But mental illness is so cool and enviable
March 16, 2014
10:55 pm
I always felt like one of the big reasons Omar was almost unilaterally more poplar with fans of the Wire than McNulty (who was arguably the “main character” of the show) could be due to the fact that McNulty was sort of a pile of angry tortured male protagonist tropes that show up in every drama while Omar had a sense of humour and a full emotional spectrum and was still an undeniably badass dude on top of all that. You watch enough of this stuff and you kind of hit that point where you realize that the dude who owns his emotions and deals with his shit is probably more intimidating and fearless than the one who bottles it all up and wastes their energy trying to look like an unaffected coolguy.
firstIn all seriousness, I’ve followed the comic for something on the order of a year now, and loved every moment. We’ve seen Rock get seriously angry when he can actually punch out the enemy, but when he can’t? This should be interesting.
I sort of suspect that that officer chap would be pleased if the Commander punched him out, despite the obvious pain involved.
Which is why it’s probably so much more satisfying not to, if we’re bein’ honest.
Commander even looks like a bad ass when crying
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ManlyTears
’nuff said.
Just when I thought I had kicked my TVTropes addiction, you send me off again. Thanks, mate.
You’re welcomed ^_^
I had plans for this evening, you know!
Not my business :P
GOOD LORD! I JUST CAME BACK FROM THERE! WHY?!
Don’t link me to TvTropes. Please. I’ve wasted too much time on there.
Even in the overall badass Aztec Empire, men crying was considered manly if done at appropriate times & for appropriate reason. Indeed, appropriate manly tears was considered to be a symbol of sacrifice & sign of penitence to the gods.
None could really deny how badass the Aztecs were. Heck, even winning in their version of the game of basketball (Ollamaliztli) could be a matter of life & death (but not always played for that kind of a result): The losers could be put to death as divine sacrifices & the game also acted as a substitute for open warfare. Even used for high-stakes gambling among various chiefs around the Central American region.
As a Mexican, I can tell you you got one teensy fact wrong. The losers didn’t get sacrificed.
The winners did.
And it was considered a great honor.
They competed for the right to be honourably sacrificed.
What I love about this whole arc is that it rather effectively calls out the “Brooding Anti-Hero” trope for the BS that it is. That’s something that’s bothered me about the DC Animated Universe Batman for the longest time now; as the DCAU went on, Batman kept getting more broodier, grimmer, and emotionally repressed, to the point that it’s little wonder that most of his old friends and allies were pushed away towards the end of Batman Beyond. Compare that Batman to how he was in Batman: The Animated Series, where he did have a full emotional spectrum and his own wry sense of humor. The original B:TAS Batman was a relatable human being, while by the time of Batman Beyond and the Justice League series, he’d been turned into this emotionally repressed, brooding caricature of what he once was.
That’s really why I like Commander/Rock Lobster so much. He refuses to be caught up in the “mystique” of the brooding anti-hero his superiors are so enamored with, and rightfully recognizes that being like that is no way to live or be an emotionally successful human being. The fact that he wants to talk to a professional therapist over the perceived loss of his family makes him a far more competent human being than the current Batman/Bruce Wayne ever will be. (My apologies for the pedantic rant, but seeing Rock Lobster’s CO berate him for not being like Batman at the news of the “death” of his family just brought to mind those thoughts again.)
*Stands and applauds*
Ah, but I think you’ve answered your own point there, without realising it. Batman got more brooding and repressed, and his friends drifted away until the point he was a crippled, lonely old man. That is a realistic response to that kind of behaviour, but would only accelerate the progression into brooding loner. Its a vicious cycle, which Terry manages to break in Batman Beyond. I can also point to some examples in the Justice League cartoons where Batman doesn’t act like a brooding psychopath, but someone maintaining a proffessional distance from his colleagues out of a perceived need to act as a counter balance to the Justice League.
Thank you for mentioning this. People complain a lot about where Bruce ends up as the DCAU goes on, but his character is still more complex and not flat at all. Maybe it’s because of how shoe horned some aspects of Batman Beyond are, but a lot of JL/JLU really fleshed him out more.
Batman is one of those characters who needs to be matched to a really skilled writer to work. He’s certainly been written well in the past, but it not an inherently well written character when the writer gets absorbed with the idea that he has to be this angry, punchy, emotionless badass.
No, Joker is the psychopath, Bats is a sociopath, totally different paths
Those words mean literally the same thing.
Psychopaths and sociopaths are actually pretty different, even though both are antisocial personality disorders. http://www.diffen.com/difference/Psychopath_vs_Sociopath
Haven’t checked that link, but basically the main difference is that a sociopath, oddly enough considering the name, is able to hide (for the most part) their anti-social behaviour (they both want you to get off their lawn, but whereas a psychopath would set boobytraps and fun explosions, the sociopath will smile, mutter about ‘kids these days’, then follow you home and slaughter your entire family while you sleep)
What is this.
Sociopaths and psychopaths are literally the same thing, one’s just an outdated term.
And a sociopath isn’t likely to rig their lawn with bombs (and a psychopath is still the exact same thing) – they still usually want to protect themselves, they just view other people as meaningless obstacles.
In the “lawn” example, a sociopath would probably maim/kill you in a way to make it look like an accident. Or just be angry at home if they thought it was too much effort and/or they wouldn’t get away with it. (Given that they think other people are basically furniture, they tend to think hiding evidence is very easy, though.)
Any thinking that psychopaths and sociopaths are different things – or thinking they like to be highly visible – is just getting your knowledge of psychology from the movies.
“A psychopath kills for no reason. I kill for money, it’s a job… that didn’t come out right.” -Grosse Point Blank
It all depends on behaviors and motive, I’m guessing…
“I’m not a crazed gunman, dad, I’m an assassin… Well the difference bein’ one is a job and the other is mental sickness!” – The Sniper, Team Fortress
Sorry, your reference reminded me of that so much that I just had to post it.
In the context of Batman=sociopath vs. Joker=psychopath, the Joker DOES have a reason for killing…For the Joker, killing is the “punchline” for the joke.
NO. Do some research before you say things, people! Even if you think that you are right, MAKE SURE OF IT BEFORE YOU ACTUALLY SAY ANYTHING! Sorry everyone, it just annoys me how willfully ignorant so many people are and how the majority of those people insist upon telling those who acually have done research and know what they are talking about how ‘wrong’ they are. I once made a comment on the difference between psychopaths and sociopaths on youtube, and in reply got a comment much like the above which not only completely dismissed my knowledge and the effort that I had put in to ensure its accuracy, but prevented the commentor and other people who did not understand the topic from actually learning anything, perpetuating the cycle of ignorence. This frustrates me immensely.
I had never heard the idea before that psychopathy and sociopathy were the same,
the link you provided gives a nice summary, the sociopathy one unfortunately fits a few people I know who have had bad experiences and decided not to get over it.
not that I have anything to add but I thought it weird how emotional people were getting on the subject
Just as a note, I’m pretty sure that’s not his reaction to the perceived loss of his family – that’s his reaction to finding out that the last two years of mourning and moving on was a lie – hence his supervisor asking him why he hadn’t become Batman.
This!
I always felt like that was a character arc, actually. As Batman sees more and more horrible stuff he gets worse and worse, loses most of his sense of humor, pushes all his friends away, and eventually retires, burnt out. Because really, the amount of things that get dumped on Batman by the writers calls for that kind of response.
It even seems fairly realistic. You can’t tell me that kind of thing doesn’t happen to say, homicide detectives and other people in high stress careers.
Of course, this means his bosses are trying to push the Commander into a self-destructive cycle.
Why can’t we tell you that detectives aren’t all burnt out wrecks?
have to give the man his props. he knows is aggression he knows what he can do and what they can’t do to him. he also knows just how to give upper command a piece of his mind and get away with it which in this case things like is just shy flipping the bird.
I like when a character gets to screw with there boss. The Commander seems to be a master at it.
His boss kicks him. He kicks back.
Who’s foot hurts more?
Probably the one without the internal plate armor.
If i used the term “War Dog” on Commander (which is badass, mind you), it’ll be like this:
His boss kicks him, he bites back.
…Sorry, lame post… =_=;;
“Let’s be clear here, this isn’t passive aggression. This here is pointedly calm, civil, deliberate, non-violent, active aggression.”
Commander Badass indeed. It’s almost like he projects an anti-bullshit forcefield around himself.
Considering what he has to deal with on a daily basis, it’s not surprising.
So, any bets that the Generic Space Future generadmiral is going to lose his cool and try to throw a punch before the Commander does?
Dear god he’s great. Not just for his actual character, but his approach to problems. Not all issues can be punched until they go away. I didn’t explicitly notice it before, but that’s also the mentality behind his manly guys agency. Some problems you can’t smash. you have to fix.
Seriously alllll the greats.
And this sort of treatment is probably why he’s so good at what he does. Nobody’s had as much practice dealing with infuriating mindgames and manipulation without flipping out.
The funny part about all of this? If I was designing a super-soldier, this collection of character traits is what I’d be aiming for.
Mind you, this entire program is hideously unethical to me in the first place.
Would you really though? I mean, born and bred, super expensive super-soldiers given super expensive super destructive wargear to go on important missions, Idunno, I’d prefer them to be as emotionally stable as possible. Being revenge driven your classic TvTrope tough-guy anti-hero usually means you will turn on your employers/country at some point.
As the commander expounds early in the comic, wars aren’t really won with competence in the spacefuture. It’s all about the image, to keep up national morale while overpowered superweapons flip the coin of who gets to survive. Not that they don’t do anything, but the Brass is apparently of the firm opinion that a marketable image is a better soldier than an emotionally healthy taskmaster.
Aside: Worth pointing out that Moe Lane was saying the same thing Samuel was but Samuel misread, it seems.
I’m pretty sure that’s what Moe was saying, that a Commander type is what you want, I realize this has already been pointed out.
to me it sounds like they are waging ideological and control wars against their own populous and economic war against their own debt problems
need a steady supply of “bad guys” for that, and the best bet is to make them yourself
Batman cried, even Frank Castle cried when he wasn’t filling graveyards… hell, Rorschach cried before getting vaporized. And lets not forget John Rambo’s breakdown at the end of First Blood, who probably got minatory psychological treatment for his PTSD while incarcerated.
Can we please have this guy call Kratos a pansy so we can see him get punched in the throat for being such a dick
I second this motion. KRATOS SMASH!
See, Kratos may BE the soldier Commander’s… um, commander is looking for.
Emotionally unstable, angry at everything, brooding, and he definitely fought against higher powers (Gods, Bosses, same things).
Given that CB hasn’t found the perfect place for Kratos yet, he should try introducing him to HIS boss.
Yes, because Kratos is also the perfect example why the emotional unstable killing machine is a very, very bad idea (case in point, GoW 2 and 3) I’m surprise this command hasn’t produced a Nuke like character by now…
Sure, he’ll want a guy that snaped and killed his last boss (that was a freaking GOD, no less).
Not “Kratos Smash!”, but KRATOS SLAAAASH!! XD
“KRATOS DISEMBOWELS AND WEARS YOU HEAD LIKE A HAT!!! YOU HAVE NOW BECOME A UNLOCKABLE COSTUME!!!” *alternate unlockable costume includes paper pirate hat made by Commander… Kratos likes hats*
So what you’re saying is Kratos has a thing for TF2?
…Maybe…
Love this plot arc!
Being manly ain’t about not having emotions; it’s about not showing you have emotions. These three flashback panels are in black and white. No other flashback panel has been before. It’s showing The Commander in a way we’ve never seen him before: emotionally vulnerable.
Commander is a polarizing figure, one who protects and helps others work out their problems. A strong manly character that doesn’t show weakness. The black and white not only sets these panels apart to show they’re a flashback but also help convey a separate tone for the comic in this brief glimpse of (very human) vulnerability.
Well, we’ve seen him getting emotional and loosing some of his cool before. In the Nomura syndrome arc, when his own kids didn’t recognise him, he was one inch from breaking right then and there. And he did flip out later in that arc on Gackt.
But even then, the Commander’s “flipout” was in the appropriate place & at the appropriate time against an enemy that really, really flippin’ DESERVED it.
I wouldn’t even say it’s about not showing you have emotions, but being on top of them enough that you choose when to let it out, rather than breaking down.
Oh, Evil Space Admiral Ed Asner, you are hilariously misinformed! Like every major editor at the super hero comics companies!
“Play it safe: brooding, gritty antihero reboot.”
“But sir: we’re talking about Captain Happiness. Won’t that defeat the purpose of his name?”
Evil Space Admiral Ed Asner…
Now you got me wishing Officer Cosgrove would march in, point at said Evil Space Admiral Ed Asner, and just say “Hey, cut it out”
Oh my gosh I can’t unsee that XD
Yes, what kind of pussy wants to talk to a therapist because they think their family is dead and then wants to see a lawyer when they find out that was a cruel and manipulative lie? Totally lame. Stable mental health and justifiable legal compensation are for losers!!!
You are a genius for coming up with this character, seriously. Not something you see everyday. Hell, I haven’t seen it yet.
As someone who is very close with their 4 siblings, that last part hit me hard :(
So does the commander still have the plate armour? And if so is it chrome?
‘Cause ya know, the future…
I can actually see the future badass cyborg doctors saying “fuckit, put chrome plating on his internal Kevlar. This is the future, Damnit! We need more chrome!”
Wow. Considering how well adjusted he is now despite those incidents, the therapist he got must have been REALLY GOOD.
Seconded!
I wonder if it was a spacefuture therapist who would better understand that he’s telling the truth or if it’s a past therapist.
I wonder if he’s still seeing them.
“Why aren’t you Batman?!”
Gee, General, it’s almost as if Batman was someone’s idealized power fantasy and your test tube soldiers were actual people! Who would have guessed?
Also wasn’t it some universal comic law that Batman can’t be created, he has to happen on his own?
Well, there’s Batman Beyond…
Technically speaking, it did happen on it’s own. The death of Terry’s dad and Terry meeting Bruce were all completely by chance. The fact that Terry just happened to be Bruce’s genetically produced son was a complete coincidence.
What you do is make that tortured male protagonist pair up with the untortured male protagonist and the latter becomes a pseudo-therapist for the former.
And then they bone, because that’s what BFFs do.
Wait, at first I was reading this as if Batman was a comic book character. Then I realized he is probably a real person in this verse.
Pretty sure he’s meant to be both, actually. :P
Also, I like C.B’s reaction: Screw you assholes, I’ll see you in court.
Sometimes, that’s the manliest way to take an asshole to task: drag their asses before a court and make them answer for what they’ve done, squirming in the light of due process and judicial review before a jury of their peers.
Seeing as pretty much everyone knows who Batman is, I don’t suppose it matters whether he is real or not in that ‘verse
He is. Commander mentions him in … hang on.
http://thepunchlineismachismo.com/archives/comic/youll-like-it-if-you-think-expendables-chicago-alice-in-wonderland-and-one-flew-over-the-cuckoos-nest-have-potential-being-the-same-movie
That one.
Yes I’m sure if you call him out on his grudge over being treated unfairly in the past will make him change his mind and let you continue to treat him unfairly just so he can be the bigger man and forgive you for it.
It’s kind of like, let’s say, if a friend borrows an unreasonable amount of money and leaves you subsisting on water and bread at the end of the month, refuses to pay you back but instead wants to borrow more and calls you a cheapskate when you explain that you don’t have any more, and the whole time make fun of you for being poor. The General or whoever he is is just not very clever.
… suddenly, I believe that the Admiral was carefully (and unethically) groomed to be like this, too.
Stands to reason that you are right. I’m trying to figure out what kind of manipulation it would take to groom someone to be the “heartless, calculating, and obsessive military commander.” I’m guessing some kind of a cross between Ender’s Game and a series of horrible betrayals by a series of close parental figures.
If the spacefuture military treats him like crap on a consistent basis, and subjects him to ethically questionable procedures, and he’s fully aware of it, why does he even continue to work for them? Or has he retired?
I think they might, like, OWN him. I mean, they literally made him, with science, so… not sure on the spacefuture rules about that. I kinda think he is literally government property.
The Commander is even more manly, knowing that his attitudes are not just some product of a Star Trek-style “enlightened” future.
Wasn’t that pretty much said, a few strips ago? About “damaging some pretty expensive government property”?
You’re always considered government property by your higher-echelon superiors when you’re in active service. Or at least so I’ve been told by my friends and family who have served and been in combat situations(Korea and both Gulf Wars).
Once you’re no longer active duty, not so much though. Unless you’re reserves, and then kinda, until you’re no longer in reserve.
Well that but he also literally is property.
I remember reading Sebastian Junger’s book “War” and there’s this part where a pilot tells a story about going to intervene in a firefight to try to save some soldiers on the ground and being told by his superiors to turn around because they didn’t want to risk damage to the expensive Apache helicopter he was flying. So he made the executive decision to ignore them and involve himself in the firefight anyway. So I figured “yeah, in this spacefuture scenario the expensive custom supersoldiers are kind of like the expensive Apache helicopters.”
While I’d argue that we shouldn’t be spending that much on military hardware in the first place, when the cost of replacing that property could feed, clothe, and educate more people than he’s trying to save, aren’t the higher-ups making the right decision?
only if you believe it’s possible to put a pricetag on human life.
Of course it is. How else would hitmen know how much to charge for their work?
Well a proper mercenary would price the base cost low and put all the big things into an itemised list of difficulties and expenses – more room for profit margin that way.
But if the helicopter isn’t damaged the money saved isn’t going to clothe, feed or educate anyone – it comes from the military budget, which is estabilished beforehand by a legislative body and is unlikely to be swayed by a single damaged helicopter (even if it’s a very expensive helicopter), so the pilot was only ‘wasting’ money that would be spent on other, shinier helicopters.
I guess that’s true, too. I just kind of figured that, despite being “built” by the military that the abolition of slavery would still apply. Just because he’s a genetically engineered super-soldier doesn’t mean that he isn’t a human with the same human rights as the rest of us. And apparently the spacefuture courts agree, at least in part, because they can’t forcibly modify him against his will and they have rules against psychological manipulation.
Unless those weren’t in place until Commander Badass came along and got himself a real high powered, genetically engineered superlawyer.
There are a lot of legal loopholes when you “aren’t a real person”
Sort of like being transgendered then.
Even that’s problematic, considering on how many “loopholes” you’re having added or removed….
Yeah, that’s pretty much true, even in today’s real world military. Believe it or not, if you spent your leave-time on the beach & get sunburned, they can set you up with NJP (Non-judicial punishment) for damaging government property.
I know this is completely unrelated but this little arc made me think…
Did Commander get divorced because his wife didn’t like something about him and was trying Really hard to change him?
I think there was a page that said that they got divorced because he had lots of unsefferable quirks.
Ah I think I remember the one, it had burning down a shed, fighting Canadian guy to the death and bullfighting in the kitchen? Not sure how much of that was just him messing with Jonesy though…
I don’t think any of it was messing with Jonesy.
Uh… Canadian Guy is still alive, so…
Rock was at least exaggerating in his word-choice there
(why did it give me an error about my comment posting speed..? Weird.)
Yeah, but he was told NOT to fight him to the death.
This has absolutely nothing to do with the comic, I’ve just been wondering for a long time, your name is a Kim Possible reference right?
Yes, yes it was. That movie cracked me up when I saw it and decided to use it as my name.
Now i remember that page, i don’t think he lies, more like he remembers snippets and ends up dodging the question in the last panel.
I am really loving CB’s backstory! Keep up the good work.
It’s killin’ me having to wait a week in between updates, but I’m gonna act manly and pretend it isn’t bothering me. I’m gonna learn how to make paper stars in the meantime.
In the comments section for the comic page just before this one, someone posted a helpful link for just that purpose. It even has video clips to show you.
Just sayin’…
:D
I’ve always thought that McNulty was put in The Wire specifically to deconstruct all those bad-boy/cop-on-the-edge tropes. Everything from getting his kids involved in trailing someone to the thing with crashing his car to being treated by the campaign consultant the way he’d treated other women (i.e. being used just for sex) to the scene with the FBI profiler in the last season. He was always being beaten up by his own self-created mythology, while Omar was who he was, unapologetically.
I never really got the impression McNulty was a deconstruction of the trope so much as played it completely straight. I feel like there’s a character almost exactly like him in almost every cop drama going and he’s pretty much interchangeable with any one of them. That said, I feel like his role in the series was to give people that sort of point of familiarity to snare them into watching the rest of it. When you make a show audiences want to see something different, but it’s almost like if it’s too different they don’t identify with it anymore and reject it. The Wire was very… I guess I’d call it visceral and unlike any other series I’ve seen tackle institutional poverty and crime like that, so it was sort of like McNulty was there to be like “Hey viewers check it out, it’s that cop character we put in every drama series that you like, how about you kick back and see what he’s up to now that we stuck him in Baltimore!” to kind of ease audiences into this new high-concept story they were trying to put together without intimidating them.
basicly, any soldier who’s life goes through hell and lose of “healthy support pillars” during their already very stressful lives…WILL break down into an unstable mess.
the general is a moron for thinking people turn into anything else when life is shit.
Revenge is a Calm (Commander) Badass!
Sometimes, people ask me why I’m not Batman.
I have a sudden urge to go and make paper stars.
Out of shredded documents?
Been lurking for a while. I loved this comic today and I love the comments.
I’m just going to drop a video of Patrick Stewart talking about PTSD.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqFaiVNuy1k
That is a pretty awesome observation, Coelasquid. :D
Also, this may amuse some people: I’ve never watched The Wire, but I know from internet osmosis that there’s a character named Omar. I had no idea whatsoever that there was any character named McNulty. “Almost unilaterally” indeed!
To make it even crazier. Omar was based on a real person, McNulty was made up.
Not gonna lie Commander, you’re a stronger person than I am. Even knowing that’s what he’s looking for I’d like you to punch him.
Ha.
Love how folks is still clinging on to that last punch dream.
Like, “Ooh, okay, I get it… buuut, one mo lil’ punch??”, which is a little too much like quitting alcohol then celebrating the fact with a beer.
Face it. Commander’s already won, doesn’t need to walk away from an explosion to prove it.
His resolve is a perfect arc. His delivery, katana sharp.
Few things mo manly that disabling your oppressor w/out raising a hand.
“But, but… punch?!”
You’ve got y’ werk cut out for you, Coela.
The way Commander rattles off the specific legal prohibitions makes me think he might have been instrumental in their creation in the first place. He’s like the civil rights leader of the spacefuture clone-soldiers in my head, now.
If he isn’t the one that made the laws, I think he was probably the one that set the precedent for their use for Gen soldiers.
I mean, those sound like laws that would be in the books anyway, for use with regular soldiers, and the brass probably just got those glossed over with their genetically engineered ‘heroes’.
Hats off to you Coelasquid. I like what you’ve done with “Rock Lobster” here. It’s a very good point in that the realistic emotional spectrum works better with a character than a two dimensional one in which they don’t react realistically.
Your story threads go on long enough that it’s hard sometimes to get people to understand what I find so amazing about what you’ve managed to do with this comic, because it takes more than just a quick glance to see it and on the surface it can look just like another comic with hypermacho characters and pop culture references. The comment accompanying this perfectly sums up a large part of why I continue reading. It’s a damn near perfect deconstruction of the macho ideal, and something I’ve been trying to argue for a while now. Men are not served by bottling up our emotions and putting up a certain image, we’re better off understanding our own emotions, including when that means breaking down and crying.
Oh Poor Commander!
Just gonna leave this here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqv_LUStxDw
I have to say, I really love that Commander’s response to being emotionally overwhelmed is to acknowledge–and to his boss, no less– that he needs professional help to work through it.
It really solidifies his badassery doesn’t it?
I just realized Rock has been making those paper stars while still wearing gloves. Is he wearing some kind of spacefuture gloves that allow full tactile sensitivity, or is he just that nimble-fingered?
He’s just that dang good :D
Well, we are talking about a man who can make a paper crane behind his head while holding a conversation soooo
I bet this is the point he went into full rebelliousness by growing out his hair and mutton chops against code.
This Spacefuture organization just slingshots between being the most ethical and the most unethical. On one hand, they deliberately encourage their artificial humans to grow up like family and become all nice and well rounded… and then they whack them with “Yeah, your family’s all dead”. I mean, I get that they want to make Batman Next Gen, but isn’t that awful risky? What might turn one guy into Batman might turn the other into Joker. Pretty sure one of them (don’t remember which) said something along the lines of how one bad day made them who they were.
It was the Joker who said that.
I figure when you’re a soldier designed like CB you don’t have a traditional family, so the squads developed those close ties on their own.
However, I do wonder about their early years – for any of them to have grown up emotionally stable, there must have been somebody looking after them as kids. Maybe those closely involved with the project were more humane than the military brass.
Although here’s an uncomfortable theory: maybe they allowed for the forming of these family ties because it would make better publicity. People are more likely to root for a cohesive, caring team. You can also use them for emotional control, as the flash back shows them trying to do with CB.
The sad irony is that the military is recognizing the power of human emotion (both from the public and among the soldiers) while showing none themselves.
McNulty was a bit of the comic relief, or just relief, from the gritty harsh reality that The Wire wanted to show.
The self-destructive alcoholic detective is pretty a old school archetype. His flings and failings are funny. Drunkenly crashing a car, then crashing it even more trying to ‘replicate’ the crash? Played for laughs definitely.
Well if he simply consented to the chest-mounted laser cannon, he wouldn’t NEED sub-dermal plating! The lasers could intercept the bullets for him! It’s win-win!
I don’t know why but the look he’s giving The Commander in panel 6 is just…
It’s got to be the arched eyebrows.
Came here to say the same thing. The Commander has never struck me as dangerous before, for whatever reason–but in panel 6? That was a deadly stare. If looks could kill…
I know right???
Robocop: Man up, you wuss. At least they let you keep your genitals.
YUK YUK ROBOCOP’S EXISTENCE IS A NEVERENDING HORROR YUK YUK
This is one of the best comics I’ve ever read.
the dude who owns his emotions and deals with his shit is probably more intimidating and fearless
You know, I realize this is especially referring to the context of manly men (and I HEARTILY agree!) but I have to say, when I first read it, the first character that came to mind was actually “wussy” little Armin from Attack on Titan…
I still wonder what the Commander is looking to accomplish here. Honestly these future types are grade-A dicks and not worth his glorious time.
It’s the principle of the thing. I’m pretty sure he just wants to make sure they remember they can’t get away with this shit and that they’re gonna be held accountable for their shitty behavior. It’s part of being a badass.
If I recall my comics right, didn’t Bruce go over a decade mourning his parents before he decided to start his whole ‘train to avenge their deaths’ thing? The idea sounds pretty broken from the get go if they expected a Batman right out of the gate. XD
Hi Coelasquid. I’m taking an In Design class, and one of our assignments is to make a cereal box. After looking at some of the designs from the previous years, I decided to try and make the manliest cereal box in existence (the box itself contains over 68 grams of protein, just to start). I was wondering if I could use some images of the Commander and crew on the box art? Things like the image of him eating cereal, or Canada Man doing… anything, really.
ahahah sure
Meanwhile those papers he’s shredding are the future cyborg conversion plans they had for his whole unit.
Wait, question. Was that flashback happening when the Commander found out that his siblings were actually alive and that he was being lied to for all that time? Since that’s the only way I’m able to make sense of that scene.
Really like this page – gives a good juxtaposition at how various leaders are, especially wen their leaders are, let’s face it, blindly incompetent. I wonder if the it was the Commander who helped instigate those laws against GenMods being messed with like he was.
Another thought: is Canadian Guy another agent from the future, just from the Canadian government and…not so well adjusted? He’s a lot quirkier than the Commander, but has a similar design to him, and as we’ve seen with the canoe and the buttonbox concertina (Father’s Day comic) he has issues…of course, I could be entirely missing the joke about him simply being a distaff counterpart to the Commander. Either way, it’s an interesting thought. :-)
Distaff counterpart? I’m pretty sure Canada Guy is a guy.
Oh
Oh, Coelasquid, I haven’t laughed that hard in a good, long while.
Thank you.
At least this non-descript spacefuture didn’t turn out like Idiocracy.
A strange thought came to mind when I was mulling over the legal implications of his position. Any Futuretech corp worth it’s salt would make darn sure to add a ‘we own the product and all future iterations of said product’ clause to their ownership rules. Does the future military own the Commander’s kids?
Weeeelp, that little flashback just kicked my momma bear instinct into high gear. Jonesy better kick some ass.
I love Commander’s face in that sixth panel. It’s just awesome. Same goes for the tenth panel.
Hmm. Does this strip intentionally have a Brando vibe to it?
I hate to be a pedant, but that has been kind of bothering me since this update… does the admiral or whatever follow a different religion than the commander, or has ‘god dammit’ and variations thereof been so stripped of meaning that you can say whatever you like and the priests of Brando won’t care?
<3 <3 <3 Commander <3 <3 <3
So I kept meaning to try making lucky stars for the longest time and this finally spurred me into giving it a go. I failed hard and I have a blog dedicated to random origami I’ve made.
I just gotta say, I’m super impressed he’s able to make them with gloves on, because I still can’t even manage without.
Oh dude the stuff on your blog is amazing, I can’t pull off any of that kind of stuff, stars are about all I can make :P
Thank you! Comes with the desk job, as it turns out. Gives me a lot of free time with my hands when I’m on the phone.
I’ll eventually figure out the stars, lol, the folds all make sense to me, it’s getting it to puff out that I had issue with. Maybe I’ll try different paper next.
I know we’re on this right now, but are we ever gonna get back to the whole “Jared’s a Pokemon Professor” bit from December?
And this is why you arent supposed to try and apply entertainment tropes to your own plans. Surprisingly, most people are just traumatized by losing loved ones, and require extensive grieving and possibly professional help to overcome them. They almost never fuel it into some sort of anti hero brooding.
PREACH.
Huh, I just noticed Flashback!Rock is missing a tooth that, iirc (it’s been a while), present!Rock had knocked out when a Future!Rock zipped back and laid him out for being too off guard.
Every couple years I think back to this page. It’s sorta inspiring