Mexican Standoff, Awkward Version – Chapter 9, Act 1, Strip 10

Yeah, as you would have guessed, there are still certain hang-ups regarding social codes and mores for the team. Biff, Gregory and the Professor have to get used to being teenagers again, which they hadn’t been for a short while (Gregory), a while (Biff) and a long time (Professor*). And K’ip has to get used to being a human…or, well, nekomimi**, instead of an anthropomorphic cat.

So certain things don’t come natural for them, but they’re trying…and they realize that in a group of teenage boys having lunch on the school’s rooftop, girls cannot be mentioned without someone making some assessment of their desirability. Gregory takes responsibility for the awkwardness he has caused and bites the bullet. As a positive side-effect, the names of Mopey’s besties are now revealed. I think it’s unnecessary to specify which one of the two is Megumi and which one is Akane…since ironclad tradition requires the one with the glasses to be the smart one. We’ve covered that ground before.

As to why Snuka isn’t off any help here, despite actually having the most and most current experience with being a teenager, the reason is that he’s an ‘outsider’-type character. Since his upbringing and experiences are so vastly different from those of the other teenagers he’s met in Lillytown, the assumption is that he played mostly at fish-out-of-water-comedy around them. Come to think of it, I should have shown some of that, it would have been funny. And on another level, he’ll never lose an awkwardness-stare-down-mexican-standoff in any case, since he can do that sort of impassive face so well…

More on Thursday.

* The Professor’s time as a barbarian in the fantasy realm doesn’t count as having been a teenager, since the age of maturity for barbarians is eight.

** I think I’m not only stating the obvious when revealing that, yes, Kippu-kun wears a hat with cat ears because he’s got actual cat ears underneath.