Cook-Cook's Mangled Head, and Other Assorted Nerdery

A nerd called Prospero's random-ass nonsense. Why are you even here?

[prokopetz]

I'm forever torn on whether Herlock Sholmes or Hemlock Shears is the better technically-legally-distinct Sherlock Holmes knockoff, because on the one hand I do love a good spoonerism, but on the other hand, Hemlock Shears has a certain indefinable ring to it.

[amashelle]

Which would you rather read about? The Adventures of_______

Herlock Sholmes

Hemlock Shears

Voting ended onDec 7, 2025

[ballistic-fist]

I for one would prefer to read The Adventures of Obi-Wan Sherlock Clouseau.

[tccartt]

Snowflake pt. 2/2 ❄️

Song dedication: The Scythe - The Last Dinner Party

Phew, a lot of blood, sweat, and tears was put into this one :,) So, a while back I heard about what happens to our beloved Illyana in Age of Revolution and I went off the prompt that she lost her life in combat. I haven’t had time to read the recent comics so I’m not aware of the details but this is what my sleep deprived mind conjured up 😅

Also, happy Halloween ! (I’m sorry)

[ballistic-fist]

This is just...incredible. I just ordered a commission from her, and you should too!

[ballistic-fist]

We finally found Easy Pete's dynamite!

[ballistic-fist]

*Batman/Huntress: Cry for Blood #3

Writer: Greg Rucka

Pencils and Inks: Rick Burchett

Colors: Tatjana Wood

Letters: Clem Robins

In which Helena Bertinelli achieves inner balance in a brisk single issue, which must be nice.

Jokes aside, this is another stellar work from Greg Rucka, who for my money has never missed. He really knows how to write to bring out his artist's strengths. Rick Burchett is not a name I'm overly familiar with, but apparently his strength is montages!

[whyenn-reader]

disabilities are not superpowers, that being said having auditory processing disorder my entire life made me insane at freestyling, cause my mental libary of homophobic phrases (rhymes) is massive and keeps expanding every day

[whyenn-reader]

HOMOPHONIC PHRASES HOMOPHONIC HOMOPHONIC SOUNDALIKES RHYMES ECHOS

HAVING AN EXTENDED LIBRARY OF HOMOPHOBIC PHRASES DOES NOT HELP YOU WITH FREESTYLING UNLESS YOU ARE EMINEM.

[whyenn-reader]

NOT THIS ONE IM BEGGING

[arikot27]

[bullfrawgs]

An extended library of homophobic phrases is how a lot of people pretend to be good at freestyle

[ballistic-fist]

I mean, an extensive library of homophobic phrases is actually how Eminem got good at freestyle.

[ballistic-fist]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

When Laura Kinney, the Wolverine, tracks a series of mutant disappearances to a Religion of Crime coven in Gotham City, she comes face to face with Kate Kane, the Batwoman. The two of them must put aside their differences to stop the Religion of Crime before it's too late. Sparks fly, old wounds are reopened, and neither will ever be the same.

After the recent DC/Marvel crossover proved to have a rather disappointing roster for me, I got to thinking about what crossover encounters I'd like to see, and well...this happened.

Oh, and in case you're wondering, they do kiss.

[bughat]

Still working my way through Marjorie Liu's X-23 and having a really good time. I also gotta say...maybe if I'd read more of their interactions previous to this book I'd feel differently, but it was a blessing for Laura to get the hell away from Julian. I keep seeing people arguing his case and hating on Liu for his writing, but I'm not seeing it. It can be true that a young character can be working through some heavy shit and also be a toxic asshole to people around him, especially the girl he's clearly decided is his to pin all his personal expectations on. He clearly cared about Laura, but most of his interactions with her was 50% being a massive, self-centered tool to her and 50% apologizing for being a massive, self-centered tool to her. After a while, the apologies don't at all make up for what came before them. People also bag a LOT on Gambit for getting threatening with him while kind of glossing over the fact that that was in response to his getting angry and physical with Laura a few seconds before when all she was trying to do was walk away from him.

[ballistic-fist]

This is what I've been saying about Julian Keller for years. Wait until they meet again closer to the end of the run. Hoo boy. That was what made me loathe Julian forever.

[prokopetz]

In this essay, I won't.

[little-tornad0]

Fuck you for coming to this TED talk.

[ardiebeaphotography]

The Hank Strips

That strip above is from much earlier, but in today's strip, Joyce's dad has once again arrived at the scene of the crime - so much crime! But how much does he know? And how is he going to react? All we can do is speculate, but that speculation should have some solid base in his actual history as far as we've seen it...

So it starts badly when a chance meeting with the Keeners and particularly Dorothy raises red flags during the (Book 3 Chapter 4) strips covering the Freshman Family Weekend. Dorothy's mother is surprised to hear that Dorothy's been to church with Joyce since shes...

That discovery, and her parents' reaction riles Joyce who only wants them to love the person she loves, and leads directly to passive-aggressive prayer. Led by Hank. Who is the one who voices concern over Dorothy's atheism and parrots anti-semetic evangelical talking points. Bleeurgh.

The rest of the day passes harmlessly enough (if you discount Ethan and Jocelyn's continued closeting) but then there's the second encounter at Showalter fountain...

This time it's Carol who takes the lead in hostility towards the Keeners, but when Joyce turns their religion back against her parents' it's Hank who follows his daughter's lead - choosing her over bigotry, just as Joyce has chosen Dorothy over their objections. I've labeled this scene before as Joyce's primary turning point. I think it's Hank's, too.

Following Becky being kidnapped by her father at gunpoinnit (Book 6 Chapter one), Joyce calls her mother to tell her she supports Becky, has no problem with her being lesbian, and nor should Carol. Carol calls back, glad that Joyce is safe, but then uses the same phrases as Becky's father, and tries to justify his actions. Nevertheless, Joyce agrees to go home at the end of the week and spend a weekend with her parents. She's terribly stressed about it, and so Becky goes with her. Hank comes to pick her up:

This scene has echoes of the moment at the start of the Freshman Family Weekend strips when Carol rushes to embrace her 'baby'. Hank's 'Apple Store' comment underscores his innate conservatism. Then Becky appears and for a moment, things are tense.

But Hank is aware that she's been through hell because of her father, and immediately embraces her, too. He has... thoughts about her appearance, but he doesn't dump on her.

And there we have it; he's struggling to accept stuff, but he knows that this is Joyce (and Becky's) journey, and so he just has to sit back and... be humble about it. Literally, to de-centre his self when it comes to their lives.

In the car-park he gives Joyce the keys to drive them home, framing it as them doing him a favour - but this is also another evidence of him trusting her to be adult. And during the drive home, he treats her like an adult further, opening up to her about his own feelings for Becky's father and basically telling her he's proud of her actions.

Back at the house, he tries to moderate Carol's hostility to Becky over the dinner table, and and then the next morning Joyce overhears him trying to calm Carol's fears that Joyce will be "seduced by unbelievers and lesbians..." When Carol says that she want's to take Joyce out of college, Joyce steals the car for the day, driving around in circles with Becky (and breaking into Becky's old house for her social security number and birth certificate, and raging at her oldest brother in a restaurant...) to avoid having to deal with the threat. Then when they get home that evening, their attempt to sneak in is derailed by the dog...

Again, Hank attributes his defense of them to his own pride, but barely hidden beneath that facade (and the very real annoyance he feels at their actions) is the fact that he is defending them. He believes in them.

But he's still not really pushing back against his own core beliefs. Yet. Then he overhears this at church the next morning...

So when Joyce disappears from worship (having noticed how some of the things Becky's father said are echoed in the worship songs), he follows. And discovers that he and his daughter have a lot in common.

Hank gathers up Becky and Joyce, and returns them to the college where they find that Billie and Ruth's suicide pact has been discovered and everyone's in the health centre. Becky's panic at this news prompts Hank to trust Joyce with the information that Becky's mum didn't die of cancer, like she'd been told, but had killed herself. He takes them to join their friends.

These are classic Hank moments. And in the strips that follow, we learn that he's helped Becky set up a bank account. He isn't perfect, but he's doing what he can; he's the foil to the 'evil dads,' Blaine O'Malley and Ross Macintyre.

Then in Book nine, Chapter three, we see that Joyce's parents' church (with Carol front and centre) is trying to bail out Ross, and accept support from Blaine to do so. This leads directly to the horrendous events of book ten in which Joyce and most of her friends are kidnapped by the evil dads, Ross is killed by Blaine, and Joyce is kidnapped by him AGAIN before Amazi-girl/Amber clean his clock for good. Then the parents of most of the affected kids rush to the scene and some of them bump into each other in the foyer...

The Keeners (via Dorothy) ask Joyce if she would be ok seeing her dad, but not her mum as they are currently, uh, not a 'package deal'. And Dorothy points out that he's visibly crying out in the hallway. Joyce goes to him and he embraces her, wordlessly. They all go to lunch together (sans Carol, who is busy wrestling Ruth), and Hank reminisces about the titty-bear who used to decorate Galasso's before it was Galasso's. Then Blaine is shot at the hospital, and they rush there to see if Amber's ok, and to check on Mike.

And that's the last we see of Hank before the timeskip. He's not shown up since then until today, though his walking away from Carol has become divorce, and he's texted Joyce to ask if it was her 'brother' at the protest.

I think it's clear that Hank is essentially a nurturing man. He hates the lies and self-centredness found in too many churches, he owns that it is wrong to the Walkertons, and he apologises to the Keeners for his judgementalism. Not of that means he's left his faith behind, like Joyce; he may be adapting it to new truths, like Becky. Or he may be keeping it compartmentalized so that it can still spring out and trip him up. But even if that's the case, the consistent thing about Hank is that he treats Joyce with both affection and respect; as an adult, not as an erring child to be corrected. He's de-centred himself repeatedly and responded to Becky and Joyce with kindness, openness, and respect.

But how will he handle Joyce being so cheerfully seduced by the godless and the lesbian? How will he cope with discovering that his son Joshua is his daughter, Jocelyn? We don't know - these may be several bridges too far for an essentially conservative man. But... he values the potential for character evolution. Let's see if he can embody it.

[lucid-luck]

I want one of those scenes in a dude bro film where “tomboy” chick has to wear a dress to go undercover or whatever, but instead of the guys drooling as she walks down the stairs, they’re like “k. U need to stop. Go put the cargo pants back on. You look super uncomfortable and awkward in that. Brutus, you go be the fake prostitute.”

[thranduilland]

I’m just imagining this super ripped guy called Brutus being like ‘YESSS!!! I’VE ALWAYS WANTED TO BE THE FAKE PROSTITUTE!! Now is my time to shine!!’

[daryltoh]

[tohdraws-deactivated20181120]

so I got inspired… and had to make a comic….

[whowasntthere-deactivated202106]

*wipes away a single tear* Yes.

[sparklyaxolotlstudent]

Miss Congeniality, but with The Rock instead of Sandra Bullock

[misshorrorotaku-deactivated2024]

He looks so ready. XD

“My time has come.”

[kenas-artstuff]

Plot twist she’s his bodyguard

[bisquid]

I specifically went back through my reblogs to find these

[a-teacup-of-golden-cracks]

My dashboard has been blessed by this post again

[i-say-ok]

ok!

[tawked]

Yeah sex is OK but have you ever made it through a shit comic book run just to see the quality skyrocket the second a new writer slides in?

[thevaultoftheatomicspaceage]

[ardiebeaphotography]

The Shower Strips

These panels from April this year (2025) show a cheerfully sexual woman. But when we first meet Joyce, she has massive anxieties about sexuality and she's phobic of things like mixed food - and showers are also really gross, only to be approached in full PPE.

College dorm life throws a lot of disparate people together in an intimate setting, and a shared bathroom opens up all sorts of possibilities for interaction and character growth. And so I wonder if the shower strips will tell us a something about Joyce's development? Let's find out.

Sexy Nudity? That first shower strip contrast's Joyce's over-clothed figure with two lightly-clad ladies. But this is the only time that a strip hints that Joyce fears being seen (or seeing) other women. I think her lady-loving is so deeply buried beneath her much more overt (and therefore scary) lad-lusting that she doesn't really register the bathroom as a potentially sexual scene at first, and this is confirmed at the end of week one when she meets Billie and immediately suggests they be shower-buddies.

The fact that Billie later is one of the first woman for whom Joyce has overt sexual feelings doesn't mean there's not sexual subtext here, just that it's not registering for Joyce.

Hair. Joyce loves hair - on Sal. On the shower floor - it's an issue.

And again a couple of weeks later...

But Joyce is an activist type of gal; the very next day we see the first of her attempts to deal with the situation:

It's laughably inadequate, but it's a glimpse of the girl who WILL find a way - somehow.

The arrival of best-friend and very out lesbian Becky introduces two new dynamics. The first is the extent of Joyce's courage and dedication to her friend; she loves her so much she braves the worst of shower stalls:

The second is that Joyce begins to think about how things might feel for someone sapphic:

Which is a chance to affirm Becky, but also an indicator that Joyce's friendships will make her more open to different experiences and perspectives.

However, it's roommate Sarah who unlocks the sexual potential of showers for Joyce when she returns to their room to find the naive Joyce swinging her vibrator around like a light-sabre. Her response conjures certain images - and associated shame - for Joyce once she's nude.

Meanwhile the hair gags (and potential solutions) continue

Underlining the depths of Joyce's dysfunctions, but also Sarah's cranky kindness:

And Joyce's half-baked ingenuity. Which leads us too...

And here's the real payoff for the 'Showers are horrible and grimy' story thread. Carla is kind. She later reveals that (pre-cannabis) she was also an intensely picky eater and empathises with Joyce - maybe a motivation for her here? The new shower shoes also give Carla an excuse to nickname Joyce 'Jugs' to differentiate her from (also 5'4", blonde, glasses-wearing) Dorothy. Shower strips provide opportunities for Joyce to connect in meaningful ways with her dorm-mates.

The next book includes a slipshine pornographique set in the showers, teased on the main site with this image:

Showers can be sites of sexiness, and many of the shower strips that follow take some cues from this - a chapter later there's a strip (named 'Showering'!) in which Becky carnally contemplates Dina in the showers. Joyce gets a parallel arc in the next chapter:

In Joyce's mind, showers are becoming sexy places. Intriguingly this story arc concludes with Dorothy strongly challenging Joyce to stop denying her sexual feelings.

But not just sexual feelings. Other feelings come up in the shower; they're places of vulnerability.

And there's Joyce, continuing to lead with her patented blend of kindness and awkwardness.

The books on this side of the time-slip are much more focused on Joyce's emerging sexuality than those prior, where it was overall socialisation in the secular world that she was struggling with. And though her neuroses are old hat by now, we still get this strip...

Keeping the gag going in a minor key - but also reminding readers of this particular neurosis as it sets up these strips a few chapters later:

Remember that Joyce who waddled into the shared bathroom swaddled in every garment she owned? Who couldn't bear the thought that she might think sexually about other people? She's gone. This Joyce, neurotic or no, is able to not only enjoy her own sexuality, but to be open about it with someone she finds intimidating. Because at heart, she's not her neuroses - she'll connect with anyone to grow and to learn. Dorothy has taught her how to love herself more, to enjoy being sexy, and so we get the Joyce who gets clean to get filthy... with Dorothy.

[dumbingofage]

if anything, i appreciate the supercut of Shower Anxiety Strips

[san-sebastienne]

Dashiell Hammett, who basically invented the noir genre (think: The Maltese Falcon, The Thin Man) hung out enough in the queer scene in San Francisco in the 20s-30s that he picked up some contemporary queer lingo that he folded into his stories. In The Maltese Falcon, there’s a scene where the wildly gay-coded villain shows up at a meeting with a skinny little blonde with a bad attitude and a gun in tow, and detective Sam Spade tells him to “leave the gunsel outside” — gunsel being contemporary gay slang for a young, effeminate man who probably bottoms (from the Yiddish gansl, meaning gosling). Basically, he’s saying “I’m here to talk to you, not your twink.”

However, a lot of writers mimicking Hammett did not know gay lingo or Yiddish, saw the word “gun,” and assumed “gunsel” meant “scary bodyguard with a gun.” They took off with a word they didn’t understand and spread it so fast that it’s now basically impossible to read a noir story written between 1930-1960 without someone accidentally being called a twink at least once. Look out for it next time you’re reading Raymond Chandler or his ilk, I guarantee you’ll find it.

[mapofyourstars]

Magneto was Right, X-Men: The Last Stand

[chickengoat1]

Enjoy these “incorrect quote” memes I made. I bet some of them have already been done before (sorry), but I saw these and instantly thought of each character lol

[queenofsodor]

todays strip is very very good (dorothy's anxious fretting is always adorable) so there was no other choice but to animate her antennae fluttering with anxiety

[dumbingofage]

i imagine they make the same flittering flute sound as Raccoon/Tanooki/P-Wing Mario does when he flies in Super Mario Bros 3