Characters / Addictive Science

The Characters of the webcomic Addictive Science

Celia Pichon

Celia Pichon

Mad Scientist extraordinaire that specializes in transforming people into anthropomorphic animals. Much more interested in transforming people for giggles than actually doing research.

• And Then What?: Repeatedly tries to take over the world, never seems to think beyond just transforming people. Taken to its extreme when the MIB actually agreed to her terms. She freaked out and gave up
• Big Sister Instinct: Celia may be an impulsive and mischievous mad scientist, but she adores her sister and will come running if she thinks she's in trouble.
• Cuddle Bug: Celia has little sense of personal space and is quick to glomp anything or anyone she thinks is cute.
  Celia: "Come! I must hug you!"

• Embarrassing Last Name: Celia does not like that her surname is cute
• Fangirl: She loves bishonens and especially bishonen catboys.
• Harmless Villain: While she gleefully describes herself as evil for much of the comic, her mischief tends to only go so far as transforming people into equally intelligent anthropomorphic animals (of the regular or Mix-and-Match Critter variety), rarely causes any material harm, and is downright shocked that a crossover character would do something so violent as punching somebody.
• It Amused Me: While she usually has some stated reason for her activities, as often as not she'll transform people just because she's bored.
• Mad Scientist: Self-proclaimed, widely acknowledged as such, and a student of the Mad Science Institute.
• Pointy Ears: She got them as a wish from Geenie.
• Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: The Energetic Girl to Lukas's Savvy Guy.
• Sarcasm-Blind: Sarcasm and irony have to be repeatedly explained to her.
• Transformation Ray: Her specialty, with methods ranging from zapping people to spiking their food.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: Enjoys transforming herself as much as everybody else.

Lukas

Lukas

Celia's roommate and "minion", Lukas is an art student who continuously tries to put a stopper on the crazy surrounding him.

• Absurdly Sharp Blade: Usually Played Straight, but occasionally subverted.
  Adam: "A fragile Japanese sword breaking against steel? Naah. That's sooo impossible."
• Attractive Bent Species: A few of his transformations have left him with admirers.
• The Dreaded: In a very narrow sense. Because of the events of their first meeting, Mary and Andora find him terrifying. Lukas finds that very amusing.
• Forced Transformation: Due to circumstances within the comic, for a good amount of time whenever Lukas was exposed to magic he'd transform into a catgirl, which he hated.
• Heroic BSoD: After finally wearing out the gender bending part of his curse, Lukas's mind just shut down when he became patient zero for the Fox Flu's vixen mutation.
• Ninja: Apparently was a fan of Naruto as a kid, which led him to study Ninjutsu. Unlike the characters of Naruto, however, his main tools are smokebombs, trained senses, and a Katana
• Only Sane Employee: While Lukas, Geenie, and Catherine are all comparatively level headed, Lukas is the most consistently proactive in trying to fix the problems that pop up. Becomes literally true after he gets his art degree and chooses to work as Celia's assistant and thus her only employee
• Relationship Upgrade: He and Geenie become a couple over the course of the comic.
• Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: The Savvy Guy to Celia's Energetic Girl
• Second Law of Gender-Bending: Inverted. Lukas generally treats transformation as a mild annoyance, but has a particular aversion to any transformation that changes his sex.
• Trademark Favorite Food: Lukas has a great fondness for tea and can often be seen drinking it. In the author's words, he's a tea addict, and he becomes frantically irritable when deprived of it.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: Celia gave him a transformation ray gun one Christmas. More recently he also discovered that he had gained the ability to shift into his catgirl form at will, and he hates that fact
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Spiders, large bugs and things that resemble them tend to freak him out.

Geenie

Geenie

A naga from a magical world, she was introduced as a genie who granted the main cast's wishes, and has since moved in with them as part of an exchange program with the Mad Science Institute.

• Alternate Animal Affection: She thinks kissing is a weird exchange of bodily fluids that humans do to strengthen the immune system. The apparent naga equivalent is coiling around each other.
• Bookworm: Often seen either sleeping or reading between adventures
• Character Catchphrase: "Humans are weird".
• Everyone Can See It: She's very obviously attracted to Lukas's naga transformation, and equally obviously enjoys the prospect of spending time with him, leading Vivian to rib her about it. Subverted in that apparently naga don't express physical affection the same way humans do, and with that in mind, she and Lukas had at least arguably been acting like a couple for some time. That said, they do become more obviously affectionate after that point.
• Foreign Exchange Student: Sorta. She doesn't go to any school, but she moved in with Celia and Lukas as part of her study of humans.
• Foreign Queasine: She salivates at the thought of fried spiders
• Literal Genie: In her first appearance she grants a couple wishes this way. Granting Lukas' wish to attract hot babes by making him attractive to fire elementals and his wish for a beard by transforming him into a wolf.
• Ms. Exposition: Having grown up in a highly magical world, Geenie is the go-to person for questions about magic.
• Only Sane Woman: Shares this role with Catherine and Lukas.
• Relationship Upgrade: She and Lukas become a couple over the course of the comic.
• Snake People: She looks like an anthropomorphic reptile above the waist, and a long snake body below.
• Summon Magic: She seems to specialize in portal magic

Mark

Mark

Celia, Lukas, and Geenie's neighbor, and a quintessential nerd. A self-described defender of good, he occasionally challenges Celia to battle to thwart her plans.

• Gadgeteer Genius: He builds a working power armor, a working mecha suit, and two advanced robots with sophisticated A.I.s
• Gender Bender: Like Ranma, his sex changes when he's doused with cold water. Unlike Ranma, the process also entails him becoming an anthropomorphic fox.
• Hero with an F in Good: Believes himself to be on the side of good, but his track record leaves much to be desired. He once shot Superman out of the sky to prove a point.

• Mad Scientist: Despite his objections to the label on grounds of his desire to be a force of good, he builds robots and mecha and his sanity is as questionable as Celia's Made official when Celia tricks him into taking the entrance exam for the Mad Science Institute, which he passes with flying colors. He embraces the label after it's explained to him that Mad Scientists are not exclusively evil
• Proud To Be A Nerd: Quizzed Vivian on her geek cred and tutored her on it before a Con, compared nerdy paraphernalia with the Shark exchange student, and has acquired "Ubernerd" powers.
• Shout-Out: If he's reminded of something from comics, video games, or anime he will comment on it.

Vivian

Vivian

A girl born with a cat head and invulnerability due to Mad Science. She is Mark's roommate and is usually quite happy to go along with the hijinks around her because she finds them amusing.

• Anti-Magic: Celia is greatly frustrated by the fact that neither Mad Science nor Magic have any effect on her. She actually absorbs magic well enough to be a grounding rod for it under some circumstances.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: Her fondest wish upon introduction. She's actually quite grateful that Celia's hijinks have gone out of control so often because it desensitized everyone to hybrids, indirectly granting her wish
• Nigh-Invulnerability: Cannot be hurt, cursed or transformed, and apparently has a very high tolerance for spicy food.
• Shipper on Deck: "Hey Geenie. Why don't you go and finally kiss [Lukas]?"
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: With some effort, Schmitt and Celia give her the ability to change her head to whatever she wants. Since she doesn't know what she'd look like with a human head, however, she mostly just sticks with the cat head.

Dr.Schmitt

Dr. Schmitt

Celia's mentor and friend, Schmitt is often visited when Celia and company have genetic questions.

• Animorphism: Is transformed into an anthropomorphic fennec fox early in the comic and is quite content to remain so.
• Arbitrary Skepticism: As a scientist he refuses to even believe in magic or mythical creatures...even while using their DNA in experiments.
• Benevolent Boss: He's unfailingly polite and complimentary to his minion Eegor, and makes a point of making sure his development was happy. Might also qualify as Good Parents as he produced Eegor from his own (fennec) DNA.
  Lukas: "Ehm...what's up with the flowery wallpaper?"
  Schmitt: "Oh? That? I want my minions to grow up in a warm home full of love so that they'll be fully focused on battle and not their problems."
• Dramatic Thunder: Originally a permanent effect around his home, he eventually switched over to a personal variation with contextual activation
• Haunted Castle: His home; complete with Dramatic Thunder and a Mad Scientist Laboratory
• The Mind Is a Plaything of the Body: He has developed a few animalistic tics that he is completely oblivious to.
• Pretty Boy: Much to his shame. Originally wore thick glasses to hide his bishie eyes. The main reason he's so happy to be a Fennec is that those same eyes seem natural on them.

Catherine

Catherine

A dragon demon from the same magical world as Geenie. Kind, soft-spoken, and shy, she is practically the opposite of Celia in personality.

• Acrophobic Bird: She gets better after Lukas teaches her how to "ninja land"
• Covert Pervert: Downplayed, but she seems to like ogling Bishonen Catboys as much as Celia does.

• Long-Lost Relative: Celia's long lost twin sister.
• Person of Mass Destruction: In as much as "destruction" applies to anyone in Addictive Science. She has incredible magical power, capable of transforming everyone in the continent simultaneously.

Mary and Andora

Mary and Andora

Twin sisters who turned into fox-taurs and decided to share their foxiness with the world.

• Harmless Villain: Most of their schemes to turn people into foxes are easily fixed with a few blasts from a Transformation Ray and half the time they defeat themselves by accident.
• Single-Minded Twins: Almost never seen apart and nearly always pursuing the same scheme. If they didn't introduce themselves every time they appear it would be impossible to tell them apart too.
• Transformation Ray: Many of their Mass Transformation schemes use rayguns, though they've also tried mutagens, potions, forbidden magics, deities...
• The Unreveal: The protagonists once found photos of their pre-fox selves, which Mary and Andora had tried to destroy because they thought they were horribly ugly, only to agree with them and delete the pics without showing the readers.
• Vertebrate with Extra Limbs: They were initially introduced as bipedal fox-people, but quickly transformed into taurs. They decided they liked that form even better. Occasionally they also give themselves wings.

Clara

Clara

A former petrol station attendant who got turned into a hippogriff by a magic book. Much to her dismay further transformation attempts have all failed, but she did get some cool magical powers and a job with the MIB.

• Accidental Incantation: Reading a magic formula in a book Celia lost in a public library caused her current form.
• Breakout Character: She was only introduced in 2021 but is starting to overshadow the original cast.
• Mix-and-Match Critters: Her upper half is some sort of bird of prey, lower half horselike.
• Non-Mammal Mammaries: A whole bonus comic is dedicated to explaining her bust as some kind of flight counterweight. She doesn't buy it.
• Odd Job Gods: The book somehow turned her into the Goddess of Awkwardness. Her MIB worshipers think she's the Goddess of Classifying though.
• Shock and Awe: She once pulled a Palpatine on a robber.
• Stop Worshipping Me: When the MIB gets wind of her divinity half of them start a cult devoted to her and a holy war with Whi’kka's followers. She and the Fox Goddess duck out for lunch while they work things out.
• Teleportation: She finds that she can teleport to people experiencing extreme awkwardness, as part of her Goddess powers.
• Winged Humanoid: She’s an anthropomorphic hippogriff, with two horse legs, two raptor talons, and two wings. She needs her levitation powers to fly though.
• The Woobie: She was a normal human being but due to reading out loud a spell from a magic book that Celia lost, was transformed into an anthropomorphic hippogryph. After she tells her background story to Celia and friends, mainly, how she was transformed, it affected her life and got some supernatural powers, Geenie delivers a totally blunt Wham Line for her, that she doesn't know if they'll ever make her human again. In later pages, the way Clara reacts to it leaves her in a shocked and depressed mood, even crying in a totally non comedic way (every time any character has cried in this comic, it tends to have been Ocular Gushers). Then comes Catherine, who gives a better description of the origins of the book, that it was made by a mad magician, it gave her power and a new form and that she'll never be human again, specially since the mad magician disappeared. Clara then just states that then there's nothing left for her but to accept her new life, while also crying some more. Catherine and Celia even start crying for her, although in a more typical cartoonish way, but even with that, we could say that Clara's introduction arc is probably the first Tear Jerker ever in this webcomic.

---