Redd is a webcomic featuring the eponymous character Vicky Redd, an armless researcher who sports a set of floating waldos and works on technology involving translating neural signals to instruments. Outside of her research position, she also fights sea monsters (apparently a very common occurrence) and seems to be being groomed by a company named IBISEC to take down the extant superhero and supervillain community. In 2014, the comic went on hiatus and has since disappeared from the web, though it can still be found through web archives.
In the meantime, creator Jack Cayless has moved on towards developing a survival horror/comedy game, (Internet Archive link since the site is gone) which features several Humanoid Abomination characters similar to the popular Redd character, Ezzie.
Be warned, while Redd is relatively tame, the site is very NSFW.
Spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned.
Redd contains examples of:
- 10-Minute Retirement: It lasts approximately two chapters.
- Action Girl: Redd. She actively enjoys the field work, and on occasion discounts solutions that won't involve getting into the thick of it.
- Arm Cannon: The weapon used for her first sea monster.
- Beware the Silly Ones: Redd has reservations about killing a supervillain because he's human, unlike the monsters she's fought in the past. After being given the villain's rapsheet and being told that he's too dangerous to the civilian populace to keep alive, she changes her mind and the readers are made aware how serious she is when she jumps from her transport towards the villain. JESUS CHRIST, VICKY.
- Big-Breast Pride: Redd, to the point where she refuses to wear a bra despite it being uncomfortable for her to run without one.
- Cape Busters: IBISEC aims to put superheroes as a whole out of business by cornering the world-saving market. They act out this trope to its full extent with supervillians, killing them off one by one as soon as they can get an individual respective contract with the government.
- Coincidental Broadcast: Redd ends up sleeping through one that reveals that one of the monsters she killed was actually a superhuman.
- Cut Short: The comic ended with a promise of a "Season 2", but it and its host site has since disappeared from the web.note
- Death Is Cheap: Implied by Redd, who has coming Back from the Dead on her checklist.
- Disability Superpower: Zigzagged: Redd's disability does not constitute a superpower in itself, but growing up without arms provided the facility with prosthetics she needs to operate her waldoes as if they were part of her own body.
- Drop the Hammer: The weapon used for the second sea monster. She has it again in Chapter 6.
- Evil Is Cool: In-universe. Esmerelda Bizarre studied the forgotten art of Flesh Magic. Despite the fact that she uses her Lovecraftian Superpower for good, she still got kicked out of magic school AND her ex-peers still want to be just like her.
- Eyes Do Not Belong There: Ezzie plays this up to eleven, since her skin is constantly shifting to include several eyes. Amusingly, she sometimes sprouts them when she's ogling Redd.Redd: I like how your skin jiggles whenever you grow a new eyeball.Ezzie: Thanks! I like how you sort'a just jiggle by default.
- Faux Yay: This could actually be Redd's default sexuality. She's way more interested in invoking Ambiguously Bi than grabbing a single Love Interest.
- Floating Limbs: Redd's floating hands. One of the few times where it's Justified. (See the entries for Handicapped Badass.)
- Gamer Girl: If she's not fighting monsters or doing tests for IBISEC, she's usually lounging around her room playing her "vidya gaems".
- Genre Savvy: Redd in spades. She constantly pokes fun at superhero tropes and wipes the floor with other supers.
- Handicapped Badass: Redd was born without arms because of her dad. Doesn't stop her from scoring floating hands of science and kicking ass with them.
- I Have to Go Iron My Dog: "REDD CAN I SEE YOU IN THE CHANGING ROOMS FOR AN IMPROMPTU LESBIAN SCENE OR SOMETHING EQUALLY UNRELATED"
- I Know Mortal Kombat: According to Redd, she got all of her fighting techniques from playing video games.
- Impossible Hourglass Figure: Redd and the woman from "upper management" are particularly obvious examples of this.
- In the Hood: Sometimes the subject of the main characters casual wear.
- Joker Immunity: Played with. The world has no death penalty, supervillians go to Tailor-Made Prisons outside government authority (that they keep breaking out of), and the superheroes and supervillains themselves keep a Venture Bros.-esque policy of Thou Shall Not Kill… other supers. Any Innocent Bystander is free game for the villains. In fact, if you happen to break this rule, you are deemed a “Cape Killer” and a guy named “The Enforcer” will come and murder you in turn. Deconstructed quickly by IBISEC, who believes that keeping supervillians around does more harm than good. Cue Redd fighting her first supervillian, starting and ending with a Neck Snap.
- Lampshade Hanging:
- When they have Redd in a suspension tank to study the effects of an attack on her:
"Doctor, we've placed Redd in the ambiguous goo tube with the bars at the perfect height to cover her naughty bits and the weird gel she can talk through"- She also questions why they don't use conventional weapons more often against the sea monsters, which is handwaved with something about trying to reduce collateral damage.
- Done to the Rule of Drama:
Ezzie: "How do you manage to slam a an automated sliding door?"Redd: "The Power of Grump." - Lovecraftian Superpower: Ezzie's shtick. Most prominently shown on the cover of Chapter 7: Ezzie! Sick Shoggoth Powers!
- Mega-Corp: IBISEC, who created Redd's handmaidens, among other things used by both the general public and the military. However, the corporation seems to hold the idea of traditional heroes and villains in contempt, and are hoping they can use their tech—along with Redd—to shake up the status quo.
- Mid-Season Upgrade: Redd's hands, and often offscreen. Many, many times. Ultimately, it's justified by IBISEC being a technological powerhouse, which they use to give Redd the appropriate armor for any given mission.
- Notably, her Multi-Armed and Dangerous armor (which was used to kill a supervillain) is one of the few, if not only, models where Redd has actual arms attached to them. Meaty, exoskeleton-covered arms.
- More Teeth than the Osmond Family: Ezzie can give a Cheshire Cat Grin like the best of them.
- Most Common Superpower: Redd is a sterling example, although she seems to come by it naturally.
- Most Definitely Not a Villain: IBISEC:Ezzie: Well I mean, the company's clearly evil. Aside from all the people I stick back together, you guys are developing anti-superhuman weapons and stuff. And Frankie Ibis' office has that "I'm evil" aesthetic to it. Anyone who has a nice office enjoys their job, and anyone who enjoys their job is hiding something.
- Ms. Fanservice: Redd, of course. For a girl without arms, she's pretty curvy, as well as proud of her figure. Most of this revolves around her Most Common Superpower and occasional accentuating outfits. She's definitely invoking this via Genre Savvy-ness.
- Nothing Is Scarier: Shown to be Redd's greatest fear when she's locked in a room of darkness.Redd: (at nothing) WHAWASSAT?!Voice with an Internet Connection: What was what?Redd: I dunno, I think my brain is bamoozlin' me. And bamboozles are my one weakness.Author's Note: Bamboozles, the superhero's natural predator.
- Powered by a Forsaken Child: Ezzie's flesh magic. The Human Resources sacrificed thousands of years ago to her buddy The Flesh God manifest as tiny screaming faces on her skin.
- Punch-Clock Hero. Anyone working at IBISEC. They can't even kill a bad guy unless they get a contract from the government. Justified since their CEO believes that regular superheroes have too much of an ego, among other "imperfections." (See Joker Immunity entry for details.)
- Radiation-Induced Superpowers: Averted. Vicky's dad wanted a superhero for a kid, so he supposedly exposed her to radiation while she was still in the womb. She ended up being born without arms.
- Red Is Heroic: Nay, Redd Is Superheroic! Also, the technology that powers her floating hands is custom-colored red.
- Paint It Black: Averted. Redd's hands go through constant models and upgrades, often reverting to black, which is simply the standard model color of IBISEC's technology.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Redd does not like being in a dark abyss.
- Seinfeldian Conversation: The dialogue mostly consists of this, with a lot of weird subjects. Subjects like recovering in a med tube from getting your head cut off and the Side Boobs in Futurama.
- Shout-Out: Has its own page.
- Smug Super: Pride is the Fatal Flaw of superheroes, according to Mister Ibis. His speech about them is basically a hoard of
Fridge Logic towards the entire Super Hero genre, spiced up with a big fat What the Hell, Hero? to every superhero ever. - Stripperific: Some of the outfits Redd wears when on-duty (this extends to the other test subjects of both genders as well). Most of them cover her whole body, but are skin-tight. She has her limits though; when she gains a darkness-enhanced magic boost from a wizard, it gave her a much more skin-baring Chainmail Bikini as a result. She immediately covers herself and demands some sort of actual cover before she fights (to which the wizard apologetically hands her a cloak in response).
- Superpowered Evil Side: Subverted with Dark Redd. Her company made a Deal with the Devil in order for Redd to fight magic-users, giving her the ability to manifest an immense amount of magical power for a short period of time. This includes an Eye Colour Change, donning a gray-and-black, more Stripperiffic-than-usual outfit and speaking in black Speech Bubbles… but no split-personality for Redd.
- Ultimate Blacksmith: Apparently, every single superhero. They make their own super-suits, which can keep up with their everyday work without getting ripped and torn like little bedsheets.
- Uncle Penny Bags: Mister Ibis, head of IBISEC. Little guy even looks kinda like the Trope Namer.
- Ambiguously Evil: As the usual course for a Hidden Agenda Villain. Oh yeah, we forgot to mention: He's evil. Rest assured, he's still a nice guy, but whether this means that he's Affably Evil or Faux Affably Evil is yet to be determined.
- Unlimited Wardrobe: Redd sports a different look several times throughout the comic.
- The Un-Smile: A lot of commentators interpreted the alien receptionist's smile here as this.Seth Brodbeck: That is the kind of smile that says "I may not fully comprehend this smiling thing, but I comprehend the disciplinary action that will be taken if I don't smile."
- Early in the comic, a woman from upper management shows up to ask Redd if she would like to participate in IBISEC's hero program. She's sports an odd smile the whole time and one of Redd's co-workers refers to the woman as a "scary lady".
- What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Redd has qualms about killing a supervillain on the basis that he's human, unlike the sea monsters she had been facing earlier, but she ultimately decides to do it (see Beware the Silly Ones above for more detail). Later, she kills a giant creature that was just standing in the ocean near a port with no hesitation, thinking it was another monster. It's later revealed that it was actually a giant man in armor (though Redd missed this tidbit when it was revealed due to being asleep at the time).
- Youthful Freckles: Redd has these.
