The Adventures Of Dr Mc Ninja / Tropes A to C

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Tropes A-C (you are here)

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Tropes H-K HERE!

Tropes L-O HERE!

Tropes P-S HERE!

Tropes T-Z HERE!

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A

• Above Good and Evil: What Mitzi believes the ideal ninja should be. Somebody's got to be available to assassinate people on both sides.
• Achilles' Heel: or, more specifically, Achilles' Right Butt Cheek Frans Rayner has one; and he has the ability to relocate it. ^note It was in his right butt cheek when he battled Dan for the leadership of the Ninja school they both attended. In "D.A.R.E. To Resist Ninja Drugs And Ninja Violence Part 2" Dr McNinja discovers that Frans has moved it to his left eyebrow. What makes Dr McNinja particularly threatening to him is his ability to identify its location. In the "Army Of One" story, it was revealed that Rayner relocated his vulnerable spot to his leg before it was amputated, so he doesn't have one anymore.
• Action Mom: Mitzi, a rare example who is entirely willing to sacrifice her children if necessary, although in the specific example in question it was to save him from a Fate Worse than Death.
• Affably Evil: King Radical. Sure, the guy's a crime boss, but he's so cool most normal people don't even mind.

• The Ahnold: Frans Rayner, although his backstory actually hews closer to The Jean-Claude Van Damme or The Chuck Norris. Geographically, he'd be more like the Dolph Lundgren. Doctor McNinja himself (minus the accent) in the "Army Of One" story arc.
• All Myths Are True: And will show up in certain arcs if they get so much as a passing mention.
• Alt Text: Musings on the story, a pithy phrase, the punchline to the strip or even little stories are all stuck in here. It can generally be assumed that even if the strip itself does not contain a joke, the Alt Text will. Chris will also bitch about how hard pirate hats are to draw whenever there are pirates, because perspective is difficult with their odd shape. He hates trees too.
• Alucard: Lampshaded. It's pretty easy for the Doctor to figure out who "Mr. Alucard" is. It's not as obvious for Benjamin Franklin II, which brings us to an arc that was almost 2 years long. Doc's reaction says it all.
• American Eagle: The White House is guarded on the astral plane by a bound spirit in the form of an anthropomorphic bald eagle. However, it's implied that his true form is a cephalopoid Eldritch Abomination and he plans to take horrific revenge when he breaks free of his binding.
• And I Must Scream:
  • The Mummy curse. Your body slowly and gradually turns to dust. Doc says all your molecules are still alive and sentient, so the cursed one would live eternally, but without body speak of, and his/her consciousness spread all over the world.
  • Sparklelord's fate was to be eternally trapped in a Stable Time Loop, repeating the same events for all time. Doc sprung him so he could stop King Radical.
• And Knowing Is Half the Battle: "Doctor McNinja's Final Thoughts" at the end of every chapter. Spoofed all to hell, as you may have guessed.
• Animal Wrongs Group: Gordito's father was assassinated by PETA. To be fair, his closing act was pretty brutal.
• Antagonist in Mourning: After Dr. McNinja fakes his death, King Radical muses that he was one of the few radical things about Cumberland.
• Anticlimax:
  • Discussed in the Alt Text fairly frequently. Here's an example. Here's another.
  • After many years of being a sworn enemy of the McNinjas, Rayner finally dies (for real) when Dan casually walks up behind him and breaks his neck. Dracula doesn't do much better. He's been vampireing it up for hundreds of years—and just got done bragging about it—when Sean hacks one of his portals to send him to a desert... the bright sunlight instantly vaporizes him.
• Anti-Hero: Doctor McNinja's a hero, no doubt about it, but he's kinda vicious about his methods. The unicorn motorcycle, Sparklelord, advanced those tendencies into outright villainy.
  • A good chunk of this ends up coming from his unhealthy obsession with taking down King Radical until Radical is finally beaten. His friends, especially Gordito, easily notice this, and after the Sparklelord incident, Gordito actively starts shunting Doc back on the right track whenever his obsession gets to him.
• Anti-Villain: King Radical. Sure he's the head of a nefarious crime ring and he's definitely hiding something but all of his actions benefit the community, and he seems to be in it primarily for the fun of it. He's later revealed to be working on an actual Evil Plan, but even that has a bit of moral greyness in it, as in saving something at the expense of something else. By the end, though, he's become enough of an evil jerk not to count any more.
  "Ah, I remember when I got letters from readers defending King Radical. No more." —Alt Text to "The End, Part 2", comic 97
• Anyone Can Die: Word of God is that as the Grand Finale is in motion, nobody is safe. Ultimately subverted though. Of the heroes, only Farmer McNinja dies and in a Heroic Sacrifice. All the heroes manage to make it out okay while the villains (save possibly for McBonald) are killed one by one.
• Apathetic Citizens:
  • The residents of Cumberland, Maryland don't particularly care when the mayor installs a citywide anti-zombie system, and a rampaging Paul Bunyan is treated by the police as ordinary police work, not worthy of exceptional notice. Now dinosaurs, that is taking it too far. Which makes one wonder how they took it in the future when intelligent space dinosaurs have occupied Earth.
  • When Doc surfs out of the sky on a robotic laughing Dracula, the main reaction is being offended because he gives the finger while doing so.
• Apocalypse How: Class 4 or 5 in the fourth time line. Played for Laughs.
• Archnemesis:
  • Parodied with the "Birdosaurus", whom the Doctor considers one just for being so annoying.
    Doctor McNinja: I hate you. I hate you so much. I will hunt you down forever. When you die, my laughter will be so bright, it will be the last thing you will hear, see, smell and feel.
  • More seriously, Frans Rayner, movie star and professional ninja killer, could claim the title against the Doctor for a few stories. Later, he becomes a Degraded Boss^note Yes, it's a video game trope, and yes, it totally applies here anyway, and King Radical steps in as a world-threatening greatest enemy.
  • Sparklelord and King Radical are also each other's arch-enemies. The Radical people invaded Sparklelord's lands and changed him physically against his will with magic, and in return he betrayed them and mostly destroyed the Radical Lands until being banished to another world by King Radical.
  • In the last stories, the Doctor becomes cursed and immediately gets most of his important old enemies and rivals so angry at him that they all decide killing him is their top priority, so basically he becomes the Archnemesis to all of them. Naturally enough, they form a Legion of Doom.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Sean calling Gordito out here
  • Sparklelord is described as a combination of "Genghis Khan, Adolf Hitler, atomic bombs and Seabiscuit."
• Art Evolution: The comic has evolved from black and white to computer-shaded black and white to color. It has also gone through several colorists, and each change was noted in the Alt Text.
• Artifact of Doom:
  • The much-mentioned motorcycle, which was actually a crazed unicorn warlord with mind-control powers. Can't forget the mind-control powers.
  • World-ending Mayan tennis machine, anyone? Averted.
• Artistic License – Law:
  • When the Vice President admitted to an assassination attempt on President Funkhouser because he wanted to be president she says he's going to be exiled for treason. To be found guilty of treason he'd have to either levy war against the U.S. or give aid and comfort to enemies of the U.S. Additionally they'd need two witnesses to an overt act or for him to confess in an open court. Dangling from the fist of a Humongous Mecha probably doesn't count as open court. Regardless, Funkhouser bypasses this particular problem by throwing him into space.
• Artistic License – Military: Lampshaded when absolutely no attempt is made to accurately depict a submarine's operations.
  Submarine Captain: Do all that stuff we have to do to shoot at him and then FIRE TORPEDOES!
• Artistic License – Paleontology: Various dinosaurs appear on the scene. No attempt is made to make them faithful depictions of real dinosaur species. Alt Text reinforces MST3K Mantra to the fullest.
• Ascended Extra:
  • Bearclaw in the main webcomic, and Beeman in the back-up story for the third print volume.
  • Archibald, King of the Hobos, originally a character conceived for a t-shirt, became an In-Universe character and mayor of Cumberland.
• Asshole Victim: Something of a running gag thus far is invoking this trope in an increasingly forced or unlikely way, after the good doctor becomes responsible for their death somehow.
  • Invoked by King Radical who has surrounded himself with an army of jerks and the absolute worst people he can find, because he intends to kill them and replace them with citizens of the Radical Lands.
• As the Good Book Says...: "Physician, heal thyself!"
• As You Know: "Oh. Thanks for catching us all up on that. We all knew it. But thanks."
  • A hilariously blatant example. Chuck claims to have known all of that on the next page.
  • Gordito, who lived through the events, deals with this with his uncles.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Persons who contract Paul Bunyan's Disease turn into fifty-foot-tall lumberjacks. The disease is weaponized in "Futures Trading".
• Author Avatar: Ron Wizard, Hasting's City of Heroes character, is King Radical's court magician.
• Awesome, but Impractical: Frans Rayner has a bionic laser eye, which is incredibly lethal. Unfortunately it lacks an external power source, and so burns his own calorie reserves for fuel. Even one shot is enough to render him unable to fight.
• Awesomeness Is a Force: In "A Cumberland Ninja in King Radical's Court", Doc discovers that King Radical is attempting to channel the power of, well, "Radicalness", to open the portal to Radical Land. The more "rad stuff" King Rad does, the stronger the portal becomes. This is in part being used as a means of seemingly killing the lamest people in Cumberland, the creeps serving under King Radical and using them as gates for the people of the Radical Land.
• A Wizard Did It: What the Alt Text to the July 1st, 2011 news entry/fill-in comic implies.

B

• Back from the Dead: Ben Franklin, via cloning; the Doc himself, via invoking Only a Flesh Wound; Frans Rayner, thanks to Never Found the Body.
• Back-to-Back Badasses: Invoked as the only way to counter Frans Rayner's Inverse Ninja Law advantage during the Army of One arc.
  DOC AND THE DANE: TWIN FISTS OF FURY
  • Played straight in The End: Part 2 between Doc and Old McNinja. Unfortunately for Old they didn't have each other's backs as much as they thought.
• Badass Bandolier: Ron sports two of these. Their only use seems to be to look awesome. That is sufficient.
• Badass Boast: Doctor McLuchador woke up a giant crab monster from hibernation, and needed to put it back to sleep with a "large concussive blast". Unfortunately, it destroyed the tank and helicopter he had prepared to do that. So what next?
  McLuchador: I'm going to punch you very hard.
• Badass Bookworm: How can a ninja doctor not be one? His brother Sean is also one of these, though he's still hiding it from his parents.
• Badass Creed: Gordito borrows Roland's from The Dark Tower, impressing Dan - but not Sean, who's also read the books (though he refuses to admit it).
• Badass Labcoat: As worn by the good Doctor.
• Manly Facial Hair: Both Dan McNinja and Gordito sport impressive moustaches, considered remarkable in-universe. Dan's 'stache is always visible through his ninja mask (it has a hole especially for the mustache). This is important, because the moustache is, in fact, the outward expression of tremendous badassery and commands instant respect. This is why Dan was made the leader of the group and Rayner was sent away humiliated. Despite years of study and experimentation, Dan still doesn't have a concrete idea as to exactly why or how this works. Also, while Dan just sort of gets his via the power of being a McNinja, Gordito grows his through SHEER FORCE OF WILL. Fuck yeah. And he's still early into his puberty, lest we forget.
  • The Ultimate Diplomat has one, which is impressive, considering he's a dinosaur.
  • Can't leave out Ron Wizard who has a mustache large enough to put even Gordito to shame.
• Badass Pacifist: The Ultimate Diplomat, who makes hardened warriors and ninjas throw down their weapons with a single sentence.
• Bad Future:
  • The world's ruled by dinosaurs, humans get hunted for fun, and food for humans is definitely not made out of dead humans
  • There have been multiple Bad Futures, all averted thanks to Chuck Goodrich travelling back in time. Other ones include a Zombie Apocalypse caused by Ben Franklin's eternal life serum, and a Robot Uprising of vacuum cleaners. However, every time Chuck prevents one of these, it just shunts us into a new timeline where a different Bad Future will occur, and a different Chuck will come back to stop it.
• Bad News, Irrelevant News: Subverted.
  Dr. McNinja: I'm really sorry, but it looks like the test confirmed it, and your cancer is back. But I do have some good news.
  Patient: Didja save a bunch of money on your car insurance, Doc?
  Dr. McNinja: ... If any doctor were ever to say that they would lose their license immediately. Do you really think that's funny?
  Patient: It's a funny commercial on TV!
  Dr. McNinja: Is cancer funny to you? Is cancer funny to you?!
  Patient: I'm sorry.
  Dr. McNinja: You should be.
• Batman Can Breathe in Space: Sparklelord. Lampshaded and handwaved in the Alt Text.
• Batman Cold Open: Monster Mart begins with Doc and Gordito battling another giant lumberjack, this time with a giant blue ox. The book-only story Beyond Winter Wonderdome begins with Dr. McNinja battling fish-man Elvis impersonators.
• Battle Couple and Badass Family: Dan and Mitzi; the McNinja family as a whole. Probably includes Gordito, who's basically Dr. McNinja's adopted kid at this point. And maybe Judy and Yoshi, which means that this Badass Family includes a deinonychus velociraptor, a gorilla receptionist, and a Mexican kid with a mustache and guns. Meaning the ninjas are the normal part of the family.
• Battle in the Center of the Mind: Doc gets dragged into one during his fight with the third NASAghast.
• Beard of Evil: Victor, along with being Obviously Evil.
• Benevolent Architecture: Lampshaded here and now the page imae too!
• Benevolent Boss: a plot point that foils the McNinjas using stealth. In the sky pirate arc the captain's insistence that recapturing the doctor is worthy of a bonus causes him to start verifying the identity of the crew in front of him when he asks their names so he can make a note on the roster. He gives the benefit of the doubt that he simply can't find 'Johnson' the name given by one of the McNinjas, but finds Neville Johnson on the roster. Then the real Neville Johnson pipes up that that's him and he's the only Johnson on the ship.
• Berserk Button: Quite a few going around.
  • It's generally not the best idea to threaten the friends of an expy of the Hulk.
  • The Birdosaurus is this for Doc.
• Beware the Nice Ones: When the dolphins finally get you to land, don't stick around to thank them. (Of course, that's because they're getting revenge for this.)
• Beware the Silly Ones: While King Radical's intentions have always been somewhat questionable, there was at least some wacky element to them. Then he blows up Congress.
• Big Bad: One each arc. The Big Bads seen so far and the story arc they first appeared in: Donald McBonald (Issue One Half), Pirates (So what IS a McNinja?), the Jet Pack Man (There is a Raptor in My Office), Frans Rayner (D.A.R.E To Resist Ninja Drugs and Ninja Violence Parts 1 and 2), Dracula and the Ghost Wizard (Punch Dracula), Robster (Monster Mart), Sparklelord (Doc Gets Rad), the President of the Human/Dinosaur Alliance (Futures Trading), King Radical again (A Cumberland Ninja in King Radical's Court).
• Big Damn Heroes: Archibald's Mummy pulls one in "All The King's Dirtbikes and All The King's Men".
• Big Entrance: Dr. McNinja makes a pretty good entrance here, mainly as a Shout-Out to Batman.
• Bilingual Bonus: On this page, the first three lines of runes can be translated to "This sphinx will shoot fucking laser eyes if you". The rest of the sentence and text is covered up, though the next part might be "donat [sic] answer the question right," whereas the rest is too covered to read, though it has repetitions of the word "fat".^note The whole visible part goes "This sphinx will shoot fucking laser eyes if you donat a ... estion rig ... fat in ... ht ... lly fat a ... en eats a ... e fat ge ... la eve ... is ... st"
• A Birthday, Not a Break: A Meta example. The comic tends to celebrate its anniversaries by inflicting some misfortune on the Doctor. The End: Part 1 finally subverts this by bailing him out of a nasty predicament instead.
• Bittersweet Ending: The comic finally ends with the Dr. McNinja faking his death, estranged from his family, unable to trust them ever again and his family most likely never being able to know what he looks like due to finally taking off his mask. Although most of his enemies are dead or gone, most of his friends are still alive and now he is able to start a new life as a normal doctor, finally free from the obligation to be Doctor McNinja. And everything bad it entails (not to mention the curse from the Ghost Wizard.
• Bland-Name Product: McBonald's angers Doc by selling the McNinja burger and are at it again when everyone believes the good Doctor to be dead.
• Bloodier and Gorier: The epic battle at the end of "Army Of One]."] Due to there being many, many identical combatants, [[spoiler:all of them being Dr. McNinja clones, it isn't necessary to keep them all alive and in one piece for the story to continue. Plus they're all clones made from an older and less effective cloning technology.
• Bloody Hilarious: Gordito fails his skill check.
• Blood Knight: Dan McNinja would even kill the little boy giant lumberjack and turn his body into a roof. Doc increasingly shows hints of being as Ax-Crazy as him but occasionally feels bad about it.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: Citizens of the Radical Empire aren't concerned with our concepts of "Good" and "Evil". They just care about how cool something is. Invading a forest and twisting the forest creatures to fit their ideals of what's cool? Neat! Attacking the military with a ghost powered Humongous Mecha built from the city, killing huge numbers of people in the process? Totally awesome!
• Body Horror: The comic has two good examples of this.
  • "[He] has a disease that turns his butt into a spider at night."
  • The deadly curse of the mummy.
• Boring, but Practical: Doc invokes the trope during a fight with Radical when King Radical uses Chainsaw Good against a simple sword, saying that his sword is an actual weapon while King Radical's weapon is meant for cutting wood and that things don't have to be exciting to be better.
• Brain Drain: King Radical and his Mafia prevent the brain drain from occurring in Cumberland, MD, by encouraging high school and college graduates to stay in the area. Very strongly encouraging.
• Break the Haughty: The End is turning into this for Dr. McNinja himself. After so many years of arrogant behavior on the virtue of trying to be Batman and failing to learn any concrete lessons, his lack of tact and strategy has finally caught up with him.
• Breaking and Bloodsucking: "Why a Gorilla" begins with a vampire, in mist form, entering the bedroom of a sleeping blonde woman. It turns out it's Doc in a wig, who promptly stakes the vampire and kicks him out the window.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: "Dr. McNinja's Final Thoughts," in which he often delivers An Aesop a Spoof Aesop on the events of the previous chapter.
  • "I don't like adressing mature issues in my comic."
• Breather Episode: "Judy Gets a Kitten." Subverted. Then double subverted, so everything's okay.
• Brick Joke: The "Birdosaurus" that the Doctor off-handedly punched keeps coming back at the most inconvenient times. It's getting close to being a Running Gag.
  • Acknowledged by the Doc himself, here
  • The throwaway one-liner about Peg Faces comes back in the background of a frame a few issues later.
  • Ninjas can't catch you if you're on fire, not even the McNinjas.
  • The dolphins get revenge.
• Bring My Brown Pants: Martin Monster threatening a mobster with "psychic powers" while activating some Red Eyes, Take Warning results in this.
• Bullet Catch: Rocket-propelled grenade catch, actually.
• But Now I Must Go: In the end, Dr. McNinja saves the U.S President and the world. But since his family "turned" on him (Since they were willing to kill him at the behest of Franz who, at the time still having control of the military, threaten to shoot them otherwise), he estranges himself from them and heads off to parts unknown with no goodbyes as part of their ninja code. The upside though, he can now leave behind his life as a ninja and commit full time to being a doctor.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Doc. The man is a great doctor, but he'll wear a ninja mask the whole time he's treating you. As an aside, he has even "disguised" himself as another doctor with the mask still on. The administrators of the hospital in question have gotten tired of this routine.

C

• Call-Back: The comic really likes to do this, especially in the later chapters.
  • In one comic, a demon kills half of Gordito's classmates, their heads exploding as the result of a spell they were being used as Human Sacrifices for. The Alt Text says "Don't worry, all their heads grow back in the next story. (Honest!)". Sure enough, In All the King's Dirtbikes and All the King's Men, Gordito says that his classmates' heads have been growing back funny.
  • In "The End", Doc receives a call from his lawyer, Brad, who last appeared on the 4th page of the 0th issue, almost a decade prior.
  • In "D.A.R.E.", Dan sets himself on fire to escape the drug ninjas and says ninjas can't catch you if you are on fire. The comic's associated store page sells a t-shirt with the same phrase, depicting 3 ninjas standing off from a guy on fire. In "The End" part 2, a bunch of pirates get set on fire and die. But one turns out to be so tough that he survives and comes after the ninja family while still on fire. The ninja family then proceeds to express confusion saying that they can't catch him, while in the exact same pose as the t-shirt.
  • In "The End: Part 2", Doc finally lives out the moment in time he saw in Futures Trading, where he's hiding in a building while a voice from outside threatens to have it bombed if it doesn't come out.
  • Franz Rayner ends up becoming the president.
  • He survives the bombing by stealing a uniform from a guard named Jonesy. All the way back in the second issue he had stolen a uniform from a guard named Convery killing him, and after his cover was blown proceeded to kick another guard named Jonesy in the face. Convery and the second Jonesy both looked quite similar to each other (due to being based on the likeliness of Chris Hastings) and both ended up dead. Because of the Law of Conservation of Detail, it's possible that both Jonesy's were the same person.
  • The Finale has the Doctor, finally taking off his mask after feeling like everything has turned against him and there is no hope at all. Just like what his father told Gordito, and true to Dan's word. Absolutely nobody is sure if they'll ever see him again or will even recognize him.
  • From the last page, all the way back to the second: "We don't hire night janitors."
• Calling Me a Logarithm: Narcomancy, which isn't really a word, no.
• Captain Ersatz:
  • Parodied mercilessly with Beeman in-universe.
  • Dr. McLuchador. Somewhat justified as he is actually McNinja in disguise, and the real McLuchador died a while ago. Somewhat less justified in that this meant there really was still a Doctor McLuchador.
• Car Fu: A lot to go around in the comic. As well as Bike Fu.
• Cast from Calories: Frans Rayner comes back from the dead as a Hollywood Cyborg with a single laser eye. But this laser eye is powered by his organic body—and it uses so much energy that a single shot leaves him too tired to stand and leaves him delirious and disoriented.
• Casual Danger Dialogue: "There is a raptor in my office."
• Catch a Falling Star: Lampshaded here: "Thank you for saving me, Superman.". Played straight here, though.
• The Cavalry: Several in "Futures Trading." First, the Nasaghast returns, and saves Chuck from certain death at the hands (er, claws) of a raptor. Then, a few pages later, who comes in to bust the Doctor and Sean out of a tight spot? Yoshi! Then, at the climax, Dracula and his moon laser.
• Cerebus Syndrome: With the utter destruction of the US Capitol Building, King Radical jumped from "wacky alternate universe savior" to "brutal terrorist", and dragged the series into a very dark, very scary new light.
• Chainsaw Good. Chainsaw nunchuck, even better.
• Chandler's Law: Problem: you have a whole family of ninja performing a rescue, but pirates aren't much of a challenge, and you can't send the ninja in because they're already there. Solution: send in the UBER-ninja.

• Charles Atlas Super Power: The organic muscle jetpack. And to a lesser degree, almost everything the Doctor does, ever.
  • Frans Rayner, whose perfect body control allows him to move around weak points in his body and survive a fall onto rocks from lethal heights by rerouting vital organs out of the way.
  • Also, Bruce Lee, who jumped to the Moon.
• Chekhov's Gag: Too many to count, but this deserves special mention. (Don't spoil it if you haven't already read up to there - it's the sort of joke that takes years to mature.)
  • Eventually becomes something of a boomerang brick.
  • There's also an arc-long example in There Is A Raptor In My Office. "But I have diabeeeeeteeees."
  • In the Alt Text here, Chris mentions that he was disappointed with King Radical's entrance, and decides to have skateboarding trumpeters announce his presence next time. They do.
  • Dan McNinja boasts that he absorbed the poison from his wife's picked beets so that he'll later be able to shoot it from his eyes, "Like a toad." He does just that later on.
  • King Radical saying he was going to use a special warhead to blow up an orphanage. He was, just not with the kids inside because he was having a new one built on the old site. (The warhead is a special, non-atomic version which blows stuff up without the messy elements of radiation and half-life; instead, it gives beards to the people who behold the explosion).
  • There's a double at the end of "Revenge of the Hundred Dead Ninja". One is an in-story reference when he catches the baby launched by the anti-zombie system, the other in the alt text calls back to "There Is A Raptor In My Office".
  • In the alt text of this page it alludes to making Doc's brother the protagonist once Doc is dead. Cut to "Futures Trading", where Doc is thought to be dead...
  • A character invented as an alternate explanation of something McNinja said in the alt text here and here becomes something real here.
  • We have Mikey, cured by Doc, but forever unable to grow a beard. 6 years worth of webcomics later, we visit Mikey again in the dinosaur infested future, where we see Mikey get dumped once again.
  • In the Alt Text of this page, Hastings comments "I think I'll have [the birdosaurus] stalk Doc forever now." Sure enough, four books later...
  • Dark Smoke Puncher hides all sorts of rocket launchers in his truck. Hee hee! On a related note, if it did explode, how awesome would it be?
• Chekhov's Gun: Very frequent. If, early on in an arc, an ability is explained or an obstacle brought up that forces the protagonists to take a different route to solving their problems, you can bet the ability will be required and the obstacle will have to be dealt with in spite of all efforts to the contrary.
  • Doc's ability to punch ghosts by humming the Ghostbusters theme appeared several story arcs before again becoming vital in his fight with the Nasaghasts.
  • Paul Bunyan's Disease.
  • Remember way back here when we found out that Dracula has a moon laser? It just got important in "Futures Trading".
  • Remember the cloaking device King Radical used to disguise himself as a cop? He put it to better use.
  • The Inocktec technology was probably due to time travelers. Time travelers indeed.
  • Way back at the conclusion of DARE Part 2, Doc explains that one power hungry jerk couldn't become president and take over the whole government unless they also killed the legislative and judicial branches. President Radical took this advice to heart.
  • Doc's first name being a secret is mentioned a few times, including Why A Gorilla? and Army of One. This is later explained during the encounter with the ghost wizard (Mentioned in Army of One) during the First Generation Ninja American arc. We learn Dr. McNinja's true name, Patrick, is used to complete a the Wizard's Curse at the conclusion of The End: Part One with an assist from Sparklelord
  • The summoning device from "First Generation Ninja American" isn't actually used until two arcs later, where it's used to summon Sparklelord.
• Chekhov's Gunman:
  • Well, lookie here.
  • The The lawyer is back with a name.
• The Chew Toy: Doc just can't catch a break some days.
• The Chosen One: Every future so far has some disaster that will doom humanity, and every time Chuck Goodrich. is chosen to go back in time and stop it. Subverted, however, in that all he's accomplished is to create parallel realities where the disaster doesn't happen, not save his own. Up to and including the Radical Land.
• Christmas Miracle: Katanakka Miracle, anyway.
• Church Militant: The Roman Catholic church is surprisingly badass, hiring the McNinja clan as mercenaries to stop a ghost wizard and providing holy relics for them to use as weapons, including a substantial chunk of the True Cross, nunchaku made from the bones of Mother Teresa, the holy shurikens Doc uses against the Nasaghasts — and bullets blessed in the Pope's mouthwash for Gordito's gun.
  • Taken about as far as it can possibly go when Dr. McNinja is able to use Pope Francis as a weapon. Yes, really.
• City of Adventure: Cumberland. Considering the town family doctor is a ninja superhero, this isn't too surprising.
• Classical Movie Vampire: Dracula himself looks just like Bela Lugosi.

• Clingy MacGuffin: The evil horsie ridden by Ben Franklin after he turns into a Headless Horseman
• Clone Army: Frans Rayner had a shoddily-made army of Dr. McNinja clones produced in order to invoke Conservation of Ninjutsu on the original.
• Clone by Conversion: King Radical's plan turns out to be doing this on a massive scale (more specifically converting people into the inhabitants of the Radical Lands, where he came from).
• Clone Angst:
  • Mostly averted with Benjamin Franklin II, who is basically a continuation of the original Franklin in a new body. Also averted with Dr. McNinja's own clones from college; they seem to consider themselves one person with multiple bodies and are happy to merge with him once their tasks are complete.
  • On the other hand, Old McNinja's clones show brief signs of individuality before they get slaughtered. But again, they were made with inferior cloning technology which is why they were both less clever than the doctor and Old as well as Made of Plasticine

• Code Name: The McNinja family. Dan and Mitzi have since gone back to their original names; Sean's is "Dark Smoke Puncher."
• Comes Great Insanity: According to the doctor, one side effect of possessing an organic jetpack is insanity due to lack of oxygen.
• Compelling Voice: Tyranoman, the Ultimate Diplomat is capable of getting people to drop their weapons simply by disapproving. A mere compliment from him left the Doctor himself weak on his knees.
• Computer Equals Monitor: Spoofed here.
• Conflicting Loyalty: In one arc, McNinja's dual urges to kill and heal become externalized in the form of his father needing him to battle the greatest threat to all ninja kind while simultaneously being asked by his mentor to help him complete an immortality serum.
• Conservation of Ninjutsu: A law of nature in the arc "An Army Of One"
  • It was also referenced years earlier in a throwaway gag involving ninja zombies, but nonetheless established as a real force in the McNinja universe.
• The Constant: There will always be a Charles "Chuck" Goodrich, who will always discover a time-space portal, and will always use it to try and prevent an apocalypse. Even in alternate universes, such as the Radical Lands.
• Continuity Creep: Issues One Half, One, and Two are one-shot stories, and other than a throwaway line in Issue Two they certainly don't make any less sense if one doesn't read the previous issues. Issue Three makes brief mention of Issue Two, but then near the end of the storyline has a plot point that makes absolutely no sense without having read Issue One Half. With Issue Four, a more-or-less continuous storyline starts, and from that point on it's written with the assumption that the reader has read previous issues.
• Continuity Nod: At one point in "So What Is A McNinja?" Doctor McNinja attacks a crew of pirates in the dark and (presumably) cuts off their faces. In "D.A.R.E To Resist Ninja Drugs and Ninja Violence" he encounters pirates with peg faces, noting they must have been among the ones he fought.
  • And of course, we can't forget this strip. Particularly, the alt text, which lists a specific other strip. Which one? Naturally, the one where he CALLED the exact method of death he'd deliver to the Big Bad.
• Cool, but Stupid: The Alt Text for this strip (in which Doc focuses his energy to fight ghosts by humming the Ghostbusters theme) reads, "Very stupid ideas taken very seriously. Dr. McNinja."
• Cool Shades: Many residents of the Radical Lands sport these, including the flying creatures and even the sun!
• Cool vs. Awesome: Oh my yes. When your protagonist is as cool as Doc, your antagonists have to be pretty good to keep pace.
  • This is also King Radical's strategy for making the world more Radical.
  • Ron Wizard cranks it up to eleven, he realizes that the biggest problem with King Radical's robot built from the city of Cumberland—not manufactured in Cumberland, actually made from the buildings in Cumberland—is that there's nothing cool for him to do with it, other than swatting away annoying military vehicles. He uses his magic to take the U.S. army tanks and fuses them into a giant T-Rex robot, piloted by the eyepatched, jet pack wearing, badass President of the United States of America in a giant-robot-on-giant-robot brawl.
• Corrupt Church: The location of King Radical's base. The reverend that runs it is essentially being bribed, trying to justify it by saying "Isn't it... God's wish that the world be more radical?". Needless to say, the superiors in his denomination are not pleased.

• Cosmic Horror Story: "We pray they ignore us, and we try our best not to attract their attention."
• Couldn't Find a Pen: In "Why a Gorilla?," a message is written in blood.
• The Coup: The Vice President and King Radical launch one against US President Maria Funkhouser in A Bad Enough Dude, poisoning her pheromones to cause everyone to attack her in a paranoid rage. However, we don't learn that they are responsible until ''Paleontologists, Politicians, and Prologue." King Radical is ultimately successful in replacing Funkhouser and he then wipes out U.S. congress to consolidate his power when they try to impeach him.
• Crazy-Prepared: Mayor Chuck Goodrich, who set up a zombie defense system in his town.
  • Subverted in that he's from the future and went back in time to stop the Zombie Apocalypse
  • Dr. McNinja has his barber on speed-dial for no other reason except that life is craaaazy. (He's not wrong.) The good doctor also has a bullet-proof clipboard.
• Crossover: With Axe Cop, a webcomic that matches this series in awesomeness.

• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Inverted with Doc, who could be better described as a Crouching Badass Hidden Moron.
• Cue O'Clock:
  • "We are on Eastern Pain Time, and it is Dan O' Clock."
  • "From Dan O'Clock to Dan Thirty, all mixed drinks are half-priced."
• Cue the Sun: At the end of Chapter 16, the Ultimate Diplomat's speech ushers in a new golden age of peace between human and dinosaur. As his oration comes to a close, the sun rises. To quote the Alt Text, it's symbolic as hell.
• The Cuckoo Lander Was Right: When giving exposition on Goodrich's extravagant anti-zombie plans, a panel shows a man mentioning a rumor that Goodrich is from a future where zombies and robots took over. That managed to be much more accurate on both counts than expected.
  • When McNinja decides to make King Radical his nemesis, he has no actual evidence that the King is anything more than he appears to be - a generally decent, if legally unfettered, person trying to make the world a "more radical" (and overall better) place to live, and many saner characters call him out on this. Turns out Radical was up to something sinister after all.
• Cure for Cancer: Dracula discovered it. And then he hid it on Mars as a private joke, thinking it will be hilarious when the rest of humanity figures it out for themselves.
• Curse Cut Short: They're visually bleeped out now, but this happened early on whenever Dr. McNinja said "motherf—" HE SAID A BAD WORD!

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