Dominic Deegan: Oracle for Hire, Mk. XLIV: Stunt Bro and Hella Jayden

[colonelslime]

Is Mookie back-pedalling on Scapilians now?

Pretty hard, I'd say.

Also, I do like how the fact that it's the Alstone Church of Scalpcare. Luana, I mean Scapila, forbid we not know what town we were in!

[random11]

Is Mookie back-pedalling on Scapilians now?

Too early to say, might be that that sect/religion just went away, or at least slowly changed to the behavior of the more dominant religion.

Either way, I hope Stunt will get mugged and lose the treasure.
I wonder if Mookie will even remember after a while that Stunt carries that necklace.

[Trazoi]

Those first two panels. It's like every religion in the Dominion derives from the pseudo-religious rambling speeches JRPG villains make before the boss fight.

Also, I do like how the fact that it's the Alstone Church of Scalpcare. Luana, I mean Scapila, forbid we not know what town we were in!

I think you're reaching there - many churches I know have names like that.

[colonelslime]

I think you're reaching there - many churches I know have names like that.

I guess, but Mookie's practice of showing an outside shot of the building, complete with convenient scene-setting signage, is really bothersome to me. It's a jarring way to do scene transitions, and he does it a lot.

[Trazoi]

I guess, but Mookie's practice of showing an outside shot of the building, complete with convenient scene-setting signage, is really bothersome to me. It's a jarring way to do scene transitions, and he does it a lot.

I'm generally okay with it except Mookie tends to do it exactly the same way.

And it's nowhere near as weird as what's going on in the bubble on that panel. Have the Scapilians merged with the Luanians and form the Amalgamated Church of the Nice Guy?

[Coidzor]

Too early to say, might be that that sect/religion just went away, or at least slowly changed to the behavior of the more dominant religion.

If they went away they'd change the signage. I should hope even Mookie would realize that.

[colonelslime]

I'm generally okay with it except Mookie tends to do it exactly the same way.

And it's nowhere near as weird as what's going on in the bubble on that panel. Have the Scapilians merged with the Luanians and form the Amalgamated Church of the Nice Guy?

"And lo, woman shall be placed upon a pedestal, to be admired and adored, but never ever approached, lest their perfection be marred by the touch of the unworthy...."

Yeah, though I try not to judge Mookie personally based on his comic, the "Nice Guy" vibes are coming off this pretty strongly.

And the religions have definitely merged, since Lizzie is apparently a Scapilian Nun, despite Jayden having known her during their mutual training and vows at whatever passes for a seminary in Luanism.

[Zaq]

A lot of people were trashing him for his use of the name "Weedle" even though it's a fairly obscure pokemon. I would be more after for him because they blatantly look like Kuribos.

Fairly obscure? It's in the original 150. It's like the first one you can catch in Red. That's not obscure at all.

[Coidzor]

"And lo, woman shall be placed upon a pedestal, to be admired and adored, but never ever approached, lest their perfection be marred by the touch of the unworthy...."

Yeah, though I try not to judge Mookie personally based on his comic, the "Nice Guy" vibes are coming off this pretty strongly.

Considering that women do seem to mostly be either whores and evil or on a pedestal but (more or less) secretly whorish, but only for the right man.

The main exceptions to this that I can recall are Melna and Barnett who are rape victims in some form or fashion, Rapechel who is a ("sexy") rapist and I suppose the closest thing to a "good whore" character, and soup wenches (I'm going to count Vasquez as one of those, especially since she wouldn't have even had a name if we hadn't insisted upon giving her one)

I suppose one of the... err... I guess interesting is the closest word in the language for it... qualities of Jayden is how she manages to seem to jump on and off of it.

[random11]

If they went away they'd change the signage. I should hope even Mookie would realize that.

It's also possible that the religion was never that bad, and it was mainly Stunt's father that made it look that way.
Now that stunt is more mature (debatable) and wiser than his young self (really debatable), he might see that it wasn't THAT bad.

Then again, like colonelslime mentioned, what is a nun from a different religion doing here, and if it Stunt's father was an exception and not the way of the religion, it's completely ignoring the conversation Stunt had with Jayden about it.

I guess we need to give Mookie a chance to explain himself for a few more strips, but it doesn't mean we need to build up hope for a reasonable explanation.

[T-O-E]

Huh, the caste system even works for churches. It used to be third but now it's second.

[Glass Mouse]

God dammit, Mookie.

[guttering flame]

According to D&D's "Ecology of the Lizardfolk", the most prized lizardfolk priests are hermaphrodites, due to embodying both the male and female aspects of the creator deity Semuanyah.

Mind you, I doubt Mookie ever thought things through like that, but it's an interesting aside.

Yes, sure, if you forget that all the Luanian clergy we saw so far were definitely male or female. Our main Luanian throughout the comic is Jayden for crying out loud.

[MReav]

Fairly obscure? It's in the original 150. It's like the first one you can catch in Red. That's not obscure at all.

Who the hell uses weedles except to evolve them? You'll stop thinking about them the moment you get your first set of good pokemon, at which point they'll stay in your inventory for the entire rest of the game, which IIRC can clock in at over 90 hours.

[Oracle_Hunter]

God dammit, Mookie.

Huh, that first link raises an important point.

Jayden -- a supposed priestess -- is able to identify Scapegotians by their creed of "everything that feels good is a sin." Yet, when we see some more Scapegotians their creed sounds very different. So either this sermon is empty verbiage that is supposed to be empty (as opposed to the Luanian credo, which is empty but is not intended to be) or Jayden is really bad at World Religions.

Also: If Mookie wanted to make Scapegotians actually good, why invent them in the first place? It would have been so easy for Altstone to be home to a schism of Luanianism or even just have Stunt's father be a rogue Luanian. I guess he didn't want his Perfect Religion get marred by even a brush with Fourth Caste Thinking.

[Gez]

So I guess that Scopalian faith is the one that says that women are Goddesses to be worshiped and bepedestaled.

And if after living some time with one of these magical creatures, you discover that they're really just human beings, just with some differently-shaped funny bits, then you've got your justification for beating them up, since they fall short of the arbitrary ideal you've built for them.

Good going, Mookie. If you were capable of self-awareness, I'd think you meant the whole Spatulan faith to be a satire of Nice Guys and their unhealthy ideas; but you just seem so earnest and genuine and oblivious to the implications of what you write...

Fairly obscure? It's in the original 150. It's like the first one you can catch in Red. That's not obscure at all.

Given that I have no idea what "original 150" or "catching in Red" means, it's obscure enough for me.

[Myrdhale]

Who the hell uses weedles except to evolve them? You'll stop thinking about them the moment you get your first set of good pokemon, at which point they'll stay in your inventory for the entire rest of the game, which IIRC can clock in at over 90 hours.

It evolves into Beedrill.
Beedrill had Drills.
I will never Forget weedle, because Beedrill had Drills.

Whenever I catch one now, its name is Kamina

Back to the comic;

So... That sign... Well, it might just be my interpretation but that sign kinda implies that Alstone has different faiths present. Why else would you need to specify it's the scapegoatian church unless there were multiple faiths present?

And as Glass Mouse pointed out, Stunt very clearly said that the church taught him to revere his father, so this softer, cuddlier version just doesn't make any sense unless Stunt and Jayden were both intentionally misremembering the teachings.

And if the church was all friendly and nice, Then that really changes the spin on Stunt's Mom and her affair.

Also, does the Preacher go from a woman to a man between panels 2 and 5 or am I just seeing things?

[Mewtarthio]

I wouldn't say it's that bad, really. Plenty of major real-world religions have bizarre, cultish fringe groups that embarrass the mainline adherents.

The real problem here is that Jayden herself earlier claimed that Scapilians hated fun and were basically a parody of abovementioned fringe groups. Seeing as she knows Lizzie Sarkhas, who is either a Nice Scapilian nun or a Luanian nun with strong ties to Nice Scapilians, I'd expect her to know more about the faith.

Also, "Lizabet"? Seriously?

For my money, I want to say that the wedding arc was the worst, but man was that even an arc? I just went back to see if it was like I remembered, and it took not even a month to play out.

Oh, that's right. Dominic and Luna did get married at some point, didn't they? It was just so tepid and anticlimactic, I completely overlooked it.

What does that say about their marriage? The proposal was a filler arc in which Our Heroes were petty and spiteful until Dominic suddenly proposed, and the marriage itself was an even shorter filler arc in which Our Heroes talk about how much they need to focus on The Greater Threat until Dominic suddenly is married.

In retrospect however, we can infer that this comic was a veiled reference to the Scapilians.

Fun fact: Miranda is not giving the Evil Eye to the idea of eloping. She's giving the Evil Eye to the idea that modest decorations can be respectful.

[Traab]

Its still possible that stunt was manipulated by his dad into thinking that the way he acted was gods will, and NOT scapalian. Those linked comics dont directly contradict whats happening now. For example, the first comic he mentions "Everything that feels good is a sin" Thats actually a fairly common view of a lot of religions. Its an exaggeration of course, but not one thats blatantly wrong like, "Omg, what? Scapalians are hedonistic by nature! Where did you hear that feels good = evil thing?"

The second linked comic also has a version of god that ive read in a number of fantasy religions. God is angry, do what he says or be punished. Once again, it doesnt directly contradict what we have seen so far in alestone. It mentioned nothing about gods general mood, just that since we were created in gods image, we should try to act as good as god or some such thing.

Third linked comic, she could be saying "thats ridiculous" to the very idea that stunt thinks thats how scapalians act. He is finally venting so she isnt going to shut him up right then and there and give a full breakdown of what his religion actually is supposed to be, and afterwards they were kinda busy. Only other comment she made was her horror at how nasty his daddy dearest was.

Now, that being said, that doesnt mean that mookie ISNT directly contradicting himself, but im more inclined to think that this is an arc for stunt to "see the truth" about how evil his dad was, and how the religion he was supposed to be raised in was twisted and manipulated by his evil dad. Then he gets to devour his dads skull in revenge.

[Myrdhale]

I think you're reaching there - many churches I know have names like that.

Except... That's a modern convention due to the many different sects that exist within large urban centers. This is ostencibly a fantasy medieval setting (sort of, haha ), so This would imply that there are many different religious movements in Alstone, as I said before.

This also means Alstone is a city, I guess? Big enough to have competeting sects in it too. So Stunt must have lived a very, very sheltered life when he was young if he only ever learned his world view from his Dad, not from the priests or any neighbours who weren't Scapegoatians.

It's just not holding up. Stunt would have to have been raised in an enclosed bubble by his Dad, at which point his youth is just a giant dose of indoctirnation by a cultist psycho with a majorly skewed view on religion. At which point, why did Stunt's Mom Marry him, if she could have had other options? Since the faith and community aren't a bunch of Misogynist bogeymen, she would have chosen to marry the unloving, abussive, compeletly delisional psycho herself.

Or did he pull a nice guy, like Siegfried.

Looking at it, I think it all really boils down to one of Mookie's biggest failings in his writing; I call it the 'Modern Fantasy' syndrome. Mookie includes all these details based on his experiences, without realising they become anachronistic and don't function in the setting he is placing them in. It's why these churchs are constantly vacilliating between Dogmatic, medieval era Christiandom (pun not intended) and modern, pantheistic interpretations that don't jive with the established culture and world setting.

Edit: Or he's trying to emulate some of the crazy polygamist sects out in the flyover areas of the U.S., at which point changing the Spatulan teachings now after Stunt's backstory makes even less sense.

Mookie writes like he would for a DnD Campaign. One where the same story has been going on far too long and the world has become a tangled mess. He needs to wipe the character sheets blank and start a new campaign.

[Myrdhale]

The second linked comic also has a version of god that ive read in a number of fantasy religions. God is angry, do what he says or be punished. Once again, it doesnt directly contradict what we have seen so far in alestone. It mentioned nothing about gods general mood, just that since we were created in gods image, we should try to act as good as god or some such thing.

The problem with it is that it shows an idea of equality of the sexes within the religious doctrine; something that Stunt's Dad clearly did not believe in. It's possible he's just the exception but then Stunt was revering his father because he was told Scapegoatians revere thier fathers by his father, who abused his mother and said it was ok because of Scapegoatian beliefs.

Could be Stunt was just an especially credulous 5-year-old. Still, it would've made far more sense for The Scapegoatians to be backwards cultists, narratively speaking. Now Stunt just kinda looks like he was a dumb-**** for listening to his Dad and no one else back then.

On a completly Different note... I'm betting Stunt Paralysed his mom. With a knife wound to the stomach. In the land of whitemagiccurealls.

Edit: fixed a typo.

[Veridis Quo]

This is what Scapilians Believe
Seriously, it just turns out that Stunt's father may have been wrong in his interpretation of Scapilianism? Pretty darn convenient. And Lizzy appears to be visiting mama Stunt because... I don't know she's still with Stunt's father or something.

[M84]

Could be Stunt was just an especially credulous 5-year-old. Still, it would've made far more sense for The Scapegoatians to be backwards cultists, narratively speaking. Now Stunt just kinda looks like he was a dumb-**** for listening to his Dad and none one else back then.

Stunt being a bit of an idiot at age 5 would be in-character. It's probably the most consistent characterization in DD.

[Traab]

The problem with it is that it shows an idea of equality of the sexes within the religious doctrine; something that Stunt's Dad clearly did not believe in. It's possible he's just the exception but then Stunt was revering his father because he was told Scapegoatians revere thier fathers by his father, who abused his mother and said it was ok because of Scapegoatian beliefs.

Could be Stunt was just an especially credulous 5-year-old. Still, it would've made far more sense for The Scapegoatians to be backwards cultists, narratively speaking. Now Stunt just kinda looks like he was a dumb-**** for listening to his Dad and none one else back then.

On a completly Different note... I'm betting Stunt Paralysed his mom. With a knife wound to the stomach. In the land of whitemagiccurealls.

Yeah, a kid raised from birth to believe what his father says and actually does? Thats OUTRAGEOUS! And it depends on what mookie is going for as to what would make more sense. As I think he is going for an arc where stunt learns the truth about how he was raised so he can reconcile with his mother and lizzie and learn that his religion was twisted by dad and is actually pretty damn decent. Also, for the extra fun, he learns that his lifetime of misogyny was actually living a life of sin according to his faith, so he is destined to serve karnak in hell. And eat his fathers head.

[Myrdhale]

Yeah, a kid raised from birth to believe what his father says and actually does? Thats OUTRAGEOUS! And it depends on what mookie is going for as to what would make more sense. As I think he is going for an arc where stunt learns the truth about how he was raised so he can reconcile with his mother and lizzie and learn that his religion was twisted by dad and is actually pretty damn decent. Also, for the extra fun, he learns that his lifetime of misogyny was actually living a life of sin according to his faith, so he is destined to serve karnak in hell. And eat his fathers head.

I can see where you're coming from; and I could see it if Stunt and his family lived away from town, in a ramshackle shack where he could isolate himself and his kid from contrary opinion. But this is ostencibly the Church he attended; the preacher is talking to the whole congregation about things that specificaly contradict what his father was saying. Stunt either didn't learn anything about his faith except was his dad taught him, or he didn't listen to anything but what his Dad said, ignoring the priests and other parishioners (or whatever areas are subdivided into in Dominion for religious purposes) completely.

It's all possible, just very very contrived, and tenously held together at best.

Which describes DD pretty well.

[Veridis Quo]

I can see where you're coming from; and I could see it if Stunt and his family lived away from town, in a ramshackle shack where he could isolate himself and his kid from contrary opinion. But this is ostencibly the Church he attended; the preacher is talking to the whole congregation about things that specificaly contradict what his father was saying. Stunt either didn't learn anything about his faith except was his dad taught him, or he didn't listen to anything but what his Dad said, ignoring the priests and other parishioners (or whatever areas are subdivided into in Dominion for religious purposes) completely.

It's all possible, just very very contrived, and tenously held together at best.

Which describes DD pretty well.

It is still a possibility that Stunt was raised as a "latch-key-kid". His father taught him at home the supposed practices of Scapilianism, while Stunt never visited the church in person. But Stunt did refer to the church itself as where he learned about Scapilianism so it is equally possible that back when he was a kid, the church had a corrupt Priest.

[Traab]

It is still a possibility that Stunt was raised as a "latch-key-kid". His father taught him at home the supposed practices of Scapilianism, while Stunt never visited the church in person. But Stunt did refer to the church itself as where he learned about Scapilianism so it is equally possible that back when he was a kid, the church had a corrupt Priest.

Omg! His DAD was the priest!

[Gez]

Also, "Lizabet"? Seriously?

Obviously, that's the non-abbreviated form of "Lizzie".

Meh, I don't have much problems with "Elizabeth" being shortened to "Lizabeth" instead of "Lizbeth" or "Eliza". It's still better than turning Vasquez into Vazkes or whatever he did to Stunt's ex-boss.

[Mono Vertigo]

Given that I have no idea what "original 150" or "catching in Red" means, it's obscure enough for me.

Pokémon.
The original Pokémon games came in two versions, Red and Blue, each with a small selection of creatures you could only catch in that specific version. There was a total of 150 Pokémons in Red and Blue versions combined.
You're welcome!

[elros]

I give Mookie a pass on the wedding arc. The guy just got married IRL, so he used the comic as a way to spread the wedding joy. It didn't mesh with the plot but when is that new? So I just ignored it.

Which brings us to today's strip. I think I'm going to ignore this story arc, too. Mookie has previously expressed some interest in spirituality (he has said as much in his daily comments), but he is not a fan of organized religion. So when he tries to write about religion in DD, he is limited by his lack of understanding. Maybe if he had read some books about spirituality instead of just listening to heavy metal music and playing video games, he would have something interesting to write about. As it is, his religions are inconsistent and nonsensical, and I don't want to waste my time reading about them.

For the record, Snowsong is the arc where I stopped reading DD daily, and I only got back into it since I found this thread. Maybe some of the later ones were worse, but I can't respect any comic where the murderous psychopath turns all mushy over baked goods.