913

Strength
Posted on November 5, 2015 by David M Willis

913 thoughts on “Strength”

  1. Doctor_Who

    SHORYUKEN!

    1. inqntrol

      HADOUKEN!

      1. TheBrigeedaRocks

        DAD-OUKEN

        1. Ana Chronistic

          DAD-TOE-KEN

        2. saki

          DAD-TOE-CAN’T

        3. Betty Anne

          KAMEHAMEHA

          …wait.

        4. Inkblot

          Half of me says violence is wrong

          Other half says screw that, Ross is a dick (and has been violent enough) and this feels oh-so-very-cathartic

        5. Meebo

          My opinion? In most situations, violence is not the answer.

          A kidnapping in progress is not most situations.

        6. Porthos9438

          Exactly! Violence is wrong. Ross is now finding out how his violent actions are catching up with him.

        7. Potatamoto

          Violence is indeed the last refuge of the ignorant. The intelligent (and/or badass) use it right at the beginning.

        8. Rowen Morland

          Karma.

        9. Yet_One_More_Idiot

          “Violence is never the answer”? Bollocks to that, Violence is the answer to the question “What does Ross deserve right now for attempting to fucking kidnap his own daughter?”

          Also, Ross, God has apparently given you the strength to get knocked the fuck out by sweet little Joycy. And it couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy. 😀

        10. TheNinthShader

          Wait a sec, ana wasnt first? ITS THE END OF THE WORLD

        11. Oruncrest

          But seriously thou, “Violence is never the answer. Violence should be the question.”

          {laughs as Joyce clobbers Toedad}

          “The answer is Yes!”

        12. Ghola

          Violence is always the answer.
          It’s the best answer.
          Want to remove a long lasting problem without lingering consequences? Violence!
          Violence until the consequences are over!

        13. Cody B

          Otoesan!

        14. I Eat Cheese

          if violence is never the answer, then what is the answer to the question “what is never the answer?”

          maybe it is violence

        15. Ruby Droplets

          DID YOU KNOW! “Violence is Wrong” is actual a misquote. The full quote is, “Violence is always wrong, but sometimes necessary.”

        16. Trolldrool

          Violence is wrong if there are other options. Unfortunately, there are always variables and not all of them allow us the time to explore other options. In this case, the main variable is Ross being unwilling to listen to anything except the dogmatic memories of his traditions, as well as showing that he’s willing to take extreme measures to enforce them.

        17. Dallium

          If brute force fails to solve any problem, it’s because you didn’t use enough.

        18. Truk2

          The funny thing is very few people I’ve run into can adaquetely define what violence is. But most are willing to impose very absolutist ‘answers’ and restriction on how you respond to a situation.

          I define violence as any application of force that comes with an inherent risk of harm. (not a quote. My own musings). Hence violence extends to emotional, physical, and even finanical actions.

          An extention of this is that it’s not about ‘avoiding violence’, its about first deciding when it is ok to apply force, and also minimising harm. This means first being philosophically aware of your values, and then looking at the outcomes rather than the first immediate action (however good it may feel)

          This is why Sal is right. Amazi-Girl is fun, but she is not a harm minimiser. She makes things likely to end badly. And also, why a strong violent first response can sometimes result in less harm than a drawn out less strong response.

        19. Pierre-Eric

          THEPIPESAREBROKEN

        20. extremist343

          May the force be with you!

        21. Betty Anne

          Looks like Toedad should have checked himself…

        22. Betty Anne

          Dangit, that was supposed to be a new comment, not a reply. :/

        23. DarkMyste

          becky-toe-dad-kin

        24. DarkMyste

          err joycehakdutoedad

      2. Animedingo

        IDLIKESOMEPOUNDCAKE

        1. Tandel

          So THAT’S what they’re saying!

        2. TheNinthShader

          IN THE FAAAAAAAAAAACEE

      3. evilmidnightlurker

        HADOUHOU!*

        * Hadouken = Wave Motion Fist. Hadouhou = Wave Motion Gun.

        1. ninja_jesus

          What about Hatouhou?

        2. evilmidnightlurker

          Wave Bullet Hell?

        3. That Damn Rat

          Waves of girls in frilly hats is a more accurate translation I believe.

        4. MortartarSaws

          I get that reference!

        5. Kamino Neko

          Pigeon gun?

        6. Resident SnipeFish

          Perfect gravatar for that comment.

        7. Deanatay

          Nope. Spider gun. Sal is jealous.

        8. WolfLann

          Oh I’m sure Sal is falling in love right now.

        9. Deanatay

          Sal?? Think about Becky!!

        10. Kamino Neko

          But ‘spider’ is ‘gumo’ not ‘hato’.

        11. HMRC4EVR

          Joyce is Derek Wildstar.

          And Wildstar just pulled the trigger on Toedad

        12. evilmidnightlurker

          Exactly. 😀

    2. Ana Chronistic

      Joyce hit so hard she knocked the site a full minute out of its usual update timeframe

      1. Idon'tcarenomore

        Which is outstanding, but…how is Toedad standing up to begin with. Broken knees and all? Guess they weren’t.

        1. horrorshow88

          Adrenaline is a hell of a thing, and I’m betting he’s full of it.

        2. Aeron

          The rush of being rebuked by a girl, for another girl, chased by two girls while being reported on by the first girl, kicked by a one of the two girls, who was rescued by a girl, accompanied by yet another girl, who was trying to save the first girl, then finally being punched by the girl who came with the girl who rescued one of the two girls who was racing after the first girl.

        3. Deanatay

          So, grrl rush, then?

        4. doubleW

          Oh he’s full of it, all right

        5. That guy

          Well, I think we can all agree he’s full of it.

      2. Jason

        Well, spoilers here (well wild guesses anyhow), but Joyce hit him so hard, she killed her own trauma and fear regarding strangers and date rape and such. 😉
        Oh, also, Joyce seems to be channeling It’sWalky Joyce lately, counterbalancing the bike during that catch, and now Falcon Punch? Inner Badass, unleashed!

        1. Historyman68

          I think that if powerful punches killed trauma, Amazi-Girl would be doing a lot better emotionally…

        2. Failed by the System

          Achievement Unlocked?

    3. Just A. Thinker

      Just plain JVT (Joyce Vs Toedad)

    4. NoHeart6265

      Next strip: C-C-C-COMBO!

      1. lejwocky

        DEADLY TRIANGLE BEAM

      2. Strangeshapes

        Your gravatar makes this comment 28% better!

      3. Porthos9438

        Sal puts herbike tire on his face and revs the engine. 247 hit shredding combo!!

        1. Screwball

          ULTRAAAAA!!!

        2. Dio

          GOD LIKE COMBO.

    5. Ben

      I wish there were likes on here… so that I could give you one million of them.

    6. Yotomoe

      How dare you. The shoryuken is a spinning uppercut and I will not have such a proud technique mocked in such a manner.

      1. Doctor_Who

        Hey, I know what I’m talking about. The Shoryuken was taught to Heihachi Mishima by the Lin Kuei master Captain Falcon. It’s the ultimate technique in Shaq Fu.

        After Mishima defeated the Skullgirl, he was declared King of Fighters, and founded the Novus Orbis Librarium to defend Urth from the vampire (and two time Dead or Alive Beach Volleyball champion) Demitri Maximoff.

        1. IceMateria

          You forgot the part where Mishima was a Street Fighter, after training with the Virtua Fighter helmet given to him by the Super Smash Bros. Heihachi got one helluva Killer Instict when he had mastered the shoryuken because he began engaging in Motal Kombat. He later would meet his end by an unforseen Divekick. It did a million damage, and he had 100 health.

        2. IceMateria

          *Killer Instinct

        3. Dio

          Smash Brothers isn’t really a fighting game if you think about it.

        4. Jupiterror

          How is it not?

        5. Dio

          Because its not even a video game really.

          (its a joke from LPer’s, The Super Best Friends, to mess with people who take playing the game way to seriously.)

    7. Cheryl

      I think you guys are looking for FALCON PUNCH!!!! Because she just showed her moves.

    8. SonicBlueRanger

      You are an asshole kidnapper that looks like a toe BUT I AM A JOYCE!

      1. HMRC4EVR

        Someone is going to flash the Linkara signal on that one.

  2. Ana Chronistic

    –FLY!

    The knack lies in learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss.

    One problem is that you have to miss the ground accidentally. It’s no good deliberately intending to miss the ground because you won’t. You have to have you attention suddenly distracted by something else when you’re halfway there, so that you are no longer thinking about falling, or about the ground, or about how much it’s going to hurt if you fail to miss it.

    For instance, you might think instead about your face connecting with a strong right hook.

    1. Just A. Thinker

      At first, I thought she’d hit him with a camo-colored piece of… something.

    2. Carriethedragon

      To those who’d ground me, take a message back from me:
      Tell them how I am defying gravity
      I’m flying high, defying gravity

      (I think I just figured out who this chapter’s title is REALLY about.)

      1. Benjamin Geiger

        … given Toedad’s motivations, “Wicked” is rather appropriate anyway…

    3. Clif

      I would have said Joyce grounded him.

    4. A Scientist

      Don’t panic.

    5. Idon'tcarenomore

      Hitchhikers Guide to the Universe reference. “There is no trick to flying, just aim at the ground….and miss’ Love that one.

      Toedad is not going to miss.

    6. Mr. Random

      Wait, is that my bag?

    7. Meebo

      My favorite thing about that part is that “throw yourself at the ground and miss” is actually how orbits work.

      Also, got my towel.

    8. Hehe... Llamas

      I give this post… a THUMBS UP

      1. Gigafreak

        Thumbs go up when toes go down

    9. octochan

      I give this post… a TOES UP

  3. Mandy

    YES. GOOD.

    1. Just A. Thinker

      EXCELLENT! EVERYTHING IS GOING ACCORDING TO PLAN! MWAHAHAHAHA!

  4. Just A. Thinker

    You go, girl!

    1. Gigafreak

      “You hit like a girl” must be a compliment in the Dumbing of Age world

      Most dudes I know can’t uppercut a motherfucker that amazingly

      1. Kintrex

        It’s a common trope in movies and tv series that people who have never thrown a punch before will be able to do it really well when it actually matters.

        1. egwenna

          Part of it comes from not knowing just how much your hand might hurt.

  5. David Alexander McDonald

    GO, JOYCE!

    1. Just A. Thinker

      *Waves DRAGONS chearleader pom-poms* RAH RAH RAH STUB THAT TOE LIKE HE DON’T KNOW RAH RAH RAH

      1. Disloyal Subject

        BIM BAM BEE! KICK ‘IM IN THE KNEE! BIM BAM BASS! KICK ‘IM IN THE OTHER KNEE!

        1. TheNinthShader

          I was going to submit an obligatory IN THE FAAAAAAACE reply, but Ive already done that two times today… hmm JOYCE PUNCHED HIM FOR A NICKEL!

    2. Yet_One_More_Idiot

      NOBODY messes with our Joycy’s family! NOBODY! 😀

  6. Victor Riley

    Strength to what? You didn’t finish!

    1. Just A. Thinker

      Strength to turn the other cheek, of course. I mean, Joyce certainly turned his cheek. With her fist.

      1. nothri

        And as a good Christian, she’s duty bound to turn the other one.

    2. Moonshine McGee

      strength to…weight ratio of a wet paper doll, it would seem.

      1. N0083rP00F

        Water is incompressible when it come to high speed impacts. It’s like diving off the golden gate bridge or getting towel snapped at the pool. Wet towels hurt more for a reason.

      2. Benwhoski

        I think this is my favorite “finish that sentence” comment.

    3. Yotomoe

      The Strength to make any girl under the age of 19’s fist explode after punching me.

    4. Tacos

      The strength to get knocked the fuck down.

      1. Smiling Cat

        In the hereafter, God, Aslan, and Dab are watching the fight on God’s big screen.

        Aslan says “give him some more strength, I want to see her knock him down again.”

        1. fizzywafflezsuperstore

          I don’t often use “lol” for it is often inaccurate.

          However, in this case, I really did lol.

        2. HMRC4EVR

          You know, Wiz and Boomstick over at Death Battle could make a ton of folks happy by doing this as one of their matches.

    5. maarvarq

      To be punched into the middle of next week?

    6. CianM1301

      Joyce: “Oh, I’m sorry, did I break your concentration?”

  7. phi

    YEEEEESSSS

    1. Airyu

      It’s the most satisfying comic in the history of the airyu internet.

      1. Airyu

        I typed this on my phone and I don’t know why it put in a second “airyu” there (airyu is one of the words I added to my phone dictionary)

    2. Just A. Thinker

      Willis, you, sir, just won the internet. Unfortunately, we’ll have to reposes the internet in order to make up for all the times we’ve damned you.

  8. saki

    You go Joyce! Man I can’t enough of all these characters kicking (Ross’s) ass! =D

    1. saki

      Also, the end of that sentence is definitely “bully teenagers into submission”.

    2. Just A. Thinker

      The end of that sentence is probably “given me the strength to remain ignorant and oblivious to my own hypocrisy.”

      1. saki

        Or, like, “given me the strength to resist any and all contradicting opinions and facts”.

        1. Just A. Thinker

          That too

  9. m-m

    “FINISH HIM!”

    1. Just A. Thinker

      NOOO! Becky still loves him!

      1. Strangeshapes

        Give him a Babality and home someone raises him better the next time.

        1. Kiggy

          ^THIS^

        2. TheNinthShader

          Fatality!

        3. timemonkey

          Babality is a physical change, not mental.

          ….Is it weird I know that?

      2. Disloyal Subject

        Hey, a brutal lecture would cut deeper than any Fatality if it got through his resolute denial of opposing viewpoints.

        1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

          He wouldn’t listen. Only thing for the likes of him is force.

        2. Disloyal Subject

          I know it’s a pretty big ‘if,’ but I think a Joyce wielding the wrath of God has a better chance than anything else.

        3. AutobotDen

          Not likely. Toedad’s a conservative “Christian” (I use that term EXTREMELY loosely, based on experience), and still thinks he’s in the right. He sees Joyce, Becky, and their gender as inferior, and even if Joyce was somehow able to put the fear of God into him, he’d still maintain that he was acting in his family’s best interests.

        4. Deathstalker

          You know, I get tired of this. It’s the No True Scotsman fallacy. A Christian did something bad, so they aren’t a Christian. Bullshit. They are a Christian, they have been up to that point. They don’t magically stop being.

          Most Christians might not act like that, but they are Christians. Christians have done FAR worse. Someone pointed out recently that Militant Islam very much resembles much of earlier Christianity. Nothing ISIS has done has not been done by Christians, and worse. Are you to say that those people were not Christians?

          Within just about any group of people there are good and bad people. The percentages may be higher in some groups, but I find that whole Christians are always good a bunch of crap.

          We had someone assassinated in my city, in a church by a Christian, for religious reasons. Much like Toedad here, and because of that, I’m not going to let someone claim even a stretch to call them Christian. If I look at the actions of Jesus in the bible, I’d have to start eliminating whole swaths of the Christians. You might as well compare Communists (Leninists, Stalinists, and Maoists for example) to Marx’s book. They hold up about as well.

        5. Mindlink

          “Nothing ISIS has done has not been done by Christians, and worse. Are you to say that those people were not Christians?”

          No, they were not, and ISIS were never Muslim.
          Saying there’s something “magical” about that, is like saying that a person that removes all its clothes somehow magically stops being clothed.
          It’s not magic, it’s removing the defining characteristics.

        6. fizzywafflezsuperstore

          “Saying there’s something “magical” about that, is like saying that a person that removes all its clothes somehow magically stops being clothed.
          It’s not magic, it’s removing the defining characteristics.”

          -Mindlink, November 5, 2015 (7:52 AM)

        7. The Biggest Tom

          The No True Scotsman is a fallacy ONLY when offered without proof. To use a less controversial example, I can declare that “A Christian believes Jesus is God’s son.” Well, as the Arian heresy demonstrates pretty clearly, there are some people who can call themselves Christian but believe things that are totally different.

          It is therefore NOT a No True Scotsman to declare that “Christians” who don’t believe a minimum defined set of beliefs are not, in fact, True Christians.

          In addition, the No True Scotsman only applies to practical examples. If I say that “No Christian should ignore the poor,” and you say “I saw a Christian ignoring the poor just the other day,” it is NOT fallacious to say “He should not have ignored the poor,” even though that’s exactly the same thing as saying “No TRUE Christian should ignore the poor.” The argument was made as an ideal to hold people to, and nobody knows better than Christians how easy it is to forget the more inconvenient teachings and beliefs like “Sell everything and help those in need” or “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” We get it. We’re flawed. Not every Christian is going to be able to do what is right all the time. However, we SHOULD be trying to help the poor, and we SHOULD be kind and understanding to others, and it’s definitely not a fallacy to say that we and those like us *ought* to do it in response to the accusation that we *haven’t been* doing it.

        8. Reltzik

          Look. Christianity is not a well-defined category. It isn’t even defined with a gray border-area, the way “clothed” versus “unclothed” might be.

          Instead, it’s overly-defined. There’s thousands of DIFFERENT definitions floating around out there, distinct from and mutually-exclusive with each other in a bunch of subtly different ways, and no one definition is universally accepted as the “correct” one. For nearly every doctrinal or behavioral standard you might wish to apply, there’s going to be at least an entire denomination of identifying Christians that fall outside of that.

        9. Random832

          The No True Scotsman thing also isn’t a fallacy when applied to matters of (arguable) definition. There’s a reason you see it cited as “No True Scotsman puts sugar on porridge” and not “No True Scotsman lacks both Scottish ancestry and British citizenship”.

          For a religion, it’s not inherrently fallacious to assert that some doctrinal matter is part of the definition, and therefore that people who claim to be Christians without meeting that definition are heretics.

        10. NotPiffany

          I imagine when the cops show up, he’ll start “justifying” his behavior to them, expecting them to back him up.

        11. NichFlamel

          I certainly hope so – preferably, he get’s maced/tazed when going for his gun, as being unconscious when they arrive won’t be as satisfying

        12. EgalitarianIam

          I have to disagree the first three crusades for instance were defensive wars, actually studied the subject. People do horriable/evil things and think they are justified because of ideology/belief

  10. chefhoag

    YYYYEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    1. Just A. Thinker

      You’ve just got to love Becky’s smile when she sees Joyce…

      1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

        Her look of consternation is less pleasant.

  11. CaptainBatson

    I’m gettin’ SEMME flashbacks.

    1. Just Me

      I was just thinking that Joyce was channeling her Alternate Universe Self. She is, after all, wearing the same outfit.

      Amazed that Ross could even walk.

      You go girl! Show him your Righteous Right Hook.

      1. Just A. Thinker

        Somehow, BOTH Roth and Joyce are channeling the Power of Righteous Fury!

        1. HMRC4EVR

          Next strip Joyce goes flame red as she channels Bruning Justice!

      2. BenRG

        I’m increasingly wondering if Willis has tired of ‘everyday college life’ and has decided to turn this into the ‘How the Gang Got Together’ story of the Justice League Bloomington!

        1. HMRC4EVR

          If so I’m guessing it’ll rotate between adventures that deserved to be on JLU and shennangians worthy of the Justice League Antartica

        2. BenRG

          I’m glad that I’m not the only one who remembers the JLAnt 😀

    2. GhostWriterL

      None are needed. This is the guy that pulled a gun out on her and kidnapped her best friend for something she’s come to realize isn’t evil, and that the only evil that exists in regards to it is the people who use God as an excuse to be abusive and violent.

      She’s probably also going to take out some of that anger she has towards Ryan on him as well, but Ross has literally done nothing but make himself worthy of being that punching bag.

      Still too bad that he’s not a toe-shaped splatter underneath a semi’s tire, but this is quite cathartic.

  12. AnvilPro

    Okay. Even with all that has happened, I will still admit I did not see that coming.

    1. Just A. Thinker

      Are you kidding? Slice of life comics always go like that! First, a character shows up on campus and turns out to be a lesbian. Then, the character comes out of the closet so hard she nukes it from orbit. Then she gets a girlfriend. The her dad shows up with a gun and kidnaps her. Then the lesbian’s friend completes their own transition to BADASS. Then she’s partially saved by a superhero, then the superhero is saved by the superhero’s arch-nemesis, then the lesbian’s friend punches the lesbian’s dad. SOOOO cliche. (Seriously, though – Willis is great at writing plots!)

      1. merbrat

        Wow! I’d read that!

        1. JoyceParty

          You did.

        2. merbrat

          (was bein’ silly)

  13. DarkoNeko

    Yeeeeees that’s what I hoped for !

  14. Just A. Thinker

    The father got over there quickly, given the apparent state of his knees.

    1. Cerberus

      There’s motion lines on his leg. I think he was able to stand up, but not by much and so was on wobbly legs when trying to assert his “authority”.

      1. Just A. Thinker

        Thanks for pointing that out – I didn’t see that

    2. segnosaur

      A lot of people have made comments about his knees being broken or otherwise mangled, but to be honest I don`t think we have enough evidence to say how damaged they were.

      Everything seems to be based on the strip which showed some red on his legs and torn pants. But, that could also simply be due to relatively minor scraping. We never saw exactly what happened to his knees, and it looked like he was sitting on the curbside in the last strip; if his knees were broken, I doubt he would have been in that position.

  15. Burgerking

    Blammo!

    1. Just A. Thinker

      More like “NNNNVVVMMMMKRCRLBRPFVOOOOOOOOOOOM!”

  16. Ray Radlein

    SUPER-JOYCE

  17. Lia47

    eventually he’ll learn to just stay down

    1. evilmidnightlurker

      that day is probably not this day

    2. Alan Lafond

      Stay down?

    3. Just A. Thinker

      Honestly, though, I just hope that he can feel guilt for his actions, and that he can come to an understanding of why he’s done is wrong, and that one day he apologizes to a tearful Becky in a strip that has ALL the feels, and that they hug, and that all the readers want to cry.

      1. Someone

        After being a recurring villain for a while, he finally comes around in time to
        sacrifice himself to stop a more dangerous villain. He will die in Becky’s arms.

        1. random832

          This is going to be one hell of a freshman year.

        2. Clif

          Yes.

      2. Needfuldoer

        From what we’ve seen of him, I don’t know if Ross can objectively look at his situation. The extreme version of “family values” and concept of absolute patriarchal authority are too deeply ingrained in his idea of what a family should be. He thinks anything less than the ‘perfect’ Leave it to Beaver nuclear family structure is unacceptable, and what doesn’t fit into it must be wrong in some way, because it doesn’t fit.

        Through this entire episode he hasn’t acted in the best interest of Becky as a person; he has only worried about losing his “perfect daughter”. He doesn’t understand what Becky is figuring out about herself, and there’s no predefined place in the template for New Becky, therefore “she is corrupt and must be restored to her proper place”. In his eyes this will save the family he’s supposed to have.

        Then again who knows, maybe he wasn’t as extreme in the past but doubled down on his ‘ideal family’ notions after his wife died. Or maybe he just really wants grandchildren.

        1. Mindlink

          “He thinks anything less than the ‘perfect’ Leave it to Beaver nuclear family structure is unacceptable, and what doesn’t fit into it must be wrong in some way, because it doesn’t fit.”

          This so true! Sometimes I wonder if sit-coms have actually done much more harm to families than any fundamentalist version of religion have ever done.
          My own parents, while they have learned and changed a lot after I grew up, were VERY much into this perfect nuclear sit-com family equals normal/standard/right, and anything that derivated too much from that was bad/dangerous/crazy. And they were strict atheists! They tolerated me having friends that didn’t fit that standard, and they had their own friends like that, but that again fits with the sit-com standard where there’s always one or two “wacky” friends, or neighbours, that the core family can laugh at but not BE themselves.
          Fortunately, one of those sit-coms were the Addams Family, so I was allowed a certain amount of freedom, but as I look back at it now, it was definitively a syndicated sit-com-family I grew up with.

  18. sistasweetpea

    DAMNN!!!!

    1. sistasweetpea

      That was great!

    2. Just A. Thinker

      DAAAAAAYYYYUMMMNNN

  19. CriticalQuit

    Looks like Joyce has a lot more strength!

  20. Ian

    *whistles*That’s gonna sting

    1. Just A. Thinker

      His heads gonna ring;
      And the ol’ internet in goin’ to sing
      Of Joyce’s Fists of Fury.

  21. Cooper

    FAAAAAAALCOOOOOOOON

    1. Hammmmm

      PUUUUUUUNNNCH

      1. Just A. Thinker

        *Explosion sound effects*

        1. Leorale

          Joyce fights for her FRIENDS!!

  22. Stephen R. Bierce

    *plays John Lennon’s “Instant Karma(‘s Gonna Get You)” on a beatbox off panel*

  23. rezby

    yessssssssssssssssssssssssssss

  24. Porto

    He gave you the strength to get FUCKING DECKED.

    Get out, toedad.

  25. evilmidnightlurker

    DAWN CASTE. Essence Fever.

    1. evilmidnightlurker

      (seriously someone needs to photoshop the sunburst caste mark on Joyce’s forehead)

      1. Disloyal Subject

        Hope you like MS Paint.

        1. evilmidnightlurker

          Thanks! 😀

        2. evilmidnightlurker

          Cool Exalt name, too. No Moon Dina = Seven Raptors Clever?

        3. Disloyal Subject

          I’m not familiar with Lunar naming conventions; I’ve been avoiding fully immersing myself in the Realm in case I get a chance to play someday so I can learn as my character does.

        4. evilmidnightlurker

          There’s a canonical Lunar named Seven Devils Clever; that brought “clever girl” to mind and here we are.

    2. sun tzu

      And here Joyce always thought she was a Zenith. XD

      1. evilmidnightlurker

        Either way it’s particularly amusing given that the Unconquered Sun is strongly hinted to be old-World-of-Darkness’s Lucifer. 😀

  26. Glitchmebaby

    I HAVE WAITED SO LONG TO SEE HIM GET CLOBBERED

  27. Jake

    perfect name for the strip

  28. Lordikaroz91

    FALCON PUNCH!!!!!

  29. Snugglebutts

    That last panel is one of the most satisfying things I’ve ever seen!

  30. John

    Sorry, butthole dad, I don’t think you’re the one God is giving strength to here.

    Just count yourself lucky she didn’t use a glass.

    1. DarkoNeko

      And that Sarah was unavailable.

  31. shadowcell

    falcon pawnch

  32. Kaara

    …take a punch?

    1. Bill M.

      No… leave a punch.

  33. Storm

    OHHHHHHHH SHITTTTT!!!!

  34. Cerberus

    I think Joyce may be ever so slightly done with his fucking bullshit. Maybe.

    1. NoHeart6265

      As we all are.

    2. Strangeshapes

      Understatement FTW!

    3. Bagge

      Joyce would like to register a counterpoint to his argument.

      And since he made HIS argument with a gun, her response is fitting.

  35. Irune

    kablam

  36. Bio D

    GOD HAS GIVEN YOU A GLASS JAW, MOTHERFRICKER!

  37. a4lbi

    God has given him the strength to get knocked the fuck out!

  38. David Alexander McDonald

    Actually, this reminds me of the time my first wife decked me. One hell of an uppercut that started around her knees, and took me a couple of inches off the ground.

    Guys, never make fun of your wives.

    1. Lapin

      Assuming there was a legit reason behind this, why exactly did this happen? /curiousity

    2. Riku

      Jesus Fucking Christ what the hell warranted that?

      1. Freemage

        I can think of exactly one thing–trash-talk during some sort of consensual bout in a gym ring. Otherwise… yeesh.

        1. AutobotDen

          Same thing. Or during Tae Kwon Do or some similar martial art sparring.

      2. Disloyal Subject

        It isn’t always warranted. People can be touchy.
        My dad still has a dent in his skull from my mother smacking him in the head with an encyclopedia because she mistakenly thought he wasn’t paying attention while she was talking, and she’s threatened to call the police on me for “assaulting” her for so much as blocking swings or twisting her fingers off of my throat.
        …In retrospect, that makes my tastes in women vaguely Oedipal. Ugh.

        1. Kryss LaBryn

          Good god, that’s terrible.

      3. David Alexander McDonald

        Short form: argument that turned funny, led to me teasing her in a way to make her mad, followed by my mocking her as a short-arse who didn’t know how to punch.

        She didn’t. And still decked me anyway. It was deserved, in my opinion…and was funny as hell to me, despite the sore jaw. I’ve been on the receiving end of female wrath in much more serious circumstances (including a run-in with a bipolar drunk who left me with three fingernail slashes down one cheek — I was the lucky one; she glassed another bloke. Wife of a pub owner in Rathkeale, Ireland, out for an evening’s riot in somebody else’s pub.)

    3. Yotomoe

      Hahaha I can make fun of my wife all I want, because I’m positive she’ll never exist.

      1. N0083rP00F

        (second hand observation from real-life tm)
        Ha, you knew that I was an (select one = idiot-geek-horriblepunster-oblivious-absentminded-nogoodatrememebringdates) and you married me anyways.

  39. Molto

    Not toeday, Ross.

    Not toeday.

    1. saki

      *slowly laughs herself into hyperventliation*

    2. Tacos

      Here, have an Internet.

  40. Cypherfox

    Oh yeah! WHO’S been given the strength, Toeboy?

  41. Just A. Thinker

    Next up, in Dumbing of Age: Joyce Brown & her Righteous Fists of Fury vs Toe Dad & his Righteous Fists of Fury (and possibly a gun too)

    1. Victor Riley

      I think the gun is on the side of the highway about a quarter mile back.

      1. Just A. Thinker

        Good point – at this point, they outnumber Toe Dad, so hopefully he’ll realize his disadvantage and the situation won’t continue escalating.

        1. saki

          He’s up against four girls. I doubt they scare him, though they should.

        2. John

          Yeah, for serious. Of the three girls Becky’s got for backup here, one of them smashed a glass in the face of the last guy to fuck with her, one of them held up a convenience store with a knife, and the last beat her own father senseless last weekend and stabbed the aforementioned convenience store robber with her own knife.

          Don’t fuck with third floor Clark Wing. They will cut you.

        3. Flipz

          Quite literally, in fact.

        4. DudeMyDadOwnsADealership

          And that last one’s father who was beaten senseless was both over five foot two and an actual mob associate. This might be little Rossie’s first time doing anything the police could take him in for on the spot if they saw. I’d both leave that gun where it is and stick to words if I were him.

        5. Fred

          And the former convenience store robber is going to be the voice of reason here!

  42. Guairdean Beatha

    The Lord has delivered him unto his enemies. Also, I told you the SEMME training had kicked in.

    1. John

      The problem with that theory is that I’m pretty sure “SEMME training” is an oxymoron.

  43. Jonathan S.

    Sorry, Toedad, looks like God’s given that strength to Joyce now.

  44. tim gueguen

    I hope Joyce hasn’t hurt her hand.

    1. -Sentinel-

      Someone’s toe got hurt.

    2. Lapin

      Looks like she went for the jaw. Good place to hit overall, because I think it’s like…ten pounds of pressure to the jaw will incapacitate a person? Not so good for your own knuckles. This sort of hit would probably not only split her knuckles, but bruise them, especially since she likely hasn’t been trained in that way to toughen them up. Worst case, a boxer’s break or a dislocated knuckle. Either way, she’ll heal up alright, and Toedad will still have been knocked flat on his ass by a five-foot-nothing, Twilight-loving, sweater-wearing, piece of fluff like Joyce.

      Which probably goes to show that there is a God in DOA universe.

      1. Ace

        Joyce can’t watch Twilight. It revolves around Edward and doesn’t admit to the presence of a God Almighty.

        Otherwise your perfectly right.

        1. Someone

          She said twilight was her favorite movie!

          http://www.dumbingofage.com/2011/comic/book-1/04-the-bechdel-test/movies/

        2. Lapin

          If you go allllllllllllllll the way back to when it showed Joyce and everyone in their gender studies class (now years ago in our time), we see that Joyce has read/watched/enjoyed Twilight at some point. Leslie was saying something about Twilight actually passed the Bechdel Test and Joyce was being smug. I have seen it touted as an “acceptable” book in the fantasy genre for her flavor of Christian before, because of the whole “Bella and Edward waiting until they’re married, gender roles, etc”.

          Hopefully, she grows out of thinking that’s an example of a healthy relationship.

          Seriously though, even if she gets a full boxer’s break (which hurts like a mofo), totally worth it.

        3. Flipz

          Can confirm that being the angle it was presented to me by my superconservative family. If Willis ever shows Joyce try to explain that “Twilight is actually secretly about abstinence” angle to her friends the way I did, though, we will have Gravatars for DAYS. xD

        4. saki

          I would love to see Joyce’s faces as someone (Dorothy maybe?) explains to her how Twilight is actually about romanticising stalkers and abusive relationships.

        5. merbrat

          Joyce: But…but, in the movie– Edwards parents have that wall full of crosses! So, that means… something, riiiight?

        6. Lapin

          Eh. I feel like Dorothy would just be too…delicate. Sarah or Billie, or even Dina, would probably be able to explain it in much clearer terms, because Sarah and Billie would just be legit, “He sneaked into her room and watched her sleep, are you fucking kidding me?” whereas Dina would list off the checklist of an abusive relationship, where Edward pretttty much ticks all the boxes, in a very logical way.

          Dorothy is great, but she would try to spare Joyce’s feelings. Sarah and Billie would have no such qualms, both out of fear Joyce would walk right into that sort of relationship and see it as romantic. (That is to say, Billie is a bit self-centered and ridiculous, but if anyone put their hands on Joyce [or any girl] that way, they’d be picking up their teeth after she found out)

        7. Kamino Neko

          Have you forgotten the nature of Billie’s own relationship? Edward and Bella ain’t got nothing on her and Ruth.

        8. saki

          Hm, good point.

        9. Steampunkette

          Twilight isn’t about abusive relationships. They’re in it, but that’s not what it’s about.

          Twilight is about Stephanie Meyer lying to her romantic partner that saving the chat logs from all the Yahoo chat rooms she RPed in was book research in a collaborative writing set up instead of being cybersex and melodramatic online relationships she had when she was 16.

        10. Bantha

          ^^^^ That…and Stephanie Meyer displaying her utter lack of understanding of the traditional fictional concept of Vampires. Sparkle in the sunlight…really? I like the alternate ending: Buffy stakes Edward. The end.

        11. saki

          I’ll agree it’s about both those things.

        12. Rutee

          Er, Twilight’s got an almighty god – vampirehood is basically becoming a mormon.

      2. Roborat

        The way she formed a fist, she likely broke her thumb.

        1. Lapin

          You’d be surprised at how durable your thumb really is. Yes, in all likelihood, she has busted it somehow, but I’ve seen people walk away with “mere” heavy bruising and a lot of swelling. And when I say mere, I actually mean “Are you sure it’s not broken?” “X-ray says it isn’t.”

    3. Ancestral Hamster

      Yeah, I figure the next panel will be Joyce clutching her hand saying, “Goddamn that hurt.” In this universe, she’s not used to punching out people and of course she doesn’t … never mind, the rest of the sentence would be spoiler material.

      1. Lapin

        At this point her adrenaline is pumping so hard she might /not/ actually feel it for awhile.

      2. John

        Nothing can hurt Joyce anymore.

        1. Lapin

          Ehh, in my experience, once the adrenaline has worn off, stuff like this actually hurts way worse, because you didn’t remember to ice it/take painkillers. Not to mention the pain she’s going to be feeling from the Epic Amazigirl Catch that definitely jolted the bike (which was moving at a very high speed). Joyce is going to be sore everywhere tomorrow morning.

        2. TheNinthShader

          Twist, joyce is secretly a cyborg. It all makes sense.

      3. Bicycle Bill

        But it hurts so good……

    4. TheLurkerAbove

      Probably has, people who aren’t trained to fight inevitably bruise or even crack a few bones the first time they actually punch someone. The hand is actually pretty fragile, given its complicated construction and all that.

      1. Kryss LaBryn

        What I find fascinating is recent studies that seem to show that we evolved the ability to both throw and take punches fairly early, like around a million years or so ago. Other apes can’t even form proper fists, but our hands, while also being way more dexterous than those of other primates, also can form fists and when we hit something (with our wrists straight, so properly), the bones in the back of our hands actually flex slightly, transferring the force of the blow to our arm bones, which of course are much larger and tougher and more able to absorb it.

        The really fascinating part is that right around the time we started being able to actually throw punches, our faces also started to become more buttressed and better able to take a hit. And although even the average woman’s face is more reinforced and better able to take a hit than those of even male great apes, human males’ faces are more reinforced than females, and the extra reinforcing is in places in the facial structure that show gender-based morphology.

        So we’ve been evolving to throw and (especially guys) take punches for, like, a million years or so. We are way, way, way better at it than other primates, even though they have more muscle strength.

        Fascinating!

        1. Kryss LaBryn

          –Joyce will never be the one to say it, but, “Here! Have a million years of evolution to the face, asshole!”

  45. Stormrunner

    God gave someone strength, and it wasn’t Ross.

  46. Enigma

    YES! YES! YES! YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!

  47. Kaara

    ..take a punch?

    1. nothri

      Obviously not, no.

      1. TheNinthShader

        IN THE FAAAAAAAACEE

  48. JessWitt

    Where’s your God-given strength now Ross, huh?

    1. Dorje Sylas

      It’s is in Joyce. You can see it in those angry deep arctic ice blue eyes. So cold.

  49. Marie

    YASS

  50. Mr. Mendo

    God gave Joyce a mean right hook! 😉

  51. Buttlerman

    Good things from this: We get to see Toedad hurt, we get to see Joyce punch an asshole, Becky will probably stay, and people will be happy.
    BAd things that’ll probably come: Becky’s relationship is probably going to be weird…

    1. Cerberus

      Sooooo, amazing first date. Sorry about my dad nearly murdering you in the treeline. Also, my attraction to Joyce may have peaked through the roof after she decked him in front of me. Anyways, you still up for Date Night Number 2?

    2. AeromechanicalAce

      Why? I’m sure at this point, becky would 100% agree he had that coming.

    3. Commodore Jeep-Eep

      You forgot how this is gunna touch off crazy drama back at Becky’s folks.

      1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

        Joyce’s folks. Fuck, I’m getting dozy.

        1. HMRC4EVR

          Her folks find out and try to pull her out of college or threaten to cut off the money if she doesn’t quit because ‘the people there are corrupting her’

        2. Commodore Jeep-Eep

          Quite probable.

  52. newllend(henryvolt)

    Toedad I think there was a miscommunication on who God gave the Superman strength here.

  53. Lapin

    Never underestimate the strength contained in a short person when they’re angry.

    1. HelpIveFallen

      Though she is but little, she is fierce!

    2. Jason

      Amazi-Girl to Joyce, days ago: “I’m gonna let you in on a little secret. It’s called a low center of gravity….”

    3. SDGlyph

      TINY THUNDER!

  54. MightionNY

    -First Attack!
    2000 pts.

  55. Mada

    The only strength God has given Ross is the strength to stand after apparently getting his legs mangled like that.

    1. Disloyal Subject

      They’re only a little sliced up. They bled plenty, but it’s already congealing – the shrapnel still stuck there probably helps stem the flow a little.
      There might be worse damage we don’t see, like fractures, but I wouldn’t call them mangled. Though if it were ground up, he wouldn’t be the first terrible dad in webcomics to lose a limb after his own stupidity got it torn to shreds.

      1. TheNinthShader

        Please link one of those comics, I need to see more idiot gore.

        1. Disloyal Subject

          Just off the top of my head. I’ll rack my brains for more later, but we’ll probably have a new page before then.

  56. Brigid Keely

    Can Becky’s dad be charged with attempted kidnapping/abduction (or… actual, I guess, bc he forced her into the car w/a gun even if they didn’t get too far)? Is she a legal adult? What are her rights, and which of them has he violated? IDK if this has been touched on in previous comments, sorry. & I know this isn’t a super realistic strip that’s going to get bogged down in legal details. But I’m really curious as to what recourse Becky has, especially since she’s probably 18 and thus a legal adult.

    1. Mada

      Becky is an adult, so it’s not like she can be forced to go with him.

      Besides, he did sort of kidnap her at gunpoint.

      I dunno, someone else can probably explain it in more detail than I can.

    2. Marie

      She is 18, so yes. Although people will probably answer you here anyway, you might want to ctrl+F kidnapping on the last bunch of strips because people have gone into detail on a lot of ways to interpret it.

    3. saki

      Even without the kidnapping charges, Toedad’ll be in a lot of trouble after waving a gun around and firing it on a university campus.

    4. dixiesaurer

      she is a legal adult and this is abduction. but even if she were under 18 there are a lot of states that allow teenagers to separate themselves from their family and more out at 16. and theres plenty of precidents for saying a parent can abduct their own child from another parent / guardian. taking her from any current living arrangements could probably bea argued pretty easily. the tricky part is that shes not living at the school / with her friends legally but squatting. the school might make that argument a little more complicated?
      even if he didnt get brought up on kidnapping though this is a pretty clear case of abuse and reckless endangerment at the least. like even ignoring all the gun and death threat shit, just this business of leaning out of a car at high speeds on a busy highway ought to be enough to get her out of his custody

      1. espanolbot

        Leaning out of a moving car with a loaded gun, no less.

        1. Kryss LaBryn

          Completely relinquishing control of the car on a busy highway to lean out the window with a loaded gun, so apparently with intent to commit murder (especially after that “send them to Hell” comment that 911 would have recorded) is going to get him into a shit-load of trouble right there, even without not only waving around, but actually firing off a rifle on campus. I mean, bad enough when he’s the passenger, but he was the driver.

          He out-and-out assaulted Dina; he out-and-out kidnapped a legal adult at gunpoint; he fired a gun in public; he relinquished control of a vehicle to apparently attempt to murder a would-be rescuer–they are going to throw the book at him. I imagine that at this point, they will also hit him with multiple charges of running stop signs, because they will want to hit this asshole with eeeeeverything. And that’s assuming he survives the cops showing up in about three, two, one…

        2. TamiDOA

          But the charge he really needs to worry about is driving without a seat belt.

        3. John

          He assaulted not just Dina, but, at minimum, Becky, Joyce, and Amber as well, and if I were charging him, I’d probably throw in Sayid and everyone else at the fountain, too. Might not stick, but it’s worth a shot.

          Also battery against Dina. And depending on what happened after we cut away from the woods, there might be other charges. We know from preview panels that she’s not seriously injured, but we still haven’t ruled out her being duct taped in the trunk or in the woods, which would be unlawful restraint and maybe another kidnapping charge.

          Bringing the gun onto IU campus is not actually against the law, just IU rules, but might turn his being there into criminal trespass.

          And I don’t even know how you’d charge the climbing out the window of a moving vehicle that he was supposed to be driving jackassery, but if I were trying him, I’d be trying to figure out a way to give him the death penalty just for that just on general principles. “Being too stupid to live, seriously, how has this guy not just forgotten to breathe” is not actually a crime, however.

    5. John

      Butthole dad has committed a whole pile of felonies, and should be going to prison for years and years now.

  57. Doom Shepherd

    Despite rumors to the contrary, violence solves LOTS of things.

    1. miados

      yes….. yes it can. it is sad it can/has to sometimes but it can solve problems. I think it got touched on pretty well in another webcomic i like (perm hiatus sadly) called better days.

      1. Mother fudging batman

        it has a sequel.

      2. evilmidnightlurker

        “Oh balls.”

    2. Ars Linguistica

      As Einstein said, “Violence sometimes may have cleared away obstructions quickly, but it never has proved itself creative.” ToeHole is a serious obstruction, and needs to be cleared fast. Becky has other problems (longer-term housing, food, etc.) and violence won’t solve any of them. Like most issues in the world, those will need creative solutions involving support from the people around her.

      (In other words, that’s how a practicing Quaker juggles general pacifism with the obvious YOU GO JOYCE! reaction here.)

    3. Disloyal Subject

      “Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst.”
      I need to read that book. The movie’s fun, but doesn’t really go into the meaningful parts.

      1. Bantha

        Ahhhh. Starship Troopers. Good times.

      2. Ross

        THERE’S A MOVIE?!?! HOW DID I NOT KNOW THIS!?

        1. Roborat

          Because it, and the sequels, are aweful. Stick to the book.

        2. Bill M.

          Because it’s like The Never Ending Story, the movie is okay, not great, but the sequels get worse and worse.

  58. Mr.J

    JOYCE SMASH!!!!

    1. Jesse

      This comment was inevitable, and I appreciate that.

    2. fallingwaters2

      ROSS SCREAM!

  59. Bladeglory

    In a surprise twist of fate, Joyce is the most horribly injured (excluding Toedad) because she doesn’t know how to punch properly and fractured her hand on his jaw. It is her that we follow to the hospital and nobody else.

    1. DarkoNeko

      Nah, the punch threw ToeDad on the road and he got hit by a car.

      1. Flipz

        Naw, man, the semi totally turned around to make sure everyone was okay, and ToeDad gets hit by that truck.

  60. DarkoNeko

    I wonder if Sal will get Amazi-girl to “safety” before authorities arrives.
    I’m not sure she’d have a reason to.

    1. BenRG

      She does, the biggest and most important motivator that she’s got: She hates the authorities and, no matter how much she despises Amazi-Girl, she despises them more.

      1. Marie

        Plus, I don’t think Sal is maliciously against her. She thinks she’s dumb, but I doubt she thinks she should be ‘punished’ beyond the direct consequences (injury, seeing she failed).

        1. Steve

          Amazi-Girl failed? She went over the top but Sal didn’t have any options other than follow and alert police if she wasn’t going to go where Amazi-Girl did…

        2. Marie

          I don’t think she failed, but I think finding out she fell off, passed out, and left Joyce and Sal (innocent and nemesis) to solve the situation will count as failure to her, and I imagine Sal agrees, if not for the same reasons (based on yesterday).

  61. Spidergirl

    I think the end of that sentence is “to get my damn face smashed in.”

  62. brumagem

    Nice good punching stance from Joyce there. She’s got her fist with the inside facing up, not toward her as some novices might do. Only mistake is she’s about to fall over for lifting her foot up during the follow through.

    1. Clif

      She looked it up on the Internet.

  63. I Eat Cheese

    BIFF

  64. caesaria82

    *heart eyes emoji*

    1. saki

      ♡ω♡

  65. LuniasM

    She probably just punched him in the face. Don’t be surprised if she just broke her hand or something.

    1. DarkoNeko

      especially since she had the whole momentum from running toward Becky.

  66. evilmidnightlurker

    “Refunneled?”

    1. Tacos

      Y’know, God gave strength that was originally going to Toedad and funneled it to Joyce instead.

      1. DarkoNeko

        Oh !

  67. maxh

    Apparently god has given you the strength to die of waif-fu.

  68. Shiro

    Sure, now that the gun’s history and he’s donating blood to the pavement, NOW he’s all ready to do the talky thing.

    Pity for him that Joyce is all done talking.

  69. MightionNY

    (Would it be nitpicky to point out Becky is on the wrong side of Joyce in the last panel?)

    1. Ana Chronistic

      must’ve punched so hard she did a 180

    2. TheGrammarLegionary

      Looking at all the comments about how little Joyce has knocked big Ross flying, I’m interpreting this as Ross having some momentum coming for Joyce and she sidestepped as she punched.

  70. Rani

    And with a well timed punch and Toedad’s glass jaw, the Indiana Holy War came to a close.

    1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

      You serious? With the shitstorm this will bring from Joyce’s folks and with her sister about to emerge from the closet… the show’s only starting.

      1. ninja_jesus

        So it’s more like “the punch heard around the Bible Belt”.

  71. Sluthy

    “And it comes to all in time, boys. For on the day they died, boys, God…was on the other side, boys.”

  72. Andrusi

    That last panel looks like the toenail has broken off. Ow.

  73. miados

    i hope she doesn’t apologize or say it was wrong at any point in the future because of family pressure.

    1. Marie

      “I’m sorry… SORRY YOU’RE AN ASSTOE” snapsnapsnap

      1. Fran

        Hahahaha! +1 xD

  74. 0kami

    Go Joyce! Stub that toe!

  75. Someone

    She got so pissed she temporarily fazed dimensions together giving her the strength of walkyverse Joyce

  76. Yotomoe

    I dunno man. God must be giving him strength because I was very sure that his legs were fucked up.

    1. syd

      Leg Day, unfortunately for Ross, was Sunday.

  77. Just A. Thinker

    Comments flying fast and furious… Gentleman, Ladies, Gender-queer folk, and those who just plain don’t want to conform to society’s norms and expectations (like myself), we may well break the record for most comments on a strip.

    1. Disloyal Subject

      Not by a LONG shot. It’s been up nearly four hours, and we haven’t even broken 500, let alone reached multi-thousands.

  78. Skizz

    *sniff* Sal Buscema would be so proud

    1. Abel Undercity

      “And the Lord did say: ‘Sweet Mother of Me, I’m tired of hearing that guy talk. Let there be a Sal Buscema punch.
      “And there was. And it was good.”

  79. syd

    JOYCE!

    We keep our feet on the *ground* when we punch! More leverage behind it, right? Strong foundations and all that.

    1. JetstreamGW

      Hey now. Judging by how he went flying if she had more leverage he’d be dead.

    2. AutobotDen

      And we punch from the shoulder. More power that way.

      1. Disloyal Subject

        Power comes from the hips.

        1. inqntrol

          This guy knows it.

    3. thejeff

      Maybe no. I think she was in motion through the whole sequence. Puts the whole momentum of running into that punch.

  80. Carolyn

    And this time stay down, you massive bastard.

  81. Ranial

    in before Joyce has to go to the hospital for a broken finger because she doesn’t know how to throw a punch

  82. Just Here

    Thus always to tyrants.

  83. Badeyes

    Nice starting position and a great follow through.

    1. Jhon

      I thought Joyce would abuse Ross verbally, not physically. But yes, she brought it up from the ground with plenty of follow through. Ross will be feeling that one for a good while.

  84. Gangler

    God has given you bloody noodles where your legs should be. Lie down and wait for medical attention if you know what’s good for you.

  85. TrueVCU

    Panel 4 is the most cathartic thing in ever

    1. Clif

      Wait until you see the eventual reckoning with Ryan.

  86. Ace

    GO JOYCE GO! ToeDad is down and OUT!

    Now where is Dina?!?!?!

    1. Disloyal Subject

      He is down. Whether he is out remains to be seen.

    2. spiderfan14

      in line buying tickets to the Good Dinosaur for all the people who helped get Becky back.

  87. Cerberus

    And of course, he had to throw in a snide dismissal due to age. Because there is no way in which that turd-blossom isn’t an asshole. Just full on, oh hey there, little girl, you couldn’t possibly understand the super important adult man things I’m doing here, so you just run along now. What. A. Dick.

    1. Marie

      It heavily reminds me of two different ex friends of mine, although they were less scary because they had no power over anyone but maybe more obnoxious because they were peers.

      (one was a ‘you just can’t understand, children’ type and the other a ‘listen to men they’re more logical you should try to be like that’)

    2. AeromechanicalAce

      Watch now as he flies into utterly impotent rage at the fact that no one is buying into his BS.

      And if he tries anything, let’s not forget that Sal is nearby, and could probably have taken ross back before he into a car wreck, then knocked on his ass.

      1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

        I can totally see him standing up only to get thumped again and again before he finally sits the fuck down.

      2. DarkoNeko

        Sal could go all Akira Clown gang on him. Y’know, the wheel to face thing.

        1. DarkoNeko

          that thing

    3. saki

      On the bright side, this made him completely underestimate her ability to knock his ass to the ground.

    4. Bagge

      To be fair it kinda IS hard to understand the whole pointing-a-gun-at-my-daughter-but-that-actually-mean-I’m-saving-her-thing. For the uninitiated it just looks like horrible abuse.

      …yeah, I meant that to be flippant but I think I just correctly described his world view.

      1. Cerberus

        The differences are subtle, admittedly, abuse is something bad that probably foreigny or non-white types do to their children, whereas he was correcting a horrible grievous error in his Godly property and showing how strong and manly he was in the process. You can tell the difference largely due to how white and proper Christian he is and…

        Dear Bob, I spent way too many years around that subculture. A bunch of racist “oh those types hitting their wives and children. What? Bill? No, they’re just having problems and you know how much of a handful Clarice is, but they are working it out to save the family with the pastor.”

        1. Marie

          > abuse is something bad that probably foreigny or non-white types do to their children
          > A bunch of racist “oh those types hitting their wives and children

          and from this rose the barbaric practices act/[attempted] hotline (it’s a hotline because you can’t call 911 on your neighbour for being Muslim), if you didn’t see all the garbage Canada went through this year (or if you missed that between the rest of the garbage)

  88. Lone Wolf

    And Sal thought Amazi-girl was gonna escalate the situation.

    Now… FINISH HIM!

    1. saki

      After shots literally being fired and a car crashed, a punch is actually closer to de-escalation than it is to escalation. XD

  89. FriendlyNeighborhoodDave

    Wow!Go Joyce!

  90. Auroki

    todays been a lot of firsts for Joyce and I couldn’t be happier~

  91. Nick Morgan

    One!
    Two!
    Three!
    Four!
    Five!
    Six!
    Seven!
    Eight!
    Nine!
    Ten!
    DING!!! DING!!! DING!!! DING!!! DING!!!
    The winner, and neeeeeeewwwww CHAMPION
    JOOOOOOOOOOOYYYYYYYYYCCCCCCCEEEEEEEEE
    BROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  92. -Sentinel-

    Just like Joyce, Becky has a mouth that’s a portal to a dimension of white.

    1. John

      It’s contagious. She caught it when she kissed Joyce.

      1. DarkoNeko

        Then soon, Dina…

        1. inqntrol

          “Cough soggies cough”

  93. Rani

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08yO7DDJccc

  94. OrtyBortorty

    This strip is awesome!

  95. Sarah

    God had given Joyce the strength to protect Becky from Toedad.

    Seriously, he must have. There’s no other way Joyce would have been able to send him flying like that.

    1. MatthewTheLucky

      Adrenaline? Secretly working out? Alien powers?

      1. John

        Joyce having alien powers? That’s just crazy.

      2. Commodore Jeep-Eep

        The fact that he’d probably have fallen over again if she didn’t krump him.?

  96. SUGauthor

    Seriously? Ross had half his body out the window of a moving car when flipped over. He shouldn’t be alive, let alone standing.

    1. Aziraphale

      Well, he’s not standing now…

    2. Marie

      He probably fell out before it flipped (thus the distance from the car yesterday), but yeah, he ain’t now.

  97. Tenchan

    Joyce, you are a certified badass!!!

  98. newllend(henryvolt)

    Oh wait wait wait I got something perfect for this :https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0yK4lxBarpE

  99. walden

    hahahahahahaha

    oh man

    okay seriously where is todays comic

  100. Cheshrin

    Let’s assume that Toedad is around 5’6″, given how he’s been drawing in strips and how he’s been directly compared to Sal’s height. Not a tall man, but still taller than Joyce. Given his body shape, he’s probably got a lot of muscle and a low body fat percentage, which means he’s going to be built like a solid brick made out of smaller bricks. Doing some research, it’s reasonable to hazard a guess that he is somewhere around 160 lbs, probably a bit more. Point, is, he’s not exactly a light dude.

    And Joyce punched him with enough force to send him flying.

    Goddamn, no wonder Willis put her in the SEMME homage outfit this arc.

    1. Riku

      It also looks like he’s struggling to stand in the first panel.

    2. Hammmmm

      That body type in a 5’6″ person would be pushing closer to 200 pounds. I’m 5’8″ with no where near that shape and I’m like 180.

      1. Cheshrin

        Fair enough. I’m a scrawny thing, so I have no idea how muscles work.

        Still, that makes it more impressive. Don’t fuck with Joyce Brown’s friends.

    3. Hi There

      My husband, who is around 5’6″ tall, has a very stocky body build with big muscular arms and broad shoulders, and apparently he looked emaciated at the one point that he was around 160 pounds in college. He’s around 245 currently. My husband’s build has more of a stomach than Becky’s Dad (granted, he could stand to lose a few pounds), so I’d really put Becky’s Dad over 200 pounds, probably closer to 220. Becky’s Dad is probably heavier than he looks. Everyone underestimates my husband’s weight when they go by just looking at him.

    4. ninja_jesus

      Highly doubt he went flying. Perspective and artistic license, etc. But the punch was enough to send him to the ground.

    5. EvolutionistX

      The average woman these days weighs over 160 pounds. Toedad definitely weighs more than that.

    6. Kryss LaBryn

      If he’s much less than 200 lbs, I would be shocked. 160 is nothing for a guy built like that; he’d have to be like four feet nothing. My dog is 100 lbs, and he’s a retriever. There’s gotta be the mass equivalent of at least two retrievers there. Plus he’s only slightly shorter and is wider than my husband, and he’s almost 200 (and military, so not all fat).

    7. Dragon_Nataku

      To add to the pile, I wrestled in high school (and for those who might’ve caught on somewhere that I’m a chick we didn’t have a chick wrestling team so I was on the guys’ team) and most of our guys were short (5’8″-ish) and we had a lot of dudes in the 152/160 lb weight classes and none of them had Toedad’s build. So more evidence to agree with everyone else who’s said even at 5’6″ Toedad should be at least 200 lbs, if not over.

    8. Trolldrool

      Shawn L. made a good point in another comment further down the page. What we’re seeing isn’t Toedad flying through the air, but struck hard enough to fall down, seen here from a low, ground level camera angle. It is conceivable that his feet didn’t actually rise into the air until the moment his fact hit the dirt.

  101. Sir Tripalot

    What did Sal say about not escalating the situation?

    1. Cerberus

      I notice, pointedly, that she’s not intervening at all here. Sal knows what’s up.

    2. Riku

      He approached her in a threatening stance with his arm reaching towards her, at that point it’s self defense.

      1. nothri

        That, and he basically threatened to murder her with a loaded rifle. You don’t exactly need a crack legal team to sort this one out.

  102. cobaltergeist

    Geeettttttt dunked on!!!
    If you’re really doing God’s work, you won’t come back.

    1. SomeGuy

      Damn. That is ludicrously appropriate considering both Ross and Joyce are running on newfound determination.

  103. rheinman

    For me, this is the second most satisfying punch thrown in this strip. Amber’s critical hit on Blaine right in the smug still reigns supreme.

    1. Riku

      That’s fair. At least Toe Dad thinks he’s helping. Blaine was 100% malevolent and knew it

      1. Disloyal Subject

        That, and Amber/Amazi-girl are capable of a certain malice that Joyce is above. Rightous fury is great, but there’s something even more satisfying about the enjoyment of throwing a punch.

      2. Gamaran Sepudomyn

        The fact that he thinks this is doing good makes him more of an asshole than Blaine to my eyes.

        1. Dragon_Nataku

          I think both of them (and Ryan) need to be set on fire. Kinda like the “how much does the semi weigh?” “After a certain amount of weight a ton or two more is irrelevant” comments from yesterday (day before?), after a certain level of being a worthless piece of garbage asshole douchebag they are all the same.

  104. zmm

    Yeah!
    Man I missed Joyce who could kick ass.
    Just hope you didn’t punch him to his weapon. and I hope Sal is behind you ready to properly shut him down.
    Also hope Amazigirl won’t see Sal realize and go rage.

    1. dailybrad

      I imagine Amazigirl’s too worn out and too occupied with Joyce and Becky’s wellbeing to be giving it too much thought at the moment.

    2. Disloyal Subject

      Speaking of, whose weapon is that going to be, legally, when all this is over? I assume the police confiscate it, but after felonies like Ross has been comitting like he’s going for a hat trick, I can’t imagine he’ll get it back. Is there a system in place for the resale of confiscated firearms, or would it just sit in evidence lockup indefinitely? I don’t really see it passing into Becky’s hands; if Ross forfeited it by the severity of his crimes, then it seems it’d be forfeited to the state, not his heir.

      1. Kryss LaBryn

        The police will sell a lot of things that have been confiscated for criminal reasons when they’re done with them, but I doubt weapons are in there. I don’t know how licensing works in the States (you guys don’t seem to require licenses to possess firearms, just for hunting) but I’d be willing to bet that even if licenses are required, Becky doesn’t have one, so they couldn’t hand it off to her. Plus, Ross is still alive (for now, at least) so she couldn’t claim it as part of his estate, assuming she even for some reason wants to have the gun her Dad tried to kidnap her and threatened to kill her friends with; I wouldn’t.

        Pretty sure when the cops are done with weapons that they’ve confiscated for being involved in a crime, they then destroy them. At least, I’m pretty sure they do in Canada.

        1. Dragon_Nataku

          Pretty sure here in America they stay in evidence forever unless they’re needed for undercover ops, like “I’m not a cop I’m actually a drug dealer/hitman/pimp/whatever, look at my gun!” or “I’m not a cop I’m a black market weapons dealer, see my large array of questionably-acquired merchandise?”

        2. Tadpole7

          Depends on the state. In AZ it’s illegal to destroy functional, safe firearms. Police must hold or sell them. Most police that I’ve heard on this subject prefer to destroy guns, for safety and avoiding the hassle involved in setting up gun sales. Personally I find it ridiculous not to let the police dispose of fire arms as they wish, especially as guns are very easy to get in this state. Still Toedad’s rifle impacted the ground at speeds so I think it’s nonfunctional

  105. Rosicrucian

    BLESS YOU WILLIS.

  106. Chinoy Industries, Ltd.

    Sorry, but I still call BS. This feels too easy. Joyce isn’t that strong. And although she has learned a lot about the real world and real people in the last few weeks, I can’t help but expect her 18 years of indoctrination to keep her from so abruptly trying to knock out an adult who she’s probably known much of her life, since she and Becky were homeschool buddies as kids.

    Why can I not enjoy happy things?

    1. Gangler

      Joyce doesn’t have to be that strong. The man just survived a car crash without a seatbelt. Flew straight out of the vehicle and skidded across the concrete. It’s a miracle the guy’s even standing. He’s in no shape to be trading blows with anybody.

      1. Cerberus

        His leg is wobbling. Honestly, he didn’t need much to topple right back over. And Joyce is pumped on adrenaline and fury, and might be full on in a fight mode of trauma response (so, yeah, Sal or somebody might want to pull her back so she doesn’t actually end up killing him), so she’s definitely going to be humming more than usual. Not enough to send him flying, but definitely enough to do the equivalent of her glass to the face with Ryan.

        1. Marie

          great attention to detail, cerberus, I missed those wiggles

        2. Yotomoe

          KNEES WEAK, ARMS ARE HEAVY.

        3. Tacos

          Something something something MOM’S SPAGHETTI.
          (Sorry. Not sorry)

      2. Clif

        But to answer your question, you can’t enjoy happy things because you’ve been over socialized – so that you can be controlled better.

    2. Dr. T

      Let me help you enjoy it, then. Joyce hit him running. Her lower center of gravity and his wobbly legs meant that most of her momentum was transferred to his body at the moment of the punch. Also, you are sort of falling victim to the perspective of the extreme close=up to Toedad. I imagine tomorrow you will find that he will land no more than a handful of feet away from Joyce, which is not much farther than he would land if he simply fell over on his own.

      Feel better?

    3. ninja_jesus

      I disagree. First off, Ross was just flung out of a crashing car, so he’s shaky enough to be knocked down with a decent hit. No matter how tough you are, you wouldn’t be walking away from that crash without feeling weak and sustaining injuries.

      Secondly, it’s not all about how physically strong you are. Look at Joyce in the last panel. She looks a lot like this picture. She threw her body into that punch, kinetic energy traveling from foot to fist, giving her the extra force to knock Toedad, who we’ve already established does not have good footing, onto the ground.

      Thirdly, that point is moot unless you’ve been through 18 years of indoctrination. I wouldn’t be able to say anything on it either. Anyone with experience want to weigh in on that?

      So, aside from the third point, I think Joyce punching Toedad is very realistic. She’s had her best friend taken away from her by someone who wholly believes he can “fix” her, similar to how Joyce had tried to “fix” Ethan, except through more violent means.

      This is Joyce facing herself, seeing her own shitty actions, and stepping up to solidify her belief that there is absolutely nothing wrong with Becky, or Ethan, or anyone who is gay.

      1. Silamy

        Weighing in on the indoctrination bit. I was raised with fairly strict ideas about the role of the child (especially a girl) in a situation that ….often wasn’t pretty. It is absolutely possible to summon the strength and fury to send an adult flying when you’re feeling furious, terrified, and betrayed -and it seems to be a pretty safe bet to say that Joyce is feeling all of those things -and that the motorcycle ride and flying Amber have probably given her an extra adrenaline boost.

        1. Cerberus

          That would also fit what we’ve seen in Joyce. The last time she was betrayed by someone who wore the trapping of her culture, she similarly went ape-shit and probably would have kept going if the drug hadn’t kicked in.

    4. saki

      I get what you’re trying to say about it being unlikely that Joyce would punch Ross given how she grew up knowing him etc, but I think all that went away when he pulled out a gun and actually pointed it at his own daughter. Even without that being the case, right in this moment, the only thing Joyce could think about was getting to Becky, so when Ross put himself between them, she most likely punched him out of pure instinct, without any conscious thought about it.

      1. Idon'tcarenomore

        I think she was very conscious of what she was doing. And derived great satisfaction from it, I hope.

      2. Rheinman137

        Reminds me of Hermione blasting Snape in Prisoner of Azkaban. She was badass in the moment, but afterwards was hyperventilating over hitting a teacher.

    5. Bicycle Bill

      Take the righteous anger/indignation of Joyce.
      Mix with a dirtbag who is already battered, shook up, and undoubtedly not at 100% peak peformance.
      Now add the element of surprise (of all people, Joyce is probably the last person Ross would believe capable of physical violence).
      Result — ToeDad flat on his kiester.

    6. ICSM

      To add to everybody’s reply, Joyce IS the youngest simbling of four older brothers. It is full believable that she learned hot to correctly punch someone square in the jaw from one of them.

      I know I have taught my younger sister to knock someone out in case she ever needs to.

      1. Dragon_Nataku

        Finally somebody brings this up so I don’t have to. Pretty sure she stated in-comic that she knows how to fight/throw a punch exactly because of this (sorry, can’t be arsed to find the comic to link to).

    7. Kryss LaBryn

      When I was 17 and about 126 lbs soaking wet (so a loong time ago 😛 ), I got in a snowmobile accident and broke my arm. I then, by myself, with a concussion and a broken arm, flipped the 300 lb snowmobile the right way up again.

      Adrenaline is fucking amazing, yo. Even without his legs being as wibbly as they seem to be, I have no problem whatsoever believing that with as much adrenaline as will be pumping through Joyce right now, that she was able to send him flying. None at all.

  107. 6Qubed

    Can the next strip just be Joyce going Full Amber on toedad please.

    1. MatthewTheLucky

      Why just Joyce? It isn’t like the others don’t have a bone to pick with him. Frankly, I’d be fine with the next couple weeks just being new characters showing up at the scene and punching him.

      1. merbrat

        That scene in “Airplane!”… everyone taking turns to slap the hysterical woman.

        1. Carolyn

          And now I want to see Maggie getting in the line to punch Ross. Because why not?

      2. Slyfincleton

        Speaking of bone to pick, I hope we find out more about what happened to Dina soon.

      3. podian

        MIKE.

  108. RandomDude

    Really? Nobody? Okay then:
    FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACCCCCEEEEEEEEEEE!

  109. Catullus

    FISTS

    OF

    FURY

  110. Bleu

    YEEEEES

  111. DT

    Joyce used Righteous Fury!
    It’s super effective!

  112. Clif

    She didn’t assault and batter him; she defended herself from his attack. We all saw it.

    1. Cerberus

      He threatened her with a gun! … (ten minutes ago). Totally counts!

      1. thejeff

        He’s still in the process of kidnapping. He’s still committing a felony. At this point, force is justified, not just to keep him from succeeding, but to detain him for the cops.

    2. ninja_jesus

      He did make a threatening move toward her, hand outstretched, as if to grab her. It’s completely fair game.

      1. Nightsbridge

        I’m not sure how it works in court, but he was also STILL attempting to keep help from reaching Becky, his kidnapping victim. There’s probably some good Samaritan law about that sort of thing.

  113. Dave

    By the might of Samson, she hath smited thee!

    1. jy3

      She hath struck thee down with great wrath, and thou shalt know that she is the LORD!

    2. Jezi

      And you will know her name is the Protagonist when she lays her vengeance upon thee!

  114. Dara

    UN-DAMN YOU WILLIS

    1. aradica

      *eye twitch*

      That’s my name…

  115. Mkvenner

    Its been revoked.

  116. Synnerman

    Joyce learned Kaio-Ken!

    1. MaximumZero

      Kaio-what now?

      1. Synnerman

        Goku’s power up maneuver learned fro King Kai eeeeeearly in Dragon Ball Z.

        http://dragonball.wikia.com/wiki/Kaio-ken

        1. Dragon_Nataku

          MaximumZero’s quoting a recurring line from DBZ Abridged (a web video parody, give it a go if you really like DBZ, it is hilarious)

          “No, seriously, Kaio-what?”
          “Kaio-crap!”
          “That’s what I thought”

          ^^ (could not stop quoting that throughout the latest DBZ Kai ep)

  117. cmd1095

    Sorry toedad, God’s doling out strength, and unfortunately for you Joyce is first in line

  118. Xerxes93

    i just lost a family member and i really needed this, thank you.

    1. ninja_jesus

      My condolences.

    2. Tacos

      I’m sorry for your loss.

    3. Bob Ellis

      Condolences and sympathy.
      I’m glad this came along for you when it did.

    4. Kryss LaBryn

      So sorry to hear of your loss. Hopefully this continues for a while and keeps helping a bit.

  119. Wublub

    HELL YEAH, GO JOYCE! PUNCH THAT SUCKER RIGHT IN THE TOE!

  120. Tacos

    Ok so he didn’t have broken legs like I thought last strip but at least he punched in his fucking face. That’s good enough for me.

  121. Henry

    God himself couldn’t give you enough strength to overcome a well-and-truly pissed Joyce.

    Partially because he’s giving Joyce that strength. Not for her character. For her fists.

    1. A Scientist

      “…and I would warn God himself not to get in the way.”

      1. Rheinman137

        I can tell you with no ego, this is my finest sword. If on your journey, you should encounter God, God will be cut.

  122. Cody

    FATALITY.

  123. Packy

    Damn. New favorite panel. 🙂

  124. Nena

    Holy shit, Joyce is full of surprises.

  125. Professor Fate

    Joyce has the strength of ten because her heart is pure.

  126. Dan

    “the strength to”
    Get knocked out by a 98lb girl.

  127. Commodore Jeep-Eep

    KICK THAT VERMIN WHILE HE’S DOWN!

    1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

      http://i3.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/996/122/0cb.gif

  128. Tandel

    Joyce just sucker punched her way back into the top slot in my heart.

    1. newllend(henryvolt)

      Your fist has touched my heart~

    2. Jhon

      Sucker Punch? There’s no way he didn’t see that coming. He just didn’t believe it was happening.

  129. newllend(henryvolt)

    Joyce I think it’s safe to say that you have now officially graduated from Jr.Rebel to Rebel of badassness, your training is now complete.

  130. Kiggy

    ROCKETTO PUNCH!!!!!!

  131. kodykid168

    KO!!! You WIN!

    1. kodykid168

      This was all I was hoping for. A satisfying punishment for the villain. Hopefully there’s more.

  132. Retrikaethan

    well shit, i’m not sure what i was expecting but that was not it. kinda surprised idiotoedad continued with his idiotic religious spiel in spite of nearly being killed because he got out of the drivers seat through a window of a moving vehicle to shoot a person on the roof of his car. but hey. that’s your brain on religion, folks. endangering yourself and your children because you think you’re right.

    in other news, i really hope joyce didn’t just break her hand/wrist/forearm cuz that would suck.

    1. Just Me

      Scars of battle, wear them proudly Joyce.

    2. Disloyal Subject

      Correction: that’s your brain on crazy.
      The radical fundamentalism certainly didn’t help, of course.

      1. Dana

        No, amazi-girl is crazy. He’s just an incredible asshole.

      2. Retrikaethan

        when fundamentalists look like that there’s something wrong with their fundamentals. ain’t no fundamentalist secular humanist kidnapping people cuz they’re “unclean” or “broken” or the like. basically, this kind of crazy does not exist outside of the religious spectrum. worse still is when people point out that the religion is makin people crazy people like you go ahead and say “ain’t crazy cuz religious!” which is just not true, especially in instances like this. dude is literally monologue-ing about how god has given him the power to “fix” his daughter after literally kidnapping her at gunpoint. ain’t not much more obvious a situation of religiously inspired insanity than that.

        1. AutobotDen

          I think I could hear the cheering from the fans an hour ago.

          Gotta love Newton’s Laws. Specifically the first: “An object in motion will stay in motion unless acted upon by an outside force.” In this case, the object in motion is Joyce’s fist, and the outside force is it meeting Toedad’s jaw. But she’s got enough momentum from her running start, as well as good form and follow-through to continue in motion.

          /slightly nerdy moment

        2. EvolutionistX

          There’s plenty of crazy all over the place if you poke around. Stalin was an atheist, but that didn’t stop him from murdering millions of people. Toedad isn’t even a real person, so his actions don’t make a real argument against religious fundamentalism.

          The majority of the world’s people are religious, and most of them have never kidnapped any of their kids at gunpoint. Even the majority of fundies whose kids came out as gay probably haven’t kidnapped them at gunpoint.

          (And for what it’s worth, I’m an atheist.)

          That said, Toedad’s actions are definitely driven by a combination of personal inclination toward authoritarian violence and a particular brand of religious fundamentalism.

        3. Retrikaethan

          false equivocation. atheism isn’t a dogma. i’m not saying the world would be perfect without religion, i’m saying it would be better. yer still gonna get power hungry fucks but in no situation can a lack of belief in santa clause be a cause for murder (cuz that’s basically what you’re saying. everyone who doesn’t believe in santa is as bad as anyone who is the same and murdered someone). as for toedad not being a real person… well, that’s completely irrelevant. people in real life do worse than this guy has done.

          and yet where religion rules, the place is infinitely worse off. saudi arabia? check fuck it, pretty much the entire middle east right now. the vatican? check. fuckin hell, the republicans of the USA are effectively the christian theocratic party now. the majority of the world’s religious people won’t kidnap their children, sure, but a good amount of them do, as well as killing their children via “exorcism” and the like (such as denying life saving blood transfusions) as well as promoting bigotry borne of the bible (cuz if you didn’t notice, that thing is absolutely filled to the brim with it). so, no. your thought process lacks the required knowledge to make any kind of noise on the issue.

          your being an atheist is irrelevant. all it says is you don’t believe in any gods.

          “god gives me the power” is all you need to hear. it’s really pretty cut and dry in this case.

        4. Gamaran Sepudomyn

          Fundamentalists exist in all forms, not just religious. They just all seem somewhat religious, because they all ascribe themselves the sort of properties commonly ascribed to gods (knowing everything is a common one).

        5. Retrikaethan

          this is literally the subject i was trying to make obvious. if your fundamentalists act like toedad has then there is something clearly wrong with your fundamentals.

        6. SDGlyph

          *waves*
          Non-crazy religious person here, popping up to say “Religion doesn’t make bigots; it just makes bigots more obnoxiously self-righteous.” Or, as I’ve said many times before, institutional religion is basically a tribal structure (see also: political affiliations, sports teams), and that tends to bring out the worst kind of authoritarian gatekeepers.

        7. Retrikaethan

          incorrect on both accounts. religion makes people selectively insane and typically, especially in the three yahweh religions, promotes bigotry as well as misogyny. every single argument against reproductive health aids are religious. first term abortion? check. condoms? check. sexual education? checked in triplicate. i mean, shit, they’re still trying to promote abstinence-only as an effective educational platform. it doesn’t fucking work! plus, every single argument against the LGBT community: religious. all of them. when you teach people to be bigots do not fucking be surprised when they act like bigots.

          sure, i get it, not every single religious person is a monster but honestly so many are it’s just not funny anymore. that said, religion by definition is selective insanity. if you’re not insane, you’re not actually religious.

        8. SDGlyph

          I fear you may have confused American evangelicalism/fundamentalism with religion in general. Not that surprising, given that they make such a noise about being the only valid form of religion, but it’s ironic that you’ve swallowed their claims wholesale without bothering to educate yourself. Also, if you’re going to call someone else a bigot, probably best not to make sweeping negative value statements while you’re doing it.

          Thanks for letting me know I’m insane by the way! I might never have known if not for your enlightened argument! 🙂

        9. Retrikaethan

          religion in general still makes you insane. sorry. granted, i might have a more hazy view of religious people in general, but the point still stands that being religious is effectively being selectively insane. at the same time, i’ll stop being a bigot when people stop murdering their children for religious reasons like denying blood transfusions, performing exorcisms, or otherwise exposing babies to probably contaminated water, as well as murdering people because they’re atheist/gay/different. i really really really hope that can happen one day soon but i honestly don’t see it ending in my lifetime. though, i suspect you will throw something like “what makes you better than them?” to which i have to point out i’m just a guy posting on the internet. i’m not out bombing churches or murdering people and/or children.

        10. thejeff

          Yeah, that’s way to extreme.

          I agree that the vast majority of people who are anti-LGBTQ and anti-sex & women and general are so because of religion, at least in the US, but that’s different than most religious people being anti-LGBTQ or anti-sex or anti-women. There’s a particular nasty strain of fundamentalism that pushes such things, but there’s a lot of religion that doesn’t.

          And I say that as a long time atheist.

        11. Retrikaethan

          the major problem is that the “not fundamentalist” religious people produce the fundamentalist people eventually. when you tell kids there’s literally a magic man in the sky who wrote a rulebook for you to follow that if you don’t you go to a magic place where you will be tortured for an infinite amount of time it’s really not surprising when they take it literally/fundamentally. the books themselves are fucking horrid and yet they keep printing them.

          there’s no such thing as nasty fundamentalism. the fundamentals of christianity (islam and jusaism too) are fucking nasty.

  133. Wallace

    FUCK. YES.

  134. Sam

    HAHAHA YES, GOOD.

  135. Just Me

    …”and god has given me the strength to ….” POW!!!!

    New addition to my Top Five favorite DoA moments.

  136. Disloyal Subject

    SMITE
    EVIL

  137. Nakama

    It’s like everyone is getting a crowning moment of awesome! And now it is Joyce’s turn! YOWZA!

    1. Kryss LaBryn

      Good lord, you guys; the Crowning Moment of Awesome page doesn’t have a DoA listing! Like, at all!

      Sadly, I have no idea how to make one. Anyone else?

  138. MatthewTheLucky

    Would not be surprised if Head Alien shows up tomorrow.

  139. Kaunisenkeli

    Oh my. Never mess with an enraged Joyce or he friends and loved ones. Gotcha.

    1. Kaunisenkeli

      Curse you, typos!

    2. SDGlyph

      Joyce is Mother Bear. Galasso’s lucky he took over before she got there.

  140. dixiesaurer

    im kind of worried about that “you came after me” line. like we know beckys not totally over joyce and this is a pretty spectacular thing joyce just did. im afraid of the potential emotional turmoil that might come from suffering such a traumatic event and being rescued by someone you love but are trying to get over

    1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

      Cue Joyce’s struggles with her own sexuality.

      1. Retrikaethan

        inb4 dina offers to help them both.

        1. Cerberus

          OT3? or should it be OT4 because Dorothy?

  141. Rodimiss

    I think God gave all the strength to Joyce for that punch. You go, Joyce.

    But it’s really, really telling about how messed up this has gotten that Joyce has realized it’s no use trying to reason with him.

    1. neeks

      well i mean he’s the guy who brought a gun to a knife fight family meeting

  142. Gangler

    So remember when Joyce had that encounter with Joe. Beat him up, Joe got pissed, Joyce was all “But I thought girls couldn’t hurt guys, because girls are weak and guys are strong.”

    Ross also comes from that same environment. He views himself as strong, Joyce as weak to the point of being harmless, but more than that, he thinks that Joyce shares these views. He’s not truly expecting a fight. He thinks that he can just be all “Rargh! Me Big Dad! You Tiny Girl!” and Joyce will step aside knowing there’s nothing she can do to impede him.

    Joyce however has learned a thing or two since last they spoke, and she’s ready to pass the lesson on.

    1. saki

      YES.

    2. Bagge

      ToeDad: “I JUST CAN’T UNDERSTAND WHAT WENT WROOOOOOONG. GOOOOOD, WHY DON’T YOU HELP ME PICK ON LITTLE GIRLS???”

      God: “Yeah, that really is a mystery of the ages, isn’t it?”

  143. Hoboturtle

    Wow, Im not sure that this isnt the version of Joyce with alien super powers.

  144. Kitschensyngk

    Toedad just got STUBBED!

    1. nothri

      No, no, no, no….

      Toedad….::sunglasses:: just got NAILED.

  145. Lordess of Madness

    And God has given Joyce the strength to toetally kick your butt!

    Joyce looks seriously awesome in that third frame

  146. nothri

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9l_U6eJpKco

  147. lumen

    FALCON FUCKING PUNCH

    1. TheNinthShader

      Getting punched by fucking falcons sounds awkward, what if they continued fucking while they punched you?

  148. Streben

    The Strength to be punched out by a young naive girl apparently.

  149. Boom

    This pleases me.

  150. Streben

    Sorry, giant sarcasm quotes around young and naive there. Not the same girl Ross remembers.

    1. Cerberus

      Loss of the certainty of your faith and a realistic exposure to the world as is rather than as sold to you will do that to a person.

      Which is why these cultures fear secular university and things like the internet so much. Because when you say everything you say is true and then they go out and find out, oh, some of it is complete bollocks, then they are more likely to keep pulling at the strings to find out what else is bollocks.

      1. SDGlyph

        Especially when one of the tenets of fundamentalism is that you have to accept ALL of it or you lose everything. Once kids who were raised to believe that find out that much of what they were taught about the physical world is bogus, they often reject the spiritual stuff too. Hence, fundamentalism is a leading cause of atheism.

  151. kenny

    joyce has evolved so much in the last 2 minutes

    1. ninja_jesus

      I’m sure it’s been longer than that.

  152. Arianod

    Well, someone has given Joyce the strength, too XD

  153. neeks

    god has given him the strength to get punched the heck in the face

  154. Daimonion

    Leave the men where they lay
    They’ll never see another day
    Lost my soul, lost my dream
    You can’t take becky from me.

  155. Cattleprod

    If the next week or so of strips was just the cast taking turns beating up Ross like the hysterical passenger in the movie Airplane, I would be cool with that. Characters who have no reason to know any of this happened could queue up.

    1. Hogan

      *volunteers… then remembers he is not a character…* 🙁

    2. 3oranges

      He’s really been stuck in encounters this whole time, huh?
      Dina attacks and scratches his face, but he is too much for her.
      So Amazi-girl attacks and takes his gun, but his car is too much for her.
      So Joyce attacks and knocks him over.

      Is Ross ready to give up, or does he need a few more? Note: Ross being ready to give up may involve being unconscious.

  156. NinjaNick

    Joyce FTW!

  157. Gob Hobblin

    FUCK HIM UP!

  158. djkaiba

    To quote lucifer from the Constantine movie: “Looks like somebody doesn’t have your back anymore.” Feels ironic quoting that in the situation but I still felt it worked.

    1. ninja_jesus

      Toedad is sort of a fallen angel.

  159. saki

    About the alt-text, at first I read “oops, re-funded” and thought it was some sort of pun about fundamentalism.

  160. desertpetrichor

    I wonder if this is going to be the start of Joyce healing from her assault. She just proved that she is capable of amazing feats to protect Becky, and just slam dunked Toe-dad across a field. Maybe this will show her that she has strength of her own and will start becoming less afraid to walk across campus on her own, and convince her to seek help with coping.

    1. desertpetrichor

      Also:
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vIARjtWLbA&t=0m59s

    2. Arianod

      It may work out like that at first -but wait until her parents hear of this… :c

    3. Cerberus

      I don’t know. Currently the PTSD of her assault is intertwining itself with her sexual repression and her faith, which is not great for her. But this might be a stake blow to said faith and the assumptions of morality it makes. Seeing how her faith looks when followed as unerring truth and without bend, seeing the similarities in mistreatment and threat and traumatization, she may be seeing those bonds start to crack, which might at least let her start talking about it openly to a select few, which would be good. Becky, especially, would be good to talk it out with, because she’s made a similar break with the restrictions of her faith and has that long history of trust that will be so necessary as she talks this out.

  161. nothri

    Funny thing is I’ll just bet Goliath thought he was the hero too.

    1. detective boomwolf

      I mean he was fighting for his country if memory serves. Might not be rememberin all the details, but dude was most likely just followin orders.

      1. Leorale

        Yep. The Philistines and the Israelites each picked a champion (so that they didn’t have to fight each other with their whole armies and have lots of casualties). Goliath was chosen to represent the Philistines, because he was friggin’ huge. There’s no reason to think he’s evil or anything.

        1. WingedBeast

          Yeah, not his fault that the Israelites chose to send in the time’s equivalent of a sniper.

        2. nothri

          Well, to be fair, putting a sniper in plain sight on the front lines where the enemy can easily get near and attack them is probably the worst thing you can do with one.

          Well, barring something really stupid or nonsensical like slathering them in barbecue sauce and throwing them into a lion pit. Its the worst thing that still kinda makes some kind of sense tactically speaking.

        3. Dragon_Nataku

          … but then his cover would be lions. Nobody would look for him under a pile of lions! Perfect camoflauge, what are you on about.

        4. nothri

          Hard to aim at anything from inside a lion’s stomach. That’s all I’m saying.

  162. Proto

    You know, say what you will about him, but damn, God must’ve given him some kind of strength. Most people don’t just pop out of a car wreck that flips the car. Or just recover from hanging out of a car window while in a high speed chase. That would be enough to exhaust pretty much anyone. But Ross is some sort of Terminator. (And I guess it’s genetic since Becky seems ay-oh-kay with zero trauma from this whole scenario)

    1. ninja_jesus

      It wasn’t God who gave him strength. He’s just rapture-ready.

      1. nothri

        I know what you mean, but suddenly I’m imagining Toe-Dad as a Big Daddy and his actions make so much more sense now. I wonder if we can harvest any Plasmids from him?

    2. segnosaur

      Remember though, we never actually saw what happened to Toedad or anything that happened after Amazigirl lost her grip on the rope. Perhaps he just fell out of the car as it was slowing down. A fall from a few feet up onto the ground might hurt but it probably wouldn`t be a devastating injury.

      1. merbrat

        I was imagining him holding the rope, when the car started tipping. The rope lost the slack, pulling him out the window…now his legs fling out behind him like a jack-knife (he is parallel to the ground, now, and face down) Lets go of the rope, and crashes to the ground, hence the knees?

  163. starkruzr

    are…

    are we sure she’s not an abductee in this universe

    ‘m just asking questions

  164. Asthin

    Joyce’s alien abductee powers activate!

  165. SargeAbernathy

    Oh. I really did enjoy this strip. 😀 Joyce with strength. I hope this strength sticks around.

    1. SargeAbernathy

      You know, if there is a God that does … once in a while … grant strength. That was it right there XD.

  166. Plasma Mongoose

    I wonder if Joyce ended up cutting her fist on his teeth.

  167. Tenzhi

    The power of Joyce propels you! The power of Joyce propels you! Pertundam ergo fugis… Amen.

    1. nothri

      Plus 50 internets to you.

  168. Bagge

    YOU GO JOYCE!!!!!

    Hey, ToeDad – what she said.

  169. Hogan

    Sorry Toedad, God distributed strength through another schedule, but dont worry, you’ll get a taste of the heavenly gifts 🙂

  170. quietlythundering

    Yessssssss.
    After dealing with the previous strips in this arc, this is just really, really satisfying.

  171. detective boomwolf

    Yeah, well whatever strength you got, apparently Joyce got it 2 times over. Get 50 shades of rekt man.

  172. Gabriel

    So i’ve been following DoA (Dumbing of Age not Dead or Alive, funny coincidence though) since the beginning and only now i noticed that there are other three or so comics with the same characters.
    So are the other comics within the same lore but in parallel universes that make the story change? Or they just look like the same characters but are different people?
    Also could someone (if it’s not to much of course) please give me an critical analysis about the other comics so that i can evaluate if i’ll read them too?

    1. TheLurkerAbove

      No, totally different lore, beyond the characters themselves. Even then some of them aren’t 100% the same. It’s Willis’s earlier work, starting from the late 90s. He’s re-running them, and currently at the early part of his second comic set in that alternate universe.

      Dumbing of Age has far better storytelling and art, because well, he’s clearly improved since those early efforts. He re-drew the first part of It’s Walky and had me wishing for more. A re-make if you will. 😛

    2. SDGlyph

      It goes something like this:
      – Roomies! was Willis’ original comic, starting off as a mostly slice-of-life college strip that went very dark after a character death.
      – It’s Walky! was the followup in the same universe, which moved out of college into a sci-fi romp with aliens, action and occasional high drama.
      – Shortpacked! then followed some of the IW! characters into civilian life working in a toy store, with a lot of pop-culture gags (and occasional high drama, because Willis).
      – There’s Joyce & Walky! too, also a followup, which takes Joyce and Walky (the original OTP of the comic) into a domestic sitcom. It does introduce a few characters and plot threads that show up here, but a fair number of the relevant comics were subscriber-only and are now available to Patreon supporters.

      Dumbing Of Age is basically a complete reboot of the entire thing with the benefit of 15 years of writing and drawing experience, going back to the slice-of-life setting of the original Roomies! (with occasional high drama). Characters are mostly drawn from Willis’ previous comics, generally keeping their design and personality outlines, but it’s a fresh start for all of them.

      Hope that helps!

      1. SDGlyph

        D’oh, I meant to link to Bring Back Roomies! / It’s Walky!, which currently re-running almost all the old strips in story order, one per day.

        1. SDGlyph

          Oh, and hey, there’s a timely interview with Willis over at The Mary Sue!

  173. Robert

    The guy who looks like a foot has a jaw of glass. *GASP*!!! He’s like a Cinderella man!

  174. Architex

    Joyce probably broke her hand, to be honest

    1. NinjaNick

      Maybe a bruised fist. I hope we’ll see more hits in the next strip. Who’s next in line to hit Ross the Toe-headed punching bag? Sal? Amazi-Girl?

      1. Robert

        The Truck.

  175. Robert

    Seriously though who heard the words “Flawless Victory” in their heads after Ross hit the ground?

    1. Jhon

      Speak for yourself. I heard “I’m making a note here: HUGE SUCCESS”

  176. Someone

    The truth is, is that Joyce actually multiplies her strength every time she swears. Her aversion to swearing isn’t because she sees it as a sin but because she doesn’t want to risk hurting anyone. Her DAMN IT! was simply her powering up.

    Hell: X5
    Damn: X10
    Crap:X15
    Shit:X20
    Fuck:X50
    Seven dirty words you can’t say on Tv said in quick succession: X500

    1. Robert

      So that’s why Cartman turned into Goku…

    2. newllend(henryvolt)

      I want that power.

  177. Foxhack

    THE POWER OF CHRIST PROPELS THIS FIST

    1. Foxhack

      Alternate comment:

      YOU GOT KNOCKED THE FUGG OUT

  178. Idon'tcarenomore

    Damn good shot. Perfect right hook.

    Heck, If AG can doing flying acrobatics on a speeding car, and Sal can do same on her bike….then why can’t 90 lb. Joyce deck 250 lb Toedad?

    Seriously, most satisfying strip in ages.

    Where is Dina?

    1. Robert

      I think she’s hunting in the woods for food.

  179. nothri

    Also, incidentally, Becky has officially never been more lesbian than she is right now.

    1. Bagge

      Honestly, she looks more worried than anything else.

    2. Cerberus

      Confirmed girlfriend who likes her back. Rescued by superheroine, hot motorcycle woman, and her crush. Plus her crush decked out her homophobic dad.

      Yeah, she’s probably hitting just about peak lesbian right now.

      1. nothri

        Feel free to insert whatever hackneyed DBZ joke about numbers exceeding 9000 or this not being her final form or whatever. I’m too tired this morning.

        1. Spencer

          UM ACTUALLY the real line is “Over 8000” and it was butchered by evil gaijin dubbers.

          #trufan

        2. nothri

          Yes, that’s true. However, the MEME, which is what everyone goes nuts over, was born from the mangled dub line. Ergo, 9000.

  180. Leon real

    Joyce knows a hell of a lot more about what a father’s duty should be, you selfish, fundie moron.
    Now kick him in the head until death.

    1. Cerberus

      “Dads know how to make everything right”

      http://www.dumbingofage.com/2014/comic/book-5/01-when-somebody-loved-me/fix/

      Damn that arc was rife with foreshadowing.

      1. Peduncle

        It’s been a wonderful sequence, with this as one of my favorites.

      2. Peduncle

        And this.

  181. Anywhere

    So glad to see the spirit of It’s Walky! Joyce has arrived.

  182. Shanunu

    YOOOOOOOOO

    1. Shanunu

      Now that I’ve gotten that out of my system, I realize the car accident pretty much guarantees that Ross is going to prison.

    2. Shanunu

      A few pages ago I was wondering how badly Becky would let Amazigirl beat him up. I can’t believe I should have been worrying about Joyce.

  183. Anywhere

    “Oh great he’s talking about father’s duty again. Lord, give me the strength to not punch him square in the jaw, or at least the strength to do so.”
    …
    “God’s will be done.”

  184. merbrat

    Damn skippy, Willis!

  185. Reltzik

    Okay, is anyone other than me reading “God gave me strength” and then imagining that as a “Magic staff, make my monster grow!” sequence?

    …

    Okay, so you didn’t, but now you can’t stop thinking it, right?

    1. Anywhere

      Damn you, now I’m picturing Toedad dressed as Rita Repulsa.

      1. Reltzik

        My work here is done.

      2. Time Sage

        As long as it’s not the rita action figure outfit with the boob cones…..

      3. Commodore Jeep-Eep

        -Brain sizzles like a frying egg-

    2. nothri

      That’s a big problem….

      We only have three people involved in the rescue. We can’t assign everyone a Ranger.

  186. Sunny Day

    Wow a real Joyce vs Goliath story, she defeated the Ass by hitting him on the jawbone.

    1. Anywhere

      +1

    2. Cephalo the Pod

      Isn’t that a reference to the Judge Samson? He beat a bunch of…Palestinians, was it?…with the jawbone of an ass. And thus he made an ass of them all.

  187. Freezer

    FALCON JOYCE!

  188. Tim C.

    In the words of LL cool J:

    Joyce is gonna knock you out…. mama said knock you out…. I’mma gonna knock you out….

  189. podian

    …Joyce sent Toedad flying…

    Are you sure there’s no Martian interference in Dumbiverse?

    1. SDGlyph

      Well, she couldn’t have done this before she devoted herself to Dexter & Monkey Master…
      (Causality shmausailty)

  190. Azarafel

    Probably been said before, but, youngest child with 3 older brothers equals not weak physically or super manipulative possible but for j I don’t think the latter is the case

    1. Cerberus

      3 older presumed to be brothers at least. Jocelyn was in that mix. But still, yeah, I imagine she knows how to rough and tumble when needed.

  191. ninja_jesus

    You know, I think this whole event speaks a lot about Amber’s effectiveness as Amazi-Girl. As far as serious crises goes, she’s 0 for 2 in terms of helping people, and 0-1 in instigating a fight with Sal. Amazi-Girl has only ever made things worse, or was otherwise useless, and I’m sure it’s because she’s not doing the “superheroine” thing for other people; she’s doing this to avoid confronting her issues, arguably at the expense of others. While I do understand that trauma is hard to work through, I think her current method of coping isn’t just dangerous; it’s selfish and self-serving, with the pretense of helping others as an excuse. It doesn’t mean I hate her; I just hope she realizes this and stops.

    Contrast that with Joyce, who’s had more victories than defeats by just being herself when it comes to fighting. She’s successfully defended Dorothy from her over-religious parents, she defended herself from a bible-quoting rapist, and now Joyce is in the process of defending Becky from her dangerously religious father. The difference between Joyce and Amazi-Girl is that Joyce genuinely cares.

    Sure, Amazi-Girl cares about human life as a general vigilante rule, but she has neither the passion nor the drive that Joyce has when it comes to confronting danger, especially for the benefit of others. Amazi-Girl is an emotional self-defense created by Amber, she isn’t there to help people; that’s just a result of imagining these crises as her past traumas.

    I think that one of the best lessons Joyce learned from growing up in a fundamentalist home is that you should defend and put your whole faith into your beliefs. Be passionate about them. We’ve seen her do that when trying to justify her belief in the Bible and God. Right now, Joyce has placed her belief in Becky, in her best friend, and she’ll do everything she can to defend her.

    1. Reltzik

      Great analysis! As with all good character analyses, the correct thing to do here is disagree. Because internet. =)P

      While I won’t disagree with you about Amazi-Girl’s motives or high-risk methods, she doesn’t seem short on passion where asshole abusive fathers and their victim daughters are concerned, and however badly it nearly turned out in this case she deserves at least an assist. She wasn’t ineffective. The biggest threats were (1) Toedad escaping in the Toemobile with Becky and going off to do… whatever he was planning, (2) Toedad shooting someone; and (3) State troopers ka-spewing Toedad’s brains in front of Becky and traumatizing her for life. However risky her methods, she neutralized all three threats. I have NO IDEA how Sal and Joyce were planning to get him to stop, but it wouldn’t have been pretty either.

      As for Joyce, I’m going to again disagree. Joyce is normally a confused and conflicted individual, handicapped by her upbringing. She leans towards kindness, compassion, and acceptance. These are at her core and are a great source of strength and determination, and they’re about character, not beliefs. She could be capable of almost anything through this. But she is held back alternatively by confusion regarding the, erm, harsher parts of Christianity, and by uncertainty stemming from exposure to the myriad things from which she had been previously sheltered. Her strength emerges not from the application of faith in any sense beyond dedication to people, but instead from setting aside this confusion and uncertainty when it truly matters.

      1. ninja_jesus

        Her passion is based on her psychological trauma, trying to “correct the wrong” that happened by using this trauma as a “weapon for good”. That is very passionate, sure, but it’s a self-serving passion that fizzles out when confronted with reality. On the flip side, Joyce is protecting her best friend when she could’ve just let Amazi-Girl do her thing. She is held back by her confusion, yes, but it’s overridden by the powerful instinct to help others when they’re in need, and that instinct is validated through her faith.

        Joyce’s beliefs are something to consider, because prior to Becky showing up, Joyce still thought homosexuality was something to “cure”. She tried to “cure” Ethan because she thought that’s what her beliefs called for. Here, she is facing that belief in the form of Toedad, and rejecting it. That alone is a very powerful message about how her beliefs and faith have changed.

        The story of Joyce is the story of coming to terms with one’s religious upbringing, how society challenges those beliefs, and how one chooses to react. Time and again, Joyce has chosen to use her faith in the defense of people that fundie Christians like toedad or her parents would condemn. She’s rejecting their interpretation of their shared faith in God and Jesus Christ and asserting her own; one that isn’t cruel or discriminatory against anyone.

        Rather than setting aside her confusion and uncertainty, I think it becomes clearer to Joyce on what she does and doesn’t believe in. She believes that Becky is valid in who she is, and she doesn’t believe that what Becky’s father is doing is right or morally just.

    2. doubleW

      Joyce is cool as hell (hah), but try imagining this strip with Toedad still armed and with a running car.

      1. ninja_jesus

        I imagine it would’ve gone better than a car crash that could’ve potentially killed the red vehicle driver (because Amazi-Girl lost her grip), Amazi-Girl herself (if Sal wasn’t there to catch her), Toedad and Becky.

        Secondly, there is more than one way to stop a car, just as there is more than one way to disarm a person.

        1. BenRG

          I don’t agree. I think that it is much more likely that it would have ended with bloodshed and multiple fatalities.

        2. Mindlink

          I imagine it would’ve ended in a car crash anyway, after Toedad trying to ram through police fortifications, possibly while shooting/being shot at, with a lesser chance of survival.

    3. Torra

      I really like this analysis! I agree with all that actually, it all makes a lot of sense. Amazi-Girl does what she does *for herself* instead of other people, whereas Joyce does things the other way around, even if its hard or its something that is against her original beliefs.

      Amber definitely needs some help. I’m hoping this will help her realise it!

      1. BenRG

        That may have been the case once but read ‘hostage’ again. See what Amazi-Girl’s reason is for keeping up the pursuit despite having smashed into a windscreen at 20mph: “I cant… fail anyone!”

        She may be crazy and self-deluding, but she believes that she’s doing this to help people.

        1. shadowcell

          well, yes, “*I* can’t fail anyone!” as good as her intentions are, it’s still about her. which is what you’d expect when Amazi-Girl is a coping mechanism.

        2. SDGlyph

          That’s still more about her own issues than actually helping people, I think, and goes back to both the end of WBDDB and Blaine berating her for not being able to do anything about Sal taking Ethan hostage. I dunno, I’m struggling to articulate the impression I got from it.

    4. Tilty

      -Rolls eyes-

      This is a very biased, unfair, and inaccurate analysis of both Joyce and Amazigirl. It feels less like you understand either character, and more like you want to find knit-picky reasons to attack Amber/Amazigirl and will twist information to suit this conclusion.

      For the record, I am not saying that was Amazigirl is doing is healthy. It is not. Burying her emotions, problems like domestic abuse, under layers of anger and disassociation is not healthy. Still, that doesn’t mean that she hasn’t helped in these situations, particularly in this violent kidnapping.

      The facts are:

      1) Toedad was ALREADY violent and talking about fighting the police over custody of his daughter.

      2) Toedad was ALREADY endangering both himself and Becky by driving recklessly.

      3) Toedad was already several minutes ahead of Sal before Amazigirl slowed them down.

      Those are indisputable facts shown through the dialogue and storytelling.

      We also know that any discussion with Becky could have led to more anger and escalation. Particularly if she had called 911 without being prompted by Amazigirl! He was already prepared to strike her for even trying to keep them from getting in a wreck, and had they continued that is a very likely outcome – particularly with Sal in pursuit.

      Do you think that if he saw Joyce in the rearview instead of Amazigirl this situation would have been resolved more peacefully? Or, more likely, would he have started behaving more recklessly in the name of “Defending” his daughter? In which case, there wouldn’t have been anyone to disarm Ross. Or keep him from hitting the pavement and dying (Traumatizing Becky). Or kept the car from flipping.

      Sal simply DOESN’T HAVE THAT SKILLSET. Without Amazigirl to disarm and stop Ross, she would have escalated the situation as well simply by being present.

      And don’t even get me STARTED on cops, who would have likely have tried to flip the car anyway.

      So, sure, Joyce got in the last punch, but it was only after Amazigirl disarmed Ross, stopped his vehicle, and got him just injured enough that Joyce was capable of knocking him down. Heaven knows she couldn’t do it at the fountain!

      In fact, I am going to double down on this stance and say that Joyce put Becky in DANGER by refusing to contact people who would be able to help her friend. She didn’t want to tell Dorothy or Amazigirl – the two people who would be most capable of preventing this situation in the first place! Dorothy is an incredibly intelligent woman with a strong understanding of the world, law, and how to help others. She’s also an aspiring politician who understands how to pull favors with connections, and her boyfriend’s mother knows the Dean. She would have been the most able to find a safe and legal way to keep Becky on campus, but Joyce would not tell her because of personal reasons. That was selfish.

      Amazigirl/Amber, had she known about Becky, could have helped ensure she wasn’t spotted and that Ross wouldn’t endanger Becky at the school. Not only is she highly educated about the LGBT+ community, and so more likely to know of resources to help Becky, but she is also generally more experienced at ensuring that she isn’t caught by the wrong people. She wouldn’t have overlooked the fact that Becky’s orange hair was a red flag. She also would have been more hyper-vigilant in ensuring that if Becky was spotted, she wasn’t put in that much danger.

      By not contacting her friends and assuming Becky could just sleep in her dorm with no fallout, Joyce CAUSED this entire arc. Without Amazigirl, people probably would have died.

      1. Kirbilius Clausius

        For Amazi-Girl’s ‘real world superheroing’, she’s not doing so bad. She’s been shown to have actually stopped other crimes in progress, or are we not counting the time she saved the woman being harrassed on the street because she’s nameless? She actually did stop the White-Board Ding-Dong Bandit. So far she has exactly two in-panel failings: picking a fight with Sal & crew and allowing the escape of Ol’ Gash Face. And honestly, after Dorothy reports _this_ incident of Amazi-Girl being hit by a car and stopping a ToeDad (a campus shooter) people might actually calm down as much as people did in Seattle after Phoenix Jones’ secret identity was revealed to be MMA. Even in this incident, Amazi-Girl may not have ‘saved the day’ but she certainly kept the day from slipping into that cold black night by disarming ToeDad, bringing the car to a stop and simply helping when it was shown that the police were not going to.

        Amber’s psychological problems are still more of a burden on Amazi-Girl than her ‘official’ record.

      2. SDGlyph

        Um. I think you’re way off the mark on a few things here.

        First, from your ‘indisputable facts’, number 2 is flat wrong. Becky got Ross to slow down and drive normally already – telling him to stop at stop signs before they even got off campus, and to ‘drive casual’ when she saw the cops coming (and before she saw AG).

        Secondly, Joyce did tell Dorothy about Becky. Becky turned up on Thursday, and Joyce told Dorothy about her situation the very next day; Dorothy discreetly raised the subject of shelters in their Gender Studies class after lunch. As for Amazi-Girl – she was the person Joyce contacted, via Dorothy, as soon as she knew Ross was back on campus (when Becky called her while running through the meadow, and before Ross turned up at the fountain with the gun). Joyce certainly didn’t “refuse to contact people”, and I think you’re doing exactly what you’re accusing ninja_jesus of here.

        Also, your whole thing with Amazi-Girl having the skills to save Ross and Becky from the crash neatly sidesteps the fact that AG caused the crash in the first place by blowing out Ross’ tyre. I’ve said my piece already in the last couple of days so won’t repeat everything here.

        It wouldn’t have been as exciting, but the best possible reaction from Amazi-Girl (in terms of Becky’s safety) would probably be something like this:
        AG: “Joyce, listen to me. Do you know where they’re going?”
        J: “Y-yes. I think so. Becky said he wanted to take her home. To La Porte.”
        AG: “Joyce, you need to call the police right now. Tell them what’s happened, where they’re going, and describe the car. They’ll catch him and get Becky out of there, I promise. Now I’m going to go find Dina and make sure she’s okay too.”

        1. Spencer

          +1

        2. Tilty

          Oh please. This is drivel.

          Firstly, Becky told Toedad to drive casual, but there was very little indication of him doing so. And, in fact, the second that anyone would have entered pursuit his reckless behaviors would have continued. It doesn’t matter if we’re discussing Amazigirl, Sal, or the police. Anyone tailing Toedad would have escalated the situation, and SOMEONE WOULD HAVE PURSUED HIM. Even if your “Best case scenario,” the police would have pursued, Toedad would have either tried to escape through reckless driving (Prompting either the pit maneuver or tire shredding strips – which would have flipped the car anyway), or he would have taken the gun out and ended in a shoot off. The fact that you believe that calling the police on a man with a rifle holding his daughter hostage in a high speed chase would have ended better than no one getting seriously injured is LAUGHABLE at best.

          Joyce might have MENTIONED Becky’s situation, but she didn’t take anyone’s advice. She wanted Becky to just live in her dorms with no one noticing, just forever. She was told this wasn’t feasible, and she didn’t care. She was told it was short-sighted, and she didn’t care. She was told of places which could help Becky AND SHE DIDN’T CARE. She, like a short-sighted child, believed that she could just hide a full grown woman away in a dorm forever with absolutely no fallout.

          There’s a difference between telling someone, and seeking help and taking that help. Joyce didn’t. She did things her way. She put Becky in danger because of it.

          But let’s return to the police again, shall we? In our universe, the police are a mixed bag. Sure you have good police officers who can and do resolve dangerous situations, but you also have a police academy which teaches force before negotiation and acceptable losses. One hostage in a car has less value than the potentially dozens who could be killed when Ross gets in a high-speed shootout. Pedestrians, other drivers, police officers… They’re not going to put everyone in danger over Becky. Period.

          And that is OUR universe.

          In the Dumbing world, the police seem to be incompetent to the point of comedic effect. Not only do they make NO effort to find an illegal vigilante on premises, they can’t even distinguish between an animal attack and a beating – from when Amber assaulted her father. After the shooting, they made no effort to secure the premises, and let a speeding car (With a girl riding behind it on a skateboard) drive right past them. Because, you know, fleeing the scene of a crime isn’t suspicious at all.

          What do you think the best-case resolution would be with cops who can’t even be bothered to do their jobs? Do you sincerely, honestly think it’d be better than disarming a dangerous man and getting everyone out alive?

        3. SDGlyph

          Hmm. Wow. You seem to be very convinced of a lot of things that ‘would’ have happened, and of what you say characters were thinking when, I believe, the text clearly shows otherwise. You’re also trying to move the goalposts after you’re been shown to be wrong (“Joyce didn’t tell Dorothy! Okay, well, she might have mentioned it but…”).

          Protip: Dismissing someone else’s reply as ‘drivel’ and then proceeding to shout at them is not conducive to any kind of discussion. You’ve clearly got some kind of raging hate-on for Joyce and aren’t interested in listening to anyone else’s interpretation, so I’m out. Have a nice day.

        4. Tilty

          I don’t hate Joyce at all. I am pointing out that saying she “Saved the day” or resolved the conflict is completely wrong when she is part of the root cause of the conflict. To be honest, I had forgotten that she had made mention of Becky to Dorothy, but she didn’t pursue advice. She didn’t even acknowledge that there was a need for long-term goals. Becky staying at a school where she would be spotted with no protection, while being stalked by her father IS in part Joyce’s fault based on the choices she made.

          And I am countering the ‘should’a, could’a, would’a’ with another perspective. The idea that contacting the police wouldn’t escalate the situation is just plain wrong. Police CONSTANTLY escalate situations. They’re trained to apprehend, and in this situation they would not have let an armed assailant escape, and Ross already said he would fight the police if they gave chase. There’s no good end there. None.

          Joyce and Amazigirl have some similarities. They are both victims of assaults that have left them psychologically scarred. They are both resistant to getting help. They’re both more willing to handle situations outside of their control independently, rather than seek help. They both need help in dealing with the roots of these issues, rather than burying trauma under coping mechanisms. They both played a role in how this chain of events played out – both in a positive and negative way.

          My problem is that the OP is fixating on one action by Joyce and saying it resolved the entire situation and that she saves people just by being herself, and that is simply not true. Joyce played just as much of a role in escalating this to violence as Amazigirl had, while Amazigirl had managed to successfully avoid getting anyone seriously injured. As far as comic-book-worlds are concerned, that’s a win! It’s more than what many heroes could say, honestly.

        5. thejeff

          Just a point: Ross caused the crash by abandoning the wheel and climbing out of the moving car to shoot Amazi-girl. A crash was pretty much guaranteed from that moment.

        6. Spencer

          Would he have let go of the wheel to shoot police cars?

          Would there be caltrops on the road puncturing his tires and sending them spinning into a truck?

          Would some random bystander end up getting her windshield smashed?

          It’s ultimately kind of pointless to ask about could/should, but I think the entire argument over the last week is less about whether Amber did a good job and more that she really shouldn’t have been physically able to without plot armor.

        7. thejeff

          That was specifically in reply to “neatly sidesteps the fact that AG caused the crash in the first place by blowing out Ross’ tyre.”

          I also suspect, you and the author may have different ideas about the kind of realism to expect in the strip. We’ve got a lot of emotional and psychological realism – everyone involved is going to dealing with the emotional consequences of this for years of our time, much like Joyce still (not) dealing with the attempted rape.
          And there’s no aliens or super-tech kind of weirdness. Still, Amazi-girl’s been playing by super-hero rules the whole time. Both in terms of physical prowess and things like the secret identity trope.

          More broadly, how else could this have gone, narratively? It’s all well and good to talk about the best realistic option being to call the cops and let them handle it, but that doesn’t work story wise. What would that look like? We see Joyce call the cops and give a report, go down the station and give a statement, then hear that Ross is dead and Becky’s been taken to the hospital for observation?
          Or we could follow Becky, sitting helplessly as Ross crashes into the police blockade and drags himself from the car with his gun, to be blown away?
          Or just wait a couple of months real time before we find they found him at home and were able to rescue her.

          The protagonists needed to be the ones to stop Toedad. How could that be arranged, without breaking your suspension of disbelief?

        8. SDGlyph

          Agree that narratively, simply calling the cops would have been unsatisfying – and certainly less exciting, as I said. I don’t think that precludes discussion of whether Amazi-Girl did the right thing within the story.

          Please note that saying “Amazi-Girl made the situation worse” is not* the same thing as “Amazi-Girl made the comic less enjoyable” or “Willis shouldn’t have written it this way”. The last week or so has been a wild and exciting ride building up to a fantastic point of catharsis, and none of it would have happened if Amazi-Girl hadn’t escalated the situation. But I absolutely think she did escalate it – again, within the story – and that plays into the ongoing arc of Amber’s psychological issues.

          (*for me; I recognise that some people have found the last week less enjoyable. Nothing wrong with that, either: people like different things.)

        9. Spencer

          That line about there being no aliens or supertech; that’s what it felt like seeing Amazi-Girl’s actions. I consistently did not believe that what I was witnessing was something that could fit into the entire five year run of the series. Given what we know about the rules of DoA and how Amber can function, I don’t believe that the strips with the chase could have actually occurred, between the heroic bystander, Amber being able to adrenaline her way through a grievous head wound, and Sal just showing up out of nowhere and catching Amazi-Girl with one arm.

          As for whether the characters have to solve this situation, well, I really disagree. At the least, they shouldn’t be put in situations where they have to solve problems completely beyond their means, and I think that armed kidnapping counts for college kids. That’s what made the original situation with Ross on campus with a rifle so great. It was the characters in this overwhelming situation beyond their control that they couldn’t deal with. It was this viscerally real, horrifying sequence of events, because there wasn’t a way to stop Toedad in this fantastical, over the top way. It’s not like we needed to just focus on Joyce at the campus waiting around for a solution; we could have had more focus on Becky’s situation and how she was reacting to it.

          Having said all that, it’s over and we’re moving on, so there’s no point in me harping on it anymore. I really didn’t like it, I thought it was a huge dip for what has been an almost constantly top quality series, I thought it should have been solved in a way that was more grounded and consistent in tone with the previous campus shooting sequence, but I also get that it worked for most of the readers so more power to you guys.

        10. Tilty

          So basically you’re butthurt because you didn’t like the resolution to the comic arc and are going to attack Amazigirl’s character despite the fact that she has been shown to achieve some superhuman acts in the comic so it’s clearly not designed to be 100% realistic?

          If you want realism, look for a comic where someone can’t use a pair of hedgeclippers to zipline their way down a power line.

        11. Nezumi

          Dude, I’m coming into this late, but you’re the guy who thinks “Is racist and negligent” is objectively worse than “Using her children as pawns in a plan that ultimately results in their deaths, including using her own daughter as bait with the full expectation she probably wouldn’t make it out of that arrangement without dying or being captured by evil aliens”, because somehow, the person doing the latter still “cares” — because I know I always care deeply about people I deliberately send off to die.

        12. Nezumi

          … I cut off too soon. I meant to finish up by saying I think you’re literally the worst person I’ve seen at literary and character analysis, ever. Amazi-Girl has ziplined down a power cable with garden shears. She’s managed feats of parkour that should be literally impossible, especially without any plausible source of training in it. People magically fail to recognize her despite her looking exactly like Amber. But, no, it’s a high-speed car chase that breaks suspension of disbelief, and her being the only one with anything resembling an actual plan in this whole affair — Sal’s plan was “Stop Amazi-Girl”, and she didn’t seem to have any plans for how to actually help Becky after that — that makes her evil and unbelievable.

        13. Mindlink

          “Would he have let go of the wheel to shoot police cars?”

          Yes

          “Would there be caltrops on the road puncturing his tires and sending them spinning into a truck?”

          Yes, if not a truck, at least another car.

          “Would some random bystander end up getting her windshield smashed?”

          Quite possibly

      3. ninja_jesus

        “This is a very biased, unfair, and inaccurate analysis”

        “Joyce CAUSED this entire arc”

        Okay buddy.

        I’m not gonna come up with a counter point because I’m lazy and you’ve already shown yourself to be dismissive of other arguments; I just wanted to point out the hypocrisy of your statement.

      4. ninja_jesus

        Okay, so, I’m sure I won’t be seeing a reply, but I’ve stopped being lazy and considered your counter argument. A lot of it has been argued already, so I won’t get into that, but there are portions I’m willing to tackle.

        “Do you think that if he saw Joyce in the rearview instead of Amazigirl this situation would have been resolved more peacefully? Or, more likely, would he have started behaving more recklessly in the name of “Defending” his daughter? In which case, there wouldn’t have been anyone to disarm Ross. Or keep him from hitting the pavement and dying (Traumatizing Becky). Or kept the car from flipping.”

        I actually think this would’ve gone better had Ross seen Joyce, someone who he’d think to be harmless, than a random vigilante character climbing onto his car, which is what prompted him to leave the wheel in the first place. His reaction to Amazi-Girl was likely the most reckless Ross could get in that situation, because anything could’ve happened once he let go of the wheel. Following Ross from a safe distance would’ve been FAR safer for everyone involved.

        “Sal simply DOESN’T HAVE THAT SKILLSET. Without Amazigirl to disarm and stop Ross, she would have escalated the situation as well simply by being present.”

        That’s a moot point; no one knows her skillset because it hasn’t been revealed yet. And again, Amazi-Girl’s mere presence DID escalate the situation.

        “And don’t even get me STARTED on cops, who would have likely have tried to flip the car anyway.”

        So, you’ve argued reality with somebody above, so let me do the same and ask: what usually happens to white men with guns? What has the media shown us time and again about what happens to White school shooters? They aren’t killed, they’re arrested; and with Indiana being part of the Bible Belt, I have no doubt that the most likely thing that would’ve happened to Ross is a pair of handcuffs and a bulletproof vest.

        “So, sure, Joyce got in the last punch, but it was only after Amazigirl disarmed Ross, stopped his vehicle, and got him just injured enough that Joyce was capable of knocking him down. Heaven knows she couldn’t do it at the fountain!”

        You’re right. She couldn’t have done it at the fountain. What’s your point? That Amazi-Girl HAD to risk the lives of several drivers and a hostage in order to “save the day”? Amazi-Girl is lucky for things to have turned out this way. A lot of blood could’ve easily been on her hands. And it wasn’t any “skillset” that helped her out here. It was pure dumb luck.

        Lucky that Ross didn’t swing her into oncoming traffic at the beginning; lucky that the red car didn’t swerve into oncoming traffic after Amazi-Girl landed against it; lucky that the driver agreed to help her; lucky she made it from one car to the other; lucky that her hands didn’t lose grip a second time; lucky Ross missed his shot; lucky that the kick landed, and that it was hard enough to knock the gun from his hands; lucky that the caltrops didn’t send the car spinning into the 18 Wheeler; lucky that she was caught by Sal at all, and that Sal didn’t arrive too early or too late for that catch.

        And you are right, to a point, about Joyce having blame for this entire scenario playing out. You are wrong, however, to assume Amazi-Girl could’ve done all those things for Joyce. Amber’s not a full-time superhero; she’s a human being, and having to worry about someone 24/7 would be exhausting; that’s why Joyce had multiple friends help keep watch.

        You’re very passionate and I respect that. Don’t think I’m mindlessly hating on Amazi-Girl/Amber. She’s one of my favorite characters in the comic. Seeing the shit she does for others at the risk of her own life, however, is terrifying, not something to glorify, especially since she’s NOT trained. The only “skillset” we’ve been told about, to my knowledge, is fucking high school track and field.

        In the end, Joyce didn’t pop the tire, Joyce didn’t endanger several drivers, Joyce wasn’t almost flung into an 18 Wheeler, and Joyce didn’t cause a car crash the could’ve killed both Ross and Becky; that was all Amazi-Girl’s doing.

        1. Tilty

          -Rolls eyes-

          Yeah. Firstly you are dead wrong. Ross was obsessive, violent, and completely consumed with the idea of ‘fixing’ his daughter. As far as he is concerned, anyone standing between him and Becky was an enemy. He even went so far as to say if ANY of her friends tried to stop him, he’d send them to hell. He didn’t say, ‘Any of your friends, aside from sweet Joyce.’

          Any. Of. Her. Friends.

          Ross was a deadly man. Assuming he would think Joyce wasn’t a threat is naive, because anyone willing to break into a school with a rifle and threaten to shoot innocent children is NOT someone who would just say, ‘Clearly you’re not going to stand in my way!’

          And this is why Sal’s skillset is important, because had Amazigirl not been in close pursuit, Sal was still trying to cut close and the second that Ross spotted Joyce then things would have escalated still. Anything could have set him off. Anyone who is dangerous enough to bring a gun to a school, hunt young women through the woods, and kidnap their own daughter is NOT being reasonable.

          And, yes, police do favor white assailants. A white man with a gun is regularly treated more favorably than unarmed black men, and that is a sad reality of our world… But a fleeing suspect would would have to be stopped because they’re endangering everyone in their way.

          Also you are wrong about Amber.

          1) She took undisclosed self-defense classes and clearly has self-trained to idolize heroes, so no her only skillset isn’t track and field.

          2) She would have the common sense to not tell Becky that it is completely okay to walk around campus just a day or two after her father had arrived.

          3) She would have had the common sense to help Becky disguise herself (At least dye her hair), because that’s something that she is intimately understands based on both her own fascination with heroes and her identity as Amazigirl.

          I would also say that while Amazigirl was no doubt the trigger that escalated the situation (Which could have just as easily been Joyce/Sal, the police, or even Becky), she isn’t responsible for Ross’ actions. Ross flung her into the red car. Ross took out the gun. Ross let go of the wheel. Ross was going to get them all die in a flaming wreck rather than surrender Becky.

          What Amazigirl did was she didn’t let Ross escape to wherever he intended to bring Becky (He said home, but who knows if he would change his mind). She disarmed Ross after he brought out his rifle. She kept him from falling out of the car when he climbed out the window. She kept the car from driving off of the road after Ross let go of the steering wheel to shoot at her.

          ROSS flipped the car when he let go of the wheel. Not Amazigirl with her spikes.

        2. ninja_jesus

          There are a few points I concede to, but I still disagree that Amber/Amazi-Girl’s involvement was necessary in the first place. Having said that, her involvement was pretty awesome to see, which I suppose is the whole point, regardless of whatever “realism” people like myself want to argue.

        3. Mindlink

          “what usually happens to white men with guns? What has the media shown us time and again about what happens to White school shooters? ”

          They usually go down in a hail of fire, don’t you watch the news ?
          Just a few weeks ago, there was a video circulating on the net, from an officers dash cam none the less, of a cop walking up to a car driven by a white college kid, and simply shooting his gun at him while the kid was just sitting there.
          And an adult brandishing a rifle, which he previously fired on CAMPUS, would definitively not be handled with gloves.

    5. ThatGuy

      Just dont forget about the fact that this campus would literally be a worse place without her.

      She may spend time taking out “petty” crime, but she mostly patrols for bullies and harrassers and assaulters

      the problem is this story isnt about Amber, its about everyone. Otherwise we’d have filler and one of gags of her day to day stopping of petty and actual crime.

      Amber is basically batman but without 10 to 20 years of coping with her issues, the good parents, money or wing wang

      1. ninja_jesus

        I don’t doubt her contributions to school campus safety, but there are better ways to make a campus safer than beating up those people. She can surely do these things without the mask, legally, but the mask is convenient for her because it frees her of personal responsibility and liability. Not necessarily a bad thing against harassers/bullies/assaulters, but crashing a car and the resulting hospital bills are something that’s in need of accountability, regardless of justification. The car didn’t need to crash for it to be stopped. Nobody had to be hurt here.

        1. BenRG

          FWIW, from the moment Becky agreed to get into the car, the road to a resolution without anyone getting hurt was closed.

        2. Cerberus

          That’s actually a good point. Even if Becky continued in her martyring and no one came after her, she would have been hurt by her dad’s let’s just say aggressive ideas of how to “cure the gay”, possibly fatally so if she dared push back against it at all. Police confrontation with gun probably would have ended with possibly her shot and definitely him shot (after all, he “wasn’t going to let them take her from him”)

          Joyce and Sal on motorcycle would have probably ended with him trying to kill them both with the car like he tried to do with Amazi-girl. If they did manage to stop him and he had his gun, he probably would have attempted to shoot Joyce or Sal and Becky would have tried to martyr herself and dissuade Joyce from saving her in order to keep anyone from being shot.

          Amazi-girl put a lot, like a shitton of people in danger with her stunt (the red car woman, Toedad, Becky, herself, the truck driver, anyone on that freeway until those caltrops are cleaned up, and Sal and Joyce when they had to save her), but lucked into the only outcome that doesn’t end in a corpse. That’s a win even though she likely won’t fully accept it as one because she didn’t personally shut him down for good.

          I think the part where the OP has the biggest point is in the risks Amazi-girl takes, especially when she is ramped up in full flashback mode. In regular mode, she is a competent and helpful addition to general campus culture removing harassers and petty thieves from the scene and rescuing cats. In flashback mode, she throws herself recklessly in poorly thought out overly dramatic ways. Confronting a bunch of delinquents in an overly aggressive way just to pick a fight with a memory of a little girl who scared her. Or any of the incredibly dangerous crap she pulled in this rescue. When in flashback mode, she literally stops caring if she lives or dies (because she has to succeed no matter what) and loses the careful planning that makes her most effective.

          What will be interesting is how she responds to this. This isn’t the first time she has “failed” by her standards of success, but this is the first time she has been grievously injured and nearly killed by her antics. The healthy response would be to use this to look at how her decision making seems to be going in bad places when she’s fully disassociating and watch that, but I have a feeling that this is going to prompt her to simply go all in on the disassociating and trying to further separate Amazi-girl from Amber. Which, I know from personal experience trying to separate out one particular alter from the others, really really doesn’t work.

          And if she goes that route, she might be starting down on a road of being less and less effective in her positive roles.

      2. SDGlyph

        That’s actually something I was thinking about this morning, and contrasting Sal with Amazi-Girl. They both have issues of severe parental neglect, but deal with them in very different ways. Sal described AG as ‘caped white girl power trip’ and… she’s kinda got a point. Sal’s self-image seems to be ‘black girl fighting back against unjust authority, refusing to let anyone else make her choices for her’. It makes her the perennial rebel without a cause. Amber, on the other hand, channels her aggression into enforcing authority, making the world a better place by taking down petty lawbreakers (from harassers and thieves to underage drinkers – she’s blind to the severity of the offence). It’s not surprising they clash.

        It gets even messier when the stakes get high, though. That’s when AG seems almost to switch into a martyr complex (remember: if not for Sal’s catch, AG would have saved Ross and Becky at the cost of her own life – and she’d probably have said that’s the way it should be). I’m finding it really hard to unpick the tangle and find where AG’s determination not to fail anyone ends and Amber’s determination not to be helpless begins. They go hand-in-hand. And that’s a sign of good writing!

        Whoo, that turned into a bit of a wall o’ text, and I still feel like I’ve barely scratched the surface…

    6. Mindlink

      ” Amazi-Girl has only ever made things worse, or was otherwise useless,”

      Umm… she just saved the day! The only thing Joyce&Sal did was save Amazi-Girl…

      1. Spencer

        I suppose the biggest question is whether or not it was a situation that could be solved in a safe way without Amazi-Girl.

        I think so. I think that Amber’s involvement and actions just made everything worse, and the only positive was getting Becky to dial 911. Otherwise it could have been something dealt by people who know what they’re doing, and even the prospect of Toedad taking his daughter with him was more manageable and survivable than what transpired.

        1. Mindlink

          In what universe is dialing 911 the “safe” option ?
          You honestly don’t think that would have escaled things just as much, or even worse ?

        2. Spencer

          No. In what universe is sending an unhinged costumed vigilante after a kidnapper safer than the cops doing it?

        3. ninja_jesus

          The Dumbiverse, of course.

        4. Mindlink

          If you can’t see how the cops would have escalated the situation, then I see no point in continuing this discussion. Come ON!
          Amazi-Girl, and any costumed hero, would ALSO escalate the situation, of course, because it’s next to impossible to intervene in an armed kidnapping without escalation. Ross having allready shown, at least to us, that he was not open for negation.

        5. Nezumi

          It’s not safer, but it’s actually not more dangerous. Ross wouldn’t have seen cops and gone “Oh, I guess I should stop for these nice people.” He would have initiated a high-speed chase or a shootout. He outright said he was willing to die. And cops use caltrops too, and high speed chases with cops are actually more dangerous — cop cars do a lot more harm than a girl on a skateboard. If the cops got involved, we’d be dealing with dead Ross, and/or dead Becky if he decided he had to “save her” from being separated from him or was just too damn reckless.

  192. Megatron

    I approve.

    1. nothri

      Megatron, no offense, but I’m not sure how to feel about your approval of a character’s actions.

  193. avistel

    Yeah, much as I enjoy seeing shitbags getting their asses handed to them, I find the possibility of Joyce decking him like that implausible. Makes the schadenfreude taste a bit ersatz, wissen Sie?

    Anybody here care to weigh in? I do a bit of boxing, but with bags rather than people for the most part, so I could be in the wrong.

    1. Megatron

      Big people aren’t hard to knock down if they don’t see it coming because they’re weight may be unevenly distributed. Boxers expect their opponents to hit them, dirtbag fleshlings do not.

    2. ninja_jesus

      Joyce has near perfect form, according to this.

      1. avistel

        Ooh, very much so. Looking at it again, that’s like a textbook uppercut – starting from a semi-crouch like that gives it a lot more oomph. Though you don’t want to telegraph it that much – try to keep your hands guarding your chin until the last second. (Granted, I’m still guilty of getting sloppy like that, so people in glass houses etc.)

        1. avistel

          Oh yeah, and keep your feet on the ground. Otherwise you’re asking to lose balance. And then you get rekt.

    3. BenRG

      He’s just walked away from a crash that ought to have killed him or at least left him a paraplegic cripple for life. At this point, I think that readers of DoA need to accept that ‘realism’ takes second place to ‘dramatic and comedic necessity’ in this strip.

  194. Saaaam

    Becky just got real turned on

  195. Rosaline

    and god has given HER the strength to KO a mofo. Or should I say, mo-toe?

  196. Mojo

    Well, that was satisfying.

  197. Pasta

    Well, seeing as nobody else has managed to die, I’m gonna put my nickles on somebody picking up the gun from the road and this storyline taking a very dark turn.

  198. Warcodered

    the strength to get knocked the fuck out!

  199. GUIGUI

    So, Do we have to assume Cartoon physic is in action, for a feather-weight like Joyce to have the strength to sucker-punch an Heavy-weight like Ross, or has he actually some head-trauma from the whole event and Joyce’s punch just made things worst?

    1. doubleW

      Joyce is filled with denouement-power.

      1. Cephalo the Pod

        I’ve been watching too much Undertale.
        I could have SWORN you were about to say determination.

    2. Slyfincleton

      Considering the bloody state of his knees, I’m guessing he was already wobbly, and even if he weren’t, a rage-filled sucker punch to the face like that will hurt, no matter who it is coming from

    3. BenRG

      She’s an Abductee. She’s at least three times stronger than a baseline human, has been brainwashed to be a living weapon and has the ability to add telekinetic boosts to her motions, massively increasing her apparent strength and agility… wait… sorry, what was that…?

      Oh, sorry, wrong continuity. 😉

    4. Lord Stoneheart

      I mean the fact that he’s being sent flying I would chalk up to artistic liscense. But the idea that Joyce could knock him down doesn’t seem that far fetched, for reasons plenty of people have already covered on this page.

    5. GhostWriterL

      Joyce is hardly a featherweight. She’s grown up with several older brothers, most of whom aren’t identifying as her big sister, and just the way she’s drawn alone shows that she’s got some meat and weight on her.

      Dina’s the featherweight, and Ross pushing her off so easily proves that.

    6. Jhon

      It’s not a sucker punch if you can see it coming. He couldn’t believe it was happening.

  200. Ryan

    All I can hear is the Scott Pilgrim K.O.!! sound.

  201. Darwin

    As Joyce clobbers Ross in a fit of righteous smite-itude, I’m reminded of my favorite part of Das Irae, which I suspect is what empowered Joyce’s mighty haymaker: “When the wicked are confounded/ Doomed to flames of woe unbounded/ Call me by thy saints surrounded.” I would say Toedad is indeed confounded. I would say he’s about to feel some flames. And I would definitely say Joyce has the might every pissed off saint behind those knuckles.

  202. BenRG

    Actually, Ross, I’d be double-checking that bit about ‘given me the strength’ because, to date, it doesn’t actually look like it’s happened. If anything… Well, consider just who has been doing the superhuman feats of late!

    At least we now know why Joyce gets dragged back home early next year! Striking one’s elders is sure to draw the attention of one’s parents! 😉

    1. Darwin

      Considering how crazy out-of-control and Toedad-like Ross has been behaving, I seriously doubt Joyce’s parents (who, while being fundies, have never been portrayed as less than sane people) would view her clobbering a nut who brandished and discharged a firearm, then drove erratically with his daughter in the car he’d just kidnapped as anything less than justifiable clobbering. Remember: Fundies, while they believe some nutty things, outside of said nutty things, are still reasonable people. Sometimes.

      1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

        Don’t get too optimistic.

  203. Kiapdx

    So list of probable injuries: Toedad likely needs a neck brace for the car accident & has asphalt in his knees and probably a bruised jaw (I’m assuming that’s where he got punched because Joyce is short) and some chipped teeth.

    Joyce probably has a broken (or at least severely bruised) hand.

    Amazigirl likely has severe bruising everywhere and a concussion and a sprain or two.

    Dina is unaccounted for but likely got knocked unconscious since we didn’t see here again.

    And if Sal doesn’t have a dislocated shoulder, well, she’s just badass like that.

    1. Kiapdx

      omg I’m Carla now? Wicked.

      1. shadowcell

        Dr. Carla, apparently

        1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

          Did we ever learn what Carla is here to learn?

  204. TVpro

    Get fucking rekt!

  205. Torra

    As much as I love this strip, (Joyce you are seriously bad ass like oh my goodness), this is probably doesn’t help Becky’s massive Joyce crush

    That doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy or want to see Joyce chase after Becky on the back of a motorbike and punch her sexist jerk dick dad in the face though. Because I enjoyed that very very much

  206. BenRG

    I’ll just add one thing: There is something you can always tell about people who really have divine strength (as opposed to those who just say that they do): They don’t need to use force or even the threat of strength. They can change the world with words or even by submitting to the slaughter with a peaceful expression on their faces.

    Ideas that need a gun or blade to gain traction tend to be ideas that, ultimately, are about power. Unfortunately, a lot of religions are like that but there are still some who seek a better way.

  207. Gwydion

    Ok, so Amber was saved by Sal, and Joyce has taken out Ross and rescued Becky. Knowing Willis, this means that Dina was in the boot of the car the whole time, right? The car that just crashed?

    1. Darwin

      I don’t think so. I think it’s highly likely Dina is clutching some bruised ribs somewhere. But not in the car. Toedad’s behavior has been impulsive. His whole plan to grab Becky and ‘pray the gay away’ seems completely half-baked. Wave a gun around, manipulate her into a guilt trip, get her into the car, figure it out from there. He doesn’t seem to think things all the way through. Most likely, I’m going to go with he kicked Dina while she was down to keep her down and sprinted to his car. Taking Dina, which would neutralize her very effectively, would slow down his pursuit of Becky.

      1. Gwydion

        I’m very much hoping I’m wrong, but it seems like something Willis would do.

        Also, knocking someone out, panicking, and throwing them in the back of a car to hide the evidence strikes me as fitting the impulsive thinking.

    2. Lord Stoneheart

      Why is everyone assuming Dina is in the trunk? After throwing her off and seeing Becky running across the field, why would Ross even concern himself with Dina anymore? (Besides, killing off a character offscreen just to mess with readers, and cause angst for the rest of the cast seems pretty unlikely)

      1. GhostWriterL

        Because they all secretly want her dead as a means to make this a Walkyverse clone, because they want a reason to whine at Willis being evil in that way, or something.

        Nevermind one of the biggest complaints against It’s Walky and Roomies was the killing of Dina and Ruth. Fandoms rarely make sense in their desires.

        1. Guairdean Beatha

          Dina dies? I haven’t caught up on the It’s Walky comics. I’m not looking forward to that one.

        2. nothri

          “Nevermind one of the biggest complaints against It’s Walky and Roomies was the killing of Dina and Ruth. Fandoms rarely make sense in their desires.”

          Well, I’m sure everyone feels properly chastised about that motive you arbitrarily assigned to them and then condemned them for. ::rolls eyes::

        3. Spencer

          Ruth’s death is like the only thing anybody remembers about Roomies.

          And Dina’s death was amazing. It’s one of the top 5 moments of It’s Walky and it’s about her as a character. That’s way different than Becky going all “what’s in the box”. If Dina died here, in a story only tangentially related to her, it would be totally bonkers.

        4. Lord Stoneheart

          That’s the main problem I have with all these suggestions that Dina was killed. Why is everybody thinking she gets stuffed in a fridge? (Okay a trunk. But it’s the same concept essentially. Killing off a character for the sole purpose of giving other characters angst. I mean, at least her death in the Walkyverse was about her)

  208. Adam Smith

    ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Ohhhhhhhhhhh. OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

    Y’ALL DON’T REALLY WANT IT LIKE

  209. acher4

    YES!!!!
    KA-POW-YES!

  210. segnosaur

    Wait a sec… isn’t this just the second time you’ve ever seen toedad’s mouth?

    1. butting

      Yup. She punched him so hard we see his mouth.

      That’s to help the medics figure out where the feeding tube goes.

      1. inqntrol

        “Emergency induction port.”

        1. xKiv

          He’s a straw-man now.

  211. Bicycle Bill

    Joyce punches ToeDad …..
    in the FAAAAaaaaccccccce!!

    Where do I send Joyce her nickel?

    1. Bicycle Bill

      Hell, I’ll give her a whole dime if she’ll do it again.

      1. inqntrol

        For 20 dollars I think she will obliterate him off the face of the Earth.

  212. TEi

    STAR UPPERCUT

  213. Dynamax

    SHORYUKEN!!!

  214. Wasted

    Dragging all this out to give Joyce her coming-of-age, when you could have just had someone finally put Toedad in the ground where he belongs.

  215. Slyfincleton

    GOT EM

  216. CianM1301

    Joyce used Sky Uppercut!
    It’s super effective!

    1. Cephalo the Pod

      Does that make Ross Dark-type? Or Normal?
      (Yes I realize their are other types weak to Fighting shut up I’m trying to be dramatic.)

      1. CianM1301

        Too devoted to a cause to be Dark, too deranged to be Normal. I’d say he’s a Rock type, because he has the emotional range of one.

  217. SDGlyph

    “Looks like somebody don’t have your back any more.”

    OH HELL YES JOYCE! Now if the cops could kindly turn up next strip and take him away before he gets up again, that would be great. Kthxbye.

  218. Siyajkak

    In a perfect world, having spent the whole day being beat up by women might convince him to revisit his patriarchal notions of masculinity and family structure. But alas…

  219. Layn

    I’m starting to wonder how the fallout of this will be for Joyce. I’m pretty sure her parents are not okay with all of this. Hopefully they’ll be more concerned about Joyce having a run-in with absolutely horrible gun-toting toe-dad and only after that concern themselves that this all had something to do with Joyce’s best friend being gay and Joyce hiding her in her dorm.

    1. BenRG

      Some of the spoilers DMW has been putting on Tumblr suggest to me that Joyce is going to be going home to ‘recover from her shock’ (her parents’ ways of putting it, like as not). I suspect that, during that visit, Joyce will be talked at a lot by her parents.

      1. Layn

        That sounds horrible…. but then again, maybe we’ll get more Jocelyn?
        In any case don’t think she’ll get stuck at her parents’ for too long. I mean even a day takes forever in this comic

    2. Cephalo the Pod

      Yeah, the Browns are no Blaine or Ross. They love Joyce. They’ll comfort her, sympathize with her about Ross’s terrible behaviour.

      But on occasion, they’ll probably say something like “you shouldn’t have kept Becky in your dorm. She’s trouble.” I imagine they’ll try to keep the two from talking to each other.

      1. Cephalo the Pod

        And Joyce might ask “would you kick me out if I were gay?” And her parents would get real awkward and go to great lengths to dodge the question.

  220. Pyr05

    “POW!” “BIFF!” “BLAMMO!” “ZOUNDS!”

  221. KSClaw

    I think God gave all the strength to Joyce there, dude.

  222. David

    Well, assuming that comic strip physics shrink and recede after a climax (and the Evel Walkerton save arguably was such a one), Joyce will be carrying that hand in a cast for a while.

  223. David

    Looks like someone took the Lord’s name in vain.

  224. Pink Freud

    GO

    JOYCE

  225. PureLionHeart

    YAAAAASSSSSSSSS

  226. Ethan Qix

    “… take a haymaker to the face”, apparently !

    Also I expected Sal to deliver the actual violence. I hope Joyce didn’t break any fingers on that one ^^

  227. PSIREN

    Now we know why It was so difficult for two people to carry Joyce to bed while she was passed out. HER BODY IS STRAIGHT UP SWOL.

  228. BenRG

    PREDICTION: Joyce is going to tell Sal to drive a recovering Amazi-Girl back to campus (“Sal, I’m not asking you, I’m TELLING you.“) whilst she and Becky sit with the unconscious Ross and watch the cops and paramedics approach. We’ll probably have another strip at the ER where Becky is being checked out that will be heartwarming in all ways.

    Meanwhile, Sal and Amazi-Girl will tell each other just what they think of each other (curiously, they both say words to the effect of: “You’re a thug and a dangerous hypocrite who’s a threat to everyone around them. I’m making it my business to bring you down!” This shocks them both into silence). At that point, Amazi-Girl’s injuries finally catch up on her and she collapses in front of Sal, leaving her with a very big dilemma, the outcome of which we will not learn until the end of the next chapter and the details will not be known for even longer.

    1. Eric Hansen

      This would be pretty great.

  229. mat

    “and God has given me the strength to…”

    Get your ass kicked by an 18 year old light weight.

    Scene: enter Karma.

  230. Amake

    That’s funny, now you’ve lost your gun you want to talk things over? We can be reasonable as long as you don’t have the power to just threaten everyone to do what you want? Maybe if you say your’re sorry and promise not to shoot or kidnap anyone we should just stop being terrified of you?

    Go to Hell, Ross.

    1. BenRG

      You’ve got to wonder who he was trying to convince of divine sanction and blessing here. I strongly suspect that it was himself.

  231. Jake'm

    THAT is satisfaction in a single panel.

  232. Foolong

    Meanwhile, Dina is dead.

  233. Kocel

    “God has given me the STRENGTH to stand with severe lacerations and oh wow I’m actually losing a lot of blood, huh”

  234. Crumplepunch

    Holy shit Joyce, that guy was about six twenty and made of triceps. How did you even do that?

    1. TheNinthShader

      It was sal in costume 😮

    2. Joe

      It probably helped that each of his legs has to be broken in like 20 places, but I’m gonna go with “empowered by Righteous Fury” for how she got that air.

  235. Uniquitous

    And the crowd… goes… WILD!!!
    *thunderous cheering*

  236. Les

    Looks like God has given Joyce the strength…

  237. Seraph

    I have this terrible fear that any day now, we’re going to suddenly find ourselves back at the fountain, and this whole sequence was Joyce’s wish fulfillment fantasy as Toedad disappears into the distance with Becky.

    Of course, Toedad himself had better hope I’m wrong about that, because considering that he did in fact fire that rifle in the middle of the quad, the alternative is – as Becky said – him getting his head splattered by the police.

  238. Spencer

    This probably isn’t helping Becky get over Joyce.

  239. Nicknack Paddywhack

    God has given *her* the strength to POW!

  240. Nicknack Paddywhack

    Seriously, props to Willis for these last few weeks, these are pretty awesome storytelling skills right there.

  241. WikiDreamer

    Dude. Toedad got punched so hard he’s actually out of frame. Ah, I believe Chris Tucker said it best https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9z8F4fgj6Q

  242. Valerie

    HELL YEAH JOYCE
    THAT’S MY GIRL

  243. Sigurther

    … Get the shit knocked out of you? Yes, yes it has.

  244. aradica

    YES!! JUSTICE PUNCH!!

  245. Coco Pommel

    Joyce’s theme right now: https://youtu.be/ct9fs3ULVIo?t=42s

  246. 2k

    It´s over 9000!!!

  247. 2k

    Gomu Gomu noooooo…. HOLY PUNCH!!

  248. motorfirebox

    Lucky for him God gave him all that strength, or Joyce punch would’ve torn his head clean off.

  249. trebthegamer

    newsflash toedad: god thinks you’re an ass too.

  250. Tomas

    And Becky yells, “Sploosh!”

  251. Fluffy

    … I think God gave all the Strength to Joyce.

    1. theheroesofcrash

      Given all that she’s survived through, I’d say God made her strong to begin with (Although sending some good friends and tough experience her way didn’t hurt!). But that’s just the way I see it. 😉

  252. arias01

    The LORD was with Toedad. He took possession of the Becky in his car, but he could not take possession of the Becky in his house because his enemy had fists of Joyce. ~New Dumbyverse Translation

  253. notlegato

    my suspension of disbelief is falling apart a little with that incredible truck save and the fact that toedad is super burly.

    1. Spencer

      Eh, I think this is coherent and believable.

      Apart from the catharsis of seeing Toedad get rekt, he’s just been in a huge car accident and Joyce is throwing everything into that punch. Other than the art suggesting he’s going flying, it’s still perfectly plausible.

      1. Shawn L.

        Given a low, ground level camera angle. This isn’t so much Toedad “flying” as falling down. The perspective makes it look more dynamic.

        And lets face it, after all the tension, Joyce deserves a moment of Awesome.

        1. Spencer

          I think you’re right. That makes a lot more sense.

    2. Trolldrool

      At this point he’s probably so dizzy from the car crash that a falling leaf could knock him off balance.

  254. Morleuca

    sooo…not to rain on everyone’s super-punch parade….but do we know what’s going on with Dina right now? Like how big is that shoe that’s waiting to drop?

    1. Deanatay

      Big enough to contain five Toedads.

    2. Cephalo the Pod

      We know that nothing will happen to severely injure her within the next three real-time months (so, like, one in-comic day).

    3. Mada

      Just watch; she’ll pop out of toedad’s trunk or something.

  255. ScoutInTheNight

    I know it’s a comic and all, but Joyce’s body positioning is completely off to have any power behind that punch. If she’s moving forward with her left leg, she’d have to be rotating her torso against her hip movements, and that’s going to rob her of most of her force.

  256. Deanatay

    I think we’ve figured out who’s going to the hospital…

  257. Shawn L.

    The thing about “turning the other cheek” is, before long, you run out of cheeks. (Wisdom from the TV movie “Coward of the County”)

  258. showler

    To anyone who objected to Mr. Willis’ grasp of physics in this storyline. Any exaggeration so far has been more than worth it for this one strip.

  259. Henry

    “And God has given me the strength to get absolutely destroyed by a teenage girl half my size.”

  260. Nono

    STRENGTH TO MAKE THE RIGHT DECISIONS EVEN WHEN THEY’RE DIFFICULT

    Man, it’s like you people don’t even remember the past storylines!

    1. SDGlyph

      A+++ callback, would be reminded again.

  261. Aislashu

    So…to further suspend belief, EVERYONE is going to be taken back by Sal on her motorcycle. At once.

    1. Stevecharb

      Police cruisers, more likely. Possibly with a stop at the station for questioning and witness depositions.

  262. Guairdean Beatha

    To all the folks complaining about the physics (and the physical) points in the comic: “What do you want? Good physics, or good entertainment?” Sometimes, you just can’t have both.

    1. Spencer

      See, this strip is actually logical within the bounds of reality this strip has set. Toedad’s barely standing, Joyce is fucking pissed, and boom: punch to the face and he goes down (and not flying, like I originally assumed).

      The Amazinator was not.

  263. Alexx

    Hope Joyce didn’t break her hand on that cinder block face.

  264. Flame_Warp

    “WHERE IS YOUR GOD NOW!?”

    “no seriously where is he I have a lot of talking to do”

  265. Lan Mikoto

    When the hell did Joyce meet Sagat? She HAD to have busted his jaw with that wicked Tiger Upper.

  266. Plume

    God has given you strength huh? Because it looks more like god has Samson’d Joyce rather than strengthened you toe-dad.

  267. Toes14

    Don’t know if I’m more sad that Toedad didn’t have serious leg injuries, or happy that Joyce in channeling Mike Tyson.

    (If this was real life, they’d be signing Joyce up as Ronda Rousey’s next opponent!)

  268. Norade

    She laid out Toe Dad in one punch. I didn’t know she had it in her. She’s never stood up to an adult in her life!

    1. Eric Hansen

      Points.

    2. inqntrol

      Actually, she stood up to her parents for Dorothy.

  269. Sporky

    Something about the Joyce punching is really familiar, but I don’t actually remember her punching anyone in the Walkyverse. Maybe in that one fight with Sal…? I can’t remember

    1. Cephalo the Pod

      Maybe you’re reminded of when she glassed Ryan in this comic?

  270. Richard

    I don’t know why, but for some reason I find the phrase, “I kick ass for the Lord!” to be highly appropriate here, and I’m not sure if it’s for ironic reasons, or unironic reasons, or double-ironic reasons, or what…

  271. Throng

    I can’t help but think Joyce’s next phone conversation with her family will be eventful.

    1. Mada

      Eventful, sure, but after a heated argument, Joyce’s parents have been shown to be a tad more reasonable than toedad here. Plus when she has to, she’s been able to give even better than she gets with bible verses.

      And of course, there’s the fact that Ross fired a gun on campus. All Joyce has to do is say “he threatened to kill me”, and I think that’d put her parents more on her side.

  272. PorpoisePower

    Poor form… not stepping into her punch.

    Must of had something else help power that punch.

    1. Origamer

      I think she stepped in with the oposite leg, but yeah, Joyce is not a martial artist. ADRENALINE RAGE PUNCH!!!! =D

  273. Amber Thompson

    Two words, Martian Strength.

  274. Justin

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfkHkdu5IEI

    this scene from the movie Braindead came to mind. Though obv with less zombies, and err kung fu priests.

  275. Jupiterror

    Welp, he got clocked right out of the panel.
    Guess we’re not seeing him again.

  276. Just Here

    Alright, I don’t think Joyce knocked Toedad more than a foot or two, but yeah, he’s probably on his ass. Joyce is pissed, he’s barely standing, and adrenaline is a wonderful thing.

    And he’s an ass too. My daughter’s only seven, but I already know she’s a person in her own right, and not a possession. Assbite.

  277. DeeBee

    “KAIO KEN!”
    “Kaio wha-”
    POW!

    1. Someone

      Joyce tells Sal to leave, Sal rides away with a passed out Amazi-Gir and Becky. The final battle begins.

  278. Cephalo the Pod

    But he sure didn’t give you enough inertia! Hahahahahahaha!

  279. Killian

    I think Joyce is the one in the hospital. With broken/severely bruised knuckles. Because ain’t no way she actually knows how to throw a punch without hurting herself.

  280. Mr. Bawkbagawk

    “… spend the next ten weeks eating though a straw.”

  281. Spencer

    So at this point it’s almost definitely Amber going to the hospital, since Becky’s fine and Joyce had to put Toedad down. Does this mean the end of Amazi-Girl? There’s no way she won’t get arrested or expelled, but that seems like a permanent end to her character.

    1. segnosaur

      I’d say its 50-50 on whether its Amber at the hospital, or toedad (who at least has a few scrapes that probably need to be attended to.)

      Amber was mobile enough after hitting the windshield to keep going, so its possible nothing was broken or seriously damaged. She might attempt to avoid the hospital and heal on her own in order to protect her secret identity.

      1. Spencer

        It can’t be Toedad because Joyce just clocked him. Narratively she would be responsible for sending him to the hospital. Amber, meanwhile, has been taking crazy abuse for the past two weeks. I think the adrenaline argument was silly enough already, but there’s no way she wouldn’t need serious medical attention.

      2. Spencer

        Though perhaps I’m reading the hospital preview panels as something that we as the reader would be incredibly worried about, and Toedad definitely doesn’t fit that criteria so I wrote him off. Even though she seems mostly unscathed Becky should still head to the hospital to make sure she doesn’t have a concussion or something.

  282. Lulu

    I know hitting your own father is a sin, but hitting your best friend Dad is not, right?

  283. Kirbilius Clausius

    How are these people affording their lives? Or is just white privilege that much of a benefits package?

    I mean-
    Joyce’ parents are paying for her college. How are they going to respond to “I punched out the father that was trying to save his daughter for sin. My atheist friend would have done the same thing.”
    Amazi-Girl’s going to heal from the car wind shield crash that has her bleeding from the head how? On campus insurance? Even if Danny comes and gets her and smuggles Amber back into the dorm, how’s Amber staying in college with skipping classes to sleep off a concussion?
    Becky’s living where? They’re not going to murder her father in the middle of the street. Anything he says will be used against Becky by the university. There’s no compromise with the fundementalist.
    Hell, Sal might be the only one minority enough to survive. “Let’s all skiddaddle before the cops come.”

    1. surfercarrots

      I know I think that stuff too
      but then I have to go, “suspension of disbelief”
      plus, with all the other previous comics with these characters, I just presume some sort of residual super powers remain in them, deep deeeeeep down 🙂

    2. segnosaur

      Its possible that Joyce’s parents would be OK with her punching out toedad, since he DID threaten her with a gun earlier. (We don’t know exactly how deep their fundie beliefs go, but its possible that family safety trumps gayness.)

      We don’t know how injured Amazi-girl is… possible concussion, definite bruising, but its possible she might be able to hide her injuries. (And she may be smart enough that she could skip a day of school to at least partly heal on her own without affecting her grades. Plus, I figure Danny would be willing to keep her informed of what was covered in class.)

      Becky is probably the biggest question mark… its almost certain her living situation will be revealed and she’ll be evicted from the campus. But who knows? Maybe the publicity might actually work to her benefit… people sympathetic to her situation after hearing about it in the news might offer her a job, or a place to stay.

      1. Airyu

        “… it’s possible that family safety trumps gayness.” This. There might be an acceptance arch with Joycelyne (I know she’s not a lesbian, but I think it would be a similar pieces with Joyce’s parents for any queer person.

      2. thejeff

        What does “evicted from campus” mean anyway? They’ll tell her she can’t stay, probably give her info on local LGTB groups/shelters/etc. Are they going to make it a high priority for campus security to make sure she doesn’t sneak back onto campus? Will there be posters up all over campus telling everyone to watch out for the homeless redhead?
        Nah. They’ll mention it to Ruth and to the front desk at the dorm. Then we see if anyone can persuade Ruth to ignore it.

        Of course, if Toedad’s in lockup, Becky could go home. At least for the short term. Not that I think that’ll happen. She’ll want to stick around Joyce & Dina and Willis wants her around.

        1. segnosaur

          Of course, someone like Mary could also make things a problem… if she repeatedly complains about “some non-student living here” then officials would probably be forced to act.

      3. Guairdean Beatha

        Becky’s lot could greatly improve. This incident will make the headlines (remember the old media adage: “If it bleeds, it leads.”), and will bring out every gay rights activist in this and several other states. The resulting grants and scholarships will cover a couple of years of college, and the university will bend over backwards to accommodate her to prove their diversity. The book and movie rights could be worth a fortune.

        I wonder who they’ll pick for the role of Amazi-Girl, Bruce Willis or Kevin Bacon?

    3. thejeff

      As for Amazi-girl, her best bet would be to get away, change and then make up some story and go to hospital as Amber.

    4. Bicycle Bill

      Cost to attend Indiana University as an undergrad
      (two semesters, school year 2015-2016):
      Tuition and fees . . . . . $10,388 ($33,740 if not an Indiana resident)
      Room and board . . . . . . $9,794
      Books and supplies . . . . $1,230
      ——————————————————
      Total direct costs . . . . $21,412 ($44,764 non-resident)

      At the risk of belaboring the obvious, poor people generally can not afford to go to a Big Ten-caliber school like IU, so I think it’s safe to assume that while these characters and their families are not in the top 1%, neither are they skating just above the poverty level.   And besides the insurance that these characters would have as registered students, many insurance plans cover adult children past the age of 18 if they are still dependent upon their parents or are able to be claimed as dependents on the parental income taxes.

    5. Gangler

      While Joyces parents might not approve of punching Ross, they probably will not remove funding from her education over it. That would be pretty extreme.

      We quite simply don’t know what Amber’s health insurance situation is. However if she does end up skipping classes for a few days while she sleeps this off, that won’t exactly destroy her financially. You can take a few sick days in college without the tax man coming to reclaim your shit or anything.

      It is yet to be seen what this all will mean for Becky’s living situation. The author has stated that Becky will be a permanent addition to the cast though, so presumably something will allow her to stay in the general area. You’ll have to keep reading to find out what.

      1. kirbilius clausius

        i get that their parents can pay for their expenses. but joyce has previously expressed that her parents would pull her from college for ol gash face leave alone this. then again, that would have been -oh the scary secular world- instead of the mirror they have to look at in toedad

        i would like to see sal an amazi-girl agree to the arranged fair fight instea of immediate violence with a bleeding an bruised an exhausted vs. sal fresh. it would be good for amber to be forced to see sal as reasonable and also realize that shes not compartmentalizing but slipping into her fathers anger.

        1. Gangler

          I don’t think the two events are really comparable.

          If they send Joyce into a Den of Sin and she nearly gets raped by a stranger within the first month, then obviously Joyce’s parents are going to be quite concerned. They’ll want to bring her home where she can be safe.

          If Joyce punches a family friend after he pulls a gun on her, what, are they gonna wanna bring Joyce home so she won’t have to deal with any more family friends?

  284. Furie

    Oh, Ross. So busy going on about the hand of God, he forgot about the fist.

  285. NotaGravatar

    It’s been a dream since Amazi-girl smashed her head.

  286. Mr.fat

    best comic ever

  287. shazz_smifff

    I would say Joyce is a little upset, but on second thoughts she called upon god to fill her fist full of righteous so she can give her friends dad the smiting he deserved

  288. KingOfGreyfell

    Ross is coming from a good place, but the problem is he is an incompetent, ignorant, and self-righteous… I actually don’t know what to call him. No insult I can fathom will suffice. Simply put, this toe-given-life gives Tywin Lannister a run for his nigh-limitless money for ‘shittiest father ever’.

    1. GhostWriterL

      He’s coming from a very self-centered place, that thinks it’s a good place, because it’s obsessed with a 3,000 year old badly translated holy book and listening to angry men on TV scream about it.

  289. Vangeln

    Right in the kisser!

  290. Eric

    The strength to get flattened by a really angry 110 lb girl?

    Now for bonus points Toedad, get Amizigirl and Sal involved in the beat down.

  291. cjack99

    Nice follow through!

  292. Pedantic Peanut

    Just out of curiosity. Has any guy in this comic managed to put up a credible fight even once?

    1. Bicycle Bill

      Danny, in the Slipshine.
      Oh wait — that wasn’t fighting….

  293. Crumplepunch

    That’s the second most satisfying punch I have ever seen.

    After this one.

    http://comicsalliance.com/files/2011/02/allstar07.jpg

  294. Deanatay

    Becky: “I have never been so lesbian in my entire life.”
    Sal: “What is happening in my pants?”

  295. Joner

    G*d has given Joyce the strength to kick ass

  296. EgalitarianIam

    I would like to point out even with adrenaline she could not hit with that much force also she had very bad form for throwing said punch with that foot off the ground. That aside the bad father put a lot of people in danger and I wonder if the police will be involved as his reckless behavior warrants legal punishment.

    1. Mindlink

      Hmh, interesting that you should say she had bad form in her stance, when I’ve read several commenters noting that she had *perfect* form, right from the text book!

  297. Roborat

    Wow, nice punch Joyce, but you should learn how to make a fist properly, with what you did, you probably just dislocated or broke your thumb.

    1. ninja_jesus

      Her thumb placement looks fine to me.

  298. Lord_Circe

    I realize this will never get seen by anyone, ever, but here are my thoughts:

    PANEL 3: Shots Chambered.
    PANEL 4: SHOTS FIRED!

    1. CriCriCri

      Well it has been seen but at least one person. YAY!

  299. Zatar

    This will probably be my favorite panel for years to come.

  300. Bagge

    And there was much rejoycing

    1. CriCriCri

      I C what U did there!

  301. CriCriCri

    We could say that was… *puts sunglasses on* the fist of jesus. YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!

    (for those of you who don’t get it: the fist of jesus is both a film and a videogame where jesus and judas fight the zombie apocalypse… don’t ask me why I didn’t see the film and the game didn’t explain jack shit)

  302. ATN

    Joyce 3:16 says “I just whooped your butt!”

  303. chris73

    This has been a fun, interesting storyline with lots of action but not nearly as dramatic as the storyline with Ryan

  304. Griffin

    I approve.

  305. Ross Vernal

    So… Shards of glass in the leg, possibly injured ankle, scrape to the face, and ego demolished.

    Good.

  306. Rideps1

    What is the opposite of “Damn you Willis”?

    1. Bill M.

      The opposite is “Thank you, sir! May I have another?”

  307. Commodore Jeep-Eep

    I suspect this arc may well be one where the metaplot started going full on.

    There’s likely going to be repercussions at Joyce’s, probably compounded by her sister coming out, this is going to be thrumming across the entire nation’s news, there’s Joyce’s own sexuality to factor in; there’s going to be crazy touched off that I can’t even think of. I think we just had our alien abduction arc.

  308. Clayton

    This sounds scarily like a Criminal Minds episode…except someone doesn’t die.

  309. CJGrimm

    Eh, I’ll give that punch an 8/10. She lost points for closing her eyes.

  310. Thomas O.

    Toebongo, you just got knocked da FUCKOUT!!!!

  311. Akiosama

    THAT… WAS… AWESOME!!!! +20%

  312. Edupoet81

    Joyce has sworn three times, and now she just dealt Toedad a powerful (and much deserved) punch.

    This turn of events has really brought out another side of Joyce. I am intrigued and curious to see where Willis takes her character from here.

    1. thejeff

      Anti-Joyce!

  313. Ruby Droplets

    So… Joyce is either going to follow this up by telling toedad to “SHUT THE FUCK UP” or she’s going to grab becky and go all licky-style on her face. WHICH WOULD BE BAD BECAUSE DINA! BUT GOOD BECAUSE LESBIANS! I FEEL SO CONFLICTED!

  314. Mr. Morningstar

    how the frick was he still standing after that.

    1. Spencer

      Barely; he’s bruised and bloodied up and in panel three you can see his legs shaking. It’s why Joyce was able to OHKO him here.

  315. Tenn

    *tents fingers*

    This pleases me greatly.

  316. Rawrbat

    Dude, anyone notice the parallels? Large scary dude with a gash on his face?

    1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

      WHENYOUSEEITYOUSHITBRICKS.JPG

    2. hof1991

      Nothing DYW does is by mistake. Having Toedad echo Ryan is a brilliant piece of writing and planned way back when Dina jumped him. No other reason for her to scratch him except to make him more like Ryan.

      Nice catch. Didn’t see that first time through.

  317. Just Me

    Toedad had slapped Becky hard just for having a Cell Phone. If no one had gone after them, Becky would have gotten worse than a slap eventually.

    In my opinion, if Amazi-Girl hadn’t done what she did, if instead Sal and Joyce simply followed him and caught up to Ross when he reached whatever destination he was heading for, they would have tried to talk Ross into letting Becky go…..

    And Ross would have shot Sal dead and held Joyce hostage as the police finally arrived.

    Argue what you will about personal reasons or methods, in the end, Amazi-Girl placed her own life on the line to make sure no one else got killed. And no one did.

    1. Commodore Jeep-Eep

      Yes. When she was called upon, she succeeded. She kept her vow.e

  318. Triniking1234

    Looks like God gave more strength to Joyce than you, Toedad.

    1. egwenna

      Amen!!! And Go Joyce!

  319. Hey Seuss

    Holy poop indeed.

  320. Jhon

    “The police should have dealt with this. Amazi-Girl just blah blah blah…”
    When you hand your characters a situation they cannot resolve and then bring in an outside force to handle it, even in Ancient Greece playwrights who pulled this got booed off the stage. What you guys should be asking is “Why did Willis feel the need to create this ?” Then watch how his characters deal with it.

  321. HumboldtRobin

    I realize this is probably a big fat downer. But We have Amber and Sal in the same place. I’m afraid the violence is just beginning….
    🙁

    1. showler

      Sal refused to fight before. She’s not going to start a fight with an injured woman.

    2. saki

      Amber seemed to have passed out in yesterday’s strip, so maybe Sal will be gone by the time she wakes up?

    3. RavenRyy

      Well, Sal saved Amber’s life here. Maybe this will lead to them making some kind of peace. I wouldn’t be surprised if Sal felt remorse for her actions.

  322. MisterGunpowder

    …Really?

    *Ahem.*

    JOOOOOOOYCE…PAAAAAAUNCH!

  323. PShiel

    Joyce used Close Combat! It’s Super Effective!

  324. Lee

    Joyce for the win!!!

  325. hof1991

    Let me count the ways I love this.

    The call back to Sarah saying that it would come down to Joyce to save Becky at the end.

    Five heroic heroines.

    Dina risks injury to take on someone much larger and stronger.

    Becky submits to what she knows will be very bad things to keep others from danger.

    Amazi-Girl who risks her life for someone she barely knows, though in the end her semi-super powers aren’t enough.

    Sal, who risks her life too, for someone she barely knows and then saves AG even though AG attacked her earlier. (I’ll mention but not count Maggie and her driving prowess)

    And Joyce. Frozen with fear of any and all men just a few minutes ago. Then threatened by an armed and clearly unhinged man, then nearly killed by a truck. She didn’t know that God had decreed that no one would get killed by a truck. Then she takes out an authority figure quoting the Bible. She has powered up big time.

    Best of all, no men needed to save Becky. Any of the potential male characters would only have messed this up. Now the police can come and take toedad to the hospital and then jail.

  326. Bosn C Otter

    I have an early Christmas wish… Let Dina land the second punch.

  327. fallingwaters2

    YES!!!!!!

    1. Someone

      never before has a gravatar worked so well with a comment

  328. Wolf_Pup81

    Please remember… History is full of -Very Bad- people doing -Very Bad- things in the name of whatever religion they followed. Don’t blame the religion for the AssToes that try using it to they’re own twisted ends.

  329. ashley laughter

    Me: where did she learn to do that?
    Me: Cartoons.

  330. Lucretiel

    My god, she punched him right out of the panel!

  331. Keulan

    Well, they tell ya never hit a man with a closed fist, but it is on occasion hilarious.

  332. Joya

    Hot damn!

  333. redfacedone

    Staying up until midnight to see the aftermath.

  334. Fran

    I feed the next strip since yesterday!!

  335. Adam Black

    Did anyone else think she punched him so hard his mustache fell off?

  336. lovintheweb

    she has the meanest upper cut. Knocking a fully grown adult male with at least 100 to 200 pounds on her off his feet.

  337. Dutchtica

    That “Pow!” is the most satisfying onomatopoeia I’ve ever read in my life

  338. MortartarSaws

    I guess Joyce was the one with the power of God… The GODHAND

    PS: Don’t act like you don’t like the Ball Bustah! *echoes: “Ball Bustah!”*

  339. mpark6288

    There’s the Joyce I missed!

  340. shadowsneakz

    REKT

  341. Plume

    Well it looks like god has given someone strength. Just not toe dad

  342. Oddi

    Go Joyce!

  343. EvilSupahFly

    I’m late to the party cuz I’m trying to play catch-up after two years with no Internet, and I have never been so happy to see somebody get hit as I was reading that!

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