Roommates: These Are My Reflections

Roommates: These Are My Reflections is an ongoing series of online-published stories. Part of the Roommates canon, it is a How We Got Here for Bowser Koopa, Jr. in his childhood, before going to college or meeting his current boyfriend Giancarlo Rosato. It also involves the members of his family -- his father Bowser, and his siblings Ludwig, Lemmy, Roy, Iggy, Wendy, Morton and Larry, and some of their friends. Whereas the main Roommates comic is created by Dreamous and Spelunker Sal, These Are My Reflections is written by session writer TreIII.

Unlike the relatively limited medium of Web Comics in Roommates, These Are My Reflections is a far more detailed account that attempts to flesh out the characters of Junior at age 17, Bowser at age 50, and Junior's siblings all as adults. They aren't up to quite the same antics they were during their younger years in the Super Mario Bros. Canon universe...nor were they ever villains in this particular Alternate Universe Fic. The family is affluent, living in a family mansion, Koopa Manor. Bowser makes a living operating a worldwide chain of hotels, Koopa Suites, and his children live (relatively) ordinary domestic lives -- ordinary for super-rich upper class, at least. They retain their colorful personalities, but These Are My Reflections is decidedly more Slice of Life.

These Are My Reflections is published at the Roommates page on Fur Affinity. Most (but not all) of its chapters are flagged mature for mature themes and dialogue, and a registered Fur Affinity account is required to view them. Suffice it to say that the story as a complete whole is Not Safe for Work. The first chapter (worksafe and viewable by all) is here, and links to the following chapter, and so on.

Tropes:
"Junior: "So...does this mean we're together now...?" Jojo: "Sure, Bowsie, I'd like that.""
 * Alternate Universe Fic: Word of God. In this particular universe, there are no Super Mario Bros., there is no Mushroom Kingdom, and the Koopa family is a business empire instead of a family of warlords. And while it has Kamek, he is not a magical magikoopa -- no one can perform magic (though something can be said about his magical ability to be Bowser's highly capable) Beleaguered Assistant).
 * Author Appeal: TreIII is an avid gamer. These Are My Reflections goes deep into gamer culture.
 * California: The home state of this particular version of the Koopa family.
 * Captain Ersatz:
 * Crunk Entertainment Television.
 * DivergentArt.
 * Drago Neery.
 * Fictional film maker Kaa Sobekberry, whose name is a play on Kaa Bakensobek, another scaly artist based on Fur Affinity.
 * Myface.
 * Snortorious LAX.
 * Twokat Mewkur.
 * Wonder Bash Bros. Melee. This Alternate Universe Fic has no in-universe real Mario and Luigi, but they still do exist as characters in video games played in-universe. But instead of fighting Bowser, they fight a demon ox king named Yukke. See the Mythology Gag bullet.
 * Coming Out Story: Junior's.
 * Conspicuous Consumption: All the Koopalings do this to some degree. Bowser himself says that each of the kids usually spends more money in a year than it takes to raise a child from birth to adulthood.
 * Conversational Troping: Roy and Junior do this a lot when discussing television and film.
 * Creator Cameo:
 * In-universe, Lemmy is the creator of a Web Comic called Spelunkers into Dreams, a Shout-Out to Spelunker Sal and Dreamous.
 * Before Junior was born, Bowser mulled over a variety of possible names for his youngest son. One of the candidates was Trey.
 * Double Entendre: Even before Junior was out of the closet, Junior and Roy would enjoy intentionally sprinkling conversations with homoerotic Double Entendre that sounds superficially like Un Entendre, just to annoy hilariously insecure Larry. While doing so, they would occasionally glance at Larry to see if he was reacting to it or not. Sometimes they didn't even have to check.
 * Everybody Has Lots of Sex: It seems like the only ones who aren't having lots of sex, are those who for whatever reason can't have it. This is mainly an informed attribute in what is mostly an R-rated story.
 * Explicit Content: Largely averted -- there is one described sex scene, and even that is more awkward than sexy, helping to advance the plot and establish Junior and Jojo's relationship. These Are My Reflections is a very long story and is full of mature themes and adult humor, but this one scene is a tiny sliver of the overall story. Other sexual situations are mentioned, but not described in detail.
 * Family Disunion: And how!
 * Fantasy Counterpart Culture: Word of God from TreIII is that the Koopa family's culture is equivalent to African American, as scalies are a minority in a society of furries. The Koopa family also has some Eastern Dragon lineage through Bowser's ancestry, implying Asian descent as well. The Roommates team chose intentionally not to follow a specifically Korean or Zainichi Korean ethnic angle for the Koopa family itself, allowing the reader to use their own imagination.
 * Fiction 500: Koopa Suites, an international hotel conglomerate that is the Koopa family business.
 * Futureshadowing: After Junior and Jojo had their first sexual encounter, the two have an exchange that mirrors the moment after Gian and Junior in the future would also have their first sexual encounter.
 * Futureshadowing: After Junior and Jojo had their first sexual encounter, the two have an exchange that mirrors the moment after Gian and Junior in the future would also have their first sexual encounter.

"Roy: "Yeah, yeah... So what will it be, Ms. Thang?" Wendy: "Chocolate chip pancakes, if you please. And don't be stingy with the Nestle, if you know what I mean! I need a trip to the Land of Chocolate in the worst way.""
 * Gay Aesop: It may be tempting to maintain increasingly elaborate lies and pretenses to stay in the closet. But this is actually harmful, not helpful, and it too easily spirals out of control. Honesty Is the Best Policy.
 * Good Parents: Bowser and Peach were always good parents to their children. Even with Peach gone and their youngest child reaching adulthood, Bowser is still a great father. This is in stark contrast to Bowser's own father Rufus, who is one of the most horrendous fathers you could ever meet.
 * How We Got Here: This is Junior's backstory of parts of his childhood with his family.
 * L-Word Privileges: "Lizza" is a slang term for person of scaly descent. Change the L to an N, and the Zs to Gs, and you get the basic gag. Roy, Morton and Rufus are most likely to throw this word around, and are incidentally also the characters with the strongest African American Vernacular English speech. Wendy sometimes does. Ludwig, Lemmy, Iggy, Larry and Junior are closer to General American English, and almost never say "lizza".
 * Mr. Fanservice: There are very few male characters with existing portrait artwork who arent this. Bowser, Roy, Morton, Hanbei, Jojo. Even Billy and Jimmy, to a degree. Averted for Lemmy, Iggy and Larry, who are drawn more average in appearance. In-universe, it is said that all of the Koopa family tries to keep themselves physically fit in some way -- with Roy at one extreme who's constantly bodybuilding and doing Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, and Iggy at the other extreme who walks on a treadmill maybe once every two weeks.
 * Ms. Fanservice: Wendy actually manages to be this in artwork and for those readers who are straight men or lesbians. Rufus's renamon escort Deena is invoked as this as well from her description, though more obviously justified in that she's likely a High Class Call Girl.
 * Mythology Gag:
 * In the first chapter, Roy and Junior sit down watching an episode of a tacky TV series, Cheaters, which candidly films people cheating on their significant others and then confronting them with it. In this episode they're watching, a Birdo woman is cheating on her Yoshi boyfriend with a Mouser guy. When confronted, the Birdo woman asks how neither of them ever noticed that she's actually a man, but had planned to get gender reassignment surgery soon. This is in reference to how the video game character Birdo is actually a male-to-female Transgender.
 * In the third chapter, Bowser's assistant Kamek interrupts Bowser in his family greeting with Hanbei to discuss the affairs of Koopa Suites. Kamek mentions some of their business partners, including Kremling Tech and Tatanga Enterprises.
 * Upon their first meeting, the twins Billy and Jimmy asked the similarly-rainbow-haired Lemmy and Iggy if they are also twins.
 * Bowser's deceased wife, Claudia Koopa, was nicknamed Peach. But she wasn't that Peach -- she was a koopa, like the rest of the family.
 * Roy's nickname for his newer, more spacious bedroom with a skylight? "MUTHAFUCKIN' SKYLAND!"
 * When Roy and Hanbei are playing Guilty Gear XX against each other, Iggy playfully calls them "Almighty Pink Craig" vs. "The Blue Demon King: Ao Maoh". In Japan, Bowser is called Dai Maoh Kuppa, meaning "Great Demon King Koopa".
 * Since Bowser and his family are not video game characters in this story, there is a demon ox character in Wonder Bash Bros. Melee named Yukke. This is in reference to one of Shigeru Miyamoto's alternate candidates for naming Bowser before he settled on Kuppa. Both クッパ kuppa (국밥 gukbap) and ユッケ yukke (육회 yukhoe) are Korean dishes popular in Japan, and Miyamoto wanted to name the character after a Korean dish. The ox is in reference to Miyamoto's possible species considerations before he settled on a turtle.
 * In chapter 9 part 2, Roy is cooking breakfast in the kitchen in his room that Wendy had installed for him.

"Junior: "When I was really young, I used to think of myself as the little artist. So, there weren't too many days that went by, where I would randomly go around, using my paintbrush to paint all over the damn place. My family's house, my classroom, some of my brothers and sister's things, at the park, etc., etc...""
 * Their mother Peach was said to make the best cakes. She wasn't that Peach, but it was still funny.
 * In chapter 10, Junior and his date Babs have arrived at their senior prom, and are making conversation.

"Iggy: "And besides, that live-action movie from the '90s SUCKED!""
 * Narm Charm/So Bad It's Good: In-universe example. Junior likes bad B-movies, explaining precisely because they're so unintentionally funny and so bad they're good.
 * CROSSFIYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!
 * To Wendy though, it's just plain Narm.
 * No True Scotsman: Junior comes from a Koopa American family. But because of his more General American speech and mannerisms, in high school he was sometimes accused of not being truly "lizza" enough. This happened even at home, where Morton accused both Junior and Ludwig alike of this. In chapter 7, in Roy's room, when Morton accused Junior of this and Morton refused to relent, Roy angrily picked Morton up by his neck, carried him outside his room, and gave him an ass-whupping. Roy then returned and apologized for the unscheduled "lizza moment".
 * Platonic Life Partners: Roy and Hanbei are one of the sweetest love stories in the Roommates universe. And it's completely platonic. Not that there is no Ship Tease...
 * Red Oni, Blue Oni: Pink-domed Roy and blue-scaled Hanbei have this trope nailed.
 * Removable Shell: Specifically noted when Hanbei first arrives -- almost none of the Koopa clan, even Bowser, are wearing their normal spiked shells. Junior and Wendy explain that it has become popularly fashionable for American turtles to live and be seen without their shells, wearing clothes directly over their unshelled bodies. Ludwig alone opts to keep wearing his shell. The story further explains that modern people of turtle descent are born with shells, that are eventually shed as vestigial organs. However, there are a wide variety of manufactured shells that turtles usually wear throughout their lives, with the exception of the recent fashion trend. Shells are also expected turtle formalwear, and Junior wears an elegant white shell with his white tux for his senior prom.
 * Rule of Drama: What else would you expect from a Family Disunion?
 * Sex Equals Love: Junior and Jojo's relationship starts out the same way Junior and Gian's relationship does in the future. Unfortunately, at first, this carries the same problems of starting an informed relationship without the audience understanding the way their chemistry works. Fortunately for These Are My Reflections, the written word is much easier to produce than a page of a Web Comic, so Junior and Gian's relationship is fleshed out in greater detail than Junior and Gian have ever gotten. This is true especially after Junior and Jojo break up, and you get to see how Junior really did love Jojo emotionally and intellectually, and not just physically. If only that kind of chemistry had been clear when they were still together.
 * Ship Tease: Roy pinning down Hanbei with great big smiles on their faces while practicing Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.
 * Shout-Out/Product Placement: The story makes a tidal wave of direct or blatant oblique references to various works and domestic commercial products, largely to add both domestic and geek appeal to this Slice of Life story:
 * 4chan.
 * A1 Steak Sauce.
 * Aliens vs. Predator.
 * Bible Adventures, referred to in-story as a kusoge.
 * Blackberry phones.
 * Carls Jr. restaurants.
 * Action 52 II, referred to in-story as a kusoge.
 * CROSSFIYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!. Junior and all his brothers (with the exception of Ludwig) even spontaneously break out into singing the Crossfire commercial jingle, much to Wendy's annoyance.
 * Crystal Castles.
 * Dance Dance Revolution.
 * Defender II, which is Bowser's favorite video game.
 * Dynasty Warriors.
 * "GO FOR THE HATCHES ON THE UNDERSIDE!"
 * Golden Eye 1997, the Nintendo 64 game.
 * Guilty Gear.
 * Hadouken.
 * Hot Pockets pastries.
 * "I'm the baby, gotta love me!".
 * The Incredibles.
 * IHOP restaurants.
 * I Love Lucy.
 * JAM Project.
 * Jane Eyre.
 * Kamehameha.
 * King of Fighters.
 * Kunio no Nekketsu Dodgeball Densetsu.
 * Lethal Weapon 3.
 * Lifetime.
 * "Lizza moment".
 * MAME.
 * Marvel vs. Capcom.
 * The Matrix.
 * McDonald's restaurants.
 * Men in Black.
 * Mortal Kombat.
 * Mortal Kombat and Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, which Roy and Hanbei watched back to back instead of attending their senior prom, for a fun night of Snark Bait.
 * Mott's fruit punch.
 * Mystery Science Theater 3000.
 * Naruto.
 * Nestle chocolate.
 * Pac-Man.
 * A Pimp Named Slickback.
 * Popeye's Chicken restaurants.
 * Quicken software.
 * Revenge of the Sith.
 * River City Ransom.
 * Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
 * Ryoga Hibiki.
 * Shaq Fu.
 * Shonen Jump.
 * Soul Calibur.
 * Strawberry Shortcake.
 * Super Mario Bros the movie, but never directly by name.


 * Super Robot Wars.
 * Tekken.
 * Tess of the D'Urbervilles.
 * TNT.
 * Urban Dictionary.
 * Vegeta.
 * Wikipedia.
 * World of Warcraft.
 * Shown Their Work
 * Slice of Life
 * Twofer Token Minority: In addition to Hanbei being both Japanese and Afro-Brazilian, the Koopa family belong to a Fantasy Counterpart Culture of African Americans, and they also have some dragon ancestry from East Asia through Bowser's lineage. And, ironically, at least one member of their extended family (Rufus) is extremely racist against Asians. Truth in Television that most African Americans are not wholly African in descent, and usually have a moderate percentage of ancestors who came from other "race" groups, often white or Native American, but also sometimes Asian.
 * We All Live in America: In this particular incarnation, the Koopa family are unabashedly American.
 * Word of God/Jossed: TreIII sometimes answers questions, including for TV Tropes, but only information that doesn't spoil the rest of the story.
 * The full names of the Koopalings are extended from the real people Nintendo named them after, within reason.
 * Larry Koopa is Lawrence Harvey Koopa, after Lawrence Harvey Zeiger, the birth name of Larry King.
 * Morton Koopa, Jr. is Morton Sean Koopa, Jr., after Sean Morton Downey, Jr., the birth name of Morton Downey, Jr.. Sean and Morton were swapped because Morton Koopa, Jr. is specifically named after Bowser's own grandfather who was also named Morton, and having them both named "Sean Morton" instead of "Morton Sean" would be awkward across three generations.
 * Wendy O. Koopa is Wendy Orlean Koopa, after Wendy Orlean Williams, the full name of Wendy O. Williams.
 * Roy Koopa was already fully-named in-story as Roy Kelton Koopa, after Roy Kelton Orbison, the full name of Roy Orbison. When TreIII was asked if this was a pattern for the other Koopalings' names, he confirmed it. However, there are exceptions:
 * Iggy Koopa is Ignatius Koopa, since Iggy Pop's real name is James Newell Osterberg, Jr., and adapting this to Iggy Koopa would have been too unworkable.
 * Lemmy Koopa is Lemmington Koopa, since Lemmy is a stage name of ambiguous origin, with no relation to that performer's real name, Ian Fraser Kilmister.
 * Bowser already explained in-story that Ludwig von Koopa was specifically named after Ludwig Van Beethoven because Beethoven music was playing at Bowser and Peach's honeymoon where Ludwig was conceived. No Word of God naming clarification required.
 * World of Snark