Rain (webcomic)

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(From left to right) Gavin, Rudy, Rain and Maria.

"A story for boys, girls, and everyone in-between..."

A slice-of-life Dramedy webcomic created by JocelynCD.

In public, Rain appears to be your average teenage girl. She enjoys shopping and dressing pretty and whatnot, but the fact is that she’s hardly average. Some would debate she’s even a girl! In truth, Rain is a male-to-female transsexual.

The irony is in that growing up, she appeared to be a completely average little boy. No one would have ever guessed that the poor child was dealing with something like this inside. Those days were rough on her. Having to “pretend” to be a boy throughout her childhood was painful for her and led to many days where seemingly nothing went right or ended in tears.

At age 13, circumstance lands Rain in the custody of her Aunt Fara, whom she finally revealed her secret to. Rather than see Rain suffer, her aunt decided to allow her to dress like a girl around the house if it would make her feel better. And it did… for a while, anyway. As time went by, Fara noticed Rain had become a bit of an antisocial hermit for the sake of being able to dress up more frequently. Already shy to begin with, this probably wasn’t a step in the right direction.

Fara came up with an interesting (but ballsy) plan to remedy this, but keep Rain happy. It took a long time and a lot of work, but she saved up enough money to move the two of them to a new town where nobody would know them. They acquired a fully female wardrobe for Rain, and she was enrolled in a high school as a girl. It would be potentially dangerous for Rain if she were ever caught, but her nature made her seek perfection in her presentation before going out into the world… Well, her voice could use some work anyway...

Rain updates on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evenings. It can be read here, or here, or on Jocelyn's DeviantART gallery.

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Tropes used in Rain (webcomic) include:

• Abusive Parents: Oh, so many. Emily's mother, Rain's father, both Rudy and Maria's parents as well as Heather and Ky's...
• Amicable Exes: Rain and Rudy after their breakup.
• Animesque: Has all the different anime tropes and references, but is not drawn by a Japanese person.
• Ascended Fanon: Page 191 is titled "RuIn", after the fandom's most popular contraction for Shipping Rain and Rudy. Notably, the page depicts an romantic embrace between the aforementioned characters.
• Asexual: Chanel is an homoromantic asexual (or, as she calls herself, "lesbi-ish")
• The Atoner: Aiken post-Character Development.
• Bi the Way: Fara and Ky(lie). Emily is revealed to be pansexual, as she only shares attraction with close friends, and doesn't like talking about it.
• Black Sheep: Rain's elder brother Aiken seems to be viewed as this.
  • Later on, however, Kellen has put herself in this spot, especially after Rain's Traumatic Haircut.
• Bland-Name Product: Video game systems and games (and possibly other things) in Rain's world tend to be lawyer-friendly versions of their real life counterparts. For instance, the "Super Nintendo" entertainment system instead becomes the "Super Funtendo" entertainment system, and the game Battletoads becomes "Fighter Frogs".
  • Not to mention the fake anime names, "Kill Book", "Dragoncube A", and "Hardsteel Physicist".
• Bonus Material: Jocelyn is interspersing bonus omake strips between her regular chapters under the title "Rain Delay".
• Cast Full of Gay: With the exception of Gavin, all the main characters are on the LGBT spectrum.
• Character Development: Lots. It's a Coming of Age Story, after all.
• Character Title
• Childhood Friends: Gavin and Rain (as Ryan). Later on, Allison has appeared as one for them.
• Color Failure: Rain's reaction to Gavin asking her if she happened to be familiar with his childhood friend, Ryan Flaherty.
  • Maria gets in on the action here.
  • The entire Halloween party loses its color when [1] Rudy, in a drunken stupor, kisses Rain.
  • All of Rain's friends react like this when Emily explains to them what happened that weekend.
• Cure Your Gays: According to Rudy's flashback, this was the reasoning his parents used for sending him and Maria to a catholic school after Rudy came out to them. Considering how they reacted, it's no wonder Maria has kept silent about her own sexual preferences.
  • Additionally, in chapter 7, it is revealed that everyone thinks Rudy's homosexuality has been cured, after he kisses Rain.
• Cute Shotaro Boy: Rain in the prologue.
• Death Glare: Maria is a master at it. She could teach T-800 robots a thing or two about how to do it.
• Dropped a Bridget On Him: Rain does this to the core cast at the end of Chapter One.
• Dude, She's a Lesbian: Trope Namer. Rudy says this exact line to Gavin when he was hitting on Maria in this strip.
• Faceless Masses: The cover of Chapter 8.
• Fictional Media: "Black Wings, Kaminari", "Halloween Princess Pandora", and "Mad Giga-Kaizer X" are all fictional manga and anime that Rain and her friends have collected.
• Flash Back: There is one in the prologue, and another when Rudy is explaining why Maria is in the closet.
• Foreshadowing: The prologue, for one. The appearance of Aiken is also foreshadowed by Fara's conversation with Kellen. Also, some of the Halloween costumes are hinted at before they are revealed.
• Gaydar: Rain doesn't know what one is, apparently...
• The Generic Guy: Rand M. Guy (AKA Randy) is the least characterized of the ensemble cast, and as of yet the only recurring character who has had no dialogue. He appeared in chapters 1 (where he gets stared down by Maria) and 6 (where Rain and Gavin both spit their drinks on him). His normalness is lampshaded not only by his name, but from Word of God and Bonus Material. (No one cares that he is bisexual).
• Gilligan Cut: The page after Rudy crashes into Rain, and sees Rain's "junk" under her skirt:

Rain (thinking): And even if he did, he probably wouldn't even believe what he saw, right? Yeah, I'm sure he wouldn't tell anyone... Rudy (to Maria and Gavin): Hey, guys! You'll never guess what I saw!

• Halloween Episode: Basically all of Chapter 6.
• If It's You It's Okay: How Rudy eventually becomes attracted to Rain, despite being predominantly homosexual otherwise.
• Improvised Weapon: Aunt Fara's improvised Weapon of Choice? Student artwork.
• Ironic Nickname: Rain is actually not that fond of rainy days at all.
• Keet: Rudy is one, being small, loud, colorful, hyper...
• Lampshade Hanging: In Girls, one of the characters, Holly, gave this jewel. Note that she prolably stepped outside to wait until her ears stopped ringing:

Holly: Umm... Where's our teacher during all of this?

• Lovable Alpha Bitch: Emily, definitely.
• Mama Bear: Aunt Fara, full stop.
• New Transfer Student: The story kicks off with Rain's first day after transferring to a new school.
• No Periods, Period: Implied to be averted here. Rain is very prepared.
• Nosebleed: Rain's gym outfit has a rather distracting effect on Maria. Preceded by a Luminescent Blush and comboed with Color Failure.
• Oblivious to Love: Rain, to Maria and Gavin's crushes on her.
• Occidental Otaku: Rain is fond of Manga, and Gavin is into Anime.
• Official Couple: Rain and Rudy were this for a while, but they broke up. As of chapter 28, Rain and Emily have moved on to this category.
  • Maria and Chanel as of Chapter 13.
• Old Flame Fizzle: When Rain and Gavin hang out again, they feel it's not the same as when they were kids, and Gavin thought Rain was Ryan. Somewhat subverted, as Rain and Gavin still remain friends, and Gavin has a crush on Rain.
• Parental Substitute: Rain's snarky aunt Fara took Rain in when Rain was 13, after "circumstances" separated Rain from her parents.
  • In chapter 6, it is revealed that Rain's mother, Liriel, is dead. The status of her father, Marcus, is unknown.
• Schoolgirl Lesbian: Maria.
• Sinister Minister: Father Quenton, the school principal, is established as this in his opening panel. (Ok, he is probably the lower-grade "high-school" version of evil incarnate, but he probably still qualifies.) Also established to have a Bald of Evil.
• Spiritual Successor: It feels a lot like Venus Envy sometimes.
  • While there are similar themes between the two, the author herself has admitted [2] ^{[dead link]} to not reading Venus Envy. Not really SS material.
• Sure Why Not: After a friend of the author thinks up the name Jerky McJerkface for Gavin, the author decided to make it canon.
• Stupid Sexy Flanders: Rain in a gym uniform invokes this reaction from Maria...and a good section of the audience.
• Sweat Drop: Both Rain and Rudy displays one the script after their collison.
• Took a Level In Kindness: Aiken, big time. He has gone from a transphobic Jerkass who left his fiancée and bashed Rain for being trans to one of Rain's biggest supporters and wanting to patch things up with Jessica.
• Transsexualism: Should be pretty obvious by now. While Rain is an mtf transsexual, the character of Ky(or Kylie) also falls under this category, as he is genderfluid.
  • Other characters who are this are Rain's therapist Vincent, Aiken's ex-fiancée Jessica and Anastacia.
• Traumatic Haircut: Rain, by Kellen's hands.
• True Companions: Rain's school friends (Gavin, Rudy, Emily, Maria, Chanel) have formed a strong bond, mostly due to their issues. It's clear they've found a family in each other.
• Understatement: There is a brief Flash Back that shows Rudy coming out, with his dad calling the operator for a young priest and an old priest, and his mom crying badly. The page title? Slight Overeaction.
• Unwanted Harem: It seems that every kid in the school with a compatible sexual orientation gets a crush on Rain. The attention is very much unwanted, for fear that someone will find out her secret.
• Wham! Episode: Tons of them.
  • Chapter 9: Maria comes out of the closet in a crowded hallway.
  • Chapters 11 through 13: Aiken deals with the fact that both his ex-fiancée and little brother (now sister) are transgender. He doesn't take it well.
  • Chapter 25: Rain finds out her sister Kellen cut off her hair in her sleep.
  • Chapter 26: Heather reveals to Jessica she has CAIS.
• Wham! Line: Take a guess.
  • This one:

Emily: I… I'm… pregnant… It's my ex-boyfriend's.

• • And this one:

Rain: Emily, I have the biggest crush on you.