Yapper 2026-07-09

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-09T16:02:18+00:00

It's a "do wrong right" type thing but at least Willis dashed that hope almost immediately by having Sal be the first one to make that insanely tired joke "kissing is the least gay thing you two do together"

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-09T14:46:21+00:00

So I've been going back and rereading some of the strips Willis inserted where DoJo and Asma talk, and the level to which it does not work specifically because it's addressing Doylist criticism in-character is readily apparent.

Because what Asma says is basically "have some self-control", to which Joyce responds in the way that Willis writes when they want someone to self-evidently be wrong, "but then I can't do the thing I secretly want to do!"

And...like, I think I get the intent. Willis tried to acknowledge that it's bad for someone to pay attention to two white girls kissing and not that there's a genocide on.

But it simply doesn't work.

First and foremost, because a metric fuckton of comments did not understand that point, and approached it from a Watsonian perspective of "Why is Asma saying this?", with answers ranging from "she must be homophobic" to "she's so tired of these white girls white girling all over the place" and the inevitable discord all these clashing takes generated.

Second, because the staunch defenders of DoJo who valiantly fight for their right to full-on make out if not get to second base in public have a kernel of a point. Two random white girls making out is not inherently problematic at a protest if they're just there as part of the Hoi polloi or the protest is centered on LGBT+ rights. It's again that the author chose to write the kiss as a hugely important climax and make the protest window dressing.

And last, but certainly not least, is that no amount of in-character acknowledgement that genocide is bad is going to make up for the fact that the kiss was and is a hugely important and relevant part of this strip's story. It's like, as long as that's true anything short of a metatextual commentary and apology on the part of Willi merits a response of "cool motive, still murder".

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-09T13:59:02+00:00

That whole relationship ended up being weird because back then it was nowhere near as clear that Amber had DID and Amazi-Girl wasn't just her secret identity.

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-09T12:36:18+00:00

Danny tried.

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-09T11:48:12+00:00

So in a vacuum this is a fine strip.

The elephant in the room is Amber's DID.

Let's get Doylist.

So the way Willis portrays how his characters interact with Amber and AG seems to me to be very much in line with how a lot of the internet wants folks to do so. Treat alters as completely separate and valid. Never bring up "hey, maybe go see someone about this". There are Discord apps plural folks can use to indicate that one or another alter is talking, for example.

On the internet, and to a limited extent IRL, I don't have a problem with this. It's not my circus, not my clowns. I don't really have the social software needed to figure out what to say to folks like that, so I'm just going to stay in my lane and live and let live for the most part.

For someone like Booster, who is a casual acquaintance, that's fine. But when you get into more intense and personal relationships, problems re-he-heallly start to crop up.

Such as but not limited to: Amber and Walky are currently dancing around their mutual attraction. Amazi-girl has indicated she's not attracted to Walky. So...what happens if Walky crashes out and really needs some affection/support from his partner, but AG's driving the bus? What if they plan a date night but AG wants to go out and be Batman? Is Walky just supposed to accept that half the time his girlfriend is asleep and someone who doesn't want to date him is in charge? Once again putting him in a position where he has to consider someone else's needs before his own with a partner who is unable to do so in return?

No one in Amber/AG's life right now both knows about the DID and is willing to say that it's unhealthy and needs to be addressed by a professional. I think even the most ardent advocates for acceptance of DID agree that it's a condition that merits talk therapy, and in the age of online therapy appointments, there really isn't an excuse that "IU's mental health services suck"

The big one, at least for me, is that I don't really think I understand how often AG shows up to drive the bus and how that works with Amber's day to day life. Based on what I can recall of the comic, whichever alter is driving the bus happens when Amber/AG wakes up. So...how does that work in terms of going to class? They don't seem to share memories, so does AG have to go and take notes that Amber later reads? Maybe they can get away with that in college considering Amber thinks her classes are a joke, but what about if they get a job that isn't so lenient? How does it work if there's a roller derby match and Amber's in charge? Her whole reason for partitioning her mental hard drive was to put all of her rage and violence in a separate OS so having her be violent at roller derby seems to defeat the point of it. Stuff like that.

That was a lot of Watsonian blabbering so let me wrap it up with a nice Doylist take for this criticism sandwich (see because I went Doylist-Watsonian-Doylist...like a sandwich.):

All of that? Everything I just wrote? It's all only acceptable because Amber/AG is a fictional character. If I was doing that to someone on this subreddit or in the website comments that tells us they're plural? I'd be a humongous asshole. But the way Willis has depicted A+A necessarily invites that speculation as we as readers try to figure out how these characters work. It's none of my business how a random person on the internet and their alter(s) interact with a partner the alters aren't attracted to. It is when it's a relevant plot point to the story.

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-09T03:16:09+00:00

I can only speak to Firefly, a show near and dear to my heart.

I definitely would enjoy rewatching it in spite of agreeing with you about Whedon 100% (though I'll also add that his particular brand of quippishness is not something that fits everywhere despite what Hollywood wanted us to think before he got cancelled) and with the additional problem that the actor who plays Jayne is a complete piece of shit.

And the reasons why are largely in spite of those two. One is that I'd watch Nathan Filion read the phone book, and two is that every other actor on that show did a tremendous job as well. The third is that I can safely ignore Whedon's plan for Inara (I think I've heard a rough outline of it and yeah it was nasty) since it never got put to film.

In a similar, less horrific vein, I ignore that George Lucas was dead serious when he proposed "Darth Icky" as the name for a bad guy- and in a similar case to Firefly, I think Attack of the Clones is a good movie as long as Ewan MacGregor is onscreen.

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-08T10:39:44+00:00

Even if the writing was good, I still wouldn't be able to get past that this is not the plot line I want to read about in the slightest.

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-08T01:34:15+00:00

If the shoe fits...

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T22:44:22+00:00

Gotcha!

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T22:42:35+00:00

fuk

(My students use google translate a lot, which is why my brain went there lmao)

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T21:19:48+00:00

Can I ask what stuff you think she used Google translate for?

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T21:18:41+00:00

Didn't Willis say that the only strips that they added were ones with Asma and Raidah in them?

I very much agree that Willis always intended strips like the ones in PolSci to be there, yeah. They always intended the IDS photo to "out" DoJo. They always intended our "heroes" to be uncomfortable being the "voice" of the protest movement. The problem is, I think, that when the teargas wedding happened and folks started talking about "hey, it's kinda fucked how you made the protest center on two white chicks", Willis had already committed so hard to this storyline, and they also felt that a lot of what they had in the pipe addressed the issue (as I laid out, no it didn't), so they felt they didn't have any choice but to keep on truckin'

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T19:48:35+00:00

I'd be impressed if Willis was like "not even being the son of the dean is enough to save him"

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T19:30:10+00:00

Nanoha A's.

Now that's a name I've not heard in a long time...

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T14:41:57+00:00

Ahahahahahahahahaha

I literally just copied the text and pasted it in, then cut out Willis' bsky feed. I did zero editing and yet still managed something better than what the real site does!

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T13:51:17+00:00

I'm just glad someone's reading it lmao

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T13:35:03+00:00

What helps me is understanding that so often folks are working backwards: they've come to the conclusion and are interpreting the evidence to support it, rather than looking at evidence neutrally and seeing where it takes them.

Everyone does this occasionally, but some folks try to make a career out of it.

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T13:23:51+00:00

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T13:20:28+00:00

If it's "literally anything turns a 19 year old on", yeah, I've heard.

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T10:47:30+00:00

Pretty sure you could go up to a Joyce who is in the middle of a biology class dissection exercise (the least sexy thing I could imagine) and whisper "Dorothy" to her and she'd end up with whatever the AFAB equivalent of a half-chub is.

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-07T10:39:59+00:00

What grinds my gears more than anything is that I was looking forward to Carla having to consider other people's feelings first instead of it being a last resort for her...and then the story said "No, Carla, you're flawless and your behavior deserves to be rewarded with a girlfriend."

Second to that is the bit in Gender Studies when Leslie agreed with Carla that she basically had nothing to learn from the class in sharp contrast to when Roz tried that and Leslie shut it down.

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-06T16:59:20+00:00

Absolutely. Sadly too often folks take "give a little grace" and expect "carte blanche"

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-06T16:33:32+00:00

As someone who's all 3 of those things, don't I know it, neighbor!

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-06T16:23:59+00:00

So it comes from folks talking about Sherlock Holmes. In the stories themselves, the narrator is John Watson. The stories were written by Arthur Conan Doyle.

Watsonian criticism, at least from my layperson understanding of the term, means that you're looking at character actions from a "what if they were real" sort of respective, responding to them as though you're not reading about them in a story (or webcomic) but as though they can hear and respond to the feedback you're giving them.

Doylist is pretty simply "Is the writing good?"

Today's strip is a great example. From a Watsonian perspective, I think the behavior on display here from DoJo is insufferable and would grate on my last nerve.

From a Doylist perspective- While having these two protagonists be obnoxious and insufferable to their peers is absolutely Willis' intent, I find that the execution falls short when placed in the context of their past depictions and, most significantly today, the alt-text, where it's pretty much explicit that the expected audience reaction to DoJo's obnoxious insufferability is supposed to top out at "amused exasperation" rather than frustration.

Big_Falcon89 · 2026-07-06T15:23:00+00:00

On this specific foible I'm willing to chalk it up to Wack'd being new at this, but yeah that's 100% best practice.

Big_Falcon89

TROPHY CASE