Popularity Contest

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Popularity Contest
Chapter109 of 129 (list of chapters)
PublishedNovember 9, 2020 (2020-11-09)
Page count14
Major charactersSue, Stacy, Katie, Daisy, Amaya, Paulo
Minor charactersAbbey, Mike, David, Jessica, Rachel
LocationsRoseville High School, Hospital
Collected inVolume Seven
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When Stacy walks right past the guild’s lunch table without a word, Sue discovers her friend is embarrassed to know her. Naturally, the only sensible response is to join the cheerleading squad and prove that popularity and nerdiness can coexist. What’s the worst that could happen?

Synopsis

Sue calls her MMO guild to order over lunch: the Crimsonflame Festival starts Friday, and plans need finalizing before tomorrow’s guild meeting. Paulo wanders over to heckle the “internet nerds”, as usual.[1] Stacy, however, walks straight past the table with Katie and ignores Sue’s greeting. Sue insists Stacy simply didn’t hear her. Abbey and Mike are quite sure she did.[2]

Determined to prove them wrong, Sue chases Stacy down in the hallway and launches into guild business right in front of Katie, who is baffled: “Do you, like, KNOW this freak?”[3] Stacy shrugs, agrees the whole thing sounds gross, and lets Katie steer her away. Katie’s parting words for Sue are “loser” and “go home”.[4]

Stacy tracks Sue down in the computer lab afterward, and when Sue accuses her of ignoring her at lunch, she doesn’t even bother denying it. “Of course I did.”[5] Sue throws her out of the guild on the spot. Stacy pleads that she loves SwordsVale, but she’s worked hard for her popularity, and the way she sees it, nobody gets to be popular and openly nerdy at once.[6][7] Sue vows to prove her wrong and storms off.[7]

Daisy is wrapping up cheer practice ahead of tomorrow’s big game when Sue walks into the gym.[8] She is wearing Daisy’s old uniform, with her hair up in a ponytail, and asks where she signs up.[9][10] Katie sneers until seniors Jessica and Rachel tell Sue she looks killer. She immediately becomes Sue’s most enthusiastic supporter.[10] Sue faces the squad, catches Stacy’s mortified glare, and leaps into her routine with a triumphant “JUST WATCH-”[11]

The next thing Sue knows, she is waking up in a hospital bed with her leg in a cast and Stacy perched at the foot of it. Apparently the leg “just kinda.. crumpled in” on the very first step.[12] Sue admits she needed to prove she isn’t a loser. Stacy apologizes properly, saying her guild friends aren’t nobodies and she wishes Katie didn’t make it so hard to be herself. Sue grudgingly accepts that Stacy will “be a little jerk sometimes”, and by the final page the two of them are grinning over a board game on the hospital bed.[13]

Character dynamics

Sue stands in the gym wearing a cheerleading uniform with her hair in a high ponytail, hands on her hips, asking "Where do I sign up?"
Daisy’s old uniform fits Sue rather well, which is exactly what Stacy was afraid of.
  • Sue and Stacy: The two have been friendly guildmates on their private SwordsVale server for a good while, though Stacy has kept their friendship hidden at school.[14][2] When Stacy ignores Sue in front of Katie, Sue learns how far she will take the act. Stacy deliberately pretends not to know her. Sue responds by trying to prove that she can be openly nerdy and popular, only to break her leg during the attempt. At the hospital, Stacy admits that Sue and the other guild members are not nobodies and apologizes. Sue accepts that Stacy will “be a little jerk sometimes”, and they reconcile over a board game.[13]
  • Sue and Katie: Katie calls Sue a “freak” and a “loser” when Sue approaches her with Stacy. At the tryout, she sneers at Sue until Jessica and Rachel approve of her. Katie then switches immediately to fawning over Sue and claiming she has always supported her.[3][4][10]

Trivia & observations

  • The chapter comes with a full set of invented MMO vocabulary: the Crimsonflame Festival, the “2.11 patch” with its bugged Hellfiend spawns, level 56 characters in iridium armor, and Stacy’s Sylvarian ranger.[1][3][5][7]
  • Sue’s “Consider yourself /gkicked!” is genuine MMO jargon, since /gkick is the real slash command for booting a member out of a guild.[6]
  • Katie fawning over “Sally” repeats an old habit of hers. In A Different Side, she tries to recruit Daisy to the squad while calling her “Danica” and “Debbie”.[10][15]
  • Stacy’s peace offering is the real cooperative board game Pandemic, which was quite the choice of get-well gift in December 2020.[13]
  • Veronica’s commentary notes that Abbey is only a “special guest” at the nerd table now that he and Paulo “aren’t at each other’s throats anymore”. As she puts it, “He’ll be back with Jasmine tomorrow.”[1]
  • Veronica confirms Amaya’s attempts to head Sue off in the hallway are deliberate. Amaya “knows what dynamic Stacy wants” and is trying to protect Sue without hurting her feelings.[3]
  • Sue’s tryout shout is clipped mid-word at the edge of the panel, right before the cut to the hospital. Veronica’s entire commentary under the reveal page reads “oh”.[11][12]
  • Sue remains on crutches for a long stretch of the comic after this chapter, and she isn’t free of them until Line in the Sand.[16][17][18]

Related chapters

  • Local Area: Stacy’s double life begins here. She recruits Mike onto the guild’s private server, on the strict condition that nobody at school gets to know they’re friends. When Stacy later ignores Sue at school, Sue throws her out of the guild until the two reconcile.
  • Guest of Honor: The guild’s game is first named as SwordsVale during the group’s convention trip, where they cosplay as their own characters. Stacy comes along in costume too, and even there she spends her time blushing and hiding behind Sue.
  • New Beginnings: Jessica and Rachel size Katie up in this chapter, dismissing her as “a bully AND a snob”. They are just as unimpressed when Katie fawns over Sue at the tryout, greeting her sudden enthusiasm with flat looks.

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 1
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 2
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 3
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 4
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 6
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 7
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 8
  8. ↑ Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 9
  9. ↑ Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 10
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 10.3 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 11
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 12
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 13
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 13.2 Chapter 109: Popularity Contest, page 14
  14. ↑ Chapter 82: Local Area, page 8
  15. ↑ Chapter 37: A Different Side, page 15
  16. ↑ Chapter 115: Track Meet, page 4
  17. ↑ Chapter 129: Tickets Please, page 8
  18. ↑ Chapter 130: [Unknown Title, page 4]
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