Sluggy Freelance/Characters

Core Cast
Torg

A Cloudcuckoolander who is an eager and well-meaning idiot most of the time, but has flashes of heroics. He's The Hero, at least a foolish version of one... until several years into the series, when he starts to Take A Level in Badass every few story arcs and thoroughly claims the title. He's still a goofy badass, though.


 * Cannot Spit It Out - Torg's crush on Zoë, which has been going for at least eight years. He did however spit it out to a parallel earth Zoë; Given the survival/sanity records of his girlfriends, not spitting it out is fairly sensible.
 * Even granted this wasn't his fault, and that he has now metabolized this fear into a damn good rationalization, it's a lovely little justification for this trope.
 * Crazy Awesome: Basically any time Torg defeats an enemy before he took his level in badass.
 * Crazy Prepared: Emphasis on the "crazy". Emergency pants!
 * Starting to become a bit more sane, though. Nice contingency plan.
 * The Hero: Especially after his levelling in badass.
 * Norse By Norsewest: Describes himself as "mostly Viking", and was once let out of Guantanamo Bay after he broke the scale on their 'Caucasianometer'.
 * Took A Correspondence Course In Kickass - During the That Which Redeems storyline.
 * Getting his hands on a kickass sword during the Stormbreaker arc may have helped.
 * Unmoving Plaid - Torg's flannel shirts.

Riff

A Mad Scientist who has been best friends with Torg since their middle school days, and has problems with women. He's The Smart Guy, with occasional forays into The Big Guy.

"Torg:"
 * Badass Longcoat - Usually subverted by Riff, but played very much straight during the climax of "Dangerous Days Ahead".
 * Riff's little shopping trip in this strip hung a big honkin' lampshade on it.
 * Catch Phrase - "Let me check my notes."
 * Despair Event Horizon/Wangst: Which one it falls under is debatable.
 * He was already Wangsting when he got to 4U, because he
 * Gadgeteer Genius - He makes mecha, dimensional transport devices, toasters that can launch toast through the ceiling, and a staple remover with a 100 foot range.
 * For Science! - Riff's Mad Science.
 * Heroic BSOD:
 * The Lancer
 * Moral Dissonance: He's extremely dickish to Aylee and Sam, constantly trying to find/make up an excuse to kill either of them. It is all but stated that this is due to paranoia rather then malice, but still...
 * Properly Paranoid: ...Then again, both Aylee and Sam are members of extremely powerful species who do eat people (though Aylee has evolved beyond that need) and, at times, have become threats due to inability to fully resist their hunger. At the very least, the weapons and gadgets he made out of said paranoia have saved the group's bacon multiple times.
 * The Spark of Genius: His inventions make sense to a very small group of people. Attempts to reproduce them without the direct involvement of Riff or brilliant scientists who have worked with him for years just don't work.
 * Sunglasses At Night - He never takes his sunglasses off.
 * Hinted (as of Sept 14 2011) to have a reason other than Rule of Cool:
 * The Spark of Genius: His inventions make sense to a very small group of people. Attempts to reproduce them without the direct involvement of Riff or brilliant scientists who have worked with him for years just don't work.
 * Sunglasses At Night - He never takes his sunglasses off.
 * Hinted (as of Sept 14 2011) to have a reason other than Rule of Cool:

Zoë

The female Unlucky Everydude that ends up constantly involved in everyone else's screwiness. While more capable than most, she's clearly The Chick most of the time.


 * Bald Women: For some time. (While changed into a camel, she bit off Gwynn's hair; Gwynn retaliated with a spell that made Zoë lose all of her hair.)
 * Butt Monkey - Usually ends up undergoing some ignominy (such as turning into a camel) even when she isn't involved in the latest escapade.
 * The Chick
 * The Chosen One - Zoë was foretold to be the "Storm Breaker," who will defeat the demon K'Z'K.
 * Green Eyed Monster: She seems to be gettingupset with Noogy's attraction to Torg. She's also shown some signs of this before she realized (and then forgot) she was in love with Torg.
 * Involuntary Shapeshifting - Her tendency to turn into a camel when a certain magic word is mentioned. How very shupid. *POOF*
 * Not So Above It All - Zoë sometimes dives head-first into the weirdness eagerly.
 * Only Sane Woman: Most of the time.
 * Green Eyed Monster: She seems to be gettingupset with Noogy's attraction to Torg. She's also shown some signs of this before she realized (and then forgot) she was in love with Torg.
 * Involuntary Shapeshifting - Her tendency to turn into a camel when a certain magic word is mentioned. How very shupid. *POOF*
 * Not So Above It All - Zoë sometimes dives head-first into the weirdness eagerly.
 * Only Sane Woman: Most of the time.
 * Not So Above It All - Zoë sometimes dives head-first into the weirdness eagerly.
 * Only Sane Woman: Most of the time.

Gwynn

One of Riff's ex-girlfriends, who dabbles in magic and has her fate entwined with the sinister Book of E-Ville. Often The Lancer, although she has been The Chick on at least one occasion.


 * Black Magic - Produces Hilarity Ensues more often than threatening The End of the World As We Know It.
 * Blind Without Em - Possibly the biggest exhibitor of the trope in history.
 * Dark Magical Girl - Flirts with this trope but never fully commits.
 * Demonic Possession
 * Scary Shiny Glasses
 * The Smart Guy
 * Spell My Name With an S: "Gwen", goodness knows why.
 * Tsundere - Type A.

Bun-bun

A miniature talking and very evil lop-eared bunny which might be the most dangerous force in the universe. Very violent and short-tempered, though perfectly controlle dif he needs to be. Quite possibly the smallest Big Guy ever to reach his level of badassitude.


 * The Big Guy
 * Can't Get in Trouble For Nuthin - Bun-bun can escape punishment, and get Torg in trouble, by wearing a Torg costume.
 * Catch Phrase: "Time to die, Nerd-Boy!" and similar, along with his switchblade's distinctive 'ka-click!' sound effect.
 * Heroic Comedic Sociopath - When he's not an outright antagonist.
 * Fluffy the Terrible
 * Implacable Bunny - So far, he's been eaten alive, thrown out of the time stream itself, and burned to a crisp. After that last one, he threw the animal services guy who tried to put him down out a window and is back at full strength, and it took some time for his fur to grow back (and as he showed Zoë, his face under his fur still has burn scars).
 * Interspecies Romance - Is somewhat disturbingly attracted to human women.
 * Karma Houdini - None of the main cast is strong or brave enough to attempt to punish Bun-bun for his many crimes.
 * Killer Rabbit - Literally.
 * My Name Is Not Durwood - Almost always refers to Torg as 'Nerd-Boy' (though he has used his real name a handful of times). Also often refers to Zoë and indeed any woman as 'toots'.
 * Mysterious Past - There's still a lot we don't know about Bun-bun's origins. All we know is that
 * Older Than He Looks? - Speculated in-universe.
 * Refuge in Audacity - Bun-bun's attitude, e.g. in one early strip, his "pirate crew" (consisting of Kiki and a little girl) is drowning, so after musing that he can't really be a pirate captain without a crew... he throws his hat away and rows off to start a black market drugs ring in Tijuana instead.
 * Spell My Name With an S: Because the comic usually uses all caps, people tend to assume his name is capitalised as "Bun-Bun". Things like sub-chapter titles reveal it's actually "Bun-bun".
 * Talking Animal
 * Token Evil Teammate - Ohhhh yeah.
 * Worf Effect - His very few defeats were caused mainly by this trope.

Kiki

Riff's pet talking ferret, who has a habit of being easily distracted and naively willing to touch anything shiny. Kind-hearted, but very foolish, and quite clearly the Team Pet.


 * Attention Deficit Ooh Shiny!
 * Genki Girl - Hell yeah
 * Talking Animal

Aylee

Fish out of water Shapeshifting alien, that came from an early parody of Alien and Star Trek and stuck around. Reserve Big Guy, Lancer, Team Pet varying depending on her form(occasionally changes forms involuntarily to adapt to her environment) and the other characters present. Is personality wise a kind of Genius Ditz due to balance between her naivety and her predatory cunning.


 * Extreme Omnivore - Her red dragon form, which ate just about everything but what would traditionally be considered food.
 * Green Skinned Space Babe - Two notable forms Aylee has used.
 * Healing Factor: In her initial "Xenomorph" form, she can recover from any injury that doesn't immediately kill her.
 * Humanity Ensues - As of her transformation in 2007, she's still covered in green scales, but she's roughly humanoid, has hair on her head, and can be passed off as human with sufficient makeup.
 * I'm a Humanitarian - When she was introduced, she ate an entire spaceship crew, minus Torg and Riff. After she wound up on Earth, she kept eating people, although it wasn't treated as seriously as it probably should have been. She eventually kicked the habit, and the forms she has adopted after that have tended to be herbivorous or similar.
 * Involuntary Shapeshifting - She tends to shift forms to adapt to her environment, but has absolutely no control over it.
 * Samus Is a Girl - Her initial form lacked even Tertiary Sexual Characteristics (as have most of the others), so it was kind of Ambiguous Gender at first. Cleared up pretty quickly after she got a speaking part.
 * Talking Animal - Some of her forms.
 * Wing Pull: Most of Aylee's forms are capable of flight, even when it's not immediately obvious.
 * Wing Pull: Most of Aylee's forms are capable of flight, even when it's not immediately obvious.
 * Wing Pull: Most of Aylee's forms are capable of flight, even when it's not immediately obvious.

Others
Sam

Formerly the cast's neighbor at the apartment complex, now a vampire Walking the Earth. He is the former owner of Kiki and still feels very protective of her. Has a crush on Zoë. Must steer clear of Riff, who tries to stake him whenever he spots him.


 * Casanova Wannabe
 * Catch Phrase: "Sam's Da Man!"
 * Friendly Neighborhood Vampire: He's dedicated himself to "staying good" as a vamp and has saved the crew numerous times. Of course, he'll still gleefully drain non-lethal amounts of blood from hypnotized women and has become a threat to the group when his vampiric hunger overwhelms him.
 * Super Loser: He may have the power of a vampire, but he's still the same sleazy, dim, lovable loser he was in life.
 * Ted Baxter
 * Third Person Person - Sam's da man! (Though he doesn't always do this - just when he's trying to charm the ladies.)

Oasis

A young woman mind controlled by a Mad Scientist named Dr. Steve Hereti. Has a tendency to come back from the dead and is very much in love with Torg.


 * Anti Villain/Anti Hero: Even as a murderous antagonist, she's a pretty sad and pathetic case rather than evil; but when rarely she's a protagonist, she's still pretty murderous.
 * Ax Crazy - Let's put it this way - when Torg said he loved chocolate ice cream, she proceeded to kill the chocolate ice cream. Much to the surprise and consternation of everyone present.
 * Back From the Dead - Many, many times. It's become somewhat of a Running Gag that any arc that features her will see her die once.
 * Berserk Button - Two-anybody she sees as a rival for Torg's affections, and anyone associated with HeretiCorp
 * "Override B-1!"
 * Chronic Villainy: Several of her arcs involve her trying to get some measure of control over herself and even try to become a better person, but invariably either Hereti-Corp's interference, her own incurably insane obsession with Torg, or simply her naturally brutal nature cause her to be unable to.
 * Clingy Jealous Girl - Literally clingy, and violently jealous, as demonstrated by the ice cream incident.
 * Foot Focus - heavily during the Phoenix Rising story arc.
 * Ironically, she ends bROKEN with her entire left lower leg and various other parts blown off by Riff's missiles. It's only this that allows Hereti-Corp to finally capture her (as if Riff had actually managed to kill her, she would have just come back in perfect health).
 * Mad Scientists Beautiful Daughter - Played with. She's the adopted daughter of a Mad Scientist, very beautiful, and in love with the hero, Torg. On the other hand, she only loves him because Steve told her to, which backfires on him when Bun-bun disables his control, making him unable to rescind the order.
 * Murder the Hypotenuse - Oasis has this as her default mode of dealing with any and all challengers for Torg's affection. She once tried this with Gwynn under the mistaken impression that Gwynn was Zoë. In the bROKEN arc, sees her finally identifying Zoë correctly... and believing Torg was "mistaken" when he said he didn't love Zoë.
 * Naked First Impression - Named one of the books: Game Called On Account of Naked Chick.
 * Psychopathic Manchild: She's really messed up in a lot of ways, and these include a lack of maturity and a fondness of violence, the later even after she decides to be a "hero".
 * Resurrective Immortality: She is implied to be one of these. It has yet to be made clear how she keeps showing up again after being shot, impaled, and blown up so many times. It's possible that this is just the result of her Healing Factor, but there is evidence it's not the case.
 * Stalker With a Crush - An extremely dangerous example.
 * Tyke Bomb
 * Yandere - So very, very, very much.
 * Then again, how stable could a Robot/Undying Clone trained to be an assassin with a mind-control enforced love be?
 * Then again, how stable could a Robot/Undying Clone trained to be an assassin with a mind-control enforced love be?

Sasha

One of Riff's girlfriends who eagerly dove into the madness that was the cast's lives. Although her stay on the strip was relatively brief (less than two years), she is very much a fan favorite.


 * Ensemble Darkhorse
 * Gadgeteer Genius, with a dash of Wrench Wench
 * Phrase Catcher - "Weird girl, Sasha."
 * Put On a Bus - She was introduced around Halloween of 2000 and moved away back in 2002, never to be heard from again.

Crystal The obligatory local bartender. Doesn't seem to mind all that much that one of her customers is a talking rabbit.


 * Lethal Chef - Don't come to her Survivor Night when she tries making new mixed drinks.
 * The Bartender

Dr. Schlock A time traveler from an alternate timeline where K'Z'K took over the world. He is an expert in inflatable technology and alternates between a cowardly Anti Hero and (mostly) (sym)pathetic villain.


 * Dirty Coward
 * Dirty Old Man
 * Gadgeteer Genius
 * Heel Face Revolving Door
 * Kick the Dog
 * Was It Really Worth It:
 * Was It Really Worth It:

Horribus A demon lord from the Dimension of Pain and a recurring villain in the strip


 * Attack Its Weak Point - There are apparently only two ways to kill a Demon Lord: decapitation, or.
 * Five Bad Band
 * Horribus - Big Bad and The Brute
 * Psykk - The Evil Genius
 * Mosp - The Dark Chick
 * And Reakk.
 * Honor Before Reason: Torg's initial escape from the Dimension of Pain was the first black mark on his record as demon lord. He became obsessed with re-capturing Torg at any cost in hopes of regaining his perfect streak.
 * Moral Event Horizon - More for the readers than the characters themselves, it's either when he, or when he
 * Not So Harmless - After all the goofiness of the storylines he's in after his introduction (both in the main comic and in Ian Mcdonald's Meanwhile... Saturday strip), this trope bites hard when he leads the invasion of the Dimension of Lame in That Which Redeems.
 * Orcus On His Throne - Horribus' attempts to retrieve Torg involve sending his minions one by one, each Hallowe'en. Justified as dimensional transport gives him stomach problems, and the one time he goes after Torg himself he ends up spending that Hallowe'en... on a throne.
 * Spikes of Villainy - All over him.
 * Unexpected Successor - As revealed in his backstory
 * Villainous Breakdown - Caused by his obsession with Torg.
 * Playing With Fire
 * You Have Failed Me -

Mosp

A member of the Dimension of Pain's Quirky Miniboss Squad who eventually befriends and helps Torg.


 * Multiple Head Case -
 * Expressive Hair - Specifically, her hair talks.
 * Quirky Miniboss Squad
 * No Mouth
 * Mook Face Turn - Torg seems to have a Friend to All Living Things' charm in this regard.
 * Mook Face Turn - Torg seems to have a Friend to All Living Things' charm in this regard.

Crushestro

The head of one of the villainous organizations bidding on Dr. Shankraft's displacement drive and one of the few who came in person rather than sending a representative.


 * Chrome Champion
 * Ensemble Darkhorse
 * Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas
 * Large and In Charge
 * Large Ham
 * Unholy Matrimony - starts a relationship with Monicruel when the two of them get stranded on Shankraft Island.
 * Large and In Charge
 * Large Ham
 * Unholy Matrimony - starts a relationship with Monicruel when the two of them get stranded on Shankraft Island.
 * Unholy Matrimony - starts a relationship with Monicruel when the two of them get stranded on Shankraft Island.

K'Z'K the Vowelless

The first true Big Bad of the series, K'Z'K (often called Kiske, much to his chagrin) is an extremely powerful demon Torg and Riff accidentally unleashed while playing with the Book of Evil. Although defeated by Torg and Zoë, he did not die, but instead his lingering will latched onto a depressed Gwynne and attempted to corrupt her into his new host before once again being vanished. Although his status as Big Bad has long since been passed over to Hereti Corp, he is still a constant presence in the comic, as his demonic servants have now formed a cult to free him from his banishment...


 * Berserk Button: Do not pronounce his name with vowels!
 * Big Bad: Not the first one to appear technically (Horribus and the Vampires predated him), but he was certainly the first one that was presented as a nigh-undefeatable threat.
 * Demonic Possession: Obviously.
 * The Dreaded

Oceans Unmoving Characters
Calix

A remarkably bright boy for a leaf person, Calix is one of the few natives of Timeless Space rather than someone who has fallen out of the timestream. He was picked up by the Bloody Bun during a raid on his village, but instead of locking him below with his tribesmen, Bun-Bun promoted him to First Mate. According to his crew, that's because the Captain likes to know where the next mutiny is coming from.


 * An Axe to Grind - Calix is extremely skilled with his twin axes. So much so that Bun-Bun deduces his people are not farmers, but warriors who happen to farm.
 * Deadpan Snarker - "Grandpa liked to smoke the purple mushrooms, didn't he?"
 * The Dulcinea Effect - To Kada. This fades when she joins forces with Bun-Bun.
 * Fish Out of Water - Even more so than the non-natives.
 * The Ishmael - To Bun-Bun.
 * Loin Cloth - And it's made out of leaves. Yes, leaves. There's a reason Bun-Bun calls his tribe the Leaf People.
 * Too Dumb to Live - As Bun-Bun put it, his grand plan for freeing his people was essentially tossing a calculator to a group of cavemen and telling them to balance their budget.
 * Took a Level In Badass - After he stops caring so much for lives other than those dear to him, he becomes a lethal force.

Kada Jansen

Bun-Bun's first mate for the tail end of "Oceans Unmoving" and the entirety of "Oceans Unmoving II", up until Bun-Bun escapes and she captains her own ship. Came from a different time period; was pulled into Timeless Space when Carib-Carriage One attempted to take off.


 * The Chosen One - she's the only one that can operate the map that leads to Teknokon One, the only ship that can enter and exit Timeless Space at will.
 * Cluster F Bomb - becoming a pirate might have been a good career move for her, as she certainly already had the mouth of a sailor.
 * Crazy Prepared - But only because of her mental block about safety precautions.
 * Hot Scientist
 * Jumped At the Call - "Let me get this straight. You're all a bunch of geeks and nerds taking advantage of a dangerous situation to play pirates? Cue the first mate.
 * Ms. Fanservice
 * Naked First Impression - On Calix and Donaly. The former in particular is turned into a blithering idiot.
 * Pirate Girl
 * Tsundere - Type A
 * Unusual Euphemism - okay, so the "curse words" in question are "freg" and "splat", and occasionally combined to make the phrase "fregging splat". She still has what in her universe qualifies as a very foul mouth, as she can't seem to go more than two panels without using one of these words at least once (and that's probably generous).

The Grays

Exactly What It Says On the Tin, played for laughs.


 * Cloudcuckoolanders - all of them, in their different ways.
 * I Taste Delicious - they all look the same, but taste different. B.A. is chocolate-flavoured.
 * Never Live It Down - Apparently Face overextended a probe at some point. The probee became known as "Ol' Double-Bellybutton]"
 * Shout Out/Theme Naming - since their real names are unpronounceable (mostly), they go by the names Hannibal, Murdock, Face, and B.A. Just to make sure you get the point, during a fight scene, B.A. goes Crazy Awesome with an olive gun (with punny sound effects: Kalamatamatamatamatamata...), then quips, "I pitted the fools!"
 * Too Kinky to Torture - Murdock especially.
 * The Unpronounceable - Subverted for Face, whose real name is "Steeeeeeve." Played straight for Murdock.

Everyone in Ocean's Unmoving
 * Trapped in Another World - Everyone but Calix, and arguably him as well since he'd never been outside his village before.