Endtown by Aaron Neathery for January 21, 2023

It’s said that when you jump, you have plenty of time to regret it on the way down.

So, he just observed the first 8 million times, and now he’s ready to manipulate the situation..? Or has he been doing so all along? I know which answer goes best with the Marx we’ve gotten to know and loathe.

once a month posting …… i can live with that… now if i can only stop checking every day : )

Notice that Duffy is still wearing the amulet that Chic gave him.

I’m glad that Marx has jolted Duffy out of his desire to suicide, moving him past this moment of despair. Presumably, the next step for Marx is to let the restored Wally finish sorting out his thoughts before he whisks them off to the next adventure. Hopefully to where Kirbee and Chic are, to rescue them.

Act #?; Scene 8 million 1:. Marx seems quite OK with playing through the probabilities as he needs his disparate batch of oddballs along to, well, something? Since we now know that Duffy still has the amulet, maybe we would be fair in thinking that its inclusion is a new wrinkle in the story of Scene 8 million1.

The last two panels. The expressions on Duffy’s face. Brilliant!

Quite profound.

So interesting anatomy fact, the finger missing from Cardoodles is the middle one. In Duffy’s grexxed mind, he was intending to give him “the finger,” but instead raised the two he could….sort of like splitting the difference. Neat.

Looks to me that Marx decided this time to stop Duffy. Marx may have an idea that to fix realities he has to make a course change. In the multiverse time and realities are best explained as a infinite wide multilane highway. Each lane goes on some times merging other times ending. Events along the lane affect the path of the lane. 8 million times Marx has let Duffy die. The realities stay messed up. This time he gave Duffy a chance…seeing a possibility that Duffy’s survival can change the realities to a different path.

So now the question is, does Marx have the soul of Duffy’s brother, Benny? We saw Duffy get attracted toward a soul earlier, and Marx made him let it go, but did he do a switch of some sort? Was he holding not just Wally but Benny as well? If so, does that mean Marx has another stop to make before leaving this doomed dimension? If this is the over eight millionth time he has done this route, it isn’t totally beyond belief. We don’t really know what Duffy’s role is at this point. In fact we aren’t even 100% sure Benny is dead, we are only assuming he is. And if we haven’t learned anything else, we have all learned to not assume ANYTHING in a Neathery Endtown strip!

The most amazing thing to me is that Marx is sitting in mid-air!

Marx: “Now, shall we go back to the deli, shall we?”

Heavy words marx. Heavy but definitely needed.

This dialog should be standard for all suicide hotlines and negotiations.

Is that ‘fun fact’ literally true?

He watched him jump 8 million times. He has so much time on his hands!!

Eight million falls…but each one was in a slightly different spacetime reality. Every time Marx “returns to an event” a myriad of other slightly-linked random changes have happened. Marx waits until jump Eight-million and…it’s time to intervene because other changes have occurred…possibly including Duffy’s attitude.

The motion indicated by the shadowed figures in the fourth panels is fantastic artwork.

I wonder if the “soul ball” Duffy grabbed was his own, screaming on the way down. Another point: I tend to use big numbers when exaggerating rather than “gazillion” for example. My niece pointed out the number 9 was always somewhere in the number. 8 million to Marx may just mean “many.”

I guess I missed the fact that Duffy was only fourteen. Yes, save him.

My favorite “chapter” was when Wally came upon the lizard people, and all that ensued…

Q: What are you doing Duffy?

A: Oh, hanging around.

I was once near suicide and I wanted to see what survival could do. It does a number, to be sure, but I’m still here

Marx’s expression is one of desperate resignation. He’s been doing this a long time and expects to be doing it a lot longer. It rarely changes and he wants so much for it to change. His face is pleading for change.

Look familiar?

https://cdn.acidcow.com/uploads/posts/2023-02/1675254549_mn_22.jpg

https://euvw.blogspot.com/2018/05/

Biggest cliffhanger yet!

If he can get it to post this next is one of the best. Seen it via Newsletter. GoComics is having a bit of issue internally for posting.

Everyone check your email and/or junk file. Aaron emailed the next segment due to technical issues.