That is a long, long, long list of people competing for position 1. Hmmm. Well, it’s the 1950s so Reagan isn’t anywhere close to being president. If she kills him we avoid Reaganomics, the increasingly encroaching power of the executive branch, we avoid a major instance of funding being cut from most federal programs in order to enrich defense spending, and the evangelical strategy gets nipped in the bud. However, killing Nixon keeps the Republicans for embracing the Dixiecrat racists and puts a hold on the war on drugs. However, in the 50s he’s a rising star commie-hunter politician, so that could make the red scare even worse. Both of these options do however stop two of the most toxic political alliances (and thus political validation) from occurring. But the ripple effects could also create something very dangerous in the long run.
Passchendaele
She could also have gone after McCarthy, as he was spewing his BS all over the place and hurting a *lot* of innocent people. Killing the most famous commie-hunter might lead to mass panic about 50s Russian involvement (ironic, since most spies had already gotten the hint the US government was watching them and fled) and more damage. On the other hand, his behavior, lack of evidence, and reptuation for being a chronic liar killed him by the early 50s, where he was ignored by his political peers and died in exile, so, at worst, she would delay the inevitable reveal of his true colors, but perhaps save enough lives by undermining his evil and above-average charisma to make up for that. In other words, sunglasses and a rifle and she’ll help the world. 😛
Passchendaele
Uggh, *political and social exile. Sadly, they didn’t kick him out for lying, but he died of kidney damage from alcoholism a few years after the Senate censured, or silenced, him.
Reltzik
Or turn him into a martyr and prevent the truth from ever coming out.
Guairdean Beatha
Sadly, McCarthy wasn’t even the head of the snake. He was just a convenient mouthpiece. Censuring him silence one very loud voice, but the accusations still came form other sources. It was less about the “Red Scare” and more about power plays. When Joseph Welch spoke against him, many realized that they were in danger. A simple accusation against someone in power put them on the defensive. By censuring McCarthy, they won a few votes, and a stay of execution for anyone that McCarthy (and mainly those backing him) wanted out of the way. If you want to kill the Hydra, you have to know which head is immortal. The others (like McCarthy) are expendable.
Goblin Scribe
The Republicans were already leaning Dixiecrat—Nixon implemented the strategy, but ironically, he was a lot more socially progressive (in POLICY) than many give him credit for, and openly despised the politics of the John Birch Society, as well as Goldwater, who he warned would turn the GOP into the “nation’s first all-white party”.
Killing Reagan potentially puts someone in charge who would do something about the AIDS crisis, so I’m thinking him.
Would offing Nixon prevent everyone who might go on to invent the Southern strategy in the 60s after the CRA and VRA?
I’m not saying you’re wrong, but that the history (sic) of time travel is full of people who failed to.stop the Nazis.
Jhon
“…failed to stop the Nazis”
“Because, you know Hitler evaded or survived at least 54 attempts on his life. What does that tell you?”
“That he was… protected? Why? To ensure your future?”
“No. To ensure a future.”
Reltzik
This is Leslie.
Leslie’s pretty non-violent. I don’t know if she’s explicitly non-violent, but that’s her leaning.
So she wouldn’t go around killing people. She’d go around educating them. She would find young Bill O’Reilly and open his eyes while he was still impressionable.
Felgraf
I turn to the wisdom of Pratchett:
Shoot the dictator and prevent the war? But the dictator is merely the tip of the whole festering boil of social pus from which dictators emerge; shoot one, and there’ll be another one along in a minute. Shoot him too? Why not shoot everyone and invade Poland? In fifty years’, thirty years’, ten years’ time the world will be very nearly back on its old course. History always has a great weight of inertia. – Lords and Ladies
That’s a silly question, she wouldn’t kill anyone.
Starting with the potential targets mentioned by Rukduk:
Regan was mainly a TV actor during the ’50s and ended the decade as the president of SAG before moving into politics. There are many, many ways to change his later impact without killing anyone.
Nixon spent the majority of the ’50s as the VPotUS under Ike. Killing him during the ’50s is effectively handing the Republicans of that era all kinds of political power. His [attempted] assassination gives them something to whip up even stronger anti-communist frenzy than what was seen and all but assures Kennedy doesn’t take PotUS in ’60 as Nixon now either gets replaced with a “better” candidate in ’60 (as he’s dead) or rides into the office on a wave of anti-communist views that more than compensates for his shortcomings vs Kennedy. That in turn probably puts Kennedy off the PotUS slot for nearly another half decade or else he outright never gets it which changes all sorts of elements in the political landscape from ’60 onward and makes the full outcomes unpredictable (especially anything involving the Dixie-crats due to potentially no need to push the Southern Strategy or anything involving US relations in relation to communist nations due to the heightened anti-communist sentiments).
Regarding McCarthy, Passchendaele said all that need be said.
I could maybe make a case for James Earl Ray and/or Lee Harvey Oswald, among other similar cases, but I firmly believe that in any of these cases it’s a crap shoot of cascading repercussions where the world ends up. Further, I personally can’t feel right condoning anyone being killed for a crime they have not yet attempted or even thought of let alone committed and that is something I feel Leslie would agree with, hence my opening assumption she wouldn’t kill anyone.
Taking out Nixon would be interesting. You don’t get normalization of relationships with China, and that either leads to the fall of China along with the Soviet Union or an eventual War with China that we can’t win without using Nukes.
Simple, Donald Trump’s racist father. D gets killed in ‘Nam instead of getting 5 deferrals, his sister gets the $ and gives generously to women’s causes, and we get spared a decade of bad TV and jokes about getting fired. Not to mention that other thing with D getting elected.
BTW Bad Joke warning. We have had time travelers for decades killing Baby Hitlers, that’s the reason for the SIDS epidemic.
Marty: “This is heavy.”
Doc Brown: “You keep using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.”
Aeron
“In the future, is there something wrong with the American education system?”
DonDueed
Oh yes.
Silly Name
So much.
Godfather
I thought it went like this:
“There’s that word again, ‘heavy’! What does that mean? Is the earth’s gravitational pull stronger in the future? Is there something wrong with the American educational system in the future?”
You can’t say that to Bean, or McFly, and make it stick. Col. Sanders, on the other hand, didn’t exactly stand up to Dark Helmet. (not the real Harlan Sanders, of course. He was never actually a colonel.)
I’ll just sit here patiently til someone recaps us on who Vivian is (I’m a Patreon backer if someone wants to point me in the right direction there)
Also I FINALLY got to backreading It’s Walky, and now I understand the people who don’t totally hate Joe. My view of him’s already pretty well tainted so that was a lost cause, but I can see now why others might not. He had, like, a second note to his personality back then.
He’s decent in Shortpacked, which is where my intro to him came from, but yeah, he’s a dick thus far. Not too far to the point I can’t forgive if he legitimately has depth or changes, but a dick.
Huh, I thought Joe was more three-dimensional in DoA than he was in Roomies. He’s got secrets now, for example. Plus he doesn’t run down hallways making kissy-faces at women, so that’s a major improvement.
I think it’s nifty that this Joe sees himself as a champion of respect and consent, when in fact he’s often barely on this side of the line.
Grethelwvier
I believe he is genuinely big on consent. Not so much on respect, though. I think I would be more bothered if he was looking to be in a relationship, yet he very adamantly is not. He seems perfectly aware of his actions, and while he is currently a dick (this is not by any means an excuse for his behavior), I wonder sometimes if he’s actually somewhat scared to look for a relationship after his seeing how volatile his parents’ marriage was, and how much happier they both were after the divorce. And I’m interested to see if/how his behavior in the event that he becomes ready make such an emotional connection.
Grethelwvier
*his behavior changes in the event…
thejeff
Definitely. Comparing DoA Joe to Walkyverse Joe is something of a disservice. The Walky one had a lot of character development over the years and by the end of SP! was much improved over Roomies.
DoA Joe is better then Roomies Joe, but is still at the start of his character arc. I do hope, that unlike SP! Joe, he does have to face how problematic his behavior was rather than just growing out of it.
Leorale
That’s a good way to put it, that DoA Joe is at the beginning of his arc, whereas Walkyverse Joe finished his (mainly by growing out of his poor behaviours).
I think that a character with the clear potential to have an arc is roughly as deep as the character who has just completed an arc. For me, depth is more about having many facets or aspects, especially usually-hidden ones, having lots of nuances. My personal definition may or may not have any relationship to what the word actually means in literature, though. I’ma look it up.
thejeff
Kind of, but it’s hard to judge the depth until it actually happens. Does the character still have depth if the arc never gets shown? Or if there is an arc but it only shows the limits of his shallowness? (unlikely here, but possible).
Leorale
Hmm. I think I’d say that a character with never-shown depth still has the depth, but that it doesn’t matter to the audience, since the audience can’t access it.
Leorale
But! An arc involves change that happens over time. An arc is a great way to find out about a character’s depth (and perhaps the best way) but it’s not the only way. A person can be deep within a single moment of their personal development.
Leorale
For you, is depth something that a person has right now, or something that happens?
205 thoughts on “Vivian”
Ana Chronistic
“Hey, Les, what didja do, jump ship?”
“Wha?”
“Well, what’s with the life preserver?”
Ana Chronistic
did Vivian’s class ever figure out whether that dress was blue and black, or white and gold
Pablo360
Neither, it was green and red and that was the end of that
Falling Star
I always saw it as green and brown.
bobjohnsonandthediglets
I thought it was all the colors of the wind
BrokenEye, True False Prophet
I am a great magician. Your clothes are red!
Doctor_Who
If Leslie time traveled back to the 1950s, who do you think she would kill first?
Rukduk
That is a long, long, long list of people competing for position 1. Hmmm. Well, it’s the 1950s so Reagan isn’t anywhere close to being president. If she kills him we avoid Reaganomics, the increasingly encroaching power of the executive branch, we avoid a major instance of funding being cut from most federal programs in order to enrich defense spending, and the evangelical strategy gets nipped in the bud. However, killing Nixon keeps the Republicans for embracing the Dixiecrat racists and puts a hold on the war on drugs. However, in the 50s he’s a rising star commie-hunter politician, so that could make the red scare even worse. Both of these options do however stop two of the most toxic political alliances (and thus political validation) from occurring. But the ripple effects could also create something very dangerous in the long run.
Passchendaele
She could also have gone after McCarthy, as he was spewing his BS all over the place and hurting a *lot* of innocent people. Killing the most famous commie-hunter might lead to mass panic about 50s Russian involvement (ironic, since most spies had already gotten the hint the US government was watching them and fled) and more damage. On the other hand, his behavior, lack of evidence, and reptuation for being a chronic liar killed him by the early 50s, where he was ignored by his political peers and died in exile, so, at worst, she would delay the inevitable reveal of his true colors, but perhaps save enough lives by undermining his evil and above-average charisma to make up for that. In other words, sunglasses and a rifle and she’ll help the world. 😛
Passchendaele
Uggh, *political and social exile. Sadly, they didn’t kick him out for lying, but he died of kidney damage from alcoholism a few years after the Senate censured, or silenced, him.
Reltzik
Or turn him into a martyr and prevent the truth from ever coming out.
Guairdean Beatha
Sadly, McCarthy wasn’t even the head of the snake. He was just a convenient mouthpiece. Censuring him silence one very loud voice, but the accusations still came form other sources. It was less about the “Red Scare” and more about power plays. When Joseph Welch spoke against him, many realized that they were in danger. A simple accusation against someone in power put them on the defensive. By censuring McCarthy, they won a few votes, and a stay of execution for anyone that McCarthy (and mainly those backing him) wanted out of the way. If you want to kill the Hydra, you have to know which head is immortal. The others (like McCarthy) are expendable.
Goblin Scribe
The Republicans were already leaning Dixiecrat—Nixon implemented the strategy, but ironically, he was a lot more socially progressive (in POLICY) than many give him credit for, and openly despised the politics of the John Birch Society, as well as Goldwater, who he warned would turn the GOP into the “nation’s first all-white party”.
Killing Reagan potentially puts someone in charge who would do something about the AIDS crisis, so I’m thinking him.
ValdVin
Would offing Nixon prevent everyone who might go on to invent the Southern strategy in the 60s after the CRA and VRA?
I’m not saying you’re wrong, but that the history (sic) of time travel is full of people who failed to.stop the Nazis.
Jhon
“…failed to stop the Nazis”
“Because, you know Hitler evaded or survived at least 54 attempts on his life. What does that tell you?”
“That he was… protected? Why? To ensure your future?”
“No. To ensure a future.”
Reltzik
This is Leslie.
Leslie’s pretty non-violent. I don’t know if she’s explicitly non-violent, but that’s her leaning.
So she wouldn’t go around killing people. She’d go around educating them. She would find young Bill O’Reilly and open his eyes while he was still impressionable.
Felgraf
I turn to the wisdom of Pratchett:
Shoot the dictator and prevent the war? But the dictator is merely the tip of the whole festering boil of social pus from which dictators emerge; shoot one, and there’ll be another one along in a minute. Shoot him too? Why not shoot everyone and invade Poland? In fifty years’, thirty years’, ten years’ time the world will be very nearly back on its old course. History always has a great weight of inertia. – Lords and Ladies
Smiling Cat
The tenth person who called her a boy.
(that hair and those pants just aren’t 50’s womanly)
vlademir1
That’s a silly question, she wouldn’t kill anyone.
Starting with the potential targets mentioned by Rukduk:
Regan was mainly a TV actor during the ’50s and ended the decade as the president of SAG before moving into politics. There are many, many ways to change his later impact without killing anyone.
Nixon spent the majority of the ’50s as the VPotUS under Ike. Killing him during the ’50s is effectively handing the Republicans of that era all kinds of political power. His [attempted] assassination gives them something to whip up even stronger anti-communist frenzy than what was seen and all but assures Kennedy doesn’t take PotUS in ’60 as Nixon now either gets replaced with a “better” candidate in ’60 (as he’s dead) or rides into the office on a wave of anti-communist views that more than compensates for his shortcomings vs Kennedy. That in turn probably puts Kennedy off the PotUS slot for nearly another half decade or else he outright never gets it which changes all sorts of elements in the political landscape from ’60 onward and makes the full outcomes unpredictable (especially anything involving the Dixie-crats due to potentially no need to push the Southern Strategy or anything involving US relations in relation to communist nations due to the heightened anti-communist sentiments).
Regarding McCarthy, Passchendaele said all that need be said.
I could maybe make a case for James Earl Ray and/or Lee Harvey Oswald, among other similar cases, but I firmly believe that in any of these cases it’s a crap shoot of cascading repercussions where the world ends up. Further, I personally can’t feel right condoning anyone being killed for a crime they have not yet attempted or even thought of let alone committed and that is something I feel Leslie would agree with, hence my opening assumption she wouldn’t kill anyone.
Clif
Taking out Nixon would be interesting. You don’t get normalization of relationships with China, and that either leads to the fall of China along with the Soviet Union or an eventual War with China that we can’t win without using Nukes.
Opus the Poet
Simple, Donald Trump’s racist father. D gets killed in ‘Nam instead of getting 5 deferrals, his sister gets the $ and gives generously to women’s causes, and we get spared a decade of bad TV and jokes about getting fired. Not to mention that other thing with D getting elected.
BTW Bad Joke warning. We have had time travelers for decades killing Baby Hitlers, that’s the reason for the SIDS epidemic.
Undrave
Man I was going to make a McFly joke…
Nakams
That’s what I was here for as well. This is heavy!
Pablo360
Marty: “This is heavy.”
Doc Brown: “You keep using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.”
Aeron
“In the future, is there something wrong with the American education system?”
DonDueed
Oh yes.
Silly Name
So much.
Godfather
I thought it went like this:
“There’s that word again, ‘heavy’! What does that mean? Is the earth’s gravitational pull stronger in the future? Is there something wrong with the American educational system in the future?”
Undrave
“Take a picture, it’ll last longer.”
Orion Fury
*click
Falling Star
[snap snap]
3-I
Seriously, aaagh, I was just about to, and… agh.
Passchendaele
“Because this is actually the movie Titanic, but were both Rose and there isn’t a Jack.”
“So there’s jack Jack.”
“…”
Power Stranger
“What’s wrong, Bean? CHICKEN?”
Schol-R-LEA
You can’t say that to Bean, or McFly, and make it stick. Col. Sanders, on the other hand, didn’t exactly stand up to Dark Helmet. (not the real Harlan Sanders, of course. He was never actually a colonel.)
Tomas
[Suddenly, a green energy portal opens and Rick jumps out.]
“Leslie! (burp) Y-y-y-ya gotta come with me! (belch) The- the Soggies may rule Leslie!”
Doctor_Who
“Well yeah. I mean, I took a photo of the debate team, and you’re on the debate team. So…”
m90photo
VIVIAN.
Kris
Vivian seems nice.
TheAnonymousGuy
Yes, though i’m pretty sure she’s a rule 63 self-portrait of Willis.
Fart Captor
You have given me some absolutely horrible ideas for make-out art picks
TheAnonymousGuy
(In announcer voice) Next week on the Fuck Zone!
Tenn
Vivian slash Lady in Red Car.
OH NO I DI’NT.
Tenn
So I read the Kickstarter preview comic.
It supports my theory that Danny is actually a young Jon Arbuckle.
Tenn
Shit, that was supposed to be a new comment.
Falling Star
You mean amazing, right?
Kris
Now I can’t unsee it! Why would you do this to me?!
Godfather
I THOUGHT THAT TOO
I was highly confused as to why Willis was in the strip. Though it’s wonderful to see him!
TrueVCU
A GROUP photo with OTHER CONGRESSPEOPLE
Behold, Leslie’s (crappily concealed) secret fetish
Pablo360
Words containing the letter ‘o’
Orion Fury
There’s worse letters to fetishize.
3oranges
Dumbing of Age, now with additional Ds, Os, and As available.
Orion Fury
Well the internet is abound with what ‘D’ and ‘O’ are, but ‘A’ is unknown to me.
Leorale
The A is roughly half of T&A.
Text and Ads. Lots of those on the internets you know.
KingoHrts
Or Time and Attendance if you are a Federal Government Employee or Timekeeper.
Orion Fury
Oh yeah.
JetstreamGW
Shut. Up. Vivian. UGH! 😛
Kris
Oy! Vivian’s done nothing wrong. Calling people out on their shame is a public service.
Shiro
I’ll just sit here patiently til someone recaps us on who Vivian is (I’m a Patreon backer if someone wants to point me in the right direction there)
Also I FINALLY got to backreading It’s Walky, and now I understand the people who don’t totally hate Joe. My view of him’s already pretty well tainted so that was a lost cause, but I can see now why others might not. He had, like, a second note to his personality back then.
BBCC
He’s decent in Shortpacked, which is where my intro to him came from, but yeah, he’s a dick thus far. Not too far to the point I can’t forgive if he legitimately has depth or changes, but a dick.
BBCC
Also, it’s one of the first bonus strips. She hangs out with Leslie, though we didn’t get a name.
3-I
something something dick with depth something
Pablo360
The question is: Is the change to Joe better or worse for the comic as a whole? Discuss.
Sporky
I think it’s better, and weirdly, I think Joe being less three-dimensional actually lends more nuance to the strip as a whole.
Shiro
Jury’s out til he finishes his character arc, imo.
Leorale
Huh, I thought Joe was more three-dimensional in DoA than he was in Roomies. He’s got secrets now, for example. Plus he doesn’t run down hallways making kissy-faces at women, so that’s a major improvement.
I think it’s nifty that this Joe sees himself as a champion of respect and consent, when in fact he’s often barely on this side of the line.
Grethelwvier
I believe he is genuinely big on consent. Not so much on respect, though. I think I would be more bothered if he was looking to be in a relationship, yet he very adamantly is not. He seems perfectly aware of his actions, and while he is currently a dick (this is not by any means an excuse for his behavior), I wonder sometimes if he’s actually somewhat scared to look for a relationship after his seeing how volatile his parents’ marriage was, and how much happier they both were after the divorce. And I’m interested to see if/how his behavior in the event that he becomes ready make such an emotional connection.
Grethelwvier
*his behavior changes in the event…
thejeff
Definitely. Comparing DoA Joe to Walkyverse Joe is something of a disservice. The Walky one had a lot of character development over the years and by the end of SP! was much improved over Roomies.
DoA Joe is better then Roomies Joe, but is still at the start of his character arc. I do hope, that unlike SP! Joe, he does have to face how problematic his behavior was rather than just growing out of it.
Leorale
That’s a good way to put it, that DoA Joe is at the beginning of his arc, whereas Walkyverse Joe finished his (mainly by growing out of his poor behaviours).
I think that a character with the clear potential to have an arc is roughly as deep as the character who has just completed an arc. For me, depth is more about having many facets or aspects, especially usually-hidden ones, having lots of nuances. My personal definition may or may not have any relationship to what the word actually means in literature, though. I’ma look it up.
thejeff
Kind of, but it’s hard to judge the depth until it actually happens. Does the character still have depth if the arc never gets shown? Or if there is an arc but it only shows the limits of his shallowness? (unlikely here, but possible).
Leorale
Hmm. I think I’d say that a character with never-shown depth still has the depth, but that it doesn’t matter to the audience, since the audience can’t access it.
Leorale
But! An arc involves change that happens over time. An arc is a great way to find out about a character’s depth (and perhaps the best way) but it’s not the only way. A person can be deep within a single moment of their personal development.
Leorale
For you, is depth something that a person has right now, or something that happens?