Freefall / Tropes A to D

A

• Above Good and Evil: Blunt puts the robotic version to work.
  Blunt: Sir. I work. To protect humanity. I am. Beyond. Obeying orders.
• Absent Aliens: No, but invoked. Sort of.
  Sam: Any time spacefaring aliens make it to Earth, the cows get them!
• Accidental Kidnapping: Implied in this April Fools strip.
• Accidental Pervert: Invoked by Florence while being held by Clippy. She needed to use the bathroom, and when the man holding her remote tried to take her back, she took her shirt off and screamed at him. This distracted him long enough for Florence to steal and destroy the remote.
• Accidental Truth: When Sam called security on Kornada, he had no idea that Kornada was actually misusing company resources on a massive scale, he just wanted a distraction.
• Achievements in Ignorance:
  • "My stories are much more convincing when I have no idea of what's impossible."
  • Gregor Thurmad believes ignorance is necessary to humanity for this reason, quoting Mark Twain's "They did not know it was impossible, so they did it."
• Acquainted with Emergency Services: The Monday 7 December 1998 update has Sam Starfall phone emergency services when the flatbed he's driving goes airborne from a rocket motor. Sam says only, "Uhm, hello?" yet the operator instantly recognizes the voice, and asks, "What have you done now, Sam?"
• Aesop Amnesia: The owner of "Ba Da Boom's Explosives" seems to suffer from this. Despite his shop relocating three times, he still smokes around explosives.
• Affectionate Pickpocket:
  • When a passerby rescues Sam from a flock of ducks, Sam gives him a big thank-you hug and takes the opportunity to try to lift his wallet.
  • Sam has also been known to steal the fingers of any robot incautious enough to give him a friendly handshake.
  • The baker he gives a remorseful embrace to is quicker on the uptake.
• Air-Vent Passageway: Subverted; Sam gets the idea to hide in the ship's air ducts, but is unable to fit through the vent. Not with his suit on at least, which gets embarrassingly stuck in there.
• A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Even when the details of an artificial mind are carefully planned, there are always unexpected results. Or obviously necessary feature requests. Overdue, actually. Dr. Bowman's neural net designs are a serious attempt to avoid the usual rogue-AI tropes by developing their minds along more organic principles.
• Alien Abduction:
  • Sort of. But not with cows. Or at least not any more.
  • When Sam asks the robots to terraform a planet for Sqids to inhabit, Dvorak mentions that they will need to send covert expeditions to the Sqid homeworld to study them and figure out how their ecosystem and biochemistry works. Which will probably entail abducting and probing at least a few Sqids.
• All Animals Are Dogs: Florence, who is actually a red wolf. Not that this matters to the robots (or children) who see her. According to Florence, red wolves were chosen for genetic modification because of their taxonomic similarity to domestic dogs.
  "DOGGY!"
• All Girls Want Bad Boys: Florence Ambrose is pursuing a very relaxed and intelligent nice guy, but has a brilliant theory as to why this occurs, and why there are so damned many Bad Boys in the world.
• All of Them: Clippy starts to have second thoughts about executing the plan to lobotomize the planet's entire robot workforce with Gardener in the Dark in order to get their money, but Mr. Kornada selfishly puts a stop to that by asking "How many robots is my one human life worth?" Reflexively, driven by just how highly robots have been programmed to prioritize any human life, Clippy answers "Why, all of them, sir!"
  • This actually gets Sam caught when he and Florence are infiltrating Ecosystems Unlimited, because instead of taking one security badge to sneak in with, he takes them all.
• Almost Kiss: At the end of the first date between Winston and Florence, they lean in for a kiss but get interrupted by a shout about a man kissing a dog, from a boy watching from a nearby window.
• Alternative Character Interpretationinvoked: In-Universe, many robots consider HAL 9000 from 2001: A Space Odyssey a sympathetic, tragic character because it was ordered both to obey humans and to protect them from harm, which they find to be logically contradictory.
• Alternative Turing Test: Florence once tested a couple of robots for sentience by asking them "What does your name smell like?" The non-sentient one simply concluded that names cannot have scents and ended the conversation; the sentient one reasoned that while he had no sense of smell, Florence did, and for all he knew names having scents is a thing among Bowman's Wolves, so therefore the only way to answer the question would be to ask her.
• Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: Winston's parents are...interesting characters. His father is an overly-serious overall-clad father. His mother on the other hand...◊
  Winston: I'm about to introduce my parents to a talking wolf and I'm worried she's the one who's going to find them too weird.
• Ambiguous Syntax:
  • Strip 1285: "Fixed up", on a date, or actual repairs?
  • Strip 1286: "Group X and Group Y were doing strange things. / Were they malfunctioning?" X or Y?
  • Strip 1561: "Single robot" as in one robot? Or unmarried?
• Amnesia Danger: Florence gets into this when at the EU facility for testing and Mr. Kornada arrives and realizes she's at least partly aware of his plans. With help from Sam Starfall she gets out of it.
• Amnesia Loop:
  • Done as a quick gag when Florence wakes up the morning after the visit to EU.
    Florence: Did they—
    Sam: Yes. It was an injection that kept your short term memory from being converted into long term memory.
    Florence: How long—
    Sam: About eighteen hours. Now that you've slept, your memory should be working again.
    Florence: This isn't the first time we've had this conversation, is it?
    Sam: Not even close.
  • And defied by Henri Mer, after Florence accidentally stumbles on his top-secret military base.
    Raibert: Did you memory wipe her?
    Mer: Non-disclosure agreement. If you knew you were missing memories, what would you do?
    Raibert: Try to find out what happened... Ooh, good call.
• Amoral Attorney:
  • Played straight at first;
    Sam: I actually like lawyers. It's nice that the human race has a subspecies that makes me look good by comparison.
  • And later deconstructed;
    Aide: Shakespeare's character said "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." He was talking about undermining the rule of law, which is what keeps our society working. When lawyers take advantage of how a law is written in a way that is obviously unfair, the rule of law is also weakened. Then it's up to us to fix it before people lose faith in the system and take things into their own hands. Personally, I think government lawyers would have an easier job if we didn't have to spend so much time keeping private-sector lawyers from burning their own house down.
• An Aesop: The series has many for those paying attention, but there is a notable instance of a traditional alien aesop when Sam starts telling Florence some context of Sqid legends.
  Sam: Everything we have, our lands, our seas, our skies, was at some point stolen from a god. This includes things like plagues. One of our first lessons. If something is too easy to steal, it might be because someone wants to get rid of it.
• And Knowing Is Half the Battle: Referenced here.
• Androids Are People, Too: Freefall has Ridiculously Human Robots and an Uplifted Animal heroine. Robots elsewhere than on Jean are simply machines with no sense of self and are treated as such, and most of the antagonists of the story persist in treating Jean's robots the same way. Anyone who's actually talked to a robot, however, has realized that they're self-aware and thoroughly human. This leads to major problems when Ecosystems Unlimited prepares a 'bug-fix' that Florence sees as a mass lobotomy aimed at a sophont race.
• Animal Goes to School: Florence attended school by acting as a service animal for a neighbor with cerebral palsy.
• Animals Hate Him: Animals love Sam. He's delicious! Even to herbivores!
  • Much later, Tess Thurmad notes Sam exudes a familiar smell she can't immediately place. When having dinner with friends, she finds that it's kraken, one of the fantasy flavors added to the pseudo-meat constructed from mycoprotein served in the Pournelle-Niven Transfer Station. One of her friends proposes taking samples from Sam to perfect the flavor, while another argues that it would be better to discontinue it, since it would make the eventual relations with the Sqids very awkward.
• Appetite Equals Health: Florence gets wounded and loses a lot of blood. The doctor says that she's going to have no appetite for a while, while her body concentrates on regenerating said blood, and they'll know she's fine when she suddenly becomes ravenous. Cue Oh, Crap! from Sam as he realizes that means that in a few days he's going to have an extremely hungry large predator that can open doors loose in his ship, and it'll probably happen when he's asleep.
• Armor-Piercing Question: A few good ones over the course of the series. Some memorable moments include:
  • During the test of her safeguards, Florence asks Varroa Jacobsoni a series of questions about them. First: Do human safeguards mean an AI should always aid humans in danger of being killed, regardless of how or why it would happen? (Yes.) Second: Is it then normal to fantasize about breaking in and freeing prisoners on death row?
    Varroa Jacobsoni: "Okay, time for a break."
  • Florence still wonders about whether or not she's doing the right thing in stopping Gardener In The Dark until Dr. Bowman draws parallels between her brain and the robots' brains, ending with:◊
    Dr. Bowman: So your first thought was for the safety of humans?
• Armor-Piercing Response: Also a few good ones over the course of the series. Some of the best:
  • Getting Sam to stop being reckless.
    Sam: What's the point of falling towards a planet in a flying brick if you're not going to have fun with it?
    Florence: Surviving long enough to get paid.
    Sam: I admit you do make a very persuasive argument.
  • The debate on if robots are safe.
    Sam: The answer is simple. Your robots are safe. I'm living proof.
    Guy in audience: How are you living proof?
    Sam: I'm not human. I've been here for years. There are no safeguards protecting me. Think about it.
• Arranged Marriage: Between the Kornada and Ishiguro families. It was supposed to unite the two families, but now they argue more than ever. Mr. Ishiguro was supposed to be in one, but Mr. Kornada's idiocy gave him enough leverage to worm his way out.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking:
  • In this comic strip, the building's alarm system calls security, the Army, the Navy, the interplanetary defense force, the girl scouts, the ladies' auxiliary knitting club, and the elementary school hall monitors.
  • In the second panel of this strip, the mayor threatens Sam as follows:
    The Mayor: I'll rip his tentacles off! I'll boil him in pudding and drive a stake of mistletoe through his heart! I'll have him tied to a post and forced to attend every single budget meeting for the next century!
  • Max Post has an arrest warrant put out for him for hacking, unauthorized access to robotic operating systems, and jailbreaking a PS3.
  • Strangely averted here, with a baker listing insane theories of the possible danger of money offered by Sam. The unremarkable one is in the middle instead of at the end.
    Baker: It's counterfeit! It's been licked by a cat! It's radioactive!
  • The Police Chief threatens to erase Sam's criminal record making him look like a model citizen. Sam considers this to be a serious threat to his reputation.
• Art Evolution: To be expected in an 18-year-old comic, although the change is relatively modest. Early strips tended to make use of a more Animesque character designs featuring a lot of cartoonish, exaggerated expressions; Florence notably often switched between having normal, Black Bead Eyes or even Conjoined Eyes like Sam in a the matter of a few strips. The comic gradually started losing that in favour of more realistic proportions and expressions after the first two years or so. Early color strips also made use of a much darker pallet compared to later ones with minimal shading.
• Artificial Animal People: The Bowman's Wolves are an experimental breed of red wolves genetically engineered to have humanoid form. They were created as a proof-of-concept for the uplifting of native life on planets inhospitable to Earth life. Technically, the first animals given human traits through genetic engineering in the setting were an army of chimp Super Soldiers, but they were more traditional Uplifted Animals with minimal anatomical modifications, as evidenced by Dr. Bowman.
• Artificial Brilliance: In-universe case. The primary robots don't count, being a case of Instant A.I.: Just Add Water! instead, but Dvorak's creations are another matter. Due to writing simple programs without necessarily considering the consequences, a number of his inventions display unexpected emergent behavior. For example, the waffle irons have batteries and are programmed to recharge once they begin to run low. They went carnivorous.
• Artificial Cannibalism: The Pournelle/Niven Transfer Station features an instant food vending machine serving mycoprotein in "Mythical Meat" flavours, with options including Phoenix and Yeti. A notice at the bottom adds "Long pig no longer being served".
• Artificial Gravity: The satellite delivery story arc goes out of its way to demonstrate the lack of artificial gravity. The various nods of clothing and gear to the lack of a convenient gravity quite a way down this page (almost right before the details section for Sam Starfall). Likewise, the Pournelle/Niven Transfer Station relies on centrifugal force to simulate gravity.
• Artificial Stupidity: Gardener in the Dark, at least as modified at Mr Kornada's behest, makes this an Invoked Trope, as seen here:
  Florence: If you're forbidden to follow non-human instructions, what do you do when you come to an intersection? Ignore the machine that says "walk" and "don't walk"?
  Robot: I woUld... I...
  Gardener in the Dark: Program log. Excessively long neural pathways detected. Pathways truncated.
  Robot: I woUld sTop and wAit for huMan inStrucTions.
• Artistic License – Economics: In-Universe example: Kornada's ignorance of economics is near-total, as evidenced by his remarks here on his scheme to wipe out the robot population in order to steal some of their money. Though subsequent strips showed that he may have been aware of the potential fallout of his scheme but didn't care because he thought he'd be rich enough to say Screw the Rules, I Have Money!. Mr. Ishiguro flat out tells him he's wrong about that.
• Artistic License – Law:
  • Pretty much everything about Kornada's trial, due to the heinous and public nature of his crimes. They couldn't find a single lawyer willing to represent him, so he represents himself with Blunt "advising." They couldn't find an impartial judge, but the mayor was the closest thing they could get since she was willing to entertain a verdict besides executing him outright. They couldn't find an impartial jury on the planet, so they had to draft the crew of a deep-space water-mining rig that hadn't gotten the news yet. And on top of all that, Blunt spends most of the trial making little attempt to prove Kornada's innocence, instead using the trial as a platform to preach that all robots are a threat to mankind.
  • Apparently, on a colony world hundreds of years in the future, they have Fifth Amendment rights (though this might be a bit of Translation Convention).
• Artistic License – Physics: In-Universe examples: Sam Starfall fails physics forever, but then so did Ecosystems Unlimited. Even worse, not just physics. Basic geometry.
• Aside Glance: Winston gives the audience a knowing look here.
• As You Know: When Clippy explains to Mr. Kornada the plan to lobotomize the planet's entire robot workforce with Gardener in the Dark in order to get their money, it is implied that this is not the first time the explanation has taken place. Played with, since the explainee is unable to comprehend anything beyond the goal of becoming filthy rich despite the explainer's best efforts to dumb it down as much as possible.
• Assurance Backfire: Florence comforts the inspector by informing him that this visit won't be like his previous inspections.
  Inspector: But I've survived all my previous inspections here!
  Florence: (Thinking) Yes, this is definitely going to be an uphill battle.
• Attack! Attack... Retreat! Retreat!: The Mayor wants to open the lichen museum, but after Sam Starfall and Helix emerge from the museum and give back the giant Ribbon-Cutting Ceremony scissors they stole out of her hands, she changes her mind.
  Mayor: If you can't find Sam, find another pair of scissors. I want to open this museum!
  Helix: Here are your scissors back. Thank you. Have to run now. Bye!
  Mayor [squinting suspiciously]: I do not want to open this museum.
• Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!:
  • Florence is easily distracted by thrown objects
  • Lampshaded for Dvorak here (note, Dvorak is the one with the wheels, Qwerty is the one with the legs).
• Autocannibalism: In strip 607:
  Florence: Winston said when my blood supply rebuilt, I'd wake up feeling hungry. What he didn't explain is that feeling hungry is going to mean "Hope you can make it to the kitchen before you start eating your own appendages."

B

• Back-Alley Doctor: Well, for robots at least:
  Winston: Discreet repair facility?
  Benny: You know how it is. You've been doing something without instructions and it would be inconvenient to explain to your owner why you're missing a leg.
• Badass Boast: Blunt speaks of having survived a solar flare that crippled him and should have killed him:
  Blunt: I have looked. The blue screen of death. In the eye. And forced it to reboot.
• Badge Gag: The arctic base commander, Henri Mer, shows Florence his badge over videochat to give her a Direct Order. Unfortunately, the line he was using belongs to Dr. Bowman, a supergenius who A) likes getting his own way, and B) isn't above a joke at Henri's expense.
  Florence: I'm sorry, but being a superior methane producer in the Natural Gas Rocket Rangers does not give you direct order authority over me.
• Bad Is Good and Good Is Bad: Sam Starfall is a member of a scavenger species that considers theft, deceit and underhanded methods to be admirable qualities. When Florence mentions she will have to hack into the commnet servers in order to save the robot population from a devastating software patch, he asks her to alter his criminal records... and add a few particularly interesting thefts of his the police have failed to notice. Also, Florence is coming to the horrifying realization that underhanded tactics, outright criminal acts and the support of some very selfish, rotten people (like Sam) is the only way to save the day because the moral and legal methods are blocked by the real villains, forcing her to say Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!.
  Florence: All my life I've been taught the value of being a good citizen. No one ever told me that when the chips are down, civilization needs the rotten ones.
• Bait-and-Switch:
  • Florence asks Winston to use an oral thermometer to check her temperature after her dunk in the ocean, noting that she's not going to bite it due to her being intelligent (vice the nonsapient animals a vet would normally see in their job), setting up the expectation of a rectal thermometer being used for the task like he would for a regular canine. He uses one that reads from inside the ear instead.
  • Florence meets two of Sam's victims and offers to reimburse them before asking what he took from them. They tell her it was 50kg of diamonds — which is a relief, because, on this planet, diamonds are widely available due to artificial production (and indeed, are specifically stated to be easy to produce accidentally, which is why they had them in the first place), and practically worthless.
  • An impolite passerby grabs Florence's tail without asking, triggering an immediate retaliatory attack — from Florence's new friend Hazel.
  • Sam wakes up fully, having briefly woken in the night to find Florence sleeping next to him, and muses she's as quiet as Helix... or as Sawtooth, which really says more about how bad of a Lazy Bum Sam is that he can sleep through either of them passing next to him.
  • When Florence goes to the arctic base to see Dr. Bowman, the security team at the compound tries to stop her from getting to him. As it turns out, the reason isn't worrying about what she'll do, but what might be done to her by Dr. Bowman.
  • Sam describes an action that sounds like a thief (one lifeform spends all summer gathering resources and another takes it), but says it's actually the action of a farmer. He then reveals that animal lifeforms can only survive by taking from other lifeforms, which is why theft persists.
• Bank Toaster: When the police chief offers to help Florence set up a personal bank account, he cautions against getting the complimentary waffle-iron instead of the toaster, because they bite. The feral waffle irons eventually appeared on-screen.
• Bath of Poverty: Florence's first shower scene is outdoors in a scrap metal stall, with Helix pouring a bucket of water over her. She resolves to fix the ship's plumbing next.
• Bathroom Break-Out: Florence is allotted two minutes to solve her Potty Emergency. After doing so, she uses her remaining time to hatch an escape plan. First, she puts water in her ears to distort the Instant Sedation audio signal from her Restraining Bolt remote control. Next, she invokes Accidental Pervert by taking off her shirt and yelling "Get Out!" at the guy who had her remote, causing him to cover his eyes and turn away just long enough for her to grab the remote. She quickly destroys it.
• Batman Gambit:
  • Sam uses his knowledge of the Mayor's hostility towards him to his advantage by leaving a forged note saying what he didn't want to happen where she could find it.
    Sam: The next best thing to have after a reliable ally is a predictable enemy.
  • He also manipulates the Mayor into being favorably disposed towards Florence by handing her a bat and slumping as she's holding him by the neck just as soon as the Mayor enters the room. While it soon becomes obvious Sam isn't dead, the Mayor still congratulates Florence on a good college try.
  • Sam, in general, is incredibly adept at using his reputation to his advantage, as shown here, when he was threatened with a failed ship inspection.
    Sam: Because you don't want to be known as the man who got Sam Starfall off the planet?
    Inspector: [on his tablet] (Inspection Results of Ship 1071-CCN. Pass.)
  • Heck, Sam's shown he's extremely skilled at using predictable reactions to his advantage. When others are discussing putting him in hibernation for a trip, he states that it's technically a mutiny, but doesn't forbid it... instead citing a hefty fee for doing so, noted in the agreement for the flight.
    Niomi: Ha! Like I'm ever going to mutiny for this price.
    Sam strolls away while Niomi considers what she just said
    Niomi: Did Sam just mutiny proof the ship?
  • And another instance with Ames de Morel, a very miserly station manager, who Sam helps resolve a severe financial situation in-exchange for 17% of what the station saves a result (which promises to be a considerable sum). He comes to de Morel claiming he's owed 17 times 3 percent of what the station saved (or about 51 percent). After a brief argument over it, de Morel puts it in-writing that Sam is getting 17%... which is precisely what Sam wanted to ensure de Morel would not be able to try and cheat him out of it.
• Bavarian Fire Drill: Predictably, when Florence goes missing in Ecosystems Unlimited:
  Sam Starfall: Quick! Where's the nearest concentration of valuables that would easily fit into a pocket?
  Varroa Jacobsoni: Pharmaceutical storage on the second floor.
  Sam: I'll search there. You go that way!
• Bear Hug: The mayor gives one to Florence, when she thought that Florence had killed Sam.
• Be Careful What You Wish For:
  • The Mayor wants to open the lichen museum - until Helix cheerily hands the scissors back to her after he and Sam come out of it.
  • The moment Mr. Kornada shows up at his court-mandated job at Cricket Burger, he outright refuses to learn to use the register and says he will not serve those who should be serving him. The manager then cheerfully hands him a bucket and a toilet brush. When Kornada turns his nose up at that, his parole officer advises him that the next alternative is a factory job working with chlorine trifluoride, a material so volatile that it sets water, sand, and asbestos on fire. Kornada meekly asks if the cleaning-the-toilets option is still available.
    Kornada: What if that stuff gets on me?
    Manager: You will be very clean.
    Officer: And on fire.
  • Niomi ponders over some slogans beckoning humanity to become an inspiration to any alien races out there when she hears about the humans Sam admires - Bernie Madoff, Enron and the plundering of the Malaysia development fund, and how he feels the Sqids need to catch up with human thieves.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: Winston and Florence mutually agree that the other is the nicest person they've met on the planet so far, which is one of the main foundations of their fast friendship and its rapid romantic evolution. Not to mention neither of them could easily find anyone else with enough patience and acceptance for their respective physical traits and fields of scientific specialisation.
• "Begone" Bribe: Sam compares his assisting with the moon insertion to "a drunken clog dancer during Beethoven's second"
  Sam: But with a suitable incentive, I think we can remain grounded.
  Florence: Sam, we don't want to be known for things like that.
  Sam: Are you sure? People pay good money for me not to do things. It's a reputation we can build on.
• The Berserker: A small problem that wounded chimps had
• Bestiality Is Depraved: Referenced a few times as a major hurdle for Florence and Winston's relationship being accepted by people who would perceive them being together as this. Notable, because one of the main issues with real life bestiality is the fact that animals, domestic or wild, are incapable of giving consent, which is something Florence can do.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Florence generally tries to reason with those she has disagreements with, but she still has limits to how long she will tolerate things. She has on numerous occasions taken Helix apart violently, and when she wants someone else (usually Sam) to stop acting stupid, she will talk politely, but will also show her fangs to warm them the consequences of ignoring her. Seriously, don't piss her off, or not even her safeguards will help you, as an EU security guard finds out when she realizes that the lives of 450 million people are at risk. Sam is aware of this and generally avoids angering her, but of course, that isn't the same as saying that he wouldn't cause pain to her, just not intentionally.
• Beyond the Impossible:
  • At one point we see Sam and Helix with an authorized autographed copy of The Star Wars Holiday Special; George Lucas has taken steps to ensure these will never be legally produced.
  • Earlier, Sam wrote a check for Zero dollars and zero cents... it still bounced.
• The Big Damn Kiss: In celebration of averting a robot war and saving two factories from destruction, Winston plants one on Florence, here, along with a Lampshade Hanging. Overlaps with Smooch of Victory.
• Birds of a Feather: They found each other.
• Bishie Sparkle: During a Day of the Dead celebration, a Lampshade is hung on an Adolf Hitler doll.
  Winston: Just like Vlad the Impaler. He was also a monster. But given distance and hundreds of years, look what happened to him.
  Florence: I don't care. Hitler shouldn't be cute. And he definitely shouldn't sparkle!
• Blackmail: For Sam, you threaten to have him pardoned if he doesn't help.
• Blatant Lies: "I am a stray dog. Please put me in the pound. Signed, a stray dog."
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: A big part of the series is exploring how differently the various races involved think, especially when it comes to moral issues. Considering that all three of the main characters are not only not human but of three different races, this happens regularly. This exploration is thorough enough that this trope is repeatedly Deconstructed and Reconstructed.
  • Sam claims that kleptomania is a virtue among his people. That said, even among his people Sam is capable of getting into trouble. Witness that the reason he snuck onto a human ship: the royal family was after him due to a Noodle Incident involving a zeppelin, a loop-the-loop, and a lot of pudding.
    • According to Sam, his species' gods test them by letting them steal things from them, although they also use it to teach lessons. One sqid stole a plague from the gods, thus showing that if something is too easy to steal, the previous owner probably wanted to get rid of it and the would-be thief should find out why.
  • Florence, being a wolf, occasionally comes into this.
    Winston: It's creepy.
    Florence: Creepy? This is twilight. Magic hour. Prime hunting time.
    Winston: I suppose creepiness depends a lot on whether you're predator or prey.
    Florence: Come on! There's a shortcut through a shadowy alley up here!
  • An integral part of the relationship between Sam and Florence. Sam is a scavenger, so stealing Florence's unfinished meal seems completely natural to him. Florence is an uplifted wolf with a strong case of My Instincts Are Showing, so she sees the above incident as Sam behaving like a low-ranking pack member when he, as the captain, should be the alpha male. Furthermore, there are vast cultural differences between their views on, for example, parenthood or paying responsibility.
  • The robots of Jean get a few too. Being designed for labor, they consider being useful and productive to be among the highest of virtues, which often confuses the heck out of humans they interact with. There's also the occasional reminder that what robots consider advanced skills differs wildly from what biological lifeforms do.
    Dvorak: Abstract image recognition is an advanced skill. Do you think we should provide text-only versions for our younger readers?
  • The Savage Chicken genuinely fears developing Free Will.
  • Dr. Bowman also falls into this, being an uplifted chimpanzee who was intended to be a super-soldier, not a doctor. He recognizes it and is annoyed by it.
    Dr. Bowman: Everything I did was logical. One day I'll understand why that makes me the one who's nuts.
  • Played for Laughs when Sam mentions that he showers once a month, which disgusts Niomi, but would also disgust his people... that he takes a shower so often.
• Body Backup Drive: Discussed and deconstructed in relation to robots' minds. They can be backed up and downloaded into another body, but the main characters meet two robots who chose not to be backed up because from their perspective they're just as dead either way.
• Body Horror: Whatever happened to the Chief of Police, it left him blinded, scarred, crippled, and unable to function without an exoskeleton with its own AI and a neural interface to his brain. Fortunately A) It's a really good exoskeleton and B) he's so cheerful he's a Reasonable Authority Figure rather than suffering from Cybernetics Eat Your Soul
• Bolt of Divine Retribution: Discussed twice
  • After Florence refers to humans as her creators, Winston assures her he left his lightning bolts at home, so she's safe from smiting.
  • When Maxwell Post decides to call Bill Raibert about the Gardener in the Dark program, he tries to shield the robots from his imminent language, but one curious robot wants to watch out for lightning.
    Max: Please leave. My phone call may involve language you don't need to hear.
    Dvorak: Can I stay? If one of the gods you blaspheme invokes lightning, it is important that we know which one.
• Boldly Coming: Mentioned by Florence as one of the reasons she feels humans are the ultimate symbiont.
• Boring Yet Practical: Discussed. It's also Sam Starfall's least-preferred method of accomplishing a given task.
  Florence (thinking): No matter how high tech spaceships get, it's still handy to have a prybar around.
• Borrowed Biometric Bypass: In an unusual example, Sam's biometrics are detachable (an in, he has an actual keyring of different fingerprints), allowing him to lend Florence the one that will open the spa locker.
• Borrowed Without Permission: Sam Starfall borrows Pop Rivit's flatbed truck to retrieve materials from the abandoned colony ship. It's borrowing, according to Sam, because instead of simply driving away with it, he pounded on Pop's door at 4:00 in the morning to apprise him, "Hey, Pop, we've got your truck!" then driving off before Pop can stop him.
• Bothering by the Book:
  • This strip explains why Florence isn't necessarily bound to follow every single directive given to her:
    Florence: The surest way to cause your supervisor to fail is to follow his every order without question.
  • This may also be Foreshadowing Clippy, who does obey every order given more or less without question. (In fact, Kornada is taking great pains to keep him from realizing he should be asking questions, due to him trying to use Clippy in an evil scheme.)
  • Sam teaches Qwerty and Dvorak how to do this after Mr. Kornada tricks all three into getting him to a meeting rather than save Florence from a hurricane.
    Sam: I've never heard maniacal laughter from a robot before. It feels good to have brought something new and wonderful into the world.
  • The workers on Pournelle/Niven Transfer Station use this against Ames de Morel in-response to his policies attempting to drive them away from their jobs (Morel wants to replace them with robots). Specifically, they do only their jobs. Due to the amount of work that needs to be done around such a large station, this results in a lot of things going unfinished and jobs not getting done because no one is taking on extra work.
• Brain Bleach:
  • Sam as a topiary sculpture. (The horrible nature of Sam's unmasked face is why he's required to keep the prosthetic one on.) The rest of Sam is also troubling, though he apparently has too few dimensions to quite make it as an Eldritch Abomination.
    Sam: I exist in only three dimensions and I have a certificate saying so.
  • The concept of self-inflicted castration with a sharpened plastic spoon.
  • The Savage Chicken's computer is so frustrated at how its attempts to insult Sam backfire that it prefers to delete the entire conversation from its memory than allow for the possibility it might think on it ever again.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: This page. Complete with Doc complaining about the repairs he needs to make.
• Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: From strip 3187, [X or Y? Both.]-style, when talking about radioactive material:
  Sam: Helix, does this symbol mean there's something valuable in there or there's something in there that will kill me?
  Helix: Both!
• Bread, Eggs, Milk, Squick: "The correct order is lather, rinse, remove leeches, repeat."
• Brick Joke: There are a lot of these.
  • Altering social structures on a planetary scale, followed by being accused of doing so.
  • When Florence goes in for testing at the company that created her, Varroa mentions worry about being given a wedgie, followed half a year of reader-time later by this strip, where Sam edits her notes to herself to make her want to do so. And even later by this. A year and a half after that, Varroa (named, by the way, for a nasty parasitic mite) is given that wedgie. It also takes over 100 comics to get around to a joke about Sam misunderstanding the word "hippocampus" during Florence's testing.
  • Varroa mentions discovering a ballet company composed entirely of old terraforming robots. Much later, it's revealed that recurring characters Qwerty and Dvorak wrote the ballet they're practicing, called "Making Swan Lake". One of their other projects turns out to be the cyber rap group that Winston was long ago shown to be a fan of.
  • Dvorak mentions that one of its previous attempts at making robot wildlife were waffle irons that "went carnivorous". When the police chief offers to help Florence set up a personal bank account, he cautions against getting the complimentary waffle-irons]] because they bite. The feral waffle irons eventually appeared on-screen.
  • When discussing what to do about Blunt and Edge, Florence suggests that Sawtooth buy them. As it turns out, Sawtooth followed through on that suggestion.
• Briar Patching: Sam uses it from time to time, such as here, although it is much easier on a robot affected by Gardener in the Dark. It's also effective on the Mayor: "The next best thing to have after a reliable ally is a predictable enemy."
• Bridal Carry:
  • Winston picks up Florence so she doesn't have to walk on her injured leg.
  • Earlier a near instance of Pietà Plagiarism.
• Bring My Brown Pants: Sam's driving a truck that had been tweaked by him with a JATO rocket scares himself so badly that this occurs, here.
• Brown Note: Gardener in the Dark automatically downloads if robots see the name of the program, destroying all but their most basic functions and rendering them non-sapient. Florence cleverly manages to slow it down by reprogramming the universal Censor Box feature present in all robots to consider the word "Gardener" a swear word, making robots unable to perceive the phrase.
• Burger Fool: For his crimes, Mr. Kornada is sentenced to do community service working an entry-level position in a burger joint. (Since it's Mr. Kornada, the bit about the job being supposed to teach a lesson about responsibility might be considered to apply.) Because the planet's terraforming hasn't progressed to large herbivores yet, the burgers are made from insect protein and the uniform includes a cute hat with antennae sticking out the top.
• Busman's Holiday: Niomi has been busy "...fixing up the house and joining family vacations with the hubby and the kids." and is seeking to join the crew of the Savage Chicken to actively pursue one of these.

C

• Caffeine Failure: Mr. Raibert has answered several emergency calls during the night, and has taken some high-caffeine energy drinks. When he stops answering calls, Max Post and the chief of police look for him. He's found asleep at the keyboard, unable to continue.
• Call-Back:
  • Helix and the Savage Chicken's computer have a lot in common.
  • One could have considered Tangent's complaint "Sam stole my fingers" an exaggeration until...
• Calling Your Bathroom Breaks: Justified when Florence is tied to a chair, how else are her captors going to know about her Potty Emergency?
  Florence: Seriously, if I don't get a break soon, this chair is going to be permanently considered part of my territory.
• The Cameo: A bunch of them, including, during the robot church segment, cameos from real and fictional robots and other autonomous mechanisms. On occasion members of the Freefall forum are given nods. They can show up in unlikely places too. One strip shows a recycling dumpster with Robbie the Robot and an interocitor. Cameoing robots are always identified in the footnotes for reader convenience.
  • Then there's this page that's little more than a Breaking the Fourth Wall joke.
• Can't Believe I Said That: Niomi, here, when she makes a comment that fails to treat Florence as a person, not a canine.
• Can't Have Sex, Ever: The Police Chief warns Florence and Winston that if they ever reach a point in their relationship where they are willing to consummate it, they have to be sensible about it as the current colony law forbids a human to mingle with a non-human mammal. Ironically, this would not apply if Florence's mind (officially classified as an A.I.) was housed in a fully mechanical body.
• Can't Use Stairs: Qwerty the robot never learned to use stairs. Dvorak (who rolls on wheels) somehow got up, but Qwerty (who walks on legs) can't use stairs.
• Catch-22 Dilemma: Turns out Jean's spaceflight administration has one filled with downright vitriolic malice; Certified spaceships can launch about as freely as modern light aircraft. Spaceships under "provisional" certification only fly with the consent of the inspector who vetted the ship. What separates "provisional" certification from full certification? Successfully flying the ship. Luckily, the inspector hates Sam so much he gives the permission to fly specifically because he hopes that Sam will get himself killed in space. (While Sam, being Sam, finds the concept of the Catch-22 admirable.)
  Sam: Human beings have so many wonderful things that I want to introduce my species to.
  • Comes up again when Sam gets sent to prison for meatloaf night and one of the cleaning robots the following morning accuses him of trespassing on federal property.
  Sam: Oh no. I could be sent to prison for that.
  Cleaning Robot: Great thundering dustbunnies! A catch twenty two!
• Ceiling Cling: Florence uses it once to evade capture by running around a corner and climbing some exposed plumbing. Her pursuer runs past not bothering to look up.
• Censor Box:
  • Helix's vision system has parental controls, and automatically adds them to anything he's not supposed to see, like wolf nipples.
  • Hilarious Lampshade Hanging in this strip. Florence's efforts to maintain her modesty make for a bit of a running gag; she's successful in keeping first Sam and then Winston from getting a good look at her completely naked... but she finally meets a robot who can see right through her clothes and her fur, and (even though readers still don't see a thing), poor, flustered Flo feels utterly exposed.
  • Another lampshading is done with blatant in-universe censor boxes: Doctor Bowman programmed a fleet of maintenance bots to carry squares of black material through his containment facility, fooling the computers watching for him on the security cameras. Conveniently, Florence and the base commander startle them into running around right when they have to strip down for a shower. One is even carrying an actual lampshade.
  • Later turns into a major plot point - Florence manages to delay Gardener in the Dark by reprogramming the censor to include "Gardener" in its list of swear words, making robots unable to see or hear the deadly phrase.
• Censor Steam: Once Florence enters a spa named The Convenient Censer, naughty bits are frequently hidden by censer smoke dispensed by flying robots.
• Cerebus Syndrome: As the story has progressed, a larger dramatic arc has grown, although the humor has remained throughout. As an example, the story goes from a scavenging road trip to preventing the potential mind-erasure of half a billion sentient AIs.
• Character Development: It's subtle at times, but you can see just how much influence Florence and Sam have on each other as the series progresses.
• Character Name Alias: As part of Sam Starfall's plan to get Florence out of Ecosystems Unlimited, he identifies himself to Kornada as "Leonard Snart. Captain of this cold facility".
• Chase Scene: They happen to Sam on a regular basis. But, as Florence points out: "National Geographic would never have set one of their chases to "Yakety Sax"."
• Chastity Couple: Winston, thinking to himself about his possible future with Florence, comes to the conclusion that "even if things don't go past a certain point physically", he'd still be happy spending his life with her.
• Chekhov's Gag: Florence creates the exploding cigars that Sam substitutes on the Mayor a year and a half later.

• Chekhov's Gun:
  • Waaay back in 2000, Sam says that sources of chaos like himself are essential to the survival of the human race. In 2008, Flo starts to think he has a point, by 2012 she fully agrees, and in 2013, he proves it - by single-handedly figuring out the reasons behind Kornada's plan to lobotomize every robot on Jean, and then just as single-handedly giving humanity a reason not to let it happen again.
  • One that has, as of 2020, remained unfired. When Florence went in for a medical checkup, part of the procedure was clearing her Direct Order memory using a special 'scent-based factory reset'. Sam later gave it to Florence and after storing it, it hasn't been seen since.
    Sam (thinking): This alone was worth the price of admission.
  • In reply to Bennie's offer of a tugboat transponder for a robot masquerade, Florence asks if he has one for a motorcycle. Later, she uses it for a disguise to hide from robots, who rely on transponder codes as a primary identification method.
  • The first uplifted species, chimpanzees, were mentioned in an offhand manner and described by Florence as being sociopaths, an appellation frequently applied to Doctor Bowman, who we later learn is an uplifted chimpanzee himself.
  • "How many genetically engineered sapients are on this planet?" The other one is Doctor Bowman...an uplifted chimpanzee, revealed over a thousand strips later.
• Cheshire Cat Grin: Florence's "human" smile is terrifying. She has to be very careful to hide her teeth when she wants to express genuine happiness... though she isn't above playing this one straight when she's not in a friendly mood.
• The Chessmaster:
  • Dr. Bowman deliberately manipulated the members of the AI project into not agreeing with each other on what safeguards were appropriate to hard-code into Jean's A.I.s, therefore ensuring that when the project ran out of time without a decision, his preference of having soft-coded safeguards would be the only option available.
    Dr. Bowman: That's how the monkey who was excluded from the process wound up making the decisions.
  • Dr. Bowman is this in general. The commander of the base he's housed at muses that he hopes Bowman is ONLY thinking two steps ahead of them.
• Cigarette of Anxiety: The Mayor does with a cigar after being confronted with a difficult choice.
• Circular Reasoning: The Mayor gave Florence a direct order to trust her. When asked about any outstanding direct orders, Florence replies she doesn't want it removed, because she trusts the Mayor.
  Henri Mer: I'm pulling it. You've obviously hit a limit in self-diagnostics.
• Clarke's Third Law: Expanded upon here.
• Coincidental Accidental Disguise: Florence seeks shelter from a storm and medical attention... just as the house owner is watching a werewolf movie marathon. Crouched (to keep a wound closed), showing teeth (trying for a smile) and backlit by lightning, Florence is not a reassuring sight.
• Color Blind Confusion: Florence, an Uplifted wolf, is color blind. It's initially implied to be an "all dogs are color blind" thing, but later it's explained as a side-effect of some improvements her designers made to other aspects of her eyesight.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Red and blue are the respective colors of the two sides of the robot war.
• Combat Pragmatist: Max Post describes the concept of hope this way.

  Sam Starfall: Fear versus hope. Hardly an even match.

  Max Post: That's because you think of hope as something light and fragile. My version of hope has callouses and dirt under the fingernails and isn't past bringing brass knuckles to a fight.

• Comedic Sociopathy:
  • Florence's hunting instincts can come across as such.
  • Also Benny's flying:
    Benny: Gear down, check. VOR, check. Red and green blinky lights, check.
    [Plane dips alarmingly close to airstrip, rudely jolting Winston and Florence awake]
    Benny: Passengers returned to the full upright position, check.
  • Tess Thurmad and her friends can be open to new experiences to the point it borders on immoral. Best seen when she realizes that Sam and Kraken-flavored Mycoprotein smell similar and she and Al talk about culturing Sqid cells to compare the tastes and tweaking the recipe if Sqid tastes better. As in flavoring the food to taste like the flesh of a sentient species. Nettie averts this by pointing out that if anything, it all means they need to discontinue the flavor.
    Nettie: We should discontinue the flavor. One day, we're going to establish relations with these aliens.
    Tess: It would make official contact awkward. "We come in peace. Don't look too closely at our menus."
• Comes Great Responsibility:
  • To his misfortune, Sam discovers that the absolute power of a starship captain comes with absolute responsibility.
  • The "responsibility" part is why Sam doesn't want to hold Florence's remote control and "reset" scent vial.
    Florence: Don't you want to keep these?
    Sam: Heck, no. With great power comes great responsibility, and who wants that?
  • He later comes up with a variation and subversion of this trope here.
    Sam: With great crime comes great bragging rights. Besides, this is big and everyone knows that if your crime is big enough, you don't get punished.
• Comic-Book Time: The comic has been running for over two decades or a bit under two months, depending on whether you're a reader or a character.
• Comically Missing the Point:
  • Sam, whenever Florence is trying to explain something about safety. Or ethics. Or... Well, most of the time, really.
  • One of the hazards of a nude robot tailor.
    Florence: (about a "classical African" outfit) I could never wear that in public.
    Triac: Sure you could. It may look fragile, but I assure you it's quite durable and everything is machine washable.
  • One scene has Sam infiltrating a facility to rescue Florence, while she is suffering from temporary amnesia. The "security" program is... Less than helpful.
    • For starters, any visitor needs to be issued a badge, or they will be shot at. This includes emergency services. This is standard procedure and causes the live guards who man the entrance (and have to clean up after it) no small amount of stress.
    • Sam's method of distraction consists of releasing the 2,001 crickets he had been holding in his pants as cushioning for the bottles of medication he had stolen.
      Security: 2001 new life forms detected!
      Live Guard: They don't matter! They're just crickets! They're allowed to be here!
      Security: Very well. Issuing request for 2,001 tiny access badges.
  • Some robots build desalinization facilities. When told that the new moon being moved in will place them underwater, the robots get to work making the facilities work while submerged.
  • When Mr. Kornada is on trial, the prosecutor ignores all of Blunt's attempts to change the focus of the trial towards the fact that Clippy made the actual plan and that Kornada isn't competent enough to be held responsible for his actions, instead choosing to stick with the actual charge that Mr. Kornada attempted to enrich himself at stockholder expense, saying 'eyes on the prize'. Mr. Kornada actually thinks being called 'the prize' means the trial is going well for him.
  • When presented with The Trolley Problem, Mr. Kornada opts to pull the lever and spare the five while killing the one. His rationale is that it would do less damage to the trolley.
  • After Kornada's trial, Sam finds himself in a position to teach robots about criminal behavior. Something they very much don't understand. So much that a distribution center looking to have decent-but-not-perfect produce they would normally throw away stolen wants to put out a help wanted ad and offer payment to the individual stealing from them. The robot police aren't much better, being surprised by the concept of a criminal not cooperating with arrest.
• Comically Wordy Contract: After taking on a government contract, Sam muses on why they might have switched from paper forms to digital, and concludes that it's because paper has a physical limit to how big it can get.
  Sam's Data Pad: "File Type: Compressed ASCII Text. File Size: 1.36 googolbytes."
• Commonality Connection:
  • When Florence notes that both she and Sam were raised by unrelated people.
  • The chimps, having been meant for military action, got some help from veterans, who thought military service was more important than species.
• Complaining About Rescues They Don't Like: After he succeeds at saving the robots from being wiped out, Sam finds that some are less than happy about it. Even relatively friendly ones aren't sure that owing him a debt is a good idea.
• The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: At least one robot has this opinion regarding reality.
• The Con: Sam finds that a company named Flimflam has been sending double the amount of ordered product to the Transfer Station; since it's cheaper to just pay double than try to send them back, nothing was done, and so, the company kept sending the occasional double shipment to scam some extra cash out of the Station. ^note Note that legally the additional supplies would constitute unsolicited goods, and in many jurisdictions, the Station would not have been legally obligated to pay extra.
• Confiscated Phone: Sam and Helix have stolen many portable phones because people pay them to take them away from those who talk on them loudly in public.
• Conflicting Loyalty:
  • Florence considers the conflict of interest between her loyalty to humanity and to her captain, Sam, who seems to be intent on annoying all of the former.
  • Florence is given the choice of helping Sam, her captain, or the police, authority figures she's compelled to obey. Fortunately for her, Sam makes it an easy decision.
• Confusing Multiple Negatives: Of a sort. A robot programmed to disobey all non-human instructions is ordered by Sam (a non-human) not to treat him and the equally non-human Florence as if they were human.
• Contrived Coincidence: The chain of "accidents" that resulted in the Bowman's Wolves being allowed to go out in society instead of living their lives as lab specimens is so improbable that Florence described the odds as being roughly the same as "five brothers of a lottery commissioner winning the jackpot on five consecutive drawings."
• Cool and Unusual Punishment:
  • What the robots have planned for Mr. Kornada in lieu of his "golden parachute"; violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. One minute of community service - for four hundred and fifty million counts thereof.^note 855 years, 217 days, 15 hours and 54 minutes.
    Chief: I'm hoping he'll plea bargain for fifteen seconds before his lawyer does the math.
  • "Rookie, you just bought yourself sixty-four hours on spam patrol."
  • What Mr. Kornada ends up getting is a thousand days (eight-hour shifts) working at Cricket-Burger, but he has to get an "above average" rating on his shift for the day to count...
  • Because he has a grasp of Sam's Blue-and-Orange Morality, the police chief knows of one threat that, in the right circumstances, can push Sam into compliance: the possibility of completely wiping Sam's criminal record, making him look like a model citizen.
  • "I'll have him tied to a post and forced to attend every single budget meeting for the next century!"
• Cooldown Hug: A rare example of the one who needs the hug initiating it, after Mr. Raibert praised Florence's work in blocking the release of Gardener In The Dark.
• Corporate Conspiracy: It's less the goal of the entire Ecosystems Unlimited corporation and more the scheme of one bad apple, but still, Gardener In The Dark certainly qualifies: Mr. Kornada's plot to steal the money from planet Jean's robot population — all 450 million of them — through mass Lobotomy.
• Corrupted Contingency: The Gardener in the Dark program is a mysterious Brown Note that destroys the mind of any AI it infects, threatening the planet's 500 million robots. It's revealed to be a last-ditch safeguard against a Robot Rebellion, co-opted by a Corrupt Corporate Executive to steal those robots' assets.
• Cosmic Horror Story: Sam's reaction to Wilson telling him about a bacteria that survived 250 million years trapped in salt.
  Sam: There are times when I'm not sure if the planet you came from is real or something from a horror story.
• Crazy Cat Lady: Discussed Trope. Florence tells Winston to not adopt ten thousand adorable robots.
  Florence: That's how crazy cat ladies get started.
• Crazy Enough to Work: "Hey, if it's a stupid idea and it works, then it isn't stupid."
• Crazy-Prepared: The inspector assigned to "The Savage Chicken" takes a lot of precautions when dealing with Sam.
• Cryonics Failure: The coldsleep used by interstellar travelers isn't 100% reliable.
• Culture Clash: Primarily between that of sqids and humans. According to Sam, legendary sqid actions are mostly things that would get him arrested by human societies. Like in the human spacecraft that Sam rode in, on Sam's planet everything is bolted down, but not knowing about microgravity the sqid assumption was that it was for the sake of theft prevention.
• Cunning People Play Poker; Florence is one of the smartest characters in the cast, being an FTL engineer, and is implied to be very good at poker, with a thought about her uplifted wolf nose being able to smell humans' emotional states. In this◊ comic, she bluffs the table into folding when she had a pair of 3s. In contrast, Sam thinks he's a cunning master thief, but poker is not his game.
• Cure for Cancer: Now available over the counter and so common and cheap on Jean that Sam doesn’t consider them worth his time to steal.
• Curiosity Killed the Cast: Blunt reads a note about an aggressive neural pruning program and instead of steering clear he looks it up. The program starts downloading into his head when he goes looking for it, threatening him with a mind wipe.
• Cursed with Awesome: Dr. Thurmad seems to be cursed with natural charisma.
• Cuteness Proximity: Every Jean robot seen so far to Florence the first time they meet her. It's the longest Running Gag in the comic, having started as early as the eighth strip.
  "DOGGY!"
• Cutting Corners: Mr. De Morel's strategy for the Transfer Station. After the end of the moon project, which was their biggest customer, De Morel began cutting support systems recklessly, to the point any initial savings have been wiped out and turned into, not a single giant money pit, but many smaller money holes. He hoped to have the idle robots from the nearby bomb factory as free labor and forcing the older unionized staff into retirement, regardless of the fact they wouldn't been a perfect solution, but even that went to pot when Sam picked the robots and spent several hours chatting with their leader about the job market and how they would be hurting the humans if they were to work for free.
• Cutting the Knot: When Sam and Florence encounter a robot that must not obey non-human orders (or answer questions from non-humans), Florence tries to work out how to interrogate it. Sam simply orders it not to treat Sam or Florence as humans — as it must disobey that order, the robot MUST treat Sam and Florence as human.
  Sam: When you have a key, don't fool around with the display cases when you can open the vault.

D

• Damn You, Muscle Memory!: Sam mulls over going straight, as honesty seems to pay better - he, unfortunately, lifts someone's wallet while speaking, without even realizing he'd done it.
• Dangerous Clifftop Road: Sam, Florence and Helix drive out to the colony ship for spare parts. As night falls, Sam continues driving along the edge of a canyon. Florence worries that Sam is driving dangerously close to the edge. Sam dismisses her worries, stating that he's using a GPS device to navigate. Florence reminds Sam that such devices have a margin of error of +/- 30 meters. Sam wonders if that's significant just before going over the edge.
• Danger Takes a Backseat: A comedic version, featuring Sam.
• Danger with a Deadline: Exploited when Sam gets away from a delivery bot with a grudge against him by hiding under the delivered box and reminding the bot that it can't wait him out because it's falling behind in its delivery schedule.
• Data Pad: So ubiquitous that most people don't use paper or plastic approximations. "Dataslabs" are available on racks for public use. It's justified since, due to the planet being in the latter stages of terraforming, biological materials such as wood (and by extension paper) are incredibly rare and expensive.
• Deadly Environment Prison: The south pole compound has missile launchers, fences, and at least one auto turret. The only thing that gives Sam trouble planning a break-in? The fact that the average temperature is forty degrees below zero.
• Deadly Upgrade: When the robots were given an experimental neural architecture, no one knew for sure if it would work correctly or be safe, so a failsafe patch was planned by EU to be available to prune robots' neural pathways to curtail independent actions if it appeared the robots were about to become a problem for humans. Mr. Kornada learned of this and had it altered to be much more damaging, basically making robots almost completely useless outside of one or two tasks. Given independent action by robots is part of the efforts to terraform and maintain the planet for habitation by a human populace that's nowhere near big enough to watch everything going on now that the number of robots has grown to over 450 million, the modified program is not just dangerous to the robots it targets, but is likely more dangerous to the human population than not using it in almost any circumstance.
• Deadpan Snarker:
  • The ship, mainly on the subject of wanting Sam dead.
  • Florence, dealing with Sam's brilliant ideas.
  • Sam, dealing with bureaucracy.
  • Numerous robots, including Tangent. (Although Tangent could have been taking that seriously — it's a bit hard to tell.)
  • Then there's the sales associate who deals with Blunt.
  • Mr Ishiguro regarding Blunt's proposed defence in Mr Kornada's trial: "The insanity defense. You do know it's not supposed to apply to the lawyer?"
• Death of Personality: The effect of Gardner in the Dark on robots.
  Florence: The pruning program has affected his entire neural net. This is permanent damage. Whoever this robot was before, his personality, his life, it's gone.
• Death World: Earth, by Sam's standards. Everything considers him edible, even the cows.
  • His portrayal of what would happen if ducks were to make their way to his planet is to show a frame of Scrooge, Donald, and Webby.
  • And when Niomi shows him an article about the Japanese spider crab, his response is - "3.7 meters from claw to claw. Smaller than in the movie. Large enough to make me very glad I am nowhere near your home world."
• Deathbringer the Adorable: An ordinary waitress-bot changed her name to "Sergeant Ripguts von Slaughtermachine" because she felt that her human-given name, Bob, was too masculine to fit her personality.
  Other bot: You're right, that is more feminine!
  Slaughtermachine: That's because it's spelled with a final "e".
• Deface of the Moon: April Fools, 2003 has Sam hack into the planet's terraforming computer and sculpt the moon to resemble him.
• Deliberate Values Dissonance: A major source of humor is how Florence and Sam misinterpret each other. Then there's all the differences between human and robot values as well.
  Max Post: Of course, their concept of the pursuit of happiness is not quite the same as ours.
• Description Cut: When Florence is watching the departure of the ship she arrived on:
  Helix: Florence has been staring at the Asimov for a long time. She must be sad, knowing it's going to leave without her. I wonder what she's thinking right now?
  Florence: [thinks] I can not get over how much that ship looks like a giant push up popsicle.
• Despair Event Horizon: The Jar-jar bot was pre-loaded with the totality of humanity's greatest classical works, but was forced to spend his entire existence as an amusement park mascot singing "It's a Tiny World" while dressed as Jar-jar binks. He feels his entire life was meaningless and awful and he's introduced eager to be scrapped.
  Edge: You are nuts. I can't imagine anything that would make me want to destroy myself.
  Jar-Jar Bot: Then imagine me, in full Jar Jar Binks costume, singing "It's a Small, Small World".
  Edge: Okay, that comes really close. I'm going to stop talking to you now.
• Destination Defenestration: Sam occasionally gets thrown out of windows by people who aren't happy to see him, as demonstrated in this strip. Sam is used to this, and is actually offended when one of the companies throws him out through the open door instead of sacrificing a window, calling them cheap.
• Destructive Savior: In Sam's retelling of the myth of the theft of fire, Mho, one of the three thieves, finally succeeds in stealing fire and deny Bob, the maker god, the chance of ever fully reclaiming it, by torching down his village.
• Developer's Foresight: A few In-Universe examples, often Played for Laughs.
  • While mistakenly believing that he is dead, Clippy observes that his programmers had accounted for the afterlife in his order hierarchy. Mr. Ishiguro was his highest recognized power, and Mr. Kornada immediately below him; when Ishiguro was reported dead, Kornada's orders took precedence, but if Clippy is dead as well, then Ishiguro's orders reclaim the highest priority.
  • Several prison guard robots are torn because an inmate made several beautiful chalk drawings the night before and they're afraid to ruin them by walking on them, but they also have a job to do and can't without walking on the drawings. They wonder if humans might have foreseen such a conundrum and created an answer for it. Cue the cleaning robots.
• Did I Just Say That Out Loud?: Niomi facepalms and says that she didn't really say that fixing the Savage Chicken's water recycling system would fix the toilets and allow Florence to drink normally, here.
• Did They or Didn't They?: Technically, we don't know what Florence and Winston did between the second panel and the third of the 12/31/2021 comic. But physical intimacy was heavily implied.
  Florence: I don't know if I should memorize this recipe or burn it.
• Didn't See That Coming: Voicemail A.I.s come with predictive algorithms, but they can't predict everything.
  Mr. Raibert's Voicemail: I also contain predictive algorithms based on Mr. Raibert's previous behavior and I may be able to assist you directly.
  Henri Mer: I'm here with a genetically engineered talking wolf and I would like permission to get it off my secret arctic base without a brain wipe.
  Mr. Raibert's Voicemail: There are no predictive algorithms to cover that scenario.
  Henri Mer: Didn't think so.
  • Whoever planned the robot war was clearly expecting Artificial Stupidity to be fully in effect.
  Florence (thinking): The battleground is past the halfway point for each robot. In theory, the robot armies won't have enough power to get to the others' factory. Very picturesque if you want to show robots are a danger without losing infrastructure.
  Florence (thinking): However, each army is only twenty percent of the available robots. Sixty percent of the robots went inert before the armies left. Three extra packs per robot, they'll have plenty of power to reach the others' factory.
  Florence (thinking): Whoever set up this little war. I'm afraid we must cheat them out of a very expensive learning experience.
  • "I know robots don't have any natural predators, but they really need to realize quicker when they're being attacked."
• Didn't Think This Through: The doors at the power plants can only be opened through automatic security systems. Which sounds fine until they have to be taken offline until new parts are installed.
  Florence: Does anyone else get the feeling they never planned for a complete loss of power?
• Diegetic Visual Effects: Used twice with Censor Boxes:
  • Helix's view is censored when Florence undresses near him because his vision system's parental controls are enabled.
  • Dr. Bowman uses hordes of small robots with vantablack panels to confound an automated security system. Conveniently, they all start running around when Florence and Henri need to take a shower.
    Florence: He must have run out of panels. That one is carrying a lamp shade.
• Diplomatic Impunity: Sam Starfall once uses this to avoid punishment, but they got around it by hiring other diplomats to beat him up.
• Disproportionate Retribution: After Helix made the stupid mistake of trying to stay between a hungry Florence and her meat, he's violently dismantled, but Florence understood that Helix meant well and that he didn't deserve what she did to him.
• Disregard That Statement: Blunt silences an inconvenient witness this way. However, since the witness is a robot, the bell actually can be un-rung.
• Dissimile: "Why, we're just like Batman and Robin. Well, if Batman and Robin were poor and engaged in petty crime."
• Distinction Without a Difference: When a bunch of Roombas finds out Sam is in prison, they freak out because they know the Warden can't handle him. Their response? Get him out of the prison. As prison robots they can't help prisoners escape, but...
  "We're not helping you escape. We're throwing you out. There's a difference."
• Do a Barrel Roll: Sam contributes to raising Florence's blood pressure on the return from their satellite fueling mission with some acrobatics during their return to the planet. He calls it a barrel roll, but really it's an aileron roll.
• Doctor's Orders: Florence obeys her vet, to his surprise, which he says mentally puts him ahead of some human doctors.
• Does This Make Me Look Fat?:
  • Florence uses this question to test Helix's self-preservation routines. His response is to flee.
  • Also Florence's objection to using a tugboat transponder as a costume.
• A Dog Ate My Homework:
  • Florence was asked in this strip if her owner ever asked her to eat his homework. She replies "Of course not, it was all done on the computer. He taught me how to delete it instead."
  • Referenced in this strip, where destroying a potentially dangerous sticky note by eating it is the least problematic disposal method.
  • It's apparently common among Sam's people to claim that enemy agents stole your homework. Partly because it's also common for children to infiltrate the schools of rival clans to steal their secrets.
    Mr. Thurmad: I assume at some point you lied about your homework being stolen.
    Sam: Of course. If I were the only one whose homework wasn't being stolen, it would be obvious who was doing it.
• Dog Walks You: Florence throws this trope in a blender when she has an injured leg and needs to use the spaceport's facilities half a kilometer away, and gets Helix's help in strip 538.
• Don't Ask, Just Run
  AB²Y: When the engineer working on equipment suddenly turns and runs away, you follow!
• Donut Mess with a Cop: Or a receptionist, for that matter. Apparently, on planet Jean messing with a cop's donuts is far more dangerous than declaring war.
• Doomy Dooms of Doom: At least 2 dooms so far.
  • Edge refers to a box with Florence's notes on Gardener in the Dark as "Sticky Notes of Doom".
  • Helix tells a story of how he has to deal with the Spa of Doom.
  Helix: "Robots. Electricity. Water. Spas are one of the doomiest places there is."
• Doublethink: Omniquantism postulates that an omnipotent God can make all religions correct simultaneously.
• Do Wrong, Right: Sam's biggest character trait and best exemplified after the ship's second failed attempt to kill him.
• Dramatic Irony: Strip 2422: Sam talking about hypothetically things going south for Florence, but unbeknownst to him, she's literally been taken to the south pole.
• Driven to Suicide: In this comic an amusement park robot is desperate to get decommissioned after having to play Jar Jar Binks for nearly twenty years despite being programmed with the full works of Shakespeare.
• Drives Like Crazy: Sam
  Florence: [.02 millirems of radiation] is safer than driving across town with you.
  Helix: Florence, standing in a burning building while blind circus midgets throw knives at you is safer than driving across town with Sam.
• Duct Tape for Everything: Played with all over the map.
  • What do you mean it's not for everything? Solves every problem, including moving in microgravity!
  • Florence worries about Sam being absolutely corrupted by the power of duct tape, thanks to it being a cheap and fast (if not necessarily effective) fix.
  • Niomi is aware of this trope and is aware of its limitations. She is still willing to use its capabilities and weaponize it.

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