The High Seas
An indie band situated in Seattle, founded by Max and Chloe about a year after the events of Life Is Strange. For tropes pertaining to Max and Chloe themselves, click here.
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In General
- The Bus Came Back: They feature in the first Life Is Strange prose novel, cementing their place in the wider-series canon with their first appearance outside of the comics.
- Canon Foreigner: The four core members aside from Max and Chloe have no counterparts in the video game series. This is true of many characters encountered in the comic, but becomes more noteworthy once it's revealed that Pixie has a superpower too.
- Five-Token Band: The band is very diverse. Aside from Max and Chloe (two sapphic white women who may or may not be romantically involved with each other, further differentiated by one being a meek hipster and the other rebellious and punky), the band has two African-American members (one man and one woman), a sapphic Muslim woman, and a final member who is implied to be a trans man.
- Mythology Gag: The band and its aesthetic are inspired by Max and Chloe's fondness for pirates in their youth.
Tammi
Tammi
The band's singer.
Dwight
Dwight
The band's guitarist.
Dex
Dex
The band's keyboardist.
- Ambiguous Gender Identity: In the comics he's strongly implied, but never outright stated, to be Transgender. A conversation about his name reveals that "Dex" isn't short for "Dexter" but is a complete name of his own choosing, and he hints at a Dark and Troubled Past that would tally pretty easily with the experiences of a transgender youth growing up in an unwelcoming environment. Later comics contained further subtle hints at Dex being AFAB, and he was notably included on the Pride Month variant cover of the 2021 Free Comic Book Day issue.
- His identity as a trans man was eventually confirmed in the novel Life is Strange: Steph's Story, which was published after the comics run ended.
Pixie
Pixie
The band's drummer.
- Ambiguously Gay: She writes a love ballad about Max and Chloe and becomes flustered when quizzed about it. The ensuing conversation makes it pretty clear that she has a crush on one of them (maybe even both), but it's never made clear whether she's out to her bandmates, or even if she's been interested in women before.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Her birth name, Sibel, is only revealed in a flashback to her childhood in Vol. 5.
- No-Sell: The ending of the fourth comics arc reveals she can do this to both Tristan's and Max's powers, seeing Tristan even when he becomes stuck as invisible and having visions of both timelines created by Max's rewinding. Vol. 5 confirms that since childhood she's been able to see all possible realities, meaning that Max and Tristan's time rewinding and universe hopping shenanigans don't affect her memories like everyone else's.
- Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory: Her power gives her an awareness of both timelines created by Max's rewinding.
- Twofer Token Minority: Threefer, really: Pixie is a sapphic woman who appears to be of Middle Eastern descent and observes at least some elements of the Muslim faith. Fourfer if you count the superpowers she's revealed to possess in the fourth arc.
Other Supporting Characters
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Tristan Tanaka
A mysterious young man Max encounters after her move to Alternate Universe Los Angeles in the second and third comics arcs. He later becomes Lawrence's love interest.
- Alliterative Name: Tristan Tanaka.
- Canon Foreigner: Easily the most prominent comics character not to appear in the video games.
- Dead Alternate Counterpart: Inverted. Tristan implies that he is able to travel between universes because he isn't "bumping into his other possibilities."
- Earn Your Happy Ending: He gets a chance to live when his fate had been sealed in other timelines, and even ends up romancing Lawrence.
- Hero of Another Story: His discovery of his superpowers is at least as interesting as Max's and Daniel's, especially what he does in the several months afterwards which is barely touched upon, but it's not as significant to this story as what he does after he meets up with Max.
- In-Series Nickname: "Hermes." Hermes is able to move between the mortal and divine worlds and act as a messenger, which fits with Tristan's reality-phasing abilities.
- Invisibility: He can use his power to become unnoticeable to others. Other powered people can see him, and trying to hide from them anyway gives him a Psychic Nosebleed.
- No-Sell: Other powered people can do this to his invisibility power. It's unclear how far this works in reverse: he can interfere with Max's time powers in some ways, but isn't unaffected by them.
- Official Couple: With Lawrence in the finale.
- Perception Filter: Rather than true invisibility, his superpower is actually to phase in and out of reality. He's still visible to himself and to other powered people like Max and Pixie (and possibly Rachel).
- Psychic Nosebleed: Just like with Max, overtaxing his powers can cause one of these.
- Tritagonist: Shares this role with Rachel from the second arc onwards. Other than Max and Chloe themselves, Rachel and Tristan are easily the most important and focused-on characters in the story.
Lawrence
An actor in Rachel's acting troupe in the alternate timeline and Victoria's in the "Save Chloe" timeline, playing Laertes in their production of Hamlet. He later becomes Tristan's love interest.
- Fake Brit/Fake American: In-Universe, he's playing Laertes with a (presumably) British or American accent to match the rest of the cast, but while he's fluent in English it's clear that he speaks in a noticeable Polish accent when off-stage.
- Gratuitous Foreign Language: Occasionally drops a word or phrase in Polish to remind the reader that he's not American by birth.
- In the Distant Finale, he and Tristan cuss each other out in Polish and explain that it's a sign of affection, with Tristan rapidly picking up some of Lawrence's favourite isults.
- Like Brother and Sister: He seems to have a protective and affectionate relationship with Rachel. Appropriately enough in the play they're playing Laertes and Ophelia, who literally were brother and sister.
- Nice Guy: He cares about Rachel enough to run interference when Zack's annoying her by lusting after Chloe, and quickly strikes up a bond with Tristan despite only knowing him as a weird guy who showed up out of nowhere and tagged onto his group.
- Official Couple: With Tristan in the finale.
- Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: The Sensitive Guy to Zack's Manly Man.
- Twofer Token Minority: Downplayed since he's a gay white guy, but it gets mentioned a couple of times that he's a first-generation immigrant to the US from Poland. (The latter is easy to overlook thanks to his All-American Boy looks and the fact that you can't hear his accent thanks to the medium.)
Zack
An actor in Rachel's acting troupe in the alternate timeline and Victoria's in the main timeline, playing the lead in their production of Hamlet. He's dating Victoria Chase in the "Save Chloe" timeline.
- Abhorrent Admirer: He has a crush on Chloe in the alternate timeline, and when he learns she's dating Rachel instead of backing off he leeringly suggests they might be interested in a three-way.
- Amicable Exes: It's unclear whether he and Victoria got back together in the end, but if not, they're definitely this now.
- Handsome Lech: He's very good looking, but his treatment of the women he likes is completely disrespectful.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: He sincerely comforts Victoria when the hurricane in the final issues causes her distressing flashbacks to the destruction of Arcadia Bay. This leads to an unusually honest conversation on both sides about the reason for their relationship breaking down, and leads to them becoming Amicable Exes (or perhaps even getting back together; it's not clear).
- One-Steve Limit: Averted. There's a minor character in the first Life is Strange game who's also called Zack and was also a cheater romantically connected to Victoria Chase, but going by their appearance and personalities they're pretty clearly meant to be different people — especially considering Zack Riggins is likely dead in the "Save Chloe" timeline the comics follow.
- Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: The Manly Man to Lawrence's Sensitive Guy.
Paul
The owner of the café in Santa Monica where Max, Chloe, and Rachel hang out. He's also friends with the High Seas, which serves to re-introduce the band into the Alternate Universe in the second and third arcs.
- The Bartender: Actually a café owner, but he serves much the same purpose in the story, right down to his constant low-level exasperation with the main characters and their friends.
Perry
The owner of the auto repair shop where Chloe works in Alternate Universe Los Angeles in the second and third arcs.
- Cool Old Guy: He's just about the only original character in the comics who isn't broadly a contemporary of the main protagonists. He lets Chloe work on her art projects in the shop, and is generally pretty chill about her friends hanging out on his property a lot of the time.
- Satellite Character: He doesn't really have much characterisation beyond "being Chloe's supportive boss".
