Teenage Sith Apprentice

This is another thing that developed in April. It's based on Anne's discovery of the fact that Ava is really, really easy to guilt. . . and so Anne used that to con Ava into basically pulling Anne's weight for her. It didn't go so well for Ava, that's why Rachel had to bail her out. Ava was trying to support two college students on one part time minimum wage worker's salary. Or she was working nights and schooling days, which did pay the rent but didn't quite cover anything else and certainly wasn't good for her health. This would grow into a huge guilt complex which would come to define Ava's character. After months of holding out, Anne is finally starting to mess her up.

Another quick explanation of a character from late April 2019: Hubris is a bit player character who is named Hubris because she thinks of herself as the scum of the earth. Yes, I do know what that word actually means. Unnecessary line of text to provide a break between two unrelated comics. So pretty much a school version of the time Anne got lost in the Death Star. If you pay real close attention to the look on Ava's face, Anne, you might notice she's about to "get riled" again. Or maybe she just never calmed down.

Ava's my favorite character by a pretty long shot. Does it show? Anne really enjoyed being the center of attention (for all her continuous grousing about how I only ever chronicle her most embarrassing moments). Does it show? Is this a little hard to read? It's my actual handwriting. BTW, I forgot a piece of Rachel story that took place in April 2019 (you know, the comics I briefly lost the second half of) that probably needs to be explained right now. At some point in April 2019, Rachel found out that Ava was in financial crisis and running herself into the ground (working 120 hour weeks, sleeping only on the Sabbath, barely eating) trying to repair the damage. At that point I had to do some authorial intervening on Rachel's part to make the next part work. . . I had Rachel basically bail Ava out of her debt and offer Ava a place to live at a price Ava wouldn't have to go into debt for. (By which I mean Rachel rented out a couple of beds at her

These comics are sorta great. . . I mean, they're easy to write and they're hilarious. But they don't hold particularly true to the rest of Anne's character. . . I have plans for her Sith skills to improve sooner of later. (Probably later.) See, this is the kind of comic that plays well into Anne's character. Anne is clever. Or supposed to be. Y'know, I try to write my characters as not Mary Sues. . . because often they need to be pretty screwed up to be funny. But so far, I only have the one character whose handicap makes any sense. Anne is a very clever girl, so why can't she figure out the Force and dueling? Ava is a genius, so why can't she add two and two? (I gave her an exotic, probably imaginary disability to deal with that question. But then I have to beat any audience over the head with that fact, because without it, Ava's math incapability makes zero sense.) Only Rachel's drawback makes any sense whatsoever. And s

In Calvin, A Novel , the protagonist asks Bill Watterson for a comic of Calvin, age seventeen, sane, and without Hobbes. (Read the book and you'll find out why.) Well, this isn't exactly it, but it's fairly close. . . although there are some very good arguments going against Anne's sanity. Anne's at her best when she acts most like Calvin. Sorta like how the strip as a whole is best when I pay no attention to the rules of reality. . .

The "DT" stands for "Darth Tochter." Vader in Darth Vader means Father in German, and Tochter is German for "daughter" (since I'm neither an adult nor male). It was my first pick for a pseudonym (Darth Tochter, that is.) This was one of my better comics - one where I just threw reality to the wind and mocked myself in purely ridiculous fashion. The emperor is a little worried about Anne's hanging around with Ava. Can you tell? I mean, he tolerates Ava because he knows there's very little chance of Anne getting a serial killer for a roommate,  but, geez, did Ava have to be a religious Jedi? And heaven forbid that he find some symbol that Anne's considering converting to Ava's religion. I mean, the sixth commandment alone (thou shalt not kill) would throw a huge wrench into his plans for Anne. . .

I now only have 7.51 months out of 18 of backlog left. What I have now consists of comics August 2019 through comics April 2020, with half a month's worth of April comics I never got around to posting. (I lost them, actually.) I'll be putting up the April comics when Ava is reintroduced, which, as it turns out, doesn't happen until September. You know, it's funny. . . I used to try and cast Ava as the optimist because she's on the Light Side. But her comeback comic was all about cynicism, and most of her jokes feature either her pessimism or her guilt issues. Anyway, here we go. August 2019. For some reason, identity theft is pretty easy to joke about. I'm not really sure what sets it apart as an amusing crime. I guess a holdup can be kinda goofy, too ("Give us all your money." "You expect me to take you seriously when you're wearing a bandana with little lollipops all over it?"), but identity theft is uniquely hilarious.

I don't know why I didn't carry this comic further by one panel: ANNE: Is this your revenge for me driving away all your customers? ME (literally drawn in there as a character): YUCK. You're going a bit far, sir. . . there's only so much Sith magic can do! Catherine - the winged girl - was four months old when I wrote this. Apparently even an infant isn't gullible enough to fall for that pitch.  Yeezh. . . 

This one was the result of me writing way too much "Avatar: The Last Airbender." I may also have been writing this at four am.  OK, fine, I know I wasn't. But it looks very much like the product of sleep deprivation and too much TV. 

This joke isn't mine. I was reading Psychology for Dummies and the author quoted some movie as having done almost exactly this.