Comic Discussion > QUESTIONABLE CONTENT

Dr. Clairetenlove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Squee

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Carl-E:
Hey, even the most jocular of us gets serious once in a while...

Claire's punning is a coping mechanism for social situations where she feels some discomfort.  The same's true of Marten's foot-in-mouth disease.  The fact is, they're not all that uncomfortable around each other, and are suddenly talking fluently and freely about issues important to them both. 

We're just not used to seeing that side of them. 


More than likely, neither are they! 

Pilchard123:

--- Quote from: Carl-E on 20 Feb 2015, 05:40 ---Claire's punning is a coping mechanism for social situations where she feels some discomfort.  The same's true of Marten's foot-in-mouth disease.

--- End quote ---

I know the feeling...

BenRG:

--- Quote from: Carl-E on 20 Feb 2015, 05:40 ---Claire's punning is a coping mechanism for social situations where she feels some discomfort.
--- End quote ---

I'm not sure about that. I just think that she's trying to get a laugh from the crowd but her timing and delivery sucks. Said issues with timing and delivery may be due to social anxiety on her part. The First Date proved that, when more relaxed, Claire's puns flow more smoothly and get a generally better reaction.

Claire's real issue seems to be that she does have a mean streak in her, which is most often directed at Clinton. It isn't so much deliberate malice as it is a lack of thought about how her 'harmless japes' might be received by its target (whom she normally sees as deserving of it in some way anyway). I'm sure that the basically nice Marten will be annoyed by this at some point; it came close to him calling her out over this in Strip 2858.


--- Quote from: Carl-E on 20 Feb 2015, 05:40 ---The same's true of Marten's foot-in-mouth disease.
--- End quote ---

Again, I'm not sure that's the case. I just think that Marten is one of those earnest, honest souls with poor brain-to-mouth filters. He says what he regards as self-evidently true and only catches up on how others react after the words have left his mouth.

I think that this is the source of the slightly 'unnatural' feel to how he has been talking to Claire - He's aware of this problem and he's sort of trying to test out every phrase and word before it comes out of his mouth because he doesn't want to upset her.

FWIW, Claire has got unfiltered Marten-speech. Specifically, I'm thinking of Strip 2871, where he basically tells her that he thinks she's wrong about libraries and how they should be used. Look at his body language in panel 2 - he's in 'unfiltered musing' mode as is often the case when he puts his foot in his mouth. If he hadn't immediately gone on to address the Easter Condom Hunt before Claire got her wits together, it's not impossible that could have turned into an argument. As matters stand, I think Claire, as she didn't have the chance to make a snap response, was able to realise that, even if she disagrees, his position wasn't unreasonable.

The point that I'm making is neither of them are perfect and two of them have a noticeable flaw that will lead to conflict eventually. I'd also not bother looking for early warning signs because, by their nature, the whole thing will blow up suddenly and without any real precursor.

Omega Entity:
The only thing I disagree with is that Marten was about to call out Claire on her taunting of her brother. It really reads more to me that he's simply telling both of them that they are, indeed, putting the cart before the horse, and there's nothing in his facial expression that indicates displeasure or censure. Hell, he even -agrees- with Claire the panel before that.

Rghfrgl:

--- Quote ---Claire's punning is a coping mechanism for social situations where she feels some discomfort.
--- End quote ---

While perhaps they can be used as a bit of stress relief at times I don't think that's the point.

Girl just loves her puns.

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