Shortpacked! by David Willis
Toys are serious business.
Convention appearances:
Calgary Expo Calgary, AB: April 26-28
Phoenix Comicon Phoenix, AZ: May 23-26, 2013
BotCon San Diego, CA: June 28-30
San Diego Comic-Con San Diego, CA: July 18-21
SPX Bethesda, MD: September 14-15
Phoenix Comicon Phoenix, AZ: May 23-26, 2013
BotCon San Diego, CA: June 28-30
San Diego Comic-Con San Diego, CA: July 18-21
SPX Bethesda, MD: September 14-15
Multiplex
Sorcery 101
Templar, AZ
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Hijinks Ensue
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So Far Apart
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Two Lumps
Wapsi Square
Wonderella
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Frumph.NET
Sorcery 101
Templar, AZ
The Transformers Wiki
Hail to the Slash
80 page GIANT
Axe Cop
The Book of Biff
Butt-Taco
Comics Curmudgeon
College Roomies from Hell!!!
Diesel Sweeties
Dinosaur Comics
Dr. McNinja
Dresden Codak
Fans!
Fleen
Gastrophobia
Girl Genius
Girls with Slingshots
Goats
Hark, a vagrant
Hijinks Ensue
Intrepid Girlbot
Legend of Bill
Medium Large
Not Invented Here
Octopus Pie
Overcompensating
Penny Arcade
PhDcomics
Power Nap
Questionable Content
Real Life
Rob and Elliot
Bad Machinery
Schlock Mercenary
Sheldon
So Far Apart
Something Positive
Two Lumps
Wapsi Square
Wonderella
Wondermark
Frumph.NET
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Cuuuuuuuteeeeee
I agree. Mike seems to be rather adorable in this strip, I think it may be the eyes.
Also, Mike’s secret is officially out!
Yeah. But then, Robin was going to figure it out eventually.
You know, what with the footsteps on her skin and the being poisoned and whatnot.
Well played, wackd.
all the abductees have weird eating habits: walky eats nachitos by the truckload, robin can eat all the sugar in the world and would only get a blackout (and simultaneously ruler of the world), and mike is nice when he drinks. sure Willis never went deep into the eating habits of all his characters, but you can see a somewhat common theme. also, leslie’s reaction to mike’s reveal is great
Joyce is pretty Nachitos happy too.
Eating is by far the most important part of life. Willis needs more strips that include both the characters and food items.
Of course, Sal’s penchace for jumping through windows doesn’t seem to have anything to do with her diet…
She eats Glass shards through her skin
Through her FAAAAAAAAAAACE.
Of course it does. Sal’s diet /is/ windows.
It’s just too cute it’s unbearable!
Adorable
Also, the “angry eyes” thing makes me think of My. Potato Head from Toy Story
So we’ve established Mike is pretty much Mr. Rodgers when he’s drunk, anyone else wondering what he must be like high?
Opens up a totally new dimension of Mike-ness there.
He becomes the next Dalai Lama naturally.
That’s implying nobody was already checking their laundry for scorpions.
They stopped when no longer living with Mike. Robin may have forgotten upon moving back in.
Awwwwwwww.
Panel 7 just reminds me of that episode of Futurama where Zoidburgs underwater house burns down.
“So that’s where I left my cigar.”
“That just raises FURTHER questions!”
Herems Conrad, the awesome if bureaucratic voice of reason.
This still doesn’t answer the burning question at hand, will she say YES or not?
Also, will she think the proposal “counts” when she knows he made it drunk?
Ah Crap, more questions to fret over.
My guess is that she will count it because she’ll understand that he chose to get drunk to do it.
The “burning question” remark, right after the reference to that Futurama episode, made me chuckle.
Just accept it, Leslie. It will be easier in the long run.
Isnt drunk + not drunk mike = REal mike?
I think I got my answer it was indeed a gambit
That’s like saying someone who is nice normally + same person who is an asshole when drunk = that person’s true self. Which is possible, but many people will argue against it. “It’s the drink that makes him say it, not that he means it.”
So it’s arguable either way.
Strong drink doesn’t make you act in a particular way. All it does is lower inhibitions – silences that little voice in your head that says “You know, maybe it isn’t a good idea to moon your boss/deck your girlfriend/drive through that wall.”
So, if Mike is angry, mean, and cruel when he’s in control of himself, but the nicest guy in the world when his inhibitions are down, that means that he’s constantly reminding himself that its not a good idea to be nice to people.
This brings up some disturbing questions about Mike’s past, and what the hell happened to make him feel that way. The boy’s been hurt. Not just once, but many, many times. I kind of hope that Amber breaks the pattern here.
Can only speak from personal experience, but drunkenness didn’t transform my personality or reduce my IQ, it merely removed my filters. I continued talking about the same subjects with the same vocabulary as before, except at one point I realized I couldn’t STOP talking — every thought that crossed my mind came out of my mouth, including the ones normally censored for social reasons.
The point being that if Mike got drunk and confessed to loving Amber, and proposed to her, he really means it. I’m inclined to lean on the side that says he may have felt that he had to drink to get past his normal hostile screens to say what he wanted to say.
I don’t know about changing my personality, but drinking definitely affects my IQ. Memory, attention span and ability to reason… all gone. Not worrying about consequences might be “lowering my inhibitions”, but inability to realize that there would be consequences is totally different.
Not-so-fun-fact: When I’m really drunk I start nagging people to make me neurology questions just so I can test how drunk I am. I usually get them right, even when I’m so pissed I can’t remember how to make my legs work.
Same here. I have been so drunk that I woke up the next day still buzzed, and I’ve never acted any differently while drunk except (a) being unable to shut up when I’m boring people and (b) bad coordination. No memory loss either. It’s kind of reassuring to know for certain that I’m just me at heart.
All that aside, I think that one’s “true” self is really just the collection of all the sides you show in different situations. There is no one face that’s the “real” one.
It seems that any discussion about how drinking actually effects non-alien-enhanced people may only have limited relevance here.
A salient point.
Leslie. <3
They were the scorpions that David Willis was prepared to swallow had this storyline failed to deliver. Because, that’s what webcartoonists do. But there is no need.
Damn, swallow ‘em anyway. Why waste good scorpions?
There’s starving children in Africa who’d love some of those scorpions.
Too late. I stirred them around my plate and hid some in my napkin.
Especially if they have been marinating in that tequila for a while ….
That, Robin, is a computer monitor. (HAW HAW)
Silly Robin, that’s Ethan’s porn, now put it down before you get hurt.
Wait. Mike’s publicly admitting his Drunk = Nice secret. He’s removing the blackmail component of the relationship now that Amber’s proven she can take him as he is.
That’s so Mikedily Sweet. (Mikedly. Like Twistedly, but involving Mike.)
Blackmail hasn’t been a component of their relationship since at least last year, after the Relationshipocalypse.
Using this link once again for the amnesiacs in the audience:
Amber releases Mike from blackmail
I think I know why some many people are forgetting this part of the comic. It’s suffing I noticed a while ago, but never mentioned. For a while, there was a glitch in the links skipped that entire section of the comic. So for a while, I didn’t realize that part even existed. I happened to stumble across it by accident, which is how I read it
Oooooooh. Well now that makes sense. Thanks for the insight, I was really scratching my head as to how anyone could miss or forget a development as big as that one.
As usual, it’s Willis’ fault.
There’s also the fact that not all the readers of Willis’ comics tend to be the brightest bulbs.
Is Ethan gay? Joe didn’t give his permission!
I mean… what?
We found out that in the case of Roz not getting permission, there was a problem with the RSS Feed, which made it so people using that potentially did not get that comic or the one before it. So sad.
You know, this sorta makes me wonder if Mike’s parents are sloshed all the time.
Or high? That woman can bake the hell out of some cookies. Munchies, anybody?
This answers…nothing.
It will be interesting to see if they all try to get Mike drunk now whenever they possibly can. Although I doubt Mike will ever let them come close.
Just turn all his T-shirts into the equivalent of “The Patch” but with Ethanol instead of Nicotine.
I wonder if Malaya turns nice when drunk. Or Faz becomes less annoying. Or Ninja Rick becomes a pirate.
We should have an “Everyone gets drunk” storyline!
I second this!
Pirate Rick would be amazing.
Rick, instead of hiding behind the Ninja persona would still be speaking in Otaku’esque but dressing as Sailor Saturn.
Faz becomes an irresistible lady’s man whilst drunk.
I see Faz as being the type that realises what a loser he is and crys a lot when drunk.
I see Faz becoming irresistible and yet being absolutely terrified of women.
Okay! So! We avoided one worst-case scenario (Leslie assumes Robin was beating on Mike out of jealousy, Robin’s crush disclosed in the process, Shortpacked becomes completely uninhabitable to Robin). Whew!
And we’ve answered ONE question: Mike really is drunk, not just showing a rare sober flash of his better side.
Otherwise, I’m with Les here. I’m SURE there’s a good reason why Amber’s shrugging off the Jacob issue, and I’m pretty sure we’ll get to it shortly. I’m going with “massive denial, possibly causing self-induced amnesia” until seen otherwise.
(While I don’t think Mike’s actions to Jacob are remotely justifiable, that’s not even the main point in this story. The point is that AMBER has been visibly upset about Jacob’s decline for almost as long as it’s been happening. And now it seems she’s willing to forget all that, since to do otherwise would mean admitting that the man she loves destroys people she cares about. Since this relationship started, one of the questions stalking it has been “who’s taming who here?” I think we’re about to find out.)
Yyyeah, I’m with the amnesia theory, given yesterday’s dialog.
I really enjoy your ability to analyze and summarize the main points of the comic.
“Who’s taming who?” Why can’t they both be taming the other? One of the nice things about love (or any relationship) is watching the two individuals grow because of it. It’s one of the things I like about Mike and Amber.
You’re absolutely right, and the idea that they’re each taming the other seemed valid for a long while. Amber let herself get a little darker with Mike… but not so dark that she lost who she was. And Mike retained most of his asshole persona… but he seemed to be refraining from doing any serious harm to anyone Amber cared about. Now we know that that’s not the case. And Amber has to make a decision a lot more momentous than the one she thought she might be making back at the start of this arc.
She hasn’t said yes yet. She just came back.
A second possibility to explain her reaction to Mike’s proposal is that she’s known all along that her mom did it with Jacob, she just didn’t tell Mike or Jacob. This might even explain why she has put so much energy into trying to help Jacob.
http://www.shortpacked.com/2011/comic/book-13/04-remedial-adulthood/psyche/
Yes, she knew. Didn’t anyone read this strip?
But I thought there wasn’t suppose to be an extra strip for Shortpacked, just DoA…
How Delightful!
She saying that she knew he loved her…. not a one sex-sound proposal, one vomit, and three-minute late follow-up to “btw, I arranged our sex addict neighbor to have sex with your mom.”
She isn’t saying she knew he loved her, she’s saying she knew he had arranged to get Jacob and her mom to hook up.
I gotta agree with Sadie. It makes no sense for Amber to be responding to Mike’s setup for the proposal, but it makes perfect sense for her to be acknowledging what he -just- -said-.
it actually does make sense that she knew either, or both.
http://www.shortpacked.com/2011/comic/book-13/04-remedial-adulthood/broken/ he admits that he’s not alone, Mike said last week you could hear through their walls, and Amber probably knows what her mom sounds like. Sleeping with Jacob probably made Amber’s mom happy, which she may have told Amber off-panel about i don’t know meeting someone where Amber lives or something. Amber’s not dumb, she could figure it out, and states so above.
Mike has said several times that he loves her, so again it makes sense
From re-reading Jacob’s arc, I realized that Mike didn’t actually cause Jacob’s relapse- that was Roz. By the time Amber’s mom got there, there’d been Roz (a few times, at least) and at least the three Asian girls who ran out of his room. So Mike sent him Ms Amber while he was in the middle of a full-fledged relapse, but did not cause it himself.
Is that better or worse? Is it worse to buy a recovered alcoholic the drink that sends him plummeting back into addiction, or to buy him a drink when he’s already fallen off the wagon?
I’m personally of the school of thought that she’s just got other things on her mind right now, you know, on account of having just been proposed to and all.
I’m sure that once all is said and done she’ll address the issue and maybe even involve Mike in her attempts to help Jacob out, but seriously. This is a big moment. Jacob being in a spiraling cycle of self destruction isn’t news. She’ll get around to dealing with that once she’s taken care of the immediate concerns.
That’s how I see it anyway. Not that I’ve got any firm evidence or anything.
Two thoughts. One which I’ve kind of mentioned before is that Mike’s evil is so perfect that nearly anyone he victimizes is in some way partially responsible for it because they saw what he was and weren’t smart enough to run screaming in response. Perhaps Amber accepts this in Mike.
It might even be a large part of why she loves him. Mike’s evil, as many have pointed out, inspires growth in others. (There is a work of macrophilic fanfic in that, but I digress) Perhaps part of what Amber loves is the opportunity to be part of that process and help the afflicted through that growth.
Forgot to brong that last point home. So maybe what Mike did to Jacob isn’t so horrible because, joy of joys, Amber now has a real mess to fix in what has become of Jacob.
Why do people keep forgetting that Amber’s Mom is a much older adult and could have said NO to Jacob? She wasn’t drunk or anything where as Jacob was.
I haven’t forgotten. It just doesn’t change things. How much responsibility we bear for our actions is a complex question. What’s simple is that Mike, by his own account and according to all the available evidence, chose his actions with the deliberate intention of ruining Jacob’s life. And he told Amber this.
Where in the past few comics does he say that? He says he knew Jacob was struggling with a sex addiction and that he had a crush on Amber.
This still does not shove out of the equation that Amber’s mom was quite sober (and could see Jacob was not) and still took advantage of the situation.
Did Amber’s Mom know he was a recovering sex addict though?
It wouldn’t matter as it was pretty obvious he was drinking – and possibly even drunk at the time.
Yeah, luckily for Robin, everyone knows Mike and can assume that she has better reasons to hit him.
Ever since they’ve been dating, Amber has been almost sickeningly adept at treating Mike’s gestures as normal relationship behavior (“Hey, I got you this rusty knife” “Oh, how thoughtful, it’s just what I needed”). I’ve never been sure if it’s denial or actually reading Mike properly; I think it’s a bit of both. Amber has this weird duality–she shows compassion but has also enjoyed being hurtful and helps Mike throw rocks at sea lions, she willfully chooses the biggest jerk in existence but insists on acting it out as a storybook romance. To be honest, I’m not sure if she fully understands who she is or who she wants to be yet. She’d prefer to choose Mike over her friendship with Jacob–she reaches out to Jacob but walks away as soon as Jacob states that Mike is bad for her–but it’s true she cares about Jacob and this might force her to truly evaluate her priorities.
My immediate question is whether she’ll compute the situation and realize that Mike probably wasn’t actually aiming to get engaged (Mike is drunk -> Mike is nice when drunk -> Drunk Mike presumably has a selfless motive for acting like Sober Mike, most likely driving her away, because why would he get drunk just to the deliver the cruelest proposal ever? He could do that better sober.)
In regards to sober Mike being better able to deliver that proposition, have you considered the fact that maybe Mike couldn’t stomach doing that sober? That it was too cruel, even for him?
Not only did he screw with Jacob’s problems, but he threw Amber’s MOM into the mix. I can’t believe Amber would shrug that off either.
Or maybe Amber realizes her mother is a consenting adult?
Perhaps Amber’s justifying Mike’s actions simply because Mike didn’t force the sex, but was a catalyst to it.
-airfox
Awe… Drunk Mike can be so adorable. XD Drunk or Sober, Mike is one of my favorite characters. Whether he’s doing my mom for a nickel, or… just this.
Robin didn’t know this?
Huh…that’s a little surprising. Sure, she was never around while Mike was drunk, but she had to’ve known at some point, right?
Well, Robin didn’t get introduced in It’s Walky until Mike was moved (she was Mike’s replacement), and Mike was hardly going to let her into the know when they were working at Shortpacked.
Remember, Mike was pretty constantly drunk when he was with Dina. Eventually, he had serious alcohol poisoning to the point where he was able to barf it all up and mean Mike let her have it with both barrels. Thus shattered, she eventually let her self hatred guide herself into a combat scenario where she died to save everyone else (kind of). Walky (feeling guilty for various reasons) beat Mike to a pulp. While he eventually healed, the higher-ups transferred him out of the squad, at which point Robin transfers in.
So long story short, she wasn’t even around to hear about his whole deal. And in SP it’s been a big “secret” topic.
Well, technically, she just said “Wait, what’s this?” All that really indicates is surprise at him being drunk, not necessarily surprise at his secret.
I always kind of assumed she knew, but it never came up in conversation and nobody ever asked her.
Yeah, but Mike answers her by explaining that he’s nice when he’s drunk. If she did know, he wasn’t aware that she knew.
There’s other people in the room, though, I assumed he was explaining for their benefit. He does look at Robin when explaining, though. Hmm.
And now I have more questions than before.
D’awwwwww… Man, the only fictional romances I care about are the deeply, deeply fucked up ones. They’re the best, dude.
agreed! I’m pretty sure I’ve been on their team since I read the phrase “most epic of hate-fucks” (or something like that… I don’t have time to scour the archives just now)
Well Dina kept the secret all through It’s Walky! And Mike was usually only drunk while working a shift at McAwesomes in Shortpacked!.
It was hardly a secret in It’s Walky! Most of the squad knew about it.
Is anyone else amused that Robin of all people has the presence of mind to put back the computer monitor she knocked over?
(Well, knocked over indirectly via punching Mike into it.)
Hit him again!
McAwesomes prefer Drunk Mike, Galasso prefers Sober Mike, he is just being a good employee either way.
Does Glasso even know Drunk Mike? If he did he might think him a separate person and hire him for his customer service skills, unaware he was paying him twice.
Maybe even get Drunk Mike to knock his daughter up.
May as well. Given Amber’s deal for the asst. manager job it looks like he is now on the hook to father Galasso’s heir as it is.
Panel 5 is super cute. And true too, I don’t know if anybody would enjoy a chemically created alter ego…
I just keep seeing the word “relationship” hovering in the bubble above Leslie and Malaya.
And so my favorite relationship in Shortpacked! continues to amuse and delight. Also, I think it’s worth noting that while Mike has a tendency to be mean to people, and do awful things, at least he’s constantly honest about it. I think there’s something to that, and so does Amber apparently.
Maybe but… the fact that he’s honest about it just proves he doesn’t care all the more. In that respect, he reminds me of someone I know IRL. Maybe it’s better than being in denial about it, but at the end of the day, most people don’t want to be around a jerk like Mike, whether or not they try to justify themselves.
Leslie’s face in the 7th panel is priceless. I’d call it a “Now I will slowly retreat backwards, so I can make it out of this room with my life” face.
Okay Amber, sheathe the daggers of hate going towards Robin in the last panel- we ALL know Mike deserves beatings on a regular basis. And since she’s known him the longest, she assuredly has the most reason.
…
…
Wait.
…
Oh… The eyes are because when SHE decked Mike, he declared his love for her. She giving the eyes as if Robin just frenched Mike. Okay, now it makes sense.
Nah, she’s just rolling her eyes.
Yeah, Amber’s even admitting that Mike probably deserved it.
Awwww~ Amber truly has a lack of perspective, but she loves him for the asshole he is…
That is kinda sweet in a really f’ed up way; perhaps I could back this pairing up; it’s cute if in a very dark and morbid way.
My conclusion is Amber is crazy and if both of them are crazy then let them be crazy together!
Keeps them out of dating less crazy people…
Panel 7 features Leslie expressing mine and perhaps others feelings about this relationship…
Wait. What? None of this makes any sense.
How does him being drunk now make it okay that he gave her the most humiliating proposal possible, stemming from a long-term plan, which involved hurting not just her friend but her mother as well?
If the point is that he created a proposal meant to drive her away when he’s nice, why did he plan that proposal (meant to unselfishly drive her away) during long months of being mean?
This doesn’t work at all.
You just DON’T get Mike huh?
he proposed. she didn’t care how, he threatened to tatoo it on her forehead or spell it out in dead cats, didn’t phase her. and while he got someone else to fuck her mom, he did not fuck her mom. for mike, that’s so nice it’s insane. this is a man who slept with ethan and amber just to fuck with robin… manipulation is his bread and butter.
I don’t think Amber’s mother was actually hurt by that plan.
I was quite impressed to see the old girl getting some action like that.
Yeah, this has always kinda bugged me about the whole “Mikes a monster and manipulated everyone” claim.
Sure, Jacob had a debateble amount of control over himself (not really Mike’s fault), but all Mike really did with the cellphone and the room placards was get Jacob and Stacy to meet face to face. Everything else was two consenting adults acting of their own accord, even if one of them has problems with moderation.
^ A thousand times this.
Mike is unquestionably an asshole, but in this scenario the bad thing he did was *record* two people having sex without their consent, one of them being his (now)betrothed’s mother. Getting them to meet was not the evil part, considering the one had already backslid on his addiction, and the other made the choice of her own accord.
Keep in mind that a whole lot of belief systems and Mythos’s place the role of the tempter as the most vile and wicked of them all.
Fiction, mythology, and religion are just littered with characters who are considered the embodiment of all evil not because of any of their own actions, but rather because they bring out the worst in all who are exposed to them.
Just try and picture that instead of it being Mike introducing Ambermom to Jacob when he’s experiencing a moment of weakness, it had been Loki the trickster god, or Satan, or Orihara Izaya.
If anything, in this instance Mike’s actions better fitted a proper villain than moments when he does things like set someone on fire or assault passers by.
Though once again it’s all perfectly in character for Mike. He gets a little nefarious at times. I’m also not looking to argue the degree to which he’s accountable for the results of this. Just saying the reaction is strongly reinforced by a lot of precedent. Or perhaps not reinforced, but rather inherently viewed that way and all the previous works were just also capitalizing on it. Hard to say. Bit of a “Which came first, the chicken or the egg” type scenario.
Either way the reaction you speak of would generally be considered the proper one. I don’t view it as invalid.
Lots of trickster archetypes are not evil too, though- Loki is an schemer, but only in the Marvel comic is he Evil. No more than Hades or Mars were evil in the original mythology because they represent Death or War. They’re just parts of life. Bre’r Rabbit, Native American Coyote, even Bugs Bunny- most tricksters exist to point out the flaws of others and show the pragmatic option.
Of course, there’s still the question of how Mike did a favor to Jacob, but we’ll see soon, hopefully.
Very late reply: Jacob seems to believe that his backsliding makes him irredeemable with this social group, and he has to abandon them and start over again. I think Mike showed him, in a round about way, that there is no way he could screw things up so badly that they’ll reject him.
“One of us! One of us! One of us!”
I totally agree with Doctor_Who. That’s how I’m interpreting the current events.
-airfox
Why is everyone saying that this somehow hurts ambers mom
Sounds like she was having a good time.
She’s an adult and a much older adult than all other parties involved
she was completely sober and choose to have sex with a random drunk dude who opened the door. No one “forced her” or “set her up” in any inevitable way. She could very conceivably had said Oh I’m sorry no thank you you’re a drunk 20 something I do not know living next door to my daughter.
In fact it was kinda fucked up for her to do in the end since he was clearly wasted as hell.
Amusingly, my exwife and I had a patter… when she’d do something odd, she’d remind me that I picked her. I would immediately respond with “I was drunk.”
Ok, so let’s see if I’ve got this right: Mike loves Amber. That is, both Drunk Mike and Sober Mike love Amber. Enough so that Sober Mike knows he must push her away because of how he is when he’s sober, but cannot do so while sober because he tries to hurt everyone as much as possible and it would hurt Amber more in the long run to stay with him. So he gets drunk (apparently scotch is his drink of choice, which endears him to me a bit more), acts like Sober Mike, and does one of the worst things he could think up to push her away. In other words, Mike has depths the likes of which no character has dared show, as well as an amazing ability to act sober when drunk. I’m actually terrified of him now. How he has not found a way to conquer the world, I do not know.
Now I’m stuck wondering if Mike’s naturally an asshole, or if he’s trying to push people away to avoid hurting them.
Mike is secretly a tsundere of such high level that it takes alcohol stripping away his inhibitions to be nice
*mauled terribly*
I wonder if he’s also afraid of getting himself hurt? I can relate to that. He just takes it to the extreme.
But hey, there’s no telling with Mike.
I’m actually impressed. Mike has proven that we’re not safe even when he’s drunk. It just takes more effort on his end.
So I’m a bit confused… Mike intentionally got drunk so he would be happy and thus able to bring himself to propose to Amber… but he did this by using a sex tape of Amber’s mom and Jacob to do it… He must not be THAT drunk, if he’s still using evil means to accomplish his goals. And furthermore… why would he have tried to end the relationship (i.e. the cross off of his connection to Amber on the chalkboard) if he’s in a happy mood and is honestly in love with Amber, who prefers him as he normally is…?
Willis, you magnificent bastard. You always know how to throw us a curve ball.
I still think he was intentionally trying to drive Amber away because, when he’s drunk, he feels that she’s better off without him. He did scribble out the arrow connecting them on the chalkboard, after all.
Though I have to say it was kind of a cowardly way of doing it. If he really feels they don’t belong together, he should be enough of an adult to just come out and say it and dump her.
That’s what confuses me. I mean, I know Mike likes to play mindgames and stuff, but if he’s being his nice/drunk self and really felt it was better for Amber that they not be together, wouldn’t it be easier to just be upfront with Amber? Until this point, the idea of him doing a hateful approach towards proposing that could lead into a break-up seemed natural for Mike. the deeper meaning behind this seems odd.
Yeah, I don’t get that either. Though, from what I’ve seen, people almost never buy the whole “I don’t deserve you / you’re better off without me” thing–they just think the person is insincere or has low self-esteem. We’ve seen Amber resist the same sentiment from Jacob (“Sure, he’s a being of hatred and evil, but everyone has problems”), so if Mike thinks he has to drive Amber to that conclusion–because she won’t accept being told–then I can sorta see why.
Yeah. It does make a lot of sense. Mike probably feels like driving her to it would be easier on her overall, because then SHE’S the one ending the relationship. I don’t blame him for doing it that way, I just think he should man up and do it the right way. Honestly I’m kinda surprised that even a drunk Mike would stoop to manipulation to get the desired result, even if that result is an honorable one.
Has anyone else noticed the sheer explosiveness of Malaya’s hair?
Seriously, that shiz is like huge. Like Yu-Gi-Oh huge. It’s kinda distracting. Each little sway is like the size of her head.
Doesn’t seem any bigger than Robin’s to me.
Leslie get the whip, Malaya needs more taming to be presentable.
Oh my. This is adorable. Thank you, Willis.
Nice Mike would do your Mom’s hair….for a nickel.
Ya know, I’m not sure Leslie should judge Amber’s taste in men, considering she’s wooing the world’s biggest bitch.
As for said bitch, I’m honestly shocked she managed to not say something snarky and ruin the moment.
Leslie clearly punches her when she is stupid. which makes me wonder how Malaya is not dead yet.
Mike seems a little disturbed at recent events.
“Whoa, she totally isn’t addressing that I manipulated Jacob into banging her mom and proposed to her in the most horrible way I could think of. Weird.”
Hmm… I think I can predict Amber’s response to the whole “mum and jacob banging” thing: Mike provided the opportunity, but in the end, her mum made the decision to stay and bang the guy. She could’ve made an excuse and walked away.
wait, blushing? (goes back to check) Oh, it’s almost not there, but it’s there, and it gets stronger after Robin decks him. The clue was there I just didn’t see it.
You are the Agatha Christie of drunk Mikes.
I’d like to think that Mike had a bit more to drink because he’s nervous of proposing. I mean, Mike may be the A** we all know and love, but I’m sure even -he- isn’t immune to the jitters of proposing and may have taken some liquid courage to make things easier.
And with Amber knowing Mike for so long, did she really expect any less in his proposal? As for the barfing issue, you may not believe it but some people do end up barfing out of extreme nervousness or excitement.
Also, SQUEE!
Awww, just imagine the story they’ll tell their kids one day.
“Mommy had some daddy issues to work out, so she found the biggest asshole she knew, got him drunk, and then blackmailed him into having sex with her so she could feel empowered. Then when they discovered they actually loved each other, Daddy came up with an elaborate plan to get Grandma to sleep with a sex addict, recorded it, and edited the sounds into a marriage proposal that he delivered while he was blind stinking drunk.”
…why are people rooting for this romance again? Oh yeah…because they’re kind of cute together. >.> And I suppose that neither of those manipulative monsters are going to find another equal, so they really are made for each other.
Ambike (Miber?) all the way!
To be fair, she didn’t actually get him drunk. She discovered he was drunk when she discovered his other toy store job.
its not a toy store. mike works at McAwesome’s Parasailing and Chocolate Bakery. Where you will get laid every night. Ethan chose the toy store instead. apparently mike took the opening.
So, angry Mike made the mix tape?
Have to say it: I told you!
I kind of feel like the phrasing of “you poor thing!” is just a bit belittling.
“Prepare to meet: Mr. Angry Eyes! Roooooaaaaar!”
WHUP. Thought I was on the outs with this storyline, but it just swerved back into interesting territory!
I love that she talks to Drunk Mike as if he were a wounded bird or something.
Last Thursday, I really thought I knew where this was going, and I loved it. Sadly, it didn’t come to that.
Still, my dream was that Amber would run out and puke, not from the audio tape and the idea of her mom fucking Jacob, but from the realization that she’s been in a serious relationship with a complete sociopath – that she’s basically opened herself up to the idea of long-term emotional abuse far worse than her father could’ve perpetrated. Robin would come out, and Amber would ask how she could’ve ever let this happen. And then Robin would say:
“Sorry, Amber, but ACTIONS have CONSEQUENCES.”
Game, set, match. I would’ve LOL’d.
Yes. Because there was totally a point in this process where Amber didn’t know what the situation is with Mike. Their first date was centered around the activity of killing local fauna. She’s cool with it. What’s so hard to get about that?
Look, evil manipulative bastards need love too you know, stop hating. All Jack the ripper ever needed was a hug… and alot of throats to slit. Hannibal Lector was a great guy to open up to… he would help you with surgical tools, what a nice guy. If two horrible people can get together in this crazy world and get off on the pain and misery of others, I say more power to those crazy kids.
Was Robin going to beat Mike to death with the computer monitor?
It was knocked off the counter when she decked Mike, I believe she was putting it back in its proper place, or planning on using it as a bludgeon. Either or.
Okay I’d accepted this pairing as rubbing me the wrong way but still it exists so whatever. I can even accept that for whatever reason the majority of people seem to think this relationship is actually a GOOD thing but the number of people willing to brush off what Mike did as being just find and dandy and feel that Amber should do the same is just too much for me. I don’t get it. I WILL NEVER GET IT! What he did was freaking vile and with every approving (or attempt to justify) comment my mind just gets blown a little more and this “love story” just becomes way more gross.
Well, I’m neutral toward them as a couple.
Amber is ok in my book as a character, and Mike is not preferred, but not disliked per say (I try not to rule out that he has somewhat a good side what with Drunk Mike being nice and all…)
BUT I still think Mike is gonna screw this up in some way, shape, or form…s:
I swear Mike in Panel 2 is wearing a Galasso expression…
Just to digress for a moment: I don’t see anywhere I can click to let Willis know this, so I’m just going to put it here.
Since last Thursday, some script running on the Shortpacked! homepage stops my browser dead at work. We run IE there. Here at home I run Firefox and everything’s cool. This only happens when I go to shortpacked.com–the DoA pages work just fine both places with both browsers.
I’d suggest the Twitter feed, but having just reanimated my Twitter account I can tell you that it looks like he is already aware of it and has been working the problem.
Seems to be happening to a number of people with IE browsers lately.
I’m not on Twitter (and it’s blocked at work anyway), but thanks for the reply.
Am I the only one that noticed that Mike never did say “will you marry me”?
Nah, I’m not buying this “I was sick because he was proposing” stuff. She wasn’t sick BEFORE he gave her the recording. She was super excited. She only became sick/horrified AFTER the realization that he kinda made her mom bang the resident sex addict. This might have already been discussed, but I’m definitely not buying it. Come to think of it, she might be formulating revenge.
My question (and one that will most likely go unanswered) is, does he find it annoying because he doesn’t like being nice, or because it’s the only way he can be nice?
Popular opinion assumes the former, but you never really know with Mike. :j
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_g7liFq_3A