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  • Same-Sex Triplets: The Archer Triplets, one of (or rather, three of) Zii's past conquests, as seen in one-panel brief flashback, were all male — and apparently were said to be identical, although Zii cast a doubt on that on the basis of their sexual performances.
  • Sand In My Eyes: In a distaff example, in the (borderline-NSFW) August 7, 2018 strip, Peggy is still at the stage where she is determined to keep her relationship with Gary casual. However, when he says something sweetly affectionate, she finds herself unexpectedly touched, and has to insist that she has something in her eye.
  • Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: This trope is repeatedly evoked but then deconstructed, mostly by Gary's relationships. He is "savvy" in the sense of being deeply knowledgeable concerning geeky matters, but not by any other definition of the word, while virtually any woman in the comic is energetic in comparison to him.
    • His relationship with Yuki seems to fit the trope, but hits the problem that Yuki isn't just energetic, she's flat-out and dangerously crazy.
    • His affair with Sonya rapidly collapses because she is passionate, with a love of excitement and novelty — things which Gary very much lacks by her standards, leading her to dump him out of sheer boredom.
    • Senna energetically drags him onto a flight to Paris and seduces him, but she has no respect at all for his brand of savviness.
    • His platonic friendship with Sandra (mostly depicted in Sandra on the Rocks) actually invokes the trope quite strongly, in that Sandra respects and needs Gary for his savviness in the geek world, and energetically pushes him into pursuing a career in video games (and into Domenico's drinks cabinet).
    • The exceptions are Gary's brief fling with Kiley and Friends with Benefits arrangement with Peggy; both are far more savvy than him. The latter relationship eventually becomes more serious, but by that time Gary is a bit more savvy and energetic.
    • And for variety — Erik seems to see his relationship with Zii in terms of this trope, but fails to anticipate the implications.
  • Saying Sound Effects Out Loud: "Yoink!" and "Yoink!"
  • Saying Too Much:
    • After Zii breaks one of Gary's Transformers and learns that it was a very rare Overlord, she tries to pin the blame on a cleaning woman she invented: "Tragic, I know. Poor Overlord ... never knew what hit him!" Gary than asks how she knew it was Overlord.
    • Kiley tends to demonstrate the trope any time she comes under any sort of stress.
    • Gary inadvertently ends up spying on Peggy's date with her ex. Later, he asks if Peggy "won't be seeing her again". Peggy starts to confirm that she won't, then realizes:
      Peggy: How'd you know my ex was a she?
  • Scenery Censor: Flat-out abused at times, although the most obvious examples in the earliest strips were eventually edited out of the archived versions. Then the Moral Guardians problem led to the exiling of nipples once again, leading to the return of occasional scenery censorship in later strips.
  • Screw This, I'm Outta Here: After dozens of increasingly cringe-making strips, Kiley, having had enough of her bizarre relationship with DiDi, finally finds a sustainable excuse to run, and slams the door in DiDi's face.
  • Sex as Rite-of-Passage: Subverted. Gary starts the story as a desperate virgin, and for a long time his personal story seems to be emulating this standard plot type. But then the story twists around (or the writers get bored with keeping Gary frustrated), and it becomes clear that Gary's real problem isn't that he's a virgin, it's that he's ... Gary. (In terms that he himself would understand, his virginity is at most a Disc-One Final Boss.) And characters who have sex, perhaps even regularly, can have just as many problems, and be just as desperate, as virgins.
  • Sex Comedy: A lot of the point, a lot of the time, though handled with some lightness of touch and irony. For example, the central protagonist's quest to get laid sometimes seems to be forgotten — and then, when he succeeds, sex proves not to be as much of a rite of passage for him as anyone expects.
  • Sex Equals Love: Largely averted, but occasionally played with and even deconstructed.
    • Most of the cast have sex-for-fun quite often, and are clear that this doesn't have to mean that they're in love with the other person. However, this may sometimes mean that they underestimate the emotional significance of the act.
    • Zii repeatedly suffers from this confusion; Yuki, Sonya, and Erik all become infatuated after flings with her, and whether or not this is due to her talent in bed, all three definitely think of it as love. Zii doesn't seem to return the feeling with Yuki or Sonya, but the only way that she can deal with the problem is by running and hiding from them. She does consciously feel something for Erik, but can't then handle her attraction to other people, leading to trouble. Then, eventually, Peggy's Operation: Jealousy attack triggers an outburst from Zii that implies that she does want to feel that all her past conquests still love her; she just doesn't know how to handle the associated complications.
    • It's also eventually revealed, thanks to Kiley's attempts to analyze her problem, that DiDi has real problems with the distinction between sex and love. She apparently thinks of the lust she inspires in all the men she dates as love, but doesn't expect it to be a lasting emotion; she regards sex as the pinnacle of emotional intimacy, and yet she needs deeper intimacy to achieve orgasm. When Kiley talks about romantic feelings (actually in the abstract), and then gives her the first-ever orgasm which she's been desperately seeking, she thinks that they're predestined romantic lovers.
    • And in the comic’s final plot sequence, Peggy’s desperate attempts to keep sex and love separate ultimately collapse.
  • Sex for Services: Amber and Dillon manage to extend their interactions with Nathan beyond a simple Casting Couch arrangement when Amber arranges matters so that she and Dillon come out of the deal with an apartment as well as three film roles each.
  • Sex God/Sex Goddess: A number of cast members embody and deconstruct this trope in various ways; see the Characters page.
  • Sex Is Cool: This appears to be a theme of the comic, what with every major character except the hapless geek having lots of sex and generally thinking that they're cool and all, but the trope is actually averted over the course of the story. Sexually active minor characters like Nathan can be uncool, the seemingly sexless Jung can be an Only Sane Man, some characters are unhappy with their sex lives, and when the hapless geek gets laid — repeatedly — it doesn't make him any cooler at all.
  • Sex Is Good: Generally assumed by most of the characters, and the comic generally portrays sexual relationships in a positive light. However, they can sometimes lead to difficulties and messy complications — although these are generally treated in light comedy style.
  • Sex Is Interesting: In a lightweight sex comedy in which the characters (of diverse sexualities) do actually have a lot of sex, the facts and nature of their sex lives are inevitably often important to the plots and characterisation.
  • Sex Montage: The comic features a lot of sex and occasional montages, if not perhaps a huge number fitting this trope's definition. A notably kinky instance, though, is the April 16, 2016 strip, which illustrates the development of Peggy's kink-heavy relationship with Gary.
  • Sex Starts, Story Stops: Some of the sex in the comic does come rather out of the blue — notably Kiley jumping Gary and Zii's night with Angele. However, by and large, there's a bit of foreshadowing or character consistency involved. Whether Sonya and Yuki's hate-sex was foreshadowed to the point of inevitability, or completely unpredictable, might be an interesting question.
  • Sex with the Ex: More than one character in this comic has difficulty controlling their urges when around someone they've long fancied, even after bad break-ups or while in relationships with other people.
    • Matt cheats on Dillon, leaving him angry and heartbroken — but Matt only has to show up at Dillon's dressing-room door with a puppy-dog smile and they're on the floor together within moments.
    • Zii tells Sonya that their relationship is over, and she wants to be faithful to Erik. Sonya keeps trying. Guess how this ends.
  • Sexy Shirt Switch: Used to indicate that Zii slept with Angele.
  • She or He Cleans Up Nicely:
  • She Is All Grown Up: DiDi's personal bad angel. "Wow! I don't think you've called on me since the 3rd grade... Holy crap! Check out the rack on me!" And that's nothing compared to her good angel, which has grown into a towering amazon — which is saying something, given DiDi's already considerable height.
  • Ship Sinking: Sandra and DiDi showed enough interest in each other to launch a very large fan ship. Then they actually tried sleeping together, and the ship sank catastrophically with all hands. Other possible relationships within the comic have perhaps been teased with varying levels of plausibility, but that one was comprehensively annihilated.
  • Ship Tease: With a cast of often-bisexual characters on a relationship merry-go round, most conceivable ships show up in the fanbase eventually — and many are teased, accidentally or deliberately, sooner or later. In particular, Zii gets a few teasing moments with Gary, mostly early in the comic's history, and then again much later, as their interactions take a complicated turn, with Zii obsessed with the reputation of Gary's "swirly" and Gary feeling drawn to Zii's stage persona. Zii certainly has to deal with increasingly complex emotions developing around Gary, such as major satisfaction when he tells her that he finds her sexy and would absolutely have sex with her, or, while she's horny and rattling through potential partners for a roll in the hay, involuntarily fantasizing about him — see Stupid Sexy Flanders.
  • Shirtless Scene: Everyone, frequently. (Not just the men, but this is defined as a males-only trope.) Matt maybe gets the most; he is an underwear model, after all.
  • Shock Party: Zii's "Surprise 6-some" (seen in a Flashback Cut) for Yuki (strip #248, January 11, 2010, NSFW).
  • Shout-Out: There are lots of these — see also The Cameo entries above:
  • Shower of Love: Oddly, given the general tenor of the comic and all its showers, anything like this keeps getting averted or subverted. For example:
    • Zii's hoped-for soapy hug from DiDi is intercepted (strip #186, August 05, 2009, NSFW).
    • Sandra's stint in the shower with DiDi was much more innocent than anyone eavesdropping their conversation would have believed (strip #240, December 18, 2009).
    • Gary's shower with Amber comes closest, but is interrupted just as it's getting really interesting (strips #662-666, October 23-November 01, 2012, NSFW).
    • Zii is working hard to restrain her lust for DiDi. Then the latter, who knows about the problem, nonetheless disregard Zii's feelings it in her haste to shower for work, leaving Zii making strange noises. (Strip #853, February 20, 2014, NSFW ironically enough.)
    • When Tess is flirtatiously denying that she is in a lesbian relationship with Maura, she admits that they do shower together. However, a flashback reveals that they only do this to save energy — and then they end up squabbling over the cramped space.
  • Shower Scene: Too many to count, and frequently notable for featuring uninterrupted views of breasts and butts. While they usually serve mildly erotic/fanservice-y purposes, Zii for one sometimes uses cold showers as a way to control runaway sexual feelings. It also appears to be a peculiarity of the setting that every private dwelling, even down to affordable one-person apartments, has a shower big enough to hold three people quite comfortably.
  • Sitcom Arch-Nemesis: Various characters get into this position towards each other, although there's no one key arch-nemesis. Notably:
    • Sonya and Yuki's relationship tends to involve each of them insisting that the other is their arch-enemy. Mostly. When it isn't getting weirder than that.
    • Sonya also eventually develops a hostile rivalry with DiDi.
    • Zii and Dillon both have peculiar enmities with Angel, mostly in the pages of Sticky Dilly Buns.
  • Skinny Dipping:
    • Senna goes skinny dipping with Sandra ... in Brazil, using a private jet.
    • Curiously, Zii, Yuki, and Sonya all forget the "skinny" part while celebrating their band's first gig. Well, they are pretty drunk at the time. (Strip #907, July 03, 2014, marginally NSFW.)
  • Skinship Grope: The female characters seem to end up sharing showers or just blundering in on each other in there fairly often, sometimes leading to invocations of this trope, usually with DiDi and usually fairly innocently. (It couldn't possibly be fanservice, could it?) See, for example, July 30, 2008 (strip #33, amazingly enough NSFW). It's a lot less innocent for Zii than for DiDi there, mind. DiDi also suffers from other women who just can't resist checking whether they're real in other circumstances; both Amber and Sonya do so on different occasions, and she implies it's happened before.
  • Slap-Slap-Kiss:
    • Sonya inflicts one textbook example on Gary.
    • One could argue part of the reason Gary likes Kiley so much is that she's about the only woman in his dating life who doesn't manifest this trope.
    • Yuki and Sonya build a whole weird sexual relationship on the Interplay of Sex and Violence:
      • After the band's first concert, they wake up in bed next to each other, with neither remembering how did they get there. Yuki accuses Sonya of taking away her "precious innocence", and they start fighting ... which leads to passionate kissing and more.
      • Quite how violent their sexual interactions can get later becomes clear.
      • Sonya deliberately invokes this effect when she insults Yuki, quite possibly hoping that the ensuing fight will lead to sex again. It does.
      • And then in the end, Kiley persuades them to admit to their feelings for each other and to make love tenderly — after which, they find that the spark has gone.
      • However, Sonya wants it to end with a more more dramatic bang, so that the they can both walk away with no regrets. Hence, she decides to make Yuki as angry as possible... by having sex with Gary and making sure that Yuki catches them in the act. Which works, but leads to a few unexpected consequences.
  • Slapstick: Not actually a terribly common source of comedy in this comic, but used occasionally, perhaps especially in early strips; see, for example, this one.
  • Sleep Cute: One or two of these occur between Zii and Gary, mostly early on in the story and largely by way of Ship Tease.
  • Sleeps with Everyone but You: Zii and DiDi are both very promiscuous, but for much of the comic's run, neither of them will sleep with Gary (or with each other, despite Zii's fervent wishes). Both come close, only to step back, primarily because they don't want Gary to think desperation is the key to getting laid. However, for much of that time, the only person giving Gary any sort of tutoring on the practical side of sexual interaction seems to be Dillon, which made some readers feel that Zii is useless in her self-appointed "wing-girl" status, cementing the applicability of this trope in their minds.

    DiDi's feelings on the matter change after she overhears Gary make Kiley lose her mind, but complications ensue — although Zii encourages her to pursue the option at times. Zii may occasionally be tempted to change her position on this as Gary becomes more clearly a sexually active being, but makes it clear in conversation with Amber that she sees Gary as too much like a brother, or perhaps as just too geeky. Gary, naturally, is always completely clueless.

    Zii's hopes of bedding DiDi are rekindled at least once, but it becomes clear to her that DiDi's interest in lesbian experimentation is a product of desperation, so Zii seems to give up on that dream. Then DiDi announces her relationship with Kiley, leaving Zii punch-the-wall frustrated at apparently having missed her chance.
  • Smart People Wear Glasses: The comic's regularly-appearing glasses-wearers are Gary (a geek and an artist, who knows a bit about computers), Erik (who mostly seems to want to wear shades all the time, but who is also fairly bright), and Takeru (a successful professional artist). The spin-offs add the very cerebral Ruby, Cammi (another shades-wearer), Tatiana (a highly organized PA), Tristan (a successful computer games designer), and Alex (another geek). The correlation isn't perfect — the very bright Kiley doesn't have glasses — but it does seem that glasses serve as a handy indicator of someone who's willing to use their brain in this setting.
  • Smash Cut: When DiDi suggests a day at the park, Gary and Zii are uncertain. But then, DiDi drops a fork, and — smash cut.
  • Soap Wheel: In its later volumes, the comic has multiple Plot Threads running, often in Soap Opera style, and hence sometimes uses this plotting technique — although Gary may show up in multiple threads. For example, in strips around early 2015, there are plotlines involving Gary's new job, which may involve separate interactions with Tracy and Yvan; Gary and Zii's dealings with Isabelle; a peculiar situation involving Sonya and Yuki; DiDi's interactions with Kiley, which in turn effects Kiley's interactions with Matt; Matt's peculiar plans for Peggy and Gary; Sonya's attempts to get Zii back, possibly aided by Peggy; Zii's attempts to work out what she wants from life; and somewhere in the background, the band's career. Each gets different amounts of attention over varying numbers of strips from time to time.
  • Special Guest: It’s a throwaway gag and surely not in any way authorized, but one flashback in a bonus strip shows Zii and Yuki’s old band guesting with the Red Hot Chili Peppers — who were probably chosen mostly because of their well-known penchant for playing naked. Yuki gets to kick at least one of them in the junk.
  • Speech-Bubble Censoring:
    • Strip #750 (June 4, 2013; nonetheless NSFW) uses this. It's maybe doubly necessary and doubly funny here because Senna is Transgender, and casual readers may not realise exactly what they're not seeing.
    • Strip #756 (June 20, 2013, probably NSFW) also uses this. The added twist here is that Yuki can apparently see the thing which is covered by the speech bubble (confirmed in later strips), which would previously just have meant chaos, but which actually leads to an interesting character development for her.
    • Strip #780 (August 20, 2013; again NSFW) is another example, again with the twist that it's Senna whose "modesty" is protected.
  • Speed Sex:
    • Allegedly the only kind of sex DiDi has ever had (until plot happens), though this seems to be contradicted by at least one strip, and things are certainly different with some of her later partners. Still, it's definitely a big problem for her.
    • Gary's first time lasts for 43 seconds. Later, he allegedly gets up to 45. Matt may treat him appallingly in the big foursome plot arc, but he also probably does Gary a huge favor by giving him some tips on how to control this problem.
  • Spit Take:
    • Gary when Zii asks him point-blank about being a virgin.
    • Eulice when Gary blurts out Zii has no job.
    • The on-line Troll upon finding out who Zii is.
    • Kiley when Matt figures out why she's seeing Gary's face on other guys.
    • And Matt when Kiley slips in a sly joke at his expense.
  • Squee:
    • Dillon does this when he finds out he's going to appear in a movie.
    • Tatiana thinks a Squee! while fantasising about Domenico in the "Sandra Interlude" guest strip #1 (April 02, 2013, marginally NSFW).
    • Gary is usually relatively reserved, or at least un-shrill, for a hopeless geek, but every now and again he slips, notably when Sandra models a videogame character, demonstrating all the symptoms except the specific sound effect — and one can guess that's present in his tone of voice.
  • Stalker with a Crush: Attraction and infatuation all too easily leads some of these characters into behavior that, in the real world, would justify a call to the police:
    • Dillon is prone to sneaking secret photos of attractive, unsuspecting straight men — including Gary, towards whom his behavior becomes increasingly manipulative and infatuated for a while. His behavior toward Jerzy in Sticky Dilly Buns gets a bit weird, too.
    • Having sneaked away from her in the middle of the night, Zii wants Yuki to leave her alone, but Yuki is very persistent, and Zii eventually gives up, and has sex with her. While Gary is on a pseudo-date with Yuki. Loudly, all night. While Gary can hear.
    • Yuki, being an all-round Cloudcuckoolander, later also takes to stalking Matt — not because she likes him, but because she wants to practice heterosexual sex with someone she doesn't care about, while she's still prone to violent fugues.
    • Around the time when Yuki realizes that she's attracted to Gary and leaves Zii alone, Sonya realises that she's in love with Zii, and takes over the function. Unfortunately, by then, Zii is trying to maintain a monogamous relationship with Erik. This doesn't stop Sonya, who deduces from Zii's treatment of herself when they first met that Zii didn't take boyfriends seriously (despite Zii's insistence that this case is somehow different), and her actions become increasingly morally dubious as she not only exploits Zii's hot buttons, but also tries unsuccessfully to seduce Erik. She does realize that she had neglected to tell Zii that she loved her as well as wanting her for sex, until it was too late, leading to an odd little Pet the Dog moment (February 19 2013, strip 710, NSFW). But she tends to bounce back from setbacks; this doesn't stop her, and nor does the prospect of competition from DiDi for Zii's affections. She does begin to wonder how she could get past Zii's "playing hard to get", but then Peggy comes to her assistance.
    • It's more a Sticky Dilly Buns plotline, but Angel is worryingly obsessed with Jerzy, to at least borderline-stalking levels.
    • And then DiDi becomes infatuated with Kiley, and starts showing up unexpectedly at her place of work on what she calls a date.
    • And then new minor character Isabelle initially shows up with just a fangirl/groupie attitude towards Zii, but her interest rapidly becomes quite extreme, probably coming closest to actual, insane, real-world stalking. (The broken-and-replaced lock on the apartment door and wanting to be called "Izz" seem like real bad signs.)
      Isabelle: I need to add her address in my contacts. Do you know her full name? Including middle name, and her mom's maiden name?
      Gary: S-somehow it's never come up.
      Isabelle: And do you know her cell number? That would be really useful. Any siblings? Cousins? Pets? What's her favorite food?
  • Statuesque Stunner:
    • Definitely DiDi, the tall and strong pro-wrestler trainee.
    • To a (slightly) lesser extent, Sonya and maybe Sandra — and don't underestimate Peggy either. Basically, female characters in this comic either fit this trope to some extent or are cutely petite.
  • STD Immunity: Word of God is that the characters are always careful and sensible about using protection in their hyperactive and diverse sex lives — even, presumably, when having spur-of-the-moment sex while drunk — though this is rarely shown on-screen. Still, the complete lacks of concern about STDs (or pregnancy) doesn't look terribly realistic.
  • Stealth Pun: Sonya and DiDi, two women who consider themselves straight but have both shown attraction to their own gender, hide in Gary's closet in the 2012 December story arc.
  • Strawberry Shorthand: Amber and Chanelle help Gary celebrate his thirtieth birthday by turning up in his bedroom wearing nothing but strawberries held on with whipped cream.
  • Stupid Sexy Flanders:
    • Gary, who is actually quite solidly heterosexual (if open-minded and open to some kinks) discovers that he can be distracted by good-looking men and gay sex, leading to some trope-typical stress for him. Fortunately, a sympathetic Matt helps him understand that his interest is basically artistic and purely aesthetic.
    • Zii increasingly finds Gary interesting, especially in later volumes, while also increasingly trying to dismiss him as a hopeless geek or more like a kid brother. (The results also serve as a Ship Tease, qv.) For example, in strip #1073 (September 22, 2015, marginally NSFW), she feels in need of a hookup, and runs through a list of possibilities; first Sonya, then Yuki — and then she involuntarily imagines Gary naked. She promptly bolts for a cold shower, screaming "Too Gary! Too Gary!"
  • Suck Her Weak Point: Yuki knows perfectly well that if she wants Zii to stop struggling, her big toe is the way to go. Ears work, too, with Gary and Zii.
  • Suggestive Collision:
    • Something of a perpetual hazard of existence for DiDi, as it seems; indeed, she suffers such an accident on her very first appearance.
    • A collision among Gary, Zii and Yuki somehow ends up with Gary on his back, Zii sitting on his groin, Yuki sitting on his face, and the latter two facing each other.
  • Suppressed Rage: Demonstrated by Yuki, when she reveals that Sonya can still, quite easily, provoke her.
  • Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • Kiley's relationship with Matt. Using your partner to prove you're a better lover than the other guy will only make her leave you.
  • When the muscular and energetic Maura bowls Gary over when going for a kiss, it has consequences for him.
  • When Gary is more or less dragged into a threesome at the start of Chapter 10, he ends up going along with it out of obligation, but after things get really weird (James forcibly intervening in Tracy giving Gary a blowjob due to his issues, leading to what amounts to fighting over his manhood), Gary walks out on them because even an Extreme Doormat has a threshold for tolerating rampant idiocy that can be crossed, and won't stick around if it is.
  • Suspiciously Specific Denial: Kiley. "It's not like I've been spying on you from a phone or anything!"
  • Sweat Drop: Used quite frequently as one of the manga-esque effects.
  • Tag Team: When the comic gets into the world of Professional Wrestling, two actual wrestling tag teams feature — "Roxxy and Moxxy" (Roxie and Brandy) and "The Tempests" (Maura and Tess).
  • Take a Third Option:
    • Gary becomes the object of both Sonya's and Yuki's attentions. To settle which one should get him, they decide to have a "sex contest", in which they date him for a month, then have a threesome with him, and he then picks one. This fails to resolve the problem, but then Gary accidentally takes a third option by losing his virginity to Kiley, Yuki's "therapist," who pounces him after he tries to console her about messing up with Yuki.
    • Played for Laughs a bit more when Gary and Senna meet Sandra in Paris. Senna and Sandra argue over whether to involve Gary in real (Senna) or geek (Sandra) culture. Gary suggests that both can be accomplished, by going to Brussels. (He has his own logic there.) Neither of the women takes it well.
  • The Tape Knew You Would Say That: When Gary heads out to Paris in a hurry, he pulls off an on-paper version of this trope, possibly by accident.
  • Team Mom: Whenever DiDi or Zii slide into Jerkassitude the other leans toward this. Later, new character Peggy seems to reflexively take this job.
  • Tear Jerker: An in-universe instance in strip #669 (Nov 8th, 2013: NSFW), when Gary talks to Dillon and (a topless) Amber about his relationship with Yuki.
    Amber: Do you want to spend the rest of your life with her?
    Gary: Sure... I guess...?
    Amber: You guess?
    Gary: Well, it's not like any other girl ever wanted to share my life. [Next panel has Dillon and Amber, on the verge of Inelegant Blubbering, hugging Gary] Okay... what's with the hugging?
  • Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Zii and the Troublemakers, the comic's resident rock band, more or less runs on this to begin with. Yuki and Sonya can't stand each other (though Sonya quite enjoys provoking Yuki), and Zii finds both of them stressful to work with for various reasons — but they all enjoy being in the band. This tips Yuki and Sonya towards Friendly Enemies status, and then more.
  • Tempting Fate:
  • Their First Time: The sex between Gary and Kiley is the first time for him, though not for her, and is realistic enough to avert the trope, in that he suffers Premature Ejaculation. (Then he subsequently brings out the Swirly, and the realism level plummets.)
  • Those Two Guys: Zii's flashbacks to previous escapades sometimes include two recurring characters, members of the band she used to be in. They generally go unnamed, although their names (James and Martin) can actually be deduced with a little digging, especially if one has access to the bonus strips in the print collections of the comic.
  • A Threesome Is Hot/Manly: See the examples listed for Three-Way Sex below, many of which are viewed as more or less hot, and with the Double Standard often averted.
    • Occasionally, this trope and the double standard may deconstructed or subverted; for example, Amber offers Gary a threesome, and he's open to it until he realises that it'll involve Dillon rather than a second woman, and he'd be expected to do things with the other man, at which he goes from nervousness to Heroic BSoD.
    • Conversely, Matt effectively invokes this trope, straight, in order to bounce Gary into joining him for a foursome.
  • Three-Way Sex: Occurs from time to time, with the Double Standard definitely averted; most possible permutations can and do happen. The men involved in the M-M-F groupings are sometimes twitchy about doing anything sexual with another man involved, but may get over it. Many but not all cases involve the often-busy Zii. Some go badly, some don't.
    • Flashbacks shows Zii's foursome with (male) triplets (exhausting) and her threesome with two male former band-mates (abortive due to male-male hang-ups).
    • Another flashback shows Zii's abortive attempt to organise a surprise six-way orgy for Yuki, which ran into the problem of the latter's phobias.
    • Zii gets a threesome with Sonya and Jake. The night ends badly, but no one is objecting at the start — and Jake subsequently develops an excessive taste for (mostly off-screen) group sex.
    • Matt manages to bag two cast members (one male, one female) from Dillon's play, simultaneously.
    • Nathan organises an encounter between himself, Amber, and Dillon (in drag), though he mainly just watches.
    • Zii gets Erik and Adrien into bed simultaneously, the first night that they all meet.
    • Amber offers Gary a threesome, and he fantasises about her and Chanelle. Unfortunately, she means with her and Dillon, which isn't to Gary's tastes, so that fantasy quickly ends.
    • Yuki and Sonya's "sex contest" for Gary's favors ends in a (pre-arranged) three-way encounter which ends when Yuki's issues kick in, again.
    • Zii, Sonya, DiDi, and Peggy, wind up in what has to be called a lesbian orgy, although that's mostly about two pairs at any given moment.
    • When Amber wakes up with Gary, and discovers that it's his birthday, she tells him that she should get him a present, goes out, and comes back with Chanelle (both of them naked but for some whipped cream and strawberries). Things subsequently get even wilder.
    • Later, Matt sets up a foursome with Peggy, Kiley, and Gary. It ends up as a threesome after Kiley storms out.
    • When Peggy becomes emotionally confused because her relationship with Gary is becoming more serious than she thinks she wants, she tries to reassert her sense of independence by setting up a threesome with Jane and Vince.
  • Title Drop: Finally happens on September 3, 2011 (NSFW), again on December 4, 2012, and also on January 24, 2019. However, it's debatable whether any of those instances quite fit this trope; they're more just casual uses of the phrase. The title is literally just a French description of the situation in the apartment, after all; see Bilingual Bonus.
  • Tomboy and Girly Girl:
    • Zii and DiDi, roommates and friends (and eventually lovers) fit this pattern to an extent. Zii is The Lad-ette; DiDi has a fuller figure (to say the least) and domestic qualities.
    • Wrestling Tag Team Maura and Tess are both quite feminine, but while Tess has short (blue) hair and a slightly more cool-headed and pragmatic attitude, Maura is a bubbly blonde with a runaway "competitive flirting instinct".
  • Too Kinky to Torture: A recurrent joke in this comic, applied to various characters:
    • Zii (see strip #188, August 10, 2009, NSFW).
    • Yuki shows strong shades of this from the beginning with the "emergency handcuffs" she always carries. Later, when DiDi mistakes her for a burglar and ties her up with bedsheets, she tells DiDi to tighten the knots and asks Gary for some clothespins. Zii confirms that this is typical Yuki.
    • DiDi as of strip #614 (June 16, 2012; NSFW).
  • Too Much Information: Judging by Sonya's expression, Yuki tells her more about their recent Slap-Slap-Kiss interlude than Sonya quite realised...
    Sonya: Oh you're into kinkier stuff than your goodie-goodie facade lets on. I had never been "fisted" before.
    Yuki: Oh, that! Actually, I punched you in the vagina and my hand got caught. Sorry 'bout that, I guess.
  • Toplessness from the Back: Seen increasingly often (frequently combined with a Modesty Bedsheet) after the comic dials back the visual explicitness in pursuit of advertising revenue, from around mid-2015 on.
  • Trade Snark: A minor one: Dillon's "open mouth Swirly-Go-Round" kissing technique.
  • Translation Convention: Used with DiDi's French and Yuki's Japanese (brackets around English text). Averted with Senna's Portuguese (the forum-provided translations of which have been copied to the trivia page).
  • Translation Punctuation: Foreign languages being represented in English (see Translation Convention, above) is usually indicated by “inequality mark” <brackets>.
  • Transparent Closet: At different times, both Nathan and Sonya fervently deny being gay, despite enthusiastically engaging in completely consensual gay sex and not hiding the fact very well from the people to whom they're talking. Actually, both seem to be functionally bisexual, but... It's Played for Laughs, of course.
  • Troll
  • Troubled Fetal Position: Demonstrated by Gary, when he realises what he's just been bounced into by Yuki and Sonya.
  • Twinkle in the Eye: Didi as she breaks out of Roxy's wrestling hold.
  • Twin Threesome Fantasy:
    • Zii — not only in reality, but actually as a triplet foursome.
    • Nathan tries to invoke it by having Dillon dress up as Amber-Amber and inviting Amber herself to their "session". He says he doesn't want to make two actual sisters have sex — a case of Even Evil Has Standards, apparently — but he seems to think that this is just as good.
  • Two Decades Behind: For a comic about 21st century twentysomethings, some of them playing in a band, this one makes an awful lot of references to '70s/'80s hair-rock/Glam Rock acts. And while the characters use mobile 'phones and even computers, at least one of them uses snail mail when e-mail would do the job fine.
  • Underboobs:
    • DiDi when she wears a shirt she borrowed from Sandra, as it's too small for her.
    • Angele when wearing Zii's shirt, which on Zii only leads to bared midriffs.
  • Unkempt Beauty: This tends to appear as a result of the art style. There are occasions when Zii or Gary wake up hungover and frazzled, and some of the fans get ... enthusiastic. Senna, who usually wears her hair in a heavily styled bob, can be even more distracting for some with bed hair or fresh from the shower. See for example strip #783 (August 27 2013, borderline NSFW).
  • Unproblematic Prostitution: Well, unproblematic sex work, anyway. Amber and several other porn actresses depicted in the comic seem completely comfortable and mostly happy in the work, though Amber for one clearly regards getting out of the field as a matter of turning respectable.
  • Unsettling Gender-Reveal:
    • "Wow! Dinah looks like a man without her wig!" ...Wait a minute... Technically speaking, this strip doesn't really fit the trope definition, because sexual attraction wasn't directly involved; however, several characters are nonetheless unsettled by the reveal in various ways. It's complicated.
    • A variant treatment of the trope subsequently appears with regard to the Transgender woman Senna, who presents as a very attractive woman — with a penis.
      • On her first appearance, in strip #400 (January 14, 2011) onward (all definitely NSFW), both Sandra and Gary are startled to see her naked; Sandra merely needs a stiff drink, but Gary, who clearly finds Senna highly attractive, especially when she starts flirting heavily with him, is rendered nearly comatose.
      • Much later, in strips from #770 onwards, Gary gets into a relationship with Senna, has sex with her while he's drunk, but subsequently, after he sobers up, freaks out over her anatomy more than once — sometimes quite dramatically when he's suddenly reminded (e.g. strip #815, November 12, 2013, NSFW).
  • Unsound Effect:
  • Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist: All of the characters in this comic are flawed in one way or another, and most of them will do morally questionable things to get something that they want badly enough, lack much self-control, or are just too dim to anticipate the consequences of their actions. This leads to a certain amount of dissonance for some readers, who describe it as a comic about horrible, unsympathetic people. Others say "fallible" rather than "horrible", and claim to find almost all the cast more sympathetic as a result. There may be a certain amount of Screw the Rules, I'm Beautiful/Draco in Leather Pants involved in this, too; this is an uncommonly good-looking collection of characters, and the ones who are shown most critically are perhaps the slightly less good-looking ones.
    • Gary partly averts this by virtue of being a mild-mannered geek and frequently seeming like a Nice Guy, but his passivity and tendency to self-pity manage to annoy many readers regardless.
    • DiDi seems at the start to be sweetly innocent, in her way, and hence sympathetic, but she seemingly changes for the worse as her sexual frustration overwhelms her. Then again, she treats her boyfriends casually badly from the first, and always has difficulty understanding other people's feelings; the "change" may just be these tendencies coming to the fore. At the worst, she's mixed up and has been driven crazy by frustration. But she's definitely imperfect.
  • Unusual Euphemism: In general, this comic doesn't bother much with euphemisms; it's not unduly crude, but if characters are talking about sex, they call it sex. But...
    • There are occasional moments like "Rubbing my earlobe". It Makes Sense in Context.
    • And then, Matt and Kiley started providing each other with informal psychotherapy — while at the same time, very frequently banging each other's brains out, allegedly as part of the process. Hence, "therapy" and "therapist" rapidly became joke euphemisms in relation to those two.
  • Unwanted Assistance: After several strips providing useful assistance to Zii, Erik throws in some well-meant advice to Terry which Zii appreciates less.
  • Unwanted Harem: Gary ends up in a version of this situation (although how unwanted some of this is might be debated, given his initial sexual frustration and obliging nature). In fact, given the comic's extensive and conscious use of manga tropes, his plot strands in later volumes can be seen as a tribute to or parody of the Harem Genre. Because of all the comedy confusions and general lack of communication (especially by Gary), a lot of these women end up as each others' unknown rivals from time to time.
    • At one point, he seems to have feelings primarily for Yuki, but there are multiple problems with this. Eventually, he finds that he can't tell her that he loves her with any conviction, and she drops him (possibly temporarily) because she recognises that she can't offer him satisfactory sex — but things are still somewhat open there, as Yuki's attempts to make the relationship viable continue. This drama runs in parallel with his interactions with other women (and men).
    • Sonya wants him, initially because of how Zii talks him up and later to annoy Yuki, and because of what she hears about his oral skills. She eventually gets him into bed, but soon drops him because of his general cluelessness, there and elsewhere. However, she later cheerfully exploits him for a booty call (actually as part of a scheme involving Yuki).
    • Kiley impetuously deflowers him, and looks at first to be heading for a relationship with him. She stops it before it really starts, for Yuki's sake, but later comics show that she hasn't entirely forgotten him.
    • DiDi and Amber both express strong interest in him, the former because she's heard about his oral sex skills, the latter because she's experienced them. Eventually, Amber closes the deal, but just the once, as it seems.
    • Chanelle's first personal interaction with him involves abortive fellatio; her second involves Amber in Three-Way Sex, as a favor for the latter (though she is soon very impressed by the Swirly-Go-Round).
    • Senna, fascinated by by his adorkability, sweeps him off on a date in Paris (joining the Mile-High Club on the way).
    • Peggy is pointed his way at one point, and eventually gets into a masked Three-Way Sex session with him. This leads to what she politely makes clear is a non-serious but very active Friends with Benefits relationship (involving a lot of butt play).
    • The keen dominatrix Tatiana, guesting in a crossover with Sandra on the Rocks, identifies him as "the perfect sub" within about five minutes of meeting him, and proceeds to investigate this phenomenon.
    • In the same crossover, Sandra becomes friendly with him while using him as a consultant on geek culture and a way to annoy Senna, although this may not develop beyond friendship.
    • Even Zii clearly feels twinges of curiosity about his oral skills, and eventually starts having to take cold showers after thinking about him — and while he mostly sees her as a friend, he is impressed and attracted when he sees her on stage. There are strong hints of Ship Tease here, and very possibility more.
    • And Dillon pursues him, despite supposedly knowing that it's hopeless. For that matter, Jordan teases him flirtatiously, and Matt, despite having little respect for him in sexual matters, keeps hallucinating his face and then finds it amusing to tease him with sexual contact and shared showers.
    • Or, to put it more briefly; the design for a poster promised as a stretch goal for the Kickstarter used to finance the printing of the comic's volume 6, entitled "Gary's Harem", features Gary, ten women, a guy in drag, and a cat. And it still misses out the woman who spanked him in Paris, and five unnamed female friends brought into his birthday celebration by Chanelle.
  • Vanity License Plate: It would seem that Zii's van's plates read "ZII".
  • Vapor Wear:
    • It seems that DiDi hardly ever bothers with a bra. It's amazing she can walk, let alone jog... She's shown to be wearing one in one strip, but she's in disguise there. Later, she's shown putting one on, but it turns out to be too small for her (strip #854, February 22, 2014, NSFW).
    • Zii seems usually to go braless as well, as does Kiley, but they're both notably small-busted and really don't need support.
  • Vomit Discretion Shot: DiDi and Sandra get drunk together and at least one of them ends up puking, judging by sound we see coming out of Zii's cellphone.
  • Voodoo Doll: It's only in a one-panel Imagine Spot, but Senna has what can safely be assumed to be a Sandra doll, showing that Gary knows something about her, at last subconsciously.
  • Vulgar Humor: Borderline. The comic's attitude toward sex can be described as "puerile shallowness" with much invocation of the Rule of Funny. But its fans tend to class this as frankness, and the approach tends to be good-natured and not usually reliant on the idea that someone somewhere might be shocked... then we get moments like accidental face-sitting or Gary peeing out the window.
  • Webcomic Time: As per Giz, only 4 weeks passed in the first two years the comic was running. There are subsequently a few faster time-jumps, but the trope is definitely strong here. For example, Gary is 29 when the comic starts; he turns 30 in strip #909, more than six years later.
  • We Will Use WikiWords in the Future: The process of portmanteau word creation is parodied in strip #756 (June 20, 2013, probably NSFW).
  • Wham Episode: The comic has a few of these, to various levels of Wham. Some fairly clear examples:
    • Zii gets a boyfriend who initially seems to have been set up as a one-night stand — and promptly embraces the idea of monogamy.
    • Gary loses his virginity — to someone whom he met barely an hour before.
    • A double instance near/at the end of volume 5: first, DiDi finally gets an opportunity to try Gary's oral talents — only to find not only that he's not home, but all his clean clothes are missing and no one knows where he's gone. Then, a few strips later, readers discover where he's gone; he's in Paris, for initially unclear reasons...
    • Strip #1361. Gary, after getting hooked up in a particularly uncomfortable sexual situation involving Tracy and James, finally says "No" to them and barges out. Considering what an Extreme Doormat he was up until that point, this is a moment of Character Development on par with him losing his virginity.
  • What Did I Do Last Night?: Several characters have been known to come round from binges with dim and worrying memories of the night before...
    • ...but Sandra is a natural sufferer from the problem. She even invokes the trope title in strip #302 (May 17, 2010, NSFW).
    • Also, Zii, Yuki, and Sonya wake up in a very confused state with uncertain memories the morning after their band's first gig, which leads to some complications. They actually just jumped in a pool and then ditched their wet clothes. By the time Zii puts this together, Sonya and Yuki are having sex anyway.
  • What Does She See in Him?: Several characters understandably wonder quite how Gary comes to attract quite so many hot women. Matt gets obnoxiously jealous, and Zii is driven nearly insane by the question — even or especially when she’s given the primary answer, which is Gary’s reputation as a cunilingus master, because she’s the one character in the comic who seems to realise quite how implausible the whole swirly-go-round idea is.
  • What the Hell, Hero?: The comic features a few of these, in highly variant forms, as it's a bit short on heroes:
    • DiDi gets one from Zii when she tries to scare Kiley away so that she can get a chance at Gary, forgetting about Matt as well as being unfair to Gary and Kiley.
    • She gets another from the same source, in short form, when Yuki accuses her of trying to steal Gary.
    • Chanelle points out Amber's mistake in letting Gary go when she had a chance there.
    • Dillon calls out Gary for nearly cheating on Yuki with Amber after finding out that Gary and Yuki are dating. (After being cheated on himself, Dillon doesn't want Gary to do that to Yuki.) He also calls out Amber for trying to seduce Gary. (The implications get a little complicated there, though. Amber protests that Yuki isn't a good girlfriend to Gary, but Dillon dismisses her, saying that of course Gary wouldn't be dating Yuki if they didn't love each other. Gary then stuns both of them by admitting that he doesn't know, since no one has ever asked him that before.)
    • And then there's Peggy's briskly efficient takedown of Zii (and DiDi) for breaking Sonya's heart.
  • Wig, Dress, Accent: Parodied at least twice:
    • First when Sonya wants to take Peggy to a concert where she can seduce Gary, without giving away the fact that Peggy isn't in a relationship with herself. (It's complicated...) Sonya, not the brightest character in the strip, suggests a (horrendous) wig and (too-)dark glasses. Peggy, suffering from being the Only Sane Woman, lampshades the problems with the idea.
    • Also in strip #930 (September 20, 2014, NSFW), when a squad of porn stars, offered one swirly each by Gary, decide that they want more.
  • Will They or Won't They?:
    • Throughout the comic's run, Gary's relationship with pretty much anyone, especially Zii, DiDi, Sonya, and Yuki, often ends up invoking this trope. Sometimes, the question is eventually answered, and sometimes it isn't.
    • Notably, during the last few volumes of the comic’s run, Gary and Zii are clearly developing an increasing mutual attraction, complicated by the facts that (a) Gary thinks that Zii is out of his league, (b) Zii thinks of Gary as a hopeless geek and little brother figure, and (c) they are both usually involved with other people (not that this tends to stop anyone in this comic). But then the comic ends. The creators have acknowledged that they set the pairing up as a serious possibility, but then decided not to do anything with it — but the fact that the option is never even discussed and rejected in the comic left it looking like an annoying dangling plot thread.
    • At some points, the trope also manifests in the relationships between DiDi and Sandra and DiDi and Matt, too.
  • Wingding Eyes:
    • Yuki's eyes become spirals when she goes into "TENTACLLLLES!" mode.
    • Hearts appear in various characters' eyes at various times. In this comic, they sometimes indicate raw lust rather than love, as here.
    • Stars sometimes appear to show that a character is starstruck by someone else (as here) or dreaming of stardom.
  • With Friends Like These...: It's probable that without Zii in his life, Gary would still be surrounded mostly by gay men (though logically he might eventually have had a run-in with Amber, and maybe even Senna). However, some of the things Zii does (such as preventing DiDi from having Pity Sex with him) raise the question of whether she ever actually intends to go through with her promise of getting him laid. At best, she tries when she remembers, but gets distracted rather often. (Although she does eventually make herself useful.) In fact, when he does make progress, the encounters are often NOT set up by Zii: First Senna, then Amber, and crucially Kiley — while Sonya, who Zii does throw at Gary, quickly dumps him as not her type (especially as she's more interested in Zii).
  • Wound Licking: Exploited by Zii. When she burns her tongue with hot coffee, she tells the attractive waitress Sonya that they need to apply saliva on the burn, and the best way to do that is making out. Sonya doesn't realize Zii has saliva in her own mouth.
  • Wrong-Name Outburst:
    • DiDi, who has trouble keeping track of her countless boyfriends, is prone to calling them by the wrong name at any time, including moments of passion. They generally forgive her, because she's DiDi, but it's rough on them. See, for example, strip #462 (June 08, 2011; NSFW).
    • Matt is peculiarly prone to having his sexual partners call out Gary's name, somewhat to his cost in mental stability:
      • First, DiDi does this, traumatizing him so badly that he requires professional treatment. (Strip #590, April 19, 2012; NSFW.)
      • Peggy later does the same, due to a genuine if weird case of comedic Mistaken Identity. This time, he decides it's an auditory hallucination, until they discover the mistake. (Strip #898, June 12, 2014; NSFW.)
  • You Knew What You Signed On For: When Yuki wallops Gary with a plushie for feeling up Sonya, and he asks Zii for help, Zii drops this on him.
  • You Can Leave Your Hat On:
    • When the irate DiDi wants to discuss their current problems with Sandra, she drags her into the nearest bar, because she needs a drink or three. Unfortunately, neither of them notices that it's a strip club. Because it's that sort of comic, in the ensuing sequence of (mostly NSFW) strips, they both find themselves on stage (briefly), then DiDi ends up in the club's shower with some of the dancers and Zii, and then DiDi and Zii both go home wearing breakaway stripper costumes, which are accidentally demonstrated to Gary.
    • Sonya possesses a killer bod, a Serious Business approach to seduction, a musician's sense of rhythm, and a love of the dramatic. Hence, she's perfectly willing to use striptease as a way to achieve results, and does so at least twice — once on Gary (when seeking to out-compete Yuki) and once on Yuki (largely to score a point). Neither scene goes entirely to her plan, but that's not for want of Sonya trying.
  • Your Door Was Open: Matt, despite his tendency to have sex in his front room with just about anyone, has the Canadian habit of leaving his front door unlocked. This often leads to people, including Matt's current lovers, finding out about his latest sexual relations while they're happening.

    In fact, the habit among many of the characters of leaving their doors unlocked, leading to them being interrupted during sex or otherwise while naked, came to be regarded among fans as one of the comic's mainstay Running Gags, going back to the very first strip, in which Gary walks in on Matt and Dillon. This is acknowledged in the very last strip, when the thoughtful Peggy carefully locks the door before having sex with Gary — only for Matt and Dillon, who still have keys, to walk in anyway.note 
  • Zany Scheme: A recurrent comedy device in this comic. Some examples by character:
    • Zii likes to think of herself as a great manipulator, but most of the time, she just improvises her way out of difficulties, and sometimes she makes things worse rather than better. For example, she brings Yuki into band rehearsals to disrupt Sonya's attempts to seduce her, but that of course brings Yuki into the band — which Zii had been specifically trying to avoid. Her schemes aren't usually wildly zany, but they're rarely as clever as she thinks.
    • Sonya is, as she says herself, fulla great plansh... uh, full of bright ideas — except that she's none too bright. Putting Peggy in a heavy wig and dark glasses to seduce Gary would just be one notable example.
    • For that matter — Peggy's Operation: Jealousy scheme on behalf of Sonya may be quite well-designed in itself, but it has to involve Sonya.
    • Tatiana's experiment to determine whether or not Gary really is "the perfect sub" tips over the edge into lunacy. It actually sort-of-works on its own terms, though, despite her failure to cover some details.

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