Jean AKA Jeannie AKA Jeanie is a film, book, and magazine reviewer for a national magazine. Most of Jean’s work is done through email, which means he doesn't have to go into the office.
On a trip to find a gift for his girlfriend, Jean found an empty Genie Bottle. Upon picking up this bottle, Jean became the bottle’s new genie-powered occupant. Not only was Jean turned into a genie, but the bottle turned him into what he believed a genie of the bottle should look like. Which, due to his fascination with a classic 60s TV show, turned him into a busty blonde woman.
A junior engineer working for a small engineering firm in Cocoa Beach. The firm focuses mostly on NASA projects.
Neil is Jean’s best friend. When Jean was turned into a genie, Neil became Jeanie’s master.
Now, is the “oh crap” because Natalie doesn’t want her Master and these alternate-timeline visitors to meet before she can sort things out, or is it because she dislikes having to serve her Master because he is a jerk/perv?
Probably won’t become an issue (I’m gonna guess that Jeanie and Neil do stay out of sight, and just get told what’s up), but… who is the master of the bottle, and therefore Jeanie? Is it Neil, or is it Natalie’s master?
I am going with Jean being the master and if Jean is the master, then Jeanie must have told Jean about the genie bottle and that it would turn him into a genie. So he got Neil to pick up the genie bottle and to become a genie.
There’s no reason to believe that Jeanie told Jean about the bottle. It is much more likely that the timeline continued as normal except that Neil is the one that opened the bottle when they went shopping.
Only that Neil is a genie now and we didn’t hear the entire conversation between Jeanie and Jean. It could be one reason that it wasn’t Jean that picked up the bottle in the first place, besides, only Jean was interested in the genie bottle originally and Neil had absolutely no interest in the genie bottle until Jean was turned into Jeanie. It would explain very well as to what has happened so far and why Neil is a genie now.
If this didn’t happen, then some else had to happen to cause what we see to have happened.
“I’m Neil Anton.”
“I’m Neil Anton. ‘Neil’ is a masculine name, and I’m a guy. You are not. So….”
===
We can’t even tell if whoever is back is male or female. So, still waiting.
Hm, check out Jeanie’s eyes, and Neil’s hand gestures.
Jeanie’s the only one who doesn’t glance up at the “I’m back!”. She continues to stare at Genatte.
In the last frame, I think Neil’s pointing at Jeanie.
===
For reasons I can’t quite explain, but including what we know of the original set up, and what we see here, I think in this time line, Neil’s the one who got geniefied by picking up the bottle. Her Master is Jean, who is still a horndog.
I am going with Jean also being Neil Natalie Master, because, originally, the only reason that Jean got geniefied instead of Neil, was because Jean was the one that picked of the empty genie totem or the bottle first and became the new genie of the bottle. There no other reason why reason why anybody else should have become Neil/Natalie master either. The only reason why both Neil and Jean were there originally was to get a present for Belle and there would be no reason for anybody else to have been there with Neil to get the genie bottle at the Co Co Beach Antic Shop.
If Jean is “Natalie’s” Master (which seems likely based on the original circumstances), then there’s a good chance she may have learned what it’s like to be a woman long before Jeanie ever did… which seems to be never.
The sleeper here is that Zoey is the only one that got a box on the left side during the school prom, if that any indication, then Neil/Natalie Master could be Zoey. Even that not off the table either.
@Larry: I agree, Zoey is always a possibility, but I think the odds-on favorite is Jean and all the circumstances point that way. Jean went shopping for a gift to give Belle and became Jeanie with Neil as Master. A slight variation would be Neil opening the bottle and becoming Natalie with Jean as Master. Perhaps Zoey was the reason Neil was shopping, but it doesn’t matter. Natalie’s reaction in panel 3 simply does not imply Zoey as her owner, but it screams douchebag Jean.
My money is still on Zoey. 4th panel, after hearing the master’s voice, Neil is making the sheepish finger gesture (touching your index fingers together). As if he just realized “Oh no, I screwed up and this is all my fault. How am I gonna explain this to Jeanie.”
Neither Jean/Jeanie nor Neal/Natalie are nitwits. But Neil’s smarts are nerdish; he understands things better than people. Jean is impulsive; he has little concern for effects over the long term. Fortunately, Jean does have some grasp of how people work.
Both Neil and Jean are smart, but they are unwise. Most especially, Jean is unconcerned with how his actions affect others, while Neil is unable to assert himself. They’re perfect for each other. Together, as Master and Genie, they might make a functional unit.
@mike: Neil has a great deal of self discipline, and is smart enough to be an aerospace engineer, but doesn’t understand people very well. Jeanie is impulsive, but has had girl friends, functions well at cocktail parties, and is capable of making a living using words to analyze and discuss movies, implying a certain grasp of human psychology. If I had to guess, I’d say Neil has the greater raw intelligence, augmented by his self-discipline, and his ability to set long-term goals. That’s why he’d make the better Master of the two IF HE’D JUST PICK UP THE DAMN LOAD. Gods, Neil could be a Hoodoo Engineer. He should quit his job, and study the Genie Manual as if his life and soul, and Jeanie’s, depended on it–because they do.
Also, look up “5 Laws of Stupidity”, which defines stupid people as those who hurt others while also hurting themselves. There’s a quadrant chart, setting harm/benefit to self on the X axis, and harm/benefit to others on the Y axis. Neil is simply naive: He lets others take advantage of himself. Jean is a bandit: he takes advantage of others. Intelligent people benefit themselves while benefitting others. Stupid people, as noted, hurt others with no self benefit. In this model, “stupidity” has NO CORRELATION with general intelligence, education, training, or any particular skill set.Stupid people are said to be more dangerous than bandits, because their actions are much harder to predict.
Am I the only one who thinks that when all this is resolved the timeline should have regular Neil, and “Librarian” Natalie, and “Genie” Natalie?
And possibly a Natalie wearing a space suit and brandishing a ray gun who bursts through the door and says “OK this is where things gets complicated.”?
I love Space Natalie with ray gun and genre awareness. Her space suit, of course, is the 1940s pulp sort, exposing as much skin as the censors will allow. Brass bra and panties, you know the type. And the ray gun fires little circles of light, like smoke rings. She is pursued by tentacled bug-eyed monsters wherever she goes.
I want that lovely Clydesdale-sized pony tail to spring out of a hole in the back of her fishbowl helmet. Robert, can you push CD to do a patreon pinup of Spacer Natalie?
What would “Spacer Natalie” entail? I don’t know what a Spacer is.
That said, I can’t really convince him to do anything while he’s away for the next ~6 months. He’s not going to be doing regular Patreon content for that whole time, and the Patreon is thus paused until he gets back.
Personal preference, not a prediction:
Resolve leaves Jean as Jeanie, and Neil as Neil–but perhaps with at least some of Natalie’s and Genatte’s memories, so that their experiences are not simply lost.
Natalie the librarian, never explained to Jeanie-the genie- that she was the new genie of the bottle. Therefor they are the same girl. The master then would be Belle or Jean giving us two Jeans. Jeanie will still have to go back in time to prom and actually have sex with Jean to reset the timeline. Most be some way to save Natalie, the librarian though. I think everyone likes her.
Comic #680. Jeanie was between the Genie Natalie and Neil, or at least closer to Genatte than Neil was. If Genatte was Librarian Natalie, she’d have recognized Jeanie since it was only a few hours ago (if that – about five strips) that she sent Jeanie off with an order to “Don’t forget me this time!”
Check out the header picture at the top of the page. There’s been a change. I don’t know when the change occurred, but it has been applied retroactively to all previous comics.
The header is always the same image, no matter what page you’re viewing. CD Rudd changes the header image occasionally, and this time it happened to be changed via a script that was scheduled to change it yesterday.
@50srefugee: It isn’t a violation because Jeanie is still a genie. Now we have two genies, neither of which can return to being human… or male. One thing that seems to be in question is whether 2 genies can live in the same vessel with the same owner (or worse, different owners), and if they can live together as sisters, what sort of domestic strife will that create.
Along those lines… here’s a horrible thought. If that is Jean “summoning” his genie from the bottle that he owns, won’t that also summon Jeanie, since they “share” the same bottle?
Neil pointing at himself? But then in panel 4, he’s pointing at Jeanie–and looks a bit stern, if I’m reading those eyebrows aright. I think Neil does recognize the voice, and it’s Jean. Jeez, Master Jean with Genatte, and Master Neil with Jeanie. My head is spinning.
I know that there are other possibilities of other people being Neil/Natalie Master, but, I am still going with Jean as her Master. It could also be why she is dreading what Jean is going to be doing too.
eh..it was known already from fan arts!….Still looks hot for her being a genie!…..what am I saying..I BEEN drawing him as a genie girl For over 2 years now >_>!
Given her reaction, I don’t think Jean is her master.
Bear in mind, int he OG timeline, Jean had to specifically request for Neil to remain her master. If Natalie is regretting her master coming home, I suspect they had some kind of falling out.
And the more I think about Jean’s personality, the less I find it reasonable that Natalie would WANT Jean to remain her master. Jeanie was pretty arrogant and controlling even when she wasn’t the one in charge; I can’t imagine what Jean would be like as the one giving the orders.
We also don’t know how far into this process of granting those three wishes has gone either. If Jean is the Master, he could be holding back on making the third wish so that Neil/Natalie can’t move on until the third wish has been made.
Given Jean’s original personality, I have a hard time believing he (1) would be content with just two wishes, and (2) has enough self-control to avoid making a third wish.
@Makaira: Nail-on-the-self-control-head. That’s exactly why Neil would be the better Master–he has far superior self control. However, I don’t think his control is perfect–and he is, in his way, also selfish.
I’ve decided that Neil’s slight scowl in the last frame indicates he’s getting the vibe that Genatte is not terribly fond of her Master, and maybe even a bit afraid of him. If he recognizes the voice, and it is, as I think, Jean, there may be Words.
I think Neil and Jeanie are going to learn a good deal about what makes a successful Master-Genie pair, by experiencing an opposite example. And, Neil? Half AT LEAST of what keeps you and Jeanie from being a good pair is on you. You have failed two of the fundamental duties of a Master: Keeping your genie from getting bored, and letting her lose respect for you.
I don’t see the scowl, I see “deer in the headlights.” Be that as it may, in this timeline Jean knows that Neil is now Genatte so what sort of words can they have? Also, Jean is a narcissist and commands a genie and Neil is just a normal guy. What if Neil’s admonishment pushes Jean too far and he reacts defensively and commands Genatte to do something rash? Unless Jeanie and Genatte engage in genie combat (a magical pillow fight, maybe? Feathers everywhere.), the former actually defending her master against her male self’s intentions, I don’t see Neil getting anywhere with his friend using just words.
It’s a marginal scowl, I admit–but I think the eyebrows pull down at the inside, and Neil’s mouth is a bit dour.
My guess that Neil will have Words for Jean is based partly on the fact that Genatte IS Neil. Our Neil might rightly be offended that his genie-self is being mistreated, and react harshly if unwisely. Maybe not; we’ll see. (Bonus: Jeanie might actually respect Neil for standing up against Jean on his genie’s behalf. Again, we’ll see.)
Neil would have to be swifter on the uptake than demonstrated in the past for him to take a stand for a complete stranger. After all, we know that Genatte (I’m coming to like that name) is actually Neil in genie form, but Neil himself JUST arrived from the past and has known this person for all of 30 seconds. As Natalie he’s been dynamic and proactive, as himself he’s a couch potato with a brain. It’s entirely possible that it will be Jeanie that takes a stand for her sister because she knows what her former self was like… knowledge reinforced by a very recent experience.
@50srefugee: I just had another bizzarro thought based on my reply to Ellie, below. Follow this chain of logic.
Guano arrives and pulls his Young Genie ultimatum on Genatte… fulfill your genie duties or else! Now, Jean has to come up with a wish in a hurry that does not alter space-time and Genatte is free of him (I doubt it will be a ham sandwich, though). At this point, Neil steps up (maybe assisted by Jeanie) and claims the bottle and rescues Genatte from being whisked away to find a new Master. Neil understands the rules, even if Genatte doesn’t as yet (and Jean certainly won’t) and can explain to her that all she needs to do is express a desire to remain with him (Neil) after the third wish is granted. They are all strangers at this point, but any port in a storm will save her from douchebag Jean and I would wager she’d grab that opportunity with both hands.
Here’s another thought. On this page Jeanie doesn’t look all that surprised to encounter her “sister” in the bottle, she was just surprised to have actually returned to it in the first place. I think her expression is more along the lines of what have I done now?
What does not track is why Genatte seems to be blowing off the presence of another genie inside her bottle but does not recognize her male self and goes directly to him with that question (and… who are you?). It can’t have been all that long since she was transformed (a year or two in Jeanie time?) so she shouldn’t have forgotten what she looked like. Surprise at there being a doppelganger, maybe?
Is there a missing half-page that’ll tie pages 680 and 681 together?
@mike: “Guano arrives and pulls his Young Genie ultimatum on Genatte… fulfill your genie duties or else!” Thing is, I suspect Genatte is fulfilling her genie duties, far better than Jeanie herself did. One of the big differences between Neil and Jean (and therefore Genatte and Jeanie) is that Neil is conscientious (one of the so-called Big Five personality traits) while Jean is not. Guano likely has no reason to object to how Genatte relates to her Master (whoever that is). If Jean is her Master, I have to wonder if her genie nature makes her take satisfaction in pleasing her Master, especially if she’s been able to negotiate with him to keep his baser urges (that is, the urge to take pleasure in her humiliation or pain, a darker place than I expect CD to go) at bay.
I guess we’ll find out tomorrow. Right now, we really have little but dim shadows to speculate on.
===
As to Neil’s expression, look at the tops of his eyes in the last frame. They’re not rounded, they’re slanted straight lines, and his mouth is also a slanted straight line. I wonder if he feels a magically strong empathy with his female genie self, or if he just senses something wrong enough to offend him. Will he take action? Remains to be seen.
@50srefugee: I’ll grant you the eyebrows, although I don’t really so it.
“her genie nature makes her take satisfaction in pleasing her Master” I’m not so sure, with a reaction like “Oh Crap…” when her owner made their presence known.
Oh, and if she has indeed granted the third wish, wouldn’t Guano or somebody show up anyway? That seemed to be a rule.
So far, we’ve only seen three genies interacting with their master/mistresses… Jeanie, Araceli and Genette. Each has demonstrated different attitudes… mostly indifferent, gushingly love-sick, and apprehensive, respectively. If there is a common denominator to their genie nature, I don’t think we’ve seen it yet.
I kind of hope that the new master is Rodge. Then Caley will show up with Araceli and we get three genies. Araceli wants neil, Jeanie is his genie and genie Natalie is him. What could be more confusing.
… Something is not right here. Jean became Jeannie because he had I dream of Jeannie in mind for his idea of Genies resulting in his becoming her. We have a (if I remember right) period of blue genies thanks to Aladdin. So how come Natalie looks like Natalie and not say Jeannie or a blue genie?
Natalie probably looks like Natalie because of a wish by her master (probably Jean) that she be more comfortable in her female body. Natalie’s boobs do look bigger, and her costume is a lot sexier; that further suggests horndog Jean as the master. And if Jean is master, he’s probably a lot more familiar with his genie’s body than Neil ever was.
Neil probably had a female genie on his mind because of the conversation he and Jean were having, thus a female bottle genie like Jeanie from the show but appearing vaguely like the girl he left behind at prom a long time ago. And yes, I can see Jean blowing one of his three wishes on something like… “I wish you looked sexier.” What I don’t see is Jean wishing for an instruction manual.
Now comes the fun part. Guano appeared shortly after Jean became Jeanie demanding that she perform her duties and grant Neil his third wish. Once that happens, Genatte is free of him because she is not going to willingly remain. The only question is, can Guano force a Master to make that third wish because it didn’t seem so at the time. It was more of a threat aimed at Jeanie.
Hm one wish to Natalie her best sexy self. One wish to become super attractive, can’t figure out a last wish. But their is a possibility that Jean new abilities have let him inadvertently start a new age of peace, which why Natalie sticks around.
Of course, Jean could have done what the Greek Sea Captain tried to do with Jeanie too and wish that she would stay around after the third wish too. Actually the Sea Captain wished for Jeanie to his wife and bear his children too.
Clearly Genie-Natalie’s Master is whichever person is in the header at the moment—which as of the strip’s release and this writing is Genie-Natalie, herself. It’s obvious, really. The word bubble is clearly aimed at her. 😉 Of course, it will probably be Jeanie, most of the time.
In this timeline someone else is now the owner to the genie totem and so is Genie-Natalie’s master.
But does that make them the master of Jeanie as well as the same totem is also hers?
So Neil may no longer have a Genie.
“No, I am Spartacus!”
“I am become Death, Destroyer of Worlds!”
“Lightweight. I am Thanos!”
“I am Iron Man!”
“Pfft. I am Galacticus! I–”
“Oh, shush. I am the Silver Surfer!”
“I am Captain Marv–”
[all] “Shut up, lady! We want the REAL–”
“Sexist bastards! I’ll show you who’s real!”
[chaos]
“Ahem. Fiat Lux.“
Last minute speculation:
Ongoing story to include both Neil and Jean as male Masters of female Genies Genatte and Jeanie. It will be interesting to see how the two Masters and the two Genies interact with each other. (I assume that neither Master will interfere with the other’s Genie. At least, not right away. Might be a bit of a problem if Genatte decides she prefers Neil’s style of Mastership.)
Alternate timeline. So is Jean or Rodge the master?
I’m gonna go for the long odds, and guess Chess King Danny. [shudder]
yeah, that honestly seems like a worse situation
that’s what I was thinking
That does seem to be where this is leading.
Now, is the “oh crap” because Natalie doesn’t want her Master and these alternate-timeline visitors to meet before she can sort things out, or is it because she dislikes having to serve her Master because he is a jerk/perv?
A good question!
I betting on Jean being the jerk that Natalie or Neil the genie is serving.
I’m with Larry on this, I also was thinking the two are reversed.
*ala Ricky Ricardo* Jeannie, You Got Some ‘Splanin’ To Do!
Probably won’t become an issue (I’m gonna guess that Jeanie and Neil do stay out of sight, and just get told what’s up), but… who is the master of the bottle, and therefore Jeanie? Is it Neil, or is it Natalie’s master?
Considering That “oh Crap”, I’ll bet it’s Jean as I predicted last time
I am going with Jean being the master and if Jean is the master, then Jeanie must have told Jean about the genie bottle and that it would turn him into a genie. So he got Neil to pick up the genie bottle and to become a genie.
As they say, loose lips sink ships!
There’s no reason to believe that Jeanie told Jean about the bottle. It is much more likely that the timeline continued as normal except that Neil is the one that opened the bottle when they went shopping.
Only that Neil is a genie now and we didn’t hear the entire conversation between Jeanie and Jean. It could be one reason that it wasn’t Jean that picked up the bottle in the first place, besides, only Jean was interested in the genie bottle originally and Neil had absolutely no interest in the genie bottle until Jean was turned into Jeanie. It would explain very well as to what has happened so far and why Neil is a genie now.
If this didn’t happen, then some else had to happen to cause what we see to have happened.
@Larry: You don’t have to be shopping for a present to be stupid curious and open things.
I’m Scruffy. The janitor?
I think Genie Neil has bigger boobs than Jean. Nice outfit, too lol So that’s what his “vision” of a genie looks like, huh?
Well if Jean was her master then “I wish you had bigger boobs”
Bah, if Jean had any forethought at all (which he probably doesn’t), then he would wish for all girls everywhere to be extra sexy.
“I’m Neil Anton.”
“I’m Neil Anton. ‘Neil’ is a masculine name, and I’m a guy. You are not. So….”
===
We can’t even tell if whoever is back is male or female. So, still waiting.
Hm, check out Jeanie’s eyes, and Neil’s hand gestures.
Jeanie’s the only one who doesn’t glance up at the “I’m back!”. She continues to stare at Genatte.
In the last frame, I think Neil’s pointing at Jeanie.
===
For reasons I can’t quite explain, but including what we know of the original set up, and what we see here, I think in this time line, Neil’s the one who got geniefied by picking up the bottle. Her Master is Jean, who is still a horndog.
I am going with Jean also being Neil Natalie Master, because, originally, the only reason that Jean got geniefied instead of Neil, was because Jean was the one that picked of the empty genie totem or the bottle first and became the new genie of the bottle. There no other reason why reason why anybody else should have become Neil/Natalie master either. The only reason why both Neil and Jean were there originally was to get a present for Belle and there would be no reason for anybody else to have been there with Neil to get the genie bottle at the Co Co Beach Antic Shop.
If Jean is “Natalie’s” Master (which seems likely based on the original circumstances), then there’s a good chance she may have learned what it’s like to be a woman long before Jeanie ever did… which seems to be never.
The sleeper here is that Zoey is the only one that got a box on the left side during the school prom, if that any indication, then Neil/Natalie Master could be Zoey. Even that not off the table either.
@Larry: I agree, Zoey is always a possibility, but I think the odds-on favorite is Jean and all the circumstances point that way. Jean went shopping for a gift to give Belle and became Jeanie with Neil as Master. A slight variation would be Neil opening the bottle and becoming Natalie with Jean as Master. Perhaps Zoey was the reason Neil was shopping, but it doesn’t matter. Natalie’s reaction in panel 3 simply does not imply Zoey as her owner, but it screams douchebag Jean.
My money is still on Zoey. 4th panel, after hearing the master’s voice, Neil is making the sheepish finger gesture (touching your index fingers together). As if he just realized “Oh no, I screwed up and this is all my fault. How am I gonna explain this to Jeanie.”
Iirc CDRudd did a what if picture of Jeanie and Neil switching places. I’m guessing we’ll see that played out now.
Ah. Here it is: comic/jeanie-bottle-75
…and a bit later, the infamous “control yours”: comic/jeanie-bottle-78
@Arthur Dent: Yeah, it was one of the early ones.
Uh, speaking of “early ones”? How the hell is all this not in violation of the “math” here? comic/06202009
===
And Wowsers, when did Genatte appear as the header pinup? Hot, but I think she used a bit much of the green eye shadow.
My guess? Since Jeanie hasn’t been “un-genied”, they haven’t broken those rules.
Another possibility: Jeanie is so powerful that she can just break those rules now.
Another possibility: Only *wishes* are so restricted. No wishes have happened in this storyline.
Another salient question: If Neil became the genie in this timeline, who defeated the Blue Djinn?
ahh, so it wasn’t that Natalie didn’t recognize Neil, it was that she didn’t believe it was her/him
that makes more sense
so this Natalie, if i’m guessing right is the younger version of Neil (who got socked in the eye.)
Oh crap… what if Natalie’s master is -grimaces in nausea- Danny of all people?
Yep, gotta be Danny.
Remember Danny in Cincinnati Ohio and the genie bottle in Coco Beach Florida, which is about a 1000 miles away from each other.
Danny’s a dope – he’s no one’s master…
I am going to say this, Jeanie you are a nitwite.
Neither Jean/Jeanie nor Neal/Natalie are nitwits. But Neil’s smarts are nerdish; he understands things better than people. Jean is impulsive; he has little concern for effects over the long term. Fortunately, Jean does have some grasp of how people work.
Both Neil and Jean are smart, but they are unwise. Most especially, Jean is unconcerned with how his actions affect others, while Neil is unable to assert himself. They’re perfect for each other. Together, as Master and Genie, they might make a functional unit.
I think you need to explain that better… which is better at what?
@mike: Neil has a great deal of self discipline, and is smart enough to be an aerospace engineer, but doesn’t understand people very well. Jeanie is impulsive, but has had girl friends, functions well at cocktail parties, and is capable of making a living using words to analyze and discuss movies, implying a certain grasp of human psychology. If I had to guess, I’d say Neil has the greater raw intelligence, augmented by his self-discipline, and his ability to set long-term goals. That’s why he’d make the better Master of the two IF HE’D JUST PICK UP THE DAMN LOAD. Gods, Neil could be a Hoodoo Engineer. He should quit his job, and study the Genie Manual as if his life and soul, and Jeanie’s, depended on it–because they do.
Also, look up “5 Laws of Stupidity”, which defines stupid people as those who hurt others while also hurting themselves. There’s a quadrant chart, setting harm/benefit to self on the X axis, and harm/benefit to others on the Y axis. Neil is simply naive: He lets others take advantage of himself. Jean is a bandit: he takes advantage of others. Intelligent people benefit themselves while benefitting others. Stupid people, as noted, hurt others with no self benefit. In this model, “stupidity” has NO CORRELATION with general intelligence, education, training, or any particular skill set.Stupid people are said to be more dangerous than bandits, because their actions are much harder to predict.
I wonder if the bottle master could be Belle?
Am I the only one who thinks that when all this is resolved the timeline should have regular Neil, and “Librarian” Natalie, and “Genie” Natalie?
And possibly a Natalie wearing a space suit and brandishing a ray gun who bursts through the door and says “OK this is where things gets complicated.”?
So, Actress Natalie, who plays a Pixie Ranger?
I love Space Natalie with ray gun and genre awareness. Her space suit, of course, is the 1940s pulp sort, exposing as much skin as the censors will allow. Brass bra and panties, you know the type. And the ray gun fires little circles of light, like smoke rings. She is pursued by tentacled bug-eyed monsters wherever she goes.
I was thinking of the classic silver latex space suit complete with heels and fish bowl helmet.
I would vote for that. Into the Natalie-Verse, perhaps?
I want that lovely Clydesdale-sized pony tail to spring out of a hole in the back of her fishbowl helmet.
Robert, can you push CD to do a patreon pinup of Spacer Natalie?
What would “Spacer Natalie” entail? I don’t know what a Spacer is.
That said, I can’t really convince him to do anything while he’s away for the next ~6 months. He’s not going to be doing regular Patreon content for that whole time, and the Patreon is thus paused until he gets back.
Just curious – is CD a serviceman – hence the “deployments”.
Personal preference, not a prediction:
Resolve leaves Jean as Jeanie, and Neil as Neil–but perhaps with at least some of Natalie’s and Genatte’s memories, so that their experiences are not simply lost.
Natalie the librarian, never explained to Jeanie-the genie- that she was the new genie of the bottle. Therefor they are the same girl. The master then would be Belle or Jean giving us two Jeans. Jeanie will still have to go back in time to prom and actually have sex with Jean to reset the timeline. Most be some way to save Natalie, the librarian though. I think everyone likes her.
If Librarian Natalie was the same person as Genie Natalie, wouldn’t she recognize Jeanie?
I think she is pointing at Neil. I believe she did recognise Jeanie.
Comic #680. Jeanie was between the Genie Natalie and Neil, or at least closer to Genatte than Neil was. If Genatte was Librarian Natalie, she’d have recognized Jeanie since it was only a few hours ago (if that – about five strips) that she sent Jeanie off with an order to “Don’t forget me this time!”
Neil must’ve grabbed the bottle first.
Check out the header picture at the top of the page. There’s been a change. I don’t know when the change occurred, but it has been applied retroactively to all previous comics.
There’s a new genie in town.
Earliest reference I found is in the previous comic’s comments, on 2 February at 0157, by Fearless Ferret.
Makes sense; that was when the time-line changed.
The header is always the same image, no matter what page you’re viewing. CD Rudd changes the header image occasionally, and this time it happened to be changed via a script that was scheduled to change it yesterday.
welp, looks like there’s only 1 way to fix this mess – time for another trip!
@50srefugee: It isn’t a violation because Jeanie is still a genie. Now we have two genies, neither of which can return to being human… or male. One thing that seems to be in question is whether 2 genies can live in the same vessel with the same owner (or worse, different owners), and if they can live together as sisters, what sort of domestic strife will that create.
Along those lines… here’s a horrible thought. If that is Jean “summoning” his genie from the bottle that he owns, won’t that also summon Jeanie, since they “share” the same bottle?
Crazy thought… Could Jeanie bring her bottle.. inside this bottle?
Infinite bottle regress…with alternating Jean/Neal Masters, and Genatte/Jeanie genies.
oh the torture to wait to see while the master is. hope it Jean that would be ironic and cool. Love Neil as new genie banner header
Neil’s expression in panel 3. He recognized that voice.
Neil pointing at himself? But then in panel 4, he’s pointing at Jeanie–and looks a bit stern, if I’m reading those eyebrows aright. I think Neil does recognize the voice, and it’s Jean. Jeez, Master Jean with Genatte, and Master Neil with Jeanie. My head is spinning.
I know that there are other possibilities of other people being Neil/Natalie Master, but, I am still going with Jean as her Master. It could also be why she is dreading what Jean is going to be doing too.
eh..it was known already from fan arts!….Still looks hot for her being a genie!…..what am I saying..I BEEN drawing him as a genie girl For over 2 years now >_>!
Given her reaction, I don’t think Jean is her master.
Bear in mind, int he OG timeline, Jean had to specifically request for Neil to remain her master. If Natalie is regretting her master coming home, I suspect they had some kind of falling out.
And the more I think about Jean’s personality, the less I find it reasonable that Natalie would WANT Jean to remain her master. Jeanie was pretty arrogant and controlling even when she wasn’t the one in charge; I can’t imagine what Jean would be like as the one giving the orders.
The choice to remain by one’s master’s side only takes place after the third wish is granted, doesn’t it?
We also don’t know how far into this process of granting those three wishes has gone either. If Jean is the Master, he could be holding back on making the third wish so that Neil/Natalie can’t move on until the third wish has been made.
Given Jean’s original personality, I have a hard time believing he (1) would be content with just two wishes, and (2) has enough self-control to avoid making a third wish.
@Makaira: Nail-on-the-self-control-head. That’s exactly why Neil would be the better Master–he has far superior self control. However, I don’t think his control is perfect–and he is, in his way, also selfish.
I’ve decided that Neil’s slight scowl in the last frame indicates he’s getting the vibe that Genatte is not terribly fond of her Master, and maybe even a bit afraid of him. If he recognizes the voice, and it is, as I think, Jean, there may be Words.
I think Neil and Jeanie are going to learn a good deal about what makes a successful Master-Genie pair, by experiencing an opposite example. And, Neil? Half AT LEAST of what keeps you and Jeanie from being a good pair is on you. You have failed two of the fundamental duties of a Master: Keeping your genie from getting bored, and letting her lose respect for you.
I don’t see the scowl, I see “deer in the headlights.” Be that as it may, in this timeline Jean knows that Neil is now Genatte so what sort of words can they have? Also, Jean is a narcissist and commands a genie and Neil is just a normal guy. What if Neil’s admonishment pushes Jean too far and he reacts defensively and commands Genatte to do something rash? Unless Jeanie and Genatte engage in genie combat (a magical pillow fight, maybe? Feathers everywhere.), the former actually defending her master against her male self’s intentions, I don’t see Neil getting anywhere with his friend using just words.
It’s a marginal scowl, I admit–but I think the eyebrows pull down at the inside, and Neil’s mouth is a bit dour.
My guess that Neil will have Words for Jean is based partly on the fact that Genatte IS Neil. Our Neil might rightly be offended that his genie-self is being mistreated, and react harshly if unwisely. Maybe not; we’ll see. (Bonus: Jeanie might actually respect Neil for standing up against Jean on his genie’s behalf. Again, we’ll see.)
Neil would have to be swifter on the uptake than demonstrated in the past for him to take a stand for a complete stranger. After all, we know that Genatte (I’m coming to like that name) is actually Neil in genie form, but Neil himself JUST arrived from the past and has known this person for all of 30 seconds. As Natalie he’s been dynamic and proactive, as himself he’s a couch potato with a brain. It’s entirely possible that it will be Jeanie that takes a stand for her sister because she knows what her former self was like… knowledge reinforced by a very recent experience.
Gawd… is it ONLY Wednesday?
@50srefugee: I just had another bizzarro thought based on my reply to Ellie, below. Follow this chain of logic.
Guano arrives and pulls his Young Genie ultimatum on Genatte… fulfill your genie duties or else! Now, Jean has to come up with a wish in a hurry that does not alter space-time and Genatte is free of him (I doubt it will be a ham sandwich, though). At this point, Neil steps up (maybe assisted by Jeanie) and claims the bottle and rescues Genatte from being whisked away to find a new Master. Neil understands the rules, even if Genatte doesn’t as yet (and Jean certainly won’t) and can explain to her that all she needs to do is express a desire to remain with him (Neil) after the third wish is granted. They are all strangers at this point, but any port in a storm will save her from douchebag Jean and I would wager she’d grab that opportunity with both hands.
I wonder what direction CD is going to take this?
Here’s another thought. On this page Jeanie doesn’t look all that surprised to encounter her “sister” in the bottle, she was just surprised to have actually returned to it in the first place. I think her expression is more along the lines of what have I done now?
What does not track is why Genatte seems to be blowing off the presence of another genie inside her bottle but does not recognize her male self and goes directly to him with that question (and… who are you?). It can’t have been all that long since she was transformed (a year or two in Jeanie time?) so she shouldn’t have forgotten what she looked like. Surprise at there being a doppelganger, maybe?
Is there a missing half-page that’ll tie pages 680 and 681 together?
@mike: “Guano arrives and pulls his Young Genie ultimatum on Genatte… fulfill your genie duties or else!” Thing is, I suspect Genatte is fulfilling her genie duties, far better than Jeanie herself did. One of the big differences between Neil and Jean (and therefore Genatte and Jeanie) is that Neil is conscientious (one of the so-called Big Five personality traits) while Jean is not. Guano likely has no reason to object to how Genatte relates to her Master (whoever that is). If Jean is her Master, I have to wonder if her genie nature makes her take satisfaction in pleasing her Master, especially if she’s been able to negotiate with him to keep his baser urges (that is, the urge to take pleasure in her humiliation or pain, a darker place than I expect CD to go) at bay.
I guess we’ll find out tomorrow. Right now, we really have little but dim shadows to speculate on.
===
As to Neil’s expression, look at the tops of his eyes in the last frame. They’re not rounded, they’re slanted straight lines, and his mouth is also a slanted straight line. I wonder if he feels a magically strong empathy with his female genie self, or if he just senses something wrong enough to offend him. Will he take action? Remains to be seen.
@50srefugee: I’ll grant you the eyebrows, although I don’t really so it.
“her genie nature makes her take satisfaction in pleasing her Master” I’m not so sure, with a reaction like “Oh Crap…” when her owner made their presence known.
Oh, and if she has indeed granted the third wish, wouldn’t Guano or somebody show up anyway? That seemed to be a rule.
So far, we’ve only seen three genies interacting with their master/mistresses… Jeanie, Araceli and Genette. Each has demonstrated different attitudes… mostly indifferent, gushingly love-sick, and apprehensive, respectively. If there is a common denominator to their genie nature, I don’t think we’ve seen it yet.
I kind of hope that the new master is Rodge. Then Caley will show up with Araceli and we get three genies. Araceli wants neil, Jeanie is his genie and genie Natalie is him. What could be more confusing.
Y’know, even if they go back and managed to undo the damage they’ve done, do these futures cease to exist or do they go on?
I think everyone wants to keep Natalie the genie. If she can’t stay in I Dream of a Jeanie Bottle maybe she could get her own spin off.
… Something is not right here. Jean became Jeannie because he had I dream of Jeannie in mind for his idea of Genies resulting in his becoming her. We have a (if I remember right) period of blue genies thanks to Aladdin. So how come Natalie looks like Natalie and not say Jeannie or a blue genie?
Natalie probably looks like Natalie because of a wish by her master (probably Jean) that she be more comfortable in her female body. Natalie’s boobs do look bigger, and her costume is a lot sexier; that further suggests horndog Jean as the master. And if Jean is master, he’s probably a lot more familiar with his genie’s body than Neil ever was.
Neil probably had a female genie on his mind because of the conversation he and Jean were having, thus a female bottle genie like Jeanie from the show but appearing vaguely like the girl he left behind at prom a long time ago. And yes, I can see Jean blowing one of his three wishes on something like… “I wish you looked sexier.” What I don’t see is Jean wishing for an instruction manual.
Now comes the fun part. Guano appeared shortly after Jean became Jeanie demanding that she perform her duties and grant Neil his third wish. Once that happens, Genatte is free of him because she is not going to willingly remain. The only question is, can Guano force a Master to make that third wish because it didn’t seem so at the time. It was more of a threat aimed at Jeanie.
My guess is that Jean has become a pathological liar. The worst kind of master to have …
Hm one wish to Natalie her best sexy self. One wish to become super attractive, can’t figure out a last wish. But their is a possibility that Jean new abilities have let him inadvertently start a new age of peace, which why Natalie sticks around.
Of course, Jean could have done what the Greek Sea Captain tried to do with Jeanie too and wish that she would stay around after the third wish too. Actually the Sea Captain wished for Jeanie to his wife and bear his children too.
The exact wish was “Now, I want you to make a dutiful wife and bare me a son. ” (Page 182). Jeanie twisted that, of course.
Lt. Uhura: Well, you know what they say, Lieutenant. Be careful what you wish for. You might get it.
Clearly Genie-Natalie’s Master is whichever person is in the header at the moment—which as of the strip’s release and this writing is Genie-Natalie, herself. It’s obvious, really. The word bubble is clearly aimed at her. 😉 Of course, it will probably be Jeanie, most of the time.
In this timeline someone else is now the owner to the genie totem and so is Genie-Natalie’s master.
But does that make them the master of Jeanie as well as the same totem is also hers?
So Neil may no longer have a Genie.
That is an interesting question.
“I’m Neil Anton!” “No, I’m Neil Anton!” “I am Spartacus!”
“No, I am Spartacus!”
“I am become Death, Destroyer of Worlds!”
“Lightweight. I am Thanos!”
“I am Iron Man!”
“Pfft. I am Galacticus! I–”
“Oh, shush. I am the Silver Surfer!”
“I am Captain Marv–”
[all] “Shut up, lady! We want the REAL–”
“Sexist bastards! I’ll show you who’s real!”
[chaos]
“Ahem. Fiat Lux.“
Matalie the genie’s master is Natelie the librarian.
100 comments Happy valentine’s day.
Yup. Something really struck a chord here.
Robert… I’ve tried numerous times to get onto the discord site and they’ve all failed. what’s the secret?
Last minute speculation:
Ongoing story to include both Neil and Jean as male Masters of female Genies Genatte and Jeanie. It will be interesting to see how the two Masters and the two Genies interact with each other. (I assume that neither Master will interfere with the other’s Genie. At least, not right away. Might be a bit of a problem if Genatte decides she prefers Neil’s style of Mastership.)