Just finished Archive Binging this liveblog. Thoughts on the comic so far:

1: Susan is my favorite character, because she comes the closest to having a reasonable consistent personality.

2: The poorly-justified Fanservice is really abundant in this comic.

3: I don't think the "I'll get back at strawman versions of the mean people who bullied me in high school" thing has ever been done well.

251

• Justin is gay!◊
• Ellen is once again readily adapting to gender stereotypes. She is now having difficulty deciding what to wear. Delightful.

252

• Justin is gay!◊
• Nanase is a lesbian!
• I still want to repeat: NOTHING CHANGED IN ELLIOT BESIDES HIS BIOLOGICAL FUNCTIONS. THAT'S IT. THERE SHOULD BE NO TRUE DIFFERENCE TO HOW SHE FEELS.
• And I will also point out that the notion of Ellen being a homosexual conflicts with Shive's other views on what the splitting did to Elliot's two personalities. He can NOT keep it straight.
• Heh heh. Straight.

253

• I bet you when he wrote this, the response he wanted to get was one of "You know, I love El Goonish Shive because it has such crazy and zany characters!" But my response to this is "If he is not going to do anything with these characters, what is the point of their existence?"
• Also, he has no knowlege of Role Playing. Just putting that out there.

254

• Can you imagine how weird it would seem if Susan was a guy and had this hatred of women? People would accuse him left and right of being a homosexual, and this strip would make him seem downright vicious.
• But there is something to be said for the Nanase/Justin Faghag complex.
• I'm strapping myself in. I SENSE A BACKSTORY APPROACHING!

255

• UGG. This is even worse. He IS going to do something with the character? It reeks of "Big Bang Theory"-style ignorance. The methodology of "Hey! Let's use nerds! Nerds are funny!" Without having any clue or idea about nerd culture. We'll just have Sheldon say faux-scientific stuff and the audience will react with hilarity!
• NANASE IS LESBIAN YOU GUYS!
• Speaking of which- AHR, does that pheromone thing ever get brought up again? Does she still have it?
• Nanase and Ellen are beginning to look far to much alike. It's getting disturbing.
• When I think of an awesome movie to watch with a group of friends on a 60-inch plasma screen, I think of To Kill A Mockingbird.

256

• Nanase is laughing at stupid things.
• To substitute comment, I would like to post a picture of my pet cat, Gizmo◊.
• I KNOW THAT YOU ARE CLEARLY IN EMOTIONAL DISTRESS. DOES PLAYING WITH YOUR HAIR HELP?
• Actually, that's usually how I help AHR when she's in emotional distress. It usually goes less successful than it does here with Nanase and Ellen.

257

• Susan is an asshole who can't keep her God damn store organized.
• Apart from that though, I can't help but commend Shive for giving a trait to Justin other than gay. It's not much, but baby steps. Baby steps.

258

• Ew. What are they doing on the floor?
• You know, I normally can appreciate porn of all kinds, but EGS porn just makes me laugh. That isn't related, but I just thought of it.

259

• No, your brother doesn't own the movie. YOU own the movie. YOU. ARE. ELLIOT. IN. FEMALE. FORM. Which is ctually a whole other hurdle that they would have to get over, really. If Elliot owned movies before, are they all now owned by the male one?
• Shive might as well have titled this strip "I Like Drawing Breasts."

260

• Man, the wind in that closed-off room is absurdly strong.
• Why does it need to be all-girls?

Yes, the pheremones are brought up again, mainly to explain the lack of it in Ellen. Also, Cakman, please put an NSFW warning. If not for every picture, at least at the top of your post. I just opened one of your links on a school computer.

@Myrm: I'm honored! Hope you were entertained!

edited 6th Dec '10 7:50:45 AM by MrAHR

Strip 361

Art:

• It's weird seeing Justin as a girl there, since when he actually finally gets turned into a girl, he looks wayyy different.

Content:

• Now, this is Ellen's characterization for pretty much up to Grace's birthday party consistently (that's 2005 or so). After that, she kind of gets toned down a bit, and becomes more...I dunno...Elliotish, I guess. Prolly because the focus is no longer on her, so much as it is on Nanase and Elliot, and then, as a result, her.
• That being said, I find her fantasies a tad creepy. How creepy? Put Tedd in her place, saying the exact same dialogue. Or, put that spikey-haired hitter-onner guy in her place, with the exact same dialogue.
• Although, Tedd and Elliot DID do the same thing with Sarah in the first couple of comic strips, but I really don't think that justifies it. For one thing, the portrayal of it was different, for another, Tedd and Elliot were portrayed more as...welll, hammer targets.
• Finally, it's the fucking first strips. You know, the really BAD ones.

—

Strip 362

Art:

• Oh Shive. Sometimes you make it blatantly obvious you NEVER practice drawing scenery.
• To the house, I say meh. Yes, it's bigger than my house, but it's nothing to go ._. over. Granted, I live a neighborhood away from some very nice houses, so I'm prolly biased.
• However, you'd be hard pressed to find a nice house— in the shape of a box. Jeebus, add some design to that thing! I mean, MY house is a three story house, but since it's a split, it's less impressive. So to me, three stories just makes me say meh.
• Obviously, he didn't set out to please me specifically, but when you go subtle, you shouldn't be having your characters react big.
• Also, WTF, only ONE garage door? Not, I dunno, three plus? That's usually the sign you're in a scary rich place (My house has two). This IS the suburbs...right?

Content:

• Ellen...you act like this. You confuse me so. I can't even enjoy a brash perverted girl character because
  • She used to be a guy, and is apparently still in the mind set of a guy (or...something...I don't know how Shive logicked that out...) and it's all Unfortunate Implications -y.
  • It doesn't make any fracking sense.

—

Strip 363

Art:

• BACKGROUNDS SHIVE BACKGROUNDS! ESPECIALLY IN A NEW AREA LIKE THIS FOR THE LOVE OF FORD!

Content:

• Ellen was absolutely ADORABLE as a cat-girl last time right? So we're gonna make her do OTHER cat-like things too! Isn't it supah kawaii?
• ...Why would she sleep on the TV, as opposed to, I don't know, THE COUCH? Think about it, she had to make the concious decision to climb up on that thing and sleep! I mean...HOW?
• And, so, Susan drops the big reveal:
• Nanase and Ellen might be into each other.
• Mind = blown.

—

Strip 364

Art:

• What happened to Susan's Mom's fingers in that fourth panel?

Content:

• Not to get into a semantics discussion, but I don't think lying works out that way. After all, despite hyperbole used by many teenagers, you really can't do the opposite, tell the truth (or so you perceive it to be) and tell a lie. You were merely mistaken. Similarly, Susan wasn't telling the truth, she was just mistaken for what was and what was not false.
• But that's not too important.
• See! See? Blame Susan's mom! She got it ALL from her!

—

Strip 365

Content:

• Are we REALLY supposed to feel sorry for Susan here? I mean. I GUESS you can make a case that Justin was her ticket to redemption, but making him gay put him in the same box as she was...
• Or something.
• It's just, are you SERIOUSLY telling me Susan NEVER ran into a trekkie fan before? EVER? Sure, they might have been a bit less...symmetrical, but they were probably more awkward than sexist. Not all male nerds are that boob obsessed. Of course, that could just be MY male nerd friends, so what do I know?
• Considering Tv Tropes though, I'd say that I can't be too far off.
• Then again, reconsidering TV Tropes...nah...
• I GUESS if Susan was genderbent, this scene could still work, but at the same time, I don't think it would. A chauvinist would need to basically recant all his beliefs, or somehow prove he was wrong. At the very least, get called out on it. Susan? Really doesn't ever get that. She gets the occasional comment here and there, and an admittance that guys aren't so bad as she thought, but I feel like its severely underplayed, not to mention rather non-chalant, in its own way.

—

Strip 366

Art:

• ...demon hair...the fuck is with Susan? Seriously, this is starting to bug me.

Content:

• OK, to be fair, I totally do what Susan just did to my sister on the bus. It's funny. She gets freaked out everytime by my lack of social grace and general creepiness. So I can't help but like this moment. Why would Susan be doing it? Beats me. It really doesn't make much sense, but it amused me.
• Don't worry Nanase. This is El Goonish Shive. The only type of angst allowed is relationship angst. And Grace-woobie angst.

—

Strip 367

Content:

• What really sucks about this scene is that I've written one exactly like this. Sorta. Anyway. Uhm...yeah.
• Now, here is the thing, some of the newcomers (Cakman), might be confused what's going on right now. Wanna know why? Because Shive decided to actually go and have her inner monologues stay fucking inner.
• Does this actually work though? Debatable. Shive isn't the greatest at subtlety, so he tends to be pretty clumsy even when he does things right, and this is a pretty good example of this, since it might be a bit confusing to follow at first. However, the explanation makes enough sense. Sorta.

—

Strip 368

Art:

• Why would her hair still be all spiky in the part that goes from blonde to black? You gotta dye your roots regularly. It should be MUCH more uniform than that.

Content:

• Susan. Your boobs are bigger. You have longer hair. Those do not make for a prettier person. Mostly.
• I mean, OK, I guess it's the art limitations, but NOTHING ELSE HAS CHANGED. Sure, boobs = hotness to most guys, but do you REALLY think that Ms. Het here would be thinking? Hair wise, MAYBE...but...merph. This does not make much sense.
• And so we see Susan's weird state-the-obvious mode. I bring this up because this is actually used again. In 2010. Yeah.

—

Strip 369

Art:

• ...and HELLO Off Model Susan...

Content:

• You know, my parents have this really weird policy of preferring to know who the parents are that I am sleeping over at. Well, not know the parents, just know what they are like, where they live, if they will be chaperoning, if there will be boys, if there will be drugs, stuff like that. So to me, this happened WAY too easily. But my parents might be a bit on the strict side, so I'll let that slide.
• And behold! Justin has problems with his dad BECAUSE HE HAS THE GAY.
• We never actually hear ANYTHING about Justin's homelife after this. Yeah. Shocker.

—

Strip 370

Art:

• Hair. Does not. Work. Like that.
• Also, why did her hair grow in the exact same way it was styled? Is her hair gel THAT all powerful?

Content:

• What, Susan isn't the LEAST bit put off by confiding in really-a-male Ellen (or so she might perceive it to be)? I mean, is it male mentality she hates, or just the penis? Do people automatically get redeemed by losing it? I'm not criticizing here, I seriously want to know.
• Sure, Susan might not be completely rational in her thoug—
• Susan might not have completely thought this entire thing thr—
• Oh forget this. Susan is a trekkie sci-fi fan that has never given any indication of some sort of poorly thought out logic before. She probably has it down to a science. I want it to show.
• But that would be ridiculous. Logic to that view? Could never happen. She just...she just IS that way. Sometimes it affects her, other times it does not. When and why does it? Whenever Shive feels like it.

—

And so we end one strip before the whole pheremone explanation thing (sorta), some REALLY bad jokes, shoddy characterization and, of course, romance wangstage.

This is reminding me of the days when I still bothered to read Dominic Deegan.

Right down to the bland artwork, annoying female character who constantly wangsts over something no other character cares about, strawman versions of people the author hates in real life, and a gay character that we are constantly reminded is gay, as if the author is afraid we'll forget.

Does DD's token gay character also essentially never portray realistic feelings and attractions, suppressed or otherwise?

Szark Sturz, DD's token gay character, started out as a promiscous bisexual murderer but eventually he realised he's gay for the self-insert Dominic Deegan all along and since their childhood so that means he cannot ever love women and also fantasises about brutally killing his girlfriend. Naturally nobody in the comic has a problem with that because Michael Terraciano has a blood-covered tits fetish (this is not a joke, check his very NSFW deviantArt account and you see this is not a joke).

Then eventually Dominic gets a magic sickness, Szark sees him puke, and is so disgusted he doesn't want to shag Dominic anymore, instantly cured of his life-long infatuation.

Yeah.

There's also been that lovely little part where Dominic's little brother told Szark how he totally sees him as Szark the awesome swordsman and not as Szark the gay guy, nevermind the fact that whenever Szark is on-screen you only hear gay jokes.

But hey, at least El Goonish Shive doesn't have any heroic rapists, right?

What.

Looks like you're ripping on the wrong comic here AHR No don't do it! Save yourself!

I don't plan to. I nitpick EGS because it is ALMOST a good strip, but it is not actually good. As a result, a lot of my annoyance comes from lost potential and really bad mishandlings. DD sounds just all around bad.

edited 7th Dec '10 8:16:00 AM by MrAHR

If you need any reason to hate the comic Dominic Deegan, it's that it a story-arc about how one character raped a little girl to save her and he's lauded as a hero for it.

There was a lot contrived bullshit about how that one orc tribe considered women property of men so orphan girls are considered worthless and must totally be killed off immediately. So this one girl just has her parents killed right in front of her eyes and our heroic rapist decides to 'claim' her so she won't get killed off. You know, because they also check whether the hymen is broken to totally make sure and everything. Then post-rape the girl just runs the fuck away and nobody bothers to go after her making this whole bullshit completely pointless.

But fine, we can see what Mookie is going for. He wants to create some moral ambiguity, you know, doing bad things with the right intentions. An excellent author could do some real magic, albeit very dark magic, with this premise.

Mookie, however, is a hack.

See, when it was first revealed that our heroic rapist is, well, a rapist basically every female character around got pretty fucking furious at him. I mean, if you found out one of your close friends is a rapist, how would you feel? But nevermind, they weren't actually angry at him, a demon poisoned their minds so they get angry at him.

A FUCKING DEMON MADE THEM PISSED AT THE RAPIST AND THEY LATER APOLOGISED FOR BEING MEAN TO HIM.

All the blame is subsequently put on the orc tribe. Admittedly blame does fall on them, but when it comes with the utter absolution of blame for the frickin' rapist, something just seems wrong.

And as a final punch in the uterus, the rape victim eventually addresses our heroic rapist as her husband.

I'm sure you see now why there are several dedicated hatedoms for DD and virtually no genuine fan community for it.

But hey, I'm drifting from our original comic of discussion, so let's get train back on the rails. The rape victim, Melna, naturally grew up to be a man-hating radical feminist. Does that sound kinda similar to a character in EGS? I'm not sure if it has been revealed yet in the latest nitpicking update, but surprise surprise it turns out Susan is a man-hating radical feminist because daddy left her. Don'tcha just love how male authors apparently only see abuse and abandonment by men as the sole reason for women to become feminists? You know, as opposed to caring about silly things like equal rights and the abolishment of stereotypes?

I guess I just haven't been sexually assaulted enough to be a proper feminist yet.

Ellen's mental gender identity is one of the worst parts of the comic. She's introduced as Elliot in a permanent female body, but never acts like it, never talks about it, never angsts about it and the other characters never mention it. The one time it does come up is when it is explained away by giving her her own memories of growing up.

My guess, she was planned as introduced, to keep both, male and female Elliot, but got taken over by Lesbian!!! and what Shive considers feminism in his writing.

edited 7th Dec '10 10:38:10 AM by eX

I came to despise Dominic Deegan before abandoning it, and even I think you're being kind of hard on it.

Nevertheless, this thread isn't about DD, it's about EGS. Which has less oracles and orc rape. I think.

@Noxi: We have not learned about Susan's father yet, but it's implied her mother probably is not a very happy camper. I don't think we get the actual reveal until after Painted Black.

@e X: I've got nothing. If I had to GUESS, I'd say Shive wasn't too sure WHAT Ellen was. At first he wanted her to be Elliot's duplicate, but then realized that having two characters with the same characterization would be rather...well, boring. Or at least, he thought it would be boring. It would leave many a group with only straight men and no main comic instigator. But, I honestly don't know why Shive did what he did. It feels strange, because I feel as if I am somehow SUPPOSED to know why, even though I have no business knowing so.

I guess it's because I have a need to be able to justify something. The only way I can really understand it is if I go back to ninth grade, where I was drawing my own bad comic, and I pretty much made it up as I went along. At some point or another I got the idea for my whole grand scheme, but by that point, a lot of the characters were rather flat, vague, or an obvious self-insert. I got the chance to do what Shive never was able to do, though. Rewrite it. I started a new draft. Set some characterization in that was not there before.

Shive never really had that chance to do that. I think that's what pretty much came back to bite him in the ass.

The one thing that puzzles me is that he has had a YEAR to think about this sort of thing. The early comics can be retconned easily into being comic fodder. But the once Ellen came about... But I want to step up and say I am basing him by my standards (I was doing a page a day, which was about 24 panels, and I had about 40 pages by the time I decided to re-do, so the actual formulating of the plot and setting of characters took about maybe two months tops, although I kept adding on as time passed, until I realized the comic really wasn't that great), so I'll let him pass.

But, enough of the vanity publishing, I have a blog to do. (Seriously, if I ever wax on too much about my self, just let me know.)

—

Strip 371

Content:

• I am not Susan. However, I don't think I could be convinced by Ellen if I was in one of my bouts of misogyny.
• The point of being prejudiced is that you let your biases come first, as opposed to what you perceive.
• Susan here, shouldn't be mentioning that guys are fine. She should be pointing out the wage gap, objectification in women in the movies, the stigma they receive in doing certain activities, and what else have you.
• Yes. Tedd has redeeming qualities. His parents are divorced. That totally makes him A-OK!
• It. Does not. Work like that.
• For example, in my schools, there is (or was):
  • A kid whose brother tried to kill him.
  • A kid whose family never gives him money for lunch and he has lots of other siblings, that I am fairly sure he has to take care of.
  • A kid that was on the fat side, and bullied by everyone. People were counting down the days until he moved to the highschool just so that someone could beat him up.
  • A kid who has a mother has a brain tumor and a completely rewritten personality and a father with anger issues.
  • And probably multiple others.
• Now, it would feel natural to feel sorry for ANY of these kids except for the fact that they are all the biggest fucking douchebags on this side of the east coast. Sure, they each have/had their friends, and the last kid is getting better, but the nasty stuff that happened to them does NOT justify the way they act.
• Even if it DOES justify the way they act, it can't be used as a crutch. It's the equivalent of trying to write people with mental disorders off with a free pass because they simply don't understand socialization. Just because you understand where they are coming from, or sympathize with where they are coming from, does not mean you should sympathize with where they currently are.
• So no, Tedd does NOT have a redeeming trait. At least, not in the sense that Susan would appreciate.
• Also, Ellen is just so TECHNICAL with her dialogue, it almost infuriates me more than Shive's shoddy logic.
• It reads like some pamphlet or textbook. It doesn't read like a teenager that's supposed to be the same girl that yelled "LETS SKINNY DIP!"
• Glaaarrrrgggg...I don't see why Ellen needs to be so all-knowing about this:
  • "You know, I don't really think I can help you with the whole...you-go-lesbian thing."
  • "Yes, but that's not the point. I mean, how guys do you know really well? Like, REALLY well?"
  • "And how many of them are evil dirt-headed jockfaces, or whatever you think they are?"
  • "Not all guys are jerks, and girls are just the same. If you wanna try and be gay, go ahead, but I'm not gonna help you just so you can go on pretending guys are all cavemen."
  • "...also, I can't really help you even if I wanted to. Venus-form exaggerates BOTH attractions, it doesn't just add."
  • "Basically, you're even MORE attracted to guys like this."
• There. I suck at dialogue, and I will be the first to admit it, but I think the following lines I gave conveyed the same meaning and kept it more casual. Of course, I am banking on the fact that I am better at this than Shive...heh. Guess it comes down to how y'all see it.

—

Strip 372

Art:

• ...why is Ellen's stomach so TINY?!?!
• Where'd all the hair go? BECAUSE! Wait...no...
• You know, the fact that Susan was wearing what amounts to a sports-bra to school, is rather creepy. Plus, hypocritical, since she seems to be rather condescending about sexual things.

Content:

• So, what did we learn from this? Nothing!
• Susan is still as prejudiced as ever, everyone else goes on passively accepting it, and that's about it! Whee!

—

Strip 373

Art:

• The art gag is a bit amusing, I will admit.

Content:

• Merph. Once again, I WTF at how Nanase managed to convince her mother this. She's supposed to be super strict right? I have semi-strict parents and they would never stand for that. I guess strict in a different way...or something. I dunno.
• My sister has an indian friend. She's not japanese, but she has the 'super-strict' parents thing going on, including the 'must get good grades' thing. You know what happened when my sister wanted to be friends with her (or, go places with her, at least)? She had to go over to the girl's house, and be INTERVIEWED by the father. He asked questions about her grades, and extra curricular activitis.
• Said indian girl is also constantly taken up by studying and what else have you.
• Hell, the asian parents who are LESS strict tend to still barge in at random times, and tell my friends to start studying, or do their homework, or do SOMETHING.
• If you're gonna stereotype asians, Shive, do it right, for the love of pete.
• Although, it MIGHT be justified if you consider the role the mother takes on later, but I still say this is bull shit.

—

Strip 374

Content:

• This is a rather well done joke, execution wise. The actual punchline is fairly predictable though. It does also show an interesting look into Nanase and Susan's relationship. They are a bit closer then one might think, in a way, and this is a nice way of showing that. Unfortunately, Susan is rarely treated as knowing Nanase, except when it becomes plot important.

—

Strip 375

Content:

• HOW DARE YOU YELL AT JUSTIN! THIS MUST BE IRRATIONALITY! IT CANNOT BE ANYTHING ELSE OH NO SIREE!
• For this hilarious gag, we'll reveal a character-trait that has never been referenced before and will never be referenced again! Well, it will be referenced again, only it will be completely different!
• Justin's line just kinda makes it worse.

—

Strip 376

Content:

• —facepalm—
• Wow. Wasn't that hilarious?

—

Strip 377

Art:

• The tree-gag would actually amuse me, if I was refusing to concentrate on that, and instead concentrated on the double standard in violence.

Content:

• If I have my facts straight, Ellen WAS originally supposed to be depressed, and even got into alcoholism or something.
• I don't know if there were any alcoholic references that I might have missed, but it makes sense if you look at the original execution of it.
• But, we can't have Ellen angst, that would make this story too DARK and UNREALISTIC, and then Shive couldn't make all his awesome JOKES.
• TT__TT Help...me...

—

Strip 378

Art

• Look at Susan in that first panel. If it wasn't obvious she was a total creeper before...

Content:

• "Inherited" some traits from Elliot? Shive...Shive I think you neglected to exposition on the one thing you would actually be FOCUSING on:
• How much of Ellen is Elliot in personality, emotionally, mentally and in spirit?
• Cause you seem to be all over the place with this.
• Also, I don't care HOW many traits you inherited from Elliot, you did that when the two of you were DATING. You have to have SOME form of social understandings, yes?

—

Strip 379

Art:

• What an odd face to make whilst watching movies, Ellen of fifth panel.
• And Justin's hair is even more spikier than normal, for some odd reason.

Content:

• Really now, Nanase? Then how do you know you're a lesbian, as opposed to just being attracted to one person? Single-Target Sexuality and all.
• OK, to be fair to Nanase, she might not really comprehend such things, but still...they haven't actually done anything together, except Nanase getting constantly annoyed by Ellen's cat-like activities. A real winning relationship.

—

Strip 380

Content:

• Shive, you imitating everything I distest in an ecchi manga does not endear you to me in any way.
• Justin is bound to take it all the wrong way. How. Because he likes Elliot? Because he's gay? Because he's been pestering you about the gheyness? WHAT?
• Lets say it's because she doesn't want him to go all "I told you so"
• Guess what? Susan has made it clear to you she thinks similarly.
• Is it because he likes Elliot? News flash, you were DATING Elliot. I don't think he would mind you dating the female version.
• Maybe it's because if she says "it's just the pheremones" Justin will get mad. If he does get mad over something as silly as that, he's not a very good friend, is he? Maybe you're friends of circumstance, I've been there. Of course, friends of circumstance tend not to drive each other everywhere and have sleep overs together.
• Basically, all in all, this really doesn't make any sense.
• WHY did it need to be Susan? Because Susan goes to the same school as Tedd, and thus is the only one that could have ANY possibility of knowing certain information.
• If only Nanase had just gone the girl route. As in "Susan's a girl, I'll tell Susan." Only more verbose. It would have made more sense, sort of.

—

edited 7th Dec '10 2:24:37 PM by MrAHR

'Taking it the wrong way' is probably a poor choice of words from Shive. I've always assumed it was due to the gay pestering, and Susan having a similar attitude to Justin is probably a minor case of Continuity Drift.

Yeah, yeah it was. But considering how she had said before that she would not be surprised if she walked in on the two of them kissing, and has shown a general lack of shame in insulting Nanase or making fun of her, I could see her still doing it even pre-continuity drift. So, even if I didn't have the comic strip, I prolly would have just gone with that.

edited 7th Dec '10 6:57:52 PM by MrAHR

261

• I really can not help but feel general creepiness with these strips. They come off as so unrealistic. So... fake.
• This was the same character that was so uncomfortable with being a woman that her sanity snapped and she was convinced that she was an evil twin.
• THANK YOU RULE 34 DATABASE! YAY!
• TEDD IS A PERVERT!
• EL GOONISH SHIVE PORN!◊

262

• First panel Justin is a short an fat midget.
• Why would they stand there for five minutes? Did it take five minutes to say those four lines?
• That garage is far to large for any house ever.
• Look at the gradient behind Justin, and compare it to the actual surroundings. It looks weird.

263

• The third panel is much more amusing than the last panel. Is there even a joke to the last panel? What? That she fell asleep? Why would she fall asleep on the tv?
• Dan, you spent ALL THAT TIME working on a picture of an angel in the first panel, so WHY COULD YOU NOT PUT ANY EFFORT INTO MAKING BACKGROUNDS?!
• Lovebirds? Why? Are Nanase and Ellen gonna get into a relationship or something?

264

• I don't know Justin. PERHAPS IT'S BECAUSE YOU DON'T TALK ABOUT ANYTHING BESIDES THE FACT THAT YOU ARE GAY.
• Of course Susan would like Justin. Because they've had such great chemistry already. Retardedness.

265

• No backgrounds. One gradient. Awesome.
• You've been in Susan's boat, Dan? Oh God, I can not tell you how much it would delight me to know that Dan Shive found a carbon copy of Grace, only for her to turn out to be gay. That would make me squeal with glee.
• She kinda looks like Charly, AHR. Just putting that out there. Savor it.
• Also, as it turns out, that pic from 262 isn't just a short fat Justin. Justin is just short and fat proportionally. What's up with that?

266

• SUPER KAWAII NYA DESU
• I hope the way Ellen was going to finish that sentence was "...because I have leukemia, and the chemo wares me out." I hate everyone in this comic.
• And I hate that Ellen-cat mess.
• I liek AHR though. Here's a picture of us.◊

267

• Wat.
• Why would she want to do that? Because of Justin? We couldn't just have one decent female character, Dan?! You're going to riddle her with insecurities in an attempt to make her appear "deep"?
• Who knows. Maybe I'm overreacting, and the reason makes sense. Let's see.

268

• BEHOLD! WHAT IT TRULY MEANS TO BE A WOMAN! TITS!
• GIGANTIC TITS! THEY MAKE PEOPLE BEAUTIFUL!

269

• I would find the Justin part funny if it were in any other comic, and if the character were less prominently gay.
• Speaking of which, while Shive is so eager to have a gay character, I don't suppose he ever actually, you know, shows Justin in a relationship, does he? Or is that too "yucky" for him?
• Also, I kinda like Susan's reaction shot. So all in all, in the grand scheme, this isn't a bad strip.

270

• Jeeze, you can't do that with hair! She's be yanking on it.
• And wait... Does Ellen's beam actually CHANGE the sexuality of the person? That's... Fucked up.

271

• How the fuck does Ellen know so much about this?
• And what redeeming qualities does Tedd have besides his parents being divorced?
• And wouldn't Susan have realized that she still didn't detest the thought of men?
• HATE COMIC CAKMAN HATE WEBCOMIC

272

• Does anyone really honestly believe that blonds are stupid?
• With that said, once again, Susan's flat reaction is nice. It's not over the top, and I can deal with it. Woot.
• Then again, though, why WOULD her hair go back to blond? Wouldn't the body just suck it back in, or however it pushed it out in the first place backwards?

273

• Hmm. Shive used "blonde" here, but my microsoft word spellcheck is telling me that it isn't a word, and that it is spelled "blond". What's going on here? It also says that "spellcheck" isn't a word either.
• Nanase has a dirty ass.
• LOLOLOL CATHOLIC SCHOOLGIRL
• Has Ellen's sexuality even been confirmed? I don't get it.

274

• UGH.
• Here's another old cliche. FUCKING FAIRLY ODD PARENTS USED THE "ANCHOVIES ARE YUCKY" BIT.
• What comes next? Decoding an Ovaltine code? IT IS SO FRIGGIN TIRING.
• Then again, maybe it's me. I don't think that El Goonish Shive was ever meant to be read in sets of 20 at a time. This is just torturous.
• And that headset is more inconvienient than anything. I could understand it in a car, but it's much easer to just pick up a phone and put it to your ear.
• Also...

"Guys, do you want me to order a pizza?" "Whatever, we don't care." "I already ordered a pizza." "Haha. You think about everything, Nanase."

275

• Once again, Is there ANYONE who is on the edge of their seat, melodramatically snapping their fingers and saying "DRAT! SHE WAS ALMOST ABOUT TO TELL US, TOO!" at the whole Ellen thing?
• The "carry on" line isn't bad, but Justin's follow-up is unnecessary, and just pointless.

Carry on.

276

• Wait, what? We didn't see the couch in the before pose. Did it, like, double in length? Is that it?
• If it is, that is sort of a joke. Sort of. But it is also pointless.
• And Justin's line serves to explain the non-joke.
• OMG THERE'S ONLY ONE BUTTON! WHAT DO YOU THINK HAPPENS IF YOU PUSH IT AGAIN?! It resets, you asshole.

277

• Those two are assholes. Why would they sit on a counter top when they know Nanase doesn't want them to?
• Speaking of which, these two◊ are assholes. They know that they don't like the webcomic. Why do they keep reading it?
• And that was a shitty explanation. Why were we put in non-suspense?

278

• ...What the fuck?
• SHIVE, WHY THE FUCK DO I UNDERSTAND YOUR CREATIONS MORE THAN YOU DO?! TO ELLEN, SHE IS ELLIOT. SHE HAS HIS MEMORIES. SHE DID NOT INHERIT THEM. SHE REMEMBERS GOING OUT WITH NANASE. GOD! IS FUCKING CONSISTENCY TOO MUCH TO ASK FROM HORSE SHIT!?
• Only two more. Jesus Christ, get this fucking over with.

279

• I bet Shive studied at the National Academy of Agricultural Research Management.
• Holy Shit, I see why people read this liveblog. Where else are you going to see such insightfull and razor-sharp wit like the previous sentence?
• Once again, (That seems to be my catch phrase for this liveblog) why not just say that they're watching a movie from the Shanghai series? Then it would be satire rather than nonsense.

280

• Joy to the world. The Lord has come. Until fucking tomorrow.
• And yet, I have nothing to add here, because AHR put it beautifully.
• Except for the fact that I despise chi- super-deformed El Goonish Shive even more than regular El Goonish Shive.

The horse has regularity problems.

—clicks egs porn—

--snorts--

And I think it enhances attraction to males. So it would only change sexuality if one was originally a straight male or a lesbian.

Blonde is feminine. Blond is masculine.

Ellen is bisexual, because the ray added an attraction to males to Elliot's heterosexualness.

Ohhhhhh.

Yeah. There's a lot of these edits then.

That isn't porn. That is EGS, if Shive would be honest with himself.

Daniel Shive is nothing if not classy.

edited 8th Dec '10 9:12:06 PM by Noxilicious

Well, to be fair, I think she's supposed to be coplaying as Risky Boots◊ from the Shantea series... But... You know what? You're absolutely right there is no need for that crap.

Blargle flargle I is tired =.=

Strip 381

Content:

• They've spent years in a semi-alliance, and they've never socialized. This is why I hate this comic. It lives in some sort of stagnant fuckfest until EXACTLY THIS POINT IN TIME WE WILL MOVE EVERYTHING NOT BACKSTORY RELATED NOW!
• And so Ellen does consider herself a male. Perhaps this would make more sense if she hadn't been acting in a way completely contrary to heterosexual male behavior up till this point.

—

Strip 382

Art:

• Freaked out Susan looks...weird.

Content:

• See, this encounter would make a LOT more sense if Ellen had informed Susan about the pheremones a couple minutes previously. But, since he doesn't, the following strip sounds like hackneyed bullshit.

—

Strip 383

Ugh. Think I'm getting sick.

Content:

• —el gaspade—
• WHAAAAT? NANASE? ACTUALLY ATTRACTED TO THE FEMALE SEX?!? INCONCEIVABLE O:
• This is not shocking. At all. The build up has been going on for too long for something as little as this to be a shocker. In fact, it would be a BIGGER twist if it WAS the pheremones.

—

Yeah, I'm really sick. Can't do much else. Sorry for the cruddy update. =.= Will try better tomorrow.

Hey guys, this sounds crazy, but I'm beginning to think that Nanase might not be totally straight.

I know it might be too early to tell, but bear with me.