One of the first characters introduced in the comic, Eliot started off as pretty much an everyman and foil to Tedd's devious antics. Since then he developed into a well-meaning, if somewhat inhibited, sufferer of chronic hero syndrome who would do anything for his friends and loved ones. He attends Moperville North with Tedd, Susan, and Sarah. He's Tedd's best friend and Ellen's brother/father.Associated tropes:
Towards Ellen, despite her being his Half Identical Twin/Opposite-Sex Clone who technically has more life experience (thanks to her dream life) than he does.
As the title of this strip puts it, Fraternal-Paternal-Maternal Instinct
Papa Wolf: And there is the fact of Ellen possibly being considered being his daughter
Actual quote from Dan Shive: "Do not threaten or otherwise endanger Ellen. Elliot will break you."
Elliot himself describes it in the simplest terms here.
Blessed with Suck: Elliot's original shapeshifting powers only allowed him to turn into a catman, which hurt. Then he developed the power to change into a girl, which he dislikes, and all of the powers he's developed since are girl or girl-related transformations as well. At least the super heroine can fly. Tedd theorizes that Elliot's magic will keep giving him girl-related transformations until he convinces himself he's satisfied with the girl forms he already has. However, this is not the only theory in play. See Hidden Depths below.
Butt Monkey: He gained the ability to turn into a girl, then had to start doing so several times a day or risk it happening on its own. He gained a super-powered alternate form, but it's female. He gained secret identity forms (tying in with the superhero form), and at least one of those is attracted to his gay friend (who, by the way, is attracted to male Elliot). The author is on record that he enjoys tormenting Elliot.
Susan once pointed out that Elliot would save his own worst enemy. Elliot denies it after envisioning himself allowing Damien to fall off a cliff, then promptly protects the worst bully in the school from a supernatural creature.
His selfless personality is slightly deconstructed in later story arcs. It's noted that this makes him ignore his own wants and not make decisions.
Second Law of Gender Bending: Played with. Tedd theorizes Elliot's magic will continue to provide him with girly transformations until it finds one that satisfies him, putting Elliot in the awkward position of having to accept some aspect of femininity in order to escape the rest.
Third Law of Gender Bending: Elliot's female transformations usually affect his clothes as well, apparently because he just can't help visualizing girls in "girly" clothing.
It is implied that Elliot's "wooden reserve" is due to his fear of losing control of an extremely violent temper.
The actual plan was for Elliot to have a Superpowered Evil Side that would emerge if he did go all-out. However, Word Of God has said this has been dropped.
Like Brother and Sister: Elliot, while describing to Tedd how he feels about Sarah when he is questioning his relationship with her, realised that this was the case with Sarah, paralyzing him with shock.
Man, I Feel Like a Woman : Averted, except for one mirror scene early on. Tedd even theorizes that Elliot's failure to "embrace" any of his girl forms is why his magic keeps giving him new ones trying to find one he will accept.
Secret Identity: In addition to the Masquerade and Elliot not liking the idea of everyone knowing he is "Cheerleadra", the spell turning him into a stock Superheroine includes for this purpose three other (and also cliché) forms that provide an efficient disguise not dependent on his acting ability.
Genki Girl: His "Party Animal Socialite" disguise form has this as her main charm.
Goth: One of his new spells. It looks like he was interested at one time.
Ship Tease: With Susan. Their friendship started to develop after he got hired in her job and started to spend more time together reviewing movies.
Erotic Dream: After a long time, he got a dream of him and Susan and started to freak out. Ellen calm him down telling him to see if it was just "teenage hormones" or it really meanted something. Elliot goes for the hormones...at first.
Kamehame Hadoken: True to the Anime and Fighting Game roots, his first magical power is "Tamashii Gekido" ("Soul Fury") — short-range force blast hurling the opponent away. Accompanying it by screaming may or may not be necessary, but the gesture is, as Elliot discovered while bound.
One of the first characters introduced in the comic, Tedd is a self-avowed pervert and mad scientist. Despite being one of the least magically capable characters in the main cast, his extensive research on the subject makes him the resident expert on the finer workings of magic. Originally written as a sex maniac, his relationship with Grace has caused him to mellow out somewhat. He attends Moperville North with Elliot, Susan, and Sarah.Associated tropes:
Elliot: Whether or not Tedd takes interest in something is a good way to determine whether or not it should be censored.
As you can see from "A Disturbing Look into the Mind of Tedd", he's secure in the knowledge that his girlfriend isn't against it. She even catalogued his fetishes (and access to the TF gun obviously allows her to personally implement a considerable part of this):
Doing in the Wizard / Doing in the Scientist: Zigzagged Trope; Tedd's technology has been changed from his own homebrew psuedo-science, to being from aliens, to running on magic, to running on energy that's essentially magic but still studied like a science. This has resulted in Tedd's Teen Genius status disappearing after the early comic, only to return in full force much later.
Famed in Story: At least amongst the magical community his name makes eyebrows raise high. Jerry could identify him just from Susan's brief explanation. And the mention of him was enough to make Raven freak out and rethink his entire plan to capture the boar. They claim it's only because he's the son of Big Good Mr. Verres or enigmatic Mrs. Verres, though this doesn't come across as completely convincing.
Gender Bender: Likes to become a woman for certain tasks, like cooking or showering. Literally all the gender bending in the series that doesn't involve Dr. Germahn's office or the Uryuom is ultimately his fault; according to Word Of God, he's the only person (other than villains) Ellen will zap without permission. At times it's hinted that Tedd may be a full-blown (albeit self-closeted) Transsexual.
I Am Who?: Turns out Lord Tedd is enough of a threat in his own universe that he conquered the planet and the possibility of Tedd going down the same path has been heavily hinted.
This seems to be because Tedd uniquely combines Anti-Magic abilities with unique Magitek technology.
Badass Abnormal: While he's superficially magically impaired, Tedd's slowly discovering that he has very abnormal magical abilities after all. And, using his Magitek gauntlet, he can power himself up into a Super Mode.
In Spite of a Nail: There is always a Tedd in every Universe. Given that at least two Tedds have independently built Magitek gauntlets, this may not be a good thing.
It's All My Fault: Blames himself for his parent's divorce. Raven says it's not his fault though.
Magitek: The prime source of it in comic. The TF Gun runs on it, as does his gauntlet.
Mad Scientist: He began with mixing human and Uryuom technologies, but now conducts his own research on their possible Magitek applications. And as he says in a sketchbook:
As he's gone on, he's moved away from transformations mostly and is instead investigating magic in general.
Missing Mom: Exactly the hows and whys of Tedd's mother is one of the biggest ongoing mysteries of the strip, although it's been hinted that Tedd believes she left because of him.
My Significance Sense Is Tingling: Has the ability to sense whenever girls he knows have moments of sexy awesomeness or nearly have that kind of moment.
Start of Darkness: Tedd may be skirting The Dark Side pretty close. He had a dream with himself as Lord Tedd duking it out with some nebulous monstrosity, and now he built a gauntlet just like Lord Tedd's. This comes at the end of an arc called 'One Way Road', after Tedd has declared that he's going to balance science and friendships and demonstrated rather militant devotion to this, especially in narration.
Stepford Smiler: In a cast of a lot of people who've undergone tragic pasts, Tedd is the most upbeat and heavily suggested to be the most miserable, at least before meeting Uryuoms.
Vitriolic Best Buds: With Susan. Until the school uniform arc, where Tedd and Susan became normal friends in a touching scene. Not that it prevented other "sissy slap fights" later.
You Gotta Have Purple Hair: His father has blue hair, and his mother's niece Nanase has red hair, so Tedd's purple hair is genetic. In the EGS universe, these colors are every bit as normal as brown or blonde. According to Word Of God, Tedd was originally supposed to have black hair, but the artist wasn't skilled enough to make it look good in the early years.
In one strip a random girl in the MNHS cafeteria refers to him as "that cute jelly-haired boy".
Sarah was the first female character in the comic and spent most of her time dealing with Eliot and Tedd's schemes to get her to appear in a bikini. Once the story started to incorporate more fantastic elements, she was made unique by being the most "normal" one of the bunch, having none of the gifts in magic or science the other main characters enjoy. She attends Moperville North with Susan, Tedd, and Elliot.Associated tropes:
A Day in the Limelight: Has been getting a lot more focus in more recent story arcs, and has developed her own personal arc about being jealous of her friends with magic.
The Chick: Considering she has no powers or special abilities herself, she's frequently left behind on most adventures because she is mildly useless. Though it's not really her fault.
Grace is a part-human, part-alien, part-squirrel shapeshifter who lives with Tedd and his father. Entire story arcs have been dedicated to her Dark and Troubled Past. Despite her history (and possibly being the most powerful character in the main cast), she maintains a positive, bubbly attitude and a strong belief in pacifism. She attends Moperville South with Ellen, Nanase, and Justin.Associated tropes:
Ambiguously Brown: Grace's gene-mother was unambiguously African-American, but Grace's features are rather more mixed (particularly her long straight hair), probably because of the admixture of other genes (including those not even of this world).
The Atoner: She's getting better, but still has episodes.
Badass Adorable: turned up to eleven. Grace is so powerful that Shive has to jump though narrative hoops to prevent her from having a Story Breaker Power.
Everything's Nuttier With Squirrels: She's most comfortable in part-squirrel shape and takes it whenever she's in private at home. Although she tend to be in full human form recently; not because she prefers it, but because of three reasons:
Human furniture isn't made with tails in mind (see for yourself)
Her antennae come with senses that are convenient to "turn off"
Clothes on fur feels weird
Fetish Fuel: Invoked. Grace can literally be everything Tedd has ever dreamed of, and more.
Flanderization: Her bubbly innocent side was gradually cranked up while her role in the story was reduced until she appeared to be little more than a Plucky Comic Relief character. Later arcs revealed she was putting up a bubbly front to cover some serious inner conflicts.
Genius Ditz/Teen Genius: What can you say about a brilliant but unworldly girl who mops herself into corners? "Mopping is Tricky!"
Genki Girl: Sometimes, but especially in the absence of angst.
Girls Love Stuffed Animals: Grace has a stuffed squirrel, hedgehog, guinea pig, and bat that represent her and her siblings.
Half-Human Hybrid: Thanks to an alien race with a very strange breeding mechanism, she's technically a first-generation One Quarter human hybrid. And all four parents are different species.
Hidden Depths: It's been implied that Grace's bubbly, innocent exterior is a facade she maintains to repress the horrors in her past. And it's been plainlystated that one never knows when she's genuinely bubbly and when she uses bubbles to mess with people for fun.
I Just Want to Be Normal: She had shades of this at first but quickly let go of this, and once she did start a normal school life with Ellen, Nanase, and Justin, she actually found it a little restrictive.
Ping Pong Naïveté: In part, she still is a bit naive (she apparently doesn't know about Santa Claus); in part, she likes to play this even when she isn't.
Single-Target Sexuality: And the target was the last to catch what's going on despite knowing the reasons.
Grace: ...I am not horrible at volleyball! Ellen: Grace, you either dive for cover or launch the ball into orbit. Grace: That's how I deal with most of my problems.
Nanase is Tedd's cousin. Martial Artist, magic user, all-around badass. Coming from an extremely strict and traditional household, she tends to over-think the potential problems until she makes a mountain out of a mole hill. Still, it's hard to find anyone less hard-working or dedicated than she is. She attends Moperville South with Ellen, Grace, and Justin.Associated tropes:
Tedd: "She's athletic, smart, trilingual, can kick the ass of anyone who messes with her, is theoretically good looking enough that most people are nice to her by default *
and when she's not burned out, she's an insanely potent magic user."
Broken Ace: Currently a type 2, trying so hard to be great at magic and eventually succeeding with her "Angel Spell", but it broke her in the process, leaving her magically burnt out.
Action Girl: Apart from Grace and Super!Elliot, Nanase is by far the strongest out of the main cast, due to both her physical and magical prowess. As of the end of Sister II, she temporarily burnt out her magic, but is still a very strong fighter without it.
Freudian Excuse: Her overbearing mother is the reason for her closeted behavior (even though this is somewhat of an Informed Attribute). Especially odd considering she hangs out with and is good friends with Justin, Ellen, and Grace.
It should be noted that the latter two have only recently become her friends, (with Ellen especially having a big impact on how she deals with her sexuality), and the former was outed against his wishes and bullied so badly that he considered suicide.
Honesty Is The Best Policy: After nearly dying because of Abraham, she decides she doesn't want to die living a lie and decides to be as honest as she can be. This includes being open about her homosexuality, wearing the clothes she like and not lying to those close to her about as many things as possible without divulging government secrets or breaking The Masquerade.
Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places/Single Woman Seeks Good Man: As evidenced recently, before dating Elliot and eventually becoming an Official Couple with Ellen, she used to date quite a lot of guys. Enough to get a reputation, as one of her exes brings up. This becomes Fridge Horror when one remembers that, even when she started dating Elliot, she was never actually attracted to him other than for his moral standards, instead hoping she would become attracted over time, which we can now chalk up to her underlying lesbian nature. All well and okay on its own, and everyone's okay with it. Now apply it to the, evidently long, list of guys she's dated, none of which she was likely ever attracted to.
Squishy Wizard: Averted. Nanase is both the most powerful Martial Artist and the most powerful magic user of the cast because her magical power stems directly from the physical and spiritual discipline cultivated by her martial arts, and her magic provides her with superhuman combat abilities while also boosting her raw physical strength.
Justin is an amiable, level-headed comic shop clerk and Nanase's best friend. Since Elliot is also the one who introduced him to Nanase and the rest of the main cast by extension, Justin feels a huge debt of gratitude and an unrequited crush towards him. He also suffers from a seemingly irresistible compulsion to mess with long hair, though he is bothered by the stereotype. He attends Moperville South with Grace, Nanase, and Ellen.Associated tropes:
Badass Gay: Despite being a martial artist, he never really had a chance to show-off. At least until he finally went toe-to-toe with a fire monster.
Berserk Button: NEVER mention Melissa or Noah to him, especially if it's about forgiving her.
Of course, since Melissa started getting some Character Development and Justin proved willing to go off on his best friends for this, this tendency has started to make him look like a total dick... which Ellen makes him realise.
In recent strips, he has begun to soften up a bit, but he's nowhere near ready to forgive everything.
Coming Out Story: Was outed to the whole town by his former best friend Melissa (or more accurately, her sister) and still holds a grudge against her for it.
Driven to Suicide: Implies to Susan that he was considering it for a while. After he was outed, he lost his best friend and was ostracized/bullied by most of his classmates. He felt completely alone until he met Elliot and Nanase.
Gentle Giant: One of the tallest members of the main cast, but as mentioned, prefers not resorting to violence.
Moral Myopia: Has this for a good while regarding Melissa - it's true that she made a terrible mistake and hurt him terribly, but until recently he took his treatment of her further than she deserved. He's getting better, though.
Out of Focus: Beats out Sarah as the member of the main eight who gets the least spotlight, with the exception of the Birthday party arc involving his admitting his love for Elliot; the current Superhero storyline appears to be his Day in the Limelight.
Secret Keeper: He knows what the main cast is up to and refuses to share details after George started putting things together. Not only that, Justin knows the identity of the mysterious cloaked figure and hasn't told anyone in the main cast. Given his history, is this any surprise?
Straight Gay: From his long list of attributes (including fantasy-geek and martial artist) the only parts of his character that give the impression that he's gay are his pierced ear and love of long hair.
Supernatural Martial Arts: Though he's not nearly as powerful as Nanase or Elliot, he's no longer someone to be trifled with.
What the Hell, Hero?: Ellen gave him a stink eye and vicious chewing-out after he snapped at Elliot for even daring to look at things from Melissa's perspective — she makes it clear that while his grudge is understandable, snapping at his friends when they only have his best interests at heart is unacceptable
The group's resident cynic, Susan (as she prefers to be called) was introduced in the comic as Sarah's man-hating best friend who would often give Eliot and Tedd grief. Interacting with the rest of the cast (and exploring her own history) has improved her opinion of the male gender to a strong degree, but she still maintains a high level of snark. She lives with her mother in a three-story house, works in a video store, and is the founder of Moperville North's Feminist Club.Associated tropes:
Abuse Is Okay When It Is Female on Male: Early comics gave Susan a free pass to clobber men with magical hammers as long as she was defending women (or Tedd, who may be just that girly.) Justified later when the creator of the hammers explicitly says that they were designed to be a "painful but harmless" way for women to retaliate against inappropriate comments.
Adorkable: That's what we get to see when she's not in the Hammer Queen role.
Aloof Dark Haired Girl: She has (at least at first) a distinctly cynical attitude which leads her to habitually set herself apart from most people. In fact, her using her middle name and (again, at first) dying her hair dark blue are a part of her rejection of the Everyone Loves Blondes template.
Asexuality: Heavily hinted in one of the Q&A, and Susan essentially defines herself as such in the story proper, but she nonetheless does develop some level of attraction to several of the male characters.
Birthday Hater: It's on New Year's Day, and she reasons that celebrations will still be going on with or without her, whether her mother spoils her or not.
Freak Out: In a seemingly mind-boggling — though understandable in context — case of overreaction. When she was told that she just didn't get an old joke.
Freudian Excuse: Caught her father with an undressed woman who was not her mother.
Locked into Strangeness: She used to dye her naturally blonde hair dark blue... until her magical powers awakened, at which point dark blue dramatically became her "natural" color.
Moment of Weakness: Panicked the first time she saw Nanase use her Fairy Doll spell and, in the process of getting help, blurted out to the others the personal issues they had been talking about.
When asked for a date by a guy, Susan marvelously freaked out: waving her hands, spitting out a bunch of lame excuses to ultimately run away.
Running Gag: Hammers, spontaneous changes in hair color.
Ship Tease: She gets some with a lot of characters, including Ellen (when she got zapped with her V5 beam), Catalina (who actually asked her out), Justin (who she made out with when they were both gender flipped), Matt Cohen (who also asked her out), and even Elliot, in a way that implies it might actually lead somewhere. Fans are...of mixed feelings about that last one, though the general attitude is to give Shive the benefit of the doubt.
Single Woman Seeks Good Man: Susan's motive to be attracted to Elliot and, let's admit it, Elliot is the best candidate for Susan's love interest. Elliot would never think in hurting her, take advantage of her sexually until they're both ready and they're more compatible than they both thought at first. Even, Elliot's Chronic Hero Syndrome could be the perfect treatment for Susan's Broken Bird situation.
Sugar and Ice Personality: Needed to unwind badly. After admitting her problems and going through a few seances of angst-dialysis, she began to learn how to laugh aloud and drop non-acidic jokes.
Wide-Eyed Idealist: Before meeting the aberration. Literally so — her eyes change into her current half-droopy state when she looks down at his corpse, and while she still haswideeyesquiteoften, they do tend towards the "half-droopy." After the encounter of a weird kind with Jerry leading to Freak Out, though, she now tends to having wide open eyes as often as not.
You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Double-subverted. She has dark blue hair, but she's a natural blonde. However, nobody realized she dyes her hair because blue is considered a natural color in this setting. Her awakening makes dark blue her "natural" hair color.
Elliot's more outgoing Opposite-Sex Clone created through magic. She originally thought she only had a few days to exist and decided to be a villain about it, but the revelation that she was here to stay caused her to lighten up. She inherited Eliot's magical aptitude, although most of her spells revolved around "spreading her curse" by turning her targets into sexy women. She attends Moperville South with Grace, Justin, and Nanase.Associated tropes:
Do NOT mock Grace in Ellen's presence; the resulting death glare alone was enough to stun two other girls into silence.
Even Justin was not safe from her wrath after he upset her brother.
Vlad should consider himself lucky Ellen didn't kill him after he nearly killed Nanase.
Bi the Way: There have been times when Ellen's bisexuality has shown through, even though she's currently in denial about it, since most of her memories are Elliot's (ie, a man's), so she's rather weirded out by the idea of being attracted to men, her biological sex notwithstanding.
Conflict Ball: Off and on; demonstrated best when completely apropos of nothing she cornered Tedd and started yelling at him about wanting to help Nanase, revealing that she has seriously conflicted feelings about Tedd.
Defrosting Ice Queen: She started with the memories of Elliot. After fully expecting to die in a month and then getting over the identity problem she embraced "live today" attitude.
Evil Twin: Tries to be one during her initial Cloning Blues crisis, but doesn't really manage to pull it off.
Expendable Clone: Felt like one long after the other characters had accepted her as a person in her own right. Subverted, as she went on to become a major character.
Expository Hairstyle Change: Ellen's gradually lengthening hair symbolizes her growing acceptance of herself as a real person and a girl.
Hypocritical Heartwarming: Her typical approach to Elliot ("You're like me if I were being directed by George Lucas.") Elliot actually gets more upset when she doesn't tease him because he feels guilty she got created (and stuck as a girl) in the first place.
Jumping the Gender Barrier: As someone on the WMG page put it, Ellen's problems derive more from not being Elliot than being female, which she doesn't seem to mind terribly.
Like Sister And Sister: She mentions how quickly she got over not being with Sarah. The fact that she considered Sarah a sister was why.
Most Common Superpower: Her body is based on "Female Variant #5" (designed by Tedd), so she's probably the best endowed of the cast. And since that is her default form, the "Female Variant #5" modification gets applied again on top of it whenever shezapsherself.
No Bisexuals: In denial, perhaps to show solidarity with Nanase and perhaps because of an incident in her dream life, though she has also claimed that that she feels squicked by the way her admitted attraction to men was artificially grafted onto her personality by the transformation gun.
Official Couple: With Nanase. It has become even more official after the arc Sister II.
Supernatural Martial Arts: She got it in ready form from Elliot, with some extra power on account of being a magical creature.
Tangled Family Tree: As seen here, it's... complicated. And that isn't even close to some of the fans' ideas. Here◊ is her family tree. She was created magically instead of being born and can be thought of as having up to four mothers: one of which is also her twin brother, and father, two are mother figures and the fourth is her mother due to being her twin brother/father's mother. By the same logic, she has up to three fathers: one because he's a husband figure to one of her mother figures, one due to her biological relationship to her twin brother, and one due to being her twin brother/father's father. Also, by the same logic, she is dating her aunt, but that is only because of the biological relationship she has with one of Ellen's father figures, so it probably doesn't count. And Magus seems to be anotherfather.
Verbal Tic: Has picked up/inherited "Za?" from her brother/father.
Younger Than They Look/Older Than They Look: Chronologically, she is less than a year old. Biologically, she is around 17. In terms of memories and life experience, she is around 35 (17 years of Elliot’s life and 18 years of alter-Ellen’s life).
Humans
The Feds
Mr. Edward Verres
Tedd's father and a significant figure in the paranormal community. He works for a government organization tasked with dealing with the supernatural and extraterrestrial and does a pretty good job at it. He acts as a mentor figure to the kids and trusts them to keep a tight lid on the fantastic stuff that goes on. Has been known to spout expository dialog ad nauseum.Associated tropes:
Badass Longcoat: Whenever circumstances require him to take the field.
Closet Geek: If he's not into geeky things, he's at least extremely familiar with them in his role as the man behind covering up real-life SF & fantasy shenanigans. For example, when Grace wanted to wear some alien spandex for a workout.
Mr. Verres: Okay, fine. But if anyone asks, you're cosplaying as an oc from your dc superheroes ff.
Kicked Upstairs: As a result of his actions in Sister II. Apparently, no one wants him fired. Even the guy kicking him upstairs would raise hell if he was axed.
The Men in Black: He's good at cover-ups and got a reputation as more cooperative than others (like his successor), though the excess of personal involvement eventually led to being Kicked Upstairs out of this position.
Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Though we have yet to see them truly in action, Raven offhandedly describes Wolf as one of the most powerful wizards in the mid-western United States, and the security scan reveals he's surprisingly buff under his Badass Longcoat.
Only One Name: The J? It stands for Just. As in "Arthur, Just Arthur."
The Quiet One: As his quote indicates, he gets right to the point.
Wham Line "The occasional casualty will not disrupt our long term objectives"
Family
Mrs. Kitsune
Nanase's overbearing and traditional Japanese Mother. Initially a complete tyrant in her home, her later appearances made her somewhat more reasonable. Has a very strong opinions on duty to family in general and motherhood in particular. She apparently knows more than she lets on.Associated tropes:
Everyone Has Standards: She may have her bigotry issues and can be controlling, but she despises Noriko, her sister and Tedd's mother, for abandoning her family.
My Beloved Smother: Though much less than Nanase thinks — as long as it's not about studies.
Background Character. All we know about him is Nanase's belief that her father won't back her against her mother.
Akiko Kitsune
Nanase's little sister. Brave enough to defy their mother (albeit in secret) by sneaking Nanase cookies, but a cypher otherwise. Rarely speaks.Associated tropes:
Elliot and Ellen's seemingly oblivious, unflappable, and ridiculously permissive parents.Associated tropes:
Cloud Cuckoolanders: How else can you interpret their non-reactions to all the wackiness in their lives combined with their unexpected seriousness about things like going to the store for furniture?
Crazy-Prepared: A pre-mission briefing — complete with poster sized charts — for a trip to the store.
Susan's embittered mother. Appears to have lost all faith in men (and perhaps humanity in general) after her husband's betrayal. Embarrassingly over-aggressive when it comes to "protecting" Susan's interests.Associated tropes:
My Beloved Smother: Bullied the school into allowing Susan to go on the field trip to France, much to Susan's embarrassment.
Straw Feminist: To the point where she openly wishes Susan were a lesbian because it would allow her to totally exclude men from her life.
Carol Brown
Ed, I grew up in Moperville. Weird stuff happens here.Sarah's older sister. A pretty, determined, and gung-ho television reporter who covers the Moperville area. Apparently immune to the Weirdness Censor that prevents other people from crediting the weird stuff that goes on in her home town.Associated tropes:
Aloof Big Sister: Has never been shown interacting with Sarah and didn't even recognize her little sister's best friend when she interviewed Susan
Ascended Fanon: According to Dan, this is why she wound up related to Sarah as part of a Retcon.
Intrepid Reporter: How else do you describe a reporter who arrives on scene via air drop?
Sibling Rivalry: Note Sarah's reaction when Elliot makes the above assertion.
Teachers & Mentors
Sensei Greg
Master and founder of the now-closed School of Anime-Style Martial Arts, which he founded after a marathon anime viewing session, Greg is heavily versed in otaku culture and applies it in his fighting style.Associated tropes:
Ascended Fanboy: Comic book & anime geek who learned how to unlock "ki" (Magic By Any Other Name) after watching 168 hours of anime straight. Much of his instructor "wisdom" comes from comic books.
Beware the Nice Ones: He's a nice guy and a goofball, but he'll still threaten to punch you through your face if you do anything evil.
Black and Nerdy: Breaks the trope somewhat by being a seven-foot-tall martial artist.
Dex: And... haven't I seen you cosplaying as Chun-Li? Greg: Yep!
Dirty Old Man: Because of anime martial arts examples such as Happosai and Master Roshi, he considers the fact that he does not fit this trope to be a point of shame.
Enlightenment Superpowers: An already experienced martial artist invented his own style after a feat of ascetism ending with a big insight. Shive knows the classics, all right. In Greg's case, it's 168 hours of watching anime without breaks for lunch and sleep — which accounts for the style's... peculiarity.
Gentle Giant: Easily towers over everyone in the main cast, yet as a black-belt level martial artist, he's not big on unnecessary violence.
No Man Should Have This Power: He closed the dojo in part due to worries that there's no way to ensure that good powers would be granted to the right people. Just before the dojo was wrecked by a sleepwalking (and possibly mind-controlled) magic-user and a dragon anyway.
Scary Black Man: Played with. While he certainly looks the part, he's actually more of a geeky otaku type at heart.
Supernatural Martial Arts: Literally. As in "closed his dojo when he realized his training techniques only worked with people who already had a predisposition for magical powers".
Adrian Raven
Moperville South's apparently sinister and demanding history teacher. He's been a teacher there for a very long time and has quite the reputation as a menacing and cryptic individual. The reality of the matter is that he's an elf who has dedicated his time to assisting "gifted" children. Also Pandora's son.Associated tropes:
Good Is Not Nice: He's very strict and intimidating, but his main purpose is acting as a guardian towards magical or otherwise not entirely mundane students. Basically, Lawful Good with the emphasis on Lawful (or asskicking, depending on the situation).
Magic Knight: Is a good spell user and knows how to fight with a sword.
Martyr Without a Cause: His greatest wish is to join the military, serve a noble cause, and to protect people — but he's not allowed to. His mother is opposed to him risking his life for mortals and points out that his desire to serve "his country" is meaningless when he doesn't even really have a country.
My Greatest Failure/My God, What Have I Done?: According to him he was even more encouraging than he is now, especially to Tedd's parents and because of that considers himself completely at fault for Mrs. Verres departure from her family.
Our Elves Are Better: Is the resultant offspring of a human and an Immortal. Such hybrids are called elves.
Really 700 Years Old: Ellen speculates that he's much older than he looks, since he's been teaching at the school since at least Nanase's mother's time. She's more right than she thinks.
Secret Keeper: Mr. Raven's real job is assisting and protecting students with magical abilities.
Cat Girl: As Elliot put it, she "seems just a tail short from being a cat-girl."
Gosh Dang It to Heck!: Involuntary; she sees herself more as Dame Diatribe, but there's some lines she can't cross at school, and all the situations that make her want to swear are at school.
She is at least somewhat bi, as apparently she was interested in Tedd; however, Tedd being as girly as he is, she's probably not that bi, and identifies as lesbian.
Liz
The Goth-esque member of the Feminist club. Seriously addicted to cigarettes.
Sandi
The airheaded member of the Feminist's club. Tony's girlfriend.Associated tropes:
He's gotten in one snark. It wouldn't be very noteworthy, except it was toward Susan. Whether this a defining trait, remains to be seen.
His speech about the uniforms was full of this, seemingly designed to get across his contempt for the system and the principal. Kind of impressive, given that these were after he was told to stick to the cards.
"Black ties are encouraged but not required for uniforms, for reasons surelynot related to those costing extra."
Dogged Nice Guy: Possibly... But considering Dan spent an extra comic because he didn't want to let Matt's intentions hang in the dark, it seems he's pure Nice Guy.
Foreshadowing: This and this turns out to be so for this. All of this took place over the course of five years. Only Dan Shive, everybody...
I Want My Fellow Student To Be Happy: Matt seems to understand quite clearly that Susan doesn't want to date him, and respects it. When he hears that she's never dated at all, he gives an earnest piece of advice to think on whether or not she'd regret not dating in High School. Even if it's not with him, he just wanted to make sure Susan would be okay.
Does Not Like Men: Not to Susan's (pre-character development) extent, but she does assume men are jerks until proven otherwise.
This may be the reason why she is fixated on Elliot, who she overheard being described as very passive.
Girl Posse: Lucy, Rhoda. Lucy fades into the background as time goes on, and she treats Rhoda more like a daughter, so she doesn't quite count in later comics.
Gold Digger: Shamelessly. Her plan is to marry a kind, compassionate, rich guy who will obey her every whim.
Rhoda: What if you just fall in love with someone someday and they fall in love with you? Diane:That'sadorable.
Identical Stranger: Distinguishable from Susan only by personality and the fact that Susan is slightly taller. They have the same face, the same build, the same voice, the same natural hair color, and they were apparently born only 20 minutes apart. The subtext with her similarities to Susan is even more blatant after the time skip: both girls have shown an interest in Elliot at the same time, although for drastically different reasons. While Susan has developed her friendship with Elliot by bonding over common interests, Diane apparently sees him as something to be used. It has been strongly hinted that Susan and Diane are identical twins separated at birth — in addition to being nearly identical apart from height and hair color, they were born twenty minutes apart at New Year's.
Weirdness Censor: She sees someone who looks exactly like her with blue hair... and doesn't even notice. When it's pointed out, she does admit there is some similarity, but doesn't see it as enough to get worked up over.
Lucy
The snarky member of Diane's Girl Posse.Associated tropes:
Demoted to Extra: It's pretty easy to forget that she's part of Diane and Rhoda's group.
Shrinking Violet: Rhoda's perception of her own size literally shrinks when she feels intimidated.
Melissa
Justin's former best friend who outed him after he told her he was gay by thoughtlessly confiding in her blabbermouth sister, and who hasn't exactly repaired their relationship with her subsequent behavior.Associated tropes:
Alternative Character Interpretation: Invoked. Justin tells Susan that Melissa is a Smug Snake who almost destroyed his life. Noah tells Elliot that Melissa is a tragic heroine who nearly destroyed her own life as well. Their respective stories are pretty consistent in the details, it's just that Justin seems to hold her more responsible than he does her sister and is thus less willing to forgive her.
Dan claims that her referring to MythBusters is a subtle hint of this.
Less subtly, she said her faith in Noah was based on seeing how he had beaten something, compared to which a bulldog faced fireball-breathing dragon the size of a half truck is a misbehaving pup. Which also explains her treatment of it.
I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Eventually gets the hint that Justin wants nothing to do with her, and promised to leave him alone. Doubles as a Tear Jerker as it comes from the realization/belief that if it took Justin this long to forgive her, then they probably shouldn't and won't be friends again anyway.
Psycho Ex-Girlfriend: An annoying example... Except that it's been revealed that her motives are a bit more complex than that. Not to mention that she is fully aware that her attempts to win over Justin are pointless and do nothing but make her come off as annoying and quite possibly psychotic, but can't seem to stop herself.
Retcon: Originally, she was just some girl who Justin dated once and who wouldn't let go, but later became a childhood friend who had been in love with him for a long time, making her story more tragic.
Set Right What Once Went Wrong: Noah believes that Melissa has deluded herself into thinking she can make everything right again by winning Justin back.
I have been told I can make straight men see rainbows.
Melissa's androgynous boyfriend who rarely uses contractions. An orphan, Noah appears to be the ward of Mr. Raven and recently made friends with Elliot. He is the mysterious hooded figure previously only known as "The Child Left Behind" who has been seeking Grace to repay his debts to her for killing Damien.Associated tropes:
Ambiguous Gender: Noah, whom we know as a boy only because it was said and in comparison to whom Tedd doesn't look "that androgynous" at all, despite this being an old Running Gag.
Elliot: Who's this... guy? I think? Student: Oh, it's that weird girl.
Ambiguously Bi: Elliot was rather surprised to hear he has a girlfriend.
Dude Looks Like a Lady: Even moreso than Tedd in that he also dresses in androgynous clothing. He killed a Running Gag: in comparison with Noah, Tedd doesn't look "just that androgynous" at all.
Nearly won a race through the "Swedekea" store with super-powerful martial artist Elliot, and later tells Raven that he was holding back. To be fair, Elliot was too, but still...
In the gym, he faked mediocrity so well that Ellen remembered him at all only because of his strange hairdo.
He also once beat the snot out of two guys who later went on to become college football offensive linemen.
An average nerd and Justin's coworker at the comic book shop.Associated tropes:
Ambiguously Gay: There are some only slightly ambiguous hints that George has a crush on Justin, but this isn't confirmed and could be a Red Herring, and all of the signs (except perhaps for one) could realistically be due to other reasons.
Author Avatar: He parrots what Dan says a lot in the commentary and interrupted a Q&A in comic to act as his mouth piece. However, he's not solely existent for that. Dan's actual Author Avatar has shown up less since he was created, though.
Fanboy: A parody of opinionated geeks as a straight-up Expy of the Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons.
Possibly; repeatedly refers to Elliot as Justin's boyfriend, but maybe he's just being sarcastic... or jealous.
Given this comic and the commentary regarding Landmark Sale, it's pretty obviously jealousy.
Dr. Sciuridae
Grace's "Grandfather" who substituted his own dead daughter's DNA (the original Grace) for the intended genetic sample when Project Lycanthrope created their fourth assassin "Shade Tail."Associated tropes:
The Stool Pigeon: He was the snitch who gave out the Project Lycanthrope to Mr. Verres after he grew attached to Grace.
Dex
A regular in the comic shop where George and Justin work, a very hairy and very unkempt guy of less than athletical body shape, though not quite emaciated. He found himself right in the epicenter of the magic mayhem in "New And Old Flames" arc.Associated tropes:
Ascended Extra: He was just a creepy dude who hung around the comic shop where Justin worked. And than he walked into Greg's dojo...
Power Tattoo: Though he can't remember how he got this, probably due to not being sober-minded at the time.
Summon Magic: Can do something like Susan's twist of Nanase's fairy doll spell.
Mr. Tensaided
Susan's, and (during the summer) Elliot's, boss at the video rental store. A huge nerd who has an entire leveling system for his employees, he was unimpressed with Elliot's unfamiliarity with movie references and only hired him because Susan told the half-truth that Elliot knows Cheerleadra. Is bombastic and hammy, and rather obsessed with the things he's a fan of.Associated tropes:
Fanboy: Perhaps even more so than George, in presentation though he's a lot more enthusiastic rather than snarky but angers easy when people don't get references he makes whereas George would just snark them.
Villains
Villains
Guineas
Guineapig/human/alien hybrid and the "oldest" of Grace's brothers. Stays in his hybrid form most of the time, in which he is unable to speak any human language. He isn't shown to be particularly bright or strong. He seems to be willing to take orders from Damian, but he also reports to Hedge on the side.Associated tropes:
Heel Face Turn: Once Damien is gone, he willingly goes with the authorities to be evaluated if he is fit for release as a normal citizen.
The Guards Must Be Crazy: Too busy cleaning out his ears to notice Elliot slips his bonds (and clothes) via shapeshifting.
Minion with an F in Evil: When his brothers are having climactic combat showdowns with the protagonists, Guineas engages Ellen... in a thumb war (and loses!)
Voluntary Shapeshifting: With some pain, he can shift between his human form and his human-guinea pig hybrid form.
The Unintelligible: His siblings understand him, but for everyone else it's rendered as "Squeek! Squee squee *snort* squee?"
Hedge
Hedgehog/human/alien hybrid and the self-appointed "Big Brother" of Grace's animal-hybrid family. Spent most of his first appearances spying on Grace and her friends before he kidnapped Elliot (who he thought was another hybrid). Spends most of his time in his human form, as his hedgehog form can't speak.Associated tropes:
Running Gag: Hedge, master of the anti-climactic moment. Also, Owls.
Voluntary Shapeshifting: Can shapeshift between his human form and human-hedgehog hybrid form with only some pain.
Vlad/Vladia
Bat/falcon/leopard/alien/human hybrid and the final brother introduced in the comic. The giant mix-match of creatures used to create him made his first attempt at transforming a life-threatening experience, so he decided to stay in his hybrid form permanently, even though he hates being seen as a freak. This lasted until he got turned into a girl by Ellen's beam, so now s/he's decided to stick with that form just so s/he can look normal.Associated tropes:
Second Law of Gender Bending: Interestingly, the only straight example thus far: "I've never been a man in my life as far as I'm concerned!"
Shapeshifter Mode Lock: With a twist. Vladia invokes this as a personal choice, as she only wants to stay human forever.
Tsundere: Haven't seen the dere side outwardly, but seems to be the part.
Voluntary Shapeshifting: Sort of. He was designed as a shapeshifter, but it almost killed him the only time he tried it, so he stayed in his man-bat form until Ellen transformed him. After he was transformed, he decided being human was more important than being male.
Damien
One of the first Big Bads in the series. He's technically another one of Grace's brothers, not that you'd guess it. Damien is a murderous Chimera with fire-based powers and a messiah complex. He wants to create an army of chimeras with him as their king.Associated tropes:
A God Am I: Damien believes he was summoned to Earth to be the Messiah of the Chimera. The realization that he isn't triggers his Villainous Breakdown.
The creator of the Dewitchery Diamond that created Ellen. Abraham swore an oath to hunt down and destroy all new creatures created by the Diamond because, due to the nature of curses, those creatures tend to be vicious monsters. However, after learning that Ellen, the Diamond's latest creation, is an innocent human being (and is loved by her friends and family), he begins to question whether or not he is in the right anymore.Associated tropes:
Anti-Villain: Especially towards the end of his arc.
The Atoner: First for making Dewitchery Diamond, then for trying to fix this problem too enthusiastically. See for yourself. But he's still incorrigibly dramatic.
Chekhov's Gunman: Was first mentioned in in the first Sister arc, but only appeared recently.
Didn't Think This Through: His defining trait. He enchanted the Dewitchery Diamond to separate a lycanthropic friend from his curse without considering the potential consequences, didn't think about things like the cosmetic use of magic when he swore that oath, and managed to forget that Adrian Raven was a wizard while in the middle of fighting him. No wonder that two of two wizards who spoke of Abe called him "idiot."
Idiot Hero: Double deconstructed, if that's the right way to put it. First, because of his stupidity, he made his friend's condition worse instead of selling the gem to someone more skilled, and it only went downhill from there-that's the example they have written on the Playing With A Trope page for Idiot hero. Then, because he was so stupid, he didn't think about cosmetic magic, such as, say, someone's best friend turning them into a girl or something less drastic, such as a change of hair color, he came to the conclusion that he had to kill Ellen. It's not cute and funny, it's the cause of a horrifying Knight Templar. I mean, he didn't even think to throw the damn diamond in a volcano. Was he even really trying?
Lawful Stupid: If it wasn't for his oath to kill anything born from the Dewitchery Diamond, he wouldn't even qualify as a villain.
Meaningful Name: In The Bible, Abraham was commanded by God to sacrifice his own child, but at the last moment, an angel stopped him, announcing that God was just testing his faith. Now consider that Ellen was created by the Dewitchery Diamond, which means that Abraham is Ellen's father in a roundabout way. Now consider that his oath to God led him to try to kill Ellen. Now consider that Nanase looked awfully angelic when she convinced Abraham to spare Ellen's life.
Never Live It Down: In-universe example. Apparently, "Every properly trained wizard has heard of Abraham, the idiot apprentice who recklessly enchanted a massive diamond instead of selling it to pay someone more skilled to fix his cursed noble friend."
Really 700 Years Old: Has managed to live for several centuries with his statue spell.
Taken for Granite: A voluntary version. He puts himself into suspended animation to prolong his life.
To Be Lawful or Good: Abraham swore an oath to destroy anything spawned by the Dewitchery Diamond, and feels obligated to kill Ellen, even though he's very reluctant to harm any innocent people.
Lord Tedd
Alternate Universe version of Tedd, presumably in control of significant chunks of his dimension along with the ability to slip a few surprises into nearby ones.Associated tropes:
Artificial Limbs: Has what appears to be a prosthetic arm that can shoot energy blasts. Some fans have theorized that it's partly made of the TF gun that causes Body Horror.
Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Hasn't been seen in (real world) years; has only been namechecked during the Sister II arc.
Evil Overlord: His apparent job, along with General Shade Tail, his Dragon, and Nioi. Though we're not sure to what extent.
Love Redeems: At least, while looking for Nioi, he looked like a more athletic version of "our" Tedd, as opposed to his maniacal look on Beta Tedd's photo and goo cell telemetery scene.
Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Lavender is obviously not human, but Agent Wolf is the only one who comments on it (he gets threatened with more "sensitivity training" for his troubles).
One Gender Race: Though you wouldn't know it to look at "her."
Subordinate Excuse: She's the personal assistant of Mr. Verres who can look more or less any way she wants, but prefers a very emphatically female human form, likes to sit on his table, follows him after a reassignment, and...
Immortals are a class of supernatural beings who exist only on the spiritual plane and who are normally limited to advising and guiding mortals to act in real world.While Immortals live forever, they need to "die" to reset their memories and personality every 200 years or so to prevent their growing intelligence and power from butting up against increasing boredom and decreasing sanity.
All-Powerful Bystander: Immortals are only allowed to guide and empower mortals without incurring the wrath of other immortals. Chaos is bending these rules, probably with the intent of tearing the whole system apart so that her son is no longer bound by them either.
Born-Again Immortality: However, to retain their full potential, they have to do this voluntarily. If they are killed or rushed in the transition, they lose a lot of their memories and power.
Immortality Immorality: Not going through death and rebirth tends to leave immortals with a dangerous combination of power, boredom, and insanity. It's hinted that this is part of why Chaos is so dangerously unbalanced.
One Steve Limit: Since they adopt their own names, this can be averted with hilarious consequences:
Grace: ...You're an immortal named Jerry?
Jerry: Hey, you should be glad I'm named Jerry! Most immortals go for elitist names from ancient mythology. Let me tell you, there is nothing more hilarious than the legendary hissy fits that result from two or more immortals named "Zeus" running into each other.
Pointy Ears: All immortals seen so far have has pointy ears in their default humanoid forms. Their "elf" half-human children inherit this too.
Super Empowering: Immortals can give a person a magic mark which allows them to use an ability related to their innate talents or strongest desire, with that person's knowledge and consent. However, trickery and lies of omission can be used to get that consent as the French Immortals did, and Chaos outright forces marks on people and edits their memories to manipulate them.
Pandora (Chaos) Raven
An Immortal that can change her form at will. Virtually nothing is known about her except that she occasionally forces Magus to do her more dirty work. She is mostly an observer, but occasionally tries to influence events, particularly when she feels she has been slighted. Oh, and she's Raven's mother.Associated tropes:
Awesome McCoolname: Pandora as in the Box. Chaos by itself is pretty cool.
Mama Bear: Is very pissed when Abraham nearly kills Raven.
Moral Myopia: Okay, killing Abraham is understandable, albeit extreme, but giving the blame to Mr. Verres?
Sigil Spam: She marks the medallion used to control Dex with a reference to Pandora.
Villainous Breakdown: When Magus refuses to do her bidding anymore, she does not take it well.
The French Immortals
A pair of elf-like creatures who awakened Susan and Nanase's magical powers in Paris and now watch over Elliot, presumably at the behest of Mr. Verres.Associated tropes:
Elderly immortal about to undergo rebirth who nonetheless takes time to aid Susan's Character Development. Looks remarkably like Santa Claus. First encountered here.Associated tropes:
Chivalrous Pervert: The backstory of the hammers. They were meant as a release valve to encourage flirting and harmless, dirty-minded shenanigans — not as a deterrent.
Eccentric Mentor: Less so than Mr. Verres, but he still fits the bill. He's been a little wacky in his life, and some things like his Hyperspace Mallet idea were kind of weird, but bear in mind he's a 200 year old immortal at the height of his power — for now, — and he's also a master of Serenity-Inducing Fluffy Animal Attack.
Physically, he's a Type B. Given that he was preparing to "die" and be reborn when first met, this will change in his next appearance.
As matter of actual passage of time, there's no way to really tell who is actually eldest, though it's hinted that Chaos has held onto her current incarnation for far too long for her mental health's sake.
Fat Bastard: Calls himself this, while he's anything but. The worst thing we've seen him do was the real origin story for the Hammers, which he admits was an adolescent prank that he didn't realize Susan would take so seriously. Otherwise? He really is just a Cool Old Guy.
Hidden Depths: Despite initially coming off as jolly and cheerful, he's able to handle Susan's angst-induced awakening with a minimum of complications and is shown to be very unamused when he hears about what the French immortals had Susan and Nanase do.
Hyperspace Mallet: Actually created and powered the artifact allowing females access to these hammers. Now that he's dying, he needs to take back in the power of these hammers.
I Gave My Word: A very honorable person. When he hears Susan's backstory, he is deeply offended by how Susan was treated and says that immortals owe her a debt — one which he swears an oath to uphold himself.
Mr. Exposition: He explains a lot about immortals, awakening, and of course, the hammers.
Other Supernatural Creatures
The Demonic Duck
Master of DistractionSome sort of magical summon that takes the form of a red duck with horns and a cartoonish pointy demon tail. He's called forth whenever someone needs the attention taken off of them for a second, usually so they can make a quick getaway. It is possible to be distracted by the duck even if you're the one who summoned him.Associated tropes:
Go Look at the Distraction: It's the whole reason he exists (to BE the distraction, that is, not to look at it.)
Phrase Catcher: "Hey, is that a demonic duck of some sort?"
Magus
A wizard tricked into transporting to environs of our universe and largely unable to interact with it, that occasionally does "favors" for Chaos for the sake of ending his limbo. Has the ability to amplify the emotions of others. Like Chaos, very little is known about him, but what is known is that he wishes to return to life, and believes that Ellen is the key to making this possible. He claims to be Ellen's "Father", which implies that he orchestrated her creation in the first place.Associated tropes:
Little “No”: He just gave Chaos a big one, refusing to go along with her plans of Disproportionate Retribution against the already defeated Abraham. Chaos is not pleased by this.
A female Human/Skunk seyunolu sorceress working for Lord Tedd. While doing private research for her little court intrigue (in Lord Tedd's best interests, as she sees it) in an Alternate Universe where the main cast lives, she accidentally met them and saved Grace using her magical shield. She "fixed" (and later contacted) Ellen as an expert in magical artifacts in general and the Dewitchery Diamond in particular after carelessly running into it while enchanted, thus accidentally creating Kaoli.Associated tropes:
Vain Sorceress: An innocent version — she played with cosmetic use of shapeshifting magic, changing her skin color and making herself slightly younger when she touched the Dewitchery Diamond. Oops. Which may be related to her rather obvious crush on Lord Tedd.
Sirleck
A body-snatching aberration who currently uses the body of an old man. Has allied himself with Magus after the latter cut ties with Pandora.Associated tropes:
Deadpan Snarker: His conversation with Magus shows shades of this.
Deal with the Devil: It's highly implied that Magus has made one of these by getting into debt with him.
Grand Theft Me: What he did, does, and is planning to do.
The "Whale"
A bizarre looking creature that is introduced in the "There Be Whales" story-line. Feeds on magic in the air and it's kind is attracted to Mopervile because of the growing magic in the area.Associated Tropes:
Eldritch Abomination: States that it is both of and not of this world. Seems to be benevolent though and acts as Mr. Exposition for Tedd.
Mind Rape: Played down. Its psychic conversation with Ted only gave him a minor headache. Ted even assumed that it kept its conversation so short because it didn't want to cause this to him.
Starfish Alien: It looks a little like a cross between a whale and a bottom feeder.
"Whale:" We prefer to be compared to whales. We like whales.
Year Inside, Hour Outside: Its psychic communication seems to cause this, with its conversation to Tedd only lasting "less than one literal second" (later confirmed to be about two-thirds of a second) outside.
Fourth Wall Mail Slot
Note that in the 'Newspaper' or 'Sketchbook' sections, any character can do this; these almost only show up when talking to the viewers.
Dr Germahn
A stereotypical Mad Scientist, and proprietor of Germahn Laboratories, complete with accent.Associated tropes:
Author Appeal: In-universe reason for what Germahn Labs produces. Also out-of-universe, probably.
Amanda's roommate, and prospective lawyer. Apparently has a crush on Amanda, but as of the last Q&A comics, she's reluctant to voice it where Amanda can hear.
Ensemble Darkhorse: In the Q&A after "New and Old Flames", Shive mentions in the commentary that she wasn't really going to be in it, but fans loved her so much that he wrote her into more strips than originally planned.
Situational Sexuality: She raised her hand when Lisa and Amanda questioned whether anyone "experiments" to test their sexuality. However, she did not reveal the results of those tests.
Dan
Author Avatar. Rarely shows up, of course, but there are times.Associated tropes:
Author Avatar: Almost any time he's shown, it's as the artist/writer.
or at this wiki
