Webcomic / Gumball Warrior

All spoilers prior to "Grand Illusion" and supplementary artwork as a whole excluding ending spoilers are unmarked. You have been warned.

Meta Knight: I knew this day would come. It's futile, Kirby! Today's the day you finally sprouted wings.

—The first lines from "Flying Lessons."

These kids grow up so fast... ^note Clockwise from center: Little Meta, Little Arthur, Ekon, Little Nonsurat, Little Falspar, Little Dragato, Margalo.
Original image. Used with permission.

Gumball Warrior is an ongoing Kirby webcomic created by Rhylem. A saga that has lasted over 10 years, it serves as a prequel showing the childhood days of Meta Knight and the other Galaxy Soldier Army puffballs from Kirby: Right Back at Ya!. It tells the story of how Meta Knight and the rest of the puffball GSA members got to where they are by the beginning of the anime... In a Foregone Conclusion, Meta Knight's comrades would disappear fighting Holy Nightmare Enterprises and he would soon face hardships such as the deaths of Garlude and Knuckle Joe's Father, before eventually meeting up with Sword and Blade Knight as his bodyguards while eventually settling in Cappy Town. But, we're not talking about the anime here, nor ever will, because none of that ever happened.

Instead, Gumball Warrior takes things further by going beyond the events of the anime and showing Meta's comrades as they age further into adulthood and beyond, ending with their descendants. While Meta Knight is one of the primary focuses, Rhylem expands upon the GSA's past by introducing a slew of new characters, including their previous supervisors, the four teachers.

• Sir Bate: The main instructor who gets more screentime than the canon characters. The loss of his wife to the war and the death of his first student left him in a recluse state. The major focus is his character development and how it connects with Meta Knight, and how he was able to overcome those odds. Trains Meta Knight and Sir Authur.

• Sir Gordon: A Gordo that is also the weapons expert. He was born and raised in the Central Crux, and looked up to his father while growing up. He and Bate would later meet in the battlefield before forming a pact. Trains Sir Nonsurat.

• Sir Ramset: A Sasuke that is the explosives expert... and the Plucky Comic Relief. Ramset was also born in Central Crux as a slave, but later managed to escape to the outer planets. Partially deaf, but gets around with hearing aids. Trains Sir Dragato and Sir Falspar.

• Sir Gravel: A Busiket that lingers outside of town. Little is known about his past, and he helped out Ramset when he initially escaped the Central Crux. His circadian cycle causes him to hibernate in the winter. What lies behind his mask is unknown. The only one of the four teachers to not have a permanent student or adopted one of their own, but shares with Ramset intermittently.

The main story of Gumball Warrior is told in webcomic form and has a planned total of 14 chapters^note Actually 15 chapters, but "Speak No Evil" was scrapped and is currently a Missing Episode, with Chapter 15 currently ongoing plus a prologue chapter. It also consists of multiple one shots and short stories that all connect to the main one, and countless other fanart to boot. All of these make up the expanded universe of Gumball Warrior.

The works that are included in Gumball Warrior are the following.

Main Chapters

• Chapter 0: A Wish is Born (2017)
• Chapter 1: Operation Nonsuart (June 2012)
• Chapter 2: Dodge 'n Burn (September 2012)
• Chapter 3: The Bird and the Squid (December 2012)
• Chapter 4: Grand Illusion (March 2015)
• Chapter 5: Speak No Evil (Cancelled)^note Written in 2014, never got past the first page.
• Chapter 6: Pitch Me a Melody (December 2012)
• Chapter 7: Flowers For Atler (2018)
• Chapter 8: Torn Chapter (2013)
• Chapter 9: Guardian of the Stars (March 2014)
• Chapter 10: The Bird and the Knight (November 2014)
• Chapter 11: One Million Voices (July 2015)
• Chapter 12: A Series of Reunions (2019)
• Chapter 13: Pawns of War (2020)
• Chapter 14: Demons from The Past (2021)
• Chapter 15: A Matter of Time (2022)

Side Comics

• Through Sickness and Health
• A Shattered Ruby
• Breaking Tradition
• One Lonely Star (On hiatus)
• My Gentle Storm^note invokedCreated by one of Rhylem's close friends. Notably the only fan created content that is canon to Gumball Warrior.
• Forget me Not
• Flying Lessons^note Made of three individual pages loosely connected to each other, these three inital pages were the original pages that led to the main story of Gumball Warrior to be made.

Written stories

• Journey to South Nova
• The House on Top
• A Friend that Matters Most
• Personal Sacrifice (On Hiatus)
• It'll Take Your Breath Away
• The Outside World of Kalmari
• Son of Arthur
• A Frozen Leo's Return
• Through Sad Eyes

Gumball Warrior can be found on Rhylem's DeviantART profile here, however the comic is no longer being updated there. It also has its own dedicated site where the webcomic and other art pieces are constantly updated, which can be accessed here.

The Gumball Warrior series contains examples of:

A to C

• Abusive Parents: The Nova System is full of tales of many faces growing up from less than stellar childhoods. Pyrell, Tula, and Gravel had terrible upbringings when they were children and nearly escaped death countless times before reaching adulthood.
• Adaptation Distillation: The entire events of the anime never take place in this adaptation. It's implied that the events of the games still take place but are radically different thanks to the presence of original characters and the GSA puffballs.
• Adaptation Expansion: This takes Meta Knight's flashbacks of him in the Galaxy Soldier Army in the anime and expands upon it, while also giving the other puffballs the same backstory as him. It also gives the Star Warriors as a whole a Backstory and extensive lore about the canon characters predecessors, such as Gryll and Kirby's.
• Adaptational Explanation: Unlike in the anime, where the Star Warriors were wiped out during the Demon Beast war against Holy Nightmare Enterprises, here they still exist into the present day, but only barely. Paverok is behind the near extinction of the Star Warriors centuries ago in this universe. His corruption to Dark Matter and Zero caused him to go Ax-Crazy, murdering the guardians of his brothers and nearly exterminating the Star Warriors as a whole. Kelderon manages to survive the Star Warrior purge, and the Star Warriors slowly recover from this bottleneck over the years. In Gumball Warrior. Shieff's plan is to wipe out the remaining Star Warriors from existence by attempting to drive one of the last Star Warriors into committing suicide.
• Adaptation Name Change: The series uses the Japanese names of the Galaxy Soldier Army characters over the Dub counterparts.
• Adaptation Species Change: The Star Warriors in this universe consist exclusively of puffballs and other Kirby enemies instead of the Loads and Loads of Races version seen in the anime, though Knuckle Joe's Father, Garlude, Yamikage, and Kit Cosmos retain their appearances despite them being mostly Adapted Out.
• Adaptational Jerkass: Arthur as a child was more brash and mean spirited than the faithful leader of the GSA he would become in the anime. He would get into fights with Meta a lot and often made fun of him.
• Adaptational Job Change: Eventually inverted during the Time Skip saga. Unlike in the anime, the puffballs don't stay in the Galaxy Soldier Army for long. Once they hit adulthood, they eventually leave the army to focus more on starting families and living peaceful lives. Kirby however does join the GSA for life once he becomes an adult.
• Adaptational Location Change: The setting is switched over to an original planetary system called Nova and the Central Crux. This is where most of the canon characters spend their childhood years.
• Adaptational Nice Guy: Marx is made a friend of Kirby during his childhood years, but eventually disappears from his life during Tulok's childhood. It is implied that the events of Milky Way Wishes in Kirby Super Star still happen at one point, severing their relationship.
• Adaptational Sexuality: Falspar is revealed to be gay and later ends up with the Burning Leo Pyrell.
• Adaptational Timespan Change: A retconned example. In 2018, the ages of all the characters were divided by 100 to match human lifespans. Earlier works used the original analogue of characters living centuries as implied by Meta Knight in the anime.
• Adapted Out:
  • None of the anime characters other than Kirby's species show up in Gumball Warrior. The Star Warriors are still at war against Holy Nightmare Enterprises as Demon Beasts appear on the Nova system, but Nightmare remains an unseen entity while Dark Matter takes center focus. Subverted with Knuckle Joe's Father and Garlude, who are solely mentioned in passing being members of Pyrell's squad during his GSA days.
  • As for the Game characters, King Dedede only receives a passing mention during the time skip, while Bandana Waddle Dee never shows up at all... though Yams appears to be a Expy of him.
• A Day in the Limelight: No, Bate is not one of these, you may put your hands down. Ramset, Nonsurat, Atler, Ellie, and Gordon Jr. get focus chapters throughout the webcomic, those being "One Million Voices," "Operation Nonsurat", "Flowers for Atler," "The Bird and the Squid," and "Speak no Evil" respectively.
• Aerith and Bob: There are the usual names from the games and anime such as Kirby and Arthur. On the side of original characters, there are normal looking names such as Gordon, Ellie, Melody appeaing alongside unusual names such as Hiero, Paverok, Kelderon, Tulok, and Atticus.
• All There in the Manual: Many tidbits and info about the cast can be found in supplementary artwork and bios on Rhylem's DeviantART page and on the website of the webcomic. Each character also has their own artwork archive dedicated to them for people wishing to seek only certain artwork featuring that character.
• Alternate Universe: Natch. Aside from the main one, there are several offshoots of the Gumball Warrior Universe that are in different canons.
  • The main AU is Ellie either not being killed by Mara and Lucian or never being sent to war. Bate gets to meet his newborn children, Kade and Emma, and later raise a family with them. Kade and Emma would live to see Meta Knight and Arthur become Bate's students, though Atler is still Doomed by Canon, but not Melody, who lives to become Kade's guardian after he awakens as a Star Warrior. In his stead, due to Bate never undergoing a Heroic BSoD, he takes in Bantle as another student. Gera would also become one of Bate's students at one point, eventually starting a relationship with Kade.
  • Another AU is Bate never meeting Suna. In this continuity, Bate would remain with Atka growing up and become recluse. Gordon would never meet Bate and instead become a high ranking general in the war. Ramset would be recaptured and sent back to Central Crux since Kalmari Town remained a Squishy exclusive population, and likely would have never encountered Gravel, who is either killed in the landslide that costed him his arm or killed by his family over his taboo. Ellie would have formed a relationship with Elliot instead and bear his children. Most notably, the GSA puffballs would never enter the GSA army, instead living normal lives outside of Kalmari Town and never taking up the mantle of Star Warriors.
  • One AU has the GSA puffballs as adults, but the teachers sacrifice their lives to save them from a demon beast. This has Arthur suffer a Heroic BSoD and laments over how he was unable to save them, until his fellow classmates promise that they will always stay together no matter what. Notably this is the closest AU that possibly allows the anime to still happen.
  • One minor AU has Pyrell dying during Falspar's academy days, leaving the Star Warrior with regret, though he later makes up for it by visiting his friend's grave everyday.
  • One AU added is where the GSA puffballs and the teachers swapped roles, with the puffballs raising the young teachers. This has some changes however, including changing Ramset's backstory to feature Hiero and his yet to be seen mother more in depth, Gravel never losing his arm and remaining a Zoos instead of being a Busiket though at the cost of being mute for most of his teenage years. Bullet sacrificing himself during Gordon's childhood instead of when Gordon is an adult, and Bate never meeting Suna.
  • Another AU has Ramset living long enough to meet Tula while she is a child. In Canon, Ramset is the third of the mentors to pass away.
  • A Played for Laughs example is the "Living With Teacher" series, which has Bate exclusively take in Meta as his son during his childhood. Hijinks ensue.

• Alternate Universe Fic: If you thought that this was going to be a prequel story to the anime, Kirby initally being raised by a Birdon named Kana and later adopted by Meta Knight and Kesuk should be the point where it is certain that Kirby Right Back at Ya! never happens in this continuity. Notwithstanding that the Star Warriors aren't wiped out either. The events of the games happening are fair game however, but they aren't mentioned.
• Age Lift:
  • Kirby when first introduced. In the present day at the start of "Flying Lessons", Kirby is around 10 years old and has already sprouted wings.
  • Dyna Blade is made younger and becomes the guardian of Kirby. Guardians share the same age as their appointed Star Warrior and grow with them over time. Her original design from Kirby Super Star is instead used for her ancestor, Dyna Star, but her adult form appears as a cameo in one art piece as the true form of Gooey.
• Ambiguous Time Period: Most of the main plot of Gumball Warrior takes place in the past: year ???? as a Mythology Gag shout out to Kirby Super Star. Central Crux and West Nova feature mostly modern technology that would later be slowly introduced in Cappy Town in the anime by King Dedede, but there aren't any land vehicles other than implications of spacecraft and there are still vast uninhabited land between settlements. From the inital flashback seen in "Flying Lessons", the events of the series roughly takes place 34 years prior to the start of Kirby Right Back at Ya!, with the present day taking place 8 years after the anime. invokedWord of God says that the anime never happens in this universe.
• An Arm and a Leg:
  • Gravel loses one of his arms to a landslide that seperated him and Mara during his childhood.
  • Mara herself would lose one of her arms in the Wham Shot at the end of "A Series of Reunions" courtesy of Shieff.
• Art Evolution: Compare the illustrations from "Operation Nonsurat" made in 2012 and then see the latest artwork from the current year. The characters become more fluid, and focus is spent on detailed backgrounds and scenes. Zigzagged if you read the webcomic in chronological order. "A Wish is Born" uses the current designs of the cast, but the next chapter goes back to rougher, simpler artwork before playing it straight for the next 4 chapters. It goes back to the 2012 designs in "Pitch Me a Melody" before making a bump in art quality in "Flowers For Atler." Every Chapter starting with the "Torn" chapter steadily improves over time as they have been published in almost the proper order since.
• The Artifact: After the Whole Episode Flashback gimmick was dropped, the sole remainder of the original premise is kept at the beginning of each chapter of the webcomic: The Past: Year ????
• Ascended Extra: Many underused enemies from the Kirby series get their time to shine.
  • The Busiket and Sasuke enemies, which only appeared in Kirby's Dreamland 3 get representatives in the series. The former gets their own tribe that lives on North Nova, while important Sasuke members include Ramset, Tula, and Siku.
  • The Squishies have been in almost every Kirby game since the first one, but here they get an entire town called Kalmari Town. They also receive a redesign that makes them more bipedal.
  • The Elieel only appeared in Kirbys Dreamland 2 and Kirby's Dreamland 3, but gets a representative in Luna/Lucian. She is a focus character during Bate's teenage years and later would return for the closing chapters.
  • The Birdon enemies would become a major species in the series, serving as the guardians of Star Warriors.
  • The Zoos from Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards also get representatives, but not in the way that you think.
• Assassination Attempt: Bate and Meta are targetted by Lucian in the "Torn" chapter as the final intended victims in Shieff's revenge plot after the rest of Bate's loved ones were killed over the years. They survive the attack, but Bate is severely wounded in the process while fending off Lucian.
• Back for the Finale: After years of being brainwashed by Shieff to do his bidding as the Ax-Crazy Lucian, Luna reawakens from her control thanks to Atka at the end of "Pawns of War."
• Big Bad:
  • Shieff, FKA Tekel, one of the corrupted guardians of Lord Paverok.
  • Zero takes over as the main villain during the Time Skip saga.
• Big Good: The Dark Matter Null towards Bate and his friends, becoming critical to the plot in the last few chapters. He is the other corrupted guardian of Lord Paverok, Madar.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: The Demon Frog from the anime episode "Frog Wild" returns with a vengance. Bate temporarily falls to its control shortly after "The Bird and the Squid" which lands him back in the hospital at the start of "Grand Illusion" once it got worse.
  • Shieff would exploit this trope by using the Demon Frog to enthrall Luna to do his bidding, turning her into the murderous Lucian.
  • Bate falls to this AGAIN at the end of "Demons from the Past".
• Broken Pedestal: Shieff was Bate's mentor during his teenage years living in Central Crux. Bate learned much from him in the ways of combat and survival. but one day Shieff changed. The last known memory Bate has of his mentor was them giving him the last known photo of Ellie at the end of "The Bird and the Squid." Things take a turn for the worse when Shieff unexpectly returns at the end of "A Series of Reunions", with him not just revealing that he ordered Ellie's death, but would turn out to be the Big Bad in the form of a corrupted Dark Matter.
• Broke Your Arm Punching Out Cthulhu: Atler manages to put up a decent fight against Shieff when he stumbles across him in the woods. He is able to rip off Shieff's helmet in the process and almost find out that he was a Dark Matter, but his blurred vision after the fight ended made it not revealed at that time. He dies of his wounds shortly after with confidence that Bate will eventually defeat Shieff in the future.
• Bus Crash: Elliot leaves the story after the events of "The Bird and the Squid,"^note Had "Speak No Evil" been completed, it would have featured him more in depth, as well as hinted towards his demise, preventing this tropeHe returns as a ghost in Bate's Celestial Void during "Guardian of the Stars" where he implies that he was killed by Lucian before the events of "Flower's for Atler."
• Call a Rabbit a "Smeerp": Call Kirby's species a puffball. While In-Universe, the meta explanation for this is that calling each puffball member a Kirby would be anacronistic as most of the series takes place before Kirby himself was born.
• Casual Interplanetary Travel: Pop Star and the Nova planet system seem to be easy to travel between despite their long distances from each other. Meta Knight finds his way to Pop Star by using his Warp Star upon reaching adulthood. Other Warp Star weilders can transport themselves and friends between the two planets in this way as well, though it appears that implications of spacecraft travel is possible in some situations. Gamble Galaxy may also count, as Bate, Gordon, and Ramset have traveled to that location easily and back in a few vacation stories.
• The Chosen One: Ancient scriptures state that a Star Warrior would be born that would defeat all evil in the universe. Kirby would eventually become the chosen hero to defeat Zero. Not once, not twice, but three times. He eventually goes on to confront Void, but that is only implied.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Marx disappears from Kirby's life during Tulok's childhood years. It's implied that he betrays Kirby and causes the events of Milky Way Wishes to happen in Kirby Super Star. In this universe, Kirby is oblivious to Marx's disappearance and still thinks of him as a friend, despite him explicitly being thrown into Nova and later had his soul form destroyed.
• Co-Dragons: Mara and Lucian to Shieff, though Lucian was forced to do Shieff's bidding via the Demon Frog. Lucian spends most of the time offscreen and only showing up at times as the Monster of the Week, while Mara begins to show up further starting with the "Torn" chapter.
• Constructed World: The main setting of Gumball Warrior is set on a planetary system called Nova. Each of the five planets has their own environments and climates.
  • The largest of the planets, Central Crux, is a mixture between Eternal Engine and Skyscraper City. Many factories and high rises populate the surface of the planet. Little else is known about the planet, though its home to many laboratories that makes weapons for war and a bunch of slave laborers forced to make them.
  • West Nova is a lush planet with beautiful oceans, squid-shaped landmasses, and the largest population outside of Central Crux home to almost every Kirby related enemy under the sun. Meta and his friends are raised in Kalmari Town, the largest of these settlements. It's said that the Great Kalamar Kalmari founded the town after being led there by Dyna Star.
  • East Nova is a desolate wasteland of volcanos, lava streams, and badlands. The Burning Leos make their home here. It hasn't seen much apperances in "Gumball Warrior," but it is the site of an incident that eventually leads to the fateful encounter of Bate and Ellie in the events leading up to "The Bird and the Squid."
  • North Nova is a desert planet with sand dunes and rock formations, something similar to Rock Star from Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards. The Busiket/Zoos tribe make their home here, and it is where Bate met Gordon. Other features to note is a GSA base where troops are trained and stationed.
  • South Nova is a world of ice. The Ice Leos make their home here, and is where Atka resides. An Ice Leo village headed by a chief is somewhere on this planet, and it is where Tulok would eventually resettle.
• Convenient Miscarriage: A weird case as it is applied to an egg laying creature. Kana's child dies while still inside their egg, but the cause of the death has yet to be revealed.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Ramset can hold his own whenever danger strikes despite being a comical character wherever he goes. Though his Crippling Overspecialization of being unable to hear without working hearing aids can defy this trope, and allows Mara to corner him in the woods once she manages to remove the hearing ability from the equation.

D to H

• Dark and Troubled Past:
  • Bate was abandoned in the harsh cold of South Nova as an infant and would have died had Suna not found him. During his teenage years he would suffer from asthma and deal with the sudden departure of his mentor. In his early adulthood, Bate would meet tragedy when the love of his wife Ellie is killed in action while away at war. Tragedy would strike once again when his first student, Atler, dies. This caused him to shun everyone in Kalmari Town and live a reclusive life until Meta was born.
  • Ramset originally grew up as a slave in the Central Crux and was originally born without a name, only being called by a number. By the time he became an adult, he would perform a jailbreak and flee from the factories with his life, but the explosions that he caused has made him deaf. Ramset would spend several years wandering about until he eventually ran into Gravel outside of Kalmari Town, where he would eventually get hearing aids to help him hear again.
  • Gordon's species were constructs to be used in war. He and others of his species were created in Central Crux. Gordon looked up to his father figure Bullet during his childhood years. Since he had unusual Psychic Powers that allowed him to conjure hands out of thin air, he was picked to be a test subject in testing out all sorts of weapons as a concept for a weapon weilding Gordo. Bullet gave his life to protect Gordon from being used as a puppet by scientists. He would later escape Central Crux in early adulthood and rise up through the ranks of the GSA in North Nova, where he would eventually meet Bate and become friends with him after many hardships.
  • Gravel is the one that has been through a lot, perhaps more than Bate endured. During his childhood years, Orzon discovering that he had the powers of the blood ruby meant that he was a target to be killed off for being an omen, but Mara eventually manages to spare him of that fate, only to be ostracized by his tribe as a result. His home in North Nova was also used as a training ground for GSA troops. One day a sudden earthquake separated him from Mara, costing him his arm in the process. He was feared dead by Mara and Shieff would eventually shift the blame for his "death" on Bate, setting up Ellie's murder. Gravel survived this ordeal and manages to flee to West Nova to recover, eventually settling in the outskirts of Kalmari Town as a cave hermit.
  • Tula has also been through a rough childhood. Before being adopted by Falspar and Pyrell, she went through several families that had histories of abusing her. The worst of these was the family she was with prior to the Star Warriors, who straight up abandoned her by telling her to wait outside while they go out shopping. As a result, she struggles with trust issues with her current parents and took a while before she was finally assured they would never leave her behind.
  • Pyrell found it hard to stick to his role of being a Star Warrior. What really happened is that he was the victim of child abuse by another Flaming Leo named Rizen in his youth, which was inevitable after his mother died in childbirth. His temperment during his early days of Star Warrior training was a result of him being born with The Surge, making his fire powers uncontrolable and prone to decimating entire towns. Rizen, not realizing that this was a rare genetic mutation, kept abusing him trying to keep him in check. Then he ticked Pyrell off a bit too much...
• Darker and Edgier: If you were looking for a happy adventure about Meta Knight as a child, this isn't the place. The corruption of creatures by Dark Matter is shown in detail. The four teachers have to endure tragedy and heartbreak. Various characters are shown getting graphically killed or injured terribly instead of simply popping into nothingness like in the games, including children. It even goes as far as containing graphic depictions of child abuse that is entirely Played for Drama.
• Darkest Hour: The ending of "Demons from the Past." The four teachers have been brought to their knees. Atka has been defeated. Gordon suffers a Game-Breaking Injury thanks to Shieff, who has revealed himself as the corrupted former Guardian of Paverok as Tekel. The GSA puffballs lives are in danger, and on top of all that, Bate is brainwashed once again by the Demon Frog after Shieff frees it from Atka's hands ensuring a final battle between the remaining guardians and the students to free their teacher from the Dark Matter's control. At the same time, Nonsurat has been revived by the remaining good side of Paverok, Luna has performed a Heel–Face Turn, and Null has revealed himself to be Paverok's other Guardian, Madar. This sets up the events of "A Matter of Time"... though considering the entire series is a prequel to the Kirby games as well as the existence of the Time Skip saga and "Through Sad Eyes" is the only saving grace from it becoming a straight downer. The last page ends on a Cliffhanger, with Meta being whisked into Bate's Celestial Void.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Arthur's Guardian, Ekon, has black plumage and sinister red eyes, but he is certainly a good guy.
• Dead All Along: Kade and Emma, the children of Bate and Ellie. They were first created for an AU where Ellie survives the war. They were later made part of the main story in "Guardian of the Stars", where by then they appear as ghosts in Bate's Celestial Void. "A Series of Reunions" reveals that Lucian killed Emma while Mara would eventually kill Kade.
• Deadly Distant Finale: The end of the Gumball Warrior timeline has Tulok as an elder and the chieftain of the Ice Leo village, long after the rest of the cast except for Kesuk have died, including Kirby. He and Kesuk would die after the former performs a Heroic Sacrifice to save the village, though Tulok's legacy lives on with his next of kin.
• Death by Adaptation: Dyna Blade is made into being Kirby's guardian as well as given an Age Lift to be a young child, but she dies prior to Kirby getting adopted by Meta Knight and Kesuk. Turns out that she was Only Mostly Dead, and was able to use the last of her strength to absorb a Dark Matter to be reborn as Gooey.
• A Death in the Limelight: Ellie, Emma, Kade, Atler, and Melody all meet their demise at the end of their focus chapters. Atler is already dead at the beginning of "Flowers for Atler," but the entire chapter is about Arthur trying to figure out how he died and made Bate go into a Heroic BSoD, which is shown in a flashback towards the end.
• Death Notification: Bate receives a notice about Ellie's death after she and her children are killed by Mara and Lucian a day before she is scheduled to return. He doesn't believe that she is dead at first and it takes days before Gordon reveals the truth about what happened to Ellie.
  Gordon: (Narrating) I dashed out of the house to find Bate. Eventually, I found him waiting on the same hill from yesterday...
  Bate: Gordon... Please tell me that letter was a joke. Ellie... she is going to arrive soon, right?
  Gordon: [Sighs] Bate..... No, she's not coming back. I'm sorry.... she passed away.
• Death of a Child: Oh so much. At least five children have met their deaths on page: Kade and Emma to Mara and Lucian along with their mother, Ton to Lucian, Melody to Lucian, Atler to Shieff, and Nonsurat and Marlo's unborn child, Caspius. Young!Dyna Blade dies while Kirby was an infant, but her legacy lives on in the Dark Matter Gooey.
• Defence Mechanism Superpower: Atka notes that Star Warriors can enter a dream world-like area called Celestial Voids. These voids only trigger when a Star Warrior is on the edge of death and needs to heal, but some can control it well enough to channel it on their own. Each void is different depending on the person that uses it, most often taking the form of the location of their first happy memory. It can also be corrupted by outside forces, as seen in "Grand Illusion" when Bate has trouble trying to remember his happy memories with Ellie due to him recovering from a demon beast's control.
• Despair Gambit: Shieff's entire plan. When Mara informs him about the "death" of her brother Gravel, Shieff puts the blame on Bate, who was stationed on North Nova the day of the incident. To that end he makes sure to make Bate's life as miserable as possible. First he lies to Bate about Luna's death when in reality he made her into the murderous Lucian. Then he would mostly indirectly murder Bate's close friends and allies using Lucian, only going personal against Atler. He almost won when Bate was Driven to Suicide at his lowest point following Atler's death but didn't count on Gordon saving him from death. When the final part of his plan to take out Meta and Bate himself with Lucian fails due to them surviving the attack, he goes out of his way to make things personal with Bate, revealing himself as the Big Bad.
  Shieff: Your life is meaningless. You are nothing. Just some worthless pawn used to achieve my goals.
• Dies Differently in Adaptation: Dark Matter Blade is defeated by Kirby once in Kirby's Dreamland 2 which made it Killed Off for Real until their surprise return in Kirby Planet Robobot. In Gumball Warrior, Dark Matter Blade survives the events of the former to once again attack Kirby when he is a teenager. Gooey manages to intervene and stop the Dark Matter, absorbing it and gaining access to a new form. Subverted in that Dark Matter Blade is still alive, yet dormant inside Gooey.
• Disabled in the Adaptation: Nonsurat. In "Operation Nonsurat", he would fall ill constantly due to his wings not being developed properly. The only way he would have gotten better was to surgically remove those wings, causing him to never develop the ability to fly like his fellow students. This also explains why he doesn't wear a cloak like the other GSA puffballs as an adult in the anime, since he has no need to hide away any wings. It's hinted in "Pawns of War" that Shieff may had deliberately removed his wings in an attempt to cripple him even if there was a way to save those wings.
• Doomed by Canon:
  • A weird variation. Since the anime never happens in this universe, none of the original characters introduced in Gumball Warrior face any risks of being killed off to make way for canon events. In the present day at the start of "Flying Lessons," Bate, Ellie, Kade, Emma, Gordon, Atler, Melody, and Elliot are all deceased, with the fates of other original characters such as Gravel and Atka being unknown or having passed naturally. It would be later retconned that Bate lives long enough to meet Kirby when he was a young child and still be alive during the events of the games, but passes away prior to Tulok being born.
  • Played straight with Ellie, who is deceased by the start of "Operation Nonsurat." This was not revealed during "The Bird and the Squid," the only chapter where she is seen alive, but her death at the hands of Mara is finally shown during "A Series of Reunions". Elliot is also Killed Offscreen prior to "A Wish is Born." The only notes about him is that he was killed by Lucian some time between "Grand Illusion" and "A Wish is Born."
• Downer Ending: For the Time Skip saga. Tulok sacrifices his life to save the Ice Leo village from an avalanche. His mother Kesuk takes over as village chief but dies of a broken heart shortly afterward. It's implied that Tulok's next of kin eventually take over as village chief, but this is the end of the Gumball Warrior timeline.
• Draft Dodging: Subverted. It's Ellie that gets the draft notice and she doesn't mind due to her already having experience as a nurse, but Bate is the one that gets angered by her being conscripted to war. Especially when she is "pregnant," which he made up as an excuse, but was oblivious to her actually being pregnant later. It doesn't work.
  Cog: We're breaking a violation?
  Bate: Yes, ... Now I demand you go back and tell them to cancel [Ellie's] draft.
  Cog: Is that so? Tell me then, what violation are we breaking?
  Bate: [Smirking] You'd be in violation for sending my pregnant wife to war. Now get lost.
• Driven to Suicide:
  • Bate attempts to kill himself after the death of Atler using one of Gordon's swords as a result of his failures in saving him and his own family. He miraculously survives the attempt thanks to Gordon finding him quickly. This also leads to his first meeting with Null in "Grand Illusion." This would had been the final part of Shieff's plan, as a Star Warrior killing themself would cause their entire lineage to break and cease to exist.
    Shieff: For if a Star Warrior commits the heinous act of taking their very life... the cycle breaks... And Star Warriors along with their guardians will cease to exist.
  • Pearla commits suicide shortly after the death of her husband Monty over fears of her children becoming impoverished, leaving Elliot and Alba without parents.
• Early-Bird Cameo:
  • Most characters get introduced this way in supplementary artwork. Atka first appeared in an early 2012 art piece of Bate alongside his childhood friends before getting a bio page. In the series chronologically, she can be seen in silhouette behind a window overlooking the newborn puffballs in the hospital at the end of "A Wish is Born."
  • Mara, Lucian, and Shieff's eyes appear at the end of "Operation Nonsurat," setting the story to show that things will get much darker from here with their presence.
  • Emma can be seen clearly with Ellie and Elliot in the photo seen at the end of "The Bird and the Squid", but austute readers can barely see a newborn Kade, who was then unnamed, barely visible in Ellie's left hand on the torn off side of the photo.
• Early Installment Character-Design Difference:
  • Squishies in general originally were drawn similar to how they appeared in the games and had mouths that were later dropped in early development. Their feet were all visible from the front instead of the two feet they would eventually have in their current designs for the webcomic, but Squishies being shown with 2 or 4 feet varies even today. In 2023, Squishies were redesigned slightly again, with their heads looking more similar to real life squids.
  • Atka orignally didn't have feet and was similar in appearance to other Blizzard Sphere Doomers from Kirbys Return To Dreamland. She was later given a Waddling Head appearance to distinguish her from her Another Dimension specimen, and to better show that she had the powers of other guardians.
  • Suna originally wore a pilot's helmlet like the Helper Birdon from Kirby Super Star. This was later removed by her next appearance, since Birdons don't need access to aircraft.
  • Bantle first appeared as a Skarmory-like character named Souso that trained under Bate after Atler's death. He would later be changed to a Corori at a later date. However, his crush on Emma remained constant.
  • An example that was made into a plot point for the webcomic. Originally, Nonsurat was portrayed as having wings like the rest of the GSA puffballs in early comics. "Operation Nonsurat" later has him fall sick and require that his wings be removed. Nonsurat's original design would only show up two other times in artwork: In "Before the Operation" which is supplementary artwork set as being from Gordon and Nonsurat's perspective of "Operation Nonsurat," and "The Gift of Life" when he is revived by the remnants of Paverok's good side and is shown with symbolic angel wings.
• Early-Installment Weirdness:
  • The webcomic was originally a Whole Episode Flashback with Meta Knight retelling the events of his childhood to Kirby. By the third chapter, where there was another flashback within the flashback as well as Meta not being present the entire chapter, the past retelling gimmick was removed. The sole remainder of this original idea is that every chapter begins with the words The Past: Year ????.
  • The first two chapters and early side comics were originally focused on the GSA puffballs as they went through training. Eventually, the Myth Arc started with Chapter 3 and placed the Teachers as the main focus, but there is still appearances from the students as well at times.
  • Some of the teachers' personalities weren't set in stone for the first few chapters and artwork. Ramset was originally more serious in tone and rather stict in his teachings like the other teachers, but his comic relief gimmick would later be finalized by "The Bird and the Squid." His relationship with Gravel also wasn't established as a romantic relationship during "Operation Nonsurat," Gravel's first appearance in which they only showed signs of being Just Friends with no Unresolved Sexual Tension.
  • The very first piece of Kirby artwork that was ever submitted onto Rhylem's DeviantART page^note No longer on there as of 2020, due to her moving most old artwork onto the dedicated website. was "Endless Appetite" some time in late 2010. Kirby didn't even have his wings that was later retconned into having from birth and he and Meta Knight were portrayed identical to their appearance in the anime other than the implications of the "Meta adopts Kirby" plot seen in the fandom that was growing popular at the time. The Gumball Warrior series itself wasn't even thought up at that point in time.
• Either/Or Offspring: Zigzagged. Depending on the couple, the offspring can be a split between both species, as is the case for Emma and Kade, Bate and Ellie's offspring. Species that look similar to each other in shape such as Puffballs, Leos, and Sasukes have a higher chance of conceiving a hybrid instead.
• Elemental Powers: While a given in a Kirby series, the four teachers have access to strengths and abilites far stronger that what Game!Kirby would be able to through Power Copying alone.
  • Bate has the ability to channel electricity orbs capable of stunning opponents. Originally, he was also meant to have a powerful ice ability called the Ice Lotus, which was taught to him by Atka.
  • Gordon has the ability to conjure hands out of thin air. With this, he is able to go from being a near indestructible obstacle to a weaponized machine capable of holding multiple weapons.
  • Ramset is the Badass Normal of the teachers, but he is still able to stand on his own using his vast arsenal of explosives. He is also capable of spitting out explosive stars from his body, but it is not that useful in the long run.
  • Gravel is one of the few Busikets blessed with the ability to summon gemstones from the ground as a way to attack. But it requires the blood of others, as the gems he can summon are those of Blood Rubies. Because of this, Gravel was shunned and barely escaped death when his tribe attemped to kill him in his youth. In his true form, he is capable of summoning storms and manipulate clouds into tangible creatures capable of attacking enemies.
• Embarrassing Old Photo: Bate doesn't really like the photos of him taken during his teenage years as seen in an archived ask.
  Atka: [Showing a picture of a young Bate] My dear Bate was such a happy, playful child—always getting into all sorts of trouble. [Shows a picture of a slightly older Bate eating candy] He also had quite a sweet tooth—Which I hear he still has today. [Shows a picture of a sleeping Bate] I suppose some things never change... including his sleeping habits. [Shows a picture of a teenaged Bate wearing his respiratior on Central Crux] Now, onto his teenage years-
  Bate: [Yelling offscreen] A-Atka!!!
• Expy: Despite the anime characters other than the GSA puffballs being Adapted Out, there are some characters that closely take personality cues of canon characters from the anime and games.
  • Les and Callan appear to be a replacement for Sir Ebrum and Lady Like respectively. They are both wealthy people that have a rebellious child that doesn't want to show off her wealth.
  • Ellie is a copy of Tiff/Fimu. She's the one that guides Bate on his journey and is crucial to the main plot. Cite is a copy of Tuff/Bun, being a young child that often is seen in the background, but do form friendships with the main cast.
  • Shieff may be based on Magolor. Both are mentors to the main cast that later betrays them late in the story. Both are the Big Bad of their respective appearances and have access to a second form when they are struck down initially.
  • Bate is a expy towards Meta Knight, even though Meta still shows up in the story. This turns out to be a Generation Xerox. During their childhoods, they were happy-go-lucky children whose Trademark Favorite Food was candy. As they got older, they would don a mask and later mentors the next in their line. This also explains why Kirby shares most of his personality with Young!Bate and Young!Meta Knight, as their characteristics were passed down to him through their teachings. In fact, all three of them were alive at the same time at one point!
• Extremely Short Timespan: The events of the final 4 chapters of the webcomic all take place over the course of a few hours aside from flashbacks. Justified as it deals with the reunion of Gravel and Mara and the eventual final battle against the Dark Matter Shieff, requiring multiple chapters.
• Fake Pregnancy: Gender inverted. Bate makes up a lie about Ellie being pregnant in an attempt to get her out of the war, even though in a supplementary image coincidentally titled "Secret Moments" it is suggested that he and Ellie had sex during that time before she left for war, meaning she was already pregnant by the time she was forced to leave.
• Family Extermination:
  • Shieff orders Bate's wife and children to be killed by Mara and Lucian after he shifts the blame for Gravel's death on Bate. In a case of Dramatic Irony, Gravel was never killed in the landslide that costed him his arm, instead fleeing to West Nova. This means that these senseless murders were all for naught other than an attempt to break Bate's will. Years later, Kade's intended Guardian Melody is killed by Lucian in "Pitch Me a Melody" to finish the job.
  • Bate would eventually be targetted by Lucian during the "Torn" chapter as the last target, but he manages to survive her attacks, only barely, leaving him in bandages for the rest of the webcomic.
• Family of Choice: A meta example. The interconnected Gumball Warrior family tree (spoiler warning) is of both blood ties and found families. Being almost True Companions at this point, the four teachers really look out for each other alongside their adopted students.
• Fan-Created Offspring:
  • The webcomic gives children to Meta Knight and Sir Arthur. Meta Knight's direct descendant is Tulok, while Arthur's direct descendant is Atticus. Nonsurat on the other hand... is tragically averted, though he and Marlo later adopt a Gordo named Cellic.
  • Inverted with Gryll, who has Cite and Vera as her parents. Her parents are never mentioned in canon proper.
  • Subverted with Tula, who is Happily Adopted by Falspar and Pyrell but treat her almost like their own offspring heavily.
• Fantastic Racism:
  • The Squishies of Kalmari Town weren't keen on accepting non-Squishy folk at first. Bate was originally seen as an outlier when he attempts to adapt to their culture and traditions. Ellie was the only exception to this. She cared about Bate's well being during his and Gordon's initial stay in Kalmari Town and didn't care about eventually falling in love with someone that wasn't a Squishy, though against her parents' wishes at first. Her friend Alba puts it up best in "Breaking Traditions" that was the turning point.
    Alba: The Great Kalamar Kalmari would frown on the citizens of today. Do you even hear the words you speak?
    Kalmari citizen: Bite your tongue, Alba, you're in no place to talk. You house and care for that spiky friend of [Bate's]-
    Alba: Because Kalamar would've done the same thing! ... When did Kalmari become a place of hate? Our ancestors allowed and accepted every kind of creature that wanted to live in harmony, why can't we?
  • Pyrell and Falspar had trouble trying to adopt Tula in West Nova due to the two of them being gay. This soon mellowed out after they finally got around to signing Tula's adoption papers, but it's implied that the two of them had to briefly hide their relationship status to get officially accepted as her parents.
• Fantasy Counterpart Religion: Implied. Four of the five planets in the planet system are named after the Nova from Kirby Super Star. Imagery of Nova is scattered around the series as a Mythology Gag, One of the guardians is named Nova, and Rhylem's signature on her DeviantART profile says >READY. However, Nova itself has never appeared physically except in the lore. Meta and Bate attend a Shinto-styled festival in Kalmari Town in one short story, so it appears to be based on Japanese religion.
• Fighting Your Friend:
  • Luna was a close friend of Bate during his teenage years living in the Central Crux. So it was Shieff's idea to turn her into the Ax-Crazy Lucian in order to fall in this trope. He planned on using her to fight Bate in a deadly battle where Bate would deliver a Mercy Kill upon realizing it was his friend all along and paint her as a Tragic Monster. Thankfully averted, barely thanks to Atka breaking Luna free from Shieff's control.
  • Exploited by Shieff just one chapter after Luna's Heel–Face Turn at the end of "Demons of the Past," where he corrupts Bate to do his bidding via the Demon Frog, setting up the final chapter to be a face off between the students and Bate.
• Foregone Conclusion: Zigzagged. Meta Knight and his fellow classmates will become part of the GSA eventually. Kirby is still going to be born and the events of the games still maybe happen as he is the choosen one meant to eventually destory all evil in the universe. However, the anime never happens due to him being adopted by Meta Knight and Kesuk instead of crash landing in Cappy Town. Additionally, the Star Warriors aren't wiped out by Nightmare, meaning they are still around in the present day, though Meta Knight will find his way to Popstar separately from the others.
• Fountain of Youth: An early version of the young teachers AU has Bate, Gordon, and Ramset being aged down to infants from a Demon Beast's magic with their respective students trying to care for them as they and Gravel figure out how to reverse the curse.
• Framing Device: The chapters "The Bird and the Squid," "Grand Illusion," and "Flowers for Atler." "Flying Lessons" is the orignal framing device back when the series was meant to be a Whole Episode Flashback.
• Genocide from the Inside: The Star Warriors were nearly wiped out centuries ago by Lord Paverok after he became corrupted by Dark Matter.
• Gory Discretion Shot: Lucian murdering Melody isn't seen in detail, but it switches to Melody's POV in the last seconds of her life after the deed is done. The deaths of Ellie, Kade, and Emma when it's finally revealed in "A Series of Reunions" ends with Ellie being Killed Mid-Sentence with a blood splat, though she is seen heavily wounded prior to Mara landing the killing blow.
• Greater-Scope Paragon: The Nova. Said to have been an ally of the first ever Star Warrior Kalamar.
• Greater-Scope Villain:
  • Lord Paverok is long dead, but his betrayal and deviation towards Zero alongside corrupting his guardians eventually cause the events of the webcomic to happen.
  • Nightmare is the catalyst of the Demon Beast war against the Star Warriors and serves as the main threat faced by the Galaxy Soldier Army and the Star Warriors within the ongoing war, though the plot shifts away from him once Shieff reveals themselves as the Big Bad of the webcomic.
• Great Offscreen War: Throughout the webcomic, there is an ongoing war going on between the Star Warriors and Holy Nightmare Enterprises, but readers don't get to see any combat action from it. Several of the Demon Beasts Nightmare sends out make sporadic appearances in the webcomic with one being plot relevant. We do briefly get snippets of the war in literature pieces and backstory information, and it is confirmed that Bate, Gordon, Ellie, and Eliott have participated in it at some point in their lives. Ellie being sent off to this war and Bate's fears of it is the main conflict of "The Bird and the Squid."
• Guardian Angel: The Birdon species serves as physical ones. They are connected to Star Warriors for life, and the death of one would mean their ultimate demise. Several Star Warriors and Guardians have managed to survive the death of their link. Not all Birdons become guardians though. Bate's adoptive mother Suna is an ordinary Birdon that just happened to find Bate by chance when he was an infant. Guardians can also be different species than that of a Birdon, but they are rarer. Atka, Bate's actual Guardian, is that of a Sphere Doomer.
• Happily Adopted:
  • Meta and Arthur lived with Bate during their childhood years after he took them in, but it wouldn't become official until they were adults. It's later revealed that Bate initally was going to sign the adoption papers to them back when they were children, but copped out of it at the last minute.
  • Kirby is adopted by Meta Knight after he passes Kana's rite of passage, now with a adoptive mother thanks to Kesuk.
• Heel–Face Turn: Shieff was the one that set up the initial encounter between Bate and Null in "Grand Illusion," intending on having Null grow in strength from the troubled Puffball's negative energy after Bate's suicide attempt. Instead, Null goes against his fellow Dark Matter brethen and befriends the puffball, setting him up as the Big Good. There's a good caveat for that, he's the corrupted form of Madar, the antithesis to Shieff's Tekel.
• A Hero Is Born: Five heroes are born. "A Wish is Born" details the GSA puffballs' birth and the four teachers making a promise with each other to train them when they reach of age.
• Hybrids Are a Crapshoot:
  • Atticus and Tulok are the result of a puffball and a Leo conceiving. While Puffballs and Leos share similar body shape and features, the same can't be said for temperature control. Because their bodies use too much energy keeping them alive, they struggle to adapt to their environment and become sick easily as a result. Atticus was later able to adapt easier by the time he became an adult since his mother was a Burning Leo, but Tulok would struggle more. Being born premature didn't help either, so he eventually ends up living in South Nova for most of his life.
  • On the opposite side, Sasuke hybrids don't fall for this trap, as they are easily capable of adapting to any environment. This is why Florian and Siku don't have the health issues that Atticus and Tulok have due to one of their parents carrying Sasuke genes.

I to Z

• I Let Gwen Stacy Die:
  • Bate initially believes himself to be at fault for causing Ellie to die when she is declared KIA during the war. He undergoes a state of depression over this and it took Null reassuring him about her to overcome that.
  • Much later in "A Series of Reunions", Mara reveals that she was the one that murdered Ellie as ordered by Shieff in an attempt to break Bate's will, turning this trope on its head. This revelation isn't taken well by Bate.
• Interspecies Romance:
  • You can count the number of couples where someone doesn't end up with a female Squishy native to Kalmari Town or with a Leo on one hand. Gravel and Ramset are the most notable of these outliers.
  • One of the main plot points is Bate's relationship to Ellie. She and Bate met while the latter was recovering in the hospital. The two would hit it off soon after and Bate would have been a father of two if not for Mara and Lucian murdering Ellie and her kids in cold blood. In an alternate universe where Bate never ended up getting found by Suna and lived with Atka, Ellie would have ended up with Elliot instead, averting this example.
  • Falspar eventually ends up in a relationship with the Burning Leo Pyrell during their adult years.
  • Nonsurat is implied to eventually get a Relationship Upgrade with Marlo once they become adults. If "Emotionless" is anything to go by, they eventually have to endure a lot.
  • Gordon and Alba are the most lopsided of these. Gordon has only Tertiary Sexual Characteristics and thus No Biological Sex due to being a Synthetic Gordo. Alba later takes in a baby Gordo to close the inability of them ever reproducing.
  • Arthur ends up forming a relationship with the Burning Leo Petta. This leads to problems down the line when they eventually have a child.
  • Meta Knight was the last of the 5 puffballs^note Dragato's love interest Indra has yet to be featured in the series via artwork or through the comic to get a significant other in the form of Kesuk who was introduced in 2018. Like what happens with Atticus, Meta and Kesuk's child eventually has to endure hardships down the line.
• Invincible Minor Minion: Averted. Gordos and Blados in Gumball Warrior are capable of being injured and even killed from the strongest attacks, but they are still heavily resilent to most damage, except when they aren't.
• It Sucks to Be the Chosen One:
  • Pyrell has had a rough life. His relationship with Drani was shaky at best. He would go on outbursts of violence at times and would cause harm to anyone, including his guardian at one point. The struggles he faced with being a Star Warrior and his cautious relationship with his guardian caused his Warp Star to crack soon after his first meeting with her. This also hints that Pyrell doesn't see himself as being mentally capable of being a Star Warrior . It's later revealed that his ordeal was caused by an abusive childhood.
  • Ultimately, Kirby himself. As an adult, he has acquired insommia stemming from PTSD from many years of facing many cosmic threats to Pop Star and Dreamland and killing them that it takes a toll on him. Not helping matters is the emotional toll that the inhabitants of Pop Star instill on him being the child prodigy that will defeat all evil in the universe. Becoming truly the last Star Warrior after the retirement of his adoptive parents adds a crucial struggle to him wanting to leave a legacy for the next generation. He gets some respite from time to time by chatting with Atticus when they get the chance, which helps ease off restless nights.
• Killed Mid-Sentence: Ellie, at the hands of Mara.
  Ellie: Bate... We're parents. You're a father, I'm a mother... But... Our time as one has been cut short... B-Bate... I... I... I'm sorry. I love y-
• Kill the Cutie: Melody is brutally killed by Lucian at the end of "Pitch Me a Melody."
• Last of His Kind: Played with. For a long while, it's assumed that Bate was the last living Star Warrior before the GSA puffballs came along according to Shieff, even though the Galaxy Soldier Army was widely present during the events of Gumball Warrior. Kade would have been a earlier case of There Is Another had he survived. As it turns out, another Star Warrior would be born around the time of the GSA Puffballs, that being Pyrell.
• Law of Inverse Fertility: A weird example. Bate is told by Atka that he is going to be a father. Cue Bate and Ellie doing what they can to prepare for a future bundle of joy. Then somehow after several attempts of them trying to have a child, they are told that Ellie is unable to conceive a child and deemed infertile. When Ellie is about to be sent off to war, Bate makes an excuse to try and get her out of it by stating that she's pregnant under the belief that he and Ellie won't be able to have children. Yet, just days before Ellie leaves for the war, they still have sex one more time where she finally becomes pregnant with Bate's kids. Too bad Mara and Lucian had to stop any chances of Bate ever seeing his family ever again.
• The Lost Lenore: Ellie, Bate's deceased wife. The mystery to the cause of her death drives Bate's Myth Arc.
• Mad Doctor: Dr. Mends. He's not all that bad as people think he is, but many of Kalmari Town's residents fear having him as their doctor since he's a Cyborg Bronto Burt.
• Mentor Occupational Hazard: Inverted. Bate's first student Atler is killed while fighting off Shieff in the woods, leading to Bate refusing to take in more potential Star Warrior suitors until Meta comes along years later.
• Mistaken for Cheating: Played for Drama. Bate gets his hands on the final photo of Ellie ever taken alive at the end of "The Bird and the Squid," which shows her alongside Elliot and her two newborns. The photo is manipulately torn by Shieff to only show the Squishy offspring. This causes Bate to believe that Ellie abandoned him to start a family with Elliot and goes into depression over it, but he was able to overcome that easily by the events of "Grand Illusion."
• Mistaken for Romance: Played for Laughs. "I Do... For the Cake" has Kirby, Atticus, and Cellic making a wedding cake for Dragato after they think that the Star Warrior was in a relationship (Likely with Cite) and wanted to celebrate it. Meta Knight of all people falls for this and thinks his friend was going to get married but Dragato eventually corrects him, though he still accepts the cake. This takes place before Dragato and Indra started dating, so they were close.
  Meta Knight: Thanks for telling me your best friend was getting married.
  Cite: Married?
  Meta Knight: Yes, Married!!
  Cite: [Groans in frustration before walking away from the puffball, grumbling] There is no wedding, and Dragato isn't marrying anyone. Now go back home.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Ramset being an explosives expert is an allusion to the bomb weiding Sasuke that was seen in the anime episode "Cappy New Year."
  • At one point in "Grand Illusion," Null brings up how Dark Matter creatures develop. The third form closely resembles Dark Nebula from Kirby: Squeak Squad.
  • In "But he has no hands!" Gordon orders the students to pick a weapon to train with. Two of the weapons seen closely resemble the weapons that Arthur and Nonsurat would wield in the anime.
• Named by the Adaptation: Downplayed with Meta Knight and Arthur. According to an art piece called "Not quite used to it," Meta's full name is Metameios Bate. This also means that Arthur's last name is also Bate.
• Never Was This Universe: The original comic that later became the inspiration of Gumball Warrior was originally set a few years after the events of Kirby Right Back at Ya! with Meta Knight discussing the entire story as a Whole Episode Flashback. As the story evolved, there would be many retcons and changes made to the main cast. Later on it appears that Kirby's life has a divergence point due to being raised by Kana instead of crash landing into Cappy Town, but implications that the games happen anyway instead of the anime allows the timeline to stay constant. As the main point of the series is about the childhood years of Meta Knight and the GSA Puffballs, this is not seen as a divergence point.
• Not the First Victim: Melody's disappearance and murder by Lucian at the end of "Pitch me a Melody" was the first time that Bate realized that there was a trend of deaths happening in the woods outside of Kalmari Town. He also found Atler dead in that same forest years earlier, but didn't connect the dots back then. It turns out that Melody was only the fifth such victim of Lucian and Shieff over Bate's lifetime, with the previous four being Elliot, Atler, Emma, and Ton.
• Older Than They Look: Guardians age at a different rate in relation to their partner Star Warrior. Meta confused Melody for a child from her appearance and personality.
  Atka: I heard from the other guardians that you knew a bird by the name of Melody.
  Meta: Melody? ...She was a friend of mine. Umm...Did you know her too, Miss Atka?
  Atka: I did. She was a good friend of mine too. [Around] 18 years [old], I believe.
  Meta: 18 years?! But she looked just about my age!
• Orphan's Ordeal: Tula has been through several orphanages all over West Nova due to various foster families she was placed in having histories of abusive behavior and neglect. The worst of these was the family before Pyrell and Falspar took her in, who abandoned her while making up a excuse not to care for her.
• Our Ancestors Are Superheroes: One of Gryll's ancestors is Lord Kelderon of the Legendary 3, giving her powerful abilities that her father Cite never thought she had.
• Patchwork Fic: Gumball Warrior mostly takes inspiration on the anime and serves as an AU prequel to it, but it also takes in content from the games for the most part. Spinoffs are even included, with elements from Kirby's Super Star Stacker, Kirby Mass Attack, and of all things, Kirby's Epic Yarn.
• Pregnant Reptile: Squishies, Kirby enemies based on egg-laying squids, are capable of being impregnated and giving birth to live young. In some cases, this is Played for Drama.
• Related in the Adaptation: Meta, Authur, Falspar, Nonsurat, and Dragato were all born at the same time and found together by the four teachers.
• Relationship Upgrade:
  • Nonsurat and Marlo once they become adults. Ramset and Gravel have yet to be seen as an offical couple in the webcomic, but they got upgraded to couple status in January 2014 in supplementary art.
  • Averted with Dragato and Cite. Cite goes on to marry Vera in adulthood, while Dragato eventually forms a relationship with an Ice Leo named Indra later in life.
• Ret Irony: Played for Drama. Ellie is killed by Mara a day before she is discharged from the war. Shieff goes out of his way to make her death appear to be a result of being killed in battle. He also manipulates a Fatal Family Photo to make Bate believe that Ellie abandoned him for Elliot, but that doesn't last. The former works for the better part of 25 years... until Mara reveals to Bate in "A Series of Reunions" what really happened. That's when all bets are off.
• Sacrificed Basic Skill for Awesome Training:
  • An example that is usually invoked with the Manufactured Gordos and Blados. They are trained from birth to be constructs for the war against the Demon Beasts while sacrificing any ability for socialization and comfort. Some Gordos and Blados however avert this trope and tend to the younger batches in secret, as is the case between Gordon and his adoptive father, Bullet.
  • Had Kade survived to adulthood, he would spend most of his life training as a Star Warrior to protect his family. This comes at the cost of learning basic English, as he is only able to speak Chirp exclusively for most of his childhood.
• Saved by Canon: Meta Knight is still going to appear in the games. The rest of the GSA Puffballs also survive to be involved in the anime even if it never happens in this universe, so they are going to survive any near-death experiences they face in the webcomic. The existence of the Time Skip saga and "Through Sad Eyes" also makes it a certainty that Bate, Ramset, Gravel, and Atka at least live long enough to see their descendants or successors, as well as making it certain that Gravel reveals his Zoos identity at some point after the events of the webcomic.
• Significant Birth Date: Ramset was born on April 1st, which is seen as the best day ever in his book. He gets A Day in the Limelight in Real Life as well, putting a Silliness Switch on the website on said day.
• Sickeningly Sweethearts: Tula and Rupion, to the point of it being distracting. Kirby doesn't like this.
  (Kirby and Rupion are in a heated battle, landing blow after blow)
  Tula: [Cheering] Go Kirby! Go Rupion!!
  (Rupion suddenly gets distracted by Tula's words and blushes.)
  Rupion: Oh, Tula~ my muse, my precious little plum queen. Even in the midst of this battle, your words can calm the raging storm brewing inside my very core like no other. How lucky am I that such a wonderful, beautiful being like yourself fell in love with some brute like me? Oh, my dear Tula, you make me the happiest Ice Leo in the entire universe. For you are the light in my life that gives me the will to keep on fighting.
  Tula: [Snuggling] Oh Rupion!!
  Kirby: [Yelling] Are you kidding me?!! Hey!! We're in the middle of a spar! Stop snuggling!!
• Small Role, Big Impact: Cog only has a few lines in "The Bird and the Squid" as well as only appearing in a cameo in "A Series of Reunions," but him giving the draft notice to Ellie ensures that Bate will never see Ellie alive again, as she and her children are later murdered by Mara and Lucian a day prior to her scheduled return.
• The Smurfette Principle: Of the known named characters in Gumball Warrior, Gera is the only female Sir Kibble known.
• Spotlight-Stealing Squad: The welcome page on the designated website for the webcomic calls this "A Meta Knight Webcomic". The true focus however in the webcomic is that of the 4 Teachers, especially Bate, who has major appearances in 11 of those chapters. He also gets 3 flashback chapters to himself. In recent years Ramset has been hogging the spotlight outside of the webcomic, especially on April 1st.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • One of Ramset's attacks is to regurgitate exploding star blades from his mouth and shoot them at enemies. However, storing blades inside one's body isn't a good thing. After only a single extensive use of it, Ramset would need to heal for months to recover from the internal bleeding it causes.
  • Atticus and Tulok are Puffball/Leo hybrids and have trouble adapting to their environment due to their bodies working too hard to keep their temperatures regulated. Atticus would be a sickly child in his youth. Tulok would be born premature and struggle to survive in the warmer environments of West Nova and Dreamland, thus forcing him to spend most of his life in South Nova. Arthur calls out Meta Knight for causing him to relive the struggles of raising Atticus after he learns that Kesuk gave birth to Tulok.
    Arthur: You knew what this meant. You knew how this would turn out. And you still did it. So I ask again: what the hell were you thinking? Why didn't you tell me Kes was pregnant?
    Meta Knight: [Stunned silence, unable to reply]
    Arthur: This takes the cake. I told you, Meta, about the dangers! I told you what would happen if you went the route that I did! But you didn't listen. You never listen! And now, not only have you put Kes in danger, you might've put her baby in danger as well!
• Time Skip: The name of an entire saga. Taking place years after the events of the webcomic, it focuses on the GSA puffballs' lives into adulthood and starting their own families. Kirby is also introduced, having a different origin story that gives confirmation of the anime never happening in this universe. Kirby goes on to be a major focus for the saga in his quest to defeat Zero. The saga continues for a long while, eventually ending with the descendants of their offspring.
• Tragic Stillbirth: Nosurat and Marlo's son Caspius dies after Marlo is attacked by a demon beast as depicted in "Emotionless." While Nonsurat would try his best to tend to Marlo's wounds, they weren't able to save her baby, making him fall into a depression.
• Training from Hell: This is the gist of the classes that each of the GSA puffballs have to take. While their first introductions to the classes were a bit on the rough side, a incident involving Gravel's first time teaching them in "Dodge n' Burn" almost gets them killed. This causes Bate to remind the other teachers to tone it down in violence and adapt to a easier learning curve.
• Turned Against Their Masters: The Gordos created in Central Crux are built for war but some of them eventually revolt and escape, as is the case with Gordon, Gordon Jr, and Cellic. Bullet and G22 are failed attempts.
• Underground Monkey:
  • Gumball Warrior has a subspecies of Burning Leo called Ice Leos. They are well adapted to their cold climate in South Nova and have an plethora of ice abilities.
  • Natural Gordos are another subspecies. The normal Gordos we all know and love as the Invincible Minor Minion in the Kirby games are Synthetic Gordos first created in Central Crux. Natural Gordos on the other hand have access to Elemental Powers beyond just Casting a Shadow, and are capable of reproduction. Some Synthetic Gordos can obtain features and abilities of Natural Gordos if they stay in certain environments long enough, like in the case of Cellic when he spent 5 years at the bottom of a lake.
• Unfinished Business: A unique spin on this trope. When Star Warriors pass away, their Celestial Voids remain as a lasting legacy. There is one thing that a Star Warrior ghost could do before moving on to the afterlife and that is giving someone that is near death the Gift of Life. Paverok's remaining good side remained trapped in Shieff's corrupted Celestial Void for centuries, but he wanted to wait for his guardians Madar and Tekel to pass on and appear in his Celestial Void so that he could apologize to them and be together in the afterlife. However, Nonsurat ended up in Shieff's corrupted Celestial Void during "One Million Voices" and was subjugated to extensive torture that brought him to the edge of death. Paverok, not wanting to see the young Star Warrior killed in this way gives up his remaining energy to him, sending him to the afterlife while Nonsurat lives, though at the cost of never fulfilling his wish to see his guardians again.
• The Unfought: Nightmare is still the main threat and sends out Demon Beasts to fight the Star Warriors across the galaxy, but nowhere is he fought by any of the main cast over the course of the timeline. It's implied Kirby's Adventure takes place during the Time Skip and he was eventually fought by Kirby, but he likely survived longer in this universe due to the events of the anime never happening.
• Unstoppable Rage:
  • Bate experiences uncontrollable anger after Mara reveals she was the one that killed Ellie. Bonus points that Bate was supposed to be the father of two children. He nearly goes through with killing Mara, but is stopped by the memories of his fallen friends.
  • Pyrell has an ability that exploits this trope called The Surge. This rare Leo genetic mutation makes his abilities uncontrolable if set off by emotional triggers.
• Unto Us a Son and Daughter Are Born: Tragically subverted. Ellie gives birth to twins while she is away at war, but she and her newborn children are killed by Mara and Lucian before Bate could get a chance to see them for himself.
• Unwitting Pawn: Bate. It's revealed in "Pawns of War" that Shieff used Bate as a part of his plans. Using the Despair Gambit to break Bate's will, he nearly wins. Subverted in that his plan suffered a mishap with Bate surviving his suicide attempt, and losing control over Luna at the end of "Pawns of War" meant he had to reveal the masquerade sooner.
• Wham Episode: The entirety of "A Series of Reunions." Gravel and Mara are reunited, some plot threads are resolved such as who killed Ellie, and the unexpected return of Bate's former mentor Shieff, who reveals himself to be the Big Bad in the form of a corrupted Dark Matter.
• Wham Line: Mara revealing that she was the one that murdered Ellie.
  Mara: I know her [Ellie] because I did it. I... I'm the one... the one... who... killed her.
• Whole Episode Flashback: Being a prequel to the Kirby games, "Flying Lessons" is set up like this with Meta Knight describing his childhood. This is also used for "Operation Nonsurat" and "Dodge and Burn," but this would be dropped by "The Bird and the Squid" where Meta doesn't show up at all.
• Would Hurt a Child: Oh so much. Shieff has indirectly obtained a kill count of 5 children through his usage of Mara and Lucian, plus the murder of Atler by his own hands. He isn't above kidnapping either, as seen with him kidnapping Nosurat during the events of "One Million Voices."
• You Are a Credit to Your Race: Shieff thanks Gordon for his betrayal against the Central Crux scientists when they meet in "Pawns of War." Seeing that he was the one that created the prototypes for the Synthetic Gordos, having his Super Prototype rebel was all part of his plan.
  Shieff: It's strange. You were created to serve [Central] Crux. And yet, here you are fighting for another. If that is the case, then I welcome the treason with open arms. Thank you Gordo #7943... [Delivers a defeating blow against Gordon, shattering all of his spikes] Because of you, I am one step closer to my goal!
• You Are Number 6: The slave laborers, Synthetic Gordos and Blados in Central Crux have numbers instead of names, though some of the manufactured races defy this by nicknaming themselves in secret, as is the case with Gordon and his father Bullet.
• You Can't Go Home Again:
  • A In-Universe non-villainous variation. It's a Squishy tradition to burn down homes once the last adult of a household dies or the house becomes too old to manage properly. Elliot and Alba's childhood home is razed following the death of their mother. Sound familar?
  • Pyrell gives a nod to this trope upon buring down Bero's home as well as inverting the trope by destroying Rizen's home, who he hated.
• You Mean "Xmas": The Squishies of Kalmari Town celebrate a christmas-like holiday called Squidmas. One year has Ramset host the gift exchange. Hilarity ensues.