Endtown by Aaron Neathery for October 05, 2015

Weren’t there comments here an hour ago?

Oh! For some reason, the strip posted twice this morning…and one counts as October 4th while this counts as October 5th.

For some reason a new comic page the same as the last one has been put up. Heh, right after I put up a long post!

And Holly’s wigging out in both of them.

As I said in the last one…does this mean their relationship is over?

Could someone please remind me who Flask and the mutant child is?

http://www.gocomics.com/endtown/2010/12/27@notus. He’s a brain like Clive

I really miss Flask. :( She was a great character.

I don’t think their relationship is over just yet, nor do I think this is Schism Syndrome. The latter seems to stem from the disconnect of a human mind with an inhuman body, and Holly seems to be accepting that she’s a three-something-foot anthropomorphic mouse with a human brain. The former, well, I’d like to think these two have been together long enough that one argument, even as severe as this one, isn’t going to tear their common-law marriage asunder..I do feel, though, that Clive has become a proxy of the child Holly lost. Word of God said that the child lost wasn’t Holly’s and Wally’s, and prior to Wally, Holly hadn’t been with anyone else, so it’s easily deduced that this happened to a Human Holly, pre cataclysm..Holly, to me, seems to be, whilst not immature, certainly not very mature, and I’d peg her around her middle twenties, meaning if the world as we know it (and no one feels fine) ended about 6 years ago, that would make Holly around 20, maybe 22 when she had her miscarriage. I’m also thinking that perhaps she had really no support after the event, perhaps because of the looming, very short war. So, she ran from people. at first emotionally, and psychologically, and when she woke up all mousy, physically. She came to terms with things, not healed, but scarred over..Then came the trial, and more importantly the incarceration during the trial. She was caged, locked away in a room with two other people, forced to eat, sleep, defecate in a corner, and be unable to move for months. She was humiliated, psychologically tortured, and made broken. She was back at square one, and she needed to run. At this point she did have support in Wally, but, he’s certainly no psychologist, just a pacifistic survivalist..Now there’s Clive. A brain-in-a-jar that, when revealed, accepted life as it was in a bitter, snarky way and just moved on, something that Holly aspires to, to get rid of the hurt. Clive also is something helpless, needing nurturing and mothering. A balm for both of her sores, but just a soothing balm, without any real medicine to cure.

Topsider flying ship communications officer: “Captain? I’m picking up voices down on the surface, but I can’t get a visual.”Topsider flying ship captain: “Is this the same set that’s been bickering ever since we accidentally found that lizard colony?”CO: “Seems like it, sir. They match the voice profiles.”Captain: “Ignore them. They’ll probably kill themselves on their own at this rate. No reason to waste the batteries on them.”CO: “Roger that, sir. Should I switch the channel?”Captain: “Yeah. See if you can get Pandora out here. Let’s watch some Rammstein videos.”

Where did Word of God say that the baby wasn’t Holly and Wally’s? I’d like to read that.

Clive is Plastic. Leave here and pickup in 1000 years and it will look the same.

Clive; Your Plastic Pal who’s FUN to Be With.

Just like on The Walking Dead, those who cannot let go of the ways things were in the past and do what has to be done, are doomed to horrible death.

Holly does make a good point.But what she does not see is she is creating a hardship for Clive…..only back in the system he knows will he ever be happy as that is all he knows now. His past is gone.Wally can work this if he can convince her he would be better off with those of his own kind.She failed to protect her own child, failed to protect the one Flask put out of its misery, and now she wants to save Clive.She does not remember she has already saved a life……Wally’s……had she just walked by him after he was beaten up and left for dead…..he would be dead.She saved Chic fighting and biting Jim or Chic would be dead. She saved Kirbee by keeping her scattered mind focused and that saved them both.If she would like Clive go she would save another.She does not see that. Holly to me is battling Schism…..it occurred as a result of her imprisonment…..it brought back those memories of her past.Choppers in the sky and lord only knows what the did to them once they caught them.

Holly makes a point she didn’t want to make over Kirbee.

Holly: Clive is a Human Being!WTF are you?Wally: Not crazy…We’ve pondered endlessly about how much of the cast in this story are still “Human”. Air quotes aside, physically, genetically, and to lesser degrees mentally out troupe are no longer considered, (largely by outward appearance) human. Just the soul, that spark of electricity that makes us alive, feeling creatures.I have always suspected that Holly wasn’t wrapped too tightly to begin with. And the traumas she has undergone, only serve to exacerbate her underlying mental issues.That she still considers herself human, is indicative of an schism.What makes this so?In all things there is a balance, like Yin and Yang.In all of us there exists aspects of many different competing drives.All precepts of civility we extend to each other are just constructs of our society and how we are expected to treat each other.Let’s strip those away….What you see here is an animal, bipedal, mostly hairless. And crazy as the day is long.All the ancient drives are there, Greed, Lust, Anger, Hatred, Love, Kindness, Family. Programmed in by untold generations that came before us. Shaped by our environment and by our interactions with one another.Look at the mob mentality closely, see how it resembles the actions of the lesser primates. How little we differ from these “inferior” creatures..What we call human is little more than a mask, a thin veneer of civilization we show each other.Until we no longer need food, air, water, or blood.We will be chained to the animal state for the meantime.Holly’s sentimentality can be an asset, like a nice sharp claymore.But a claymore cuts two ways.And so does Holly’s loyalties. And right now that loyalty to an inanimate object that was once human. Is a hindrance to their safety.If she don’t straighten out, the Cat’s gotta cut her loose.We all know what the alternative is..

Just your ordinary, civilized discussion between spouses. NO SWEARING IN FRONT OF THE CHILDREN!!

schism disorder

I wouldn’t refer to Clive as a doorstop, Wally…I’m thinking…more like a paperweight. It seems a more dignified position.

Li’l Aaron was right, somebody is stealing the shoes. State College PA Bulletin As always, voting links for TopWebComics are in my profile. Sorry I cannot get up earlier. JusSayin

In the fourth panel it looks like Kirbee is about to interfere in their discussion.

Holly’s Choice.I forget… Did Flask kill Sandy before or after Holly nearly jumped from the clock tower? If it’s before, then the baby she meant may have been Sandy.Holly would rather keep Clive around instead of Kirbee because she can’t treat Kirbee like a baby who needs her.Clive is a head also. Just like with Petey, the part above the cheeks is removed and fixed to a dish. The eyes and ears are covered with caps that are probably I/O nodes. You can see the bridge of Clive’s nose between the two eye caps. The holes covering his scalp (the scalp is intact, including the skin) are where other cables connect.

I disagree with Holly. I also think Clive can fend for himself….he can do anything once he put his mind to it.

I wonder if Wally would be able to remove the transmitter in Clive’s base. I know he’s an engineer but he is a civil engineer, and may not have much of an understanding of electronics. I am a mechanical engineer and I wouldn’t feel comfortable doing the job — I’m not sure I could tell homing transmitter from a voltage regulator.

My two cents would be Holly was pregnant when she mutated and lost the baby later after the change when it was due. It’s how she ended up with Doc as an overprotective adoptive father and what happened probably did damage to her so she can’t end up having kids. Schism seems like it happens when an anthro can’t comes to terms with their old human self and new animal self (as we saw the animal self devour and posses Jim), I don’t thinks she’s at risk because of that because she seems haunted by the loss and not what she became. Being unable to have children would explain why in her fragile state she is clinging to Clive as well as just how extra horrifying and devastating the lizards eating their young would be to her; also the rift that seems to be growing between her and Wally as well as the sudden urge by her not to remain ‘settled down’ where eventually them not having a kid might become obvious. But of course that’s all just my current theory.