I Mean, Maybe

Marten, on the other hand, might turn out to have been carefully guided into place as a kind of human seed crystal around whom small, tolerant, thriving micro-communities would tend to form.

"Dallas" style. The whole world WAS in fact a sim to help Hannalore learn. And by that, I mean Hannalore is the next gen Cyborg, hybrid AI created by her dad. After meeting her Mom, can you really believe she would decide to have a child other than as a DNA donor (I guess she could use a surrogate)? Tortura is an AV designed to remove bad code. Note how spooky said there were very specific limits on the actions they could take. They may be involved in the creation of the sim and would allow them to "spawn" into the sim where ever they wanted.

Jim Feldman

I am not sure he would ever want to stop, after all it is his literal paying job. We as readers have been really open to letting him take the comic wherever he likes creatively. Robots, AI, new minor characters turning into majors, old major characters disappearing, all have been ok.

Ronald Stimbert

I would rather see it go on forever, maybe winding up about different people altogether, but if it has to go out, I would like to see it go out with a single plot arc that puts everything and everyone together into a vast architectonic story of stories involving Hannelore's nemesis, the fairy girl, Spookybot, Crushbot, the Bros, Steve's secret life, Station, a survivor from Bubbles's old squad, the Pillsbury Doughboy (who becomes Roko's boyfriend), and everyone. Everyone gets a sweetheart and they all go to colonize the stars. Or something.

Has anyone considered this may be how Jeph leads into spinning down the comic? Tai and Dora get married and move away, Marten and Claire move out of Noho. Not sure how he'd close out Faye and Bubbles; Maybe moving back to take care of her Mom? Hanners goes back to the station. Just feels like he's leaving himself plot exit points.

Jim Feldman

Not apropos of this strip at all, but I'm doing another archive trawl and have been reminded that Dora used to be Jeph's favourite character, then later it was Hanners and then Marigold. Have I missed him updating this lately?

Mark

way to bury the lede, Marten!!

Joe

Good catch. Now I want to know what qwerty is about.

SpookyPenguin

Jeph, stop giving me the sniffles! *receives note* Oh I see. Sniffles are good for you. Okay, carry on.

Lene

Claire has a filthy mouth <a href="https://questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=1200" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=1200</a>

Bagge

OPPOSITE WORLD!

Bagge

To be fair - he does a great job to help her disconnect from the exam stress

Bagge

What strikes me about this plot is the degree to which Marten lives in his own head. Someone starts him thinking about something that might affect his life, and for the rest of the day, that’s all he thinks about. What to do about it, how he feels about it, how he feels about how he feels about it… He misses out on the resolution to Tai’s proposal, when everyone else is reacting hugely to it, and he doesn’t engage much with Claire’s exam experience. Until he settles his own anxiety, that’s all he can think about. I don’t know if I can call it selfishness, exactly – I mean, the whole thing is about him wanting to tell Claire he’s ready to make compromises to support her career – but it does show that putting himself in others’ shoes can be a task he needs a bit of a run-up to land.

Diptych

Martin. You can't give this girl that kind of whiplash. You're going to break her.

Dylan T

Coming sooner: Joseph Bonnar does bread earrings... I'm sorry, I yeast couldn't resist that.

The next panel is just a very floofy mushroom cloud

Fart Captor

If she did, you KNOW she'd be banging on Marten's door by now.

Coming soon: Roko does bread pairings.

BobC

The real question is... did Dora panic and bolt?

Bagge

you mean people don't? I've never heard it, but I'm over 40, I just assumed from this strip that it was yet another thing the yoofs did that I was oblivious to

Well, there wasn't much of a way to segue into Dora and Tai maybe being engaged, but it wasn't smooth at all, even for Marten.

i absolutely love the idea of someone saying ADJKPF in real life, i want to know what it sounds like

JD

Claire speaks for us all.

Populuxe

I see a P, she jumped the home row and nearly hit all the random math punctuation

gatherer818

Verbal keysmash, Claire confirmed as bottom.

Valraven

Because she wouldn't be guaranteed to be the one hired? Also, she wants a full librarian position, and he's just staff.

Ted Van Roekel

Next up, Steve in Paris and Hannelore eating cereal

Thomas Halpin

Even when he's doing good at communicating, Marten is still terrible at it!

Grace Kieser

If he's willing to move for her, why doesn't he give up his job so that she can have it? She's more qualified than him, and if they move he'll have to give it up anyway.

JD

Honestly, I think it would be genuinely funny if next week was just some filler arcs. Keep the people gnashing at the bit to see what comes. We could drop in on Hannelore, see Steve...

Lucanid Landman

[Claire.exe has crashed and will be restarted. Please wait.]

Captain Button

That reaction of Dora's a couple days ago, I'm pretty sure she said, "Yes."

Czarzhan

Next week: a whole miniseries about Hannerlore and everything that Winslow hates about where they are. Day 1: Monaco. “I hate the Grand Prix!”

Miyaa

Killin' it

A sheep

I love how Claire manages to verbally mash the home row in surprise.

Scooter