Dominic Deegan, Mk. XLVII: A Flat World From Recycled Scrap

[Nerd-o-rama]

How long before Dom turns into a space foetus?

I doubt that will ever happen. Mookie's American, so he'll turn into a space fetus.

[Cavelcade]

I now love this comics, for the multiple interpretations of the whatever-it-is in SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE. I have never seen his flaws as an artist more eloquently expressed.




Well okay, I've never seen this particular flaw so eloquently expressed.

[MReav]

Yeah see, I dont buy it. The way I see it, CAD cant do ANYTHING other than stupid silly or else its automatically punted to Loss whatever version. I think this current arc is actually going fairly well. We get the whole time travel crazyness, learn about the threat, and it was established in what I think was a fairly reasonable way. (Ethan rebuilds embla, she turns zeke anti human, robopocalypse happens, and the most important person in ethans life is killed. ) I just think this is a knee jerk reaction that happens anytime there isnt a stupid punchline. The arc isnt that bad. Not even close. Not saying it cant or wont be ruined before its all over, but still, right now? Its going pretty solid imo.

The problem is that Ethan is just such a massive jackass to so many people and he's allowed to get away with it so often, and when bad things happen to him, it's usually so far divorced from reality that it causes mental whiplash. It's like he causes disaster after disaster with no consequence and then a random disaster happens and he's caught in the crossfire, when having his jackassery come back to bite him would be so much more satisfying, like Lucas finding out he stole his identity and ruined his career to get some Bioware game a few weeks early and severing their friendship as a result.

[random11]

Could it be?

Surely it couldn't be?

Looks like Domi is ready to leave this world and and step through the gate into the next, (where he will shortly explode)

Nah, who am I kidding.

At least the plot is advancing?

Well, not really, but everything looks better by comparison after Facebath.

[Squark]

Yeah, I don't have anything special to say, other than this is a really lazy way to move the plot forward (Work? Who needs work? Dominic just gets visions as the plot demands. Looking for the heart of magic? Poof, gets a vision. Need to find the door? Vision!)

[Johnny Blade]

Because he loves and values humans donchaknow, which is why he never uses spells to mislead or control them, ever around. Now, if Deegan were a werewolf or something, no second thoughts, kaboom, game over because the king doesn't respect those guys even a little.

Oh yeah, of course. How could I forget that, it being his defining character trait and all...

I thought it was an elevator.

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[Nerd-o-rama]

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You know how we exaggerate and use acronyms and hyperbole about how we "fall out of our chair" or "roll on the floor laughing?"

I just actually did both of those things.

[Coidzor]

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Thank you, thank you, thank you!

[T-O-E]

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I'm so proud that I could be a part of this.

[Squark]

Also, and I know we've discussed this before, but how does a celestial object affect only a specific geographic area for an extended period of time? If the object isn't orbiting the planet in question, then the difference between how close it is to two countries or continents is insignificant (Also, planets rotate, so what continent would be closest would change on a constant basis). And if it is orbitting (like say, a moon), the object's influence would wax and wane regularly, unless it was tide-locked or near tide-locked, and even if it was, it wouldn't affect just one country unless that one country was an enormous, giant, continent-spanning empire. Which Callan doesn't seem to be.


You know, DJ would be a much more effective villain if the real problem was the heart of magic going through an orbit that would leave the entire Dominion world in jeapordy, and DJ is trying to preserve magic itself from going into decline, but doing so will spell disaster in some way. As is, not only is DJ's execution of his plan stupid, but it's also based on astrological nonsense.

[Mono Vertigo]

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Thanks to you, all those years of snark and confusion were not in vain.

[PhantomFox]

I think in honor of that I'm going to have to dig up that one flash game where the goal was to punch Dominic in the balls.

Ah, here we go: Punchy's Brilliant Adventure: Ley Line Scramble or Punch.BA:LLS for short.

[Traab]

The problem is that Ethan is just such a massive jackass to so many people and he's allowed to get away with it so often, and when bad things happen to him, it's usually so far divorced from reality that it causes mental whiplash. It's like he causes disaster after disaster with no consequence and then a random disaster happens and he's caught in the crossfire, when having his jackassery come back to bite him would be so much more satisfying, like Lucas finding out he stole his identity and ruined his career to get some Bioware game a few weeks early and severing their friendship as a result.

You mean like. . . inadvertently causing the robot apocalypse, which forces the surviving humans to go underground all john conner style after he watches lilah get killed in front of him? After he loses lucas, and is now treated as a monster for being the one who built zeke in the first place? Those are some serious consequences to me, showing pretty damn clearly how his dumbassery has caused real nasty stuff to happen to everyone including him. Yeah, I know, it will get fixed by the end of the arc, but so what? But it isnt good enough, because he cant be allowed to write any sort of semi serious arc without the world jumping down his throat. So he is damned for writing silly comics where the main character has no serious long lasting consequences. Then when there ARE serious consequences, he gets mocked for writing a crappy drama in whats supposed to be a comic. Buckley cant win.

I dont even know why i am defending him so much, I dont like his comic that much. Its ok but nothing special. Maybe I just dont like to see the internet feeding frenzy effect where once something is decreed by the faceless mob to be bad, everyone takes turns dumping all over everything that person does from then on.

[Trazoi]

You mean like. . . inadvertently causing the robot apocalypse, which forces the surviving humans to go underground all john conner style after he watches lilah get killed in front of him? After he loses lucas, and is now treated as a monster for being the one who built zeke in the first place? Those are some serious consequences to me, showing pretty damn clearly how his dumbassery has caused real nasty stuff to happen to everyone including him.

There is enough fuel for a whole analysis thread on the mood whiplash in CAD's storylines, but in brief: all those consequences happened to Future Ethan. Actual Ethan isn't taking it nearly as strongly as he should. The missed potential for a serious storyline I saw was keeping the two Ethans together, so Actual Ethan could have some sense knocked into him by the more mature Future Ethan. But that doesn't appear to be.

As for how Actual Ethan is taking it and more missed oppotunities, take these two panels right before the two split:

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I think Buckley just threw in some topical video game babble in Actual Ethan's mouth to fill space, which is a pity because that was brilliantly the absolute worst possible question to ask after learning about how your Xbox robot murdered your wife and destroyed the world.

That said I'm enjoying keeping up with this CAD arc because panels like the ones above remind me of the better days of DD.

[MReav]

You mean like. . . inadvertently causing the robot apocalypse, which forces the surviving humans to go underground all john conner style after he watches lilah get killed in front of him? After he loses lucas, and is now treated as a monster for being the one who built zeke in the first place? Those are some serious consequences to me, showing pretty damn clearly how his dumbassery has caused real nasty stuff to happen to everyone including him. Yeah, I know, it will get fixed by the end of the arc, but so what? But it isnt good enough, because he cant be allowed to write any sort of semi serious arc without the world jumping down his throat. So he is damned for writing silly comics where the main character has no serious long lasting consequences. Then when there ARE serious consequences, he gets mocked for writing a crappy drama in whats supposed to be a comic. Buckley cant win.

The problem is is that the robot revolution is a storyline so out there and uses such fantastical elements that I can't be bothered to care (like with the sentient evil penguin storyline), whereas his actual, realistic jackassery like treating his customers like crap and yet not being driven out of business still looms.

[Trazoi]

What makes Strangle another Loss is that CAD can't hit the reset button after this arc and pretend it didn't happen. Ethan can't go back to having wacky video game adventures with his robot buddy. If Ethan gets back, not wanting to shut down Zeke goes beyond jackassery and anti-socialness through to completely inhuman monstrosity level, and I don't think any handwavy explanation can get around this.

Anyway... Sneaky Gate
Future Link

How the heck is this going to go for seven more months if we're going to get turbo-express plot stuff like this?

I Love Dominique:

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[Mewtarthio]

The Elemecca was a spaceship the whole time?

I thought Klo Tark was aaaaangels
When much to my surprise,
We climbed aboard their starship
And headed for the skiiiiiiies!

[SaintRidley]

I thought Mookie was hoping to wrap up by the end of this year, hence the mad dash to get to the end of the plot (and the characteristic failure to stay on point about doing so).

Do we really have seven more months of this?

[Trazoi]

I thought Mookie was hoping to wrap up by the end of this year, hence the mad dash to get to the end of the plot (and the characteristic failure to stay on point about doing so).

Do we really have seven more months of this?

It certainly feels like a mad dash to the end, but from his Wednesday newspost:

There are still some folks who don't know that the comic is ending on or around May 2013!

I just don't know.

[Zaq]

SUPER DOMINIC GALAXY!

Yeah, OK, I got nothing. Neither does Mookie.

What the hell is that face in panel 1? No, really?

[Rhapsh]

Why is Elemecca in space? Has it always been in space? Why didn't we know it was in space? We've been here multiple times. Wasn't it suppose to be in the elemental planes? Do any of these questions even matter?

The answer to the last is no.

[random11]

So to find the location to the heart of magic, you had to do nothing, then surrender, get tortured by an galactic monster, and have your brain sucked out with tentacles.

No wonder DJ failed to find the heart of magic for so long, you have to be ultra special pathetic to do that.

[guttering flame]

I have no idea what Mookie tried to show me here. Did Domi accidentaly land on a carnivorous space platform that had some problems digesting 3-dimensional creatures, being a little 2-d itself?

(Of course Domi, is so used to episodic non consequential horrific traumas that he doesn't notice he's being eaten while he looks at the scenery.)

[T-O-E]

It always gets worse.

Today's comic could be considered, quite literally, a cliffhanger. Hee hee.

I've got stars on the brain (again). With autumn upon us and the winter months approaching, some of my favorite celestial objects are making their return to the night sky. It's nice to peek out the front door to see Orion, the Pleiades, and Jupiter hovering overhead. The New Age-y part of my brain likes to think they're watching over me. The stargazing part just thinks they're awesome.

That's all from me for now.
Rock on, and have a nice weekend!

EDIT: The Man of Many Shades updated again. I would update that thread I made but I don't want to triple post and no-one reads it anyway. Happy is a really good example of an ******* main character done right and his recollection of his time in jail, particularly to do with the inspirational quotes, has stuck with me. Hope he doesn't get softened too much, as often happens.

Rainbow is a surprisingly good villain too.

[rocketpony]

Why were you not expecting there to be a void between the platform you're on and the door Dominic you can see that the door is floating in a void and you know that you are not floating in a void, of course there is going to be a void between you and the door that is floating in a void.

Also - check out panel four. That's his mechanical foot, which I think means he's actually in space, since, word of author, he projects himself with both feet.
So it's not that he's getting random visions of the Macguffin, it's that having THE BEAST drill into his skull apparently caused him to teleport directly there. Checkmate, snarkers

[Mr. McGician]

Mookie moving the Elemecca into space seems to be his attempt at reconciling his new astrology obsession with established canon, and as usual, it doesn't work. And the door still looks like a box

[Nerd-o-rama]

Why were you not expecting there to be a void between the platform you're on and the door Dominic you can see that the door is floating in a void and you know that you are not floating in a void, of course there is going to be a void between you and the door that is floating in a void.

I think Dominic didn't realize he was on a platform because he was that disoriented. He's also missing his glasses.

[random11]

I have no idea what Mookie tried to show me here. Did Domi accidentaly land on a carnivorous space platform that had some problems digesting 3-dimensional creatures, being a little 2-d itself?

I thought I was the only one who saw that.
You know it took me about 3 minutes to understand it's supposed to be a view from above in the fifth panel, and he still has his legs?
That's three entire minutes wasted on DD.

Regarding the news post, does that mean that what he thinks of that day might enter the comic somehow?
If we, for example, send him the entire collection of Rocky movies as a gift, will we see a new Italian character, or a tournament of mages done as a boxing match?

Here is a topic for the weekend: What random idea/object would you like to enter the comic?

[Squark]

I guess... Technically Mookiee is trying his hand at show, don't tell, a bit here? Still narrating, but at least the narration isn't a substitution for showing now.

[Welf]

only 4 days missed, and so much has happened?

Also, how unnatural is "we need werewolf fight songs"? Wouldn't something like "I feel like some werewolf fight songs might do the trick" or "Do you know any werewolf fight songs?" or "The hymns are nice, but my people respond better to our own music, like werewolf fight songs" or whatever be better? But no, just "we need werewolf fight songs. NOTHING ELSE WILL DO. RAWR."

They probably will get paid with 10 gold.

What the hay is a heart of magic?

Some magic comet that boosts a nations magic power. Every nation had its turn, and now the orcs are supposed to be the next. But evil king DJ doesn't want that. Because no ruler should work on preserving his nation's commonwealth.

How the heck is this going to go for seven more months if we're going to get turbo-express plot stuff like this?

I Love Dominique:

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The Elemecca was a spaceship the whole time?

Did Mookie ever say the new comic would be set in a different universe? Maybe the rest of the comic will set up the new comic? Probably Luna's super-eggs will be put on the Eleccma and turn into the main character and her foes.

Also, and I know we've discussed this before, but how does a celestial object affect only a specific geographic area for an extended period of time? If the object isn't orbiting the planet in question, then the difference between how close it is to two countries or continents is insignificant (Also, planets rotate, so what continent would be closest would change on a constant basis). And if it is orbitting (like say, a moon), the object's influence would wax and wane regularly, unless it was tide-locked or near tide-locked, and even if it was, it wouldn't affect just one country unless that one country was an enormous, giant, continent-spanning empire. Which Callan doesn't seem to be.

Probably the same way some stars who can be seen from earth in certain forms can influence a person's personality: it doesn't work, but it makes sense in a story.

At least the plot is advancing?

Well, not really, but everything looks better by comparison after Facebath.

...and suddenly Facebath makes a lot of sense as a story device.

Also - check out panel four. That's his mechanical foot, which I think means he's actually in space, since, word of author, he projects himself with both feet.
So it's not that he's getting random visions of the Macguffin, it's that having THE BEAST drill into his skull apparently caused him to teleport directly there. Checkmate, snarkers

So Dominic can breath in spaaace? Not surprised.