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Webcomic: The Sorcerer's Apprentice

Volume 1 on sale now!

An original webcomic from the desk of Bwillett

/ Clowprincess / Nasdreks, author of other fan webcomics such as Cardcaptor Torika and Queen of Games. Can be read online here

Victoria Evans is a (relatively speaking) seemingly normal 17-year-old girl from White Ivy, a seemingly-normal town in Connecticut. One day, she takes a seemingly-normal field trip and stumbles upon a lost Italian Renaissance ring. In an attempt to return the ring to its guardian, college sophomore Renard LaFayette, Victoria winds up inadvertently putting it on and releasing its power: a horde of rampaging monsters! To defeat them, Victoria must unite with the spirit of a 700-year-old magician, Allister Magi de Illuminatis, one of the greatest practitioners of "magic" in his day. Except it isn't really magic... but science!

Though the premise is largely very typical for a Magical Girl series, the series takes a much more realistic (and occasionally cynical) look at many of the tropes present in the Magical Girl genre, occasionally even poking fun at them. Many characters are Genre Savvy (or at least savvy of something), and many tropes listed below are played with, subverted, and averted because of it. The drawing style is also distinctly manga-like, noteworthy for the occasional cutesy panel that breaks up an often serious scene. The author also employs a number of western conventions and pop culture references, particularly to western comics.

The series shares many cosmetic similarities to Cardcaptor Sakura, a series commonly thought (including by the author) to be one of the most codifying examples of the entire genre. Much like Cardcaptor Torika, the author instead deconstructs the entire premise, leaving little similarities to its precursor beyond these cosmetic similarities. Unlike the older Doujinshi, since The Sorcerer's Apprentice is a wholly original series, the author is free to take this same deconstruction even further.

Not to be confused with the 2010 Nicolas Cage movie, the Disney version, or the "Sorcerer's Apprentice" styled plotline.

This webcomic provides examples of:

All Fun And Games Until Someone Loses An Eye: Though many scenes are light and humorous, injury (or the threat thereof) turns the plot in a more serious direction very quickly.
All Part of the Show:
- How Victoria hand-waves her fight with the goblins. In a crowded mall.
- Victoria uses the same excuse after her fight with the giant spider monster.
Alpha Bitch: Lucinda McMillan
- Flanked by her Girl Posse, Jenn and Skye.
The Apprentice:
- Victoria, natch'.
- Cooper tries to be Victoria's apprentice, only for Victoria to abuse him for it.
Armor Is Useless: Played with. Victoria's breastplate is useful against blade-wielding monsters, but it sinks like lead.
Art Shift: Used every so often for either Rule of Funny or Rule of Cute, sometimes both.
Badass Long Robe: Victoria when in her battle costume, which incorporates Allister's long robe. Allister as well, of course.
Beard of Evil: We're not quite sure yet. All we know is that the beard in question belongs to a guy who knew Allister when he was alive, and who may or may not be responsible for killing him.
- Heavily subverted by Victoria's father.
Berserk Button: Victoria's is revealed when Renard assumes Cooper is suspicious because of his piercings. Turns out he was right, at least at the time.
Big Brother Instinct: Cooper, who typically wants nothing to do with his family, will go to great lengths to protect his little sister, Alice.
Black Magic: Most magic gets this reputation with non-magic users, particularly with Cooper's parents. Subverted in that this isn't actually how magic works at all.
Bling of War: Allister's (and Victoria's) battle costume has various bits jewelry incorporated into it (most prominently with Allister's ring) that serve solely cosmetic purposes.
Bodyguard Crush: Renard to Victoria
Book Dumb: Cooper, whose educational accolades include a GED... and that's all.
Boring, but Practical: Victoria's combat strategy usually involves throwing spells until something sticks. Seems to work well enough, given that no monster seen thus far has ever survived a clean hit. Possibly due to Victoria picking the optimum spell to destroy each monster, skipping the waves of less-effective attacks altogether.
Breast Plate: Though hardly a Chainmail Bikini (it's more of a frontal torso plate supplementing a long robe), it's still rather form-fitting. Allister doesn't wear any equivalent armor, though probably because he never needed to.
By the Power of Grayskull!: Played with. When Victoria asks Allister about her lavish and extravagant transformation incantation, Allister responds that it's mostly about showmanship.
Victoria: "Master de Illuminatis, though your body is dead... Blah, blah, blah." *
Exact Words
Calling Your Attacks: Not particularly necessary. Incantations don't really do anything on their own, except serve as mnemonic devices. See By the Power of Grayskull!.
Cast from Hit Points:
- Improperly cast fire magic can drain the caster's life force.
- The last spell Allister ever personally cast, which "required [him] to die".
Catch Phrase: Victoria's is "Normal is overrated.
Cat Girl: Victoria is randomly drawn with cat ears when she's embarrassed.
Chekhov's Gun: Flashbacks of Allister fighting monsters show a number of monsters that Victoria eventually goes on to fight, including a hellhound and a harpie.
Clark Kenting: In combat mode, Victoria just looks like a blonde version of herself in a different outfit.
- It gets even more transparent when Victoria's battle costume evolves, revealing more and more of her own purple hair. Needless to say, Patrice and Bethany are hardly fooled when they first see Victoria in her battle costume.
Cool Car: Renard's Rolls-Royce.
- Victoria has the other kind of car.
Compelling Voice: Cooper specializes in hypnotism.
Costume Porn / Unlimited Wardrobe: Very, very much. Victoria never wears the same outfit two days in a row. Even her standard battle costume changes as she learns more powers.
- As of Chapter 16, Victoria has re-used all of one outfit: her Sailor Fuku, first worn in early Chapter 1 and worn again in Chapter 14. Also seen (carried, not worn) in the cover art for Chapter 3.
Defeat Means Friendship: Cooper
Delinquent: Subverted by both Cooper and Victoria's father. Both look like biker thugs with Savage Piercings, but are actually nice guys. Unless you happen to be wearing Ed Hardy clothing, in Cooper's case.
- This is the reason for Victoria's aforementioned Berserk Button.
Dude Looks Like a Lady: Cooper's first (off-screen) encounter with Ben.
E = MC Hammer: The first chapter's cover art.
Everything Sounds Sexier in French: Renard gets this when he first meets Victoria's friends, who respond to his "Enchantee" with a massive Squee.
Mr. Fanservice: There's Ben, Cooper, Renard and Allister... Y'know, it's faster to list the guys who aren't this trope.
Five-Man Band:
- The Hero: Victoria
- The Lancer: Cooper
- The Smart Guy: Renard
- The Big Girl: Patrice
- The Chick: Bethany
Fish Out of Temporal Water: Allister, particularly in the Beach Episode, where he finds the lack of female swimsuit modesty somewhat unnerving.
French Jerk: Renard. Though not really crude per se, he can still come off as inconsiderate and arrogant, especially towards Cooper.
Fun T-Shirt: Cooper's first outfit, featuring a shirt reading "Shh! I'm hiding from the ninjas".
Functional Magic:
- Apparently all of it. Static electricity is a very simple version that anybody could do, probably without even realizing it. Even the more exotic spells (mostly involving energy transference) are supposedly within the capabilities of normal people, though training may be an issue.
- Subverted with stuff like spiritual possession, creating sentient familiars, and Allister's final spell, which tend to toe the line towards the blatantly fantastic.
Funny Background Event:
- While brushing up on his physics, Cooper can be seen reading "Chemistry for Noobs".
Geek Reference Pool: Defied by Victoria, whose nerd specialties are in history and textiles rather than the more stereotypical math, science, and information technology.
Giant Poofy Sleeves: A feature in many of Victoria's outfits, including the initial version of her battle costume.
Ghost in the Machine: Allister can project his image via computer screens.
Gratuitous French: Renard, when he's under a lot of stress, including but not limited to being shot at.
Headdesk:
Renard: "Tell me, are you truly that immature? That you would delight in belittling someone 700 years your junior?"
Allister: "Yes. Yes I am."
Renard: *invokes trope*
I Have No Son: Cooper's father.
- Results in Cooper's Parental Abandonment.
I Just Want to Be Special: Victoria's life-long mission statement.
Impossibly Low Neckline: Victoria's version of Allister's battle costume. Not particularly noticeable until Victoria masters water spells.
- Noteworthy for its otherwise Subversion: not one of Victoria's hand-designed outfits fits this bill, including her swimsuit.
Instant Awesome, Just Add Dragons:
- One of the first monsters Victoria fights is a flying, fire-breathing dragon.
- She fights another similar dragon at the start of Chapter 14.
Jump Scare: How Victoria gets Allister's ring on her finger in the first place.
Jumped at the Call: Victoria. She not only jumped at the call, but she came up with the idea of studying magic as Allister's eponymous apprentice.
The Knights Who Say Squee: Cooper, who will do absolutely anything to learn magic from Allister.
Large Ham: Bethany, when she really goes for it.
Made of Explodium: Dragons explode rather spectacularly when hit with fire magic.
Magic Wand: Victoria's staff is a caduceus. *
A Staff of Authority, usually associated with alchemy. Also associated with Hermes, the Greek messenger god, as well as other messengers of wisdom. More on The Other Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caduceus
Mundane Utility: Most sorcerers are savvy enough to use their powers for making everyday tasks easier.
- Cooper uses hypnosis to keep his employers from firing him, and to ward off bullies when he was younger.
- Victoria contemplates the use of magic for self-defense, not against monsters, but against gun-wielding New York muggers.
- Averted when Victoria offers to help Renard by carrying his priceless artifacts with a wind spell. Renard is not amused.
Mysterious Past: Allister always changes the subject when Victoria tries to ask him about intimate details of his life.
New Powers as the Plot Demands: Victoria doesn't so much learn her magic through practice, but by mastering it on the fly. Usually in the middle of a fight, right when she needs the new power.
No Guy Wants an Amazon: Patrice's lament
Noodle Incident: Something involving Allister leaving Victoria (and possibly her friends) unsupervised. A goat was involved.
Not so Above It All: Allister. Though he starts out aloof, he becomes progressively more accustomed to 21st century culture and even begins to emulate it.
The Obi-Wan: Allister
Oh Crap: When Victoria tries to create her own familiar and winds up creating a monster instead.
Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions: In the past, people thought science was actually magic. In the present day, science has largely caught up.
Powers via Possession: While symbiotically possessed by Allister, Victoria has all of Allister's raw power to draw on, but she has to learn to cast her own spells. When being "traditionally" possessed, Victoria can use Allister's spells, but Victoria herself won't be conscious for the duration.
Really 700 Years Old: Allister. Literally, seven hundred years.
Red Oni, Blue Oni:
- Cool and composed Renard to the carefree and easygoing Coooper.
- Renard is also the blue to his lax roommate's red, who calls him "Ice Man".
Refusal of the Call: Victoria flatly refused to let Allister possess her (and spend months of her life unconscious while he cleaned the mess up). In turn, she Jumped at the Call to become a magician herself. So...she Jumped At The Call as a means of Refusing The Call.
Ridiculous Procrastinator: Victoria procrastinates at everything, from her schoolwork to her magical studies.
Ridiculously Cute Critter:
- Nix and Umbreo, the successfully-summoned familiars.
- Special mention to Blinky the Narcoleptic Squirrel. Bonus points for being based on a real squirrel.
Sealed Evil in a Can: Allister's ring
Secret Identity: Allister suggests that Victoria maintain one so as to preserve the general peace. Nevertheless, Victoria's family, and later her friends (except Ben) are actually in the loop about her magic, much to Renard's surprise.
Shoot the Dog: When Victoria has to destroy the familiar she improperly created.
Shout Out:
- The name of Victoria's primary electric attack spell is "Static Shock".
- Victoria mentions having watched Pokemon growing up when Cooper zaps himself by stepping in a puddle and using an electric spell.
  - Another Pokemon reference: Victoria names her familiar "Umbreo", a name close to Umbreon.
- Victoria has a plushie of Kikki or Mimmi (the author's "resident spokeschibis") in her room. Both Kikki and Mimmi reappear (along with the author's logo) as advertisements in Times Square in Chapter 16.
- When Bethany imagines what Victoria looks like as a magical girl, she envisions Victoria dressed in Mew Ichigo's battle costume.
  - The same character makes similar remarks that being a Magical Girl entails "fighting evil by moonlight".
- A piece of bonus art in Volume 1 (and on the comic's webpage) shows Victoria and her friends dressing up for Halloween as various characters: Patrice as Wonder Woman, Bethany as Storm and Victoria as Sailor Moon.
Sorcerer's Apprentice Plot: Comes up less often than you'd think, but is the general idea behind Victoria creating a berserk "familiar".
Sorting Algorithm of Evil: Allister notices how the monsters that attack Victoria are getting progressively stronger.
Spit Take: When Bethany tells Patrice and Victoria rumors about a Magical Girl running around town fighting monsters...
Sprouting Ears: Victoria, often in a brief single-panel Art Shift.
Strange Girl: Victoria revels in it.
Tomboy and Girly Girl: Patrice and Bethany, respectively.
Translator Microbes: Victoria explains to Patrice and Bethany, after they figure out that she knows magic that Allister can only speak French, but Victoria can magically understand him.
- Possibly subverted when Allister appears immediately after the above scenario, speaking flawless English and explaining that he's also a quick learner.
Weirdness Censor: Most normal people who get caught up in a monster fight think little of magical monsters running amok. Newscasters seem to report on them as if they're completely normal, everyday things.
Wake Up, Go to School, Save the World: Harder than it looks.
Wax On, Wax Off: In Cooper's first appearances, he thinks that Victoria's 'training' is preparing him to learn advanced magic. It's actually just Victoria's petty revenge.
World's Smallest Violin: Patrice did this gag in response to one of Bethany's drama queen spiels.
Why Did It Have To Be Spiders: Victoria's greatest fear, revealed when she fights a giant spider monster. Naturally, that issue led to an Aesop about conquering her fear. And Renard having a purpose in Victoria's battles.
Write What You Know: Some of the Expo Speak makes it blatantly obvious that the author knows what she's talking about, such as when Cooper gets bitten by a monster and Victoria instructs Cooper to not tell the doctors it was a random animal bite due to the complications of having to identify the breed of animal and getting rabies shots.
You Gotta Have Blue Hair:
- Victoria's purple hair (and purple eyes).
- Lucinda has pink hair, though that probably is hair dye.