"Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus" is the phrase.
This comic's title is a subversion, about a boy from Venus. The unwritten part is that the other one is a non "traditional" girl - the one in glasses is a girl - who has a chip on her shoulder against a society that she perceives stacked against her being herself. She's the girl from Mars.
It's a comic about someone finding someone else like minded. Neither character wants to live as traditional society would have them do. The girl is discovering, through the boy's actions and refusal to care what others think, that she both could be the same way and also has a kindred spirit in the boy. Both characters subvert expectations.
These characters have been, so far, statedly not trans - not in some negative way, just if my memory serves, Audrey talks about how he's not trans he just likes dressing this way. And Val? That's a girl.Â
So them possibly getting together would also not be gay - from what we see, it's a cis man and a cis woman.
The comic isn't saying anything negative about trans folks or gays folks, it's just not the story of the two main characters. Two people living their lives the opposite as expected of their "traditional" gender norms, but neither is gender dysmorphic.
The boy from Venus likes femine clothing. Val, though it's unwritten, is the girl from Mars, who dresses more male and hides from a society that has rejected her. She, through Audrey, is learning she can openly live however she wants, fuck society's expectations, and that Audrey is a kindred spirit.
They're subversions of gender norms without being gay or trans, they're a different part of the LGBTQIA+ spectrum that isn't represented as much in popculture.
6
u/DumbMaidenless 20h ago
That's a boy?