233

Strangers
Posted on June 2, 2022 by David M Willis

233 thoughts on “Strangers”

  1. The Wellerman

    That’s it Billie!!!!

    Time to use my secret technique!!!

    ? Parasite Powers: NOSTALGIC NEURO-BLAST!!! ?

    No way her inner child will resist singing along to THIS!!! ✌️?

    *plays “Pokemon Theme Song” on hacked muzak*

    1. King Daniel

      1. Amós Batista

        it’s super effective

      2. Taffy

        Ya don’t say?

        1. Clif

          I don’t believe he did. Though I’ve never heard it expressed better.

    2. Shadowsnail

      That’s good, but then there’s this. Pokemon Theme (metal cover by Leo Moracchioli feat. Truls Haugen)

  2. Ana Chronistic

    well, at least she’s loaded so she can be the friend who helps you “go camping” out of state/country and also never talk about camping again once you come back

    1. Ana Chronistic

      also… he DIDN’T give her that name? the “name stealer!” chanters did? he just went along with it? =|

      also……. the alpha wolves are… the parents??

      1. Sirksome

        She clearly doesn’t remember. I give her props for even being close I honestly remember nothing from that being that young besides losing my favorite Yugioh card in a bad trade in 3rd grade.

        1. Doctor_Who

          I have memories going back to about age four, but I’m sure I wouldn’t recall anything as specific as the origin of a nickname.

      2. Thag Simmons

        She’s the first one who called her Billie, and when the other Jennifers started acting mean about it being a boy’s name, Walky backed her up and gave himself a similar nickname.

        1. Needfuldoer

          She wouldn’t have had to come up with “Billie” if he hadn’t interjected with introducing her as “Buttifer”.

          Of course, how substantially that changed the course of their lives is debatable. For all we know, everything could’ve played out the same but with everyone calling her “Jenny” instead.

          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2022/comic/book-12/04-dont-stop-billie-ving/billie/

        2. someone

          There was already a Jenny.
          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2022/comic/book-12/04-dont-stop-billie-ving/names/

          Could have gone for just “Jen” I guess.

        3. TemplarKnight

          Or do what my wife did and go for TWO n’s and be Jenn.

        4. Ana Chronistic

          Shades of “I learned it from watching you!!” ?

          Pretty sure if she’d gotten to go by Jennifer then, today she’d be demanding to be called something else

        5. Victor

          Boy’s name? Billie is my aunt’s actual legal name.

        6. Wizard

          Mine, too! Then there’s Billie Jean King, Billie Holiday, Billy Eilish… Plenty of women out there who answer to “Billie”.

        7. Opus the Poet

          All my mother’s relatives call he Bill even though her given name was Mildred. I don’t know why.

  3. ThunderNight

    Did Jennifer ever tell Walky she didn’t like being called Billie before?

    1. True Survivor

      I’m not sure. I know she probably asked him to call her Jennifer after the time skip but I don’t recall her ever rejecting that name or trying to get a new one at college when she had the chance to start over largely away from Walky.

      I think the comment is more aimed at the person ‘Billie’ rather than the name.

    2. newlland(Henryvolt)

      I think at a point she was just “Whatever” about it. But that last line felt more like the classic “I hate past me” trope.

    3. Yotomoe

      My memory is muddled cuz I DO recall her not liking that nickname but that was in the walkyverse…I think. In DOA I can’t recall if she ever acted like she hated the name and even introduced herself by that name.

    4. Ray Radlein

      Are we sure she’s saying that she didn’t like being called “Billie”?

      ‘Cause all she actually said was “I never liked Billie”

      1. Abel Undercity

        This is an important distinction.

  4. Sirksome

    I guess you could say that Jennifer is unBillievable!…I’m not sure that pun was really set up but I’m owning it!

  5. brionl

    I remember I could look out my (2nd story) bedroom window and see the school when I went to Kindergarten. Across the street and about a half block down.

  6. Yotomoe

    https://i.imgur.com/4hqTm1J.png (NSFW)
    In an exact opposite version of reality to this one 😛
    Story so far…
    https://imgur.com/a/9Ob1cy3 (NSFW)

    1. The Wellerman

      ?Even when enamored, she doesn’t break character
      also feet LOL
      They’re closeness here, and as childhood friends, beautiful ?

      And worry not, for her Jennifer branding and all it entails are merely an instrument she uses to benefit from association with her bourgeois “friends”, and in due time will dispose of it once she sees it herself as obsolete or it can no longer fulfill its purpose

      Much like Billie and Walky’s mind in this excellently erotic strip, the seemingly solid “Jennifer” will eventually melt into air and leave us with classic Billie

    2. newlland(Henryvolt)

      One of the few times I can see him over exerting himself for something.

      1. Deathjavu

        Honestly given how little Walky exercises it’s lucky he hasn’t collapsed already.

        1. Taffy

          We know based on his first Slipshine appearance that Walky has a surprising amount of sexual stamina. In this scenario, he’s also doin’ it with Billie, a known and convicted Very Sexy Person, which might be giving him a bit of a boost, because when you get a chance to hook up with someone that hot, you make it count.

    3. Andy

      I didn’t realize it until I looked over the story so far, but they’re being awfully athletic for a top bunk.

      1. Rose by Any Other Name

        Eh – banging their heads on the ceiling isn’t sexy. I’m willing to suspend my disbelief on that.

        Unless you’re suggesting that the bed should have collapsed?

        1. Andy

          Neither, just that I slept on a top bunk in college and I never would’ve trusted it so much. The bed was always a bit shaky and it’s still only a twin. Not a ton of maneuvering room.

    4. Maveric1984

      I’ve been following this little fan comic as closely as I have the cannon one for a while now, and I gotta say I think you’re doing an amazing job. Absolutely love it!

  7. DailyBrad

    Walky’s not wrong in that yeah, Jennifer’s been very hot and cold when it comes to how familiar any of them are supposed to act with her, but I also think it’s true she tries to be there for her friends when the chips are down.

    1. Mano308gts

      This is also the same person who, according to prior elements of the story, actively, openly bullied Walky throughout their school years in order to gain social credit.

      Jennifer Billingsworth might be ‘there for’ her cool cheerleader friends… But she’s a shit friend to her ‘pseudo-brother friend’.

      Basically, at virtually every point in the comic, the dynamic between Billie and Walky has been her taking, and him providing support.

      1. drs

        Billie tried to hook Walky up with Dorothy. It was completely unnecessary but some points for intention?

        1. thejeff

          She also tried to help him after the breakup with Dorothy – it wasn’t really effective, but it was a try.

      2. Zach

        She also claims to have bullied the shit out of goths in a threat when Ruth was mopy.

  8. Nono

    ‘I honestly don’t remember that, but I’m sorry.’ is, somehow, one of the best things Walky has ever said.

    1. Thag Simmons

      He might not remember that because he didn’t give her that name

      1. Nono

        That doesn’t matter. Apologizing is still the best thing he could have done here.

        ‘WELL, ACTUALLY, YOU WERE THE ONE WHO GAVE YOURSELF THAT NICKNAME’ would hardly be the best thing to say.

        1. Thag Simmons

          Oh, it’s absolutely the correct call

  9. Yotomoe

    Now this could be a double meaning. That she never liked the name Billie, or she never liked who she was. Or maybe both!

    1. Sol

      You and I are on the same wavelength apparently lmao

      1. Yotomoe

        We’re Sol mates.

        1. Sol

          *Groans*.

    2. tim gueguen

      I think she’s never liked herself far more than she’s never liked the name.

      1. khn0

        On the other hand, she already defined herself as “head cheerleader, problem solver”. The alpha bongo is new I think, but it’s not like that was a thing.
        Meet new Jenifer, same as old Billie.

        1. thejeff

          Nah, “alpha percussion instrument” was part of the original package. Part of the same quote I think, if not she’s definitely used it before.

    3. C.T. Phipps

      I think Jennifer wants to change who she was. The alcoholic suicidal drunk driving rich girl.

      Walky accepts her as who she was and….she doesn’t want that.

      Which is why Joyce resonated with her.

      1. StClair

        She’s gonna keep discarding and reinventing herself until she becomes someone she actually likes.

        1. Proxiehunter

          It feels like there are better approaches to that same goal. But there are a lot worse ones too.

        2. StClair

          There are a lot of characters in this comic employing what I will call “sub-optimal” life strategies, coping mechanisms, etc. Most of them, in fact. See title.

      2. thejeff

        I mean sure – but it’s not just that.
        She’d already stopped the drinking by the end of last semester and hopefully that’s lasted. It’s possible the therapy also addressed the suicidal depression and her feelings of being toxic and dangerous to those close to her – but we haven’t seen any real indication of that.

        This really seems to me to be another superficial change to avoid the deeper problems and that’s frustrating because she seemed like she was in a better place before the timeskip.

        1. C.T. Phipps

          I mean, she acts NOTHING like she used to. I’m not sure if you can remotely call it a superficial change. There’s no sign of drinking or suicidal depression and she seems in a far better place.

          What would you say if she HAS change dramatically?

        2. thejeff

          Not drinking is good, but as I said, she stopped drinking as Billie. She’s had long periods without visible signs of suicidal depression before, so that doesn’t necessarily mean anything.
          We’ll see how it goes when the whole Raidah thing explodes and she realizes her new social circle doesn’t actually like her.

    4. newlland(Henryvolt)

      Definitely both but she probably leans tawords the latter.

  10. Sol

    “I never liked Billie, that’s why I went by that name for most of my life, even when I moved on to being with popular people.”

    Unless of course she means she never liked “Billie” as in *herself*. Hmm…

    1. C.T. Phipps

      I mean, that is pretty much my read.

    2. Archieve

      I think Jennifer/ Billie is a bit confused on the double meaning herself. She chose to introduce herself as Billie and kept it through high-school so she can’t really blame Walky for the name itself. She’s trying so hard to reinvent herself again that she now considers the old nickname to represent every part of herself that she hates. Getting angry at Walky is easier then lashing out at herself because self loathing is supposed to be a Billie problem.

      1. StClair

        not unlike “Amber problems.”

      2. Plaaaa

        She didn’t mind being Billie until Billie became known as drunk drawn to abusive relationships. She still is all those things, but now she’s Jennifer!

  11. Sirksome

    Also I don’t know who, but someone hard called that Jennifer had taken at least one of her friends to have a secret abortion with essentially no proof that actually happened. I don’t think it was ever even implied. Good on you, whoever you are!

    1. Mano308gts

      Her lines here were directly quoting an earlier ‘intro’ speech she used at one point. They might even be word for word identical, but I don’t recall that well.

      Hence, it wasn’t a matter of calling it, but rather remembering it.

  12. RassilonTDavros

    “who among us remembers clearly our kindergarten days”

    when the memory is sus.

    1. RassilonTDavros

      Dear god that was terrible why the hell did I write that

      1. chuckroast

        Someone had to do it, and by god I’m glad it wasn’t me.

      2. Keulen

        I’m just glad somebody made that reference.

      3. Casi

        I’m sorry, but you are going to have to surrender your internet commenter license for 347.239 minutes for making that joke.

    2. Opus the Poet

      Well let’s see, I was in K when JFK was shot so that kinda cemented things for me. Also my memory is kinda flakey, I remember things from when I was 2 and 3 YO, but not many things, just a few things.

  13. Yotomoe

    Also yeah, I’m gonna call BS on her assertion that she “takes care of people.”. At least as like…a consistent action that she should be known for. She’s actually been pretty destructive to people, herself included. She’s done good for sure, but like…we’ve all done good things. You don’t get to JUST be the positive aspects of yourself while being a pill in every other way.
    Glad you’re here to help when people are in trouble, but if it takes a crisis for you to step in and be a decent person then you’re just kind of a fairweather problem solver. A problem Tourist, if you will.

    1. C.T. Phipps

      Billie’s problem is that she’s not GOOD at that.

      She wanted to help Ruth and….well, was confronted with the fact she was enabling her rather than helping.

    2. StClair

      She solves problems, and also causes them.

      1. The Wellerman

        Much like the alcohol she used to covet, nonetheless.

      2. Cerusee

        Billie: the cause of, and solution to, all of her life’s problems.

        1. Clif

          Hey, it’s good to know that if Walky got pregnant that Jennifer would sneak him off for an abortion.

    3. Nono

      I don’t think she thinks she’s a good person, if most of the strip is any indication. It’s more that she’s offended that Walky insists on being fond of parts of her past like shoving him into lockers while ignoring the good parts of it that survived til today.

    4. newlland(Henryvolt)

      That has got to be the only type of exercise he would approve of.

      1. newlland(Henryvolt)

        Oops wrong post.

    5. Sirksome

      I’m interested in why you think this? Sure Jennifer has been plenty destructive to herself, but the only time that’s actually hurt others that I can think of is her DUI incident with Alice in highschool. That’s a pretty big incident of course but as far as I can recall she’s been a decent enough friend, no better or worse than most of the cast. She definitely has not been a primary catalyst for conflict in the story so far.

      1. Yotomoe

        Billie’s been rude, dismissive, trying to distance herself from her “friends”, talking down to people and just sorta self destructive. She’s not like…actively antagonistic like Mike or Mary or even Carla but like…she’s kinda toxic to people. And while it’s not car accident harmful, it can make everyone around her feel like shit. And that’s the opposite of helpful!

        1. Sirksome

          I’m not remembering it like that. Billie has been abrasive, but the whole distancing herself is a recent development even if it’s admittedly a rehash of her first attempt very early in DoA. But she failed early on and abandoned that pretty quickly until post time skip. She was actually often used as a sounding board and source of advice, by characters like, Joyce, Becky, Lucy, Walky, and Dorothy, other than that most of her time was being attached to Ruth. The worst thing I can remember her doing was when she threatened to pound Joyce into the concrete until she wanted to die.

          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-7/01-glower-vacuum/jacket/

          But that’s not her everyday dynamic. I don’t want to defend Jennifer, but beyond admittedly being a supreme class jerk to Walky, she was never that toxic to anyone. I’ve been checking back through the archive to check on this, cause I feel like I’ve been missing some subtext or something?

        2. Sirksome

          To be clear I’m not trying to invalidate your opinion, Yoto. If that’s your take on Jennifer than I think it’s fair. I just wanted clarity. I don’t particularly trust Asher for instance, but plenty of people seem to think the dude is okay. So I’m definitely in the minority on certain character opinions.

        3. Seralyna

          Personally, on my somewhat recent readthrough, Billie came off as mostly just, distant? She spent A LOT of time wrapped up in her own stuff and basically only interacted with the rest of the cast to halfheartedly try to solve something that either had already been solved or no one wanted solved. It was played for comedy and it didnt seem to upset anyone, of course, but it definitley felt to me that she just wasn’t very involved in anyone else’s stories other than her own and Ruth’s.

      2. thejeff

        It’s pretty heavily implied that the whole Alice situation was pretty destructive all around – not just the DUI that ended it. An awful lot of bad decisions driven by Alice’s crush on Billie and how Billie responded to it – combined with drunken parties and drunken sex with boys (and sometimes with Alice, which kept her coming back).

        Hmm, now I wonder if that abortion she references might have been Alice’s. That would be a kicker.

        1. thejeff

          None of which is to say that Billie didn’t try to take care of her flock of cheerleaders. She did earn that wealth of helpful knowledge concerning terrible and horrific things.
          Just that she was dealing with symptoms and not helping with the underlying problems. Maybe even making them worse.

    6. Archieve

      Jennifer first needs to admit her help method hasn’t been perfect and improve from there, otherwise her efforts will probably continue to be hit or miss. She wants everyone to see her as she always saw herself and can’t deal with the thought that she hasn’t been reliable enough to warrant a reputation in that field yet.

    7. Lily

      all of these examples are feminine aligned for the most part so it makes sense that walky wouldn’t really see it as part of herself but the “alpha B” part probably caused some drama precollege as well

    8. Keulen

      It’s great that she’s there to help people when they’re in crisis situations, but it’d be nice if Jennifer was there for her friends when they’re not in a major crisis too.

  14. C.T. Phipps

    Walky never realized Jennifer was alone and just wanted to be liked and loved.

    That’s why she wanted to be the popular girl.

    So of course she hates Billie and wanted to destroy herself. Of course she wants to move away from Walky and other family who just sort of thought being an alcoholic self-destructive mess was “normal.”

  15. newlland(Henryvolt)

    And there it is she spelled it out.

  16. Roe

    I am once again saying 🙁

  17. Doopyboop

    Walky is many things, and he may be annoying at times, but he really didn’t do anything to justify Jennifer getting mad at him here. When was the last time Jennifer talked to Joyce before suddenly going ‘must fix’ mode on her? Nice as it was that she was there for Joyce and helped her (in a much more constructive way than Becky and Dorothy), it’s also clear that she helped Joyce more for herself than anything else.

    Also, the flashback that started this storyline makes it clear that Jennifer nicknamed herself Billie and just likes to remember Walky doing it instead for some reason. Jennifer, if you really are going to a therapist, you might wanna talk to them a bit more about this self-loathing ya gots.

    1. C.T. Phipps

      Jennifer basically seems to think Walky is somehow related to the part of herself she hates most.

      1. Kyle Voltti

        Probably because Walky genuinely loves Bilie and if he loves her than she’s worthy of love. But Jenifer doesn’t want love, she wants clout and status. She wants to be the social apex because that will make her safe.

        1. C.T. Phipps

          I think that’s simplifying things. Jennifer wants to be loved but she wants to be WORTHY of love.

  18. Adj

    “Alpha bongo.”

    You know, my thinking is that if you have to announce you are “alpha,” you’re not.

    1. Adj

      Oh, “bongo” is it? Even when I’m quoting the character? Son of a bongo!

      1. Victor Riley

        I’ve gotten in the habit of actually writing “bongo” instead of a bad word. That way the algorithm doesn’t have to do it for me. It works hard, it can take a break for my comments.

      2. Francoinblanco

        So bongo, bongo, bongo, I don’t want to leave the Congo, oh no no no…

        1. Taffy

          The question I have is, did you type the b-word 3 times and the c-word once and let the filter do the rest, or did you type the real lyrics?

    2. Francoinblanco

      Alpha bongo:D i now I see another walkyverse where Bilie is head of “herbalist enthusiast”. Im Alpha Bongo god dammit I know a guy i have stuff and drink a lot of water with that

  19. Dr. T

    I can’t help but to think that statement has two meanings. She didn’t like the name nor the person she was when everyone called her that.

  20. Nono

    People are really harshing on Jennifer for not having perfect memory from when she was like, 6.

    1. Yotomoe

      To be fair, she’s kinda doing that to Walky right now.

    2. Sunday

      I’m more interested in the reason why she’s misremembering lol

      1. Sirksome

        It’s actually pretty common for people to have curated memories when it goes that far back. You’re mind tries to fill in the blanks and it often favors toward what you want to believe instead of the truth. You might remember aceing a test but in truth you only got a B- for example.

        1. Sunday

          I guess I’m speaking more in terms of the meta, like how does it serve the narrative unfolding

    3. RassilonTDavros

      Was about to make this exact comment but I’ll just piggyback on yours instead. Like, holy shit are people ever jumping to attribute malice to Jennifer not perfectly remembering something that happened when she was five-ish. It’s not even funny.

      1. Sunday

        I find the comment section of any strip tends to have a lot of “This character is an asshole/a jerk/deplorable” any time they don’t carry themselves perfectly. Like you said, they assume purely malicious intent out of any character who isn’t being nice. I wish people could just step back and not dig their toes into hating on any character who made a mean quip.

        1. Seralyna

          Yeah. It does really feel like the fact that this is a comic format that requires A- tension and B- Jokes is lost on people.

          Like, yeah it can occasionally be a little dissonant that characters are a little abraisive to their friends, but you kinda just have to work based on how people react to a situation in-universe to understand how bad something actually is.

          People were harping on Becky for years over her very minor bit with dorothy being her arch nemesis, despite dorothy very clearly not minding, just to name a single example.

        2. Sunday

          yeah I think understanding that it is supposed to be comedic and sometimes a punchline or joke can be one character ribbing another one. which in real life would come off as rude but in this format of a daily strip is mostly for the sake of delivering comedy, unless it specifically becomes relevant to the plot.

        3. Cerusee

          It is a major hazard to overanalyzing a creative work told in approximately four panels a day, in a format geared towards generating a punchline or a dramatic beat in each sequence. Like…you cannot get a good read on a character from any individual strip. You gotta look at the whole of a storyline.

    4. Agemegos

      I’m not clear on whether the blue-tinted flashback panels represent one character’s memory or the view of an omniscient narrator.

      I guess I would be slightly irked if they turned out to be fallible.

      1. thejeff

        So far they’ve always been reliable – though we’ve sometimes gotten another version that gave more context and changed our interpretation without directly contradicting what had been shown before.
        Like it was a long time after our first look at the robbery before we saw Sal release Ethan on her own.

    5. Fay

      Eh, I feel that it’s more like Willis showed us the flashback to the origin of “Billie” so recently for a reason. I feel like the reader is intended to pick up on the fact that Jennifer misremembers the situation? It’s not an indictment on her, but rather that she’s the one who invented “Billie” to begin with, despite her putting the blame on Walky here.

      I think it’s kinda showing she pushing some of her self-loathing onto Walky, and a part of her wants to blame the people from her past for her own problems.

      1. Cerusee

        Yes! I think that was a deliberate creative choice and the reader is expected to remember it. It’s not a super deep cut from seven years prior in the strip. It’s significant that Jennifer’s memory doesn’t match the flashback! Walky doesn’t remember that incident clearly either, so it’s not like “what is wrong with you for not remembering this incident from age 5 in crystal clear detail”, but rather that Jennifer has a personal narrative of the origin of her nickname that does not match reality and suggests some personal baggage.

    6. Bryy

      I think people are being harsh to Billie/Jennifer because she’s upset that Walky is not buying her “you should feel bad because I’m better than you” bullshit.

  21. Sunday

    It’s funny, Walky wasn’t the one who first called her Billie, that was her. And she wasn’t the one who gave him the name Walky on that bus ride either like she claimed she did a few strips ago, he chose it himself in solidarity with her.

    Is Jennifer always trying to solve other people’s problems because even after therapy and breaking up a toxic relationship with Ruth she still can’t face her own problems? What is she really trying to run from here?

    1. Lanie

      Is she actually going to therapy though? Last I knew the fact that Billie/Jennifer wasn’t going to therapy was a huge problem that Ruth had with her. I might be forgetting a strip somewhere between then and now though.

      1. Lanie

        Oof, went a little rogue with the italics there. Sorry about that.

      2. StClair

        She doesn’t have to go to therapy anymore! She went, and now she’s all better!
        😐

        1. The Wellerman

          ?

          *cranks up Pokémon theme song still playing on hacked muzak*

      3. Sunday

        I mean true, she said she went to therapy but there’s a lot of stuff we didn’t see from october to now

        1. Cerusee

          IIRC, she says she “got” therapy, which is syntactically ambiguous, but could very well mean “I *went* to therapy but now I’m fine and I’m not in therapy now because I don’t need it anymore”.

          I’m not an expert on this, but I’m willing to hazard that there’s very little chance Jennifer could sort out the MASSIVE EMOTIONAL PROBLEMS that plague in her in at *most* half a semester’s worth of therapy sessions. The delusional self-image, the alcohol dependency that at one point led to a serious car accident that endangered herself and a friend, the fact that she’s so distant from her parents she referred to Wally’s parents as being essentially her real parents—she’s got a LOT going on in there, and I’d be skeptical even if she wasn’t displaying some old patterns!

          I could be wrong, but I suspect she probably focused mainly on quitting drinking, and when she was able to do that she declared herself All Better, No More Problems. (And that’s a reasonable thing to focus on, since it was her most immediately dangerous and self-destructive habit, and a major issue between her and her alcoholic depressed girlfriend who was also trying to give up alcohol! It’s just that it was only one of her many issues.)

      4. thejeff

        She’s very likely not still going to therapy – she hasn’t said she is and she implied with the “got therapy” bit that it was in the past.

        In the last major Ruth/Billie arc before the timeskip, she did say she’d gone to therapy and the way she phrased it then and the context strongly implied it to be true and ongoing. That and her quitting booze was the resolution of their pre-timeskip story.

  22. Axel

    It’s concerning me that now in the spring term, Jennifer is doubling down on “Head Cheerleader, Alpha bongo.” It put me off a bit in the first term but at least that started within 3 months or so of the end of high school, and it seemed like she’d been moving away from it.

    (I do understand that she is saying “I am and have always been me,” but the specific way she is evoking that is what I’m talking about)

    1. Lan

      It seems to me that Jen wants to be a leader/generally reliable and trustworthy whereas Billie wanted to be popular and get that external validation. She still wants to be “head cheerleader etc.” but now it’s about taking care of others rather than being worshipped as the top dog

      1. Mr.Morningstar

        Is it though? It still seems to me shes not doing it for others or even in a healthy “for herself” kinda way. She claims shes the one who solves everyones problems but, in reality including getting joyce birth control you can counts the times shes been overtly helpful to the group on one hand.

        It might not be for “popularity” in a normal sense but it really screams “look how good i am” to me

        1. C.T. Phipps

          I think every indication is that Jennifer is a lot healthier, nicer, and more stable person than Billie.

          But fans don’t want to accept that because she achieved it by ghosting the others and taking up with Asher.

        2. Mr.Morningstar

          I dont see it. She doesnt seem to be acting all that different to me really.

          She strikes me as someone who THINKS shes doing better but is slowly but surely going to have a breakdown and repressing everything rather than dealing with it

        3. Devin

          It looks to me more like she’s declared that she’s these things and is trying to just pretend like nothing that came before ever happened. Which isn’t the same as growth. I have a hard time taking seriously her sentiment to Joyce about people not letting her move on and grow, because she spent a significant amount of time and effort refusing to move on from high school, and drilled that identity into the people surrounding her.

          And that seemed to stem from some self-loathing, but just pretending that that person doesn’t exist anymore and getting mad when people don’t immediately swap over to a newly-invented persona when she spent so much time and effort pushing the old one is disingenuous at best.

        4. Bryy

          Jennifer is actually more of an asshole than Billie was. The little we’ve seen of her. This scene alone is hammering that in.

      2. thejeff

        Billie used the same rhetoric – and even pulled off the helpful alpha percussion instrument a few times. Meanwhile Jennifer’s being gaslit by her new fake friends – getting that popularity and external validation from Raidah, who she wanted to suck up to when she first met her.

        They’re not that different.

  23. Mr. Random

    That’s the issue with re-inventing yourself.

    How do you know what parts of you are the “Real” you, and the ones you performed? How do you know which parts you want to keep and which ones to stifle?

    If you want to be someone new, can you really divorce yourself entirely from who you were?

  24. Pocky

    Goes by Billie for years; expecting Walkie to mind read about not wanting to be called Billie.

    Ah yes; such alpha, much bongo.

  25. Grimey

    He’s the closest thing she has to yelling at herself which is still kinda shit.

  26. Bagge

    “and do you like Jennifer any better?”

    ?

  27. newlland(Henryvolt)

    “You keep telling me we’re strangers now.”

    …Was that any different than before?: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2010/comic/book-1/01-move-in-day/sister/

    Like I said I’m willing to believe she’s has changed a bit but not everything has. But hey its sort of like what they’ve said, The more things change the more they stay the same.

    1. Reaver

      And this is like after he makes fun of her alcoholism twice too..geezus

      1. thejeff

        It’s also after she bullies him for years in high school and it’s clearly not about that. It’s about nerds and social circles.

  28. Victor Riley

    Yep, just confirmed… he did not give her that nickname. She gave it to herself: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2022/comic/book-12/04-dont-stop-billie-ving/names/

    In large part, because there was some little bongo on the bus that called her a “name copier”. (Sorry, but even at that age I knew there were other kids with my same name. We didn’t choose what our parents named us.) Besides, she was “Jenny”, and J/B could have been “Jennifer”.

    1. SuperZero

      One of them was Jenny and the other was Jennifer.

  29. UrsulaDavina

    Is it me or has Jennifer made this exact speech before?I feel like I am having a case of dijon mustard.

    1. StClair

      “All of this has happened before, and it will all happen again.”

      or if you prefer, another quote relating to her actual problem:
      “No matter where you go, there you are.”

    2. Taffy

      That’s bigoted against French people.

    3. Mano308gts

      This is a paraphrase of her preferred introduction speech. It’s even quoted on her walkypedia page under the DoA section, a fact which I know because I looked up the words, and that was a top result; but more generally know because I read through the entire comic in the last two-ish years, so ‘old’ comics are far more fresh in my memory than for some others here.

  30. BBCC

    Yeeeesssssssss. Embrace the sibling relationship and make good progress on talking.

  31. William

    I get the feeling that the social acceptance structure that Billie is surrounding herself in is a house of cards that just needs one unfortunate mishap for it to come crashing down around her. When that happens, I’m not sure if I’ll be sad for her or point and laugh.

    1. Needfuldoer

      If Jennifer’s building a house of cards, Raidah and Carl are just out of frame, armed with leaf blowers, cackling.

      1. Bryy

        Oh, for sure. Raidah has already implied that she’s just waiting for Jennifer to “slip up”. She’s gonna try to pump Walky for information.

        Raidah is the person that goes to Comic-Con and is upset that nobody stops cosplaying when she makes fun of them.

  32. King Daniel

    Little confused as to why everyone’s claiming tonight that “Walky absolutely did not give her the ‘Billie’ moniker”—as Walky was the first character to say “Billie”: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2022/comic/book-12/04-dont-stop-billie-ving/buttbuttbus/

    Yeah, he added a “-swurp” to the end but still. (It’s also worth noting that Walky unambiguously came up with the “Billie” nickname in the Walkyverse.)

    1. Fay

      I don’t think him just mispronouncing her last name really counts, especially as a kindergartener. Jennifer is still the first person to use just “Billie” as a name for herself.
      https://www.dumbingofage.com/2022/comic/book-12/04-dont-stop-billie-ving/names/

    2. Tan

      By that logic, you might as well say her parents were the first to call her Billie. Sure they added an -ngsworth on the end, but that’s picking nits.

    3. Devin

      The Walkyverse has absolutely no relevance here on this topic. They have their own separate timelines and canons.

  33. drs

    https://www.dumbingofage.com/2022/comic/book-12/04-dont-stop-billie-ving/billie/

    Doesn’t portray her as hating “Billie”. Lots of happy faces there.

  34. Proxiehunter

    She doesn’t mean the name.

  35. ESM

    I like the duality of Jennifer giving Joyce this whole “I know what it’s like when people won’t accept you’ve changed” heart-to-heart and then almost immediately gets into a fight when Walky doesn’t accept that she *hasn’t* changed

  36. DaisyFM

    God, all of Jennifer’s old friends constantly dead-naming her. I’d be fed up with them too.

    1. The Wellerman

      Would you consider it “dead-naming” if I called Meta a Facebook?

      ’cause that’s basically the same motif behind Billie’s new name. A rebranding, nothing else.

      1. DaisyFM

        No, Jennifer’s not a corporation.

      2. Reaver

        No, because Jennifer is a person wanting her name to be respected…

    2. Sunday

      honestly is a bit disrespectful lol since she’s made it clear she prefers jennifer

    3. Yotomoe

      I feel like most of them haven’t been? Also I feel like Walky brought up “Billie” in the context of it not being who she currently is.

      That being said, there’s a little leniency I give people when you go from calling them something for a really long time and suddenly have to switch gears. I still mess up from time to time.

    4. Needfuldoer

      I can understand Joyce slipping up, they’ve barely interacted since the time skip, and that was only about a week ago in-comic time. (They’ve only been in about 16 strips together since then, and many of those are just group shots.)

      I think Walky used it here more as an “I thought that was part of the act before”. The only other time I remember him calling her “Billie” since the skip was before she told him she’s not using the name anymore, but I might be wrong.

      1. shikomekidomi

        I agree, the phrasing indicates he’s not saying she’s Billie now, he’s saying that he wasn’t sure how much of her former personality he’s expected to know is the same now that she’s not Billie.

    5. Rogue 7

      While folks definitely should respect her wishes, I think Sal was right when she pointed out that Jennifer rebranding is not the same as her dealing with gender identity issues. So I definitely see folks still using “Billie” as less of a faux pas than if circumstances were different. Still worth calling out, but not quite to the level that I associate with “deadnaming”

    6. Cerusee

      It’s disrespectful to ignore people’s wishes about how they’d like to be addressed (“IN GOOD FAITH, WALKY. IN GOOD FAITH!”), but I’m leery of using the term “deadname” in this context, since that has specific connotations about gender identity and transphobia that are not in play here.

      However, I’m cis, and also recognize there’s likely not a universal consensus on what is or isn’t an appropriate use of the word even among folks who are trans, so I will leave it at that.

    7. Jabberwocky

      As a trans person I’d ask you not to equate deadnaming with occasionally calling someone by a nickname they don’t like.

      1. Yotomoe

        I dunno I mean…it’s not my place but…Daisy may be similar boat?

      2. DaisyFM

        It’s cool if you disagree with my comment, but I just want it on the record that I’m also trans.

    8. Opus the Poet

      I get tired of people who knew me from before I died calling me “John” when John died in 2001. Seriously, that was a life-changing event, who and what I was before is nothing like what and who I am after. There is a sharp break in the timeline at 2001-08-31 0119. John died, Opus was left to pick up the pieces. My Shadowrun character is me “cursed with immortality” because that was the best in-game mechanism we had to explain it because the GM ruled I couldn’t be a dragon. ?

  37. ADLegend21

    *You* called yourself Billie, Jennifer. That’s the name you chose forever only to suddenly rebrand a month ago.

    1. Reaver

      She picked it when she was 5.. her memory is not perfect

      1. Devin

        This is very true. And also she could stand to be a little less certain in her citing of said memory.

        I acknowledge that this is a hard thing to achieve, one’s natural instinct is to trust one’s own memory. But she’s allegedly trying to grow. (I say allegedly because this reinvention seems to me to be more projected than anything else.)

    2. Blue

      She is growing up and she may want to give up her childhood nickname at some point

  38. JessWitt

    All I recall from kindergarten was multiple instances of missing out on in-class work. In hindsight I realize I had (and sometimes have) attentional issues.

  39. Cmasta1992

    This conflict makes it both funnier and hotter that Yoto is making these two bone

  40. Carms

    I would not have picked walky being this kind of chill good friend, but I mean, it’s not out of the blue. I guess I just haven’t thought of him as dependable before.
    I guess he has known her for a while, and doesn’t put a lot of stock in being taken seriously.
    Good show from walky here. He really is a rock :p

  41. Dwayne

    1968. I was 4 years old in kindergarten in a catholic school under the “Sisters of Mercy.” I was the first kid to read aloud and was rewarded with a green wooden yo-yo. I had no idea what it was. My friend, Harold, 7, taught me how to play with it. Harold was a “sleeper,” meaning that his parents took him home on the weekends.

    1968. Height of the Civil rights movement. Harold was black.

    One day Harold complained about a toothache. A nun walked him from the recess playground into the garage. I pulled myself up to look in the window.

    The nun was holding the 7 year old little boy down on a chair with one knee while she ripped the offending tooth out if his head with rusty pliers. I still have nightmares about the arc of blood in the air.

    I never saw Harold again.

    1. brute

      holy shit

    2. Taffy

      That’s a hell of a story, cap.

  42. Needfuldoer

    Come on, Walky. Use that burgeoning new spine of yours. Prove the apple doesn’t always land next to the tree.

  43. Joyfulldreams

    I’m coming up on something that I’m starting to think a little more with regards to Joyce and Jennifer’s somewhat common theme of the conflict between trying to become a new person when everyone around you is too eager to keep you in an old, familiar box that you want no part of any longer.

    It’s definitely a conflict, to be sure. But I’m starting to wonder how much of that tends to actually come from the friends in question, and how much is…well, honestly something of an over-sensitivity on the part of Jennifer and Joyce?

    That is to say–your friends and other peers treat you similarly to how they used to, not because they refuse to acknowledge the ‘new’ you necessarily, but because THEY are still the same people they used to be, and they tend to act a certain way because…that’s who they are. This reminds you of the version of yourself you desperately want to get distance from, and then ‘blame’ for self-loathing you feel in response gets projected onto everyone else.

    Now. Of course there very much are instances of people in this comic legitimately just reacting badly to the idea of Joyce or Jennifer or whoever daring to step out of a particular box. But there’s probably a bit of give and take, here, I think?

    1. brute

      agreed

    2. Annika

      For sure. I think a lot of it is that people have a way of slipping into established patterns with their friends- and so folks who are trying to reinvent themselves may distance themselves from who they knew before as a way of breaking out of those old patterns (I personally see this most often with folks distancing themselves from their family). I do think a lot of it is projection, and a lot of it is being afraid to communicate what you want to everyone you know (for example, after Joyce confided in Becky about her developing feelings about her faith, family, and church, Becky told her it was a stupid phase, and Joyce clammed up about it for a while). But yeah, I think I’m the case of Jennifer here, she seems to be projecting her self loathing onto him. She can be very mean to him because he is generally very safe, he is her oldest friend, and projection is easier for many people than introspection.

    3. Devin

      I think it’s also a matter of growth vs reinvention. Actual growth doesn’t happen overnight, and both of them are trying to push versions of themselves that don’t quite match up with reality. At least not yet.

      And there’s a difference between saying “Hey I’m trying to be better about these things” and saying “Hey I’m better now I’m not the same person I was that short time ago”.

      Fake it ’til you make it isn’t the worst strategy in the world, but it’s not a failing on the part of friends who notice that it’s at least partly a facade. Friends can help you grow in the former above example, or you can set them up to be setbacks when you abruptly pull the rug out from under them and pretend that you’re just a different person and expect them to forget all that came before.

  44. Darkoneko

    Liar

    1. Clif

      Pants on fire.

  45. Rabisch

    And she neve really liked you too, Walky. Jennifer… two steps forward, three steps back. I’m glad Walky told her what he thinks about her situation, maybe one day Jennifer will be able to figure out that he’s right, but by then, I hope Walky has definitely cut ties with someone who always treats him badly and now is basically accusing him to have ruined her life.

    1. Needfuldoer

      She liked him well enough to use him as a backup friend when she fell from social grace. Now she’s pushing him away again because she doesn’t “need” him for now.

      1. JBento

        I just realised.

        This entire arc is just going to be about how Raidah and Jennifer are basically the same, and then after Jennifer realising that Raidah just hangs around with her because of her family’s clout she’s going to have the “wait, maybe using people and then throwing them away when you no longer have need of what you were using them for is bad” epiphany, isn’t it?

        1. Rabisch

          Let’s hope so. Or maybe Jennifer will think Raidah is amazing and instantly falls in love with her.

        2. Rose Red

          Huh. Do we know if Raidah’s straight?

      2. thejeff

        More than that I think. Not just a backup friend, but family. Someone she can always fall back on when she’s at rock bottom.

        Problem is that she doesn’t treat him well when she’s on the up side of the cycle. Some of the feuding and the back and forth is acceptable as part of the near-sibling dynamic they’ve got, but she’s gone beyond that.

  46. Arianod

    I’m trying to remember any instances of Billie being actually helpful before off the top of my head, but… nothing? It’s probably me, but still…

    1. Needfuldoer

      The most repeated example is when Joyce got roofied at that party. (This was after Jennifer ran off to get wasted and party, and Joyce gave ol’ gashface his face gash.)

      And the time she sacrificed her fake ID so Jason would call a ride to bring her and Ruth to the hospital after Ruth started breaking out in hives after drinking while on antidepressants.

      I think she’s recited panel 2 before, almost verbatim. It seems less like an accurate description of events and more like a mission statement. She’s good at dealing with the fallout from bad decision-making, but bad at making good decisions.

      1. JBento

        I’m just going to slip in a quick but vehement objection to you apparently classifying “getting roofied” as “bad decision-making”.

        1. Sam

          I would argue that if you are referring solely to Jennifer’s actions, there were bad choices made like Jennifer abandoning Joyce to herself at a party when she had never been to one before/not warning her to not take drinks from strangers.

          There were definitely some bad choices if she cared about Joyce’s well-being which aren’t mitigated by her coming in rescuer style afterwards.

        2. Needfuldoer

          Absolutely not! I’ll cop to bad phrasing but I would NEVER make that correlation.

          The bad decision she made there was goading her naive new friends to a party, then immediately leaving them to fend for themselves while she boozed it up.

          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2011/comic/book-1/06-yesterday-was-thursday/where/

        3. JBento

          “I would NEVER make that correlation.” Not only do I absolutely believe you, I actually believed that before you even said that, which is why I put in an “apparently” there.

          I’m going to lodge another objection, though, on both you and Sam. Jennifer had no responsibility to keep watching over Joyce, and she didn’t “goad” them to go to the party. Dorothy was leading them to the party (she’s the one with the address), and she and Joyce were going to the party even before Jennifer knew there WAS a party.

        4. Needfuldoer

          I forgot that detail.

          https://www.dumbingofage.com/2011/comic/book-1/06-yesterday-was-thursday/walmart/

        5. JBento

          It was for-fucking-ever ago. Honestly, it’s lucky I even remember there WAS a party, and if not for Joyce’s roofieing I probably wouldn’t.

      2. thejeff

        I agree with the general principle of good with crisis situations, bad with avoiding crisis situations, but there have been other less dramatic cases too. A lot of them dealing with Ruth’s responsibilities or pulling Ruth together enough to deal with them. She’s also tried to play matchmaker for Walky with Dorothy (and also with Walky for Lucy), not to any avail in either case, thanks to Dorothy. Also tried to help Walky after the Dorothy break up.

        1. Needfuldoer

          “Good with crisis situations, bad with avoiding crisis situations”

          That’s what I was trying to say. Thank you.

  47. anonymsly

    There was an awful lot of self-hate in Billie, so I think it’s probably fair to say she never liked Billie. She may be liking Jennifer better, so far. I have to say that I kind of do, myself.

    1. thejeff

      Jennifer is Billie. If she hates Billie, that’s still self-hate.

  48. Sombrero

    Will the real Jennifer Billingsworth please stand up? No, not you Billie!

  49. Adept

    Urgh… her self loathing is really ugly when it’s turned outwards.

    Still, Billie was a self-destructive, status obsessed alcoholic. Some change was needed, but I hope this isn’t her final form.

    1. thejeff

      Thing is, Billie had been making progress on the “self-destructive, status obsessed alcoholic”. It was Billie who stopped drinking. Billie who’d accepted the friends who initially weren’t high-status enough for her and tried to push away the adulation of the Forrest Quad girls by revealing both her nerd interests and her DUI – possibly in the wrong order.

      Billie had been working on her problems. I’m not sure Jennifer is doing anything but pretending they’re not there again.

      1. StClair

        Works every time!
        Until it doesn’t.
        And then she just walks away from the wreckage and pretends that doesn’t exist either.

      2. Adept

        Good point. This new identity does seem like a way to ignore everything that happened before. It’s a form of denial.

  50. foducool

    liked the name enough when there were multiple kids called “jennifer” back in that school bus tho

    1. Taffy

      Kindergarteners need to be held accountable for their future selves’ emotions more often, I agree. They have the emotional and mental maturity to make long-term decisions in a clear-headed, informed manner, and the fact that they get away with so much speaks volumes about our society.

      1. Username Taken

        THANK YOU! I’m so sick of giving five-year-olds a pass. They’re always acting like they’re “still learning how everything works.” You had your chance to learn when you were a toddler, ya little monsters. Time to be accountable!

        Truly, we are lost as a society. /s

  51. DudeMyDadOwnsADealership

    I think her point is that she’s trying to tap into the ‘problem solver’ side of her that’s been eclipsed by all the years of her Bojack Horseman B.S.

    Which wolf will win? The one you feed, and she’s been sober long enough to reflect over how she’s been pampering the wrong one for far too long, and it hasn’t been working out for her, either.

    1. Rogue 7

      I’m trying to recall where we learned that Jennifer is no longer drinking. Was it stated?

      1. thejeff

        She stopped drinking before the time skip. Big focus of her and Ruth’s last main arc – around Birthday Pursuit. Pukey withdrawal symptoms and all.

        I don’t think it’s been explicitly brought up since the time skip, but there have been no signs or references to her drinking, so I’m growing cautiously more hopeful.

    2. Devin

      She definitely can successfully tap into that part of her, but this strip reads to me like she’s indignant that she ever be seen as anything else, despite all of her actions that might have that consequence.

      Growth is good. Revisionist history is less good.

  52. bcb

    But…I just read the beginning of this chapter again, and Jennifer is actually the first person to call herself Billie. I guess neither of them remember it all that well.

    1. DalNiente

      technically yeah, but she was kind of backed into it by Walky’s preemptive “Buttifer Billieswurp” joke name. so I can see why she’d remember things that way

  53. the jighole man

    i may be seeing this wrong but, she seems to see herself as a utility in people’s lives, instead of being her own person.
    “Head cheerleader, alpha bongo, problem solver”

    her self description is that of a reluctant protector and fixer, rather than being friends with people she likes.

    Head cheerleader: the one that sets the direction so people know what to do
    alpha bongo: you go through her to get to her friends
    problem solver: self explanatory.

    even the nickname “Billie” was just something walky gave her because HE liked it, or it was easy for him to remember. she didn’t even get to have her own proper name, just some nickname that everyone agreed on.

    1. the jighole man

      seriously? it autocorrects B***H to bongo?
      you literally have the words alpha B in your comic.

      1. daeranilen

        It’s almost like there was a time when commenters used it to refer to characters unprompted so much that a filter needed to be applied, and it’s never been lifted since.

      2. Blue

        It started as a Joyce joke but it stuck.

    2. thejeff

      Also, “Billie” wasn’t a name Walky gave her as we found out in the flashback at the start of this chapter. She picked it when the other girls were making fun of her for being another Jennifer, Walky just backed her up, picking his own nickname to match hers.

  54. Amtelope

    I will start feeling some interest in Jennifer as a character again the moment she admits that being bisexual isn’t “some weird phase she was going through.” It’s absolutely fine if she wants to call herself Jennifer so she doesn’t have a “boy name” and have a relationship with a guy. It’s unattractive to pretend she hasn’t also been into girls since high school.

  55. Caro

    Walky’s hair in the second-to-last panel is kind of genius? Like. His eyebrows are hidden in his hair, but the shadow creates faux-eyebrows that make the panel viewable with a neutral and a concerned expression

  56. Blue

    The Jennifer/Billie divide was not as deep as we thought.

    1. The Wellerman

      The point is that, to her bourgeois “friends”, it is.

  57. Julius Cooper

    I’ve been away for about…oh, a month…so pardon the tardy commentary, but damn if that ain’t the truth bomb that gets you right in the feels. I had a childhood nickname that can’t seem to get left behind: my mother, my friends, my brothers, cousins, aunts, uncles (my late grandparents) and even now, my nieces and nephews sometimes “slip” and use that name. Which would be OK, if it were just about my family. But as they brought around friends and the family grew to include new spouses (and thus, nieces and nephews), the name persisted…. So, I get where Bi…I mean, “Jennifer” is coming from. Which makes me wonder…does Dave not like it when people say he eats diapers (long before the Uber Eats trend, btw… 😉 )

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