Serious Business/Web Comics

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


"You have wronged innocents, Charles. I formally challenge you to a game of four-square. The loser will be given over to the lords of this realm to do with as they please!"

  • Mal of Head Trip warns her siblings in the tone and posture of a drill sergeant (even using the words "troops," "soldiers," and "mission") not to talk or make any sound whatsoever while watching the final season of Battlestar Galactica. She is dumbfounded to find that they don't in fact give a rat's behind about the show.
  • Emeril LeGoinegasque, a supporting character in Achewood, is the president of a club dedicated to the made-up hobby of Trashspotting, driving around on garbage day and building up extensively detailed personality profiles of people they've never even met based on what they throw out. He lives and breathes trashspotting, his character blog (yes, Achewood characters get their own blogs) was all about his trashspotting exploits, and he even had a trashspotting forum for a while. To him and his club, if to nobody else on Earth, other peoples' garbage is serious business.
    • Emeril's trashpotting even acts as a Chekhov's Skill in one arc, where Philippe goes missing -- he manages to figure out where he's going based off a sole discarded can of baked beans.
  • In a The Adventures of Dr. McNinja story, tennis was created to make sure there is always a champion to battle an ancient death machine in a game of tennis every year so it does not destroy the world. The U.S. government loses a team of Navy SEALs to the tennis temple's security system everytime they have to replace the current tennis champion. Also, they have to get through robot commando temple guards to even get to the temple.
  • In Sluggy Freelance holidays are Serious Business. Bun-Bun actually tries to take over the world by becoming the patron figure of Christmas, Halloween, Thanksgiving, etc.
  • Science fiction and fantasy, and the fandom that has built up around them, are very Serious Business in Fans.
  • Darth Maul and Marluxia have come to blows over smoothie flavors in Ansem Retort.

Maul: [while using Force Lightning on Marluxia] Say it, bitch! MANGO STRAWBERRY!

  • Collar 6 features a BDSM society that keeps superpowered enforcers on retainer. Apparently the Judiaticizes are authorized to kill people.
    • It's justified in that it's not just the enforcers who have powers. Think about this for a moment: people who enjoy hurting others and/or hurting themselves, in possession of superpowers based on whether they are sadists or masochists (or both). And not just enjoying a little, either. People who literally GET OFF from either the pain they themselves feel, or the pain that others feel. Without someone to keep them in line, how is that NOT supervillains just waiting to happen?
  • In Problem Sleuth, if something is "Incredibly Silly", you can pretty much be sure it's also "SERIOUS BUSINESS".
    • In Homestuck, the log header in John's dad's PDA declares ties to be Serious Business.
    • A magazine named "Serious Jester" is for those who really mean it.
  • Something*Positive features the Teddy Bear Liberation Front. Plenty of people in Real Life find the idea of plushie fetishism weird or disturbing, but as fetishes go, it's pretty harmless. The TBLF think it's so disgusting they kill and torture people who make, sell, or use "yiffable" plushies.
  • In this strip of Loserz, Makkaroni with cheese are Serious Business!
  • In Nectar of the Gods, bartenders are the general focus of the Webcomic, in the Tournament Arc bartending and mixing cocktails is very Serious Business! Where just drinking a specific type of drink can either fix a person's emotional problems in an instant or drive to induced suicide.
  • In Las Lindas, Rachael feels this way about the fights in the arena. She cuts herself off before she can use this trope by name.
  • In Sinfest, fashion is serious -- with fashion police.