It’s taken 13 years for me to fully understand this: I do NOT like Tip. His ridiculous self-obsession crossed the line from humorous personality trait to a mood killer a while back and I’m just not realizing that’s why I don’t enjoy him anymore.
Thank goodness it’s an ensemble cast and there’s plenty more to love!
Tip in the Oz books was a magical disguise/curse for Ozma, intended to be as crude and self-absorbed as she was noble and selfless. So, pretty much on brand for him.
Honestly, Tip’s self-obsession is as much of a mask here.
I mean, yes, it’s also part of his superpower. But he’s got an OTP and can get -very- serious when he does (and also his OTP is Tigerlilly, at least so far).
While looking something else up I recently saw a Sunday comic I missed the first time around. It laid out Ira’s Wizard of Oz parallels with Unity, Nick, and Sweetheart as Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion. That makes Tip more bearable. Still not a fan though.
He was promoted in the army for pulling several people out of a burning humvee. He sacrificed his entire wardrobe to ensure that a NHS rights bill passed. I think there’s a decent and honourable person in there somewhere.
I dunno. You join the military, you’re expected to pull your fellows out of a burning humvee. That’s the job. Imagine if he DIDN’T do that – no one would have been okay with him just sitting there doing nothing.
(Also part of the job is shooting total strangers because they signed up for the same job with a different government. Kind of undercuts the valor and morality of pulling people from a burning vehicle – he could have been a fireman and done that, without also killing people.)
(Also also, pulling people from a burning vehicle ONCE is something anyone can do, assuming they’re on scene when it happens. I’ve been an amateur first responder myself, having witnessed and run to help with severe car crashes that unfolded in front of me, and the only reason I’ve never had to pull people from a burning vehicle is because the vehicles in question didn’t actually catch fire in the crashes.)
And giving up a wardrobe? Seriously? I get that Tip likes his clothes, but it’s like… if I could help fix police brutality by giving up some frivolous luxury I love but I don’t need, I wouldn’t even think about it.
He passes a certain minimum bar of “Is Not A Total Asshole”, but that doesn’t really counterbalance the rest of who he is and how he acts.
When the foul-mouthed, neurotic, anti-social video game nerd of the comic is both more likeable and arguably more of a “Good Person” than Tip, something is off.
Tip feels like he has all these personal flaws, but he never seems to recognize or address them, never seems to make any progress on being a better person, and never even gets called out on it all by other characters. He just sort of exists in this weird bubble of willful ignorance and automatic excusal of his shittiness by everyone around him.
It feels like he gets a free pass to never actively work to be a better person, for some reason. It’s not that he hasn’t grown, it’s just that the only times he ever grows it 1) is barely growth at all and 2) it only happened because some situation beyond his control forced it.
Just because a despicable person does something good once in a while doesn’t mean that they’re secretly a good person. If anything, it makes him even more despicable, because you know he’s capable of being a good person, but he chooses to be a self-absorbed dick anyway.
If Tip Wilkin is lucky, someday he may be Nick. At least according to the heart-to-heart communications Nick decoded at the Whimsey World Little House.
Its just a recurring gag. This strip straddles the line between a self aware gag strip and a serious drama. Tip is silly when he needs to be silly and a hero when he need to be.
All the characters are silly from time to time, and then get serious when called for, but only Tip seems to have this weird “Gary Stu” dichotomy going on.
All the other characters have their flaws, but we at least understand WHY they have them. Virginia is half-mad and is neurotic from her childhood and her family’s excessive expectations for her. Nick was a pimply maladjusted teenaged gamer – a fundamentally decent person held back by his social inexperience. Moustachio, UNITY, and Sweetheart are all mad-scientist engineered living weapons. Etc.
But to channel Jerry Seinfeld for a moment… “What’s THE DEAL with TIP?”
Tip is bizarrely qualified. He’s ex-military, despite the obvious question of “Why would the military accept/retain a narcissistic cross dresser?” He’s supposedly a trained psychiatrist, despite us never seeing any objective evidence to suggest that is true – no other doctors ever recognize his work, we never see a diploma, and we also never really see him psychoanalyze anyone in a way that couldn’t be done by an enthusiastic amateur. He’s a crack shot with a pistol, despite us not knowing where he learned that skill. He has ridiculous magical “Mojo” powers, with zero explanation except that it’s funny / it’s because he’s a cross dresser.
When it’s time to stop being silly and be a hero, ALL the characters step up to the plate, but only Tip is weirdly good at it without us knowing WHY he’s good at it.
And likewise, all the other characters have flaws that make them imperfect people, but only Tip doesn’t have some sort of understandable reason WHY he’s flawed.
We know nothing about his past; nothing about who his actually is as a person. We know more about the history and character development of a SENTIENT WATER COOLER, than we do about Tip. He’s literally the first character we ever meet in the comic, in the very first strip, and we still know nothing of substance about him!
Let me see…his real name is Dennis Wilkin, Jr….he’s a captain in the US Army and also been trained by the CIA…he also found time to get a degree in psychology…like many of the Skin-Horse denizens, he acquired a twin sister in the alt-universe they visited…he’s an expert on how to dress in dresses…he has a rival and nemesis named Tremontino, who tempts him with wonderful outfits…he carries a gun he’s named Alice (I think—it’s not in the cast bio entry)…he’s vain and self-centered to unhealthy extremes…and he’s inhumanly attractive to (and attracted by) the opposite sex, whatever that happens to be.
Psychologist, not psychiatrist. There’s difference.
Also he’s a research psychologist, not a psychoanalyst. IIRC most of his doctoral work involved running experiments on lab rats. He’s not a competent therapist of any sort, that’s been a running gag since week 1. (Although he sometimes stumbles his way into competence like in the basement dwellers story.)
The fact that he kept getting assigned that role on missions despite all that is part of the overall “inept bureaucracy” joke.
We don’t know anything about WHY Tip became a behavioral psychologist experimenting on rats. He doesn’t seem like the sort of person to pursue such a direction in his life. Nothing about his personality would suggest that decision.
He’s clearly not a scientifically minded person – so why experiment on rats? He’s also demonstrably the kind of person who excels in the military, but how does that line up with the kind of person who is drawn to lab rat experimentation?
Speaking of the military aptitude, why does he cross dress? It seems inexplicable that someone who is able to take orders and conform to expectations well enough to be an officer would then turn around and defy orders and break expectations. What is his motivation for doing so?
Why is he so fashion obsessed? There’s absolutely nothing wrong with a man wanting to wear dresses that he feels he looks good in, but why is Tip so utterly FANATICAL about his cross dressing? It’s an extreme behavioral choice, and it seems so utterly unmotivated – and the most likely potential motivations seem directly at odds with the other things we know about him and his personality.
Nothing about Tip makes any sense! It’s like he’s not a real person, but some shambling psychic construct of stitched together personality traits, that somehow just magically work together despite inherent contradictions. You can’t trace the path of his thoughts and motivations – you can simply observe that in situation X, he reacts with behavior Y, with no apparent rhyme or reason behind that.
But honestly Tip doesn’t have any flaws — except that he’s a really bad counselor. It’s more telling on the beholder than on Tip that people (ok, one person) are so hung up on his “flaws.”
Tip thinks he looks fabulous. He does. This isn’t vanity; it’s underwritten by the reactions of many, many characters throughout the series.
Tip likes having a large, wardrobe focused on female-associated clothes. And? That’s not a flaw; it’s a lifestyle choice. He doesn’t have a shoe problem; he has a large, flexible wardrobe and is clearly an expert at its use.
Tip’s a tremendous slut. Well, yes. He’s also a caring and attentive partner. Wouldn’t consider it a flaw in a woman; no reason to consider it one for a dude.
As to how Tip’s story fits together, well.
Near as I can tell:
He joined the army (like you do). He was, to all accounts, really good at it; makes the sense; everyone in this outfit is exceptional (often despite appearances).
Leaving the army presumably came with (as it often does) a load of trauma and also a GI bill covering college. So presumably he went to school, and wanting to do something to help people, went into psychology. There’s no reason to believe he went for a higher degree; getting an undergraduate Psych degree often involves things like experimenting on rats. But maybe he got a master’s degree. Presumably, college is also where he developed and honed his tastes and skill in cotture (I expect he was a hit with both the ladies and the other psych majors).
He then needed a job. A psych degree would qualify you nicely for a social work job, if you wanted it; how he ended up at Skin Horse would probably make an interesting side story (I’d guess it was that lots of other federal agencies didn’t want a lady-dude and he ended up at the place that really needed a human employee to meet regs and also Anisigma demands).
I could be misremembering, but I’m pretty sure Tip got a PhD in experimental psychology. I believe he should formally be addressed as Dr. Dennis Wilkin. Of course, Tip doesn’t like to go by Dennis, and isn’t generally one to stand on formality, and so doesn’t generally want or expect to be addressed as Dr. Wilkin in most cases. I think that he instinctively understands how to disarm people by dispensing with excessively formal etiquette, so it’s easy to forget he is a doctor.
I don’t know that it’s ever been made clear why Tip joined the Army in the first place, but I recall some back story from a while back in which I believe Tip was hired directly from the Army into Skin Horse, I think by way of the CIA.
It may be that Tip completed his education before joining the army, and decided that he didn’t really like experimenting on rats, and joined the Army just because it was something different (or maybe to pay off student debt? PhDs tend to be fairly expensive, over time.) Alternatively, he could have completed his PhD while he was in the Army. I believe the U.S. armed forces do all have programs in which members can complete educational courses, and ultimately even earn degrees, while they are still in the service. They will also often offer to pay for someone’s education, if the individual contracts to join the service after completing a degree. I used to get tons of offers like that from the various armed services when I was an undergraduate, because I had a good GPA. (I didn’t sign on with any of them, but it really wasn’t a bad deal – they agree to pay for your education, and you serve a term of service afterward – you get a degree with no student debt, and a guaranteed job afterward.)
I really, truly have no vision.
Though I am curious now…
Wonder when we have pictures of Gin in that outfit?
Kickstarter stretch goal.
Kickstarter sketch. Good idea.
Forget Kickstarter. I vote for next month’s wallpaper.
Same boat
Like that James Bond scene where he takes off the wetsuit to reveal a tuxedo, except in a jungle!
I don’t really wanna see Tip in that outfit…
Now I want to see Ginny as a housemaid! Mind you, I think she might make a kawaii catgirl as well. ^_^
It’s taken 13 years for me to fully understand this: I do NOT like Tip. His ridiculous self-obsession crossed the line from humorous personality trait to a mood killer a while back and I’m just not realizing that’s why I don’t enjoy him anymore.
Thank goodness it’s an ensemble cast and there’s plenty more to love!
Tip in the Oz books was a magical disguise/curse for Ozma, intended to be as crude and self-absorbed as she was noble and selfless. So, pretty much on brand for him.
One wonders when our Tip will make the transformation.
That said, pretty much the entire cast is varying shades of petty and self-absorbed, so he fits in pretty well.
Honestly, Tip’s self-obsession is as much of a mask here.
I mean, yes, it’s also part of his superpower. But he’s got an OTP and can get -very- serious when he does (and also his OTP is Tigerlilly, at least so far).
While looking something else up I recently saw a Sunday comic I missed the first time around. It laid out Ira’s Wizard of Oz parallels with Unity, Nick, and Sweetheart as Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion. That makes Tip more bearable. Still not a fan though.
Except Unity is the Patchwork Girl, from a later book in the series.
He was promoted in the army for pulling several people out of a burning humvee. He sacrificed his entire wardrobe to ensure that a NHS rights bill passed. I think there’s a decent and honourable person in there somewhere.
I dunno. You join the military, you’re expected to pull your fellows out of a burning humvee. That’s the job. Imagine if he DIDN’T do that – no one would have been okay with him just sitting there doing nothing.
(Also part of the job is shooting total strangers because they signed up for the same job with a different government. Kind of undercuts the valor and morality of pulling people from a burning vehicle – he could have been a fireman and done that, without also killing people.)
(Also also, pulling people from a burning vehicle ONCE is something anyone can do, assuming they’re on scene when it happens. I’ve been an amateur first responder myself, having witnessed and run to help with severe car crashes that unfolded in front of me, and the only reason I’ve never had to pull people from a burning vehicle is because the vehicles in question didn’t actually catch fire in the crashes.)
And giving up a wardrobe? Seriously? I get that Tip likes his clothes, but it’s like… if I could help fix police brutality by giving up some frivolous luxury I love but I don’t need, I wouldn’t even think about it.
He passes a certain minimum bar of “Is Not A Total Asshole”, but that doesn’t really counterbalance the rest of who he is and how he acts.
When the foul-mouthed, neurotic, anti-social video game nerd of the comic is both more likeable and arguably more of a “Good Person” than Tip, something is off.
Tip feels like he has all these personal flaws, but he never seems to recognize or address them, never seems to make any progress on being a better person, and never even gets called out on it all by other characters. He just sort of exists in this weird bubble of willful ignorance and automatic excusal of his shittiness by everyone around him.
It feels like he gets a free pass to never actively work to be a better person, for some reason. It’s not that he hasn’t grown, it’s just that the only times he ever grows it 1) is barely growth at all and 2) it only happened because some situation beyond his control forced it.
Just because a despicable person does something good once in a while doesn’t mean that they’re secretly a good person. If anything, it makes him even more despicable, because you know he’s capable of being a good person, but he chooses to be a self-absorbed dick anyway.
and that’s why it’s “somewhere”
If Tip Wilkin is lucky, someday he may be Nick. At least according to the heart-to-heart communications Nick decoded at the Whimsey World Little House.
Its just a recurring gag. This strip straddles the line between a self aware gag strip and a serious drama. Tip is silly when he needs to be silly and a hero when he need to be.
All the characters are silly from time to time, and then get serious when called for, but only Tip seems to have this weird “Gary Stu” dichotomy going on.
All the other characters have their flaws, but we at least understand WHY they have them. Virginia is half-mad and is neurotic from her childhood and her family’s excessive expectations for her. Nick was a pimply maladjusted teenaged gamer – a fundamentally decent person held back by his social inexperience. Moustachio, UNITY, and Sweetheart are all mad-scientist engineered living weapons. Etc.
But to channel Jerry Seinfeld for a moment… “What’s THE DEAL with TIP?”
Tip is bizarrely qualified. He’s ex-military, despite the obvious question of “Why would the military accept/retain a narcissistic cross dresser?” He’s supposedly a trained psychiatrist, despite us never seeing any objective evidence to suggest that is true – no other doctors ever recognize his work, we never see a diploma, and we also never really see him psychoanalyze anyone in a way that couldn’t be done by an enthusiastic amateur. He’s a crack shot with a pistol, despite us not knowing where he learned that skill. He has ridiculous magical “Mojo” powers, with zero explanation except that it’s funny / it’s because he’s a cross dresser.
When it’s time to stop being silly and be a hero, ALL the characters step up to the plate, but only Tip is weirdly good at it without us knowing WHY he’s good at it.
And likewise, all the other characters have flaws that make them imperfect people, but only Tip doesn’t have some sort of understandable reason WHY he’s flawed.
We know nothing about his past; nothing about who his actually is as a person. We know more about the history and character development of a SENTIENT WATER COOLER, than we do about Tip. He’s literally the first character we ever meet in the comic, in the very first strip, and we still know nothing of substance about him!
You’re absolutely right! There’s no way that’s not intentional. 😉
Let me see…his real name is Dennis Wilkin, Jr….he’s a captain in the US Army and also been trained by the CIA…he also found time to get a degree in psychology…like many of the Skin-Horse denizens, he acquired a twin sister in the alt-universe they visited…he’s an expert on how to dress in dresses…he has a rival and nemesis named Tremontino, who tempts him with wonderful outfits…he carries a gun he’s named Alice (I think—it’s not in the cast bio entry)…he’s vain and self-centered to unhealthy extremes…and he’s inhumanly attractive to (and attracted by) the opposite sex, whatever that happens to be.
Perhaps we are seeing only the tip of the iceberg?
Tip is but following the Scout motto: “Be Prepared”.
All those clothes, and all he needs with Tigerlily Jones are the *bare* essentials.
Ah, but getting there is half the fun!
Besides, our Tip just may be hoping for an extended stay…
Some kids just want their gifts and some enjoy the anticipation of unwrapping them.
What, no Sailor Moon? And he calls himself prepared. Hmph.
Case no. 4, in between the 1920s Cleopatra costume and Bjork’s swan dress.
The question is not whether the maid costume would fit Ginnie, it’s whether Nick could talk her into wearing it in the first place.
I suspect Nick could talk Virginia into wearing a maid costume, in private.
She wore the superhero outfit, and Nick didn’t even have to ask her to. She would undoubtedly wear just about anything if he asked.
Psychologist, not psychiatrist. There’s difference.
Also he’s a research psychologist, not a psychoanalyst. IIRC most of his doctoral work involved running experiments on lab rats. He’s not a competent therapist of any sort, that’s been a running gag since week 1. (Although he sometimes stumbles his way into competence like in the basement dwellers story.)
The fact that he kept getting assigned that role on missions despite all that is part of the overall “inept bureaucracy” joke.
…my previous comment was supposed to be a reply to D Walker. Oh well.
It’s so easy to get them mixed up. Pyschologist, pyschiatrist, psychoanalyst, psychopath…. huh, I’ve just figured out how Dr Engelbright got her job.
Fair points, but still.
We don’t know anything about WHY Tip became a behavioral psychologist experimenting on rats. He doesn’t seem like the sort of person to pursue such a direction in his life. Nothing about his personality would suggest that decision.
He’s clearly not a scientifically minded person – so why experiment on rats? He’s also demonstrably the kind of person who excels in the military, but how does that line up with the kind of person who is drawn to lab rat experimentation?
Speaking of the military aptitude, why does he cross dress? It seems inexplicable that someone who is able to take orders and conform to expectations well enough to be an officer would then turn around and defy orders and break expectations. What is his motivation for doing so?
Why is he so fashion obsessed? There’s absolutely nothing wrong with a man wanting to wear dresses that he feels he looks good in, but why is Tip so utterly FANATICAL about his cross dressing? It’s an extreme behavioral choice, and it seems so utterly unmotivated – and the most likely potential motivations seem directly at odds with the other things we know about him and his personality.
Nothing about Tip makes any sense! It’s like he’s not a real person, but some shambling psychic construct of stitched together personality traits, that somehow just magically work together despite inherent contradictions. You can’t trace the path of his thoughts and motivations – you can simply observe that in situation X, he reacts with behavior Y, with no apparent rhyme or reason behind that.
Because he’s queer? Obviously?
Gotta let people live their truth.
But honestly Tip doesn’t have any flaws — except that he’s a really bad counselor. It’s more telling on the beholder than on Tip that people (ok, one person) are so hung up on his “flaws.”
Tip thinks he looks fabulous. He does. This isn’t vanity; it’s underwritten by the reactions of many, many characters throughout the series.
Tip likes having a large, wardrobe focused on female-associated clothes. And? That’s not a flaw; it’s a lifestyle choice. He doesn’t have a shoe problem; he has a large, flexible wardrobe and is clearly an expert at its use.
Tip’s a tremendous slut. Well, yes. He’s also a caring and attentive partner. Wouldn’t consider it a flaw in a woman; no reason to consider it one for a dude.
As to how Tip’s story fits together, well.
Near as I can tell:
He joined the army (like you do). He was, to all accounts, really good at it; makes the sense; everyone in this outfit is exceptional (often despite appearances).
Leaving the army presumably came with (as it often does) a load of trauma and also a GI bill covering college. So presumably he went to school, and wanting to do something to help people, went into psychology. There’s no reason to believe he went for a higher degree; getting an undergraduate Psych degree often involves things like experimenting on rats. But maybe he got a master’s degree. Presumably, college is also where he developed and honed his tastes and skill in cotture (I expect he was a hit with both the ladies and the other psych majors).
He then needed a job. A psych degree would qualify you nicely for a social work job, if you wanted it; how he ended up at Skin Horse would probably make an interesting side story (I’d guess it was that lots of other federal agencies didn’t want a lady-dude and he ended up at the place that really needed a human employee to meet regs and also Anisigma demands).
I could be misremembering, but I’m pretty sure Tip got a PhD in experimental psychology. I believe he should formally be addressed as Dr. Dennis Wilkin. Of course, Tip doesn’t like to go by Dennis, and isn’t generally one to stand on formality, and so doesn’t generally want or expect to be addressed as Dr. Wilkin in most cases. I think that he instinctively understands how to disarm people by dispensing with excessively formal etiquette, so it’s easy to forget he is a doctor.
I don’t know that it’s ever been made clear why Tip joined the Army in the first place, but I recall some back story from a while back in which I believe Tip was hired directly from the Army into Skin Horse, I think by way of the CIA.
It may be that Tip completed his education before joining the army, and decided that he didn’t really like experimenting on rats, and joined the Army just because it was something different (or maybe to pay off student debt? PhDs tend to be fairly expensive, over time.) Alternatively, he could have completed his PhD while he was in the Army. I believe the U.S. armed forces do all have programs in which members can complete educational courses, and ultimately even earn degrees, while they are still in the service. They will also often offer to pay for someone’s education, if the individual contracts to join the service after completing a degree. I used to get tons of offers like that from the various armed services when I was an undergraduate, because I had a good GPA. (I didn’t sign on with any of them, but it really wasn’t a bad deal – they agree to pay for your education, and you serve a term of service afterward – you get a degree with no student debt, and a guaranteed job afterward.)
“It’s my industrial-strength hairdryer. AND I CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT IT!” – Princess Vespa, Spaceballs