The meme Walky is doing is the Thor one, yes. Ana’s comment is taking a different meme format involving rapper Drake, which is a four-panel layout. In the top-left is Drake holding his hand up as if to reject the thing in top-right. In the bottom-left is Drake pointing toward the thing in bottom-right, indicating it to be accepted as the superior option to top-right thing.
In Ana’s comment, the top-right rejected thing is the Thor meme which Walky used in the comic, while the bottom-right accepted thing is yet another meme from JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure in which the antagonist, Dio, appears in place of something more expected.
Laura
Ah. Wow. That’s… a little too complex for me. ;-D
Thank you for your explanation!
Jennifer IS a lot nicer and more helpful than peeps give her credit for, but also sometimes you just want to do the meme.
Archieve
She is nicer but so far that seems to be limited to interactions when she’s helping somebody one on one.
Needfuldoer
The social conditions have to be right. She’s with Cool People right now, and so she can’t be seen interacting with people who aren’t Cool People.
Daibhid C
Much as I hate to defend Jennifer, I’m not … entirely sure that’s true. I probably would have been before the “Raidah complains that Jennifer won’t shut up about Kit Fisto” strip, but apparently Jennifer believes, completely wrongly, that she can be her entire self around these people and they won’t judge her for it.
Daibhid C
Of course,the logical follow up to that is that Jennifer completely blanks Lucy because she wants to, so I guess I’m not really defending her at all.
Needfuldoer
This is the same Jennifer who was mortified when Joyce showed up in Forest Quad, and who abruptly let go of Ruth’s hand when Lucy met them in the hallway.
She absolutely compartmentalizes her social interactions.
Marma
Doesn’t everyone though?
Taellosse
I think it’s a little more nuanced than that, though perhaps not actually better – being accepted by Cool People is a side-effect of her true craving: to BE a Cool Person. It’s why she denies her geeky interests exist (or tries to argue they’re actually mainstream), regardless of her current company. She finds them embarrassing according to her own standards of Cool, irrespective of anyone else’s opinion.
I was also stating to feel this is the first time they’ve felt like a fitting couple, but you have reminded me of the real reason I didn’t like them. That gave me the “icks” too strong. And autism loves to amplify that.
But TBH Walky had a really bad first semester what with all the chaos of getting kidnapped by his girlfriend’s father and seeing Toe Dad get murdered in front of him, and then his girlfriend’s father getting murdered in the hospital. So he might have been a little gun-shy about a relationship.
I’m still on the fence. Maybe it’s because we’ve only witnessed romantic affection from Walky in the form of sheer infatuation to the level of unhealthy idolization, but it still feels to me that he likes and respects Lucy as a person but is only dating her because a) she’s there b) she gives him the validation he doesn’t give himself and c) (and this is the most critical piece of it imo) Dorothy told him he should
Also, Walky added a stated reason, that he doesn’t want to watch cartoons alone. Which honestly sounds like a perfectly good friend-activity, come to think of it. Just because a pal is your preferred gender and likes you, does not mean you automatically need to date.
Lucy deserves somebody who is actively excited to be with her. Maybe Walky will become that person! It’s fine to let feelings develop slowly instead of throwing toys at her head. If he doesn’t get there, though… maybe Jacob.
Thinking about it, not shocked he doesn’t mount any actual disagreement. Yes, I know Walky would prefer Jennifer be Billie, but he also never was keen on Billie and Ruth as a couple, so much as I don’t think he’s ever going to be the leader of Asher’s fanclub, he might still think it’s an upgrade on that front.
Then again, I know Ruth did later give him his shoes back mounted like a trophy, which he was amused by, so maybe he softened on her a bit.
I’m… actually quite interested in Walky’s take on Asher, at this point. Walky is perceptive, empathetic, and thoughtful when he wants to be; when he’s not running away from something, he tends to have really good takes on stuff.
Lucy is definitely looking at Jennifer’s friend group through rose tinted glasses, she was honestly more popular in Lucy’s dorm wing atleast for a while.
Her expression in the fourth panel is really heartbreaking, like she’s trying to justify to herself more then her brother why Jennifer’s behavior is acceptable and that Jennifer not being a bongo (she is).
I don’t see it. Jennifer and Lucy are roommates sure but does that dictate acknowledgement from across the room when you’re out with your boyfriend? Lucy can easily walk up and say hello. At most Lucy would get a wave from me. I don’t see how this is Jen being rude.
Archieve
Jennifer didn’t need to even wave at her just a brief nod and smile to let her know she was acknowledged as an acquaintance. After going out of her way to make Jennifer/bille included in their dorm hall again after burning her bridges there I think Lucy atleast deserves the causal nod you might give to somebody you barely know on the street.
Archieve
Also her brother indicates this happenrd before so not just a one time incident of Jennifer not hearing Lucy
I really do not understand this comment. The author is, pretty blatantly, spelling out that Jennifer is regularly pretending not to see Lucy in public. The bare minimum would just be a small nod—how is that not rude? And why would Lucy walking over to her to say hello be *less* intrusive to her spending time with her boyfriend?
Sirksome
I don’t know what’s expected here honestly. This is the first time I’ve seen anything close to Jennifer ignoring Lucy intentionally happen. She tried to ignore Walky at first and that went bad for her, but not Lucy. Lyle seems cool, but I don’t know him for squat, so his take doesn’t mean much, especially since we know Jennifer has a group date planned with Walky that Lucy is expected to be a part of. Why pretend she doesn’t see her now?
Maybe it’s because I have very bad vision but I if my name was shouted from across the room. I would ignore it most times, especially since it’s a very common name much like the name Jennifer. To me this isn’t Jennifer being a jerk and ignoring Lucy. She’s just living her life.
What you gotta go inspect everyone who shouts your name? Acknowledge them, cause they did that? Like some kinda big fancy acknowledging person, bowing to a Queen when she summons you or some shit? Nah!
That last part was a joke but I seriously don’t get why Jen’s a jerk here. This seems like a neutral social occurrence, not a malicious snub.
Archieve
Like walky she only talks to lucy when alone never in public. Also recall the ‘group date’ was radiahs plan not jennifers, Jennifer actually made it really obvious to walky and Lucy that she wanted them to decline because she doesn’t want them to be apart of her friend group. If this was somebody else who didn’t have a history of snubbing former friends I could give them the benefit of the doubt, with Jennifer it reads like a deliberate act because that has been her past behavior, like if somebody has a past of giving back handed compliments it’s natural to be suspicious when they give compliments.
zee
A wave with maybe a smile. That is literally all that is expected here. That is what you do when you see someone you don’t actively dislike in public.
Daibhid C
This is why I never leave the house if I can avoid it.
My instinctive reaction is on the “not acknowledging someone who says hi to you is rude” side. Certainly it’s not something I’d do (I’ll look round any time I hear the name “David”, pretty much automatically.)
And by the same token, I feel like if I see someone I know and don’tsay hi, that’s also me being rude. And I don’t want to be rude! But, while I don’t share it, I feel like maybe the idea that expecting someone to exhange “hi”s with you just because you recognise them is actually throwing a social burden at them is equally valid. And I don’t want to do that either!
So I just avoid ever seeing anyone I know.
Daibhid C
BTW, I am aware that this tran of thought suggests I have serious issues, so nobody needs to tell me.
Leorale
Not serious! Just a lil case of overthinking it. Any reasonably smart person has overthought social things before. You’re in good company.
Very cute ending but someone really needs to point out to Jennifer that acting like a high-school snob in public isn’t the power walk she thinks it is. This is an instance were Lucys brother being blunt is a good thing and it would be great if he got the chance to point out to Lucy that she has been more of a friend to Jennifer than Jennifer has been to her.
Snobbery would be in character, but I can also thoroughly believe that she is just totally absorbed in the presence of her partner and isn’t perceiving anything else.
Walky is very cute doing the meme, so I approve. (I was going to say that I approve him throwing Billie under the bus to do it, but then I saw that the comments are a chorus of “But is she though?”. . . It’s not throwing her under the bus if it’s deserved!)
121 thoughts on “Pretending”
Ana Chronistic
Drake meme hand up: is (s)he though meme
Drake meme pointing: “You thought it was Jennifer, but it was me! DIO!”
Ana Chronistic
alt: was actually gonna use the salad but couldn’t decide how
Clif
Lettuce bypass the salad. You should say what you meme and meme what you say.
The Wellerman
I do love a well-placed JoJo meme! ?
Laura
So, I’m a bit at a loss. Is this what we’re referring to?
https://youtu.be/9ddJyWLqbt4
Or something else?
Tan
The meme Walky is doing is the Thor one, yes. Ana’s comment is taking a different meme format involving rapper Drake, which is a four-panel layout. In the top-left is Drake holding his hand up as if to reject the thing in top-right. In the bottom-left is Drake pointing toward the thing in bottom-right, indicating it to be accepted as the superior option to top-right thing.
In Ana’s comment, the top-right rejected thing is the Thor meme which Walky used in the comic, while the bottom-right accepted thing is yet another meme from JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure in which the antagonist, Dio, appears in place of something more expected.
Laura
Ah. Wow. That’s… a little too complex for me. ;-D
Thank you for your explanation!
Pylgrim
Oh? You’re approaching me?
Blume
Super cute!
The Wellerman
? Lovely!
BBCC
It’s a good meme!
But given how she’s helped people before, I second ‘IS she though?’
alongcameaspider
She wasn’t terrible with helping Joyce see a doctor about birth control
Sirksome
Jennifer IS a lot nicer and more helpful than peeps give her credit for, but also sometimes you just want to do the meme.
Archieve
She is nicer but so far that seems to be limited to interactions when she’s helping somebody one on one.
Needfuldoer
The social conditions have to be right. She’s with Cool People right now, and so she can’t be seen interacting with people who aren’t Cool People.
Daibhid C
Much as I hate to defend Jennifer, I’m not … entirely sure that’s true. I probably would have been before the “Raidah complains that Jennifer won’t shut up about Kit Fisto” strip, but apparently Jennifer believes, completely wrongly, that she can be her entire self around these people and they won’t judge her for it.
Daibhid C
Of course,the logical follow up to that is that Jennifer completely blanks Lucy because she wants to, so I guess I’m not really defending her at all.
Needfuldoer
This is the same Jennifer who was mortified when Joyce showed up in Forest Quad, and who abruptly let go of Ruth’s hand when Lucy met them in the hallway.
She absolutely compartmentalizes her social interactions.
Marma
Doesn’t everyone though?
Taellosse
I think it’s a little more nuanced than that, though perhaps not actually better – being accepted by Cool People is a side-effect of her true craving: to BE a Cool Person. It’s why she denies her geeky interests exist (or tries to argue they’re actually mainstream), regardless of her current company. She finds them embarrassing according to her own standards of Cool, irrespective of anyone else’s opinion.
Thag Simmons
Jennifer’s good at certain sorts of problems. Y’know, practical problems.
thejeff
She does command a wealth of knowledge pertaining to terrible and horrific things.
Needfuldoer
Not problems like “What is beauty?”, ’cause that would fall within the purview of your conundrums of philosophy.
Tan
Jennifer’s good at helping when she gets out of her own posterior.
She spends a lot of time in her own posterior.
JBento
To be fair, it’s a pretty great posterior.
Lars
Well, she got Ruth a boyfriend – by setting up a date between Daisy and Ruth, but hey it’s the result that counts.
Poor Daisy.
Joy
I’m not sure Daisy is ready for a relationship tbh. Either that or she needs more practice dating. I can’t tell which.
Leorale
Definitely more practice.
And maybe some medicine for her anxiety-bowels.
Sirksome
This has been the first hint for me that Walky has more than a passing interest in Lucy. It took awhile but it’s a start.
DailyBrad
He’s shown it a few other times, too, like when she licked the sauce of his shirt, but yeah, this was one of the more overt examples.
Carla's #2 Fan
I was also stating to feel this is the first time they’ve felt like a fitting couple, but you have reminded me of the real reason I didn’t like them. That gave me the “icks” too strong. And autism loves to amplify that.
Imogen
Agreed! It’s cute!
Diana Nock
To me, it’s the first time they’ve actually felt like a couple.
Opus the Poet
But TBH Walky had a really bad first semester what with all the chaos of getting kidnapped by his girlfriend’s father and seeing Toe Dad get murdered in front of him, and then his girlfriend’s father getting murdered in the hospital. So he might have been a little gun-shy about a relationship.
Needfuldoer
At first I was asking myself “when did Jeremiah kidnap Walky?”
His fling with Amber was brief but eventful.
Wizard
Don’t forget that his roommate and sorta-friend also died.
Lan
I’m still on the fence. Maybe it’s because we’ve only witnessed romantic affection from Walky in the form of sheer infatuation to the level of unhealthy idolization, but it still feels to me that he likes and respects Lucy as a person but is only dating her because a) she’s there b) she gives him the validation he doesn’t give himself and c) (and this is the most critical piece of it imo) Dorothy told him he should
Leorale
I agree with you.
Also, Walky added a stated reason, that he doesn’t want to watch cartoons alone. Which honestly sounds like a perfectly good friend-activity, come to think of it. Just because a pal is your preferred gender and likes you, does not mean you automatically need to date.
Lucy deserves somebody who is actively excited to be with her. Maybe Walky will become that person! It’s fine to let feelings develop slowly instead of throwing toys at her head. If he doesn’t get there, though… maybe Jacob.
Stephen Bierce
*plays Eric Clapton’s “Pretending” on the hacked Muzak*
DailyBrad
I am really feeling these two lately, it’s very cute.
DailyBrad
Thinking about it, not shocked he doesn’t mount any actual disagreement. Yes, I know Walky would prefer Jennifer be Billie, but he also never was keen on Billie and Ruth as a couple, so much as I don’t think he’s ever going to be the leader of Asher’s fanclub, he might still think it’s an upgrade on that front.
Then again, I know Ruth did later give him his shoes back mounted like a trophy, which he was amused by, so maybe he softened on her a bit.
Thag Simmons
If he softened on her it was only by a bit
DailyBrad
Between this and punching Asher, Walky sticks up for his sisters these days. Good of him.
Jamie
I’m… actually quite interested in Walky’s take on Asher, at this point. Walky is perceptive, empathetic, and thoughtful when he wants to be; when he’s not running away from something, he tends to have really good takes on stuff.
Thag Simmons
Walky did punch him in the face once
Suet
If she’s popular, then I’m a C-lister.
Very high ceilings, this place is hella swanky.
Suet
Le meme in question
Archieve
Lucy is definitely looking at Jennifer’s friend group through rose tinted glasses, she was honestly more popular in Lucy’s dorm wing atleast for a while.
Vukodlak
Wow together those two around two hundred points of weapons grade adorkable.
Audkitten
Lucy deserves so much better from everyone
Archieve
Her expression in the fourth panel is really heartbreaking, like she’s trying to justify to herself more then her brother why Jennifer’s behavior is acceptable and that Jennifer not being a bongo (she is).
Sirksome
I don’t see it. Jennifer and Lucy are roommates sure but does that dictate acknowledgement from across the room when you’re out with your boyfriend? Lucy can easily walk up and say hello. At most Lucy would get a wave from me. I don’t see how this is Jen being rude.
Archieve
Jennifer didn’t need to even wave at her just a brief nod and smile to let her know she was acknowledged as an acquaintance. After going out of her way to make Jennifer/bille included in their dorm hall again after burning her bridges there I think Lucy atleast deserves the causal nod you might give to somebody you barely know on the street.
Archieve
Also her brother indicates this happenrd before so not just a one time incident of Jennifer not hearing Lucy
System_Anomaly
I really do not understand this comment. The author is, pretty blatantly, spelling out that Jennifer is regularly pretending not to see Lucy in public. The bare minimum would just be a small nod—how is that not rude? And why would Lucy walking over to her to say hello be *less* intrusive to her spending time with her boyfriend?
Sirksome
I don’t know what’s expected here honestly. This is the first time I’ve seen anything close to Jennifer ignoring Lucy intentionally happen. She tried to ignore Walky at first and that went bad for her, but not Lucy. Lyle seems cool, but I don’t know him for squat, so his take doesn’t mean much, especially since we know Jennifer has a group date planned with Walky that Lucy is expected to be a part of. Why pretend she doesn’t see her now?
Maybe it’s because I have very bad vision but I if my name was shouted from across the room. I would ignore it most times, especially since it’s a very common name much like the name Jennifer. To me this isn’t Jennifer being a jerk and ignoring Lucy. She’s just living her life.
What you gotta go inspect everyone who shouts your name? Acknowledge them, cause they did that? Like some kinda big fancy acknowledging person, bowing to a Queen when she summons you or some shit? Nah!
That last part was a joke but I seriously don’t get why Jen’s a jerk here. This seems like a neutral social occurrence, not a malicious snub.
Archieve
Like walky she only talks to lucy when alone never in public. Also recall the ‘group date’ was radiahs plan not jennifers, Jennifer actually made it really obvious to walky and Lucy that she wanted them to decline because she doesn’t want them to be apart of her friend group. If this was somebody else who didn’t have a history of snubbing former friends I could give them the benefit of the doubt, with Jennifer it reads like a deliberate act because that has been her past behavior, like if somebody has a past of giving back handed compliments it’s natural to be suspicious when they give compliments.
zee
A wave with maybe a smile. That is literally all that is expected here. That is what you do when you see someone you don’t actively dislike in public.
Daibhid C
This is why I never leave the house if I can avoid it.
My instinctive reaction is on the “not acknowledging someone who says hi to you is rude” side. Certainly it’s not something I’d do (I’ll look round any time I hear the name “David”, pretty much automatically.)
And by the same token, I feel like if I see someone I know and don’tsay hi, that’s also me being rude. And I don’t want to be rude! But, while I don’t share it, I feel like maybe the idea that expecting someone to exhange “hi”s with you just because you recognise them is actually throwing a social burden at them is equally valid. And I don’t want to do that either!
So I just avoid ever seeing anyone I know.
Daibhid C
BTW, I am aware that this tran of thought suggests I have serious issues, so nobody needs to tell me.
Leorale
Not serious! Just a lil case of overthinking it. Any reasonably smart person has overthought social things before. You’re in good company.
Say Hi when you want to say Hi to people.
(They’ll probably do the same.)
Yotomoe
Is she though?
Awaiting Moderation
Sometimes the relationship between these two feels very… not there. Like it’s still a one-sided crush with very little real chemistry.
Today is not one of those days though because that last panel in particular is just adorable.
Archieve
Very cute ending but someone really needs to point out to Jennifer that acting like a high-school snob in public isn’t the power walk she thinks it is. This is an instance were Lucys brother being blunt is a good thing and it would be great if he got the chance to point out to Lucy that she has been more of a friend to Jennifer than Jennifer has been to her.
Mark
Snobbery would be in character, but I can also thoroughly believe that she is just totally absorbed in the presence of her partner and isn’t perceiving anything else.
Archieve
Unfortunately the first option is more incharacter for Jennifer at this point
RassilonTDavros
Genuinely failed to recognize the meme on first read and thought he was trying to do a Faz impression.
this may have something to do with my never having seen a single avengers movie
Mark
My first thought on that panel was, “why is Walky wearing Asher’s mouth?
AbacusWizard
it’s a good meme; I use it once in a while myself
saltchocolate
Walky is very cute doing the meme, so I approve. (I was going to say that I approve him throwing Billie under the bus to do it, but then I saw that the comments are a chorus of “But is she though?”. . . It’s not throwing her under the bus if it’s deserved!)
ADLegend21