Line #39 YMMV/MenageA3


1	* {{Adorkable}}: Gary and, to a lesser extent, Kiley are depicted as, basically, lovable dorks — though frankly HollywoodHomely at worst — and some readers clearly respond to this.
2	* AlasPoorScrappy: Love her or hate her, it's hard not to feel sympathy for Yuki after [[spoiler: her breakup with Gary]]. Though some readers manage.
3	* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation:
4	** Gary is usually seen as a good guy who just needs to grow a little backbone and learn to stand up for himself. A few people have argued that Gary's supposed "niceness" is nothing more than passivity, and the only reason he's not a jerk is because being a jerk would require more initiative and personality than he's got. After he went through several hours in Paris basically ignoring the continuous verbal catfight between the two women he was with, and paying little attention to the one with whom he was nominally on a date in favour of the other, his clueless passivity perhaps ascended to a kind of rudeness all his own. And when he made an amazingly tactless remark to Senna about having broken up with her, some readers felt that she couldn't be blamed for hitting him in the face.
5	** For a long time, [=DiDi=] was one of the strip's sweetest characters, before her quest for an orgasm brought out a nastier side to her personality. Re-examining how she treated her past boyfriends, along with implications that their failure to satisfy her might be partially her fault, some readers still think that she's a genuinely nice woman whose ditziness and effects on other people make it difficult for her to know how to properly interact with them. Others began to feel that she's a selfish person who only knows how to ''act'' nice, and that she ultimately only cares about her own gratification -- an impression that was hugely reinforced by her weird relationship with Kiley, and later by her utterly selfish, unfeeling treatment of Sonya. (Given that Sonya is one of the few women in the strip who can come close to challenging her raw sex appeal, there's also a sense there that [=DiDi=] is so used to being the alpha female in any situation that she reacts with reflexive hostility to any competition.)
6	** Combining this with AmbiguouslyBi... Sandra's character page entry describes her as straight (mostly, anyway) and her relationship (and intimate moments) with Matt demonstrated she's no slouch when it comes to men. But her night out and subsequent dinner date with [=DiDi=] raised a number of questions about precisely ''how'' straight she really is.
7	*** Although the girls decided they weren't as bisexual as they thought, there were several moments that suggested romantic/sexual attraction was in fact taking place (most notably #438); it's possible there was genuine chemistry between them offset by inexperience with women and fear of the unfamiliar, or alternatively that [=DiDi=] had a childish infatuation with her friend that didn't transfer to the sexual while Sandra's suspect moments were platonic affection mixed with shock, confusion and embarrassment, coalescing into StupidSexyFlanders.
8	*** Confusing the issue further, [=DiDi=] did much later demonstrate a lesbian side of sorts, with someone else...
9	*** ...While Sandra continued in a mostly heterosexual pattern in [[Webcomic/SandraOnTheRocks her own comic]], but was tempted towards a lesbian fling at least once -- and a bonus strip produced following a Website/{{Kickstarter}} campaign suggests that her actual orientation is more complex than even she knows -- at least when she's sober. And in the end, she seemingly resolves her contradictions with a hefty dose of what may just be IfItsYouItsOkay.
10	** Does [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/just-in-mutual-therapy this strip]] indicate that Matt and Kiley have become a couple, although they're in denial about it? [[http://www.pixietrixcomix.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=16070&start=15#p541297 Some readers certainly think so;]] [[http://www.pixietrixcomix.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=16070&start=30#p541330 others are more cynical about Matt.]]
11	** And talking of Matt -- is he a bit of a JerkWithAHeartOfGold, or just a {{Jerkass}} who [[PetTheDog pets the nearest dog]] fairly frequently? That depends how far you think his better moments compensate for his bad behavior.
12	** Is Lynn the ClosetKey for Maura's bisexuality and they're in a legitimate relationship, or is she simply exploiting her masculine physique for the sake of her own gratification and Maura is in a tangled web of her own [[CompetitionFreak competitive instincts]], [[FanGirl admiration]], [[WomenPreferStrongMen physical preferences]], [[StupidSexyFlanders misplaced heterosexual appreciation]], and [[ExactWords denial]]?
13	* AluminumChristmasTrees:
14	** Both [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/nothing-exciting-ever-happens "Giant-Size Man-Thing"]] and the infamous [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/cakewalk "Power Pachyderms"]] are perfectly genuine comics titles.
15	** [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/better-you-maul-him-than-maul-me Zii's Hello Kitty vibrator]] might be taken as a joke about ridiculous geek memorabilia. However, [[https://www.amazon.com/Vibrating-Hello-Kitty-Vibrator-Masturbator/dp/B000JO034A it really exists]].
16	* ArchivePanic: The comic passed a thousand strips at its peak, with ongoing plots dating back to the early days, and with two fairly closely linked spin-offs and some bonus material. While this is just a fraction of what some Webcomics have achieved, it's still a non-trivial history.
17	* BaseBreakingCharacter: This comic's discussion boards see a fair amount of squabbling among readers...
18	** Have a strong opinion about Zii? Don't worry, by all appearances, so does just about everyone else. Examples of these diverging opinions can sometimes be found scattered across various pages on TV Tropes, too.
19	** Both Yuki and [=DiDi=] have also inspired arguments; Yuki over whether or not she's nuts or a psychopath and deserves to be locked up, [=DiDi=] over whether her search for an orgasm has made her completely unsympathetic or not.
20	*** The strip "A hundred times more" (September 22, 2012, NSFW) added more fuel to the fire in Yuki's case, and now the fanbase is divided over the nature of Yuki's feelings for Gary, and whether their on-off relationship is healthy or not. Her stint as Gary's girlfriend, a relationship that took a ''lot'' of strips to work through, did NOT help matters either way.
21	*** Yuki's relationship with Sonya, on the other hand, contrives to be just plain funny, even after it has cooled down from its peak of sexual passion, and even shows Yuki as the ''sane'' one at times.
22	*** Meanwhile, the focus of [=DiDi's=] unthinking cute selfishness shifts towards Kiley. Getting her orgasm doesn't make her a much better person. Then she moves on again, and doesn’t improve as a person at any point.
23	** Also, Sonya. She's either disliked for being a jerk and tactless for petty reasons and for her constant advances on Zii, despite Zii being in a relationship with Erik in the early days, or still liked for her ditzy sexiness and ability to bounce back from setbacks. However, nearly everyone sees this as Zii's former seduction of Sonya [[LaserGuidedKarma coming back to bite her in the earlobe]].
24	*** Sonya slips down the moral scale with her continuing and ruthless pursuit of Zii, although her vulnerable or sentimental sides emerge just enough, from time to time, to at least keep her interestingly complex for some readers.
25	*** Then ''things'' started happening in her relationship with Yuki, showing Sonya as, well, someone who really needs to get her head straight.
26	*** By Volume 10, it’s fairly well established that Sonya, while flawed, is pretty much a force of nature. Good or bad isn’t the point; she lives and exists for drama. In the end, she can only get a strong enough fix by migrating to a whole different ''genre''.
27	** Since the "Amber tricking Gary into giving her oral" incident, readers have been divided over whether Amber is likable or not -- although that's no longer much of a live discussion among fans, and a lot of readers have warmed up to her. Her relationship with her sister Ruby, and her uncertain pursuit of love, in ''Webcomic/StickyDillyBuns'' take her character in new directions.
28	** On the male side, we have Erik. People think that Erik is either cool or terribly bland. And there's also the matter of his relationship with Zii; it either worked well and was a good thing for the story, or didn't quite work out.
29	** Gary too inspires debate. It's not exactly a love/hate division, but he's still pretty base-breaking in the sense of having readers who like him the way he is, readers who like him but wish he'd [[GrewASpine grow a spine]] already, and those who find him bland and boring due to his lack of assertiveness or any other strong personality features. The fact that he bordered on CosmicPlaything with his ButtMonkey credentials does NOT help, and his escape from that status is more a matter of luck than effort on his part.
30	** Senna has been seen by readers as, variously, cute if vain and ditzy through to cute but downright psychopathic, but that's not her really base-breaking feature. The trouble really blew up when she let Gary get drunk (arguably through carelessness and inattention rather than deliberately), and then seduced him. (To be fair, she was pretty drunk herself too.) This led to, let's say, a fair bit of debate on the boards over issues of consent and responsibility. Her pre-op UsefulNotes/{{transgender}} status confused the issue further, as Gary identifies as heterosexual; some readers doubted that he'd willingly have sex with someone with a penis while he was sober, even if she did look like an international lingerie model, whereas others noted that he always seems to have found her very attractive when she was dressed, despite having seen that penis.
31	* BigLippedAlligatorMoment: [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/reasons-we-clicked Here]], Gary accidentally sees Peggy on a date with an old college [[ExperimentedInCollege roommate/girlfriend]], Bianca, and they seem to be reigniting the relationship. However, it's revealed that after college [[OutsideContextProblem Bianca became an international spy who's now being targeted by assassins]]. This has no bearing on the plot of the story beyond pushing Peggy back to Gary, and it comes completely out of nowhere. Which said, Bianca subsequently runs off with Sonya, and the fact that she occupies a completely different ''genre'' to the rest of the cast is relevant there; Sonya has to make that big a jump to find the thrills she craves.
32	* BizarroEpisode: Two could be considered like this:
33	** The "'Gently Caress' You" arc from 2010 features, from the main cast, only Zii and Gary, while the other characters in that episode never return apart from a one-panel cameo years later. It's a revenge-based plot based on Zii being trolled on the internet (while allegedly looking for girls for Gary) by what turns out to be a punk-ass kid that Gary knows from a Transformers message board -- who conveniently lives nearby, so Zii to get revenge on him by having sex with his mother. Until a February 2017 strip, this was never brought up again.
34	** Similarly, in "Babes in Toyland", the (so far) never-to-be-brought-up-again plot focuses on Zii and [=DiDi=] accidentally "breaking" one of Gary's Transformers figures and deciding what to do about it. Some consider this to be [[CoolAndUnusualPunishment payback]] to Zii for her actions in the previous BizarroEpisode, as it turns out the toy was never broken in the first place and Gary ends up supposedly making Zii watch the entire Transformers cartoon with him as a consequence for messing with his stuff. Except that's never mentioned again either.
35	* BrokenBase:
36	** Some readers find it frustrating that the comic manages to go on and on when many arcs seldom ever receive any sort of satisfying closure. Characters frequently get [[MomentKiller cock-blocked]] and miss their goals by a hair through [[ContrivedCoincidence unbelievably bad luck]], which is only exacerbated by [[{{Farce}} all the awkward misunderstandings that arise when nobody bothers to communicate what they really mean to the people who need to hear it.]] Other readers would say that this is all par for the course in this genre, but those who don't like it are left screaming "JUST FUCK ALREADY" at their screens whenever someone who's been desperately trying to score with someone else [[YankTheDogsChain gets their chance snatched away by whatever "zany antics" the rest of the cast is up to that day.]]
37	** The 2016/17 "Pro Wrestling" arc also caused some ''debate'' among the fans; see, e.g., [[http://www.pixietrixcomix.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=16946 this thread]].
38	** By the end of Volume 9, Sonya and Zii are together in a FriendsWithBenefits set-up — but then, Zii dumps Sonya for [=DiDi=], leaving the fandom to divide further. A lot of the audience sympathizes with Sonya, seeing Zii's dumping of her as cold-hearted and selfish, and hope that when she gets over her tears and starts working on some kind of revenge plot, they'll get to sit back and watch the ensuing spectacle. Others instead saw Sonya as UnintentionallyUnsympathetic, feeling that after having previously engineered the breakup of Zii's happy relationship for her own selfish ends the fit she threw was blatant MoralMyopia and what happened to her was a [[HoistByHisOwnPetard well-earned reversal of fortune]], while also pointing out that [[JerkassHasAPoint it made no sense for Zii to be in a relationship with someone she didn't feel anything for]]. Still others don't sympathise with either party, thinking they have too much jerk baggage to be sympathetic either way, but still want to see what comes of this new development.
39	* CrackPairing: We have a cast mostly consisting of good-looking people, many of them bisexual. And then we have Eulice the hideous landlady (even if she does suffer from ChuckCunninghamSyndrome). Hence, "Eulice and <somebody else>" has become fans' standard joke response to any suggestions about possible pairings.
40	* CreatorsPet:
41	** Zii appears to be this to a number of fans, due to never facing any sort of repercussion for her actions pre-CharacterDevelopment.
42	** Yuki ditto for some. She too rarely seems to face any real consequences for her violence and self-absorption.
43	** The creators do have an ''acknowledged'' soft spot for Dillon, but that has been expressed by giving him [[Webcomic/StickyDillyBuns his own spinoff comic]], where he gets his own CharacterDevelopment.
44	* CryForTheDevil: Sonya had developed stalker-ish tendencies towards Zii, and her relationship with Gary was largely about using him for sexual satisfaction and to make Yuki jealous, (and she dumped him, fairly politely but ''in the middle of sex'', when she realised that she found him boring). But then, when she realized that Zii didn't reciprocate her feelings, she went back to sleep in Gary's bed, weeping and in need of a hug (February 19 2013, strip 710, NSFW). Likewise, when Zii dumps her for [=DiDi=] in Volume 9, she ends up spending the night crying, with just Lita for company, and given that Zii has behaved quite appallingly here, Sonya gets a lot of fan sympathy.
45	* EnsembleDarkHorse: Junghan is really popular among the fanbase. During his long absence, people kept wondering if he'd ever come back and suggesting that he was the best character in the comic. Since his return, each of his appearances (including some brief but entertaining cameos and a huge off-screen character reveal in ''Webcomic/StickyDillyBuns'') has been welcomed with much rejoicing. Most people acknowledge that he's a better character if he doesn't get too much focus, though, if only because the writers don't seem very good at writing snark, which is his specialty.
46	* FanNickname: "[=Ma3treal=]" (or [=“Mà3treal”)=] is used to refer to the comic's version of Montreal, particularly when it comes to the ArtisticLicense aspects.
47	* GeniusBonus: Zii's guitar is a Telecaster ... with a Stratocaster neck. This would actually make sense, since Telecaster necks are famously chubby and Zii is quite petite; it's also feasible, since Fender necks are bolt-on. There's even big-name precedent for it, since Music/EricClapton played a Tele with a Strat neck while he was in Blind Faith. You can maybe tell that Giz is a musician.
48	* HarsherInHindsight:
49	** Yuki's lines [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/i-try-so-hard in]] [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/what-the-hell-was-that these]] [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/dillon-is-our-girlfriend four]] [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/treat-girls-right strips]], considering the path her relationship with Gary took, count as either Harsher or Hilarious, depending on how one views the situation as a whole.
50	** Talking of hindsight hilarity -- Zii promised to have Gary up to his neck in naked women by the time he was thirty. On his thirtieth birthday, Gary ended up discovering the drawbacks to being more or less literally up to his neck in naked women.
51	** [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/glare In Issue #441]], Yuki and Sonja fight over Gary and ask which of the two he wants. Gary, being Gary, says [[GirlOnGirlIsHot he wants both of them]], and he receives a ''double DeathGlare''. Fast forward to Issue #1200, over ''five years later'', and he actually ''does'' get both women in bed at the same time, but not entirely how he expected.
52	* HollywoodHomely: After he first appeared, nobody in Internet discussions seemed to think that Yvan was especially unattractive -- even given the comic's high level of GenericCuteness. However, when she first saw him, and knowing that she might have to flirt with him, [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/get-a-better-look Zii gave a mental yelp of shock]]. He appeared at first to be flagged as "homely" by being a little heavier-built than most of the cast, having PermaStubble, posing a little, and using AnticipatoryBreathSpray -- but then [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/what-a-great-guy he displayed a really worrying smirk]]. Though maybe Zii is a bit of a snob, too.
53	%%* HoYay: Ho '''[[{{Pun}} Boy]]'''.
54	* LoveToHate: Yvan. He's purposely made to be a toxic, rage-inducing {{Jerkass}} CasanovaWannabe, and the comic's audience reacts accordingly.
55	* {{Moe}}:
56	** Yuki. True, she's screwed up in the head, having been traumatized by being exposed to her father's tentacle hentai at an early age, and has nymphomanic lesbian tendencies towards Zii. But, when she's not having one of her ''episodes,'' she really is cute. [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/the-real-woman Especially when she tries.]]
57	** The same can be said for Kiley, who suffers a heartbreaking case of ACupAngst. So much so, being told her boobs are just fine, by her patient, [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/such-progress! makes her shed tears of joy]]. Then simply breaks down in tears when she's [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/okay-sized! reminded of what she's lacking]]. Seriously, these two need a hug.
58	* NauseaFuel: Some people felt this way about [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/i-will-be-good Zii's comment here]].
59	* NeverLiveItDown: Though it's maybe been a while since the last time she's done it (much less in comics time than in real-world time), Yuki's infamy for kicking guys in the nuts (due to her extreme phallophobia) has become established to the point where various members of the cast are quick to snark on her for it, including [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/do-not-dress-as-anyone-else Jung]] and [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/originalu-soundtraku Sonya]]. And when she went to Kiley's place for more therapy, Matt remembered and recognized Yuki as [[TheDreaded "the crotch kicking girl"]] and dove for cover.
60	* OneTrueThreesome: Around the start of Volume 7, Gary and Zii began to show slight hints of a new mutual attraction, while Yuki referred to both of them together as her loves. This caused some fans to note that a relationship between these three might actually work quite well and even be stable.
61	* PairTheSpares: Yuki ending up with Matt, of all people, which in TheReveal is depicted as kind of heartwarming, has quite a layer of relationship horror to it, as if you know how both of their personalities work, they may be the least suited to each other. Matt is a serial cheater; almost every single relationship he has had on screen, as it were, has gone down in flames due to his inability to actually commit properly, and the authors paired him with ''Yuki!'' A woman who until the tail end of the strips had a severe phobia of penises, to the point of reacting... [[GroinAttack violently]] to being confronted with even an image of one. Maybe having her in a relationship with a serial cheater is going to end rather badly, and possibly make her issues even worse.
62	* PanderingToTheBase: A harem comic filled to the brim with HoYay and {{Fanservice}}, where sex and hardcore situations are teased constantly, but nothing seriously explicit ever occurs, some think mainly for purposes of building a fanbase who will wait patiently for "the big moment." And until that big moment comes, the artist has made some softcore porn of the characters for sale while they wait.
63	* RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap: Multiple cases. Basically, while few readers would consider this comic a masterpiece of subtle characterisation, most of the cast have both virtues and flaws, which are amplified for comic effect. Hence, some of them garner a bit of fan hatred when they do something bad early in their time on the comic, then confuse the readers who dislike them by doing something good.
64	** To some, Zii gets rescued from the heap when she acts supportive of Gary's budding relationship with Kiley and prevents [=DiDi=] from sabotaging it -- [[spoiler:and then consoles him after Kiley dumps him]].
65	** Amber, while not a Scrappy ''per se'', falling more into the BaseBreakingCharacter category, had readers who previously disliked her warm to her when she supported Gary over Yuki's failure to give him any form of physical affection.
66	** Matt, with his nigh-pathological inability to remain faithful in a relationship, was unpopular with a lot of fans -- who then got very confused when he provided Gary with genuine help with understanding his sexuality, or showed a sensitive, intuitive side in his early dealings with Kiley or his encounter with Ruby.
67	** Sonya recovered some fan affection when, after finally getting and enjoying Gary's oral attention, she reminded him that there were advantages to dating a woman without Yuki's weird phobias -- by cheerfully jumping him for conventional sex. Compared to his relationship with Yuki, this constituted Gary catching a huge break.
68	*** Admittedly, she then dumped him a few days later -- relatively politely, but with ''terrible'' timing.
69	*** And she caused some to take said affection back and punt her back to the Scrappy Heap hard enough to score a field goal come Chapter 6, when she showed ''glee'' at having caused Zii and Erik's break up through her manipulations (combined with Zii's alcohol-driven loss of inhibitions). As this was not only likely to leave Zii crushed, but also imperiled Zii's (and for that matter Sonya's) dreams of a musical career, Sonya's joy looked short-sighted as well as selfish. Though some were happy to see Zii hit with what they see as LaserGuidedKarma, while others considered it more like DisproportionateRetribution.
70	* ScifiGhetto:
71	** Gary appears to be firmly stuck in a ghetto by his own choice. He's a wannabe artist, in Paris and offered a chance to visit a whole range of classic and modern art galleries and collections -- but [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/where-shall-we-go-first his first instinct is to dive into a video games shop.]] To be sure, he wants to be a ''comics'' artist, and he subsequently displays a broad, informed knowledge of that specific field, but the idea of drawing inspiration from any non-comics artists, or even just admiring non-comics art, doesn't seem to occur to him.
72	** Conversely, Senna demonstrates an old-fashioned high culture disdain for comics art [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/giant-murals-of-comic-art here.]] Apparently, she's never heard of Pop Art, or any of the fashion designers (i.e. people working in her own field) who are influenced by comics styles, or anything else on those lines. Given that Creator/RoyLichtenstein was producing comics-based "high art" a good ''fifty years ago'', some readers [[DontShootTheMessage wondered what the writers were thinking there]] (and also [[StrawmanHasAPoint shared her exasperation with Gary]] to some extent). One possible conclusion is simply that Senna is nuts.
73	* TheScrappy: Being a long running comic, it has many characters in constant competition for this spot:
74	** Zii, for those who were left with a bad taste due to her Jerk Sue and KarmaHoudini credentials, pre-CharacterDevelopment.
75	** Dillon, post {{flanderization}}, with a recent increase in {{cloudcuckoolander}} tendencies and campiness, and taking his flirting with Gary a bit too far, which can be nerve-grating for some readers.
76	** Matt, due to his {{jerkass}} ways so far as romantic monogamy is concerned, plus his KarmaHoudini moments.
77	** [=DiDi=], thanks to her efforts to undermine Kiley and her willingness to break up her own (admittedly casual) relationship with Matt just so Gary could give her an orgasm or two, and by [[ItsAllAboutMe her attempts to persuade Yuki to let her have use of Gary]]. It almost seemed like she was ''trying'' to invoke this trope.
78	** Sonya, for her [[TookALevelInJerkass sudden increase in selfishness and jerkass tendencies in general]]. Chapter 6's first strip further boosted her jerkass status, with her glee in breaking Zii and Erik up (which also means that Zii's musical career dream will be jeopardized).
79	** Yuki, who was already a scrappy for those who weren't fond of her self-centeredness and childish tendencies, became an even bigger scrappy after the events following "A Hundred Times More" (September 22, 2012, NSFW), having Gary continuously give her Swirlies, while not giving him any form of physical affection.
80	** ''Gary'' himself, for failing to grow some spine for a very long time, despite everything he's been through.
81	** While all of the above have some love to balance out the haters, it seems that one of the few characters with no fans at all is Zii's stalker Izz.
82	** Tracy, starting from "Gary giving James a blowjob" arc. Tracy forcing Gary into a sexual act he's clearly uncomfortable with to fix her own sex life with James infuriated a number of readers.
83	** James, especially after his StrawFeminist tendencies have been {{Flanderized}} to the point that he can't grasp the idea that women might enjoy giving blowjobs to men, thinking of it as an obscene, phallocratic act, and stops Tracy from giving one when she straight-out tells him she wants to. (Even after that, he immediately interrupts her and still insists on saving her from the "too degrading" act despite all her protests.) It's hard to tell whether or not the fan hatred for him on this basis was intentional, but the fact that an ongoing story arc hinges on his idiotic nature, and that Volume 10 opened with a focus on him, Tracy and their still nonsensical relationship issues rather than a number of hanging plot threads from the end of the previous storyline, and that both of which have left some readers hoping for any excuse to be rid of him, was most likely ''not'' intentional.
84	* SeasonalRot:
85	** Volume 5 received complaints of this nature, due to an overfocus on Yuki, along with seemingly switching the focus of the strip from "People having sex" to "People getting interrupted while trying to have sex." Volume 6 may have reversed this problem for many with a massive plot switch and the return of some popular minor characters, albeit maybe at the cost of some loss of a sense of realism.
86	** The "Gary Giving James a Blowjob" arc is widely panned by fans, who accuse its story of being insultingly stupid even by the comic's ''amiably uncomplicated'' standards. For context: When Tracy asks Gary, a grown, patently heterosexual man despite everything else he's been through, to give her boyfriend a blowjob because her boyfriend idiotically misinterpreted Gary's attempts to pitch blowjobs as an enjoyable experience, Gary simply can't find the nerve to say “No” to Tracy's face. What follows is then a story of a grown man trying to fake a blowjob while keeping the appearance of a friendly guy to his co-workers. Also, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking the punchline isn't all that funny]].[[note]]Adding insult to injury, the beginning of Volume 10 brings back this plotline, with James wanting ''another'' blowjob from Gary, who still cannot say "No" to Tracy, infuriating many readers.[[/note]]
87	** The wrestling plotline of 2016-17 started with [=DiDi=], never the comic's most nuanced major character, suddenly getting involved with a whole bunch of new secondary characters. Then, as it developed, it began to lean heavily on the appearance of yet more new characters, all of them {{exp\|y}}ies of characters from the authors' other comics, ''Webcomic/EerieCuties'' and ''Webcomic/MagickChicks'', giving the whole thing the look of an over-stretched in-joke. Meanwhile, Zii, a major character with a lot of dangling plot threads and personality issues attached, had been invisible for many months, real-world time. Some fan grumbling ensued.
88	* StrangledByTheRedString: [[spoiler:Zii and [=DiDi=]'s]] sudden realization that they are in love can feel like that, since their feelings for each other were depicted as nothing more than [[spoiler:friendship on [=DiDi=]'s part and lust on Zii's.]]
89	* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot: The "Gary Gives James a Blowjob" arc could have been a biting commentary on the politicisation of consent, as well as a reminder that sex requires both parties to consent and men can say "no", (mostly) by simply giving James a better reason for not wanting a blowjob, such as not liking it. But instead he's a StrawFeminist and doesn't want to "degrade" women with an "obscene" act, and through downright ''insultingly'' idiotic misunderstandings he ends up wanting Gary to give him a blowjob.
90	* TooBleakStoppedCaring: While more mundane than most instances, every significant character is heavily flawed, or at least heavily controversial. There have been some readers who gave up on the strip because they reached the point where they felt that they couldn't truly sympathize with anyone. Alternately, some readers only find Gary sympathetic, and get fed up because they feel the nicest character is the one who suffers the most.
91	* UnintentionallyUnsympathetic:
92	** Gary, to a number of readers. His abject spinelessness has crossed into unfunny territory more than once, while he can seem short on personality and tiresomely incurious. Admittedly, his CharacterDevelopment turned out to be largely about fixing the spinelessness at least, with hints that he was becoming more adventurous in general.
93	** Some readers found it hard to sympathise with Sonya after Zii dumped her for [=DiDi=], feeling that her past behaviour made her look like a serious {{hypocrite}} -- especially since her very first act as Zii and [=DiDi=] moved to leave was to [[MoralMyopia try to seduce DiDi away from Zii to prove a point]]. (The opposing argument noted that Zii knew that Sonya wanted something more, and that Zii and [=DiDi=] broke their promise to not have sex in Sonya's apartment literally ''seconds'' after Sonya left.)
94	** By the last volume, it became clear from discussions on the comic’s boards, and comments there from the creators, that [=DiDi=] was meant to be somewhat more sympathetic than quite a few readers found her. She was apparently meant to be a ditz with emotional issues linked to her {{anorgasmia}}, but good-hearted and loyal, with real, passionate feelings for Zii. However, the sheer number of jokes playing off her ditziness, her casual accidental cruelty to multiple boyfriends, and her obsessive pursuit of orgasms at any cost, made it all too easy to see her as a self-deluding, solipsistic moron — and her interest in Zii looked like it was about nothing but the orgasms. That casual cruelty to Sonya, and the broken promise, didn't help either.
95	** Zii's overreaction to [=DiDi=] sleeping with Gary (after her "breakup" with Kiley) made readers feel ''less'' sorry for Zii, seeing it more as a deserved shot of LaserGuidedKarma for Zii, who minutes beforehand was trying to emotionally manipulate the heartbroken [=DiDi=] into sleeping ''with her'' (but [=DiDi=] being, well [=DiDi=] got her wires crossed). Unfortunately Zii's Mary Sue status struck again when she got what she wanted anyway while completely destroying Sonya's heart. She [[CrossesTheLineTwice crossed the line twice]] by dumping Sonya then sleeping with [=DiDi=] in Sonya's house mere minutes after promising that they were just going to talk.
96	* {{Wangst}}: Gary is prone to outbursts of self-pity, as in the very first strip. And yet, he not only has a job and friends and family who care for him; he has remarkably good looks for a {{geek}} who never seems to take any exercise, and an increasingly ''interesting'' love life. His attitude in early strips might be forgiven in that his plot-driven luck hasn't kicked in fully yet, but his pessimism in strips such as [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/gifts-picked-out this one]] ("I just ''know'' I'll mess up!") makes this look like a bad habit which likely ''causes'' a lot of his problems.
97	* TheWoobie:
98	** Gary, throughout. Though his woobie status becomes highly questionable in Volume 6, when he's having sex with a lingerie model while on a free trip to Paris. The fact that many of his problems actually arise from his lack of backbone, rather than the hostility of the universe, has not only become increasingly obvious at this point, it ends up being explicitly {{lampshade\|Hanging}}d in strip #795 (September 24, 2013, marginally NSFW).
99	** [[{{Tsundere}} Yuki]] and [[ACupAngst Kiley]] also qualify.
100	** Sandra, after she gets her job in Brazil but before she gets talent-spotted as a model. Senna can be a cruel boss.
101	** Think what you want of [=DiDi=] (she definitely TookALevelInJerkass in her pursuit for orgasm), her reaction to [[spoiler: getting dumped the first time in her life]] is [[https://pixietrixcomix.com/menage-a-3/is-this-what-breaking-up-feels-like pretty heartbreaking]].

Context YMMV / MenageA3