Troperville
Editing Help
Tools
Toys
|
The Dragon Doctors is a transformation webcomic about four "magical doctors" ALL touted as the best in their respective fields, who have banded together to do good and solve medical mysteries. Conisting of a whimsical shapeshifting wizard, a grim magic-assisted surgeon, a thoughtful "magical scientist," and a caring shaman/therapistm the team helps others and solves previously incurable diseases and conditions. And it all takes place in the aftermath of an expedition to solve the mystery of a cursed valley which, while sucessful, turned them all into members of the opposite sex, to which they adjust with varying degrees of success. Some of their patients so far range from a sentient tree to a girl that is mysteriously invisible to a man suffering from a horrible sentient cancer.
This Web Comic contains examples of the following tropes:
- After The End: Civilization is said to have fallen four times during the two thousand years between Rina's time and the Doctors' time (The "Breakings").
- Aerith And Bob: The protagonists are named Mori, Aki, Kili, Goro, Sarin... and Greg. This may be due to the aforementioned mixed-up nature of the worldsetting or the cosmopolitan territory; one caucasian character, for example, was named "Preston Chang."
- Also likely because Greg is meant to be as plain as possible. This kinda gets changed later on when he ends up as a werewolf
- Akashic Records: As a shaman, Kili can access these at will and used them to research Rina's case, since all other records had been destroyed by time and the various Breakings.
- Almost Kiss: Kili and Greg.
- And I Must Scream: Rina. For two thousand years.
- Art Evolution: Some, though there's still room for improvement. The first chapter were poorly-drawn pencil sketches in black and white. The second chapter begins in color and with cleaned up art. The artist himself is constantly apologizing to the readers for not being a better artist.
- Attractive Bent Gender: Subverted/Inverted from the norm with Mori, a short, fairly plain woman who changes into a tall, buff guy, and averted with Aki's father, who's just as overweight as a woman. The aversion is Lampshaded when Aki's dad admits "Not everyone gets to be a babe when they jump the gender fence."
- Badass Bookworm: Sarin and Mori. Especially Sarin, though Mori fits the trope better.
- Badass Labcoat: Mori.
- Little Miss Badass: Poor, poor Gorro.
- Baleful Polymorph: One of the effects of Mori's Spell Gun in the Mr. Smith arc.
- Sarin's master put him through this as training. Sarin also spent a couple years as a tree after being transformed in a forest by said master.
- The same thing happens to Tanica the assassin when she's hit with Sarin's seed.
- Beware The Nice Ones: The comic is full of nice people who could kick your ass and/or have a hidden dark side; sweet and sensitive Kili can turn into a ravening werewolf strong enough to punch people through walls, Sarin the wizard used to be an evil mugger and still remembers how to knife-fight (and has a Berserk Button: don't condescend to the magical badass), and Tomo the schoolgirl will MELT YOUR FACE OFF with disinfectant.
- Blessed With Suck / Cursed With Awesome /Disability Superpower: Kili developed a disability as a kid; her spritual senses are far too strong and without her magic tattoos that suppress her vision, she'd go insane. She's managed to use this to her advantage and has developed into a powerful shaman.
- Body Horror: The Crax, a sentient cancer that devours its victims' minds and bodies.
- Body Snatcher: Again, the Crax. A couple of sub-tropes, too.
- Brick Joke: Tomo's return at the end of the Crax Arc.
- Catch Phrase: Sarin seems to have adopted "I am a total magical badass."
- Cat Girl: One of Marty's employees. A few others have shown up sporatically in the backgrounds here and there; there's also been at least one catdude.
- Gorro gets turned into the hairy version during the Crax arc. She's pissed.
- Clothing Damage: Weaponised as another effect of Mori's Spell Gun. Sarin also uses this as punishment for a very nosy magic user.
"Fredricka and Davan narrowly avoided getting arrested for public nudity...."
- In a subvertion of the usual tranformation clothing damage, Mori expodes her shirt when she turns into a man.
- Combat Medic: Naturally; three of the doctors are powerful magic users, and Goro used to be a soldier and even in a weak body, is still a good shot with a thrown scalpel.
- Combat Tentacles: the Crax.
- Complete Monster: Take your pick. The Crax (a horrible parasitic being that devours its victims minds and bodies) is revealed to be the vehicle of the consciousness of a man who wanted to live forever— by eating everyone else. There's also been Derek, a magic user who would force other magic users (usually girls, apparently) into turning themselves into statues which he then collected (he got what was coming to him, though). The current arc involves a killer shaman hunting other shamans by plunging them into absolute nightmares.
- Compliment Backfire: Goro, who is having difficulty adjusting to being changed from a large, burly man to a small and frail woman, is not happy when a patient suggests that having small, delicate fingers must give her a big advantage when performing delicate surgery
- Crowning Momentof Awesome: For several readers, this was when Sarin casually turns herself back from being petrified by a gorgon with the words "I am a total magical badass."
- Dead All Along: Tomo doesn't know she's a ghost. Kili says the Trope name in conversation.
- Defeat By Modesty: see Clothing Damage.
- Deus Ex Machina: Averted, but lampshaded in the strip title when Tomo arrives at the end of the Crax Arc.
- Discount Lesbians: The inhabitants of Agri Village, and in the main cast Aki and Gorro.
Kili: "I don't think they're lesbians so much as—"
Spirit: "Pfft. Like I care about technicalities."
- The Aki and Gorro pairing is especially strange because, in one regard they're both heterosexual men.
- Well, not really for Aki, since she hasn't been a male since she was 5 years old, and never considered herself a boy anyway.
- Epileptic Trees: What's wrong with the Patient Of The Week, or how the Doctors are going to fix it.
- Everyones Dead Dave: Rina had to deal with this after being turned to stone for two thousand years; Kili had to deal with it as a kid when everyone in her village were drowned in a tsunami.
- Expressive Shirt: Sarin's robe from the first arc.
- Fantasy Gun Control: Despite having access to home computers, a league of assassins uses knives, and there are no armed police when they arrive. The only gun seen in the series thus far fires spells. However, guns have been referred to several times, and one of the assassins, Tanica, later explains that since they use invisibility suits, all they usually need are knives.
- Fingerless Gloves: Goro, for the express purpose of looking more badass.
- Freaky Friday: Another effect of the Spell Gun, combined with a Gender Bender.
- Gender Bender: Yeah. Also:
Greg: I have no idea how I'd react to that.
Sarin: Why wonder?
*snap!*
*bwooomp!*
- Gendercide: Well, nobody actually died, but the first chapter of the story that sets everything in motion is a cursed valley that caused all its visitors and inhabitants to become permanently female. The protagonists are not immune to this curse either (they use protection magic, but it fails). They find out the curse is caused by an artifact that siphons masculinity from everything around it to promote plant growth (male fertility, basically). To blow it up, Mori has to sacrifice her own feminine essence and becomes a man permanently as a result, so all four of the protagonists start off the series getting permanently gender-bent.
- Gift Of The Magi: Euryale the gorgon has herself turned human to be with Percy (the human), while Percy has himself turned into a rock golem-thing to be with Euryale. Euryale's earned unlimited credit, so they just laugh it off.
- Harmless Freezing: Justified with the Nigh Invulnerable Crax; the Doctors plan to dispose of it by freezing it with magic, storing it in liquid nitrogen, and disolving it with magical acid.
- Idiot Plot: The Doctors' mishandling of the Valley case. Sarin justifies the mistake later by saying "Every good wizard needs to screw up once in a while, it keeps us humble."
- Invisible To Normals: The Silent Suffering arc features a character who is invisible to everybody, even Kili when she isn't trying.
- I See Dead People: Kili. Her tattoos negate some of this ability so that she stays sane.
- Jumping The Gender Barrier: Subverted with Mori and Sarin, since they both changed genders.
- Love Is In The Air: Another effect of the Spell Gun. Possibly.
- Magic Pants: Literally. Sarin can summon "emergency pants," a spell apparently developed because "I had a very wild adolescence." Averted in most other cases, however, since quite often we've seen that transformation does not apply to people's clothing (necessitating the need to buy all-new wardrobes in certain cases).
- Man I Feel Like A Woman: Sarin. She also teases Kili by accusing her of this when Kili's just having trouble putting on a bra.
- Magi Tek: Since Mori is a "magical scientist," Mori is often seen using some sort of techno-wand.
- Mandys Law Of Anime Gender Bending: The whole main cast (except Mori), and
everyone in a bit short of half of Agri Village.
- Averted with Greg, who changes back to a man within five panels.
- Older Than They Look: Greg just celebrated his 60th birthday.
- Our Werewolves Are Different: Literally; as of the "Quarantine" chapter, Greg and Kili have become "variant" werewolves that do not necessarily follow the known patterns of other werewolves, due to the highly unusual way they contracted the condition (a living cancer invading their souls). One of the current side-effects is their hair growing REALLY long.
- Outof Clothes Experience: Nicely twisted when Tanica the assassin-turned-tree is depicted in this way, and the reader is left to assume a straight use. A fair bit later other astralwhatever representations turn up, and when those look normally clothed it becomes clear that hers shows just how vulnerable she feels.
- Patient Of The Week: Patient of the Arc is more accurate, but the trope works.
- Reed Richards Is Useless: Totally averted. The Dragon Doctors solve as many mundane cases as they do extraordinary ones (just very quickly) and humanity in general seems to benefit from a lot of the stuff they are capable of doing; people can purchase rejuvenations once they start getting old, for example, and Sarin's ability to magically turn anyone into anything is compared to an advanced form of face-lifts.
- Ret Gone: Doesn't actually occur in this comic, but is referenced when Aki's reading to Tanica. Tanica really hates this trope.
- Schizo Tech: It seems like another pseudo-medieval fantasy world...until they start making deliveries on motorcycles...and doing research on the Internet.
- The current explanation is that at some point in our future, magic is revealed to everyone. Over about 2000 years, and four major "Breakings", massive disasters that can be either magical or mundane, the world became the place that it currently is.
- Science Hero: Mori.
- Shout Out
- Spirit World: Kili goes here occasionally.
- Stupid Sexy Flanders: Slightly subverted with Sarin and Mori, since Sarin is suffering from the mind-altering affects of changing genders. And they end up as a couple.
- Suddenly Voiced: Tanica, the assassin-turned-tree, is inaudible to the reader for the first few chapters she's introduced in, though the characters can hear her inner voice with the aid of magic (though Aki's fairy antennae work on their own, too). This resulted in a lot of one-way conversations with a mostly-inexpressive tree, which was tricky to do, so the author allowed Tanica's voice to be audible to the reader in later chapters, starting when she first converses with Greg.
- Taken For Granite: Again, Rina. Greg also gets this when he's turned to stone so they can delicately remove the sentient Crax from his body, and every one of the Dragon Doctors is turned to stone for a moment by accident when they look at a gorgon. Sarin simply brushes off being petrified though, and restores the team.
- Tastes Like Diabetes: Lampshaded here
- There Are No Therapists: Very much averted, and not just because one of the main characters is a shaman/therapist. Several other characters have been in or are still going through therapy (like the devastated Rina, who's much better for it years later.)
- The Reason You Suck Speech: Preston Chang, the mind operating the Crax, a horrific entity that is attempting to consume Kili and Greg's minds from within, gives a rather nasty one to Kili once she's cornered. He's already dominated most of her mental landscape and if some part of her remains alive inside, she'll just be forced to watch.
- Translator Microbes: There's a world-wide magic spell called "The Language Barrier Breaker" in effect at all times, explain the doctors to Rina. The doctors themselves are explicitly stated as speaking a distant descendant of English, and all signs are in English for reader conveinance.
- The Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer: Rina, eventually. It helps that she already knew magic before emerging in a magical world, and that the culture she came from was compatible with Frontera—the characters point out that if she had been unfrozen during one of the Dark Ages she wouldn't have fared nearly as well.
- Voluntary Shapeshifting: Sarin. Besides transforming, she can turn anyone into anything.
- Why Dont Ya Just Shoot Him: Justified; the assassins use invisibility suits and knives for maximum quiet in their kills. This backfires, however, when the psychic Kili senses the intent to kill of over 20 people closing in and the invisibility is dispelled, causing a Mexican Standoff between the magic-using Dragon Doctors and the posse of knife-wielding assassins, while they're operating on a patient.
- Winged Humanoid: Aki, a couple Pixies, and Sarin with the aid of a spell. There's no flapping because, as Sarin explains, Pixie wings (and spell wings, appearently) work using magic, rather than aerodynamics.
- Year Inside Hour Outside: When Kili and Greg bond inside a dreamworld while the doctors operate on Greg's petrified body to chip out the Crax, we see seasons passing as they get to know each other. They spent long enough with one another there that they have fallen deeply in love.
- You Can See Me: Tomo says this. Subverted because she really wants to be seen.
- You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Kili and Sarin have permanently white and green hair, respectively, though it is explained that each is due to an unusual magical circumstance (Kili was haunted as a child, Sarin was turned into a tree for several years). Occasionally other characters with unusual hair color show up, but they might be "naturally occurring," such as a pixie with bright pink hair (and bright orange skin).
|
|
