Early update for August 14, 2024
Added 2024-08-13 03:55:01 +0000 UTClive mary reaction
Comments
Mary judges you.
Sumit
2024-08-13 22:49:42 +0000 UTC@Preventer Wind: You make a lot of really good points (although I'm not sure I'd characterize Joyce's recent behavior as "spiraling"). I just wanted to drop in here to note just how accelerated the timetable is. Today (in comic time) is Wednesday; Joe confessed his feelings to Joyce, starting their relationship, on Tuesday of last week. They have been dating for EIGHT DAYS. And Joyce's night of drinking with Dorothy was just this past Monday, the night before last. The thing that's always amazed me about DoA is that, for a strip that moves at such a glacial pace, the changes to the characters' lives always seem sudden and seismic. And this is entirely intentional. Life moves painfully slow but impossibly fast at the same time.
Harold
2024-08-13 15:32:04 +0000 UTCJoe-Drinks- AHA! You want to use alcohol as an excuse for evil behavior against Joyce! Joe-Doesn't Drink- AHA! You want to use your clear focus to better commit evil behavior against Joyce! We've only seen him be very consent-focused for everyone he does anything sexytimes with.
Shane Wegner
2024-08-13 14:04:57 +0000 UTCPoor Joe was kind of in a ‘damned if u do damned if u don’t’ situation last night
River Smith
2024-08-13 13:01:24 +0000 UTCI think she just means the irony that she trusted the campus womanizer more if he got drunk than if he stayed sober.
Wyle Heart
2024-08-13 12:38:25 +0000 UTCI feel like I’m alone in the thought that Joyce has been spiraling, and also taking things to extremes *very* quickly. From “I go get drunk with Dorothy to get her to open up” within the past week (few days?), to accidentally dropping the F-bomb and then just using it the time possible, to also having started a relationship with Joe that has moved physical very quickly, especially from completely naive good girl Christian 6 months ago. I know they haven’t had intercourse, but first kiss to sleeping topless with hands on chest in less than a month (I think only a few weeks?) seems fast. And when Joe loves her as the smiling positive girl who wants to help others and then was embarrassed at a life drawing class, and she’s now racing to be a ‘normal’ college woman, there’s definitely room for some concern. In a similar situation I remember being sat down on the couch with a girl who got very drunk her first time because the other people in the room knew that if she tried to get handsy/kissy I was the least likely to do *anything* in return. I am completely on Joes side of wanting to be protective and watch out for her, particularly when she does seem to be radically changing. Particularly when he has clear lines of consent and knows that drinking can mess with people’s inhibitions (and I think I remember being taught that even pre-consent isn’t enough to count when someone lasted says they want something while drunk). Particularly when he loves Joyce and has been trying to move a her speed, but if he was drunk would he have given into her speed? Consent can’t be given when intoxicated, and that goes both ways. Joyce’s view her of ‘it’s okay for both of us to be drunk’ almost leans into a situation where she would put Joe in a place he’s very uncomfortable with. So yes, lying is bad. Clear communication would have been better. But I don’t know if it’s reasonable for Joe to have foreseen how Joyce would act while drunk (this is her second time), and then plan to have that conversation before the party setting boundaries. Plus he knows that everyone sees him as a man a guy who would sleep with practically any woman that moves (earned reputation or not) and he has to be *extra* good to overcome Dorothy and Sarah’s eyes. Lying in a clearly uncomfortable place to avoid doing something he doesn’t want and he feels might put him in a worse situation really seems like a reasonable thing to do in that moment. The other thing to do have done is taken Joyce has already been demanding drunken smoochies and give her a lecture on consent and boundaries when she is least likely to listen or process. Joe may have done the ‘least wrong’ thing in this particular situation. Especially when Joyce has been radically changing in the past month and it’s hard to know what she might want next. I’m sure I’m about to get a lot of comments of ‘lying is never ok’ and ‘honest communication is the right thing’ and I don’t deny that. But in the moment Joe made a choice to keep himself out of what could have easily been a situation. I hope they can have a good conversation where they are both honest and Joyce can understand. Sorry for the novel, but it’s kind of been building in me over the past weeks worth of strips specifically, and more over our past few months of Joyce’s radical changes. Joyce is probably my favorite character and I’ve been worrying about her, probably as much as others have worried about Dorothy.
Preventer Wind
2024-08-13 11:42:25 +0000 UTCwait does Joyce think it's ironic that she trusted Joe or did she trust Joe in an ironic way or manner?
Jasmijn Wellner
2024-08-13 11:41:55 +0000 UTCjoyce that arm doesn't have a distinguishing feature anymore, you're gonna need to fuck it up again
Seth Aaron Hershman has they she pronouns
2024-08-13 11:12:38 +0000 UTCI know people are hating on Sarah for this, but this is what Sarah has been to Joyce all along - her voice of reality for better or worse. She knew what Joyce was saying when she talked about them both being drunk, and Joe wouldn't have told her - lying by omission is still lying. This is why Joyce trusts Sarah, and why she is mad at Joe. Long term, she would have been MUCH angrier at Sarah if she didn't speak up, and that would last longer than her being angry at Joe.
Onyx
2024-08-13 08:30:05 +0000 UTCYeah, Joyce, you're still learning, so I don't expect you to know this, but if you're okay with doing something that under normal circumstances would be a very clear case of assault, like smooching/more while drunk or asleep, you have to communicate very clearly and explicitly beforehand.
Berry
2024-08-13 08:22:05 +0000 UTCMature answer in the third panel. Hopefully Joyce gets there eventually
Bagge
2024-08-13 08:02:04 +0000 UTCSarah isn't in this strip at all?
Girlycore
2024-08-13 08:00:01 +0000 UTCMan, Sarah, I have been shilling for you but this is not a good look. Read the goddamn room
Morgan Byrd
2024-08-13 06:16:03 +0000 UTCudpate
darklion
2024-08-13 06:09:27 +0000 UTC
