#groundhog dave

[antialiasis]

Groundhog Dave, the 16k-word Morphic time loop extra, is finally up on TCoD. If you've been following this blog for a while, you may have seen me intermittently talk about it. Long story short, Dave is trapped in a time loop on the day of chapter 13, and we explore how he responds and unravels.

Content warnings: This is a whump fic. It features some strong violence including gun violence, suicide and suicidal thoughts, brief vomiting, a deluge of strong and demeaning language, consumption of alcohol, heavy emotional distress, existential horror, and a whole lot of children dying.

Some rambling below the cut about how it came to be and my favorite bits in it.

The first inkling of this story was when I saw someone in the Groundhog Day tag on Tumblr writing a Newsies time loop fanfic titled Groundhog Dave. I have never seen Newsies and have no idea who that Dave is, but I think of Morphic Dave every time I see the name, so instantly I pictured Dave in a time loop on the day of chapter 13, and I could not stop intermittently thinking about it. Eventually, I started writing it.

I don't remember the process of beginning to write it super well, but I remember waiting for a coach at Port Authority with Negrek after seeing the actual Groundhog Day musical and typing up the bit in the third iteration where Dave rages at God on my phone, which was definitely one of the earliest bits I thought of. I know that for a while, what I had written up in the document was the first four iterations and a bit: the original, the one that more or less spawns the Dave and Mia Discuss Family AU, the one where he snaps and gets himself killed, the one where he wakes up after that and decides he can experiment and figure this out, and the summary of his next few goes. I know the document was stuck there for a while, with intermittent tinkering and vague ideas but nothing really in the way of writing progress. On August 12th 2021, I posted in the Thousand Roads Discord about how I'd just written an entire NaNo day's worth of Groundhog Dave, and I'm quite sure there I was referring to the scene where Dave is at the hospital, fails to shoot himself to end the loop, and talks with Cheryl. In 2023, I started doing regular sprints working on it (thanks, Negrek), which was what finally got me past the finish line; before that, the document stood at about 8500 words, while it ended up at about 16500 (though with some bits and notes at the bottom).

The actual ending went through a series of iterations as I was working on it. My first idea for an ending for it was just a cruel, "He does finally fix everything and all the kids live, and then he goes to bed and wakes up in the canon timeline, because he cannot have nice things." This wasn't a super satisfying idea, of course, by itself. I went back and forth through various possibilities from there over the story's development time. At one point or another I considered different variations on whether he does manage to stay in a Better Timeline or whether he ends up back in the canon one at the end, how exactly the loop ends up breaking (initially I was genuinely thinking the loop would break one way or another once nobody dies and the Character Development would have to be leading up towards that, but later I realized it was actually tastier if he does manage it and the loop just keeps going anyway; the precise nature of the Character Development involved was also a bit back and forth), and whether the whole thing would be completely unexplained in the vein of Groundhog Day itself or if I would make more ambiguous use of Lucy's recurring penchant for being involved with bizarre supernatural happenings in non-canon extras.

I'm pretty satisfied with what I did end up with, at any rate. My first inkling of the Lucy thing was just sort of ending with ambiguous Lucy, and I wasn't sure that would really work, but it felt a lot more appropriate to actually do that once Lucy tied more into his overall character development - the couple of early iterations where he takes things out on her specifically as if it's her fault or she should have intervened, his general guilt about actually using her to intervene, the repeated conversations in the car where she manages to confront him at the right moment with why he's so mean, him managing to choose to let go and not be an ass to her in the final scene. I'm also pleased with what I landed on with the several different things happening for the first time in the final iteration: him actually mustering the ability to articulate how much he needs the kids for his life to be worth anything, and affirming that he'll keep doing it even if he'll never get to live in the good timelines, and being forced to confront the ways in which he's been cruel and unpleasant to the kids despite how much they mean to him and choose not to, and finally being able to express an honest vulnerable emotion to Jean, accept her offer for emotional support and ask her to stay up with him because he needs that. Something just feels a lot stronger to me about it with a greater degree of ambiguity about the end of the loop, no one single obvious switch that's the thing like someone was dutifully waiting for him to just say this one magic word. (Similarly, what exactly Lucy did in fact have to do with this, if anything, had to be ambiguous. The loop cannot be a concrete phenomenon with a clear singular cause, or it would have just felt wrong. I have realized I have strong feelings on when fiction should be deliberately ambiguous, not because there is a concrete truth that the author is arbitrarily concealing to force you to guess, but because one way or another establishing any concrete truth would detract or distract from the story being told.)

Some little things I enjoy in this story:

Dave's increasingly frazzled awakenings in the first few loops just really tickle me.

Him knocking on the door, then realizing Cheryl heard his sky-rant and just immediately turning around to go on an ill-advised suicide mission to the church rather than have to try to explain that to her amuses me greatly. What a timeline.

My favorite bit of said suicide mission is actually the bit where he's lying there dying and manages to spend that time being restlessly, angrily impatient about how long it's taking and grasping hard for some sense of satisfaction in having killed this stranger, without ever managing it. The most pathetic possible suicidal rampage of revenge.

The hospital bathroom scene is still my favorite scene in the whole thing. It presses my particular whump buttons extremely hard, and it's just extremely representative of Dave and his problems, him mercilessly bullying himself and Cheryl trying very genuinely to reach out to him and let him know he's not alone while he compulsively rejects it, adamant that he doesn't need anyone or anything even though he's acutely suffering, resenting her for it and shooting back at her efforts with pointless, uncalled-for sarcasm. It also has some of my very favorite lines: "There was a knock on the door and he lowered the gun quickly, like a kid caught playing with something he shouldn't," "What the actual fuck did she think he was doing in here," "Still there?" answered irritably with, "There's only one door. Do the math," when he came so, so close to not in fact still being there. So fond of it.

The offhand unelaborated upon mention that Dave has at one point or another read enough to not bungle a suicide by gunshot is extremely some precise button that I have.

I'm also deeply fond of the iteration where Gabriel dies. Dave tries so hard to force himself to decide he can live with that and just decidedly does not succeed. I enjoy him sitting there irritably thinking maybe they should have just done this in the first place when the others attempt to safely reach the police, silently pretty much convinced that would have been a better idea and thinking all this could have been avoided (but without actually consciously admitting to having been wrong, of course), only to immediately go, "He'd always known this was a bad idea. Why'd he even fucking let them?" when the consequences come knocking. You fucking let them because you thought it was probably a good idea at the time, Dave.

I really enjoy how much Dave cares about the kids, can't not care about the kids, while most of the kids have a hard time grasping how much he cares because he's so persistently Like That. Loved to write the multiple times Jack viciously accuses him of not caring about Gabriel, and the way Dave's idea of disabusing him of the notion is just to be an asshole to him, because he's incapable of expressing sincere emotional sentiment. Lucy, similarly, keeps probing him about what he's going to do if the loop doesn't stop, and he just keeps answering in evasive, defensive irritation as if she's challenging him somehow, until he finally manages to realize that no, she was worried that if his efforts wouldn't end the loop he might just stop bothering. (Only then he's finally been driven far enough to actually manage a smidge of emotional honesty.)

Similar recurring horrible dramatic irony I enjoyed: Dave hates Jean's evolved form so, so horribly much when it's just a hypothetical manifestation of Something Horrible Happening To Her that he's trying to stop and not what his daughter really looks like. One of the things that only quite felt right when I'd finally landed back on him ending up in the canon timeline was that he then actually has to confront the cruelty of that with himself and affirm his unconditional love for her, instead of being 'rewarded' with the cuter, unevolved Jean.

I always get a kick out of how relatively easily Dave in nonsenscial situations just slides from adamant atheism into antitheism without a pause. He's perfectly genuine about thinking God doesn't exist, of course, but there is a level on which he kind of wants him to, just so he can face him and walk backwards into Hell, and as a result you get these situations where he sort of entertains the idea far more easily than he rationally should given his priors. The yelling at God about why he isn't curing malaria instead of whatever this is is pretty unique to the very particular mental state he's in on that iteration, but the multiple times he offhandedly thinks maybe this is literally Hell are total nonsense in his professed belief system but nonetheless a place where his mind is just inclined to go.

Meanwhile, I also enjoy the bit where Mia gets him to contemplate that he might be experiencing proof that souls exist - but he's less willing to entertain that in the same way because it doesn't have the same emotional valence for him, so it's not something that properly occurred to him before that, and then he just throws up his hands and moves on.

Thanks if you read it! I would love to hear any thoughts on it.

[oldschoolfrp]

Happy Groundhog Day!

Dave Manak from Plop! #22, 1976. Plop! Was DC Comics’ “magazine of weird humor” in the mid-1970s, featuring gross-out art by Basil Wolverton and contributions from Mad/Groo artist Sergio Aragonés.

[tomorrowusa]

A reminder that Friday February 2nd is Groundhog Day.

If Trump sees his shadow, we're in for nine more months of demented rantings powered by Diet Coke®, amplified by Republican grovelers, and facilitated by Russian bots.

[spilladabalia]

The Fall - Junk Man

[julio-viernes]

¿Música y matemática? Pues ahí está, ¡TRACATRÁ! Sobre todo en el arranque de la primera parte de "Long Piece No.3" de Egg, la larga pieza, como su título indica, que ocupa toda la cara B de su segundo LP "The Polite Force" (Deram, 1970).

[greensparty]

This Month in History - February

Quite a few pop culture anniversaries to celebrate this month:

Feb. 1, 2013: Sound City opens

In Feb. 2013 Dave Grohl’s doc about the legendary recording studio was released. Here is my piece I wrote in 2018. Happy 10 SC!

Feb. 3, 1998: Yield released

In Feb. 1998, Pearl Jam’s 5th album was released. Here is my piece I wrote in 2018. Happy 25 Yield!

Feb. 5, 1988: She’s Having a Baby opens

In Feb. 1988, John Hughes’ underrated adult comedy was released. Here is my piece I wrote in 2018. Happy 35thh SHAB!

Feb. 10, 1978: Van Halen released

In Feb. 1978, the debut album from Van Halen was released. Here is my piece I wrote in 2018. Happy 45th VH!

Feb. 12, 1993: Groundhog Day opens

In Feb. 1993, one of the great Harold Ramis / Bill Murray collaborations was released. Here is my piece I wrote in 2018. Happy 30th GD!

Feb. 14, 2008: Definitely, Maybe opens

In Feb. 2008, the rom-com I worked on in the art dept. was released on Valentine’s Day. Here is my piece I wrote in 2018. Happy 15th DM!

Feb. 15, 1978: Coming Home opens

In Feb. 1978, Hal Ashby’s streak of gems continued with this war movie (or anti-war depending on how you look at it) about a love triangle between a paraplegic Vietnam vet (Jon Voight), a volunteer at the VA hospital (Jane Fonda) and her marine husband (Bruce Dern). I’d rank this up there with Best Years of Our Lives among the best movies about vets returning from war to civilian life. Ashby had so much to say and the cast was all at the top of their game. Happy 45th Coming Home!

Feb. 22, 1993: Pablo Honey released

In Feb. 1993, Radiohead’s debut was released. Here is my piece I wrote in 2018. Happy 30th PH!

Feb. 22, 1998: Ray of Light released

In Feb. 1998, Madonna’s 7th studio album was released. There’s different stages of Madonna as she has always reinvented herself, but this was her greatest album IMHO. After having her first child, much of this album reflects that, realizing a change in her outlook, and a newfound spiritualism too. She’s always played with dance music, but here she went for electronic and techno even moreso. It’s got some really impressive songs that still hold up. Happy 25th ROL!

Feb. 25, 1973: Billion Dollar Babies released

In Feb. 1973, the 6th album from Alice Cooper was released. This stands as one of my favorites. I was at a record convention when I picked up the rare vinyl that included the dollar bill poster inside. So many gems on this album. It’s one of my favorites from Alice! Happy 50th BDB!

Feb. 26, 1993: El Mariachi opens

In Feb. 1993 after some film festival screenings, Robert Rodriguez’s feature film debut opened theatrically. He made this film for $7,000 and it ended up grossing over $1 million. It also began his Mexico trilogy, followed by Desperado and Once Upon a Time in Mexico. Along with low-budget indies from that era like Slacker, Clerks and Brothers McMullen, this was a highly influential film for me. Rodriguez’s book Rebel Without a Crew about the making of this film, was also quite inspirational. But the film itself is very action oriented and fast moving to the point where the viewer isn’t even paying attention to the budget or the lack of movie stars. You’re just sucked into this Western and the mysterious guitar case. Rodriguez has made some great films since then (From Dusk Till Dawn and Planet Terror for example), but this one was one of those “I can do this too” moments for me as a filmmaker. Happy 30th El Mariachi!

Feb. 28, 1983: War released

In Feb. 1983, U2′s third album was released. Here is my piece I wrote in 2018. Happy 40th War!

[thewertsearch]

One can make either true statements or false statements about reality. All of the statements I make are true.

One can make true or false statements about reality, but those aren’t the only options. ‘This sentence is false’ and 'lies are not funny' are examples of statements which are neither.

You proceeded to question me believing you understood the purpose of the Scratch. You received your information about it from trolls. I assure you that in most ways, the trolls are as confused about everything as you are.

Confused she may have been, but Aradia got her Scratch lore from Sburb's own NPCs. Doc's plans run deep, but he can't have been manipulating every Consort on LOQAM.

Maybe the Sburb NPCs she was talking to are simply mistaken in their understanding of the Scratch. It might be a phenomenon which looks like a spacetime rift, but functions completely differently.

TT: What exactly does the Scratch do, then? It resets the game.

It resets the game.

...like, completely? Are we going to Groundhog Day right back to John's original entry, with all our memories intact? I have no idea what that'd mean for the trolls, interwoven as they are into the kids' session - but either way, the possibility of a full reset for John & co. is amazing news.

It would be fascinating to see the kids taking another shot at Sburb, armed with all their accumulated knowledge. They'd be starting from a much better position, and we could sidestep mistakes like Jack's ascension before they happen. We'd be seeing new prototypings, new alchemy, and potentially more God Tier ascensions. Terezi did say that Dave was only locked out of God Tier before the Scratch, and I think I'm beginning to understand what she means. A lot of possibilities we've long since given up on have just been placed back on the table.

The elephant in the room, of course, is the Alpha Timeline. Changing the past should doom us all, so what's our loophole? I guess we could just transport the Players to a freshly generated session, without any time travel - but I personally don't think that's what's happening here. The Scratch is Time-themed for a reason.

TT: We all start from the beginning again? When John entered? No.

...oh.

Welp, that's another theory that didn't survive the brooding caverns.

The release of temporal energy will be quite massive. This is a hard reset. It will reboot the conditions in your universe well before you began playing the game. You will have lived different lives after the reset. The different initial conditions will ideally lead to a more favourable scenario in the new session.

I guess Scratch has a point. The kids' prior lives were heavily influenced by events in their session. Hell, Jade killed her Grandpa with a gun that wouldn't even exist if John's Veil trip had gone differently. Even the Frog Tem-

...oh, no.

Even Bec could be Scratched.

Now. If I'm an omniscient, malevolent First Guardian, and I'm making some edits to a universe, what's the most effective change I could make? What's the best way to ensure that it serves my purposes?

Well, it would be pretty useful if I were in the universe, shaping it as I did Alternia - but my impending death might put a damper on that plan.

Alright, then. If I can't the the one to shape this universe, the next best thing would be an entity of comparable power - one who is as loyal to my master as I am.

And I know exactly how to make that happen.

Even Bec could be Scratched.

Literally.

[thewebcomicsreview]

Hate to tell you this, but the HSBC update just got updated.

I get that they wanted to keep the Hell Arc confined to page 666, and it'll make the archival experience pretty cool, but hard refreshing the site didn't let me see the update to the page due to cache bullshit, I had to use a different browser. So let's liveblog now before it breaks again:

Looks like we're back to Tavros. I guess it makes sense that the first path to update would the one where they could reuse the talksprites.

So, as directly stated by Davepeta, Vriska is trapped in a time loop, where Tavros doesn't remember anything that happened the previous day, just like in the movie Groundhog Day. That Davepeta called out the movie explicitly in-universe as the reference makes me wonder if events will follow the rough plot of that movie. It's clearly what Davepeta wants to happen, but...Vriska....

Anyway, Vriska offers to let Tavros decide what to do today, for the first time. It took two whole years for her to try that, but she is the Thief of Light and not letting anyone else decide what to do is literally her cosmic role and stuff, so I guess that tracks. And what Tavros wants to do is....play a game.

Last update I said that Vriska saying she's done some things wrong while shrugging and laughing is the ultimate distillation of Vriska, but her having won everything and being miserable about it is also the ultimate distillation of Vriska. She's a woman of contrasts, that Vriskers.

The use of the phrase "session" here outs this line as having Deeper Meanings. Having SBURB sessions over and over so we can play forever is literally Dirk's plan, and most of the fandom is assuming a Candy session is coming.

So, even though they're talking about playing FLARP (the troll DnD game, which is apparently PvP), this is also an argument over whether or not Homestuck should continue. You can't really "win" if the game keeps going, but that doesn't mean you're stuck doing the same thing over and over.

I know Vriska is Problematique, but I'm still taken aback by her 2000s kid usage of "gay" as a general-purpose insult, and not just because trolls don't have a concept of "straight" or "gay". Apparently she doesn't even know what it means and learned the word from Da-

Oh, it was just to set up this line for people to screenshot. Alright. Fine.

brb, gotta go post this in the hard to use reaction images channel on the discord and have someone complain it's easy to use.

Tavros accuses Vriska of projecting her own fears onto him, and then gets into a tangent about being a "soft" female fairy and Vriska takes him up on playing this new "game for girls" and he panics and changes the subject. There's a...lot....going on there.

Vriska starts to have an actual breakthrough, when suddenly Aradiabot appears. Wait, is this where Aradia and Ult!Dave went?

We fade to black and I thought that was it, but apparently not. This being a visual novel makes it feel like a much bigger update than it is, and also kind of makes you read each line a bit more carefully. It's a good way of having multiple meaty (or, um, candy-y) updates in a short stretch of time, and that's kind of an important part of the "feel" of Homestuck that no one can really replicate.

Oh, I do not care for this talksprite.

The downside of this format is that it's harder to liveblog, I think, but basically Aradia is complaining about the Vriska Cycle of "Do bad thing, self-flagellate to be redeemed, repeat".

Vriska justifies it because she has to take action and set people straight and stuff, and if this conversation/game isn't leading to the return of "(Vriska)", the OG timeline Vriska who died and got a ton of character growth before post-retcon Vriska stole her girlfriend, then what is it building towards?

A lot of these lines make good single-panel memes. Yes, Vriska, you are the problem in nearly every situation, even (especially) when you're also the solution.

Aradia sa- oh for fuck's sake this is unreadable, guys. Anyway she says that getting into a routine leads to stagnation and slow death, which, mood, but also is about Homestuck itself as much as it is about Vriska.

Jesus Christ, how long is this update? This page is a full on Pesterquest game when the other five routes are finished.

Oh, okay. That's it. Vriska levels and we get a bunch of fire-themed pun ranks for her, of which Skinner's Bane is the best

[divineerdrick]

Homestuck: Beyond Canon Upd8 for July 23, 2024

Alright! We've got a new Upd8, and apparently it's a doozy! As usual, we'll start with the news post first!

Oh! There's a vod of the SAHcon panel. Might have to look that up.

James mentions a "big flash," and wants to give the team a break before either they start work on it or they drop it (wasn't sure here). I'm all for this. I don't want this team to burn out. Apparently there's progress on the plush, but James isn't telling us yet because it might not make it into the final version. Other than that, it's just this upd8. They're planning on more like it, so this won't be the only one of this style.

And what is this style?

It's a freakin' visual novel is what!

Looking at the options we have some basic VN selections, including options for skipping text. We have a History panel, which hopefully will allow us to go back to prior choices. We can also save and load. We don't have an option for full screen, so that's a little frustrating. But otherwise, away we go!

Yay! New talk sprites!

Absolutely love this one!

Oh man! Tavros got sucked into this too? Or is this some sort of construct or projection?

Oh wow. Vriska's trying to reconcile and every time she gets a prompt, she comes up with something else awful she did to him. I'd say we could be here a while, but I'm pretty sure she's going to lose patience soon.

"Hours later, but not many." Or we do that XD

Vriska doesn't get that the patterns that lead her here are the problem. She doesn't understand that being "an expert on this revenge thing," is part of the problem. The problem was that she was always trying to force Tavros to conform to some image of strength she had for him in her head, and used only the methods that she thought made her strong. That is, when she wasn't just losing her patience and doing something out of spite and anger.

Just as she thought she made things square with him before, she's not listening to him now. She's still never gotten that her failure to help Tavros wasn't Tavros's fault. It's always been her fault for not trying to understand who Tavros was and what he needed. By trying to help Tavros get revenge on her, she's just repeating the pattern again.

"Before I screw your life up," wow, I think she might have just had a genuine realization there! That's what she needs, though she still needs to understand why. She needs to understand why she did it, and why it caused Tavros so much suffering.

"Kill me." Oh wow. We've literally been exactly here before. How can she not realize that it didn't work then, and it's not going to work now!

"TAVROS: nO, i LOVE TO RUN AND, i DO NOT PLAN ON STOPPING, aNY TIME SOON,"

Ouch.

"Thief: Do the right thing."

Oh this is so not going to be the right thing.

Wow. She looks way too happy to have gotten Tavros to kill her. She is so not going to be happy when this almost certainly doesn't turn out to have worked.

Yep! That sure looks like we're back where we started! Respawn time!

Yay! Davepetasprite^2 talk sprites!

'Nother Vriska talk sprite. Is this a look from her past we haven't seen yet?

Hah! Groundhogs Day reference.

Sorry Davepeta, you can't help but make that innuendo sexual. It is your nature. Well half your nature.

Oh wow! When they said, Year 2, they weren't depicting a second point in the time frame. Vriska has been at this for over a year! "welcome to hell"

Whatever problems Dave and Nepeta respectively had, they just can't relate to the twisted mindset Vriska adopted to survive on Alternia.

"purrppets and then theres pawppet33rs" That one took me a while.

I think Davepeta just admitted that both Dave and Nepeta prefer to follow and let someone else be in control of things. No wonder Dave put up with so much of Jade's constant desires to form a stable polycule. I think I'll have some more to say about this later. Might even put it in a separate post.

Oh! Well that's that I guess! Might as well talk about this "panel" then.

So let's start with this. I do not believe in "leaders" and "followers". I think that's such a false dichotomy, that it barely deserves commentary. I think at best you can say that a person would be more likely to take charge, follow along, do there own thing, or disengage under sociologically normal circumstances. Already, that's four potential responses verse two, and these only apply under each person's "normal."

But even if we break it down to just "leaders" and "followers", Homestuck has already broken that dichotomy plenty of times. Take our beloved nub horned ball of of anger. Karkat presents at the beginning of Act 5 as a "leader." He was even somewhat good at it by Vriska's own admission. But Karkat was never happy as a "leader." He was doing it because he felt he had to. Being an exceptional bloodthirsty Troll warrior wasn't going to be good enough for him to avoid getting culled. He needed power, fear, and respect. He needed to be a "leader."

But once everything was over and he was given the chance to relax, he abandoned the role and was all the more happier for it. Pre Game Over, he wasn't particularly happy but he seemed less miserable than he did in game. And most of his anxiety revolved around not knowing where he stood with Dave and Terezi. Post Game Over he seems to have practically thrived. Letting Vriska, Rose, and Terezi handle all the planning and organization allowed him to finally enjoy life for once.

But now on Candy Earth C, he's a "leader" again. While he seems to be delegating a lot to Meenah, he's still the one everyone looks to. And while I can't say our beloved Knight of Blood is thriving, he's definitely much more comfortable as a "leader" now.

So all of that being true, has HSBC made any case for any character being a "leader" or "follower"?

But let's assume the premise and say Davepeta is correct. I think Nepeta can be said to be a "follower" in such a dichotomy. Even when it upset her, she still went along with Equius's wishes. But I would still stress she didn't exactly get a lot of screen time. We never got to know how Nepeta might have developed as a character over a full Homestuck run.

But what about Dave? Does Homestuck depict Dave as a "follower"? We definitely have plenty of examples of Dave going along with the plans and wishes of others. But I feel like we have far more examples of him taking initiative, doing his own thing, or even refusing to go along with a plan. Dave didn't want to play SBURB. Dave ignored Jade's advice to let the Crow hatch the egg. While he followed Terezi's plan, he eventually needed a break and basically broke with her after they finished the time loop. When Jade needed help, he acted on his own to get her situated in the game. He didn't like Rose's plan and refused to let her be the one to sacrifice herself when it seemed like that was the only option. He refuses to go along with Karkat's plans to try and setup quadrants with Terezi. In Game Over, he jumps into the fray to try and placate and then fend off Jack and PM. In Collide he takes the lead roll in the Strife at several points, including being the one to land the killing blow. Even Davepeta, as Vriska points out, was the one that secured victory against Lord English.

I think at most, what can be said is that normally Dave prefers to go with the flow. As he puts it, "maybe id rather just be like the dave of guy." This is one of those places where again, I have to ask if Homestuck has ever depicted a "leader/follower" dichotomy. Dave really seems happiest when he's just being Dave doing Dave things. Given a fully informed choice, Dave might have done everything he could have to avoid the SBURB session taking place. He stayed on the sidelines as things went to shit on Earth C, even as Karkat was looking to him for help. I just don't see Dave as a "follower."

That doesn't mean he has any angle to relate to Vriska. But for being an enlightened Sprite^2, I don't think Davepeta's take is a good one.

[codywiththeladies]

Assigned animals for my au. TDI I realized I had a majority already and I came up with the ROFI cast like a few days ago? From RR, I only had Dwayne and Junior figured out but the rest I figured out today. Also no reboot characters bc I haven’t even watched it yet

TDI:

Owen: bear

Justin: white tiger

Cody: red squirrel

Courtney: Birman cat

Gwen: hyena

DJ: goat

Lindsay: spotted deer

Tyler: beagle dog

Izzy: poodle

Noah: spaniel dog

Trent: groundhog (9 letters)

Harold: caribou deer

Beth: beaver

Heather: Dobermann

Leshawna: panther

Ezekiel: raccoon

Duncan: wolverine

Sadie: hedgehog

Katie: porcupine

Geoff: golden retriever dog

Bridgette: otter

Eva: Siamese cat

TDWT:

Alejandro: lion

Sierra: maned wolf

TDROTI:

Mike: monkey

Scott: roof rat

Dakota: horse - alicorn

Cameron: holland lop bunny

Dawn: Florida white rabbit

Lightning: carpathian shepherd

Zoey: red panda

Staci: pig

Anne Maria: lemur

B: seal

Sam: sheepdog

Brick: ferret

Jo: wolf

TDPI:

Max: chinchilla

Amy: opossum

Sammy: opossum

Leonard: raven

Sky: snowy owl

Topher: servai cat

Scarlette: red fox

Shawn: singapura cat

Sugar: pony

Beardo: american black bear

Ella: flamingo

Dave: dachshund

Jasmine: emu

TDRR:

Junior: roborovski dwarf hamster

Dwayne: Meerkat

Kitty: burmese cat

Emma: burmese cat

Josee: lynx

Jacques: arctic fox

Ellody: barred owl

Mary: grey parrot

Tom: llama

Jen: hare

Lorenzo: capybara

Chet: mink

Rock: badger

Spud: skunk

Laurie: camel

Miles: donkey

Kelly: caracal

Taylor: bobcat

Devin: border collie

Carrie: silver fox

Stephanie: jackal

Ryan: bull

Brody: sea lion

Jay: armadillo

Mickey: armadillo

Ennui: coyote

Crimson: wolf

Pete: gopher

Gerry: mongoose

Tammy: lamb

MacArthur: German shepherd

Sanders: Labrador retriever

[time-traveler-tourney]

And here we have it! 32 Time Traveling contestants who are ready to give their all!

The Battles on the left side will start on the 28th and the right side on the 30th of March, both at 10:00pm!

So, as long as you can’t hop through the passage of time yourself, stay tuned!

And our travelers are:

The Doctor (Doctor Who)

Henry Stickmin (Henry Stickmin)

Homura Akemi (Madoka Magica)

Max Caulfield (Life is Strange)

Silver the Hedgehog (Sonic the Hedgehog)

The Chrono Trigger Group (Chrono Trigger)

Ingo (Pokémon)

Jayfeather (Warrior Cats)

Bunnyx (Miraculous)

Cavendish and Dakota (Milo Murphey‘s Law)

Jack and Annie (The Magic Treehouse)

Casey Jones jr (Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles)

Grovyle (Pokémon Mystery Dungeon)

Galacta Knight (Kirby)

Artemis Fowl (Artemis Fowl)

Nadia Vulvokov (Russian Doll)

Doc and Marty McFly (Back to the Future)

Number 5 (The Umbrella Academy)

Dave Strider (Homestuck)

James T. Kirk (Star Trek)

Link (Legend of Zelda)

Phil Connors (Groundhog Day)

Time Keeper Cookie (Cookie Run)

Celebi (Pokémon)

Claire Foley (Professor Layton) (My Pick) (Please vote for her)(thanks)

Sissel (Ghost Trick)

Sam Becket (Quantum Leap)

Yoo Joonghyuk (Three ways to survive in a ruined world)

Bill Preston and Ted Logan (Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure)

Lilith Clawthorne and Luz Noceda (The Owl House)

Brainstorm (Transformers)

Frisk (Undertale)

[shitty-davesprite-daily]

love u davesprite go king go

TG: see this is the type of shit you should be sending me

TG: not the insanity i find in my askbox every day like some torn up bird the cat dragged onto the front doorstep

TG: like cmon man im gonna step on that shit. you know i am i can tell from your smug little eyes every time you watch me do it

TG: its like my own personal hell

TG: every morning i wake up thinking today might be it. today might be the day i finally make it outside with my foot clean of sin and bird guts

TG: and then every day im proven wrong in some nightmarish groundhog day type bullshit

TG: 'but dave why dont you just step out of the way? if you know its going to be there cant you avoid it?' i hear you ask

TG: trust me

TG: i hear you

TG: and all your idiotic insane bullshit you leave in my inbox

TG: (not you guy i just replied to youre cool)

TG: im cursed to constantly hear everything you say its just another carefully designed part of my own personal hell to make me finally lose it for good in the next thirteen years

TG: but until that day comes i have no choice but to commit

TG: sure i could dodge the bird

TG: but what kind of message does that send? it just means ive accepted my fate. ive acknowledged that stepping on a bird every morning is just a part of my routine now.

TG: it means im going out of my way to change my behaviour. it means ive given up

TG: it means the cat wins

TG: and fuck that bullshit

TG: stepping on the bird every morning is a rebellion

TG: its a sign that i havent given up hope

TG: one day my torment will end and my foot will finally be clean

TG: and until then ill keep spraying the cat with water every morning and itll keep fucking off for the rest of the day until i go to sleep

TG: and the dance begins again

TG: also making a bird step on a bird? pretty fucked up. borders on a hate crime im gonna be so real

TG: if birds are a protected class anyway

TG: which they should be

TG: fuck killing the bird is even more of a fucked up thing to do then

TG: what the fuck dude

[shmreduplication]

Pirates of Penzance good and has a happy ending :)

Literally the Groundhogs Day of pirate media, just as every timeloop story since Groundhogs Day has been informed by it, every pirate media since Pirates of Penzance has been informed by it

I wanted a sad ending cleanser after Assassins and Girl From The North Country before seeing Fiddler next week and I didn't expect it to be about a Father With A Bunch Of Daughters Who Are Of Marrying Age, just like Tevye and Mr Bennet

Also one of Sondheim's Sondheimisms is having a fast list song (like Not Getting Married Today from Company and Franklin Shepherd Inc from Merrily) which has gotten Tonys for those parts multiple times (Dan Radcliffe just got his this year for that part in Merrily) and the most famous song in Pirates is Modern Major-General, the fast list song of the show, which i didn't know because it's the only song i heard from the show before watching the whole thing today

In Hamilton, George Washington gets to reference it directly, calling himself the very model of a modern major general, but that musical is so fast that Washington slows down the song to underline the reference. For all of Lin-Manuel Miranda's love of Sondheim, he writes all his songs too fast that he has a difficult time emulating that Sondheimism (not for lack of trying, LMM wrote some lines for Daveed Diggs that are faster than LMM can say them but Diggs is a faster rapper. But select lines aren't a whole song)

Anyway my point is Pirates of Penzance is very silly and has a secure part in musical and pirate history

[technologicallytailored]

February 1st - Server Room

I am logging the reports from last night and as I do Dave has slipped into the hub. I asked him what was keeping him up enough for him to walk all the way across the city. He mentioned he had to find a Groundhog.

I had to look up what that was. We already had several pigs that reside on the ground. I did not know there were different types.

He said no. Then let this oversized rodent scamper through the breakroom!

He pulled it from another timeline, so the poor thing is shaken. I guess it is for a ceremony tomorrow morning.

Dave explained this was a ceremony involving groundhogs who will pop out of their respective hole in the ground. If they see their shadow, this dictated six more weeks of winter. If not, the spring will come early.

... This is not a logical way to tell the change of seasons.

[antialiart]

A Lucy, inspired by Groundhog Dave.