Zip it
Posted on September 29, 2025 by David M Willis


Tags: becky, dorothy, hank, jocelyne, joyce

474 thoughts on “Zip it”

  1. NGPZ

    well this is… quite some way of coming out XD

    also, I love these dorks heehee ^^ <3

    1. Lumino

      I love how Hank at first thinks Joyce is lying to cover for her sibling, but by the end he’s like “Nobody could be this insufferably clueless as a lie, this has to be legit.”

      1. drs

        “Look! We have journalistic evidence!”

      2. a/snow/mous/e

        I’m still not sure that he does believe it. (If he does, he seems pretty underwhelmed. Maybe after Becky came out, he thinks lesbian relationships are pretty ordinary things now??)

        1. Mollyscribbles

          Yeah, that expression leaves me with the impression he’s thinking “. . . what’s bad enough she would lie about being a lesbian as a distraction.”

        2. Daibhid C

          I agree with Lumino that I read it more as “Good Lord, this is so totally Joyce. Joyce isn’t self-aware enough to be this Joyce as part of a deception.” But ICBW.

        3. GreyICE

          I read this as Hank being like “okay I’m being snowed”.

          Which he is. By idiots. Well meaning idiots.

        4. Steamweed

          He def knows he’s getting jobbed.

        5. Steamweed

          “Oh my God, Joshua must be planning on becoming a webcomic artist!”

        6. Roe

          ?

        7. Embe13

          +1

        8. Anna

          I think he might regard them as “just a phase”.

        9. NGPZ

          this… seems like a realistic outcome, ngl ?

    2. Yet_One_More_Idiot

      WIFE??!
      I am squeeing so hard right for Joycy and Dots! ^^ I just love that that’s where Joycy’s mind went for a sec instead of “girlfriend”. ^^

      1. Astariel

        I know, right? It’s so awesome!

  2. Doctor_Who

    Joyce: “Dad, Dorothy is my chief concubine!”

    Dorothy: “I-I’m your what?!”

    Joyce: “Oh, I guess we hadn’t really discussed the matter. I’m starting a harem. You’re in. So’s Joe. Oh, and Becky, if you wouldn’t mind…?”

    Becky: “YES?!”

    Joyce: “…could you put out some feelers and see if Sal might be interested in joining?”

    1. bubba0077

      I hate that I laughed at this.

      1. Aquila

        I hate that I had food in my mouth when I snort-laughed at it.
        Now where did I put those wet-whipes …

    2. Lightweight Baybee

      i feel like becky wouldn’t be poly
      girl’s heart is too big to not be someone’s primary

      but for this bit i concur
      anti joyce sweep >:)

      1. Rov

        Becky’s only being asked to get in touch with Sal, not to join.

      2. Hacksaw

        Of all the goofy relationships in this, I feel like Becky and Dina will be an item very long term.

        1. Morrison

          Becky will be shocked to realize Dina was aware all along g that Becky was still hung up on Joyce. It will be beautiful to see Becky realize Dina loved her still.

        2. Sharizard

          Yeah, i could see Dina being Dina and saying that she’s okay with ‘sharing’ Becky with Joyce, if that were to ever happen. At the same time, i could see Becky being against doing that, even if she kind of wanted to.

          Furthermore, i could also see Dina saying that she was okay with it, but then kind of discovering that she’s not.

        3. Amara

          I would love to see Dina explore feelings of jealousy. Also didn’t she already give permission for becky, way at the start of their relationship?

    3. Reltzik

      It’s … at best debatable whether or not sapphic marriage is biblical. But the concubinage definitely is.

      1. Wizard

        The Book of Ruth is sometimes interpreted as a sapphic love story.

      2. Steamweed

        It’s only mentioned a few (dozen) times.

    4. Quinn

      That ending was harsh. Poor Becky.

    5. DJTsurugi

      prolly as long as Joyce gives her flowers. ~<3

  3. apricot

    Girls, you’re doing the thing again

    1. nadamás

      And they should continue to do the thing

      1. clif

        And they are very cute doing it.

        Even Hank is conflicted.

        1. StClair

          I’m not sure he’s conflicted, I think he’s just Done.

      2. apricot

        I didn’t say they need to stop, just calling the sky blue and the grass green.

    2. Dot

      Big Z, where are we on the cycle?

      1. Donovan

        If I recall, this is back to phase 1, but I defer to Big Z

        1. Big Z

          It does appear that we have again reached DORKCON 1.

          I am making a face very similar to Hank’s. I hope his reasons are as relatively benign as mine.

  4. JA

    Wow, straight from making out to wife, Joyce moves fast. Didn’t even do the moving truck.

    1. JA

      Also we NEED Hank’s face in the last panel as a pfp.

      1. Kim

        YES!

    2. mindbleach

      They have some history with box trucks.

    3. RassilonTDavros

      They actually considered the moving truck in an earlier strip, but decided against it after consulting Ruth.

      1. Jeff K!

        That’s because they’re no strangers to love.

        1. Qube

          well at least they know the rules

        2. Icalasari

          A full commitment’s what they’re thinking of

        3. Taffy

          They wouldn’t get this from any other gay.

      2. kotarisu

        Was that a moving truck from Acting Integrity Movers?

      3. and painted shark women

        OH YOU GOT ME! I haven’t been got in YEARS. Oh, I feel young again! <3

    4. Gnomedeplume

      Well she did say her vows from the Book Of Ruth earlier, seems like that makes it pretty official

    5. John Campbell

      They got married, twice, before they made out.

      The second time was immediately before the kiss. The first time was way back in Leslie’s class, after the first time Joyce evicted Walky from his relationship with Dorothy.

      1. Jimbotherisenclown

        Please tell me that comic was foreshadowing how Walky and Joe would get together as a result of Joyce throwing a joycewrench into everyone’s relationships.

    6. anon

      HYeah there was that school project tho back in the day we had a school ‘family’ among classmates/fan groups and said ‘wife’ and such even for ppl not dating XD

    7. Proto

      I mean she was basically already trying to fuck Joe but he was the one slowing them down. Joyce basically speedruns relationships and frankly it’s a minor miracle that the stars have aligned (or mis-aligned)so many times for her to have not had sex yet.

      1. ResRam

        Using the narrow PinV penetrative definition of “having sex”, huh?

        1. Skychrono

          I think it’s more the definition of “both/all of the partners consider this as sex.”

        2. Proto

          I mean she’s obviously not, but for the purposes of my comment, just to prove how fast she goes, yes

        3. thejeff

          It was the definition she was using at the time. It’s not a great definition, but it’s no worse than the one she’s using now, though it’s bad in a different way.

      2. Steamweed

        Joyce does, indeed, speed-run into relationships. Joe was the slowing-down on their relationships. Dorothy…welp, she has no chance. She’s just holding on for dear life.

      3. Astariel

        But on their last date, Joyce was the one who decided she wasn’t ready for (what she currently considered) sex.

    8. anon

      i mean there is a stereotype about lesbians moving fast

    9. Deanatay

      Hey, Truck-kun knows their place in DoA.

  5. Dara

    They’re all just so hilariously bad at all of this xD

  6. Dot

    Oh good it’s the Dorothy and Joyce squee-cute routine. Yeah Hank I’ve got that expression on my face too.

    1. Dot

      AND THEYRE DOING THIS SHIT IN FRONT OF BECKY AGAIN

      1. Alongcameaspider

        Becky is torn between heartache and a full on panic attack dreading how Hank is about to react

        1. Qube

          I mean unless he’s had a shotgun hidden down his pantleg this whole time they should be okay

        2. Decidedly Orthogonal

          Wow. That gives a whole new meaning to, “riding shotgun.”

        3. yet_one_more_idiot

          Me: Is that a shotgun down your trousers, Hank, or are ya just happy to—

          Joyce, Jocelyn, Becky and Dots: Yomi, NO

          Me: *shuts my yap quick-sharpish*

        4. Qube

          I mean he also hasn’t looked particularly happy to be here, either

      2. NGPZ

        you can even see her jealously in the last panel :0

      3. Reaver

        They do not have to STOP being lovesick idiots for each other just cuz Becky is there.

        Becky did not call Joyce Dibs.

        This sentiment is so weird to me.

        Like I get feeling sad for Becky but also Becky HAS A GIRLFRIEND.

        So why shouldn’t these two idiots be gross together?

        1. NGPZ

          yeah Becky clearly… has some stuff she needs to work through :/

        2. Dawn

          Agree. I feel awful for Becky and I want to give her many hugs but Becky feeling heartbroken isn’t Joyce and Dorothy’s fault, she just really needs therapy to work through her feelings of low self-worth.

        3. SillyGoose

          It’s just kind to try and think of other peoples’ feelings, is all.
          Sure, they get to be ott cute. And I get to share my baby pictures with my friend, and we squee together, but when our other friend is there who’s heartbroken because he can’t have babies, we just find another topic.
          His situation is not our fault either. But we like him so we take him and his feelings into account.

          …but then again we’re waaaaay older than these two and also not in the throes of just-discovered-we-love-each-other.

        4. Reaver

          Okay but thats apples to oranges, if your friend is heartbroken HE’S not having babies with YOU, would you never bring your partner around or up just to spare his feelings?

          EVER? EVEN if your friend already has a partner, but he pined for you so hard that you ever being with another would be a betrayal?

          Cuz this situation is nothing like not sharing baby pictures with a unfortunately childless friend…

        5. yet_one_more_idiot

          I feel a little sorry for Becky. I feel way MORE sorry for Dinah given how big of a torch Becky is still clearly carrying for Joyce. I hope this doesn’t hurt them in the long-run… but this IS a comic written by Willis, so….

      4. Qube

        after all of becky’s blabbin’ about being The Most Lesbian Of All Time™ she could stand to get Hold My Beer’d at least once

        1. Throwatron

          you’re outta line, but damnit, you’re right

        2. Taffy

          There’s really only one way for the four women to settle this. They’re gonna have to have a couple-off. A contest, of sorts, to determine which of them is the Most Lesbian.

          Dorothy and Joyce have both intentionally sucked the cocks of cisgender male dudes, at least one each. I’m not sure how that affects the score.

        3. Dot

          I mean I feel like Dorothy and Joyce are both disqualified on the grounds that neither of them are lesbians.

        4. Qube

          neither is Dina, if memory serves

    2. AMagicalDuck

      Yes. Shockingly the people who just started dating are giddy about their relationship. How awful of them

      1. Dot

        I’m allowed to find it insufferable!

        1. nadamás

          And other people are allowed to find you complaining about it insufferable too.

        2. Dot

          If you have nothing productive or substantial to say in reply to someone, you should not say anything at all. I feel I must keep making the point that people in this comment section need to learn to think “I disagree” and move the fuck on.

        3. nadamás

          This is an internet comment section, nothing anybody says is substantial or productive.

        4. Decidedly Orthogonal

          I couldn’t have not said nothing better my not self.

        5. Dot

          nadamás, I recognize that your primary contribution to this comment section is snide one-liners and petty jabs but some of us do actually like having actual conversations here.

        6. Taffy

          Oh, you like actual conversations? Name five Power Rangers from after the original series, then.

        7. Dot

          You’re barking up the wrong tree here, I’m afraid. Never got into Power Rangers. I think they were just a little before my time – Pokemon was the 1990s kid craze I got really into.

        8. Tan

          I can name way more than 5 Power Rangers from after the original series: Red.

        9. Taffy

          Alright, fucker. I see you.

        10. perpetual summer

          That’s definitely true for you, but like, skill issue I guess?

        11. perpetual summer

          this is actually a great example of “should’ve kept scrolling”. my b

        12. Odditude

          You’re definitely proving that true haha

        13. Decidedly Orthogonal

          Ah. You’re one of these, “my opinion matters to be voiced, but not your opinion,” type folks. Classic.

        14. Dot

          No, I just prioritize constructive and substantive conversation over petty sniping and bellyaching about other people’s opinions.

        15. Astariel

          And you see a two sentence comment complaining about Joyrothy for the umpteenth time as starting a constructive and substantive conversation?

        16. Fuzzy

          It’s as constructive and substantive as a two sentence comment cooing over Joyrothy for the umpteenth time. Which don’t get this pushback.

        17. Dot

          Astariel, you may notice that I do not jump onto your ad naseum squeefests about how cute and perfect DoJo is, because I do not have anything to say about it other than that I hold a different perspective.

          To answer your question, my initial post is merely me sharing my reaction to the strip. Any subsequent replies constitute starting a conversation, and I would hope that they be substantive and thoughtful because otherwise we are just wasting each other’s time. If you have a substantive point to make in response to anything I said, you are free to make it. As it stands, you are lashing out at people who are not on board with your OTP. That’s an attitude you can have, certainly, but it is not going to make me respect you or want to engage with you.

        18. ResRam

          Thats also what YOU could have done. You notice that, right?

      2. Donovan

        Disgusting.

    3. Donovan

      Mood

    4. Greg

      It has been insufferable. It feels like the comic is taking a victory lap to celebrate getting these two characters together and I’m waiting here tapping my watch like that one judge Judy gif and getting impatient for the story to move on.

      1. Needfuldoer

        Right? It’s more fun when it isn’t The Jorothy Show.

        1. Astariel

          No, it isn’t.

        2. Dot

          Let’s take this as an example. There is no point being made here. It’s just “nuh-uh.” The only information communicated here is that Astariel thinks DoJo is great, which, like, established.

        3. Jimbotherisenclown

          I just find it amusing how accurate the avatars are in the above conversation.

          Dot – Avatar is unknown character who gives off “pleasant, but done with it all” energy.
          nadamás – Sal, complete with “I’m just saying!” energy
          Decidedly Orthogonal – Booster. Just… Booster.
          Taffy – Jax, the consumate troll
          Astariel – Leslie with the biggest shit eating grin.
          Fuzzy – Smol pony trying to be a voice of empathy and understanding
          Donovan – Completely done with it all (TM), as portrayed by Ruth

          It really is just fascinating how well the avatars line up with the tone of the comments attached to them.

        4. Dot

          Points of order:

          * “Booster” should be “Charlie”
          * “Leslie” should be “Agatha”
          * My avatar is Aigis from Persona 3

        5. Taffy

          My avatar isn’t Jax, though… ?

        6. Fuzzy

          Don’t worry, Jimbo, my avatar is a smol pony so you got that one right!

  7. shadowcell

    “roommate” is the most intimate form of relationship between two women

    1. Delivery McGee

      As a kid in Texas, I was always told that my great-aunt’s roommate/business partner was her “friend” … there was only one bed in their vacation house on the lake where they hosted the family 4th of July party. Because of my sheltered upbringing, it took until my 20s to realize they’re a gay couple.

      1. Proxiehunter

        Oh my gods, there was only one bed.

      2. Rogue 7

        Ask me how long it took me, a kid in the 90s, to figure out what my neighbor’s son’s deal was. He was a hairdresser, unmarried, and the one time I went into their house (to grab some more Tintin comics, those were fantastic), I saw he had an absolute shitton of medications there.

        Yeah, a few years into college I realized “oh, holy fuck, he was gay and had AIDS. Goddamn.”

      3. jonathan young

        taking the place of the Victorian/Edwardian “Companions” 🙂

    2. windowz97

      LMFAO this made me yell

    3. StClair

      “Cousins” or simply “pals” are close behind.

    4. Yumi

      A couple years ago, I was looking up my middle school English teacher– kind of to see if she was still alive. And she was, but she was also mentioned in a woman’s recent obituary as being her “roommate of 50 years.”

  8. ReFlex76

    Some people were complaining that Hank was starting to look like Blaine; to them, I submit Panel 5’s Hankface.

    1. Risky

      That face is really giving x doubting by the rock

  9. Jay

    Hank is so done with today

    1. GholaHalleck

      The man fought Indiana highway traffic to make sure his kids didn’t get bean bagged in the face and this is what he gets…

      1. nadamás

        He cane because he thinks the protester are terrorist not because he was worried about police violence tho.

        1. Bryy

          This.

        2. Decidedly Orthogonal

          Neither. He came because

          he cares about his kids.

        3. GholaHalleck

          Right? He was worried there was going to be violence and wanted to make sure his kids were okay.

          It doesn’t matter to Hank which side was going to be violent, hell, he could think *both sides* are violent idiots, and his “son” is an idealist that’s going to get “his” head caved in at a protest.

          I doubt Hank cares a lick where the person who hurts his kids falls on the political spectrum, just that his kids could be hurt by being near a protest.

        4. Gwen

          If that was his primary concern, he could probably have said it at any given point during this whole storyline rather than being more mad about the politics, or expressed relief upon seeing his daughter safe rather than immediately going with a pithy comment about her hair.

        5. Proxiehunter

          Not according to what he’s said or how he’s acted since he showed up in this storyline.

        6. eskimolos

          He cares about his kids, but he is actually thinking his child might be a violent terrorist and is hoping to bring “him” back off the ledge, as we -just- saw from his conversation with Becky.

        7. Rogue 7

          Even if you give Hank the least charitable take possible (which, fair dinkum, it’s 2025), that still doesn’t discount him being concerned for Jocelyne’s safety. He can simultaneously be worried that she’s been “infected with ideology”, something he sees as bad on its face *and* that said ideology could very well get her seriously injured if not killed if it means she’s confronting cops.

        8. Astariel

          But he hasn’t said anything about being concerned for anyone’s safety. If he’s feeling that, we haven’t been shown it.

        9. Rogue 7

          That’s valid.

        10. GholaHalleck

          So *that’s* where NuJoyce picked that up from…

        11. Rogue 7

          Why not both?

    2. StClair

      So done.

    3. Odditude

      I am with him haha, I want the day done with so we hopefully get some resolution on the Joe situation.

      Thats a minor ticking bomb I am waiting for to go off

      1. Jay

        I’ve been done with the past 2 in comic days.

        Like I get, the plots gonna take time to unfolf but we’ve been on this arc for like 4 months now and it just feels like a can being kicked down the road rather than smth they have to deal with.

        I’m just following the arc for the ride at this point cause I know it’ll hopefully become enjoyable again when it’s over

  10. Isalis

    Oh poor Becky in the back there. This has gotta be killing her.

    1. Getsu

      Yeah thats what I came here to say she looks like shes breaking

  11. Sirksome

    Don’t trust daughters. Especially since you have at least 3 maybe 4 now. The 4th is possibly Dorothy. Wait Dina might count too. Shit Hank.

    1. Yumi

      Glad you escaped from Ken’s clutches. (and/or, you are Ken.)

      1. Taffy

        This is definitely a “kill and replace” situation. Don’t trust Sirksome.

    2. Nymph

      Hank: There are more daughters every time I look. I’ve stopped checking. I just assume there are twenty in there.

      1. and painted shark women

        That reminds me of the old DerrickComedy skit where the secret agent yells “I was undercover in a polygamous cult for twelve years! I had no choice but to have a LOT of DAUGHTERS!”

  12. Dawn

    Oh Hank fully doesn’t believe them. Girls, time to kiss.

    1. ReFlex76

      “He still doesn’t believe us! Quick Dorothy, grab my boobs!”

      1. Decidedly Orthogonal

        Where’s a Maytag when you need one?

    2. Tequila Mockingbird

      Honestly I can kinda understand. Hank may not know exactly what’s going on, but he does have at least a little bit of a bullshit filter. Were we not in the know, I could easily see Joyce bullshitting the most dramatic thing she could think of just to run interference for somebody she cared about.

      1. Gangler

        He just saw through Becky’s attempt at a diversion, and it’s plainly obvious that this is more of that.

        It absolutely makes sense to reason that Joyce is just saying crazy shit to get him off “Josh’s” back, even if we, the audience, know that Joyce’s statement is factually accurate.

        Plus he saw the birth control in Joyce’s room, and probably thinks there would be no reason for that if she was seeing women. He doesn’t seem like he has a super complete understanding of that subject.

        1. Throwatron

          these are all A+ points

        2. thejeff

          This could work out. Hank realizes it’s all a distraction and then Jocelyne jumps in with an over the top “No! I’m really a girl” and he refuses to believe that either.

        3. Dot

          At this point Jocelyne could pull down her top to show Hank her HRTits and Hank might feel inclined to just tell her to lay off the cheeseburgers a little.

        4. jonathan young

          today i learned a new term and am writing it down 😀

    3. Wraithy2773

      Its like the inverse of a failed Bluff check. 😀

  13. Isactuallyabear

    Oh my god Hank’s face in the last panel. XD

    Giggling and stimming up a storm here.

    1. GholaHalleck

      I have never felt a closer kinship with a character in this comic then I have with Hank right now.

    2. Rebecca

      My vibe exactly!

    3. Risky

      ??? There’s no sufficient emoji.

      1. Morrison

        THIS

  14. Shakes

    Joyce hitting her sister with the “CAN IT, TOOTS!”

  15. AbacusWizard

    I am kind of loving Hank’s expression in the final panel.

    1. Tequila Mockingbird

      Came here to say pretty much the exact thing. It’s a wonderful cartoonist combination of srsly bro?” and the deepest, most exasperated “oy vey” that can be mustered by human vocal chords.

  16. Animedingo

    Theyre really bad at this

  17. BorkBorkBork

    Yeah, his #1 thing is “I’ve been lied to like 30 times.”

    Hank’ll be OK. He’ll get there.

    1. Dot

      Like father, like daughter:

      https://www.dumbingofage.com/2012/comic/book-2/06-strange-beerfellows/sin/

    2. Laura

      …Anyone care to actually count the misleading statements? Has it actually been 30?

      1. Dot

        Well there was the obvious lying about the birth control, and then Becky’s gladhanding probably counts to him.

      2. Laura

        Ok, counting out all the moments that Hank might feel like he’s been lied to since he got there:

        1. “What brother?”
        2. “Oh! Those are actually mine.”
        3. “Been looking all over for them!”
        4. “Sex-on-demand all the time. With boys.”
        5. “You accidentally left your birth control in Joyce’s room?” “…Yes.”
        6. “I… did not have any brother at a protest.”
        7. “Hmm!” (Carefully placed foot stomp.)
        8. “…No other thing…”
        9. “You two go on ahead” (concealing surreptitious text).
        10. “Can I borrow ya fer a sec?” (Diversion from non-answer, avoidance.)
        11. “We did ‘Awesome God’.” (Becky actually dislikes the song because of its homophobic lyrics.)
        12. “Maybe it’s the divorce?” (Deflection.)
        13. “Naw, Mr. B. I get it.” (Hank actually did say something offensive.)
        14. “Thank goodness it’s never TWO things!”
        15. “Don’t sweat it. I can take care of this for ya.” (Hank does feel he should sweat it.)
        16. & 17. “Talk him off his lefty ledge.” (Jocelyne is not “him” and Becky has no intention of dissuading Jocelyne of her politics.)
        18. “It’s why I’m here.” (Becky primarily wants to study hard sciences, rather than only political science.)
        19. “How great Ronald Reagan is”. (Becky does not actually connect Reagan with greatness.)
        20. “Nothin’s more dadly than buyin’ their kids some pizza.” (Diversion to get him away from campus newspapers.)
        21. & 22. “I can handle Josh for ya. You can go home.” (Deflection, avoidance, misnaming.)
        23. “Remember pizza?” (Blocking view.)
        24. “Mr. B!” (More blocking, distraction.)
        25. “I’m handling this!” (Surreptitious admission of manipulation.)
        26. “I need to tell THIS truth before worse things happen.” (Implying an intent to reveal one truth to conceal another.)
        27. “Zip it, sibling!” (Deliberately ambiguous language.)
        28. “You don’t gotta cover for me any more!” (Implying that Jocelyne’s living her life was actually just an act to distract from Joyce’s gayness.)

        And… that’s all I got. So, yeah, 28 is “like 30”, give or take a few.

        1. Random832

          some of those require him to have guessed certain things at least to the point of being on his radar, so maybe we can call it 22 or so, but when the overall vibe is “these kids are all definitely hiding something, possibly multiple things” rounding up isn’t unreasonable.

        2. IntangibleMatter

          Thorough, I’m impressed

        3. Adam Black

          What homophobic lyrics?

        4. Taffy

          That’ll be “Judgement and wrath He poured out on Sodom”, I expect.
          Y’know, like where sodomy comes from. The butt sex kind. The kind gay people do. In their butts. Their gay butts. The sodomy. From Sodom. Where the wrath apparently got poured.

          Rest In Piss Rich Mullins

    3. OBBWG

      The pizza is a lie.

      1. BorkBorkBork

        You will be baked, and then there will be cake pizza.

  18. Steve

    Somehow I don’t think Joyce is going to have any room for Joe. She’s very very serious about Dottie, like endgame serious.

    And yeah, I think they will end up married.

    1. drs

      > I don’t think Joyce is going to have any room for Joe

      She seems to find plenty of room for him whenever she’s in a room with him.

      1. StClair

        She’s very into whoever she’s with at the moment, and guilty about anyone else who might be involved but not enough to actually stop.

    2. Jeff K!

      The verse she shouted across the field with the tear gas filling the air was a popular lesbian wedding vow, specifically called out as such by Dorothy earlier in the series.
      Joyce may actually be considering that a wedding, symbolically if not literally.

    3. Corey C.

      May I remind you that Joyce was going to break up with Joe, only for him to give her a blanket, which then caused her to give him a BJ. She’s a horny idiot who really doesn’t know what she wants right now. And “Polyamory” might sound great for her, and even Joe would be down for it, but I think Joyce not flat-out dumping Joe for Dottie is going to cause a wedge between them given that Dottie loathes him.

      1. a/snow/mous/e

        Poly dramaaa~

        1. a/snow/mous/e

          wedge away

        2. Nymph

          Yesssssssssss!

      2. Dot

        It’s gonna be a disaster! I can’t wait!

    4. Astariel

      I think you’re right. I mean, we’ve basically seen it with the pharmacist bonus strip.

    5. Jay

      Enough room to do a lil sucky sucky instead of dumping him noth times she’s had the chance

  19. M!a

    Well at least it isn’t Carol she’s having to do this with.

  20. Thing 2

    I’m sick, so have been so busy reading it all again, I forgot to come look for the update!

    1. True Survivor

      I am sorry you have been welling under the weather. I hope you feel better soon.

  21. Bajja

    Becky needs a thousand therapists

    1. Bryy

      So, like, how many of the cast that have been in traumatic situations *don’t* have therapists?

      1. Taffy

        Most, I believe

      2. Astariel

        I think everyone except Dorothy, Ruth, and Jennifer.

        1. Dot

          And Dorothy’s is of limited utility while she continues to lie to them.

  22. Yotomoe

    Boy, I wish I found these two cute.

    1. Dot

      It’s all being laid on rather thick, isn’t it?

      1. Donovan

        I miss Ruth

      2. Corey C.

        I’m fully expecting this perfect union to be ruined once Dorothy finds out that Joyce still hasn’t broken up with Joe. I’m expecting him to show up, maybe with flowers, Dotty tells him to shove off and stop being a creep to her girlfriend, then reminds him that Joyce dumped him for her, and Joyce butts in and says they never actually broke up, shocking Dotty because Joyce herself laughed at Dotty and Walky’s breakup. If Joyce can “win” in a love triangle, why can’t Dotty?

        1. Lumino

          I REALLY hope this happens.

        2. Jay

          Please i just want some drama and this would be so good ?

    2. Sirksome

      It’s a lot less cute still fresh from how this all went down and with Becky right there being visibly hurt after overcoming that immediately to play defense against Hank yes. Maybe a few months down the line we’ll all be okay after characters have moved on. Everyone’s kinda okay with Jen again after turning on her for seemingly ages post time skip. I have hope. Or maybe some we’ll never be okay with them. That’s fine too probably.

      1. Yotomoe

        Yeah honestly I can’t forsee me really…caring about Joyce and Dorothy for the forseeable future. In the same way I just do not care for Walky and Lucy. I’ll probably just focus in on the characters I do like moving forward.

        1. Donovan

          Solidarity, brother.

        2. Armadillo

          Definitely the only healthy way to be reading this thing, yeah.

        3. Smokeysis

          It kind of is the relationship equivalent to cardboard, yeah. I miss all the messy Billie/Ruth death spiral drama.

        4. a/snow/mous/e

          Yeah … Seems like Becky and Sarah are the only ones mad at Joyce and Dorothy cheating. I didn’t expect Walky to be all that upset considering they were only dating a couple days, and Joe’s reaction makes sense if he thought they weren’t exclusive, I guess ..

        5. eskimolos

          A. Becky doesn’t seem to care about the cheating at all, her feelings are exclusively to do with the fact that she already struggles with the notion that sexuality can be fluid, paired with her rationalisation that Joyce couldn’t be into her because she was straight, which Joyce being in love with Dorothy plainly destroys.

          B: Joe has never had a relationship, he has been pointedly anti-commitment due to his parents and specifically his dad, he was willing to try with Joyce, maybe even wanted it with Joyce, but it certainly appears he never remotely assumed that monogamy with him was what Joyce was actually aiming for. People can be upset about this all they like, but it is 100% in character and a thing that actually happens for Joe to have read the unspoken feelings between the girls and realised if he had any space there to be with Joyce, it wouldn’t be a huge amount.

          Not really to you but to the comments in general on this storyline : Joyce is dumb, horny, and impulsive, but absolutely not malicious, Joe is responsible for his own observations and decisions made from those observations. I’m getting huge “but where’s the kaboom” from all these Marvin martians here in the comments section. Sometimes there isn’t a kaboom, sometimes it’s a slow deflation. I personally find Joyce and Dorothy absolutely adorable and agree there have been around about 15 years of breadcrumbs leading to this storyline, and I am curious to see where it goes.

        6. thejeff

          It might be in character for Joe, but that realizes it wouldn’t be a huge amount and settles for it anyway thing is precisely what people don’t like about it. Poly is fine. Settling for poly because it’s the only way you can get anything isn’t healthy.

        7. AK

          They had one of my favorite dynamics in the comic and unfortunately it is this now. I… don’t feel like I can remember finding another couple in this comic this unlikeable even when I actively disliked the pairing, and I really really think the amount of look how into each other these guys are with no new information being engaged with by either character is a huge part of that. I am being shown basically the same thing on repeat, and it’s not something I really liked, but even if it was nothing is interesting repetitively forever.

          Idk, I recall somebody talking about the Joe/Joyce date feeling short, but like. That seems like the correct length for a sequence in which no new information is introduced to the relationship. I like that ship a lot, but if you aren’t introducing new information you just give the audience the idea until you get to the part of the sequence where something new IS happening in the relationship and you take more time there. Idk man. I imagine I would be less annoyed if I liked the pairing more, but it’d feel like beating a dead horse either way. Interesting stuff IS happening in this sequence. In like. The last few days of comics. And the first half of this one. And then the second half of this one is the same information we’ve been receiving for the last month but again. These characters dynamic used to have a push and pull and now it does one single thing and it’s this. I hope someday it will do something else and I will like whatever that is more.

        8. Gotthammer

          It’s tedious.

          A lot is happening but nothing has happened because any plot grinds to a halt to centre them being “cute.”

        9. finep

          I think that’s the point of the storyline (them not being smooth at all), and that we are supposed to find it less cute at this point.

          As people have said, we read it at a way slower pace that is really ideal. It’s not Joyce and Dorothy who grind it to a halt, it is just slow, and they are getting annoying (or more annoying).

        10. Gotthammer

          With how many people are still cheering and squeeing over them, I don’t think it’s working.

          >we read it at a way slower pace that is really ideal

          Then it should be written better to account for the format. Given Willis has been at this for a very long time, I’d hope they understood pacing by now.

          >It’s not Joyce and Dorothy who grind it to a halt

          Yesterday Joyce literally leaped from somewhere to derail Jocelyn’s coming out and give us today’s comic of waffle and divert the story back to them.

          Jocelyn’s coming out has so far been entirely about Joyce, Joyce is called more vulnerable than a trans woman in 2025, and Jocelyn was quite literally interrupted to recentre Joyce and Dorothy.

          One can argue narrative & character reasons for that, but the author chose to set up the story and pace it this way.

          This whole arc is Poochy. We are never getting to the fireworks factory, and whenever Joyce or Dorothy isn’t on screen, everyone is asking where they are. Quite literally in Hank’s case.

        11. Finep

          I’ve read it as Jocelyn being wrong about it, and that she probably meant financially (since she is already out of university, while Joyce isn’t).

          But I’m not from the US, so I don’t know if it would be understandable for her to do that while in panic.

          And I think Joyce was right to stop her, but she did it so poorly…

        12. thejeff

          I think you’re right and that practically speaking, Joyce is more vulnerable than Jocelyne right now. That’s not to say that trans women are more vulnerable than bi girls, but that Joyce is still almost entirely dependent on Hank, while Jocelyne has been preparing to cut herself loose for a long time.

        13. Gotthammer

          and I am not criticizing you for taking a more charitable approach – I am just wanting to further explain my critique.

        14. Yotomoe

          It really insists upon itself yeah. Like every few minutes the characters remind us that they’re a romantic pairing who super love each other and always have.

          And that’s just…not interesting to me. Joe and Joyce worked because despite having had chemistry for years we had such a slow gradual build of them breaking down each other’s walls. When they were finally at the “I love you”s I FELT it. With Dorothy and Joyce ever “I love you” almost feels cynical. As if I’m being “told” they love each other since the story was pushed earlier than initially planned. I don’t feel chemistry. I don’t even feel the chemistry that these two characters HAD prior to this development. It’s like we skipped a step and it feels a bit jarring. I dunno I feel like even if I shipped these two I’d probably want…more than this?

        15. Drew Hargrave

          Wait, how do you know it was earlier than planned? Was there a tweet or statement or something?

        16. AK

          There was a big patreon post about it.

          In general I tend to feel that a lot of the “and Willis has exploded his plans for this thing I don’t like” stuff is kinda weird given that my understanding is he wrote his characters and the thing that happened was the thing that felt right and in character for them so he was like okay then and continued to write in line with what felt honest to the characters to him instead of finding a reason to put it back and spin his wheels for a bit. I have not been a huge fan of this arc, but I think describing it as being something other than the author intended and explaining not liking it that way feels kinda weird when we got here because it felt more honest to the characters for him. If he’d had second thoughts he had a year to change his mind. I really do not think that’s the problem.

        17. Sirksome

          I think it’s much more simple than a pacing issue, not to undercut anyone’s valid opinions on any issues they have in aspects of the comic, but I think it’s just that Dorothy and Joyce exist at the expense of another pairing that was enjoyed and it sucks to see them being lovey dovey, even if that’s a very natural thing to expect from a new couple.

          I think this because I felt this way about Lucy and Jacob because it quashed my desire for the Sarah and Jacob couple. It’s that simple to me. Joyce and Joe as a couple were perhaps unexpectedly great to watch for a lot of readers even if their official relationship isn’t that long, but I think it would be false to say Dorothy and Joyce wasn’t an even longer slow burn and I don’t think it feels rushed in comparison. I think it just ran over something that felt like it was just being built in Joe x Joyce. That sucks.

          Also just in general the way Joyce and Dorothy operated in initiating their romance felt like awful behavior from them, but I also felt a bit that way about Jacob too. I do think time is just what is needed even if some will never enjoy Joyce and Dorothy now because of the circumstances around it. I think it’s pretty a devilish writing achievement to give people what they wanted for so long but now they can’t enjoy it.

        18. Yotomoe

          Writers aren’t infallible. There’s plenty of professionally written stories made by lauded writers where they wrote what felt right for them and…fans didn’t like it. This is actually a very common thing to happen. I’m not saying this “isn’t what he intended”. I’m saying that he the pacing surrounding this couple seemed really sped up compared to Joe/Joyce a slow build that really pulled you in to its gravitational pull. Willis really wanted to see these two get together and probably assumed everyone else wanted to see these two get together. It’s like his OTP. Being intentional doesn’t necessarily make it well written.

        19. Yotomoe

          @Sirksome
          Due to the pacing of the comic there’s kind of an emerging trend that when one couple breaks up that character more or less instantaneously rebounds into a new relationship that immediately gets to an intimate level because slowly having them get to know each other and develop their feelings/physicality would take months if not years.

          Walky and Lucy have a slow budding relationship that ends rather abruptly and Walky basically hops right into bed with Dorothy.

          Jacob and Lucy immediately hop into bed together after the night they meet despite Jacob having hangups about being objectified and Lucy historically being a fan of taking her relationships slow (Now obviously in this case Lucy jumping into bed with Jacob instantaneously is a reflection of her lashing out at Walky more or less doing the same with Dorothy as well as somewhat wasting her time. But for Jacob it feels…odd.)

          Carla mulls over how to ask out Charlie only for it to be revealed they’re already dating and have been for a while.

          Sarah pines for Jacob for a really long time but interacts with Tony like…twice and they’re now just…dating.

          And now we have Joyce and Dorothy, who sure, we’ve had breadcrumbs for years. We also had Breadcrumbs of Joyce and Joe for years (he was a good friend and confidant to her quite a while, even before the timeskip) But Joyce and Dorothy hopping right to this “I love you so much we’re basically married I love you so much woweee” and it just…feels like we’re just jumping into the Deep end. Especially for Joyce, a character who seems openly resistant to change and struggles through every new thing she learns about herself hopping right into a WLW relationship without like…second guessing herself and/or having some kinda internal turmoil about it. Needing glasses for her was an ordeal, but her burgeoning feelings for another woman feel unexplored. Especially since it’s at the expense of a pretty supportive and loving relationship in the form of Joe.

        20. Li

          Let’s be clear, though, that big Patreon post was actually like four posts, and several of them detailed EARLIER attempts to start this train.

          It’s not a binary: we don’t have “either this or five more years of buildup”, we have “this could have started in like 2019, or 2023, or 2024, or this year, or five years from now”. Probably between now and then there would have been a few more “almosts”, too.

          Fully fair to dislike this and fully fair to think you would have liked it better in another five years.

          I personally think another five years of Joyce and Joe being cute would only have made everything worse? Because I do think a lot of the pain right now comes from attachment to Joe/Joyce as a monogamous couple and attachment to Joe and concern about his feelings.

          I also think folks are assuming waiting five years would have meant no cheating, and I’m not at all sure why that is the assumption? Maybe folks figure Willis would have had someone else cheat instead?

        21. Yotomoe

          At this point if things were worse they’d be better. I don’t even mind it being a cheating story. But there’s SO much you can do with a cheating story that they just…jumped past.

          -The characters sharing an intimate moment that they both agree they should never do again (they kinda do this a little)

          -The characters sneaking around behind their partners backs (the story just doesn’t allow time for this to happen

          -Joyce specifically dealing with and addressing burgeoning lesbian feelings she’s either become aware of or has suppressed until recently.

          -fallout with the people who have been…cheated on.

          It’s not really a good cheating story cuz none of the drama comes from…them cheating. Or even Joyce and Dorothy realizing they’ve had sapphic affection for one another rexontextualizing their entire friendship. As it stands this isn’t a cheating story. It’s a story that has cheating in it. Which i don’t think would be hurt by having more build-up or taking place later in the narrative. (Also maybe it would have prevented it from happening during a genocide protest)

        22. BorkBorkBork

          But I think that the real issue here… really isn’t an issue at all.

          Dumbing of Age has always been an extremely divisive strip. Its core theme, if it has a theme at all, is a coming-of-age story taking author avatar and nearly-POV Joyce through a journey that turns her understanding of the world upside down. Along the way, her friends will also fundamentally change and grow and change their own perceptions. That will always be divisive to some of the population.

          It doesn’t *feel* divisive because most of us who talk here all basically agree on the same things. And we get that way because the comment section is, for lack of a better term, curated. The strip, by taking a black and white view on some issues, invariably agitates people, gets them to speak out, other commenters harshly criticize them, and then suddenly the offending person isn’t here anymore. And that’s not a criticism – I moderate some online spaces, and when someone starts saying something that sounds prejudiced, they’re out, full stop.

          It’s been accused of pandering to an audience, but I don’t think it does. Willis drives his strip where he wants it to – he has to, with that much of a buffer. It’s just that where he’s driven it to, so far, has been safe. Inarguable. We can all agree that it’s bad to be homophobic, yes? Bad to be racist? Bad to force your beliefs on others? It’s not ‘brave’ to stand tall and say “Look, it’s not a moral failing to have sex before marriage,” at least not in front of us.

          We haven’t really had many “debatable” issues. There’s no vegans in the cast, for example, at least none that we know of because none of them talk about it. The cast is *extremely* fit for a state that has a nearly 40% obesity rating, so there’s no arguments about fat-phobia. Nobody owns a fursuit (probably) or anatomically correct life sized stuffed animals. And despite law enforcement being extremely important for all of Blaine and Ross’ arcs and Amazi-Girl being extremely Lawful Good and using the police, any time the cops are doing good there’s no face, and any time they’re doing bad there’s *absolutely* a face, so you can’t even say Willis is portraying something other than ACAB.

          (not that I think most of us would have an issue with the furry thing, but it’s more that half of us would be like “Hey, that’s perfectly fine, he’s not hurting anyone” and the other half would be cracking jokes nonstop and offending the first half)

          But with this storyline, I feel like for the first time, it’s going somewhere that isn’t “safe” because disagreeing with it isn’t being prejudiced. It feels obvious now that Willis’ eventual plan was some sort of open relationship or throuple, but while people seem OK with the *idea* of poly relationships, not as many have likely thought through how someone *discovers* that they are poly, and aren’t thrilled with seeing how the sausage is made.

          There’s also the fact that being cheated on is something that can literally shake you to your core and be a life-changing event, and the fact that there are so many axioms about it (once a cheater, always a cheater, etc.) means that the POV character has now been irreparably stained for some people. After all, if you were devastated by your longtime crush cheating on you after two weeks with their best friend, how do you go about not only being OK with, but forgiving Joyce for essentially doing the same thing? Even if Joe was OK with it… you weren’t!!

          But you can’t curate the comments section here the same way you can if someone says “Malaya says she’s not a girl? WTF?” because it’s not wrong to say you’re not OK with cheating.

          Maybe that’s why so many of Willis’ polls have been about cheating and if we’ve forgiven Joyce and Dorothy yet or if they need to be “punished” more.

        23. Odditude

          @Sirksome
          Beautifully put.
          Joyce/Dorothy is so divisive because of it coming at an expense of another ship.

          Like, the cheating and it feeling a bit invited upon would have made it divisive itself but oh well, I guess Joyce got her wife a lot earlier than I expected.

          It does feel more endgame than Joe/Joyce, I’ll give Willis that

        24. Amara

          I think part of why Joyce has been so nonchalant about this is that she’s basically reached her limit of change freak outs? It was a huge deal when she swore. It was a huge deal when she became an atheist. It was huge when she got glasses, or diagnosed with autism. More than her own reactions, she’s tired of other people’s reactions, which is why I think she took this revelation in such stride.

          Alternatively, she’d been feeling these emotions and slowly realizing them over the past few weeks, and the masturbation and bar night helped solidify them. Not that I aim to convince you one way or another, just wanted to offer my perceptions as to why Joyce didn’t freak out about it.

        25. thejeff

          @BorkBorkBork: Mostly I agree, though I’ll point out we’ve had some deeply divisive things before generally involving direct conflict between main cast members. Joyce and Becky over atheism. Sal and Amber’s fight last semester.
          Mostly though I’d just like to push back on most thinking that Joyce/Dorothy are irreparably stained or that they need to be “punished” more. How about just a little bit? How about one of the boys involved being upset about the cheating part?

          @Amara: I can see that as a possibility, but that’s all it is. It would have been really nice to see some introspection. Or even someone asking why she isn’t freaking out about it.

        26. BorkBorkBork

          @thejeff – oh, that irreparably stained” bit isn’t a belief I have. I’ve been both cheated on by someone else, and had cheated on someone, back in high school. I’m simply saying I understand where they’re coming from.

          Joyce and Becky over atheism is a safe debate. We might have rustled up a lot more people who felt strongly, but the moral here was “Joyce being an atheist is to be celebrated and Becky should accept it.” Meanwhile, overzealous religious types tend to clash with people who have been hurt by overzealous religious types, and get curated out. See? Safe.

          I honestly don’t remember a “Sal vs Amber” serious debate in the comments, but Sal and Amber don’t conveniently stand for two different sides of a societal issue. Their issue is deeply personal to their own backstory. There’s not a disenfranchised minority of boarding school kids who got their hand stabbed that are offended that Willis is treating Amber fairly, and another loud group of nerds with superhero alters that are calling out their shit. Safe. We can disagree and nothing hits close to home.

          Going back to cheating. For me, at least, I think it was easier to be cheated on, than to do the cheating. When I was cheated on (at prom no less, so very public) I was depressed for about a week, then picked myself up and told myself that I was better than either of those assholes, and wrote them out of my life.

          When I cheated on someone else the following year… and to be clear, we’re talking barely second base… it utterly destroyed my self identity and sense of worth. I would lay awake at night worried about how what I did, and ask myself why I did it, and knew without a shadow of a doubt that it was because I was a worthless asshole that wasn’t worth knowing, and should be written out of people’s lives. It took me, not years, but well over a decade to try to see worth in myself outside of what validation others gave me. To this day, I’m not able to watch even the silliest romantic comedy that has a cheating subplot without feeling sick to my stomach.

          Learned decades later that I just might have a depression issue. Who knew? Not me!

          And I think I’m a bit more unusual, because typically it’s the cheat*ed* and not the cheat*er* whose life is more destroyed. But it does seriously hurt people. We talk about trigger warnings; what kind of trigger warning is there for “Hey, the main character of the comic strip is going to gleefully do something that reminds you of when your husband left you for your coworker, you might want to just stop reading something you’ve invested ten years of your life in.”?

          If I were moderating this like a subreddit. Am I going to ban the person out there who is *clearly* hurting, saying that this isn’t OK, that they just wish everyone stops acting like this is a good thing? No. Who are they hurting? But the storyline doesn’t change, because it’s written, dammit, and we have to get to the end of the road.

          So that’s what I’m saying when I say that Willis is taking this in an unsafe path. People can argue, and there’s not one right side or wrong side, and both opinions are valid – at least, to the average person. That makes it so you *really* can’t curate.

          Also, I want to say- if I was trying to get my audience on board with following my storyline and curate out the loudest detractors. I might try to subtly make suggestions that recontextualize the side that disagrees with me. I might suggest that these people are being prudes, or overly sensitive, or judgemental. I might go and suggest they’re White Knighting traditional relationships and labeling everyone who doesn’t agree with them as sick. I might give them a poll where the closest option to being dissatisfied is “they need to be punished” and then ask them if they still need to have more consequences – as if the only thing standing in the way of Joyce and Dorothy living their best life is all these commenters who seem to care that they got the steps of breakup wrong.

          I don’t *want* Joyce to feel what I felt. I don’t want *anyone* to feel what I felt. But she barely cares that she cheated on Joe, and really didn’t care that she cheated on Dorothy, and she REVELED in the fact that she kissed the person that Walky was dating. At this point, it’s not “I want Joyce to be punished” but “I want Joyce to stop acting like a narcissist and consider other people for a change.” It’s as if everything that made her a moral, decent person was actually tied to her old religion, and without it she’s literally allergic to treating others like how she would like to be treated.

        27. Li

          Just wanna clarify real quick that when I say “would have made everything worse”, I mean “would have made the people who are upset more upset”.

          Maybe some folks wold feel like Joe/Joyce had gotten its “fair share” of time, but I think a relationship that long would be just as long to have folks feel like it was going to be endgame, and therefore more betrayed to have it rug-pulled.

        28. AK

          I mean they were saying I love you platonically before, it felt pretty good, and I think if instead of full gear shift they’d kept having that kind of relationship but they kissed now sometimes and Joyce’s doing a sex arc involved more people it would probably still feel pretty good. It is. Weird. Feeling like their entire dynamic has been overwritten with something different instead of extending naturally into a romance, but maybe we’re gonna talk about how NRE can be drugs and turn you into an ass. Fair enough. It is weirder watching the pacing stop for it constantly even when not giving us new information.

        29. Big Z

          There was a comment somewhere that I kinda agreed with that almost any resolution to Joyce and Dorothy’s feelings short of an endgame/finale would feel kinda lackluster given the sheer amount of buildup over the course of the strip.

    3. Mal

      Yeah…yeah. It’s been a nagging little splinter in my enjoyment of the last 2 strips. On the one hand: Joyce is making herself and her relationship with Dorothy the center of attention for a Good Reason this time, to protect Jocelyn.

      But given how that’s been the theme ever since the protest kiss, it loses it’s punch. It’s as if every time we get a peek at another story– the protest, Raidah and Alma, Amber, Asher and Ethan, Joe and Walky, Becky — we must hastily cut back to a reminder that Joyce and Dorothy are in love, they’re a couple, they love each other, they’re so meant for each other, ultimate couple.

      I don’t generally approve of Hank, at least not yet, because while he might come around to Joyce’s sexuality and Jocelyn’s identity, he’s still enough of a stressor that Joyce and Jocelyn, and Becky, feel the need to damage control to protect each other. Not a great quality in a dad, even if he’s better than the mom and will further improve. But his expression in the last panel perfectly encapsulates how I feel every time Joyce and Dorothy make everything about them: a bemused and weary “Really? Really. You think this is charming, don’t you?”

      1. Armadillo

        I feel like it’s really unfair to act like Hank is a bad guy until he starts actually having genuine negative reactions to things. So far other than having extremely incorrect opinions on protests he’s only been guilty of getting dragged around in circles and lied to by people who are assuming he’s going to be an asshole about things. We do not yet have a real indicator of how much of this panic is the result of genuine reason to distrust Hank and how much of it is just all of these characters working themselves up into an unnecessary panic (something they are all extremely prone to doing, you might recall).

        1. Gangler

          I mean, it’s nothing as bad as Liz’s dad, but he’s made it pretty plainly clear he doesn’t like queer people or protestors every time either subject has come up.

          He may or may not go on some big homophobic tirade, and I certainly don’t expect him to become violent, but it’s not like these people are lying to him out of some unfounded belief that he’d respond negatively to the truth.

        2. Gangler

          Becky I mean. Nothing as bad as Becky’s dad.

        3. Rabid Rabbit

          On the other hand, https://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-6/02-that-perfect-girl/humility/

        4. Dawn

          “Doesn’t like queer people” when he chose BECKY over his own wife and church? He’s more just uncomfortable with queerness, which is absolutely still homophobic, but he hasn’t even pulled any “love the sinner, hate the sin” stuff or acted like it’s a choice or something you can pray away, which makes him WAY better than just about every “nice” religious homophobe I have ever met.

        5. Big Z

          I think you could read this in a way such that Hank holds a really common opinion among some Christian conservatives, namely “I am generally opposed to anything other than cis/het-ness, but if someone I know/like personally comes out, then I assume they are one of the good ones and they are okay.”

          And a lot of those folks are fine with their LGBTQ+ friends but wouldn’t be fine with LGBTQ+ kids.

          I do tend to agree with you, but the other reading is still kinda available.

        6. Li

          Also: Willis is deliberately extending tension on this point. I don’t think it’s supposed to be completely obvious which way Hank will fall right now.

        7. S.R.

          Didn’t he open a joint bank account with, y’know, the homeless lesbian who was homeless due to being a lesbian?

        8. Mal

          Sure, if this happened in a vacuum away from Joyce’s childhood and the interactions she’s had with her parents before. Her mother is worse, no doubt about that. Hank has stepped up in support of Joyce and Becky before, which is a more positive indicator that he will at least try to come to terms with all of this. “Evil” is an overstatement of Hank’s flaws.

          But at the same time, Hank is part of the fundamentalist religious upbringing that Joyce and Jocelyn have had to overcome to get here. He still holds on to at least some deep seated religious beliefs that, while he has been learning, make him judgmental about things like: masculinity and how he thinks Jocelyn should act, the idea of Joyce having birth control and/or being sexually active, “communists” which he associates with protesting, and yes even his child’s potential sexuality given how awkward and hesitantly he broached the idea that Jocelyn might be gay. Hank has always shows the capacity to learn and grow, but the sheer initial panic that Becky, Joyce, and Jocelyn show at the idea of him learning about Joyce’s sexuality and Jocelyn’s identity don’t come out of them just being whacky and over dramatic. Hank has the capacity to be a safe person/parent. That does not make him one at this moment, and his children have valid reasons to worry that he might not be one.

    4. Greg

      I was saying earlier that I think Joyce and Dorothy is a more interesting couple than Joyce and Joe (mostly for Joe’s sad sack “well maybe I just want to change everything about myself for this perfect girlfriend” routine) but the last several weeks have been grating. I’m assuming the drama is about to finally start soon. (I mean I thought it would’ve started a few days ago once Joyce’s dad showed up and yet we’re back to “ha ha look at how cute the two of them are being!” so I dunno.)

      1. biomanzilla

        Honestly that routine is just Joyce’s attitude toward Dorothy, but spread out over longer.

      2. Yotomoe

        I feel like at this point the hope for any level of drama just feels like more of a cope than an educated guess. I mean like maybe we’ll get drama about Joe’s proposal for an open relationship but so far we’ve kinda matrix dodged any and all long term or impactful drama with this couple.

        1. Greg

          If I’m being honest the fact that basically all the major concerns were expeditiously resolved with “no everybody is fine with this” was kinda funny in retrospect if only because of how anticlimactic it was. On some level, I’ll always be somebody who will enjoy a story that prepares you for an event and then pulls the prank of just completely deflating any tension instead. It’s a good bit when deployed well!

    5. Kyulen

      Same. If their relationship hadn’t started with cheating, and continued with them treating a bunch of other people shitty, I would be happy to find this cute.

      1. Thing 2

        Is there possibly a beam in your own eye that is making this speck look a little larger than it is?

        1. eskimolos

          This feels like a Snow Queen reference and if so I’m here for it entirely. I was going to say something about having a particular woodland utensil that may need a bit of stone-based friction.

          I don’t personally think they are treating anyone shitty (except walky), and I find it a rather deranged idea that what two people want to do with one another is inflicting things on other people. It has been social dogma since I was a little kid that each person is responsible for themselves, for their own emotions and reactions. In no circumstance would we think a dude hung up on his childhood friend is owed anything by said friend if that friend were to reject him then go with another guy he’d been jealous of, but because we love Becky and it’s gayness involved, suddenly Joyce and Dorothy are the worst for *checks notes* requiting feelings in her general vicinity.

          It isn’t as though I haven’t been here, I was 17-18 when my best friend hooked up with my ex boyfriend a week after we broke up, it was constantly grating that they would sit on my bed and hold hands while we hung out together, so much so that I moved to another state when they’d broken up, we’d gotten back together, he had dumped me and then gotten back with her. I knew they would PDA around me and I knew they’d decided to get back together before he had left me. I left to have time and space to get over it, yes they could have reduced PDA around me for my comfort, but to be real I was always capable of setting my own boundaries and making space for myself to get over it. And I did, and I had years of bitterness about this and other elements, but I got over that too, and I do not think it is reasonable nor mature to classify other people’s romantic feelings for one another as being inconsiderate of people with unrequited feelings for either of them. We deal with ourselves, we are the only people who’s feelings we are responsible for, and therefore we are the only people who’s feelings we get to have a say in.

        2. Big Z

          Wow. I literally cannot imagine a life where I didn’t care about the feelings of others because I felt they had a moral obligation to manage their own feelings in a vacuum — and fundamentally, that’s the outcome of what you’re saying.

          If we’re all solely responsible for our own feelings and never allowed to care about what other people’s feelings are, AND that extends to “not being allowed to care when someone does things that they know are going to hurt me where I can see them”, that’s just bleak.

        3. Yotomoe

          I think that’s a jump to far.
          Like yes, Empathy is good. Empathy is essential. But understanding and trying to avoid hurting someone’s feelings shouldn’t come at the expense of one’s own happiness. And someone should be aware that their emotions shouldn’t take precedence over someone’s happiness. I had childhood crushes that ended up dating different people nearly constantly and I had to learn to manage how I felt about that. But I never made my feelings HER problem.
          Becky feeling upset by Dorothy and Joyce getting together being a major feature of this arc feels strange. When of any people who’ve been wronged here, the two people who should MOST be effected have had their reactions downplayed and have been openly mocked. I definitely think it’s not unrealistic to have Becky be depressed about this but maaaaaaan…both the writing and the characters feel like Dorothy and Joyce should feel guilty for their loving each other and not…their cheating. Which is odd. Their issue isn’t being gay/in love. It’s cheating.

    6. biomanzilla

      Canon ships are always boring. Everyone knows the best pairings are the ones that have no chance of happening for real.

      1. Yotomoe

        I disagree. Joe and Joyce wasn’t a couple I thought I’d be into but it had slowly become a highlight of this comic for me. And then there’s Amber and Walky. A couple I NEVER even considered who expeditiously became my favorite couple in the whole comic ever.

        1. eskimolos

          I found Amber X Walky so boring and I think I still would but Walky X Lucy was so much -more- boring and Amber has had such a Time of things since then that honestly I feel like they’d be great together again. Unless sal X amber wants to materialise as a thing.

        2. Amara

          I think Amber/sal has about equal odds happening as Walky/danny. Ships that would be incredible but must remain purely in the realm of slashfic. (Unless…..?)

        3. Amara

          If Sal DID become amenable to and wound up in a gay relationship, and Linda began making a big deal about it, Walky would absolutely find a guy to go down on just to spite her. Regardless of his actual orientation, which I’m still convinced is apathetic except some people are pretty.

      2. Taffy

        #JoyceXLuminaFlowlight4eva

    7. Scruffy looking nerfherder

      It would help if it had any substance in the slightest besides them being so saccharine sweet with each other. Every storyline with them has been the same where some thing comes up, it’s a minor inconvenience at worst actually, they spend half of the time glazing each other in the middle of this supposed crisis then it goes away as quickly as it was brought up and they’re free to go back to endlessly glazing each other until something else happens to briefly interrupt it.

      Not an ounce of intrigue to them at all, they’re just that annoying couple that is always yapping about how much they love each other so much that most people hate in real life, not surprising it isn’t much more appealing in comic form.

      1. Dot

        They are every baby gay couple I knew in college that didn’t survive graduation.

  23. True Survivor

    Poor Becky, her timely distraction was for naught. She seems to be taking it very hard, but she shouldn’t she tried her best.

    1. Bryy

      I super do not want this to turn into a “I covered for you and you blew it” thing. Because this very much is what she did not get from her dad.

    2. Dot

      You can see her inferiority complex get worse with every second.

      1. Donovan

        threw herself on a grenade only to be immediately forgotten. Salutes to a real one.

        1. Taffy

          I don’t even remember her name, honestly.

    3. biomanzilla

      Joyce isn’t worth it, Becky needs to be with people who appreciate her.

      1. deliverything

        Where’s Dina when we need her?
        Someone check behind the door.

      2. Astariel

        Yep, Joyce isn’t worth it. Definitely never gave her food and shelter when she was homeless or punched out her evil dad for her. None of that happened.

  24. Bryy

    Hey Hank maybe there’s a reason why you’ve been lied to thirty times in one hour for something you consider trivial?

    1. NGPZ

      what because that “something trivial” has lead to actual shootings at their school, and that they’re in the middle of a religious red state?

      total over-reaction /s

  25. VolticEXE

    Hank’s face is great here, I’m so happy to see where Joyce gets her faces from.

    It also tells me that he’ll be on-board with both of his daughters… with a little bit of time & some honest conversation.

    … also man, their GF talk would be nice if Becky wasn’t RIGHT THERE HAVING HER HEART SHATTER MORE.

  26. Thing 2

    Future wives.

    1. anon

      depe nding on how well becky takes it, mahybe double wedding with her and dina 8D;

  27. Amber

    Half expected Willis to cut to Steve eating cereal.

    1. Lee

      I understood that reference!

      1. John Campbell

        I understood that “understood that reference” reference!

  28. darkoneko

    “I haven’t even had lunch and I am so, so tired already” — Hank

    1. Sirksome

      Hank had a chance to go get pizza. He could be the dad with pizza right now instead of the dad making that face and not having pizza. He blew it.

      1. StClair

        There’s still time for him to just turn around and walk out.

        1. Proxiehunter

          And get pizza.

        2. StClair

          right, yes, I didn’t say that but I was definitely thinking it.

        3. Greg

          It’s way past time for us to admit that every Dumbing of Age strip would be better if everybody had some pizza at all times.

      2. biomanzilla

        He shouldn’t be having pizza, anyway. It’s against the recommendation of his physician.

        1. Nymph

          Pshhh, what do doctors know anyway?

  29. BlackScarabFilmZ

    I’ve heard of U-Hauling but this is ridiculous!

  30. Slartibeast Button, BIA

    She opened up her eyes she saw the sign.

  31. Slartibeast Button, BIA

    They have to get married now because they are lesbian pregnant?

  32. Opus the Poet

    Yes, you can call 50 foot billboards “signs”…

  33. Quinn

    Admitting this to her dad makes this relationship all the more real in Becky’s eyes.

  34. Ruby/AGV

    Hank channeling his inner homophobic dog

    1. Slartibeast Button, BIA

      Don’t go libeling Snoop that way!

      1. anon

        is there some kinda homophobic snoop? i just think of that white dachscund meme with hte ‘i know what you are’

  35. Seralyna

    I really like the way the last shot is framed, where your eyes are drawn to the two of them being cute and excited first, and then you realise you’ve been starting at Becky suffering the entire time. just really clean visual storytelling

    1. StClair

      at the moment, they only seem to be aware of each other.

      … which is a problem, IMO, because they aren’t the only people involved, or even present.

  36. Joe Moose

    Dammit ladies get a room or something

    1. Serendipity

      They tried! Becky was there waiting for them!

      1. Myra V

        And then dad showed up immediately afterwards.

  37. JessWitt

    Man, opposing reacts from Hank and Becky (skeptical and distraught, respectively).

  38. Corey C.

    I think Hank might be okay with Joyce coming out, as his exasperated look at Joyce and Dotty getting giggly at calling each other girlfriends is the typical look parents give to their adult children when their significant others start showing a little too much affection but they can’t really step in and separate the two. I should know, my mom gave it to me when my college girlfriend came to visit during winter break of my senior year. All she did was sigh and tell me to buy condoms.

    Hank doesn’t mind that Joyce is gay, but would rather not see any PDA.

    1. Dawn

      Yeah, he has accepted Becky was gay and has been mentally prepping himself for Jocelyne being gay. He’s not perfect, he is still uncomfortable with gayness, but he accepts that it’s a thing. Which is a good start for a guy who spent 50+ years being extremely brainwashed against gay people until only a few months ago.

      I don’t think he actually BELIEVES Joyce is gay, is the thing. This whole interaction is so awkward and he knows there has already been a ton of lying, so I think he is fully convinced they are acting in order to hide something.

  39. Schol-R-LEA

    Toxic Yuri Level: RHODONITE, because both Joyce and Dorothy (mostly Joyce) are in Panicked Babbling mode.

  40. IntangibleMatter

    I feel like he’s more annoyed about the possibility of being lied to yet again than about Joyce being gay lmao

  41. Juanoku

    Oh God looking at Becky is like being stabbed in the heart, poor girl

  42. TheCruisiest

    I need Dina here. Becky needs emotional support.

  43. noisy

    I fucking love Hank’s face in the last panel. Becky’s face, not so much.

  44. K the Nerd

    What’s gayer, them kissing or whatever the fuck this is

    1. Throwatron

      Since the day they met, it has never not been the second thing.

  45. Taffy

    I can’t wait for their intensity to go down a little. First-day NRE is a buzzkill.

  46. Shiro

    She really meant to say girlfriend

    1. anon

      Who knows maybe leslies’s schol project was legally binding ;P

      1. Thing 2

        Then Joe and Walkyare also….

  47. darkoneko

    oh my god they were roommates !

    1. Nymph

      I actually don’t think they’ve ever been roommates.

      1. Dot

        They sleep over often enough that they may as well have been.

  48. Li

    Super heckin cute dummies.

  49. Coco Pommel

    It’s okay Becky, at least you aren’t being NTRed by an ugly bastard…

    1. anon

      Considering she said something like “good thing you’re not gay or i’d question your taste in bony poindexters” that might be worse

  50. Cracked_Egg

    I’m pretty sure he doesn’t care and just wants to talk politics

    1. a/snow/mous/e

      uh oh, politics on a sliding timescale

      1. a/snow/mous/e

        (spin, grav wheel)

      2. Nymph

        Which is the reason for Bulmeria, but that has not been a popular choice in the comments section.

  51. acher4

    “There’ve been signs.” is the understatement of the decade. 😛

    How can a panel (the last) be this hillarious, adorable and so tragic at the same time? :O

  52. Wizard

    Since I don’t have a Bluesky account, I’ll answer Willis’s question about “creation research” here. It’s just like regular research, but in reverse. Start with the conclusion that the earth is about 6000 years old, then search high and low for any evidence that can be stretched and twisted to support that conclusion. Also, come up with evidence free “theories” to explain any discrepancies. “Argon dating gives false results because in the early days of creation argon aged faster.” Because God just likes to fuck with you.

    1. StClair

      to which I usually go, “y’know, if God is that determined to make the Creation look many, many orders of magnitude older than 6000 years, it would be terribly ungracious of me not to go along with His will.”

      (oh but wait, no, all of that evidence was actually put there by Satan trying to deceive us, and that’s where I just throw up my hands and nope out)

      1. Yotomoe

        I often say how it’s very interesting that a lot of faith hinges on god being all powerful, all loving and aware of everyone and all things all the time. But also like…the devil is everywhere and he just has free reign to just fuck shit up and put shit places to trick us and god just…chooses not to intervene. How the hell is satan doing ANYTHING? God hates that guy and intrinsically knows everything he’s doing at all times forever.

        1. Nymph

          Okay so disclaimer that I don’t believe ANYMORE but I was raised in this nonsense. I’mma try to “explain” not that it makes sense:

          – God doesn’t hate Lucifer. He loves Lucifer, he’s not mad he’s just Very Disappointed. Like a father, he punished Lucifer by sending him to Hell to his room where he also sends everyone else deemed naughty by santa’s list The Good Book ™

          – Satan is allowed a certain amount of leeway on Earth because “Free Will” is important to God, and if you never had the option of making the Wrong choice and going to Hell, then that’s not free. (nevermind that one side being literal hell and the other side being literal heaven doesn’t really offer a lot of ‘free choice’ – very cake or death.)

          Essentially, God COULD stop Satan, and he doesn’t. For our own good or something. He only stops very big things that go against His Plan, but otherwise just offers a way to safety from Satan’s plans and machinations through salvation, etcetc.

          Notably, no one likes if you ask why God thought it was important to give the pastor a new car but not save the 12yo in your congregation from cancer.

        2. deliverything

          That last paragraph reminds me of one time, back when I was actively giving Christianity a final chance to convince me before I abandoned it, I went to one of those healing prayer meeting things.
          There was a girl in a wheelchair there. I’ve never seen anyone look so betrayed as when she wheeled herself back out at the end.

        3. thejeff

          Of course if you read the Old Testament closely, the Satan is just a position in YHWH’s divine council. It’s God’s prosecutor, not an enemy. (And there’s not even a hint that the serpent in the garden was Satan.)

        4. Yumi

          omg, loved the “cake or death” bit as a kid. She was one of the first stand up comedians I really got into.

        5. Yotomoe

          As someone who isn’t very religious I’ve always found the idea that despite everything, God loves Satan is actually a really interesting narrative throughline. Like he’s painted as this ultimate irredeemable evil and God himself is just like “yeah but he’s still my son.”
          Gives me real white beard and black beard vibes. Which it seems wrong to compare the Bible to One Piece (if only cuz I find one piece is a much more enjoyable read.)

        6. StClair

          This is what is known in “the biz” as The Problem of Evil, and it’s one that’s confounded theologians for a very long time.

        7. StClair

          (IMO, it’s unsolvable unless you back off on one or more of the absolutes (“all-“), and a lot of people aren’t willing to do that.)

    2. Taffy

      How about they start with the conclusion that liquid nitrogen isn’t very cold and go have a swim in some.

    3. biomanzilla

      I mean, Willis was a creationist once, he should be telling us.

    4. thejeff

      The Creation Research people pretend to be more scientific than that. It’s definitely conclusion driven, but they come up with elaborate reasons why science is wrong, not just “God likes to fuck with you.”

      1. Wizard

        The “God just likes to fuck with you” part is just my own conclusion. When I hear some of their special pleading and convoluted explanations for why a 6,000yo planet just looks like it’s four billion, I just can’t come up with a better theory for why God would do any of this.

  53. foducool

    I think at this point, the old man is out of f*cks to give lol

    1. deliverything

      Thomas Benjamin Wild Esq. has a song about this:
      https://youtu.be/Vqbk9cDX0l0

  54. Kyulen

    Didn’t expect myself to relate to Hank today. But at least in this strip, he’s kinda right. Joyce and Dorothy have been lying to everything and acting shitty, and barely thinking about how their actions affect other people around them for far too long lately.

    1. Thing 2

      Yes indeedy, those naughty sinners need to be punished by a vengeful God for all their naughtiness. None of it has anything to do with living in a naughty world where is is not SAFE to be yourself and there is hatred for perfectly normal human behaviour all around them. Consequences, that’s what they need, like, oh I dunno, being happy. Loving, changing, resolving, being loved. People who say they are Christian abandoning the vengeful petty god and getting to grips with the main proponent of their religion, love, forgiveness, acceptance.

      1. Gotthammer

        Hey siri what emoji best represents making a jerk off motion?

      2. Taffy

        Lol what

      3. Kyulen

        I’m starting to think you’re not even reading what I wrote before replying to me, because your replies are implying a whole bunch of bullshit that I didn’t even say.

        1. Donovan

          Literally more obsessed with ‘sinners and punishment’ than anyone i’ve ever seen them word-vomit this shit at. Its really weird.

      4. perpetual summer

        wait, are you the same person who was obsessedly counting Kyulen’s comments a while back or was that another absolute weirdo?

        1. Kyulen

          No, that was someone else. Lots of people here seem to enjoy replying weirdly to my comments these days.

        2. perpetual summer

          ahhh I see. Apologies to Thing 2 then for insinuating that, though I do still think they’re weird for continuing to engage in bad faith. At a certain point it’s a little embarrassing.

        3. eh, whatever

          It wasn’t me either, but it did become rather tiresome that you repeated yourself every day for weeks, and five times on some days.

        4. perpetual summer

          1) literally scroll past the bright red icon. it’s not hard. 2) that aside, surely you agree that searching for every comment Kyulen makes and passive-agressively replying to it because they want a reaction is a fucking weird & sort of gross way to go about making that complaint, yeah? like you just said it in a normal way, though I still think the sentiment is sort of unnecessary.

        5. Thing 2

          I am not a USAvian. I’m kinda deeply puzzled by this whole idea that Joyce and Dorothy are “bad” and therefore live should “punish” them. It seems, well, oddly fundie for fans of this comic.
          Yes. OK, I will lay off Kyulen. But it would be nice if Kyulen could lay off this theme, we have clearly got it.
          Yes. I say it in a ‘normal way’, it is just deeply weird to me. Perhaps someone could engage with that part of it with me. Meanwhile I will stop being as repetitive as Kyulen.

        6. perpetual summer

          I guess I personally feel that if you’re curious about this specific thing you can easily go to any of the strips post-kiss with like a million comments and read about it there. Because people did in fact ad-nauseum talk about why they feel this way. And you might still not agree or just realize the viewpoint is so different from your own it’s just strange, I certainly felt that way when talking about morality in media or w/e but it’s literally fine to Just Not Agree & Move On. And if you really want to /have a conversation/ about this topic, act like it. And have it with someone who wants to talk to you.

      5. Astariel

        Yes, they are bad, bad people who must be stopped and punished. Damn, that one’s getting tiresome.

        1. Thing 2

          But why? Why do fans of this comic have this thought so strongly that they keep saying it?

      6. Odditude

        Mate, I think you need a little break from the comment section haha

        Unless, this is a reply to someone else you left it here by mistake

        1. Thing 2

          Me, or Kyulen?
          If me, it is surely up to me to decide if the comments are problem enough to take a break. I’m not having a problem. I an curious. Why why why do people reading this comic think like this?

      7. Jay

        I….you’re stupid

    2. Myra V

      They’ve been panicking. There’s a reason that (as trite as it sounds) the first rule of dealing with a crisis is don’t panic – this is why. Joyce has been running on pure instinct for this entire arc, and while she absolutely thinks she’s doing the right thing, she keeps making mistakes that could easily be avoided if she came at things with a calm and measured approach. The sort of approach that Dina would bring to the conversation to just cut through the BS and lay everything that’s been revealed so far on the table (and ensure that everyone that HASN’T said what they want to say yet can do so). Which, you know, is probably why she isn’t part of the conversation (at least not yet).

      1. Spacie

        What is the second rule? Grab a towel?

        1. Myra V

          Honestly, it depends on what sort of situation you’re in – but Evaluate, Plan, Execute, Repeat is generally a good set of rules for survival. Usually a good idea to be prepared as well (though obviously you cannot be perfectly prepared for everything, having some broadly useful tools available and knowing how to use them for a wide variety of situations and tasks is very important).

          But above all else, don’t panic. Panicking does nothing but make things worse.

          And yes, I know full well about the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy reference there – and there are rather a lot of issues that having an infinite improbability drive available could solve. But that doesn’t change the fact that Don’t Panic is one of the most important pieces of advice for getting through pretty much any stressful situation.

    3. thejeff

      It’s understandable that Hank’s upset about being lied to. It’s also completely understandable that Joyce (and Becky and Dorothy and even Jocelyne) are scared of revealing that his daughters are various forms of queer. (Or even just using birth control.) Trusting Hank here is a huge risk.

      Of course, that they’re laughably bad at hiding it in their panic and that he’s almost certainly going to find out most of it anyway might make it bad strategy, but the instinct is understandable.

  55. Owlmirror

    Hank: Gah! You’re trying to distract me!
    *wheels around, points at Jocelyne*

    Hank: Joshua! Please answer a few simple questions! Look me in the eye and tell me the TRUTH!

    Hank: Are you a communist?

    Jocelyne: No. I think there are many problems with capitalism, but I am not a communist.

    Hank: Are you a terrorist?

    Jocelyne: No. Unlike the ones deploying bullets and chemical weapons, I reject political violence.

    Hank: *makes face similar to final panel of this strip*

    Hank: You know what? I’ll take it. Can we all just go get pizza now, and maybe talk about something that’s not controversial?

    Hank: By the way . . . Josh, do you need cough medicine or throat lozenges or something? Your voice sounds a little off.

    Jocelyne: Yes, I’ve been drinking lemon tea with honey for my throat.

    Hank: *brows knit, frowns* Any chance of a haircut in your future?

    Jocelyne: I’m comfortable with my hair this length, thank you.

    Hank: . . . Fine.

    Hank: So, what have you been writing lately?

    Jocelyne: I’m working on a speculative fiction piece. A man and a woman swap bodies, and have to navigate the world with their experience and instincts in conflict with their physical bodies.

    Hank: . . . Huh.

    Becky: Can my girlfriend come? She can regale us all with dinosaur facts!

    Hank: Sure, why not. Uh . . . will the dinosaur facts come with talk about millions of years?

    Becky: Probably?

    Hank: . . . Fine.

    1. Taffy

      Joyce asks for a supreme pizza.
      Hank just starts crying.

      1. Nymph

        Good. He could use a good cry.

  56. CianM1301

    Jeez, just twist the knife deeper into Becky’s heart, why don’tcha?

  57. biomanzilla

    The rest of the comic should Joyce making increasingly desperate attempts to convince Hank she’s dating Dorothy, but he just never buys it. In ten years he’s invited to their wedding and he still thinks it’s a set up.

    1. 3oranges

      I’d like to add Jocelyne coming out to Hank. Years later he still wonders what exactly was so horrible that Jocelyne would actually go through with transitioning just to keep him from finding out.

    2. Dawn

      He is literally walking Joyce down the aisle, still expecting a HA GOTCHA!

    3. and painted shark women

      I like the cut of your jib, sir/ma’am/other

  58. Freezer

    Breaks out the neck brace for the emotional whiplash Joyce gets when she sees Becky’s face.

  59. kenny

    Hank’s face is I don’t believe this. this is just another distraction or a lie.

  60. Rabid Rabbit

    Oh, wait, that’s what’s different about Hank, aside from his mysteriously growing half a foot. He’s got glasses now, just like his younger daughter.

    Hopefully they’ll help him see things more clearly.

  61. redward

    the gender neutral “sibling” to not misgender her sister without outing her ily joyce ?❤️

  62. Thing 2

    Mr B, I’m pizza, and I love Pizza. Do you like pizza? I like it. Did I say Pizza? I meant pizza.

  63. Arianod

    Hank in the last panel: “Yup, they ARE gay.”

  64. ADLegend21

    I actually think he doesn’t believe her and that’s so peak.

  65. Scruffy looking nerfherder

    I used to damn the Willis trademarked hot swap of perspective, but every time these two are on screen I yearn for it.

    1. Dot

      I wonder what Danny is up to.

      1. Taffy

        Third knuckle of his middle and ring fingers, if I had to guess.

        1. Dot

          Sal’s a lucky woman.

    2. nadamás

      Suck to be you i guess

    3. Jay

      I literally want any other plot to be happening but Joyce and Dotty macking it and being insufferably sweet with each other has taken front and center.

      Not even calling it a cheating arc at this point because the cheating literally didn’t even fucking matter to anything

  66. Agentomega

    Hank’s verbiage/framing in panel three has me headcanoning his expression in the last panel as “I don’t care if you’re into women, but dang, I didn’t think I raised you to be this cheesy.”

    (Sure, there’s also the “I’m pretty sure there’s something else you’re hiding” component, but that’s not necessarily mutually exclusive. I eagerly await tomorrow’s.)

  67. C.T Phipps

    I REALLY hope this goofy happiness is all leading to Dorothy EXPLODING when she discovers Joyce is still with Joe.

    Not because I don’t love Dorothy and Joyce.

    But I love characters when horrible things happen to them. Call it the Game of Thrones effect.

  68. anon

    dang poor becky that hank face is great but i’m sure he’d believe it as soon as he saw how disappointed becky is (tho idk if he knew she held a torch for joyce)

  69. Needfuldoer

    Oh poor Becky… 🙁

  70. Proto

    I find Hank’s reaction hilarious. Like, not even the funny face, just the “no no this is all way too much bullshit for a simple coming out”

  71. darkoneko

    Oh no. Oh, Becky. Run hug your Dina, Becky. Just go.

  72. Amós Batista

    Something said to me that Jocelyne was wrong: she’s still the most vulnerable between her snd Joyce

  73. Myra V

    I get people being annoyed at how over-the-top Joyce and Becky are acting right now – but being a high functioning autistic person myself, I’ve been through times where high-stress situations cause me to burble in a very similar way, where I just need to overwhelm whatever’s going on with my own chatter. Combine that with Joyce’s ALREADY overzealousness when it comes to relationships, and… Well, this is entirely in character for Joyce.

    I get that this is painful for Becky thanks to her still not getting over this strip: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2024/comic/book-14/04-for-me-it-was-tuesday/fluididentities/ – which we confirmed the impact that it had here: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2024/comic/book-14/04-for-me-it-was-tuesday/badinheritedthoughts/

    And Hank has been fed what he thinks is a pack of lies since the protest started (though mostly they’ve actually been true but misleading statements meant to distract and misdirect him), so his reaction is quite on point. Really, the only person I don’t feel like their reaction is on point in this scene is Jocelyne, who doesn’t seem to be NEARLY as annoyed at Joyce’s antics as I would think she’d be in that situation (and DEFINITELY a lot less than I would be) – but that may well be because she only appears in one panel today.

    Joyce and Dorothy are absolutely being adorkable in today’s strip, and I am enjoying their adorable flailing – but they are absolutely (and unintentionally) trampling all over the feelings of everyone else in the room, and I can understand others being quite annoyed with their antics. Heck, if I was in the conversation, I’d be annoyed with them as well. But watching it from the outside? I can find the entire thing cute and adorable in a “puppy love can make you do stupid things,” sort of way.

    1. Sam

      It seems on point for Jocelyne to me as I am pretty sure she is aware that Joyce and Dorothy are together given she was literally right there… and she wasn’t admitting to being trans out of a desire to, but to try to shield Joyce so yeah, she’s not mad, Joyce is doing this to prevent Jocelyne being forced to out herself or feel compelled to for her sake.

      It’s siblings protecting siblings from having to reveal info about themselves that could result in a bad time with parents.

      1. Li

        ^^^ this.

        It would be so very different if Jocelyne hadn’t basically said out loud with her mouth that she was only coming out to Hank to distract him so that he wouldn’t realize Joyce is bi.

  74. Da Boy

    Oh hey you can see Becky’s heart fall apart from here.

  75. Matrix

    Joe isn’t there but he is also feeling his heart breaking like Becky

    1. Vulcanodon

      Reminds me of that scene in “Twisters” where Bill is declaring his continuing love for Jo while Melissa is listening on the radio. As Philip Seymour Hoffman looks on.

  76. NotPiffany

    The best part of this strip is “Zip it, sibling!” Even while panicking, Joyce is refusing to either out or misgender her sister.

    1. Dot

      See, I don’t know how to feel about that. She was just taught by Dorothy that in order to protect Jocelyne, she may on occasion have to affirmatively misgender her. And yet here she is, ostensibly to protect Jocelyne from having to come out on her account, and she is still refusing to do it. It’s probably fine here, but what happens when Carol comes calling and is asking more intrusive questions?

      1. Big Z

        TBH, I fully expect at least part of the resolution of this to be that Joyce starts just hanging up on Carol if she deigns to call at all. It seems somewhat likely that their interaction with Hank will end up in one of two places:

        1) “Hey, dad ended up being cool about this. I don’t have to put up with parents who aren’t cool about this.”
        2) “Jeez, dad was cool about Becky and he STILL exploded, I am DEFINITELY not going to talk to the parent who SUPPORTED Toedad.”

        1. Dot

          See I was more thinking Carol showing up at the dorm again.

        2. Big Z

          One can only hope, if that happens, that Joe goes even MORE feral without Joyce to hold him back.

          Carol: “You! Young man who’s dating my atheist hussy daughter! Where is she?”
          Joe: *eyes turn red* “DIVORCE SUUUUUUUUCKS!”

        3. Big Z

          Reference.

          Aside, this is the shit that makes ME feral when people say these two weren’t both a great couple and fun to watch.

        4. Donovan

          I miss them already

        5. Thing 2

          HAS anyone said they weren’t a great couple and fun to watch?

        6. Dot

          Yes, absolutely. There were a lot of JoJo naysayers in the comments.

        7. Big Z

          Yeah, everything from “too conventional” to “must be comphet, she can’t actually like him” to “anything that stands in the way of Doyce must be bad” to “actually he hasn’t had enough of a redemption arc, dunno why she likes him”.

        8. Li

          I mean I’m also gonna throw my hat in the ring for “liked them as platonic friends, was disappointed when they became romantic”. It took me a long time to come around on that.

      2. thejeff

        Yeah, if there weren’t dozens of wilder things going on right now, “sibling” would jump out as a weirdness that risks questions. I doubt Joyce has ever called any of them “sibling” before in her life.

      3. superglucose

        Eh, the cis never notice when you start degendering your language around closeted trans people.

        1. Donovan

          Unfortunately, they can notice

    2. anon

      well she has learned a lot in college, wonder if there’s other terms besides keg stands she found

      at least she didn’t show hank her list about potentially pegging joe and otherwise

  77. perpetual summer

    I personally don’t find it terribly productive to comment about how boring these 2 are every other strip they’re doing their thing in but part of that is because the other haters have got me on that one. Shoutouts

    Anyways Becky in the background is funny to me. She really swallowed her complicated emotions about this + her self worth issues to help these two for nothing (…I guess Jocelyne was informed in the meantime) PLUS she has to watch them do PDA. Also Hanks expression is really good.

    1. Zaxares

      I actually had a different read on her expression in the last panel. The last few strips have been her basically doing some Olympic-level emotional suppression because she was just hyper-focusing on the task of keeping Hank distracted. But now that Joyce has just come out and ruined her efforts, she once again has to be fully confronted with the realization that, yup, her first (and possibly greatest) love is full on gay for Dorothy and she’s even thinking about lifelong marriage and the problem was just her all the time, wasn’t it? SPIRAL-INTO-DEPRESSION-AND-SELF-LOATHING

      Meanwhile, I have to say that I’m still not pleased with Joyce de-railing Jocelyne’s coming out like this. Yes, maybe she would have preferred to keep it under wraps a bit longer and chosen a better time and place, but it looked like she had “made up her mind” and decided this was going to be it. I can’t speak for her, but if I was in her shoes, I’d be mightily peeved at Joyce for disrupting something so important that I wanted to say.

      1. Dot

        Add to that: “I sacrificed my own comfort and ability to process everything that just happened to fall on this grenade for her, and it meant nothing. It was pointless. I’m pointless. I’m useless. I’m less than useless.” etc etc etc allll that negative self-talk is swirling around in her brain rn

        1. StClair

          I really, sincerely hope she gets out of this situation ASAP and finds her rad girlfriend and unpacks some of this.

          She needs to not be here, and to NOT “not be anywhere”, or “not be”.

        2. Dot

          Yuuuup

        3. Thing 2

          Or not. Falling on a grenade means total dismemberment. I get that it is a simile, but it is desperately extreme. “… it meant nothing. It was pointless. I’m pointless. I’m useless. I’m less than useless …” is an extreme position to take as a reaction. And readings of Jocelyne so far have been that she’s pretty level-headed.

        4. Thing 2

          Or Becky, if that is who was meant.

        5. Dot

          Becky is most certainly not in a level-headed frame of mind right now.

    2. Jay

      Why I haven’t been commenting.

      I’ve made my thoughts on this arc perfectly clear at this point and they haven’t changed.

      Jotty isn’t cute rn its just fucking annoying and disappointing because them being gay is taking precedent over every scene they’re in instead of idk LITERALLY ANYTHING ELSE IN THE PLOT HAPPENING

  78. The Queer Agenda [frog memes]

    Hank, sighing: Becky?

    Becky, startled: Yes, Mr. B?

    Hank: Do you still want pizza?

    Becky: Do I ever!

    Hank: The rest of you figure out your story by the time we get back, and maybe I’ll bring some takeout. Let’s go, Becky.

    (Love the awkward Dorothy and determined Joyce faces in panel 4.)

    1. Da Boy

      Yeah this is too much nonsense to deal with on an empty stomach XD

  79. Charlotte

    I love that they’re doing their thing and I love how unrepentantly cute they are while doing it.

  80. Needfuldoer

    Dorothy’s throat puffs up like a bullfrog’s as a defense mechanism.

    (Seriously where does that chin go when she’s facing the camera?)

  81. goggleman64

    Willis, that Hank face is one of the best expressions in all of Dumbing of Age XD

  82. Big Z

    “Wife”, Joyce? My god, your Hallmark Movie Syndrome understanding of the world has metastasized, hasn’t it?

    Meanwhile, we can all hope that Hank’s face is more like “I knew my kid was a complete idiot for romance, but there’s a time and place!” rather than any serious bigotry.

    1. Dot

      Honestly Joyce calling Dorothy her wife is a little less sugary sweet and a little more concerning in the context of the Hallmark Original approach she’s taken to relationships!

  83. C.T Phipps

    I think Jocelyne only planning to out herself to Hank to save Joyce is something I hope is disproved. They need to be shown they’re not the main concern for the majority of people here.

    1. nadamás

      I don’t see why she wouldn’t be a concern for Jocelyne specifically. And she pretty much spelled it out last strip “i am afraid i am not longer the most vulnerable”.

  84. Steamweed

    And now for the rest of his life, Hank will not believe Joyce is any kind of queer. 100% straight, that’s Joyce. Dorothy and Joyce can do 10 minutes of making out, and he will just think they’re covering for something.

  85. Opinion

    I think Hank drove to campus out of a genuine desire to make sure his kids were safe. The misinformation built into his media bubble made him afraid of the wrong side, but based on the information that he had he thought his kids were in danger and is taking action to protect them

    I also think in very short order he is about to be told
    – Joyce is gay
    – Joycelyne is trans
    -his daughter has spent the morning telling him things that are untrue
    -(possibly) his understanding of the protest is wrong
    -(possibly) some of the “true” “facts ” his news sources have been telling him are in fact not true.
    -(if he remembers the birth control) Joyce is taking a medication he has been told it is morally wrong for her to take.

    That’s alot of information for anyone to process quickly. Especially starting from a Fundamental Christian starting point its a big shift to get to being okay with all that. Heck just look at how much it took for Joyce to undo her programming, its not easier if the person has been programmed for more than twice as long. Logically even if Hank is the perfect most well intentioned person thats alot of adjustment and a long way to go mentally from where hes starting. 0% chance he navigates this perfect. But I dont think the comments are gonna give much slack if he fumbles this.

    1. Niklarean

      Plus pretty much everyone involved has been having a very rough 24 hours (since the protest was only the yesterday), so…tensions are high. You’re probably right about the comments not being likely to give him much slack.

    2. Vulcanodon

      Also Joyce is an atheist. Literally every single thing his fundy frame has ever feared…

    3. thejeff

      He’s definitely dealing with a lot today, but I think it’s important that he hasn’t said one word about being worried about Jocelyne’s safety. He hasn’t asked if she was alright or anything like that. He hasn’t given the slightest hint that her being at physical risk has even crossed his mind.

  86. ValdVin

    This is always a fun webcomic moment.

    QC readers may remember Faye and “boyfling”. This is from Leftover Soup.

  87. Zamperla

    Oh, Becky. Im sorry, sweetheart.

    …but also this makes me think of my friends who 100% call each other their Wife all the time and it’s SO cute to me. (they aren’t married.)

  88. Andy

    Poor Hank. So many stories being told. So many lies and bs piled on top of each other. He should ask Becky to sort this out and just let him know.

    1. Myra V

      Well, the good news is I think we’re finally at the point where the lies will start to be peeled away – the question is how long will it take Hank to recognize the truths that are being told after having so many ill-conceived lies thrown in his face already?

      It’s… probably going to be a process.

    2. StClair

      That should not be Becky’s responsibility to deal with. Especially not right now.

    3. thejeff

      Becky was one of those lying to him (or at least trying to distract him to hide the other lies.) Why would he trust her to let him know? That’s what she was trying to set up before.

      Beyond that though, while I understand sympathizing with Hank here, I don’t really care. It’s a rough situation, but it’s one he built himself. There are reasons his daughters are afraid to trust him. He earned that fear over years and he’s going to have to earn trust back.

  89. Big Z

    Further thought: I’m gonna say — as a Dad myself — it wouldn’t surprise me if Hank has achieved total understanding of the entire context of these two dorks’ relationship, including both the amount of foreshadowing AND how long it’s been official AND the fact there’s some fermenting chaos underneath it, from just this one exchange.

    1. Li

      I particularly enjoy the context of remembering standing up to him and Carol about being friends with Dorothy as Joyce’s first-ever defiance of her father.

      It wasn’t romantic at the time! But like, why should he think so?

  90. twiz

    Hank: “Yeah yeah everyone is so surprised. What were you going to say, Joshua?”

    Also I feel for Becky, but I hope she remembers soon how she has the best SO out of the entire cast and moves on.

    1. Dot

      As annoying as the endless “yeah we already knew” reactions have been Hank doing it would be pretty funny

  91. Astariel

    Love Dorothy being all awkward in panel 1. Love Joyce and her Freudian wife slip in panel 4. Feel a bit bad for Becky in panel 5.

  92. Byron Orpheus

    Hank’s internal monologue: “Great. Teen romance drama. The one thing I understand and it had to be that.”

  93. Jernacious

    Joyce: “And this is Dorothy…” 🙂

    Hank: “…”

    Joyce: 🙂

    Hank: “Oh! No, don’t you dare!”

    Joyce: 🙂

    Hank: “Don’t you dare!”

    Joyce: 🙂

    Hank: “Don’t-”

    Joyce: (Borat-voice) “Mah wi-ive!” 😀

    Hank: “For God’s sake…”

    Joyce: 🙂

    Dorothy: 🙂

    Becky 🙁

  94. Daikaiju

    Well, could have been worse. This could be her mom hearing all this.

  95. Leadsynth

    Ugh! I feel like Joyce is ruining Jocelyne’s big announcement, AND all the being cutesy with Dorothy is probably making Becky feel just awful. Do better, Joyce!

  96. profnekko

    well let’s hope that Joyce didn’t mention dating Joe to Hank or she’s just going to do her thing and dig her hole deeper by doing a “Joe means nothing to me Dorothy is everything!” while Joe comes into earshot

  97. Jdorr

    I wonder who would feel more uncomfortable right now if Joyce’s current Joe situation popped up? Hank or Dorothy?

  98. Li

    Also: I feel for Becky here too but idk about all the “where is Dina when you need her, Becky deserves someone who values her” comments, because Dina is not Becky’s emotional support pet, and I don’t really want her to show up right now just in time to get to also feel heartbroken??

    https://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-6/02-that-perfect-girl/thoughtless/

    It’s just really giving me this smash-cut, tbh.

    1. Rogue 7

      That’s an interesting row to hoe.

      Because on the one hand you’re 100% correct that Dina is her own person with her own wants and needs.

      But on the other, the notion that one should be able to lean on one’s partner for emotional support is, at least in my experience, a definite expectation of many if not most committed relationships.

      1. Big Z

        There’s something to be said for the idea that it might be a little fraught to ask your current partner to help with emotional support while you work through your feelings about your best friend and former(?) crush ending up being into girls after all, just not you.

        THAT is the kind of stuff that sad advice column letters are made of.

        1. Rogue 7

          I’d say r/relationship_advice, but that place is terrible and I actively hateread it to be honest.

        2. AK

          I wish that place were any good. Used to hang around there to get a sense of what the general public perception of certain ideas are (get out of my bubble a little) but honestly it is much less stressful no longer spending time there and I’m not sure I was contributing enough of value to be worth the stress.

          In all honesty, I had fairly good success in anonymous chat rooms for this stuff when I was a teenager/young adult? I know people nowadays do not like it when adults have conversations with kids on the internet, but there’s something very special about going a place full of people who have more experience than you and being allowed to talk without consequences about your life and have them relate and give advice and talk about their own stuff back. I dunno. I’m honestly not sure if or where that kind of culture exists anymore online. RIP Omegle and most forums.

        3. Li

          We have lost much of the anonymity of the internet and we no longer teach kids basic internet safety, so it’s now pretty dangerous for them to talk to adults online, which sucks on pretty much every level, because intergenerational friendships are very important.

        4. Li

          This exactly.

          Romantic partners, like FRIENDS, are indeed supposed to support each other! I’m extremely dubious of all of the “every form of seeking support is automatically trauma-dumping” stuff going on on tiktok.

          But this isn’t just anything people are suggesting Dina should materialize to comfort Becky about, and it is strange to me that people are specifically calling for Dina to materialize while complaining about how mean Joyce is being to Becky by not considering Becky’s feelings and how watching this is wounding her.

          Like, you can’t have it both ways. If Joyce is harming Becky right now by rubbing her previous heartbreak in her face, then Becky would also be harming Dina by asking her to come be reminded that she was Becky’s rebound and that Becky is still this hung up on Joyce.

          Mind you: I don’t think there are any villains here; I don’t think Becky is being fundamentally crappy to Dina by having feelings, and I don’t think Joyce is being fundamentally crappy to Becky by having feelings. But I do think the “Becky deserves to be loved by someone for whom she’s not an afterthought” crowd is… well. Asking Dina to come here to provide selfless love for Becky while she is, currently, herself, being an afterthought for Becky.

          And that’s a bit of a crummy attitude that I don’t think people are thinking through.

  99. ElderlyMarxist

    aw, poor becky </3

  100. Borg

    I wonder if he’s going to notice the contextually weird non-specificity of “zip it, sibling” amongst everything else going on here.

  101. Chasey

    Waiting for Hank to just throw his hands up and leave.

  102. Val

    NGL this comic is getting incredibly stressful, I’m terrified..

  103. Marvelman

    I don’t think Hank is buying it.

  104. Micki

    How funny would it be if Hank just straight up thought they were lying again to cover up whatever is really going on.

    And then Jocelyne can finally come out for real ?

  105. Antisolanum

    It would be really funny if the Jocelyn thing was an absolutely legitimate fear but he was actually totally neutral about the gay thing, like “yeah whatever I don’t care”, not even particularly supportive or an ally but a “…what? Sure, who cares”

  106. Quinn

    Has anyone floated the possibility that he actually believes her but…

    A) it’s just a phase.

    B) it’s okay for girls to be gay, but not men.

    1. yak

      Could be both of those, but he seemed to instantly perceive that Joyce is trying to cover for Jocelyn, so it might not be relevant to him whether what Joyce is saying is true right now.

    2. Quinn

      She did jump in and take a metaphorical bullet for her. Hard to miss when it’s right in your face.

  107. Rectilinear Propagation

    David always makes S-rank facial expressions.

    I’m not actually going to give up my current Sarah face for Hank in the last panel, but I’m tempted!

  108. wakeangel2001

    oh just have Jim come in, have this dude realize his daughter is actually a polyamorous bisexual and his son is actually another daughter and watch his brain just ooze out of his ears

  109. Pappenheimer

    Man, it must be go week for declarations of lesbian love.

    “Purple, red beans and rice, and the Tombs of Atuan. I know you, Xiaoling Chavez.”

    From Dresden Codak

  110. Boh No

    Oh my god because this relationship was birthed in the fires of protest these gals keep flirting it up in bad situations because it’s literally the pinnacle of their inception as girlfriends nooooooo ;___;

  111. BYM!

    I feel like Becky had a “Well at least I can still be useful to Joyce and Jocelyne” thing going and now that’s kinda out the window too. Man somebody’s gotta talk to Becky, pleaseeeeee

  112. Steamweed

    I must remember to use “Zip it, sibling!” on one of my siblings sometime soon.
    (tbh most of them deserve it)

  113. Jade

    I see you, Becky “eyes filled with longing and sadness” MacIntyre ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°).

    It’s amazing how Willis can make little bean-shaped eyes so expressive!

  114. Lee

    This would be very cute if (a) Becky wasn’t having to witness it and (b) about 50-60% of the strips we’ve gotten about these two being buffoons since the protest had been us finding out a little more about how Amber was doing / if there’s an arrest warrant for AG, somebody *anybody* other than Sarah minding all the cheating or the fact that Joyce *still* hasn’t mentioned the polyamory to Dorothy, and well what the hell I’d also like to know what Leslie has been up to lately.

    Don’t @ me, sickos.

  115. Suet

    I feel every single person in this. Except Ken, they covered him.

    marking this strip down for “who’s taking the lead in this relationship”…

  116. Michelle J Caboose

    Awww… That’s so sweet! They’re such very good friends! Possibly even future roommates!

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