Wee to the Oh

(LAST UPDATE: 1/3/13!)

Okay. That’s it. I’m not the biggest fan of JohnDave, but I definitely see the at least one-sided feelings that Dave has for John. (Sort of like a mirror of Dirk’s feelings for Jake?) I mean, go ahead and ship what you want, but this is my personal take on it. And I’d like to get all of the clues together in one place. This was inspired by this beautiful post (the original was moved or deleted), by the way, so go do that. 

Anyway, feel free to add on to this list, okay? I’ll edit as people add on. But here.

1. The aforementioned post corresponding to this panel, where Dave’s Beat Machine plays the Ghostbuster’s theme.

2. This notorious conversation and confession.

3. The incident with alternate Dave (later Davesprite) in which he comes back to save John’s life. Although this can also be seen as strategic (which I will not try to argue against), quite a few people see this as a sort of shipping moment? That Dave would sacrifice himself for John?

4. The fact that Dave wears the glasses John gifted him instead of the ones his bro gave him. And that he never takes them off. (Again, this could be due to his strange eye color, but Rose’s purple eyes don’t seem to phase her? And why not switch between the two sets of glasses?)

• In fact, once he gets the present, he switches out Bro’s glasses for John’s instantaneously. It’s get, read, switch. That simple, and that fast. 

5. (from moss-piglets) ”Just wanted to point out that some of the hidden tracks on Dave’s beat machine have been removed or changed. One of them used to be I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing, the original version. There’s also a version of John singing it here. Not particularly shippy, but just felt like sharing it.” 

• (added by ectobiologistegbert) “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing”. That’s a love song. (every time i dream of you, the sweetest dream i’ll ever dream… etc.) But yeah, it totally is. And considering dream dave looking at john on his computer…also, it’s written by Diane warren and it’s from one of John’s favourite movies (Armageddon). Another song by Diane Warren (and probably John’s favourite) is How Do I Live.

6. (from anon and moss-piglets) The fact that Dave has been living with puppets for 13 years of his life, and it’s not until John points out to him that they’re disturbing that he begins to be afraid. Clearly John has a large influence over Dave’s actions.

7. (from ectobiologistegbert) John showcases a lot of control over Dave.”Not to mention that Dave says that John’s got him all torn up inside over something as simple as the Howie Mandel apple juice pee incident.”

8. The continued mention that Rose constantly hits on him, despite the situation in point 2, where she indicates she knows Dave’s feelings. (I don’t know about you guys, but from my experience with younger children, when you have a crush on someone it’s pretty natural to present opposition into the situation, whether it’s real or not. Sort of like “ohhh~! Be careful! I could get stolen away at any moment~!” I could be reading too far into this.

• (from ectobiologistegbert) “Also, funny enough but in act one John asks Rose to stop hitting on Dave after the coolkid in question tells John about Rose’s macking on him.”

9. ( from ectobiologistegbert) ”There’s the birthday letters and the fact that dave referred to his as sappy (rather than sentimental or heartfelt or some other word like that).”

10. ( from ectobiologistegbert) ”There’s the fact that when John faced Typheus, Typheus gave him the choice to either live /or/ to be killed. Being killed would save Dave from the timeline and allow him to continue on, and John let himself be killed (apparently burned to death) in order to save Dave from that timeline.” 

11. ( from ectobiologistegbert) ”When Davesprite asks Dave if he’s got ANY questions he can ask and he’ll get an answer, the first thing Dave seriously asks about is John’s wellbeing, and his and his alone.” 

12. (from ectobiologistegbert)“There’s the thing where Terezi tells Dave that he won’t tell John about Dave not being as cool as he pretends to be, because she knows that that’s all he cares about.”

• “dave has no problem with jade knowing he’s not cool and likewise rose but he does everything to make sure john still thinks he’s cool. like with the puppet thing with the ALL CAPS. Even though he’s freaked out he puts that guise on of him still liking them just to keep john unaware.”

13. When Dave mourns Bro’s death, he begins doubting if he is a real hero. In fact, he only compares himself to one other person, which is John, stating that “John is a hero.” and that’s he’s not. When standing above the body of his Bro - who was possibly his biggest hero while growing up - why cite John as the best example of a hero that he can think of? 

14. (from moss-piglets) “Somebody did a mini analysis of a song found on one of the albums.”

15. (from moss-piglets) “Anyways, Dave can be pretty quick to help John (like any best friend or a dog). Like when John finally made it over to where Rose’s room was, Dave showed really keen and sudden interest in that. Like an instant perk up, “What? John’s here? Right now? What?” Also when they’re blatantly invading Rose’s privacy, Dave definitely could have snooped around before John came along. Rose has been asleep for a while now and it’s only when John shows up that Dave takes a stronger interest in her room and whatnot. It kind of reminded me of a kid that sticks around because the person they like is there.” 

• (from anon x 2) Right before we see Dave on Derse for the first time, he’s shown to be snooping over John’s shoulder, presumably for the code John is holding. Once he’s awakened on Derse, the image of John stays on his computer, even after the dance party. When Rose checks over his shoulder, she seems not only to not be surprised that Dave’s been watching John, but it almost looks like she’s smirking, too. Dave’s pointing out to her that John is at her house, but this could very easily be a cover as to why he was watching John from his computer.

16. (from moss-piglets) “And lastly (hopefully), I just wanted to point out that John does thank Davesprite for saving his life and Davesprite does differentiate between that John and the other John, his John that’s dead.”

• (from ectobiologistegbert) “in this conversation davesprite seems legitimately hurt about not being “real” when john talks to him, and then dave says not to worry because he “wouldn’t give a shit” though we know he obviously does care deeply for john”

17. I continue to assert that there seems to be parallels between Dave and John’s relationship and Dirk and Jake’s. In keeping with this theme, (in both cases, by the way, both non-Striders are “not a homosexual”), I find the idea that Jake mentioned to Dirk that they would be great, were it not for their shared gender something to go on. In other words, Jake led Dirk on. (I’m sorry, I can’t find that citing right now.) Well, in a way, John led Dave on as well, albeit briefly. Although, I may be looking too far into this, but the way Dave reacts makes it almost sound like this is a habit John has. I can’t think of more canon evidence when this happens, though, so if you can, please let me know.

18. (from anon) ”Heyy about your JohnDave archive thing, would anything about post-scratch Dave work too? Because it was stated that post-scratch Dave had a short obsession with Con Air and he actively sought out Ben Stiller shades John gave him pre-scratch. Obviously we dont know much about him, but canon implies that he and Rose retained some memories so maybe those little things are important??”

• (from crouching-moron) “With respect to #18, we see that all the pre-scratch kids’ interests are the same as their post-scratch counterparts. Jade’s affinity with adventure was there (though Bec was in the way in the beta universe). Rose writes wizard novels. And John is a comedian. But Dave is not a rapper. HE MAKES MOVIES. MOVIES.” 

19. (from ectobiologistegbert) The command on this page indicates that John is capable of keeping Dave chill. Plus the comment that it’s important to “keep the wires hot” between those two shows some insight into precisely what Dave thinks about John. 

20. (from ectobiologistegbert) In this situation, we get another insight into Dave’s mind. It’s interesting to observe that over half of what he thinks about here has to do with John.

21. ACT 6 EVIDENCE! Out of curiosity I was going through the conversations from Act 6 that Dave has, and it’s really interesting, because for the entirety of the time that he’s on the asteroid, he’s very talkative, to the point that it’s almost rambling. This persists until the end of this conversation, when Rose mentions - you guessed it - John, at which point he gets quite attentive to her speech.

22. (from ectobiologistegbert) It’s been suggested that SBaHJ was based off of John and Dave. Their colors, blue and red, point in this direction, as well.  It’s also been suggested that the hoodie that HJ wears in the movovie looks similar to the Breath God Tier Hoodies.    

• The “ROCK SOLBO” hella jeff is performing is eerily similar to the guitar solo John rocks out to here.
• (from ectobiologistegbert) ”In this one, Davesprite’s “ahahahaha you fucked up” is actually paralleled in SBaHJ #18, to add to the SBaHJ and Dave/John similarities, and the fact that the two cartoon characters were most likely conceived based on Dave and John.”
• (from ectobiologistegbert)  ”Oh, and to add to the SBaHJ and DaveJohn stuff, on the back of the poster Davesprite even DRAWS them. It’s also notable that the poster John uses is from Armageddon (where Don’t Wanna Miss a Thing, which is on Dave’s Phat Beat Machine’s secret track, is from).”

23. (from ectobiologistegbert) The “man bro bukkake” line that Dirk delivers to Jake is actually a line that Dave delivers to John earlier on when they’re discussing Ghostbusters Two. Just to keep up with the parallels between the two relationships.

24. (from ectobiologistegbert) “There’s a few things with this one. Davesprite tells terezi he’ll hop through time just to kick her ass if she dares mess with john again and  ”TG: to awaken some egregious homofantasy for a ripped blue dudes mammoth eco friendly bulge” that line sort of jumped out at me. also he seems almost disappointed/angry when he says that he’s impressionable “unless you actually want to help him and then he’s a tough nut to crack”

25. (from ectobiologistegbert) “There’s the fact that when dave was smiling (the only time he smiled IN CANON), yes he was talking to jade. but it was about john actually”

26. I may be stretching with this one, but. It struck me that when John saved Roxy, the two people that saw him were Karkat and Dave. Karkat, who we know attempted to share a quadrant with John at one point and got turned down, and Dave. Dave, who also has evidence pointing towards the fact that he wants John in a “quadrant” and will likely get turned down. 

• (from clearlyodd) “As mentioned in 26, Dave and Karkat saw John get stabbed by Meenah while saving Roxy.  Later, we see the two of them (and Kanaya) attacking Meenah—although possibly just because she has a generally obnoxious and volatile personality, it could also be because she “killed” John.”

27. (from ectobiologistegbert) “John has SBaHJ/Dave references in his Echeladder. Three that we know of (YOU ARE THE STAR., ITS YOU, and UNREAL HEIR). This is similar to how Jake has several references to his suitors in his echeladder. These two are the only ones we know of who have references to people who (may) have feelings for them. Also, just to point out when John reaches ECTOBIOLOBABYSITTER, baby Dave is the only one clinging to him while the others are pretty much on the floor. It’s not particularly shippy though.”

28. (from ectobiologistegbert) “In this panel, Dave seems pretty bitter at the fact that John forgot about him (and even had the gall to say it). It’s almost like he’s saying that of course John forgot him, because he’s not the “real” Dave.”

29. (from stutler) In this panel, “Dave seems pretty interested in whether or not John likes Vriska, and he goes out of his way to tell John how he wasn’t flirting with Terezi. Plus, John mentions how he has never liked a girl before. He also goes to “warn” John to tell him that Karkat may make an awkward advance on him, indicating that he doesn’t want him to, and finds John good enough to be hit on.”

30. This isn’t a big indicator, but it was really something that just kind of caught my interest. In this pesterlog, about halfway through, Dave compares Terezi’s stupidity to John’s. He says it’s “almost egbertian in elegant stupidity”. This is the second time in the events happening immediately after Bro’s death that he mentions John, the first one mentioned in point 13, and the other discussed here. He’s been talking to Terezi for about five pages, and in those five pages or so, he compares both himself and Terezi to John. Just a little interesting point.

31 (from ectobiologistegbert) In Homestuck Book 2, Andrew Hussie writes, “I like to believe that over the years Dave has accumulated thousands of pages or sent messages after John has already logged off Pesterchum.” So Dave writes to John even when he’s not there. I personally think that’s adorable and deserves to be in this index XD

• (from ectobiologistegbert) ”the more i look at it, the more i think it means: dave’s got thousands of pages of messages over the years of things he’s been unable to say face-to-face (or as directly as you can get over IM) to him. I don’t even think pesterchum has offline messaging support, meaning Dave’s got thousands of messages stored of things he KNOWS John won’t get. And things he can’t tell John when he’s online. As in Dave is in love with John and can’t tell him in person so he’s confessed to him numerous times over IM because of the fact that he knows John won’t receive the confessions. Among other lame, dorky, cute things he’s probably got saved as well.”

32. When Jake shows up with Aranea, Dave’s first concern is to find out who the “john-looking kid” is. It’s interesting that he doesn’t worry about the troll he’s attacking or the other troll that just stopped them all from fighting. He focuses instead on the one who looks like John.

• (from ectobiologistegbert) “immediately after aranea calms meenah down, dave notices this john-looking individual and that’s the first thing that he focuses on. Not the new spider troll or what she’s doing, but this individual standing there in the background that looks startingly like the guy who’s his best bro, the dude he’s never met in person but really wants to (as evidenced by the letter), the guy who he was worried about, the guy who was the reason he was fighting meenah with karkat, the guy who he’s in love with.”

33. (from roonseyrunes) Dave spends quite a bit of time worrying about John’s happiness in this panel.

34. Dave is having a hard time coping with Jake’s presence. In fact, he seems to be rather flustered whenever Jake is mentioned. He volunteers to talk to him, but he shies away, almost as if afraid to talk to someone resembling a crush? This might be a stretch, but I think it’s legit.

35. In this update, when Rose mentions that she’s seen John recently, Dave starts questioning her excessively. This train of inquiries ends in him stating that he’ll just dream up his own John, at which Rose snickers. In conjunction with number 2, giving what Rose already knows, this seems to pretty much seal the one-sided-Dave-likes-John deal.

36. (from raceagainstelegance) “i also want to point out that john WAS THINKING ABOUT DAVESPRITES GHOST BUTT before  and jade mentioned weird hand gestures in the previous panel ????

idk but johns technically thinking about daves butt ok”

37. (from onewayworld) “Besides Dave, John was the only one who got anything from Davespirte. A Denizen’s weapon at that. Quote:”TG: im more real actually cause ive been through some heavy shit already hopping around on red hot gears and i-beams for like a year TG: and grinding shit out for your ungrateful ass” And he got the code despite how he was probably on his last legs fleeing from Hephaestus. Bonus is that he /memorized/ the weird code just for John! (WIin189Q) Pages: 003592 003640 and 005844”

I’ve gotten a lot of requests for canon moments of John’s feelings for Dave.  So here’s a bonus section and a few little points sent in by others!

1. (from clearlyodd) ”For stuff on John’s side, the Act 6 intermissions are filled with little details here and there.  John can tell for certain that there is no difference between Dave and Davesprite’s rapping styles and is generally defending the fact that Davesprite is still just Dave (the somewhat infamous “i just call him dave.”) Here, John condemns romance and dating as “dumb and boring,” emphasizes that when they all meet up he will give Rose a FRIENDLY hug, but turns around and says he will offer Dave a tender bro embrace.  Obviously this could just be the beginning of John’s mid-teens “I hate everything” freakout, but he is still giving Dave special consideration.”

2. (from clearlyodd) “In the third act 6 intermission, when John gets pissy over Con Air (and a million other things), he not only admits that he now thinks everything Dave told him about the movie is right, he also calls the movie an “oddly poignant tale of bromance,” and goes on to say that it is “just two bros separated by destiny, waiting to be reuinited. when they finally come together to kick some ass, it is arguably more moving than when he reunites with his wife and daughter!”  This, of course, could be seen as a parallel to his and Dave’s relationship.”

3. (from clearlyodd) ”This one is a bit thin as far as shipping goes, maybe, but while yelling at the sky, John does refer to Dave as “the best friend a guy ever had.”  His feelings towards Davesprite might have changed, but he still holds Dave in very high regard.”

Unfortunately, since I haven’t reread in quite a while, these are the only ones I am aware of at the moment. I plan to reread starting tomorrow, and I will update this as I do, but until then, does anyone else have any canonical moments like these? I will accept anything you guys give me. :) I just figured it’d be easier for everyone if this was compiled in one area. Thank you, everyone!