(From PvP! Click on the thumbnail for full sized full contact Romancin'!)
This plotline, over to the Player v. Player, intrigues me.
See, it's not that it's a romance competition between Brent and Francis, to see who can better treat his significant other to a night out on the town. I mean, there's nothing wrong with that, don't misunderstand me. It's one of those plots that Kurtz is good at, and this one's had some nice references, and some revealing moments and all.
No, the intriguing element came on August 16, when it was revealed that Marcy and Jade are in cahoots.
(Have you ever noticed how much fun it is to type the word "cahoots?" Try it sometime. It's surprisingly pleasant!)
See, this is a relatively common trope, over at PvP. People... well, plot. They have wacky adventures. They try to trick the people they love into doing things they think will be nice for everyone involved. They mess around, they act without thinking, and when it explodes with comedic results, they have to deal with the consequences.
The difference is, it's not usually Jade and Marcy doing the plotting.
Kurtz recently wrote a blog entry expressing some dissatisfaction with what he's given Jade to do. In his own words:
It seems like Jade has become more of a reactionary character who's there to roll her eyes at the crazy antics of the guys. It's like she's not even her own person anymore [...] Jade deserves to be so much more than just the annoyed girlfriend who crosses her arms and says kitchy things like "tee-hee. Girls play games too."
And now, we have Jade and Marcy doing some plotting. In hopes of having a really good evening on all sides, of course -- I don't think there's anything wrong or malicious about this. Brent and Francis have both pulled similar things on Jade and Marcy in the past.
The thing is, when people in PvP plot... things go wrong. I mean, they just do. This is... well, the whole nature of the "comedy" thing. We have the seeds for things going wrong -- Brent and Francis are far more interested in one-upping each other than actually being romantic with their respective dates, and that can escalate quickly. For that matter, who's to say that Jade and Marcy won't get into the spirit of the competition a little more directly -- after all, a limo versus a horse drawn carriage can be a fast basis for "my boyfriend outdid yours."
Or, something else might happen.
All I know is, something will go desperately wrong. And that's a chance for Jade and Marcy to take center stage again, and I'm entirely down with that.
I'm waiting for Francis to remember, "Hey wait, I was in the middle of dumping this girl!"
I dunno... I've actually been a bit dissatisfied with the storyline. Part of it is because it relies a bit too heavily on the trope that a man has to be prodded into doing something nice for his significant other. Maybe Kurtz will show this up by having Cole suddenly appear with his wife on a date that blows both Francis and Jade out the water and planned on his own. But personally, I've never been fond of storylines that can be summed up by "man tries to be romantic because he's prodded into it."
The other part is, Jade still isn't doing all that much. For all her "plotting," she's being remarkably passive. She (and Marcy) haven't been speaking up, trying to push for certain things at all. She's just been smiling as appropriate and fixing her hair.
I could still see this going places (after all, Brent still has the ring somewhere). But so far, I think Kurtz isn't bringing it all yet.
Firstly, I love how in touch and in control of everything Marcy is. So far the writing on her has been brilliant.
Secondly, I can see this whole debacle ending in tears and engagement...
Thirdly, I think that this is some of Kurtz's finest work in quite some time. Good on him.
Actually, I dig this story arch. There's truth in it. It reminds me of the madness of prom where my friends and I managed to get into serious debt, not because of how much we wanted to impress our dates, but because we had something to prove. Stupid and 17. It's hilarious that Brent is still doing this, and he's how old? And the fallout of these sort of things is that the guys seem more committed to the relationship than they really are. However, I expect Brent to win this one. After all, he has the ring.
I keep imagining one or the other of these guys at some point forgetting the date entirely and saying "Oh, yeah? Well I am WAY more romantic than you! And I'll prove it!" before whipping out a character sheet upon which has been scrawled: Romantic + 1,000,000,000.
Francis and Marcy are both listed as sixteen in the Wikipedia entry. Third base is a legitimate worry.
Didn't Francis explicitly ask for third base once?
Knowing that Jade knows they're in a competition, and knowing Brent has the ring, I'm willing to bet if he whips it out she's going to say NO.
Best possible way this could end: JELLO WRESTLING.
Oh God. Proposing to Jade just to one-up Francis? Brent can't be that insecure. Or that stupid. Or can he?
One thing's for sure. If Brent did, he would be letting his immaturity get the best of him, as usual. The only difference is, this act of immaturity would force him to mature. After all, whether or not his impulsive side notices it, marriage is pretty final. And I don't see Brent backing out of marrying Jade once he's proposed. So if Brent acts immature by proposing to Jade to "one-up" Francis, he would be forced to mature in the process (or at least in the weeks and months following his impulsive action). Irony on this grand a scale seems to be too much for Kurtz to resist.
The only thing that I could think of that would be better is if Jade says no, which could also be a possibility. Remember how they got in a fight when they had to share a car to work? When they lived in the same apartment for a week? What would happen if that became permanent?
And finally, if Brent does propose, how is Francis going to try to one-up Brent?
1) Have we seen a time where Jade or Marcie has acted immature? I wouldn't put it past them to screw this up, with Brent and France in cahoots. (Hey, it is nice to write cahoots!)
2) As for the possibly of a cat fight, only that might happen if Jade's sister comes in. And in that case, all bets are off.
3) And I think in the end, the most romantic thing to do would be to let the other couple win. And really, there's only one way this could end in an appropriate PvP way: World of Warcraft wedding.
Didn't Francis explicitly ask for third base once?
For Christmas.
Wasn't there an old, old PVP strip where someone (Marcie?) predicted that Francis would get his first kiss on some specific date in 2007?
It's not that far away, you know…
Part of it is because it relies a bit too heavily on the trope that a man has to be prodded into doing something nice for his significant other.
This is Brent and Francis we're talking about. Those characters are already the kinds of people that tend to have to be prodding to not be stupid about relationships.
Today's is up.
Aaaaaaaaand it appears to be *on*.
You've got a point, Matt, but it doesn't make it any easier to read the ten dozenth iteration of the story I wasn't much fond of in the first place.
Admittedly, though, the concept of the women getting it into their heads that they have to one-up each other (possibly leaving the men panicked and trying to prevent a full-scale disaster) based on today's comic does pique my interest a little bit, but I still think Kurtz has done much better work.
Especially since, despite Jade's quick attempt to take credit for this entire scenario, she hasn't really done a damn thing yet. Yeah, compliment Marcy on her great plan to sit back and watch the men make fools of themselves. That was really straining work right there.
I'm disappointed.
Mostly because Kurtz wrote that entry about how he feels Jade falls into too many stereotypes, she hasn't really developed any personality beyond the stereotypical eyeroll, "silly boys."
And how does he change it? ...
By having her trick Brent into the stereotypical romantic night out.
Uhhh, yeah, good job helping Jade develop that independent-of-dudes sense of self, Kurtz. Thanks bunches.
There just doesn't seem to be much personality to Jade. She's bland. She's just there along for the ride the guys are taking her on (the "manipulation" even seems sort of weak and almost not believable). She really can't do anything independent of the men.
It sort of saddens me.
Geez, give Kurtz a chance, people. We've barely started this storyline, and people are complaining about how Jade isn't being given enough time. This doesn't seem like a legitimate complaint so much as a reaction to Kurtz's news post, and the expectations people put on it. As Francis says, the night is still young. And if you'll stop the "Oh nos! We haven't seen Jade's character undergo drastic developments in the last five strips OMFG!!!!" you'll notice that Kurtz has followed Jade and Marcy into the ladies' room, rather than stay outside and listen to Brent and Francis trash-talk each other. So the ladies will likely be getting equal or greater screen time with the boys in this strip. And really, focusing solely on Jade and Marcy would be as big a mistake as focusing solely on Francis and Brent. Either way, you're missing three-fourths of the comedic opportunities.
Doug, in all fairness, I think you need a better rejoinder than "Give Kurtz a chance." It's not a thoughtful response to criticism about the story - it's merely a gut reaction that doesn't address the meat of concerns some of us have.
There's a reason the boys have been goaded into taking the girls on "the stereotpyical romantic night out" (jeez, how many things are stereotyped these days? The old tropes do seem to work best...). Note today's comic, where Marcy is commenting on this, in a completely non-meta way. She sees how stereotpyical and overdone Brent's view of a romantic date is, to her. To us, what's a limo ride and a nice night out? For the younger crowd, likely the same.
There have been dozens of instances in entertainment where the romantic date has been had and typically bases its comedic or dramatic effect on what goes wrong with the date. This one, though? I think Kurtz is looking to have it be the interactions and perceptions of the other date, and the people on it, that provides the comedy. "Oh, this is overdone," "like we haven't seen that to the nth degree," etc.
Also, I believe it was Brent who said that Francis would lose his virginity on May 24th, 2008. I know it was 2008, which would likely make him eighteen years old, but the date's a bit fuzzier. If you're looking for it, it was a brief time after the halloween arc the year before Diablo II came out.
32 Footsteps: It's a luxury that only webcomics has to have the ability to criticize a storyline before one part of it has even ended. Just wait a week, jeez.
So since nobody else mentionned it, I'll note that Eric has now completed his trifecta of usual suspect snarks with S*P, Narbonic and PvP, showing that he is, in fact, back. And looks like it is going down between Jade and Marcie as of the latest comic.
No, I'd say "give him a chance" is a well-thought-out reasoned response. It adresses the concerns by pointing out that they're based on insufficient evidence to make a conclusion.
And only on the web can "it's not his best work" be received by such exasperated responses.
Seriously, chill a bit on me and the others who agree with me. We don't have our pitchforks out. We're shrugging and said we've seen better stuff from Kurtz.
If you want to counter the criticism, however mild it may be, I welcome it. But saying "give it time" (politely in the case of Doug and 101, a bit less so in Abby's case) isn't countering the points at all. It's a conversation ender; it's saying that you can't counter the criticism and you're hoping that Kurtz's work will do so eventually.
And quiller, we're now awaiting the superfecta. Of course, since I'm not fond of the fourth comic in question, I'm not speaking its name.
Superfecta...? What's the fourth? Penny Arcade? Sluggy Freelance?
I'm noticing that my perceptions of PvP are changing. Before, I was fine with the rather stereotyped characters and clichéd plot arcs, but now I'm unsatisfied.
Reading back in the archives, it's rare to find a comic that I laugh out loud to now.
I guess I'm just growing away from PvP. YHMAYLM.
Heh... I said I wouldn't name it because I don't like it. But I do like and read Sluggy (I'm really interested to see where the current story is going to go, even with Pete's forewarning about possible disjointedness), so I can tell you that's definitely not the comic I had in mind.
Well, I'll say this for Penny Arcade, I'd definitely wear a T-Shirt with the last panel of today's comic on it to my D&D game.
The amusing thing about this is that what they're doing isn't 'Romantic' it's nothing more than a contest of egos. Brent and Francis are only doing this to one-up the other, I will admit that I've sorta seen a slump in some of what Kurtz has done but I think that might also be because in the last year the changes that were made have been far more...what's the word...shaking. They merged with Max, The lottery win, these things altered the landscape of the comic far more than this stuff and I think that part of the problem is that Kurtz has too many secondary characters. He has to bring them each out for some air so they don't get forgotten/lost but it can quickly turn into a game of musical chairs.
Here's an idea to get Marcy and Jade have more development and not be reactionary to Brent and Francis: have them in a storyline where they aren't "the girlfriends of Brent and Francis". Seriously, what's the last storyline that features Jade? She has mysterious lunch with Max and reacts to Brent's hairbrained reaction. When's the last time Marcy even interacted with a character other than Francis.
I agree with Epyon, Kurtz has seemed in a slump. There have been a lot of plot threads which he has dropped halfway through (remember 'Jade's sister' and 'token black guy' [both of whom have names, I just can't remember them] going out? did that ever resolve? Did we ever figure out when Jade and Max started having lunch chats? Half the time I feel like Kurtz has good characters, but doesn't know what to do with them (except the dog, whom eats poop every fourth comic).
The problem is this too, looking at it this comic line is interesting but it also gets difficult to use the characters outside of relation to the 'main cast' I mean Marcy joined the PvP comic as Francis' girlfriend. One thing I still wonder about sometimes is how she reacted to the whole android thing. She seems over it but I'm surprised she never questioned not noticing changes in Francis.
"Oh God. Proposing to Jade just to one-up Francis? Brent can't be that insecure. Or that stupid. Or can he?"
Well, it doesn't look like he did just to one-up Francis, since if he had the ring in his desk, he'd been thinking about it for awhile.
However, your prediction appears to have been largely on target. Well done!