it feels bizarre for anyone to hope I’ll “feel better”.

          Why?

        7. Christron5000

          Honestly, real. Not GREAT but real.

        8. NGPZ

          yeah, there’s “feeling better”, but that’s separate from awareness of things getting *materially* worse in our country,

          I’m pretty sure that’s what you mean?

          yeah, mood

        9. nadamás

          This sounds like a mom trying to guilt trip her adult children.

        10. Yotomoe

          Sorry I’m just sensitive to heartache and it strikes a nerve when people are like “oh yeah he deserves this” about a story where he was cheated on.

        11. eh, whatever

          “Deserve” is such a strange word to use in that context.

        12. Yotomoe

          I guess it’s contextual in the same way “deserves food” and “deserves to eat” may be considered different things.

    3. Amós Batista

      *sending faraways hugs*

  39. SillyGoose

    I was listening to Radiohead when I read this, and now I’m not OK either.
    Poor Joe 🙁

  40. Lee

    Based on some of the absolutely tie-yourselves-and-the-truth-into-knots interpretations I’ve seen the last few weeks, I presume a bunch of y’all think that “it’s no big deal it was only 12 days” is sincerely how Joe feels about this situation.

    1. thejeff

      It’s not even what he says. He’s saying it’s his fault it was only 12 days.

  41. Sirksome

    I got something to say that’s gonna piss off you Joe fans. It’s his fault this happened.

    There’s an alternate hypothetical reality where he’s in the slipshine right now deflowering Joyce while Dorothy wines to I guess Amber about losing Joyce and all Joe had to do was not be an asshole for months. Scratch that even. All he had to do was apologize and try again more earnestly and sincere like he’s been these last two weeks or month or so since return from break.

    There’s a very real reason Dorothy won out here and it has nothing to do with true love or destiny and everything to do with Dorothy investing time and being a better friend and support that made it easy for Joyce to fall for her. What was Joe doing that entire time? Pointing at his dick, fucking the RA (Jason wishes he could’ve pulled Joe), telling girls to kiss, and lying to himself about his feelings.

    So yeah it fucking sucks he lost here, but I kinda love it because dude is gonna be such a better person for the next lady.

    1. Jay

      You’re right, but joyce is still a twat for it ?

    2. Yotomoe

      >:(

    3. shepsquared

      Yes, it was definitely only Dorothy that supported Joyce through difficult times. There was never a friendship between them based on difficulties with family, or on the other person being safe because they don’t expect you to be perfect or terrible. Dorothy earned this because her response to Joyce getting a boyfriend she didn’t like was to (in Joyce’s words) have sex with her.

      1. deliverything

        One reference link: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-6/04-it-all-returns/help-2/

    4. Dot

      Joe was a good friend to Joyce too.

    5. Yotomoe

      What Joe should’ve done is masturbate with Joyce in the laundry room with the explicit purpose or keeping her from being aroused by other people. Or send her unsolicited titty pics. Yknow. Romantic stuff like that.

      1. Dot

        Yeesh. Thanks for reminding me of the specific reason why I really do not like the laundry scene.

        1. Big Z

          Oh, just one of MANY reasons I didn’t like the laundry scene (including getting accused of homophobia for my opinions that Dorothy was being too pushy)

    6. Lee

      While I’m sure there are people who thought Joyce should pick Joe over Dorothy, that’s not remotely what the critical mass of the frustration in the comments is about.

      And I don’t even think this is entirely accurate. I think Joe’s been improving since Rachel explained to him the way the Do list could put people in real danger. And yes, I’ve said myself that he was due for some bad karma, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t going to be disappointed in Joyce for delivering it via cheating.

  42. Acher4

    “I haven’t”

    YES!

    Joe!Joe!Joe!

    1. JoeCovenant

      What??

      😉

    2. yak

      I want you to know that I read that last line like the Bill Nye intro theme.

  43. Big Steve

    I love this comic, but sometimes I get total whiplash from the degree of time compression. Not normally, but every once in a while something like this comes out and hits me over the head with it! Wow.

  44. Arianod

    “So did you get it? Character development?”
    “Yes.”
    “What did it cost?”
    “Everything.”

    1. Newlland(Henryvolt)

      +1

  45. Fail Earnhardt

    At this point, the funniest outcome of all this would be Joyce cheats on Dorothy with Joe in some galaxy brain attempt to balance the scales while conveniently avoiding any difficult conversations.

    1. yak

      Joyce spends the entire rest of the comic doing the “brought two different dates to the same restaurant” bit

      1. Dot

        Some relevant strips here:

        https://www.dumbingofage.com/2020/comic/book-10/02-to-remind-you-of-my-love/interested/

        https://www.dumbingofage.com/2020/comic/book-10/02-to-remind-you-of-my-love/situation/

        1. thejeff

          I really want to see Joe talk to Jacob about this.

        2. Dot

          It turns out it is kind of different when you’re inside a situation.

        3. Big Z

          Yeah, I kinda want those two to have a solid moment about this — they’re by no means close as far as I can tell, but this WOULD be the moment for Joe to come back with a “hey, next time I ignore your advice, remind me not to do that”.

          Given the speech about things Joyce gets right vs. wrong, Joe might be too down bad for that even now.

        4. Fail Earnhardt

          OOOFFF

          Jacob is about to cash in the biggest “I knew it” of all time

  46. Kyulen

    No Joe, it’s not your fault that Joyce cheated on you. And the shortness of the relationship doesn’t change the fact that she cheated on him. Sadly it seems like he’s not ready to accept that yet.

  47. Aquila

    Twelve days, huh?
    Felt a lot longer from this side of the screen.

  48. Josh

    I’m not entirely convinced that he hasn’t. I don’t think he is convinced either.

  49. Zamperla

    Joe’s a good dude, with a genuinely… incredibly reasonable sense of scale tbh. I appreciate that. I hope he really can take the good he got from having this experience with bein in a supportive relationship.

  50. Rimwalker55

    Very strong script today, Joe is showing both his weaknesses and strengths.

    1. Rimwalker55

      Sarah showing a lot growth too, from crippling social anxiety and trust issues to respecting another’s emergent goodness.

  51. darkoneko

    haven’t you, tho ?

  52. DashWallkick

    I like that Joe is actually not as altruistic as he seems. He’s genuinely hurt and is behaving the only way he knows how — gently, kindly, selflessly, but he’s not doing it because he’s a hero, he’s doing it because he’s devastated and doesn’t know what to do.

  53. Reflex76

    To all the people feeling sorry for Joe:

    Any reason he didn’t tell Sarah about his poly proposition to Joyce?

    Arguably calling her a hussy to try to shame her into it?

    1. Dot

      That wasn’t trying to shame Joyce into it, that was trying to get her to cut the crap and stop making excuses for why she “couldn’t” do it and instead consider if she *wanted* to do it.

      1. Adeptus

        I 100% agree with Dot’s analysis

      2. Big Z

        Yup, Dot’s right here. There’s not really any even slightly fair reading where you can even TRY to twist Joe’s words into “shame her into it”.

    2. eh, whatever

      what

      No. What Dot said.

    3. RexLatro

      …Didn’t Joyce bring up being a hussy herself first in response to Joe putting the poly option on the table? Joe was being patient toward someone who had cheated on him, but points out the obvious to her, which results in her calling *herself* a hussy?

    4. Nymph

      Woof, buddy.

      He doesn’t owe Sarah the details on a potential polyamory relationship that he hasn’t even finished talking to Joyce about yet. It’s actually fine and reasonable to want to keep that to himself for now. Or for always if it doesn’t work out.

      As for the hussy thing: What Dot said.

      Sincerely,
      One of the people feeling sorry for Joe.

    5. furubatsu

      Joe: Why can’t you date two people?
      Joyce: What??? No! I’m not a hussy!
      Joe: I have in my hands right now photographic evidence of you tonguing someone whose not your romantic partner and am trying to give you a “get out of judgement free” card to salvage this relationship
      Joyce: Oh god, I’m a hussy!

      You, somehow: God, Joe’s such a dick

  54. Dot

    I don’t know how I feel about Sarah centering Joyce in her little pep talk here. Like it does make sense, but it’s like. I feel like we’ve given enough weight to what Joyce thinks and feels over the last few months, thank you very much. I think I’d tweak it to something like:

    “Joyce saw something incredible in you, and despite my best efforts I ended up seeing it too. I choose to honor that.”

    It’s subtle, but it shifts the focus from what Joyce thinks about Joe to what Sarah has come to think about Joe, and the relationship between the two, which is what really should be the focus here.

    1. Fuzzy

      That would definitely be a better pep talk, but it’d be stepping out of character for Sarah. She doesn’t like to acknowledge her own feelings out loud (if those feelings aren’t “you’re hot” or “I’m mad”) very often.

      1. Fuzzy

        (not that she couldn’t have said it. it just would’ve taken courage for her to say it.)

      2. Dot

        I don’t think it would be! She’s been making a genuine effort to step out of her shell and open up to people lately and I feel like this would be in keeping with that growth.

    2. Big Z

      I’m not going to say it’s GREAT, but it IS in character for Sarah, whose current entire position on Joe is roughly “I kinda justifiably thought you were a fuckhead until Joyce convinced me otherwise, so most of my esteem for you is still kinda tied up in that construct.”

  55. Christron5000

    Sarah has a sense of justice despite her cynicism and thinks Joe didn’t deserve this for all his effort, Billie despite trying to distance herself from them still cares for Walky and doesn’t want ill-will to come to him, and Danny outright calls out how hypocritical Dorothy’s actions would be going forward.

    Everyone keeps calling out the consequences not hitting fast enough or this couple being boring, or trying to quit the comic which hey I’m not a mind-cop, it’s your bandwidth, do with it as you please. But…has it occurred to anyone the amount of people who care about Walky and Joe in this context of this friend group is pretty finite, let alone people on this campus? (we could also get into how close this friend group actually is but that’s a whole other thing.)

    Look I’ve seen historical, full consequence crashouts from cheating in fiction and in real-life, but I’ve found people in the periphery can be pretty indifferent to the whole thing. Sure enmass, the consensus is cheating is bad, you have entire reddit pages dedicated to vilify cheaters but there’s a finite amount of people actually engaged in this? Who are the other people who should be angry at this for the cheating and not everything around it (the protest, Becky’s whole deal etc), Sal? I can see it, easy, but past that?

    I don’t know, I’m guess I’m kind of more curious about how Walky and Joe recover and rationalize all this than everyone being mad at Dorothy and Joyce.

    1. nadamás

      Honestly seen few people say they quit the comic. More people stubbornly sticking to it despite clearly not enjoying anything that is happening.

    2. Shepsquared

      There’s not exactly a whole lot more people who care about Joyce and Dorothy though. Ruth’s going to be disappointed she didn’t get to dump Walky for Dorothy, Dinah will feel ba for Joe once she gets through what’s happening with Becky enough to notice him, Raidah will happily add this to the pile of reasons Joyce bucks of she finds out, most of the dorm will only care superficially, and I can’t guess how Sal will react.

      1. Dot

        Danny, Lucy, Jacob, and maybe Rachel are also all factors who are likely to have their own reactions.

      2. Fuzzy

        Raidah found out about the Walky half of it through Alice, at least. She asked if there was anyone’s partner Joyce wouldn’t make out with.

  56. Galuna

    Joe in no world is it justified for you to be cheated on.

  57. Fuzzy

    I don’t understand what is happening here. It’s a very aggressive/defensive response from Joe that seems pretty unrelated to what either of them actually said last strip? I’m kinna just confused why they’re saying this stuff.

    1. Scruffy looking nerfherder

      I think it’s cope. Joe doesn’t want to admit that he’s been done dirty and even though he expected as much to happen doesn’t mean he has to be cool about it.

      It’s like somebody else in the comments has said, he went from one extreme to the other, ending up like his mother to avoid being like his dad. He’s being a doormat because he thinks he deserves it as a penance for how he used to be and never truly believed he deserved Joyce in the first place. So how Joyce does things doesn’t matter because he deserves nothing, so anybody trying to feel sorry for him is basically just being foolish and it’s all his fault no matter what happens.

  58. Opinion

    I think this really points out how the time compression causes problems. It feels like characters relationship with time is really inconsistent. What is days in universe is months or years for us. Which can work.

    BUT it feels like what we are supposed to give weight to is all over the place. Like sometimes we are supposed to have the emotional weight of seeing something build for months/years.

    And sometimes characters turn to the Camera and go “it was 12 days you are dumb for thinking that it was long enough to be relevant”

    1. Skychrono

      Agreed, it’s weird. Like this strip points out that Lucy and Walky lasted longer somehow?! But I never felt like they were endgame, and while I liked the relationship a lot it never felt like it was given the weight of finality of Joe/Joyce.

    2. 3oranges

      This is taking what Joe says here as the author’s word. But Joe spent a lot longer than twelve days getting closer to Joyce. I think he’s giving an excuse to not care, not that he’s meant to be right.

      1. thejeff

        I think he’s at least partly lamenting that he didn’t move sooner, so he could have had longer. Or even, with more time, maybe made a deeper connection before the Dorothy thing came to the surface.

  59. Big Z

    Yeah, Doylist interpretations aside, this really does feel like Joe trying very hard to be cool and normal about his first real relationship blowing up in his face through no fault of his own via a vector he was consciously trying to inoculate against.

    Personally, I can kinda smell the bitterness he implicitly claims he does not feel in some of those words.

  60. raultsi

    12 days? But … what year is this? Reminds me of Dragon’s Egg by Robert L. Forward. Intelligent life on a neutron star meets humans, except time to them is nanoseconds to us.

    1. Steamweed

      Sequel was a lesser work, but, yeah, those were a couple good books. Life processes at nuclear speeds. Very fast-lived, those Cheela!

  61. Steamweed

    “Don’t go back to the old bad Joe ways.”
    “I won’t. I’ll go forward to the new bad Joe ways.”
    [dun Dun DUN…]

  62. Maddie B

    As a Joyce–Dorothy shipper…

    I really, really like the version of Joe that he’s been over the last few years of comics. He deserves happiness and continuing positive development, too. Hopefully plenty of other friends will be there for him like Sarah is right now.

    1. Astariel

      As a fellow Joyrothy shipper, I completely agree.

    2. Li

      +1

  63. IntangibleMatter

    Okay, I really feel bad for Joe, but also if he’s going to take what positives he learned from the relationship and move forward with them, I am so excited and happy for him, and look forward to seeing where he goes next

  64. Skychrono

    It’s been an emotional ping pong in here recently, and I feel like both sides are being taken for a ride. If you’re a “sicko” you have to contort yourself to explain how Joe and Walky weren’t wronged/deserve it/it wasn’t cheating while you feel glee over your ship sailing. If you’re a “paladin” you get to feel validated that Joe was a good person and that the girls really are ruining things.

    Everyone wins/loses! Good job Willis?

    1. Nymph

      You actually don’t have to do either of those things. In fact, I’m literally begging people to stop trying to force this weird dichotomy.

      “Sickos” and “Paladins” were joke names ascribed to two WIDELY varying points of view. Plenty of people who called themselves sickos (me included until everyone turned it from a playful thing into something fucking weird) were here for the drama. I don’t owe any kind of explanation about Joe and Walky (two fictional characters) being wronged or deserving it or anything.

      It’s actually fine to enjoy that a ship is sailing and enjoy the damage it causes because it’s going to be a good story to watch everything explode for a bit (or, I thought it was going to be… the reality hasn’t been what I hoped, but I’m still happy reading what we did get instead). It’s fine to think Joe is a good person who doesn’t deserve bad things and still be kinda hype when bad things happen because it’s narrative friction.

      1. Big Z

        Endorsed, as someone who has been jokingly calling himself an OG Relationship Paladin (and will probably continue to do so, since I’m jokingly a “paladin” in so many other contexts in my life) — the dichotomy stinks, in that each position at BEST describes a broad array of actual desires for the storyline.

        1. BorkBorkBork

          Of course it stinks. It’s an artificially-created dichotomy created to cause an us-vs-them feeling among the community. Remember, there’s no waffling, no middle ground, you must choose a side.

          Yeah, that’s being cynical, and I’m not saying it was intentional… but I’m not not saying it was intentional either. Because if you divide people up between two extremes, then start driving towards one extreme, then the people who aren’t wild about it (the ‘haters’, as some say) will either put up and shut up, or eventually leave. And the people on the fence will get daily constant reinforcement from the loudest group.

          I lowkey really dislike today’s strip. This is going to sound weird… but it’s like getting in an argument with your SO, and instead of your SO either listening to you or arguing their own opinion, they instead just try to pick apart your argument, as if they can end the whole thing by showing you that don’t have a reason to be upset.

          “Look, see, Joe’s actually OK. He’s put this in perspective. Neither Joe OR Walky are upset at Dorothy and Joyce; they’re fine! Look, Joyce saw something AMAZING in him, and he still has that, and Sarah sees that. What are you upset about? Why are you even here? This was as much time as Lucy and Walky had, and you didn’t argue then!”

          Which… ugh.

          As for their relationship, I really do hope that it ended and doesn’t linger with Joe playing third wheel, because there were some parts of Joe/Joyce that was actually a bit toxic.

        2. Donovan

          The poll was so toxic to the discourse here

        3. Jay

          Honestly willis in general has been pretty toxic to the discourse

        4. Li

          It was a joke, observing the already-existing dichotomy, so. No. It was not “created to cause an us-versus-them” feeling, and I think it’s silly to blame the person who coined jokey names for the factions OR Willis for liking the joke and making a poll…

          …for how the rest of us mostly-adults have behaved since.

          Like I don’t know about you, but I am a grownup capable of taking responsibility for my own actions, thanks.

        5. Jay

          Let’s not pretend Willis hasn’t been fanning the flames for basically the entire arc by essentially hand waiving anyone who wasn’t 100% on board with it and hyping up the folks who were

        6. Li

          I am in fact going to “pretend” that because I think they’ve been incredibly kind and generous to their “haters”, especially considering the things that are regularly said not only in this comment section but directly to them on BlueSky, pfft.

        7. BorkBorkBork

          Yeah, I’m not saying it was intentional, initially.

          But that poll started in June and ran to July. Literally every single day was a battle with people arguing left and right. You had to be willfully blind to not see what effect those labels, and that hostility (CHOOSE A SIDE YOU COWARDS) had on the community.

          Joke =/= lack of wrongdoing, or a lack of agency. In fact, a lot of wrongdoing happens BECAUSE of jokes, and failing to take a situation seriously. And like Jay said, it’s not like it wasn’t fed into repeatedly, through other polls, through alt text, through general stated sentiment.

        8. Li

          When did Willis say “choose a side you cowards”, I must have missed that poll…

          Also, quoting you directly: “It’s an artificially-created dichotomy created to cause an us-vs-them feeling among the community.”

          You very much did say it was initially intentional. That’s what “created to do x” means.

        9. Li

          Like. You and Jay are certainly mutually riling each other up, but this perception you have of Willis as hating “your side” is… well, it seems willfully uncharitable to me, and not at all a reflection of the attitude I’ve ever seen Wilis express on BlueSky, Tumblr, or their Patreon.

        10. Jay

          Li you’re totally fair and right but I just don’t remember the comments being *this* divisive.

          Maybe it’s always cause I’ve been on the side of the majority but this particular arc the comments and reaction from Willis (in alt text and polls specifically, I don’t look at their socials) feels a lot more divisive and hostile to one another (on both sides and I won’t deny being a part of the problem myself)

        11. Big Z

          point of order to everyone, the TITLE of that poll was in fact

          “CHOOSE A SIDE, NO COWARDS”

          which is both less hostile than Bork’s memory, but close enough to remind Li that it was framed that way.

          (personally, I seem to remember Willis mostly being bemused/sad that some people find DoJo boring as hell, and also it seems clear to ME that Willis is mostly framing things to dunk on the homophobe/misogynist contingent but does so in a way that splashes sometimes, especially given the existence of the small minority of the commentariat that interprets certain anti-DoJo feelings as homophobia/misogyny)

        12. Jay

          Like especially with all the people handwaving this whole thing as just “lol it was only two weeks get over it” when it reality Joe/Joyce has been built up since fuck whenever Joyce was at her parents and the text messages at least but a few years.

          I feel that’s more a problem of the format than anything else but still

        13. BorkBorkBork

          Aw shit it was “No cowards” wasn’t it.

          Yeah, I admit that I might be reading into it a bit. And hell, if I was writing a big long epic and giving it away for free, I’d probably feel a little annoyed that people are complaining so much about simply the direction of my story. So even if there IS a subtle unconscious “OK, come on guys, get on the damn bus or leave, we’re going in this direction whether you’re on it or not,” that doesnt mean that I should read malice into it.

          I think I might need to take a bit of a break. This’ll probably be easier to digest if I’m going through it rapid-fire.

        14. Li

          @Jay 1: I agree it’s more divided. I will continue to gently but firmly reject the idea that that’s the fault of the random commenter who just happened to observe and name the factions that were already forming back then, and who’s said they regret saying anything. It seems especially unfair to attribute forethought and malice to that person naming the sides, which is what BorkBorkBork did in the first comment on this topic, the one to which I replied.

          I also think that being in a bad mood affects how we interpret other people’s tones, especially in text. And I genuinely think folks who are upset right now are reading hostility into Willis’s polls and alt text that just isn’t there, though again, I will say that if I were them, and people were talking directly to my face the way that some of Willis’s readers are talking to them throughout this arc, I would not be handling it with as much grace.

          Like, yes, Willis is a professional. I’m sure they’ve had people be at least this rude to them before. But if the hostility in the comment section is draining for us, imagine for a moment how much worse it must be for them. What must their BlueSky mentions look like on a regular basis. They also do at least some moderation of the comments here, which includes approving first time commenters and banning people, and we know there’s been an uptick in not just rude but explicitly bigoted and weird commenters since all of this started.

          @Big Z: Thank you for the correction! I retract my specific statement but stand firmly by the bigger ideas that no one was actually forced to vote in any of the polls and that “pick a side, no cowards!” doesn’t strike me as particularly serious.

          Also, everything I just said above. I know my skin is not thick enough to handle a fraction of the “feedback” Willis has gotten on this.

          I also agree that there’s some splash damage happening, even though I think it’s unintentional, and I know feeling like the butt of a joke isn’t fun, and at this point I think Willis should probably stop with the polls for a while just because people are feeling targeted by them and taking the options personally pretty much every time. Again, I don’t at all agree that that’s Willis’s intent, which again BorkBorkBork was originally making a case for.

          @Jay 2: Conflating arguments a bit, I think? Some people don’t care about (fictional) cheating. A LOT of people have been surprised to be reminded that in-universe, Joe and Joyce weren’t dating for long — surprise from both “sides”, inasmuch as there are sides at all. Some folks have responded to this surprise by saying, “Oh, well, jeez, that changes how I feel about this”; others have responded by saying, “See? The briefness of the Joe/Joyce relationship only underscores all of my earlier points about this not being such a big deal.”

          I’m sure there have been at least a couple of literal “lol get over it” comments, because in general we have been varying degrees of unkind to one another.

          Personally, I think it’s a bit of a specious argument — on both sides. Someone who’s decided to adopt a fully watsonian viewpoint is just going to keep saying, “but IN-UNIVERSE, it’s been 12 days,” and the doylists are going to keep saying, “but IN OUR REALITY, it’s been three years,” and… given that both of those statements are in fact equally true, no one’s going to be persuaded that they’re wrong for considering their preferred statement more important.

          As with every other aspect of the timescale, Willis is probably going to try to have it both ways in some respects: here Joe is trying to use the in-universe time to minimize his own hurt feelings, and Sarah is implicitly using the real-world time as she argues that Joe’s feelings are still real and still matter.

          Like, it’s been a bit since my last binge, but someone in this very comic has basically said that a two-week relationship CAN be important: that it can be life-changing. That’s not gonna be less true in-universe now that it’s a couple days shy of two weeks.

          Anyway, I think both “sides” should stop trying to use this line of argument, just because it seems really unproductive to me. And rude, when either side is trying to use it to wholesale dismiss people’s right to feel things.

          @BorkBorkBork: That sums up both things I feel on the subject, yes: that folks are reading hostility into Willis’s polls and alt text that I don’t think is there, AND that if Willis were actually a little bit sharp with people, I’d find it understandable, given all the givens.

          If you do take a break, I sincerely hope it helps both how you’re feeling right now and how you feel about this storyline later when you come back to it, bc I think we’re all happier when we’re reading something we enjoy.

      2. Cameron Stone

        Yeah I feel the real issue is that Willis spent all this time on Joe/Joyce, but then seemingly pulled the ripcord on it. So people who were naturally invested want that investment to be paid off in some other fashion if we’re not going up the relationship escalator with it. The Sickos/Paladins thing to me is people confusing the story as just a sequence of events (i.e. it’s only been 12 days for them) and not a narrative curated to build investment (i.e. it’s actually been 2 years for us).

        1. BorkBorkBork

          Three years, actually, if we’re only counting when they’ve been actually dating. It was October 26, 2022, when Joe and Joyce went to her Life Drawing class.

          But it’s been almost four years since Joe trusted Amber with his anxiety over hurting Joyce.

          Six years since Joe opened up to Joyce about his fear of change, and Danny freaking out about how much she was getting from him.

          Eight years since The List, and Joyce asking what she was to him before she hurt him, and her saying that she liked her rating because it was the only one that reflected how he thought of her as a person.

          And Joe and Joyce’s first date was one of the first story arcs of the series.

          But yeah, twelve days, like what Walky and Lucy had.

      3. thejeff

        To be honest, this comments sections is quite able to divide up into factions without the cute labels. I doubt the labels did any real damage to the discourse. We don’t need them to fight.

        I do get they’re reductive and neither camp is of one uniform opinion, but it’s not the labels that lead to those misunderstandings.

  65. Zahra

    Joyce has two hands

    1. Taffy

      Yeah, and both of them are inside Dorothy right now. She’s busy.

      1. Dot

        Both of them? On her first go-round? She’s a bold top, I’ll give her that.

      2. Mr D

        Dorothy gonna be sore tomorrow.

        1. Vaishino

          Soreothy.

        2. Taffy

          Medieval Canadians when they’ve interacted with someone in any way:

  66. AlexanderHammil

    Joe has a better read on what’s going on than 99% of the commenters.

    1. AlexanderHammil

      really i think the issue is that this isn’t joyce and dorothy cheating on their partners, this is them dumping them. which sucks for joe and walky, absolutely, but it’s not immoral. sometimes people get hurt when relationships end and it’s not anyone’s fault

      1. Dot

        Well except no, it’s them cheating on their partners, and it’s extremely easy to read this strip as Joe trying to cover up the fact that he’s extremely hurt about it – even if I have my own gripes about the possible Doylist implications.

        But even so, why should Joe be responding to the situation with maturity and nuance? Why should Sarah? Why should Walky? Why are Dorothy and Joyce acting like not-fully-mature college students, while the people around them don’t do the same?

        1. Yotomoe

          THIS. Everyone is allowed to be immature and impulsive except the people who are cheated on who have to be mature and resigned.

        2. Taffy

          Kinda gets close to compulsory victim shaming, viewed through that lens. Like, “How immature of you, being bothered about getting cheated on.”

        3. Donovan

          Yeah that kind of sums up something i’vi’ve been thinking circles around but couldn’tvarticulate

        4. Taffy

          It’s also just an extension of our society’s obsession with perfect victims. If you were wronged in any way and express anything but demure passive acceptance, you deserved it anyway because you’re overemotional and probably crazy in some way. Doesn’t matter what it’s about, you’re either inspiration porn for someone else’s self-inflating cock ring, or you’re harping on it and milking it for sympathy points.

        5. AlexanderHammil

          i mean we’re at a flat impasse over whether or not this is cheating, and that’s pretty irresolvable. you can’t have a victim without a perpetrator, and that requires a framework that holds what joyce did as a violation; my whole point is that isn’t what happened.

          and i don’t think joe is being mature and graceful here, nor does he have to be. you can be salty and immature when you get dumped, that’s entirely reasonable. but being hurt and mad doesn’t make it cheating

        6. Dot

          The fact that the parties involved all agree it was cheating does make it cheating, though.

        7. Taffy

          You’ve misunderstood something somewhere.

        8. AlexanderHammil

          i mean, okay, but if we’re going by what the characters say then… everyone involved in this said they were fine with it, too. both joe and walky have flat out said that they are neither surprised nor outraged by this outcome

        9. Taffy

          A-Ham, I gotta be real honest with ya. I don’t really get where you’re going with this line of thought. I said the way Joe’s being written rhymes with Perfect Victim Syndrome, not that he’s a literal victim. Now you’re talking about “they’ve flat out said they’re not surprised or outraged”, like that’s not part of the writing I’m referring to. Walky and Joe ain’t autonomous, Willis 100% wrote their reactions to Joyce and Dorothy cheating on them (which everyone involved has referred to as such in explicit terms, except maybe Walky), and those reactions aren’t a lot more intense than “Aw, shucks. Well, this really puts a damper on my morning.” It’s all connected to the original point I made.

        10. Big Z

          To be frank, given how the characters in the story have characterized it, I think any impasse only exists in the minds of people bound and determined to let DoJo get away scot-free with cheating on their partners.

    2. AlexanderHammil

      i understand what you said, taffy, i think the issue is that i (a) don’t think joe has been wronged and (b) don’t care if handles this breakup maturely or not. i’m not expecting him to be a perfect victim, and i don’t think the writing is, either. this reaction from joe is entirely in line with the character growth that people have been seeing in him since before he and joyce got together. it feels weird to frame that as a break from expectations?

      1. Taffy

        If you understood what I meant, you wouldn’t have come to the conclusion I thought you, specifically expected Joe to be a perfect victim. I haven’t said anyone expects that.

        1. AlexanderHammil

          well then why the heck are you having this discussion in this thread? how is any of this responsive to what i said up top?

        2. Taffy

          Look, I don’t have the patience to baby you through the process of comprehending what I said, why I said it, or how it connects to what Yotomoe said.

        3. AlexanderHammil

          what an unpleasant exchange this has been. every day i check the comments section is a mistake

        4. Taffy

          It would probably have been easier on you, if you’d been willing to ask for clarification on anything I said, rather than latch onto an assumption and refuse to let go no matter how many times my responses didn’t match up to it. I’m always happy to clarify when asked, but you have to actually ask first.

        5. AlexanderHammil

          would you say i was being overemotional and harping on about it?

        6. Taffy

          What an odd question. Do you believe you’re a victim of some description, here? Do you believe I was describing my own beliefs toward how a proper victim should behave, rather than a trend of societal pressure?

  67. Odo

    Kind of don’t like how Sarah is giving Joyce all the credit for having “found” value in Joe.

    1. Rebecca

      I mean, she did literally hate everything about him on a psychological level until like, this week. Unsurprising that she’s a little slow to give Joe the credit.

    2. Vaishino

      Finding out about what Ryan almost did to her at a party was kind of the catalyst for his change in attitude/behaviour tbf. If not for Joyce confronting him with that, he probably wouldn’t have done any soul searching.

  68. Shogeton

    A thought I have is that while Joyce and Dorothy didn’t handle this cleanly, I don’t think that is the main problem of Joe. In the parallel universe where Joyce and Dorothy didn’t kiss but just stared each other in the eyes, and then right after Joyce went to Joe and said ‘I’m sorry, I love Dorothy, we have to break up’ and only then went and kissed Dorothy he’d be about just as sad. His reaction to the brief cheating with the ‘you were in the newspaper’ seemed ‘annoyed’ more than anything.

    And as for the ‘but she leaves him hanging’ I will strongly maintain that Joyce is perfectly within her right to say ‘Sorry can’t answer you right now, and I’m not going to put my relation on pause for that’. I’m willing to accept that some people feel that is unfair to Dorothy not bringing it up, even if I feel I would be a-okay with that. But Joe is not entitled to an instant yes or no on a question like that, or for Joyce to refrain from intimacy while she’s considering that.

    Is it unpleasant for him to be left wondering if that is an option. It sure is. But it doesn’t put the onus on Joyce to realign her life. Anyone who starts to insist they are owed an answer right away to such a question, should get the answer. And the answer should be no, monogamy or polygamy.

    1. albi

      *tired sigh*

      Polyamory.

      1. Shogeton

        My bad. Polyamory.

    2. BorkBorkBork

      Joe simply not caring about being cheated on, when his father’s cheating was so prominent in his life that he purposefully never became emotionally close to anyone of the opposite sex to avoid potentially hurting them the way his mother was hurt, and then being cheated on in less than two weeks by the first woman he grew close to… is just so very, very strangely out of character that I just can’t wrap my mind around it.

      And the only way I can really logic it out, compared to his actions over the past few years, is if he’s harboring some self-loathing or guilt. Something like, “Look I don’t really deserve anything better than that,” or “I can’t be upset about that, especially considering what I’ve done,” or “As long as she has some room for me, I’ll be OK,” or “All that matters is if she’s happy… if she’s happy, then I’m happy.”

      Because he’s echoed all of those in past strips, both pre and post teargas. That’s that same thing with “If you love them, set them free, and if they love you they’ll come back.” That flowery bullshit basically says, “I love her, she shows no sign of loving me, she broke up with me, and while I didn’t beg or plead for her to stay, if she came back in *any* capacity I’d immediately jump back in, and that would PROVE that she actually loved me!”

      I dunno. Maybe Joe’s switched from acting out the role of his dad, to acting out the role of his mom. Being subservient to the person taking advantage of him, never speaking up, acting self-deprecating. Because yeah, even this is self-deprecating. “SHE saw value in you, therefore you have value, so don’t you dare sweep the value SHE found under the rug.” Joe was improving himself long before he got together with Joyce. She can’t claim ownership of his self-worth, and the less he ties his own sense of self-worth to what someone like Joyce thinks about him, the better off he’ll be.

      1. Strain Of Thought

        Grade A comment, no artificial sweeteners or fillers, would serve it to my friends.

      2. Shogeton

        One thing: What happens with Joyce and Dorothy is not the same as what happened with his father. It was not a planned thing and Joyce came clean within hours of the kiss, and it was about a twelve day old relation rather than a marriage. Just because Joe had really bad experiences with his father beating a serial cheater doesn’t mean that he can’t put things in perspective.

        1. Dot

          It’s a less interesting story if you don’t exploit the character’s preexisting anxieties and insecurities for their dramatic potential. Joe’s hangups about infidelity were not used in the most interesting way they could have been. Like, yeah, he can put things in perspective, but that’s boring.

        2. BorkBorkBork

          First – “Not planned” is mostly BS. Joyce knew how she felt about Dorothy, Dorothy knew how she felt about Joyce. They just didnt know how the other felt. She literally said the day before that she’d rather fuck Dorothy than Joe, so if that isn’t premeditation I don’t know what is. They’ve been doing this dance for a while.

          2 – I suppose “Nearly 24 hours” is in fact “hours”, but she spent a mystery day with Dorothy unaccounted for, got back at night, opted to give him a BJ rather than tell him, then spent the night in bed with Dorothy before being guilted into it by Sarah.

          3. I dont think the reason that Joe never wanted to have an actual girlfriend and go on an actual date was because he was he was worried about one day, eventually, hurting someone, when they’ve been married for quite a bit. You may be taking him at face value, but his expression on the second and last panel, and his self-deprecation on the second and third panel, suggest that he’s actually in pain, and coming up with rationalizations and places that he can place blame on himself.

  69. CianM1301

    I think Joe really needs a hug right about now…

  70. Vaishino

    I think the most shocking thing about the “it’s been 12 days” reveal, to me at least, is that Sarah went from “I need to convince someone to seduce him to get him away from Joyce” to “how dare Joyce do this to sweet innocent Joe?” in such a short span of time

    1. StClair

      A lot can happen in 12 days, even when they aren’t decompressed over two years.
      And particularly the past ~24 hours, in-comic, have been full of revelations to (and about) some people.

  71. Jay

    Working out with someone does a lot IG

    1. Scruffy looking nerfherder

      Gymbros is a connection that is only trumped by Barber and Barbee in the scale of relationships. At this point Sarah and Joe are like brothers in arms.

  72. Big Z

    Nasty thought for the day on this: “It’s okay, Joe. Joyce is in good hands. After all, we’ve seen the kind of care and emotional intelligence and consistency that Dorothy has applied to all of her college relationships so far, what could possibly go wrong with this one?”

    1. Big Z

      (immediate clarification: as much as Joyce has been a grade-A jerk in this storyline, I think “Dorothy treats her as well as she treated Danny and Walky” is possibly the harshest actual consequence I’ve ever suggested happen to anyone in this comic, and probably about 5x as harsh as she deserves)

      1. Dot

        She already does the thing she did with Walky where she remolds her partner in her image…

        1. StClair

          Over the course of the next 12 days (in-comic), Dorothy moves entirely into Joyce’s **** (and not in the *cough* “fun way”) and starts “helpfully” managing everything for her.

          Next speedrun objective, the “Lovers’ Quarrel”!

        2. Scruffy looking nerfherder

          Joyce was already showing annoyance with it back during the pill saga, but has disappeared entirely during this.

          Would be an appropriate time for it to reappear after the honeymoon.

        3. Li

          I do think folks tend to discount that Joyce was in debilitating pain and also experiencing hormonal mood swings when she expressed those feelings, possibly because a lot of us readers would be much more annoyed with Dorothy (and Sarah and Jennifer, but mostly Dorothy).

  73. Alan in DC

    …And they’re only freshmen.
    Cant wait to see what happens when they all GROW UP a little bit more.

  74. chuckroast

    This is just like John and Vriska, and it hurt just as much back then.

  75. Embe13

    CALLED IT!!!!!!!!!!!

  76. Suet

    Just don’t shave that stubble again. Or do.

    on the twelfth day of Joycemas…

  77. Adam Black

    I’m calling Bullshit on the this comic , its title, “12 days” and every fool that repeats it as Gospel.

    12 days is a LONG TIME drama wise in this comic. Almost NO major storylines lasted 2 weeks in comic times. only about 3 months have been shown in 15 years! thats about 20% of the story!

    Plus the seeds of this arc go all way back to Joyce going home in October and joe being joyces confident.

    Walkys main ( 2nd ) dating arc with Dorothy probably wasnt 3 weeks.

    what about Ruth-Billie ? I think their antagonist arc was around 10 days. Disaster drunk dating maybe 2-3 weeks.
    their recovery arc was all of October …. but due to the timeskip most off it wasnt shown.

    Applying a realworld framing serves to negate the value of almost all the storylines over 15 years! It also discounts the fact thats its been 2 years of our lives. The comic chose to spend a lot of real world time and panels on it, thats what makes it important.

    OR you can add up all the reader comments about it. By any fair measure , panels, comments, real world time, this was an important story and it mattered.

    what happened in the 10 days or so before halloween? or between halloween and Thanksgiving?
    or thanksgiving to christmas?

    apparently nothing of value to the story. By this value Comic days dont fully matter as a value. it might be meaningless.

    the most important events in the story occurred within 1 or 2 days arcs.

    but 13 days of main characters having a main character arc, when we have been shown EVERY DAY no time skips, is a lot of comic time and attention.

    the person-hours on this ship, writing, drawing it, reading it, commenting on it, probably exceeds 50,000 hours! ( maybe 100) Someone a little more nerdy or autistic, i invite you to please work out the numbers based on reader and comments.

    1. Adam Black

      ^ this isnt me desperately defending a Jo-jo ship but defending ALL of them, and the majority of the storylines.

      ANYONe who reads this and disputes it, Go ahead, Please do. *

      Because every minute you read this, and comment im counting as proving my point. more manhours talking about it

      I’m not attacking the cheater shippers, nor Jorothy, ( i dont think this ship is intended to last 12 full shown days. I dont think it will make it that far without a timeskip. )

      and if it gets a slipshine ( already)
      AND lasts 6 full days im not going to throw your words back in your face and say “12 days huh” *

      AM I annoyed JO-joe didnt last longer ( like 15 or 16 days )?

      YES I am. because I invested 2 years time and feelings into it, and it was clit-cock-heart blocked.

      there was a LOT more drama and romance and heartbreak that was poured down the drain.

      and this hurts me liking Jorothy, because its hurts putting my faith into it.
      Which to be FAIR was set up too. They are cute together but ( shrug ) and I dont care they cheated! I care I was cheated,

      but Jo-jo was fanservice and and we deserve that in hard times.
      i dont mind it didnt last, i care it didnt finish.

      *Especially when I KNOW many of you are vulnerable queer readers struggling to survive fascism, and that might have 14 months of real world struggles and threats.

      1. Matrix

        Also Dorothy and Joyce’s relationship can blow up too. Plenty of time for that once they’re out of the honeymoon stage

  78. Matrix

    ???

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