Oh and you have a present coming up, but it’s not ready yet! But since it’s Christmas I’ll tell you what it is: A bonus prose story called “All The King’s Men” which will be talking about King’s first foray into the world of dogs with Fox guiding him. Merry Christmas guys!
And also there will be an epilogue Monday so you have some closure on the other things.
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so what was was said is true….
He IS kind of a jerk.
Half way threw I thought King was going to be turned back into a human and take Sasha as his pet but I was wrong. Either way I like this story line
You just want to keep adding to his crimes, don’t you? Sasha’s owner may be a drunken, no-good bone-head; but he’s still her owner.
To be fair, that doesn’t necessarily imply “adding to his crimes”. Methods for this that were suggested earlier included legal action (locking her out in potentially lethal temperatures probably constitutes cruelty to animals), deus ex machina (Pete or some other intervention), Purchase, and her owner either deciding on another way to pick up girls and dumping her or on his acquiring a steady girlfriend who didn’t like dogs, and dumping Sasha. Her running away would be another possibility, although the legal ramifications of that have not yet been explored in the Housepets universe. Theft is not required.
Most of those would probably be traumatic for Sasha, and seemed unlikely in the storyline even before this point, but none of them would be particularly criminal.
Yea what he said.
While my earlier comment on the subject seems to have been outright nuked (vice edited by a mod like with some “fixed” joke posts) due to mentioning a certain internetism, from going through all the posts it looks like the non-objectional part of the nuked post was answered.
No, I’m not the only one who thinks Pete’s being a real jerkwad.
(And for the record, no I’m not going to get all whiney about delete vs edit. In retrospect the other comment wasn’t the smartest thing I could’ve posted, to put it mildly.)
partly, i feel sorry for king, partly i’m glad because he’s much cuter now then he was (i totally want to adopt a corgi more then ever now!)
Poor King…
I’m using Panel 9 as my new avvie…
That’s cool. Mine’s Panel 4
Magical face changing hat!
Hehe…you can see he really ment his words in the 10th panel, great work with your expressions. Messed up ending though. XD
Cant wait to see your gift story. :3
If I was Sasha I would have probably either woken up when Pete said “King” or when King laid her down on the snow/ground.
Of course, Pete was probably keeping her asleep – I would be pretty freaked out if a guy with the head of a griffin was talking to somebody I just cuddled up with for the night (innocently) too.
How appropriate, that Rick is using characters such as “Pete the Griffin” when his last name just happens to be Griffin….. and, yet, Pete is nothing like Peter of Family Guy (well, maybe the jerk aspect…).
A normal person would’ve been freaked out. I’m pretty sure Sasha would’ve thought it was awesome.
BTW, Rick, you should really start putting up voting incentives for the TWC webcomic voting. Almost all the comics I’ve read that have their comic on TWC have a voting incentive every month or so. If you don’t wan’t to do one, or if you don’t have time enough to do one, I understand. The comic is wonderful enough that I can accept that. I’m just saying that my laptop hard drive is seriously lacking in respect to things related to Housepets.
I’m not sure that Rick actually cares if people vote or not. The TWC thing is pretty recent and, I think, at the request of readers to start with. Having incentives for something that started as a reader request seems a bit silly.
Even if the position on TWC actually mattered much, I’ve never felt that bribing people to vote for you was an especially good approach to things.
Looking at it, I’d say that doing such a nice job on the strip is more than enough reason to get people to vote for it.
It’s okay, really. I just wish there was more actual “art” besides the bonuses, since there’s not much there besides a few extra comics strips, some guests have made, and a small amount of fan art.
And I don’t view it as bribing the reader to vote. I view it as a special bonus you get for voting. However, if I don’t like the comic or the art style of said comic, I won’t vote just for the incentive.
You catch my drift? I’m not demanding anything more from Rick than what he chooses to give. I just wish for more Housepets-related art, seeing as I don’t have a tablet nor good enough colouring skills with a marker to produce worthy enough fan art. :X (Which smiley is the embarrased one?)
Besides, I’ve been voting ever since I noticed the button on the page. I love this comic. Let me never make you believe otherwise.
Rick’s in college, has a active church life and is working on other projects (Check his FA). He tends to limit Housepets art to the comic.
Again, it’s okay. I’m fine with that. My b-day is coming up soon (January) so I might be getting a tablet with the money I get, and maybe then I’ll submit some fan art of my own!
poor king his life is so up and down
Up and down like a haywire elevator. Only, it goes down more than it goes up. He’s probably in negative floors by now.
Wow, Peat really is a jerk. And I’ll vote anyway. The comic is enough incentive.
You spelled Pete wrong….
Well, perhaps Pete actually is a psychic projection created by the massed consciousness of all the self-aware organisms in peat bogs around the planet. “His” agenda is actually legal rights for plants, fungi, and bacteria, and thus he’s grooming Joel – an extreme and easily led, but still relatively sane, proponent of animal rights – to become the worlds first serious plants-rights activist.
Somehow I doubt it, but we don’t actually know enough about Pete yet to eliminate scenarios like that.
See what you’ve gone and suggested with a single typo? Thank goodness there weren’t two.
You… you’re a genius, Thoth.
awwww poor king i wonder….should him and shash get together since he might not change back and bido deosnt deserve her..i think thats the dogs name that gave him the cat nip bomb……correct me if im wrong
I really, really hope King and Sasha never get together, because somewhere inside, King is a human named Joel. And I don’t think the human/animal relationship would go over very well. Also, it would go against King’s current anti-animal nature.
And even if he can’t remember his human name, and his body is that of a dog through and through, he was once human. I think he might have problems with that kind of relationship scenario.
Also, it’s “Bino.” His brother is Fido.
I’ve been reading for a while, but never commented.
I have to say, I’m a little confused as to why everyone seems to be so upset about King’s situation. This is the same character who helped steal someone’s pet. Who, before being turned into a corgi, everyone wanted to end up punished. Instead of being imprisoned for x amount of time, he is turned into a corgi and essentially given a new life. How is this a horrible thing? Yes, it is not what he is used to but his fate could have been worse.
Well lets see…
1) Quite a few people have no real objection to Kings general situation; save for the general observation that a lot of the readers think that all the pets (and ferals for that matter) deserve more rights and most deserve better treatment than they’re getting.
2) A fair number think that Pete is indeed being a jerk – which is quite independent of his target. It could be Attilla the Hun or Mother Teresa, but it would still be obnoxious to kidnap them, not correct their false perceptions, and treat them the way Kings been treated. If you want to compare pet treatment, look at Grape and Peanut; they’re allowed to go in the refrigerator, get the soda and ice cream, and make themselves rootbeer floats.
3) Yes, this is the same character who helped petnap Fox. It’s also the same character who objected in advance, was dedicated enough to pets rights to join any pets rights group that would have him, and who recognized (despite his own past traumas) that he and Fatty were committing a major injustice.
4) Yes, most of the comments at the time were quite hostile. Of course, many new readers have arrived since – and many of those comments were predicated on the simple statement “I’m with PETA”. Since then it’s become apparent the Joel was never really “with” PETA; he didn’t even listen to the orientation lecture. Joel simply assumed that PETA was sane – the mark of an easily-led individual who’s obsessed with his own goals and assumes that they’re shared. He was a stooge, not a villain.
5) Being given a new life may well be a good thing. It might even let him fulfill his ambitions to really do something for pets. There are some objections based on his presumed loss of lifespan – which does seem excessive given the original “and the sentence was going to be time served” note – but there’s plenty of time to work that out, and he might eventually conclude that it’s worth it.
6) As for “his fate could have been worse”, well – that’s pretty much always true. It could be eternal damnation in one of the more inventive traditional hells after all.
The net result? A number of the readers a relatively decent individual, who’s being mistreated – and is now an essentially-helpless pet being dominated by a powerful magical being, which makes it even less justifiable. That may or may not be an accurate perception, but the viewpoint is certainly justifiable and understandable enough.
Bother. That last paragraph should say “a number of the readers SEE a relatively decent individual…”. Oh well. Typos will sneak in.
typos are evil they need chainsaws thrown at them…..or atleast be fixed
“atleast?” ATLEAST? ANGER.
Why does everyone assume Pete is a jerk? Whether he is or not will depend on his ultimate motives in doing what he is doing. Akkadian ruins and high technology – talking animals with opposable thumbs (the system they have would never have evolved if pets were like that from the beginning, so it has to be recent) – magic… a lot of loose elements even if you take the initial premise on its own. None of this is out of canon for the strip at all, really.
All the humans get changed into “pets”? All the humans are “ascended” and the world is left to the “pets”? Pete really does want to end all life? Pete has some totally benign, if unexpected, motivation? The first is as redundant as simply reversing the “pet”/”Pet Owner” relationship. The second is also rather cliche. The third seems unlkely and goes FAR beyond being a mere jerk. The latter is far more likely and is most in tune with what I would do. I like unexpected, irony and humor in all sorts of combinations
The only reason Pete is considered a “jerk” is because he can also be considered “cruel”.
King assumed he would eventually be turned back into a human after he learned his lesson. Having allowed King to believe that for such a long period of time and then crushing it with a simple off-handed comment allows us to call Pete things like “jerk” and “cruel”.
Besides, Tarot already said he was a jerk, so we were already biased from the start, even before we met Pete.
Long period of time? Hasn’t it only been one day? Or two?
Undetermined; there was the time-jump to Christmas eve, but we don’t know how long before Christmas the arc started. A followup at a vets is normally several weeks though, at least for shots and things; you want to make sure that the immune reaction is complete before going on to the next series.
I think they take “being a jerk” (rude, manipulative, and somewhat unkind) as demonstrated. Motives are irrelevant; being a jerk lies in social behavior.
As for the animals, the author has indicated that they are natural to this world and that – as demonstrated by the pumpkin-carving strip – the world isn’t necessarily entirely “reasonable”. Ergo, most speculation focuses on character motives, personal histories, and trying to guess the plot – not on trying to justify the world. If you want a semi-hard-science strip, try “Freefall”
I made the implication of some coherence due to an offhand remark earlier about a “non-canon” element in the story, which it wouldn’t be.
And Pete will seem like a jerk until his motives are fully explored. If he fails to follow through and has no further plans for Noel/King, then Pete’s a Jerk. If he had been a Dragon, then this might be seen as just how dragons might operate, but all he is, is simply a powerful being of unkown motivations. After all, who has Pete been a “Jerk” to, except Noel/King?
Rick wanted to know what kept fans coming back to this strip? The characters… and Pete, as well as Noel/King, sure are characters
I think you’ve got a difference in definition there; some of the readers are using a purely operational definition of Jerk, you’re using one that involves motivations as well.
Sadly, differences in definitions are not resolvable by debate.
Fortunately, everyone who does keep coming back does seem to enjoy the characters…
“Pete is neither kind nor good, he’s actually sort of a jerk”
After Tarot said that on November 23, people didn’t just take up on it, they’ve clung on it as if their lives depended on it.
Not really. Occult sources of information are notoriously unreliable and Tarot is more than a bit spacy anyway.
It did seem likely to be a statement of Tarot’s real opinion, but little more.
On the other hand, if you want to talk about behavior – Pete has kidnaped someone, broken jail, involuntarily transformed someone (assault and battery at the least, probably criminal mischief and more esoteric charges as well), and subjected his victim to unlawful imprisonment and medical experimentation (canine shots were not designed for transformed humans).
And all of that came even before letting him work under the wrong assumptions for a fairly long time and then casually squashing his hopes. That’s nasty enough even if King wasn’t already troubled.
Tarot’s opinion is not governing, but observation is.
Tarot isn’t spacey, in fact its clear she has genuine power. She’s odd certainly but she definitely seems to know what she’s talking about. (Except for that end of the world bit. That was weird)
Also, after what Pete did and from what we’ve seen, King is a dog, through and through. So pet shots shouldn’t really be an issue. (Although it IS somewhat cruel and unusual.)
Having actual power does not keep her from being spacey. While she hasn’t appeared much, we do know that she managed to lose the TV remote in about thirty seconds – and that seems to be blissfully unaware that using odd powers for trivial ends might upset people. Thus spacey – disconnected from her environment.
As for shots, King may indeed be a dog through and through – but anyone lacking omniscience cannot actually know that; hence the the action remains an experiment.
Sorry, there’s an extranious “that” before “seems”. Late night typos I’m afraid.
Tarot’s not even a bit spacey? How about when she asked the spirits where she placed the remote? I’d have at least looked for it…
Man, and I was about to start liking Pete. At least he said SOMETHING nice.
By that “not changing back” statement, I’m wondering whether Pete meant that he was never, ever going to change King back into Joel, or that it wouldn’t happen for a very long time–at least until King actually changed. Does anyone else have thoughts on this?
To me it feels like he’s leading Joel-King (intended “joking” pun?) on with all of this. It’s obvious he’s trying to teach a lesson of humility, however cruel the lesson may be. Pete is a jerk, but he doesn’t come across as evil, just one of those “though love” types. Only, instead of a sack of tomatoes (doesn’t leave bruises), he uses regular vet checkups.
Those who can’t do, teach?
Hard to get much more arrogant than deciding to forcibly teach someone humility.
I don’t think that Pete was trying to teach a lesson at all. I mean from the very start, we don’t know what Pete’s intentions are. He doesn’t ever seem to “lie”, however he let’s everyone deceive themselves. If you notice that from the very start Pete didn’t say anything about teaching Joel a lesson, or that he was ever going to turn him back into a human. King Assumed everything in “An Undigested Bit of Beef”, while we assumed that he was right.
When Pete said “On the ball today, aren’t we?”, he was using sarcasm for Everything that Joel said up to that point. (Point and case proven in this triple strip.) Joel essentially is a nice guy (I mean was a nice guy, now a nice dog.). I mean what “evil” person actually wants to turn himself in. He may have “animal issues”, but he still cares about the “animals”. The fat guy was the one who should have been punished for these crimes.
To summerize: Pete is a JERK. Joel/King was/is “innocent”. Chubby should suffer.
I don’t think Pete means that he’s not going to, or going to, he’s being strictly by-the-letter truthful, but not in the least bit honest.
I agree. =3
“Humility? Empathy?” — My mind reads those with a funny accent that was used by some guy on some show who was “standing here beside himself”! XD Also a character from Short circuit who had a similar accent — been so long since I saw the movie I’m not sure if that actually is the one. XD