Jeanie Bottle 641
Jun15
on June 15, 2021
at 12:00 am
and modified on December 27, 2022. at 12:28 am
I hope Jeanie keeps that outfit when they go back to the present. She looks darn cute in it!
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I hope Jeanie keeps that outfit when they go back to the present. She looks darn cute in it!
Well that was a valuable lesson Neil learned to have fun but no fashion montage. But love the dresses.
I’m disappointed Natalie didn’t get a montage.
Readers were complaining about montages slowing the plot.
Not all of them, several were asking for a Natalie montage.
We always get a montage, sometimes it is nice to not get a montage. Everyone gets something at somepoint. This was the non-montage people’s time.
Jean can turn those readers into frogs.
Will Natalie get a prom dress Montage?
how did Jeannie learn hypnotism so well?!
Nat only has one bag.
She still has a lot to learn about shopping.
And is that redhead Belle????
No, that’s Rita, the cheerleader whom male Jean had wanted to take to the prom. Jeanie has gotten a bit of revenge against her by stealing her credit card and using it to pay for her purchases.
Thanks for Rita ID. I couldn’t place her.
jean into identity theft now
And credit card fraud. Which is not justified by stealing your romantic interest.
I mean, are we surprised that Jean would? I’m not surprised, on the Jean sociopathy level scale this is maybe a four, or a five at most.
Neil, chain of command issue here. Your genie is responsible to you. You are responible for her, to the rest of the universe, and to the upper genie hierarchy.
Get your genie under control, before she really hurts somebody.
A few dozens of strip too late, I’m afraid.
@Dagor: “A few dozen strips too late” Oh, the crisis has been building apace; this may be Neil’s breaking point. And I’ve been pressing for Neil to assert his mastership almost from the beginning; bit of a bee in my bonnet, to be honest.
Get Jeanie under control? Guano couldn’t. Even the Blue Djinn couldn’t in the end. Neil has about as much chance of getting Jeanie under control as a three-legged horse winning the Triple Crown.
@Tom:
There are flaws in your premise. Jeanie doesn’t like Guano and Blue was a murderer. Neil on the other hand was Jean’s best (and maybe only) friend. Add to that a bottle genie’s genetic need to bond with their Master and there’s a strong possibility Neil can eventually pull this off. Eventually. Maybe.
@mike: Yes. If Neil can get Jeanie’s attention, he might be able to keep her from disaster.
Eventually. Maybe.
But I’d sure like to see him try.
Get it into your head… like most of the males in this strip, Neil’s a doormat. That’s why Natalie is more interesting.
Yes, I am in agreement with you, Neil is just a doormat and will probably never be anything more than just a doormat too. That his lot in life, to be a doormat always.
@Chelsea: “Get it into your head… like most of the males in this strip, Neil’s a doormat.”
Oh, believe me, I know. I’ve been asserting that (if not in so many words) for most of the history of the strip.
I frankly don’t see Natalie doing much better. She’s a bit more flexible, and has mostly been able to roll with the punches so far. She has been able to override Jeanie at least once–although part of that was her anger at being transformed from Neil to Natalie.
But Jeanie may have gone too far this time. She is hurting people to frivolous ends.
And I would very much like to see Neil learn to not be a doormat, and get his Genie under control, acting as her Master. (Question, is Natalie still Jeanie’s Master?) I think that transformation would be far more interesting than just learning to be a girl.
“Question, is Natalie still Jeanie’s Master?”
I’ve been wondering that too. Of course, it would be way too easy for a genie that’s isn’t particularly fond on their master to poof them into something else to escape ownership. So, my guarded opinion is that yes, “she’s” still Jeanie’s Master.
It’s implied that Mastership is linked to the soul rather than the body—e.g. if Jeanie body swapped Neil and Rodge, then it would be Neil’s soul in Rodge’s body who would be the Master, not Rodge’s soul in Neil’s body.
@Mike
Shouldn’t that be – yes, “she’s” still Jeanie’s Mistress.
🙂
You forget that Neil doesn’t want to treat Jean like a slave.
@Jack: “You forget that Neil doesn’t want to treat Jean like a slave.” That’s likely true, but it’s a very serious misconception of what a Jeanie’s Master can be. Think Captain of the ship. A good Captain does not hold his crew as slaves; he’s simply there to coordinate their efforts towards a given goal, which they may well have a say in setting.
I suspect that the Care and Feeding of Genies manual, written in a time when slavery was pretty much the default human condition, does present the situation in master/slave terms. But there’s nothing I know of that says a Master has to treat his Genie that way.
And it’s clear that Jeanie absolutely needs the guidance and control of someone like Neil. She’s really going wild here. She also needs him to set more appropriate goals than inflicting credit card fraud on a teenage girl who is no more obnoxious than Jeanie herself.
There are other options than treat Jean like a slave and being doormat. But I actually suspect treating her like a slave would work better. Part of being a genie is being ok with that, and Jeanie actually already shows some signs of that despite Neil trying so hard to be doormat and not her master.
@HKMaly: I haven’t noticed any slave-like behavior, or maybe I just missed it. How about citing your references?
@HKMaly: ” I actually suspect treating her like a slave would work better” Better than being her doormat, certainly. But I suspect simply acting like her Captain would be about right–absolute command, but with a very light touch day to day. As I keep saying, Neil needs to give Jeanie interesting things to do.
@mike: I haven’t noticed any slave like behavior from Jeanie myself–but I have definitely seen a desire to please, and that she can be daunted by Neil’s displeasure. Again, though, she would thrive more under a strong, benign captain than under an arrogant slave driver.
And yes, I’m going to say it: Neil needs to take Jeanie as his lover.
@50srefugee: “inflicting credit card fraud on a teenage girl”
Rita is fine. She just reports the card as stolen and can probably get the charges cancelled. However, Jeanie had better not try using it after that because 50 will be all over that.
@mike: Rita is still inconvenienced for as long as it takes to get a new card. If she carries little or no cash, this could be a serious problem. Until the card company restores her account, she’s out whatever Jeanie spends–and, teenager that she is, she may depend on that card for food, gas, and other necessities, and likely has little or no margin.
in the larger picture, the dress shop may lose money, at least temporarily, and it may not have much of a margin–which is, in any case, likely to be narrower than we might like due to shoplifting.
At the largest scale, the card company writes off the theft and charges you larger fees and interest to balance the loss.
Even if you don’t use a card, you are still paying for the various anti-theft measures built into retail and finance generally.
Finally, in the context of this story, Jeanie’s showing a greater and greater willingness to break the rules at the expense of others. This is a very common pattern of delinquency, because there’s a positive feedback loop involved.
Jeanie is behaving badly, illegally in fact, and is giving a number of people she doesn’t even know a bad day.Sooner or later, she’s going to be brought up short–and the sooner the better. Ideally, her comeuppance will be at the hands of a more or less sympathetic friend. Like, oh, say, Neil. The alternative is the much harsher justice of Guano, or even Haji’s court
Ah, yes. The Law of Unintended Consequences. And I agree, she’s breaking rules at an increasing pace.
The problem with appealing to Jean’s sense of empathy is she just doesn’t have any.
Also; no montage, good. We’re moving on with the story part.
Actually, I believe some people enjoyed the montage. Perhaps a compromise with a double strip… a montage and some continuing content.
@mike: I very much want to see a Neil montage–but this is perhaps not the best time. Neil has more important things to attend to than fashion.
And some people don’t. There have been lots of montages, we can skip one now and then so the non-montage people also feel included.
“Find a place to stay for the night.” This might pose an interesting problem, one that can easily be avoided since time travel is already involved.
The only establishments that would rent rooms to teenaged girls without parental approval are not exactly reputable. There would probably be a lot of seedy characters coming and going, some of which might have the wrong idea about two cuties sharing a room. And I’m sure Rita is going to cancel her lost credit card.
Jeanie could just as easily poof them into the following evening and avoid the hassle.
YWCA hostel or some similar organization.
Didn’t Aracelli give Neil a palace in his office or apartment?
And Jeanie herself connected Neil’s apartment with her own.
Jeanie could duck under a bridge and find a five-star hotel room.
But I expect her actual choice will cause somewhat more drama.
A nice looking page, I like the higher-rez.
I think it’s pretty obvious at this point that Jeannie sees herself as a girl.
Correction, it obvious that she acting like a girl and has the personality of a girl and is in every way she can be a girl, she is a girl, which is true, but, Jeanie could and probably still thinks of herself as a man in a female body. I have been saying for months now, that Jeanie is a female or is becoming more female as time goes on. The only thing that may not have changed is her idea of whether she a guy or a girl.
Don’t know.
That why Jeanie having trouble figuring out why shopping for girl cloth doesn’t get Neil or Natalie excited. Because, they use to do things together when they were both guys, now everything is different and Jeanie doesn’t know why.
So why steal and pay for stuff. If they’re trying on clothes and like an outfit, just blink up a duplicate for gossakes. She’s a genie! Also, is Neil Jeanie’s master or not? If so he really needs to exert some control. Like, “Jeanie, turm me back to a man, NOW!” Yeah, I get it. Where’s the fun in that.
@SFCGator: ” is Neil Jeanie’s master or not? If so he really needs to exert some control. ”
I guess we’ll find out. Master or doormat seem to be Neil’s only options. I’m hoping Neil doesn’t have to be a doormat, because Jeanie’s made it very clear that she has nothing but contempt for doormats.
Neil is not here for your fetishes, and your insistence that he should be is getting quite tiresome. I’m sure there are plenty of domination themed comics out there if that’s your primary interest.
@Pilgrim: There is a difference, I think, between a BDSM fetish, and wanting to see Neil ascend from doormat-hood, a point I’ve made repeatedly.
i wouldn’t be so insistent if Jeanie were not so selfish and irresponsible. She is using her powers to hurt other people for petty and peevish reasons.
@Pilgrim – Wow that’s kinda harsh. Where’s that anger and judgemental attitude coming from? No fetish, I’m just wondering regarding the rules of the genie realm, who’s the boss? Neil is not the domineering type but technically, is he not the one who has ultimate control? I’ve been following Jeanie Bottle from the beginning and maybe I missed something over the years regarding their relationship. They are good friends so I get why Neil would not want exert undo control over his buddy, but c’mon I’ve had good friends who have crossed “the line” and stopped them cold. I think getting turned into a teenage girl is way over the line. I get the kink that the first time the gender bend thing happened would have been interesting but Neil is straight and likes grrls. That said, in his place, I’d be like okay Jean if we have to go to the prom, fine. But you’re going to turn me into a teenage guy.
Jeanie doesn’t think like genie should and Neil doesn’t think like her master should. And results – stealing, endangering time, …
Probably ran out of cash money with the wrong dates on it.
I love this comic! I love it in general and this page in particular. I love Jeanie. I love Natalie. I love the way Jeanie keeps needling Belle in different ways regardless of any morality. I love that the males are doormats. I love the way Jeanie turns guys into gals whenever she wants to (and I wish she would do it more often!) I love how she gets away with stuff. I love how you draw people and get the idea across that Jeanie and Natalie are hot chicks while still keeping them as silly-looking comic characters. (In the first panel the drawing of Jeanie looks very silly, yet in context her expression and posture is a fantastic caricature of every pretty popular girl I ever lusted after in high school!) I love the expression of befuddled confusion on Natalie’s face in the third panel and I love her (his?) new outfit. I love how Neal/Natalie never knows what’s Jeanie will do until she’s already done it. I love that by the time he can think of the words to protest whatever outrageous thing that Jeanie has done, she’s gone on to do something else, probably even more outrageous! I love how Jeanie is the most powerful genie around and yet just uses her powers for her own whims. I love how the fans keep wanting the characters to be better people even when you’ve demonstrated again and again how little Jeanie cares about that and how ineffective Neal is in curbing her whims. This is one of my favorite comics and I am always eager to open each week’s newest page to see what your characters will do next!
I love your very thorough description of why you love IDOJB. 🙂
Some time ago, I committed a quick-and-dirty fan fic with Neil as the protagonist. It’s badly flawed, but I find it relevant once again to the current story line. It’s at
www dot booksie dot com/643110-neils-discipline
Booksie members may leave comments there, which I value greatly, negative or positive.
Robert, if you can fix the link so it doesn’t trip the spam trap, I’d appreciate it.
Rira’s farther is going to want to know how her credit card got totally maxed out. How long is the statute of limitations on credit card fraud. When the girls get back to the present they might be in the clear. Jeanie could poof herself into the older sister to get the room. OH wait, She remimbers that Jean already rented a room. problem solved.
Yes, Jean did rent a room. For after the prom, not today.
This is the day before the Prom that they need that room and not the day after the prom that Jean rented the room for. Yes, Mike is right.
Jean might have had to rent it for more than one day in order to reserve it.
If the hotel will rent a room to male Jean, then they would prdo the same for Jeanie unless they have no more vacancies.
You know… I realize Jean isn’t supposed to be a ‘likeable’ character, but I don’t think I’m meant to actively despise him. And I do. He’s the asshole friend you have left over from hs that never grew up, but had -just- enough of his shit together that you’d feel bad kicking him to the curb. You always expect him to be one revelation away from ’getting’ it, and becoming a better person. Or at least less of an ass.
But nope! Dude’s gone full ass. I know his character is basically ‘selfish jerk’, but I always got the impression he was supposed to be a slightly sympathetic jerk. But this isn’t sitcom shenanigans… it’s just cruel. Jean seems devoid of empathy, and I’m really starting to hate him.
You are not alone in your general distaste for Jeanie’s behavior. Giving genie powers to someone as impulsive and self-centered as Jean, augmented by the social power of making him an attractive female, has really gone to her head.
It’s an interesting twist on the traditional wish-granting stories.