Characters / Smile For The Camera Monster Mashers

The Monster Mashers are a group of monster hunters and the cast of the Reality show of the same name. As a group of D-list celebrities, the Monster Mashers intend to both keep the world safe from dangerous supernatural creatures while documenting their adventures to boost their show's ratings.

Tropes relating to the team in general:

• Punny Name: Named after the song Monster Mash by Bobby "Boris" Pickett and the Crypt-Kickers.
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Straddles the line between this and Badass Crew.
• To Be a Master: In addition to keeping humanity safe, many of the monster hunters are motivated by the fame and status obtained from their position, having several other monster hunting reality shows to compete with.

Joel J. Jones Jr.

One of the founding members of Monster Mashers and the descendant of a long line of monster hunters. Joel is something of a gruff, sarcastic individual, but it's pretty clear that he considers his fellow monster hunters to be his True Companions. Something of a generic guy compared to his more colorful teammates, but still has a distinctive personality and abilities. Never seen without his necklace, containing the tooth of some unknown creature defeated by one of his ancestors.

• The Ace: Zigzagged; he's a renowned monster hunter from a huge family of renowned monster hunters, but he repeatedly claims that fighting monsters is just about the only thing he's good at, and if it weren't for his paycheck from the Monster Mashers TV show he'd be broke and living on the street.
• Alliterative Name: Taken to the extreme.
• Animal Motifs: Word of God likens Joel to a lion.
• Badass Normal: Most of the time.
  • Empowered Badass Normal / Superpower Silly Putty: On the other hand, he's usually the one most likely to get equipped with one or more of Jason's power-up cards. Usually ends up being given a combination of the Animal ability and the Super Arm.
• Beast Man: With Jason's Animal card equipped.
• Big Brother Mentor: Tries to be this to Jason, with varying levels of success.
• Big Eater
• Blood Knight: Of the Worthy Opponent variety.
• Charles Atlas Superpower: Surprisingly good at holding off monsters even when unarmed, and practically Made of Iron to boot.
• Deadpan Snarker: Or at least he tries to be. Most of his "snarking" tends to fall flat, however.
• Distracted by the Sexy: Gets incredibly flustered whenever he's around Clarissa.
• Dying Moment of Awesome: Lampshads this with some of his final words, saying that he always wanted to die heroically.
• Generation Xerox: Comes from a long generation of monster hunters.
• Guns Akimbo: When he's not simply beating up monsters with his bare hands.
• Heroic BSoD: Goes into one following Frankie's near-death at the hands of War.
• Heroic Second Wind: Happens during his fight with Lord Famine. And then he dies.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: How he sees himself.
• Memento Macguffin: His necklace.
• Messianic Archetype: Keeping with the story's Biblical motifs, his death inspires the world to stay hopeful, and he appears to Frankie when the end of the world is underway.
• Power Fist: Jason's Super Arm card.
  • Right Hand of Doom
• Sacrificial Lion
• Technical Pacifist: His firearms are usually loaded with tranquilizers to avoid having to kill whatever he's fighting, but he's not above using real bullets whenever he deems it necessary.
• "Well Done, Son" Guy: Seems extremely focused on living up to his family legacy, even if it means risking his loife in the process.
• The Worf Effect: Double subverted in the fight against Lady War: she manages to knock him out rather early on in the fight, only for him to regain conciousness in time to defeat her. Though it was implied that she let him win to further her own plans.
• Worthy Opponent: To nearly everyone (and everything) he ends up picking a fight with.
• Western Zodiac: Taurus.

William T. Wolfgang II

A werewolf, abandoned by his parents in the woods and literally raised by wolves. Despite his brutish demeanor, he's actually quite intelligent, but his temper and lack of impulse control usually hinders his ability to make logical decisions. Has something of a friendly rivalry with Joel.

• Alliterative Name
• Badass Bookworm: See below.
• The Big Guy
• Badass in a Nice Suit: After all, he is an executive for a company.
• Deadpan Snarker: During his mission the Shadow Hackers, and generally whenever he's around Portia.
• Genius Ditz and Genius Bruiser: As mentioned above, he has the potential to be one of the smartest members of Monster Mashers, but usually opts for brute force instead.
  • According to his bio, his previous job before joining MM was a computer programmer.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: At least he admits that it's something he needs to work on.
• Honest Corporate Executive: Before he quit his company.
• Hot-Blooded
• Leeroy Jenkins: Denies being this while inspecting an Abandoned Hospital with Frankie and Jason, before immediately attacking everything suspicious they come accross.
• One-Steve Limit: Averted with him and fellow Monster Masher William Francois Nancy, aka Frankie.
• Our Werewolves Are Different: He doesn't transform, instead being in the constant state of being a wolf/man hybrid, causing his parents to disown him due to his freakish appearance. Also, he claims to be unaffected by silver.
  • Wolf Man
• Parental Abandonment
• Pop-Cultured Badass
• Raised by Wolves
• Shout-Out: A big, hairy, animalistic creature who also happens to be a Genius Bruiser? Are we talking about William or Beast?
• Super-Senses: All part and parcel of being a werewolf.
• Werewolf Theme Naming
• Western Zodiac: Gemini.

William Francois Nancy (aka "Frankie")

A large, humanoid spider and self-proclaimed ladies' man. Frankie is something of a trickster, often pulling pranks on both his opponents and teammates alike for little more than his own personal amusement. That aside, he's still a valuable member of the team and a rather sophisticated fellow. He also may or may not be the legendary Anansi of African folklore.

• Ambiguously Human: We know he's not, but most of the time he looks enough like a human that he's able to pass as one.
• Bilingual Bonus: Tends to slip into Swahili when he's distraught (or drunk).
• Casanova Wannabe: His track record with the ladies is not quite as successful as he claims it is.
• Cool Old Guy: According to his bio, Frankie is apparently somewhere around 76 years old, though it's implied that that's just a rough estimate.
• Cultured Badass: Probably the most sophisticated member of the Monster Mashers crew, when he's not trolling people for laughs.
• Demoted to Extra: After he was put into the hospital after the Lady War incident, we haven't seen much of him.
  • Now being averted.
• Dirty Old Man: Averted. He's actually quite the gentleman.
• Giant Spider
• Leeroy Jenkins: Unlike the other William, however, Frankie actively embraces his role as a "Leeroy", gleefully rushing into danger at the first opportunity.
• Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Though he's capable of hiding all but two of his arms when not using him, he's usually this in combat.
• One-Steve Limit: Averted between him and the other William (see above), but he usually goes by his middle name to avoid any confusion.
• Super-Senses: He's able to use the hairs on his arms to detect things around him, even referring to it as his "Spider Sense".
• Troll: Especially around his more serious teammates like Naredlek.

Malachi Richardson

Once an ordinary man, Malachi ended up being cursed into becoming a Jiang Shi after a run-in with a drunken wizard during a trip to China. Despite his rather difficult life, Malachi remains an eternal optimist, always trying to cheer up his fellow Monster Mashers in times of distress. Unfortunately for them, he's really bad at doing this.

• Chinese Vampire
• Cloud Cuckoo Lander: Stops a man telling him about a potential monster sighting mid-sentance to sketch a picture of him. Also, see Literal-Minded below.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass
• Cursed with Awesome: Being turned into a Jiang Shi not only made him stronger, but it also gave him the ability to leap over buildings In a Single Bound and shatter concrete with his kicks.
• Friend to All Children
• Friendly Neighborhood Vampire: While he still expresses a need to drink blood, he's still the friendliest and most outgoing member of the team.
• In a Single Bound: Being what is classified as a "hopping vampire", he's quite adept at this.
• Kid-Appeal Character: In-universe, he tries to make his screentime on the Monster Mashers TV show kid-friendly, spouting off Aesops while kicking a monster's face in.
• Literal-Minded: During his fight with the half-demon Murphy, Malachi remembers that demons are weakened by holy symbols such as crosses...so he decides to hit Murphy over the head with an "Armadillo crossing" sign from the side of a road.
• Parasol of Pain: His umbrella is often used as a weapon.
• The Pollyanna
• Super-Senses: Has an acute sense of smell, but as a trade-off his eyesight is below average.
• Weakened by the Light: Makes use of an umbrella and clothes that cover as much of his skin as possible to try and avoid this.

Albus Eldritch

Albus is an Ent, and the former guardian of a forest until it was destroyed, which also resulted in the deaths of most of his family. Now working as a monster hunter, Albus is wise, polite, and overall more level-headed than most of his teammates, though just as capable of holding his own in a fight.

• Green Thumb: Capable of growing plants to assist him in combat.
• Failure Knight: The incident involving his forest being destroyed and his family being wiped out.
• Not Quite Flight: Shown to be able to float through the air using giant danelion seeds.

Dyana Raine

Another one of Monster Mashers' verteran members, Dyana is also the owner and operator of a ranch where she looks after various monsters, many of which she captured during her time on the show. Loud, energetic and excitable, Dyana often goes into battle with the help of a few of her pet monsters, which she is able to summon with the use of a set of cards.

• Obfuscating Stupidity: A preferred tactic of hers, to the point where she's begun to do this without even realizing it.
• Put on a Bus: Now apparently has business take care of with Victor, separate from the group.
• Summon Magic: The cards she uses to summon her monsters in battle are essentially this.
• Technical Pacifist: One of her defining characteristics.
• Thou Shalt Not Kill: She always captures monsters alive as opposed to killing them, and personally finds the more ruthless behaviour of teammates like Clarissa and Raik apalling.

The Operator

A mysterious figure of unknown origin and species. The Operator is quiet, enigmatic, and a little bit unsettling, but still a contributor to the Monster Mashers, if not exactly a "team player". Appears to be at least a little bit skilled in magic.

• Ambiguously Human: Subverted; whatever he is; he ain't human.
• The Faceless
  • In the Hood
• Humanoid Abomination: Strongly implied, especially seeing as he claims to be immortal and that seeing him without his hood is considered bad for your health.
• Out of Focus
• Put on a Bus: For a while, until...
  • The Bus Came Back: ...mysteriously returning.
• The Quiet One

Torgrot Ironface

An ork. Got his name from the obsidian mask permanently fused to the top half of his face. Formerly a notorious pirate before joining the Monster Mashers, Torgrot is about as violent and trigger-happy as you'd expect an ork to be, though he's actually quite reserved compared to most members of his species.

• The Alcoholic: Played for Laughs.
• An Arm and a Leg: Loses an arm during the fight against Murphy, only for the latter to reattatch it for him at the end of the fight. It's implied that this wasn't the first time Torgrot has had to replace a limb after fighting.
• The Big Guy
• Blood Knight: He's an ork, after all.
• Determinator: Doesn't even let losing an arm slow him down. At best, he treats it as a minor inconvenience.
• Jerkass: again, he's an ork.
• More Dakka: Read: ORK.
• Our Orks Are Different: An obvious homage to the orks of Warhammer 40K, all the way down to the speech patterns.
• Proud Warrior Race Guy: Do I even need to say it?

Clarissa Zaruta

Having many other failed careers under her belt, Clarissa eventually decided to join Monster Mashers, hoping it would be her ticket to stardom. Being able to coast off her good looks for most of her life, Clarissa doesn't have much of a work ethic, but still proves to be just as effective at slaying monsters as the next person...perhaps even more so.

• Action Girl
• Alpha Bitch: One can assume she was like this back in school.
• Attention Whore: Her main purpose for wanting to join the show.
• Badass Normal
• Berserk Button: Messing with her appearance.
• Blood Knight: Pretty much the last person you'd expect to fall under this trope, but it would seem that Clarissa enjoys her job a little too much, gleefully averting Thou Shalt Not Kill in contrast to Tenchical Pacifists like Joel and Dyana.
• Brainless Beauty
• Brainy Brunette: Inverted, she is rather a ditz.
• Clothing Damage: Suffers this during her fight with Wendy.
• Cloud Cuckoolander
• The Ditz: Though she does get several moments of genuine competence, she appears to view herself as such.
• Guns Akimbo: Oh, this definitely.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: With Portia, the latter even referring to her as "best friend".
  • Les Yay
• I Broke a Nail: Though unlike most examples, her usual response to this is bloodthirsty rage.
• Innocent Innuendo: Durring the fight with Lady War:
  Clarissa:Pull out your big hard... wallet.
• Inferiority Superiority Complex: She covers up the fact she's lost her other careers.
• Sword and Gun: Though usually not wielded at the same time.
  • Laser Blade
• Ms. Fanservice: In-universe, she thinks of this as her main purpose on the show. Nobody else seems to argue.
• Most Common Superpower: Uses it to her advantage.
• Popular Is Dumb: According to her backstory, she was popular but wasn't really the study person.
• Rich Bitch: Coming from a wealthy family has this in mind which has her going to a Money Fetish.
• Trigger-Happy
• Western Zodiac: Aries, Word of God.

Jason Scott

One of the more inexperienced members of the Monster Mashers group, Jason is a 15-year-old Kid Hero armed with a "Card Reader", and a set of possibly-magic cards with a diverse variety of effects. Having little fighting prowess himself, Jason usually stays away from the front line, preferring to use his cards to provide assistance for his teammates. As such, he has a suitably meek personality to match, but still strives to contribute to the team whenever he can.

• Adorably Precocious Child
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: With Rocky.
• Hero of Another Story: It's implied that Jason and Rocky ended up having several adventures together before the ended up joining Monster Mashers. Also, upon his first appearance, Jason mentions he just got back from a mission involving a zombified version of Barney the Dinosaur.
• Jack of All Stats: His use of a wide verity of Cards implies he's this with them. Justified in that they're his only Weapon
• Magitek: While it's never fully explained how the Card Reader works, this is one possible explanation.
• Nice Guy: Generally the quietest and most polite member of the group, with some Shrinking Violet tendancies as well.
• Non-Action Guy: While he's fought monsters on several occasions, he usually prefers to fill the support role, using his cards to buff his teammates in various ways.
• Pop-Cultured Badass
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The blue to Rocky's red.
• Shout-Out: Each of his cards is a reference to one or more Nintendo franchise, and the character of Jason himself is based partially on the protagonist from Kamen Rider Decade.
  • Also the fact that his Card Reader is called the "Cosmic Reader" and him being irradient by "Cosmic Radiation" might be one to Kamen Rider Fourze
  • Rocky one time mentioned that his middle name was 'Lee', this would give him the same name as the first Red Ranger, Rocky later makes it even more obvious in his Shout-Out barrage
• Shrinking Violet: A male example.
• Status Buff: His cards more or less amount to this to his teammates.
• Story-Breaker Power: He essentially has the power to not only give people temporary superpowers and weapons, but also change them on the fly as often as he wants. The creator of the character and the GM are both well aware of this, however, taking precautions to prevent it from getting out of hand.
• Super-Empowering
• Superpower Silly Putty: Just about anyone he comes in contact with becomes one of these, thanks to his cards. The effects don't usually last long, however.
• Western Zodiac: Virgo.
  Card Capter: because giving the 15 year old male shrinking violet a star sign that sound a lot like virgin amuses me

Portia N Tesla

An loony but somewhat competent attractive scientist. Who joined Monster Mashers for scientific appeal of it. She's also pretty skilled in the chemistry and inventing, along with being friends with Clarissa.

• Action Girl
• Ambiguously Human: With all the experiments she's encountered? It really questionable.
• Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: One of her aforementioned traits. Has problems with her attention span due to ADHD.
  • Science-Related Memetic Disorder
• Affectionate Parody/ Homage: One to the assistant from the B-movies of the 50's.
• Badass Labcoat: Definitely, scientist staple.
• Badass Bookworm: Secondary to William.
• Chemistry Can Do Anything
• Cloud Cuckoo Lander: Part of her mental condition.
  • The Cuckoolander Was Right: Her ramblings usually become right.
• Dumb Blonde: Downplayed She's not stupid but just a little off.
• Expy: Your probably best imagining Agatha Clay, in a Badass Labcoat.
• For Science!: Her point of being here. Also, her Catchphrase.
• Gadgeteer Genius: Duh.
• Genius Ditz/ Ditzy Genius: Sometimes her distractions can result this.
• Genki Girl
• Goggles Do Something Unusual: Her googles allows her to see things in a different way.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: With Clarissa.
• Large Ham:.....FOR SCIENCE!
• Mad Scientist: Played for Laughs, obviously.
• Pop-Cultured Badass
• Science Hero

• Shout-Out: To Nikola Tesla. Also, her raygun has the options seen in Gunstar Heroes.
• Raygun Gothic: Portia's weapons and device often mimic this aesthetic. Which is rather, intentional.
• Reluctant Fanservice Girl
• Western Zodiac: Claims she's a Libra.
• Zeerust: See Raygun Gothic.

More to come!