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Dominic Deegan: Oracle For Hire is a webcomic started by Michael "Mookie" Terracciano in 2002. It follows the life and times of Dominic Deegan, a messianic yet pessimistic seer who travels about with Spark, his feline comic relief and assorted companions. Originally a lighter strip based on puns and wordplay, it came down with an in-/famous case of Cerebus Syndrome, arguably starting with the "Visions of Doom" arc. Though some fans have bemoaned subsequent Moral Dissonance and the Flanderization of characters, Dominic Deegan has always maintained some level of its earlier whimsy.
The "Storm of Souls" story arc is a notable example of Dominic Deegan's Cerebus Syndrome. It deconstructs Order Versus Chaos while also providing expanded Character Development. Additionally, it was rife with Heroic Sacrifices and someone being Killed Off For Real - though all except for Dominic's teeth and leg were eventually reversed, resulting in Battle Royale with Cheese... making future Heroic Sacrifices liable to result in Narm.
Opinions are deeply and sometimes loudly divided about the quality of the comic. The three main fan forums can be (very) roughly characterized as cheerleaders, critics, and snarkers, all moving towards the latter, and the comic has a substantial hatedom. For an illustration of the difference, consider this comic: from the intended viewpoint, cartoon slapstick violence. Creatively misinterpreted, a main character spurned by a trickster murdering him and a number of bystanders, which she has every right to do because she's a main character. Consequently the extent or even presence of many tropes listed here can be (and is) disputed. To prevent things from getting out of hand, please keep Justifying Edits to a minimum, and be aware that this page exhibits severe Multiple Personality Disorder.
For information on the major characters in this webcomic, please refer to the Dominic Deegan Character Sheet.
List of Major Arcs
Tropes used include:
- Aloof Big Brother - Jacob.
- Because Gregory is the youngest of the three Deegan boys, Dominic sometimes comes off as this to Gregory.
- Animesque
- Author Avatar - Averted (allegedly); Many have asked Mookie if Dominic was supposed to be him; Mookie has stated (in his third book) that Dominic's father Donovan is who he considers to be most like himself.
- Beat Panel - A pun will frequently be followed by the victim staring at the "camera" with a sour expression.
- Blessed With Suck - Being a Resistant (immune to ALL magic) sounds cool, but remember that while they can't be hurt by magic, they can't be healed by magic either.
- Call A Rabbit A Smeerp - Start with "mavpel" candy, apparently the sap of the "mavpel" tree boiled to solid form, and just keep going...
- Canon Sue - Several characters have mutated into this over the course of the comic, most strkingly Dominic Deegan himself and his lover Luna Travoria, who alternate between Canon Sue and Anti Sue.
- Cheek Teeth - Happens every time.
- Christianity Is Catholic- There is only one true church and all humans appear to fall under its banner. Like Dungeons And Dragons with racial religions.
- Contractual Immortality - Celesto,
Klo Tark, The Infernomancer... so far. In the Infernomancer's case, this is literal as his contract with Karnak makes him immune to all wounds.
- Cursed With Awesome - Dominic has complained since the very first strip about the burdens of being a seer.
- It's not so much being a seer, it's that his gift of random visions (coupled with he and his family attacked right in their home by one of mom's old nemeses) which led him to focus on studying Second Sight. He wanted to help people with his gift; instead the comic opens In Medias Res with him being a fortune teller for a town of complete idiots.
- Dark Is Not Evil- Klo Tark's companion, Rilian, who is a walking skeleton and a master necromancer.
- Deal With The Devil- Infernomancers
- Death By Materialism - Amelia
- Depraved Bisexual - Szark, Celesto
- Designated Hero - Dominic has some, ah, interesting methods at his disposal. And for that matter, some rather dubious motives at times.
- Did Not Do The Research - On every subject, even trivial ones; this is how, for example, a wooden door gets cracked like glass or clay by a dagger stuck in it.
- Discretion Shot - various, including Shadow Discretion Shot.
- Dis Continuity Nod - Quilt, the necromantic golem; before he was given a name, forum regulars named him "Patches." Quilt himself rejected it, saying it made him sound like a dog.
- Disproportionate Retribution - see the fireball strip linked above. For those who subscribe to the latter interpretation, that sort of thing happens all the time.
- For those who don't, the archives will show that Luna's favored method of "payback" is to fake someone out by projecting an illusion of a destructive spell which will not, in fact, cause any damage to anything but pride.
- Draco In Leather Pants - Lord Siegfried "Siggy" Damaske.
- Drop What You Are Doing - upon harsh shocks, things get dropped.
- Eye Scream - The price The Inferomancer had to pay for his power.
- Fanon - Some anti-fans are now devoting more attention to extensive Alternate Character Interpretations than to the actual canon. A halfling is smitten by a main character right after meeting her; readers note that the Deegandrug her body releases into the air is not a neurotoxin, as the enslavement's speed is affected by body mass. Non Mammal Mammaries led to the coining of the "nipple fairies," then to speculation about their life cycle and effects on civilization.
- Fantastic Racism - Orcs, sometimes called "piggarts"
- Fantasy Kitchen Sink - Previously the comic featured knights, wizards, dryads, werewolves, undead, slimes, orks, dragons etc., but ever since the Dominic's and Luna's 'round-the-world trip story arc, this trope has gone into overdrive, with the author adding a ton of new races, i.e. merfolk, sea monsters, hobgolins, halflings, dwarves, mongrelfolk and whatnot in rapid appearance.
- Flanderization - Szark's crush on Dominic. Siggy's racism. Quilt's stupidity. Dominic's ability to plan ahead.
- Fun With Foreign Languages - Donovan Deegan speaks comically bad orcish. Also a direct Homage to the Monty Python "Naughty Hungarian Phrasebook" sketch.
- Gender Bender - Male misogynist Stunt was subjected to a (very brief) gender bender in the Wild Edge territories story arc, before being turned into a half dozen other critters, and eventually changed back.
- Get Out Of Jail Free Card - No Heel Face Turn is complete without one (lampshaded at least once, by Celesto regarding Amelia's brutal murder vs Szark's redemption, but even still...)
- Green Rocks - Illusion spells, good for trapping all-powerful foes and calming friends by faking your death at their hands!
- Good People Have Good Sex - Donovan and Miranda Deegan
- Good Scars Evil Scars - Subverted with Nimmel, a good-natured graduate of the School of Arcane Arts. His scar (encompassing his right eye and a good chunk of flesh around it) was deliberately made to look as nasty as possible.
- Groin Attack - "There's no need for — " Yes there is.
- Hatedom - So much so that "If you don't like it, then don't read it" arguments will get turned around to "If you don't like us complaining, then don't read the forums."
- Head Tiltingly Kinky - Hobgoblin mating season sex.
- Hurricane Of Puns - Lots of them. Sometimes one-sided, sometimes a volley between two characters, and sometimes the entire on-panel cast will join in.
- Jerkass - Lord Siegfried Damaske, Stunt
- Jumping The Shark - Depending on who you ask, the comic has already jumped long ago, but people are divided over the exact point, citing a specific story arc or even a specific comic strip.
- Kick The Dog - Often invoked to prevent the protagonists from looking too gray. Unless a villain is immediately painted as sympathetic and merely confused, expect some detail to turn up that justifies doing horrible things to them.
- Mad Scientist - Jacob Deegan the necromancer.
- Magitek - What starts out as a pseudo-medieval fantasy world turns out to be a world with advanced arcane laboratories and magical electric guitars and heavy metal bands. And, apparently, spandex.
- Mama Bear - Go ahead and piss off Miranda Deegan. See what happens.
- Meaningful Name - Donovan's orcish name, for one. For two, Stonewater.
- Memetic Mutation - On at least one forum, Dominic Deegan is referred to as "Lord Dominus," an amoral overlord who uses his second sight to control all of his friends and loved ones.
- No! Mention not the Dominus on this public space! He shall become aware of our knowledge of his deeds and send us to Aberthast!
- Mind Rape - And they may not be so far off the mark. Very little of this is perpetrated by the villains, and there's plenty to go around.
- Misaimed Fandom - The strip is apparently meant to be enjoyed unironically.
A substantial portion of the fandom A whole ton of loud people disagree.
- Moral Dissonance (see also Canon Sue)
- My Hovercraft Is Full Of Eels - Donovan's attempts at speaking orcish.
- Narm - Klo Tark's second death and also Siegfried's death
- Nerd - Dominic was a huge nerd as a kid. So is Prento Fallin, one of Dominic's students.
- Noble Demon - Averted, as Mookie does not find them appealing in the least.
- Noble Savage - Orcs; some of them, anyway.
- Obviously Evil - A common accusation leveled at the series is that every antagonist that doesn't do a Heel Face Turn and embrace Dominic and his Nakama within the course of a Story Arc will devolve into this.
- Omniscient Morality License
- Open The Iris - They're anime style characters. The sizes of their irises/pupils change with their emotions.
- Pardon My Klingon - Ilka Tuk Tak
- Parent Ex Machina - Miranda, somewhat exceptional in that the main character is (ostensibly) no longer a child. Actually lampshaded at one point when Miranda refers to herself as "Mama ex Machina"...or at least tries to, but can't get the wording right and eventually settles for, "I'm his mother, and I'm going to fix everything."
- Put On A Bus - Szark and Snowsong are sent to the "Aberthast Cathedral" to await their Heel Face Turn.
- Rape Is Love - Melna was raped by Stonewater (as a child!) to save her life, but after meeting him again some years later, she realized that she loves him. On further rumination, Melna loves what Stonewater has come to stand for... which is not that surprising given Stonewater tried to model himself after Melna's father, horrible traumatization aside.
- Ironically that is how Dominic's first date turns out. KITTY!◊
- Real Men Wear Pink: Dominic's father, Donovan.
- Sadist Teacher, subverted. During his tenure as a teacher, Dominic gained a reputation of being a hardass before the first day of class even began. He admits that Second Sight (the course he was teaching) would be hard, as there is a lot of history and heavy reading involved. Despite this, he has a positive relationship with his students, and vice versa.
- Shut Up And Save Me - The Trope Namer, here.
- Snark Bait - A good chunk of the comic's readership enjoys it as this.
- Snarky Non Human Sidekick - Spark
- Strawman Political - Heavily abused, to the point of being Anvilicious more often than not. If you don't embrace multiculturalism and tolerance, not only are you a idiotic bigot incapable of reading or thinking for yourself, but you're also just plain evil, going to die, and going to Hell.
- To be fair Siggy did a bunch of bad stuff... cheat on his best friend; beat up civilians (in his first introduction); drive a girl to suicide; kill a person out of hand; lynch an entire family of innocent orcs, children and all, to make a birthday gift for his father...
- Superhero Episode - SuperGreg
- The Masochism Tango: Dom and Luna.
- Trademark Favorite Food: Dom's "Mapvel Candies"
- Unfortunate Implications - far to many to list, but most recently the comparatively dark-skinned Semashi turn out to be a musical, deeply sexual people which occasionally solves disputes via "dance off," at least if those disputes happen to happen between dancers.
- Unpleasable Fanbase - Although there are plenty of legitimate objections to raise, sometimes even the critics and snarkers get a little too into it. A man exploding from chaos magic is probably just as likely to have three spines as one, and gratuitous gore + Smug Snake Karma Houdini getting pasted = beautiful.
- Utopia Justifies The Means - Celesto.
- Wall Banger: Several moments qualify, depending on how long you've followed the comic. Some really dislike the aforementioned Rape Is Love scenario (due to Values Dissonance...Stonewater had to rape Melna to save her...riiiiight), but the Super-Greg storyline gets a much more intense reaction from its detractors.
- Well Intentioned Extremist: Celesto Morgan, who first wanted to cleanse the world with Chaos after deciding the people in it were all assholes, and who now says he's trying to save the world from The Infernomancer while incidentally destroying Lynn's Brook, which he calls "a small price to pay."
- What The Hell Hero: occasionally invoked, always promptly dismissed.
- White Magic: White magic can manifest in white mages in the form of light, or in more exceptional mages, (e.g. Gregory) white fire.
- Who Wants To Be A Superhero - Gregory's alter-ego Super-Greg, and Dominic's childhood love for The Adventures of Mighty Man.
- Who Wants To Live Forever: The Aliak
- Xanatos Gambit / Xanatos Roulette: Dominic uses his Second Sight to pull off Gambits that would be Roulettes for anyone else. Other characters comment on it — but they're not being Genre Savvy. Dominic likes to do The Reveal when his plans have come to fruition — or is occasionally forced to reveal his intentions when one of his plans goes awry. It's the major source of friction in his relationship with Luna (who spent most of her life getting abusively manipulated by her mother and sister).
- Or would be, if the friction hadn't been magically Handwaved off when Dominic proposed.
- Some of the villains like to pull gambits of their own, leading to insane Thirty Xanatos Pileups in at least two story arcs.
- You Know What You Did: Neilan attempts to pull this on Dominic and Luna. It fails miserably.
- Your Mileage May Vary
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