Housepets!

This feels mature.

Nice to see Spot again.

Wait... THERE’S A MAILBOX?!?

Hmmm I wonder what this strip is really about?

Wooooow, Rick's throwing shade!

I kind of love that.

I also think this isn't just about this arc. Let's face it, at one point or another in the course of this comic, a lot of us have been Larry at some point.

I mean, funny, but... *looks around* completely unbelievable.

Saturn381 wrote:Nice to see Spot again.

"I would LOVE to go back in time and fix your first world problem" Aaaah, I missed Spot (superdog)'s insightful sardonism so very much!

Saturn381 wrote:Nice to see Spot again.

It's called "send private message to Rick", but yes.

We enter now the fourth wall of Spot
as readers conspire to ask their woes;
drawing it out whilst Rick does plot,
not answering questions on Spot’s foes.
He’s quite at home here, we can see,
with fire, dressing gown and bubbles;
he’s as relaxed as we know he can be,
taking time out from his tiny troubles.
So we’ll be back to the main plot after
seeing out this session of Q & A?
The guy in charge is a master crafter
who works hard in brightening up the day.

Cool, a brief break. Wonder if after the breather strip(s), we'll get a scene change to another character, or move right on ahead from Marion's perspective.

What I hope is the opening to "My Life As A Teenage Squirrel, Part 2"
[Opening panel: Small Fuzzy paw smacks smartphone that was playing song as alarm]
Squirrel: "Man, I couldn't get in touch with Marion at all last night. Seriously can't believe he roped his mom into that senior prank and got her to call me and tell me that he was missing."
Squirrel: "I really need to head over to his place before finals today and give him a piece of my mind. Doesn't he want to graduate?"
Squirrel: [Rubs face] "Also, go see that squirrel. She was kind of cu-"
Lois: [Last panel: she notices she's been squirrelified and there's a zoom-out on her room as she freaks out] -uuuuuuuuuuuaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-"

Candide or Asimov? Or Postman Pat?

Is that Tiger's smoking robe? Coffeeeeeeeeeeeeee........ !

I noticed the reader mail segment looks a lot like Reading Corner.
To anyone who started reading after this came out, there wasn't a mailbox to send questions to Spot (Superdog), though there was a thread devoted to discussing how good Spot arcs were. http://www.housepetscomic.com/forums/vi ... f=2&t=4593

Ash Greytree wrote:What I hope is the opening to "My Life As A Teenage Squirrel, Part 2"
[Opening panel: Small Fuzzy paw smacks smartphone that was playing song as alarm]
Squirrel: "Man, I couldn't get in touch with Marion at all last night. Seriously can't believe he roped his mom into that senior prank and got her to call me and tell me that he was missing."
Squirrel: "I really need to head over to his place before finals today and give him a piece of my mind. Doesn't he want to graduate?"
Squirrel: [Rubs face] "Also, go see that squirrel. She was kind of cu-"
Lois: [Last panel: she notices she's been squirrelified and there's a zoom-out on her room as she freaks out] -uuuuuuuuuuuaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-"

Given that the first part "in some ways it may feel like a retread", I think having a mirrored start to the second part might be a bit too on the nose, but you never know.

My question to Spot’s mailbox would read:

Dear Spot (superdog), what do you have to respond to the comments that say Professor Spot is better looking than you.

Well, looks like Peanut got rid of his writer’s block.

This is a little bit meta, isn't it?

First time having to sit through a Spot Arc- I mostly skipped through them, but that was because I was flying through the old strips. I wonder if Rick is talking about retreading on Marion's story, or King's Story.

Next up on Housepets: all of the Humans have been turned into Pets and the Pets into humans. Mass hysteria ensues.

Spot's violating Niven's Law.

Argent wrote:Spot's violating Niven's Law.

What law?

SeanWolf wrote:

Argent wrote:Spot's violating Niven's Law.

What law?

Niven's. Larry Niven wrote a number of rules for Sci-fi. This is one of the mains -
If the universe of discourse permits the possibility of time travel and of changing the past, then no time machine will be invented in that universe.

This is basically because of paradox. If you go back to the past due to receiving a letter telling you of something tragic and then you prevent that thing, that letter would never have been sent so you never got it, never went back, never changed the event thus meaning the letter would be sent so you go back... ad infinitum.

The Doctor gets around it because so few events are fixed for him/her by knowledge that the even happened. Even he couldn't stop Vesuvius.

Hehehe xD

Just letting you know, Rick, we are just anxious (at least for me, don't know if everybody are thinking the same) about the poor teenager boy because being transformed into a (possible female) little squirrel can be a heck of traumatizing experience and would make any person die of anxiety. x_x Even for us, readers, because we don't know what will happens and WE want to know T-T

We already passed through this with King's arc and now we're like "ah ****, here we go again". x'D

So.. Spot has performed a Hill Climbing algorithm on timeline goodness

Dunno Why but when I read the Title, I couldn't help but hum Jt Machinima's "With Great Power".

"You Know what comes with This Great Pooowwwweerrrrrr~! I'm not So tall, but watch me Towweeeerrrrr~!"

"Why would you ever Fear of fallin' when my web will catch you? Why would I wanna think of stoppin' when I know I'm meant to?"

"I know what comes with This Great Pooowwwweerrrrrr~!"

Mctwisp wrote:Hehehe xD

Just letting you know, Rick, we are just anxious (at least for me, don't know if everybody are thinking the same) about the poor teenager boy because being transformed into a (possible female) little squirrel can be a heck of traumatizing experience and would make any person die of anxiety. x_x Even for us, readers, because we don't know what will happens and WE want to know T-T

We already passed through this with King's arc and now we're like "ah ****, here we go again". x'D

Honestly, I am just going, "Not Again."

Mostly because Rick had advertized that he was pulling away from the Celestial Story plots... But it Seems he keeps veering back into it a lot.

If he truly was veering away, Great Kitsune would have not appeared So often... But he appeared at least Eleven times in each Temple arc, and with the constant Foreshadowing of Magic being abused, we Are likely going to have that nine-tailed Prat show up, be useless again, and not add anything of relevence to the story.

It got annoying, and frankly, I feel like how King does about it. Remember when They tried to call him to the Temple? He used a LOT of profanity, most which was implied he never really used Till that point, and kicked Tarot and Sabrina out.

Which, considering how much of a Sour taste The entirety of the last Temple Crashers left in my mouth shortly after Tarot abandoned Peanut, Grape, Res and Maxwell, I say he dodged a .50 BMG.

Welsh Halfwit wrote:

SeanWolf wrote:

Argent wrote:Spot's violating Niven's Law.

What law?

Niven's. Larry Niven wrote a number of rules for Sci-fi. This is one of the mains -
If the universe of discourse permits the possibility of time travel and of changing the past, then no time machine will be invented in that universe.

This is basically because of paradox.

Actually, it's because paradox isn't a thing. When you go back and change the past, the timeline that actually exists now contains your arrival in the past, it doesn't matter if the timeline you came from doesn't exist any more, the arrival of you and the time machine out of literally nowhere is part of the timeline. I mean you're violating causality by even having a time machine, so stuff magically appearing out of nowhere is a minor issue by comparison.

And changing the timeline is going to happen anyway even if you try not to change the past. Timelines are fragile because of the butterfly effect.

The problem is that so long as the time machine exists, it's going to get used, eventually, and as long as it's used eventually it's going to go back and destroy itself in the past, and now you have a stable non-changing timeline with no time machine so it doesn't get changed again. Every time someone invents a time machine, that happens, until all the time machines get uninvented and time is stable again.

If you invent a time machine that means you're doomed, your only hope of survival is inventing an impenetrable space station and going back to the big bang and setting up a colony for lost time travelers before time exists. Or hope someone's already done that.

Actually, that would be a great Spot arc. The lost colony of time travellers.

Literally the first thing that came to mind after “oh no.”

Dear Rick Griffin,
I very much enjoy what you're doing and especially enjoy reading that unique arc with a teenage squirrel and all her struggles.
Keep going and never let yourself be discouraged!

I think, in a strange way, Rick here is a victim of his own success.

He managed to create a sympathetic character in 4 panels, 8 words and a scream. I think a lot of long term readers got invested in a hurry. Everything that followed gave us a character that I think we all felt was getting abused for no good reason.

In the past, I think its safe to say that anyone who had this level of trauma in the comic either deserved it or brought it on themselves. Bino gets abused all the time, including my favorite since HP! panel with Bailey punching him in the face. Joel, Steward and Thomas all had a hand in their own fates. As far as we know, Marion didn't.

And his comment about the next arc being a bit of a retread can go a lot of ways. It might be, as has been suggested, a mirror of this arc with another character (such as Lois), or something like what happened with King which implies that there is some aspect of the Game still afoot.

All I can say is that I hope that this interlude is short because I very much want to see more of Marion and would like to see things start to look up for him. Even if his destiny is to remain a 2 foot tall rat with a fuzzy tail, it would be nice for him to find a place to come to peace with it. Of course, how long did that take for King in real time? Five years?

Geartooth wrote:I wonder if Rick is talking about retreading on Marion's story, or King's Story.

dr_eirik wrote:And his comment about the next arc being a bit of a retread can go a lot of ways. It might be, as has been suggested, a mirror of this arc with another character (such as Lois), or something like what happened with King which implies that there is some aspect of the Game still afoot.

If you're both referring to the tweet I linked, check the timestamp. Rick Griffin tweeted that right before the start of the arc we just went through. I considered changing the tense of the quote, but I decided to leave his words as much the same as possible. Oh well. I'm pretty sure he was saying Marion's introduction might feel like King's introduction.

Champion Wallace wrote:I think having a mirrored start to the second part might be a bit too on the nose, but you never know.

For the sheer comedic effect and twist (and a slight bit of payback for Marion's sake since she didn't believe him) that it'd provide, it'd be worth it.

Ah, good to see again a small interruption by Spot (Superdog), here in a new home suit. Indeed, there was a reader mailbox? And since when? Pff, Larry is too much exigent, and anyway, Spot (Superdog) shouldn't use that power of his to "fix" a silly thing like that. Uhm, ain't your powers are getting lower, Spot (Superdog)? You're becoming old... Your end is a bit rude, but appropriate.

Dear Spot, please mind the fourth wall break, but I'd like to give some praise to your in-universe creator, he seems to be writing with a bit more self-awareness than usual, Joey will be proud of the improved artistry as well.

On a less joking matter though, glad (well not really, but you know what I mean) to have some confirmation that "waking up" probably isn't gonna be solving Marion's problems. As much as I feel for Marion, I'd be more irritated if Rick reversed it, pretty much making marion's suffering pointless narratively. Also, anyone wonder how Grape would react to this one? I personally want to know what Peanut thinks of teenaged squirrels on top of that, I bet the main character's name is Mario if Rick ever gets to that.

If I didn’t know that the alt text wasn’t canon when it came to the strips, I would say that it was such a good coincidence that Peanut was making a comic named after the arc so it could be used for an intermission. xD

Cesco wrote:Ah, good to see again a small interruption by Spot (Superdog), here in a new home suit. Indeed, there was a reader mailbox? And since when? Pff, Larry is too much exigent, and anyway, Spot (Superdog) shouldn't use that power of his to "fix" a silly thing like that. Uhm, ain't your powers are getting lower, Spot (Superdog)? You're becoming old... Your end is a bit rude, but appropriate.

Well, Larry did kind of establish that he's a narcisstic twit....

Larry sure gets around a lot. He is also a character on "Impractical Jokers" Lulz.

Though Rick's Larry predates theirs by 3 years.

Amazee Dayzee wrote:Larry sure gets around a lot. He is also a character on "Impractical Jokers" Lulz.

Though Rick's Larry predates theirs by 3 years.

Maybe it's easier for Larry to get around now that he doesn't have Moe and Shemp to hold him back …..

Yeah no. Its a different one.

Gameb18oy wrote:Dear Spot, please mind the fourth wall break, but I'd like to give some praise to your in-universe creator, he seems to be writing with a bit more self-awareness than usual, Joey will be proud of the improved artistry as well.

On a less joking matter though, glad (well not really, but you know what I mean) to have some confirmation that "waking up" probably isn't gonna be solving Marion's problems. As much as I feel for Marion, I'd be more irritated if Rick reversed it, pretty much making marion's suffering pointless narratively. Also, anyone wonder how Grape would react to this one? I personally want to know what Peanut thinks of teenaged squirrels on top of that, I bet the main character's name is Mario if Rick ever gets to that.

I don't think reversing it would be a problem unless that's the next page or two of the arc. Then it would be pretty jarring. If he finds a way back after going though a journey, figuratively or literally, then it might make for a satisfying ending.

As to Ricks tweet, I hadn't caught the date but I don't see this as a retread of Joel/Kings experience save for very broad points. King was actively being broken down by Pete. He had his humanity stripped away and, little by little, had his dignity as well. Pete did what he could to essentially torture him.

Without knowing exactly why he was transformed in the first place, Marions experience isn't the same. What's happened has been generally predictable events given his circumstances. No one forced him to pull his backpack onto himself, or climb to a high shelf to get granola. Or to drink an energy drink with 10X the lethal dose of caffeine for his body.

Now if it was 10 times the lethal dose of caffeine though, he would be dead!

Argent wrote:Actually, it's because paradox isn't a thing. When you go back and change the past, the timeline that actually exists now contains your arrival in the past, it doesn't matter if the timeline you came from doesn't exist any more, the arrival of you and the time machine out of literally nowhere is part of the timeline. I mean you're violating causality by even having a time machine, so stuff magically appearing out of nowhere is a minor issue by comparison.

And changing the timeline is going to happen anyway even if you try not to change the past. Timelines are fragile because of the butterfly effect.

The problem is that so long as the time machine exists, it's going to get used, eventually, and as long as it's used eventually it's going to go back and destroy itself in the past, and now you have a stable non-changing timeline with no time machine so it doesn't get changed again. Every time someone invents a time machine, that happens, until all the time machines get uninvented and time is stable again.

If you invent a time machine that means you're doomed, your only hope of survival is inventing an impenetrable space station and going back to the big bang and setting up a colony for lost time travelers before time exists. Or hope someone's already done that.

Actually, that would be a great Spot arc. The lost colony of time travellers.

Well, it does depend on which theory of Time travel you follow (there are many)

If there were Time Machines, wouldn't we know by now? Depends if you can have proof of something existing before it's created(!)

But, as you put it, Time Travellers changing history would be, theoretically, near inevitable.

I'll use 'Star Trek TOS: City on the Edge of Forever' as an example as it's just been on one of the cable channels here.

McCoy is driven half insane by an accidental drug overdose and escapes through a portal into 1930's New York where he changes the future. The Enterprise no longer exists. Kirk and McCoy, protected from the change by being in close proximity to the portal, follow him and stop him. That's a brief synopsis.

But... First Kirk is nearly hit by a car. The driver shouts at them and moves off. But his timeline has changed. He's now several seconds behind where he was previously and he's going to be travelling at a different speed to before for a while at least. He might now get caught at the next lights and have to stop. Or he might have BEEN stopped previously and now the light changes just before he gets there. His line is different.

They steal some clothes. The people who owned those clothes now no longer have them. They could lose their jobs because they don't turn up later that day. Because of that, perhaps their kid never goes to college and becomes a Doctor. Everything changes when Time travel gets involved. And it never was the same anymore.

Seems like Peanut found inspiration. I wonder if he opened up to people sending him questions.

Also, on a side note, I really wonder if Tarot might draw her own comics soon to become more like Peanut and find creativity... That would be potential to bring more development to her character.

IceKitsune wrote:Hmmm I wonder what this strip is really about?

Game of Thrones. No, wait, Avengers: Endgame. Wait no it's The Last Jedi wait no