Nerd and Jock

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About

Nerd and Jock is a webcomic written and illustrated by Marko Raassina. The comic stars the two titular characters, a nerd and a jock, who strike up an unexpected friendship in which the nerd helps the jock with his intelligence while the jock helps the nerd with his confidence and motivation. The comic has become popularized online for its wholesome portrayal of their friendship with some of the strips also being used as meme formats.

History

It's unclear when Nerd and Jock started, but it appears to have been in the latter half of 2017. On October 17th, 2017, Imgur^[4] user hunterripper posted a compilation of early Nerd and Jock comics. Marko Rassina began posting the comic series to Webstoons on December 23rd, 2017.^[1] The first comic shows Jock approaching Nerd threateningly, but ultimately asking for help with a math problem. The first few comics show how the two strike up a friendship by helping each other in areas where they're lacking.

Over the following years, Marko began updating the comic on their Instagram^[2] and Tumblr.^[3] As of February 9th, 2023, there have been 184 updates to the comic. Notable side characters include Olga, a girl who develops a romantic entanglement with Jock, and Tiger, a fiery redhead who develops a crush on Nerd in later updates to the comic (shown below).

Online Presence

Nerd and Jock comics have been widely reposted and celebrated online for their wholesomeness. Reposts of panels regularly appear in subreddits like /r/wholesomecomics^[5]^[6] and /r/wholesomememes.^[7] On Webtoons,^[8] the comic has over 321,000 subscribers. Nerd and Jock also has a dedicated page on TV Tropes.^[9]

The comic has also inspired a sizable amount of fan art, particularly of Tiger. On January 16th, 2023, Twitter user @Dano_d_kaiju^[10] posted art of Tiger that gained over 80 retweets and 1,600 likes in three weeks (shown below, left). On November 13th, 2022, Twitter user @Loki159_ArtWork^[11] posted art that gained over 100 retweets and 1,600 likes in three months (shown below, right).