Comic Book / Animosity

Mostly, what we know is this:
One day, for no goddamn reason, the Animals woke up.
They started thinking.
They started talking.
They started taking revenge.
We call it the Wake.
It's less dramatic than the Funeral.

Animosity is a post-apocalyptic Xenofiction comic book series created and written by Marguerite Bennett and produced by Aftershock Comics, first published in August 2016.

What would happen if every animal in the world suddenly gained sapience, and was able to talk and think like a human? Would they live in harmony with us? Would we learn from them? Or would they take revenge for everything we've done? Every species we've driven extinct, every pound of meat we've eaten, every kill a hunter's shot, every bug squashed underfoot?

The Wake did just that — every creature, from dogs and cats and whales to bees and mayflies woke up one day. Since then, society has collapsed — animals outnumber humans greatly, and they rule the world. Caught in the middle of all of this is a child from New York City named Jesse Hernandez and her dog Sandor, a bloodhound who loves her more than anything in the world. The two of them, along with a group of animals, are trying to travel to California, where Jesse's half-brother Adam North, her only surviving family member, lives.

Animosity also has two spin-off works: Animosity: The Rise and Animosity: Evolution, both of which focus on Adam, in a San Francisco ruled over by Wintermute, an ambitious and mysterious canine. The Rise is a completed trilogy, and Evolution is currently ongoing.

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Animosity contains examples of:

• Arc Villain: The Dragon for its synonymous arc, and the Headmistress for the "Power" storyline.
• Arc Words: "One day, the animals woke up. They started thinking. They started talking. They started taking revenge."
• Amplified Animal Aptitude: The Wake gave every animal on Earth the ability to think and speak like a human of their equivalent age.
• Apocalypse How: Global Societal Collapse, due to animals outnumbering humans.
• Artistic License – Biology:
  • Discussed — several animals without the capability for speech are suddenly able to vocalize, including mayflies and clams.
  • Subverted with regards to a Koala living on tofu — they can only eat eucalyptus due to a specialized digestive system, and as a result, it's speculated that's part of the reason behind the mutiny at the Animilitary compound.
• Baby Factory: The Walled City is revealed to be one.
• Berserk Button: Don't ever tell Sandor he's a 'bad dog.' He'll kill you for it.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: As a dog, Sando's only morality is "protect Jesse at all costs."
• Canine Companion: Sandor has been with Jesse since she was very little.
• Cats Are Mean: Inverted, as cats are one of the few animals that are always allies to humans and mostly good. Mittens is shown to be way more ethical than Sandor even with his lapse in judgement about the bees, Pallas Cat is an outright Nice Guy, and during the Wake, the first thing an unnamed house cat does is threaten to claw his owner's abusive husband's eyes if he lays his hands on her again.
• Children Are Innocent: Jesse, poor girl. Sandor's trying to keep her from seeing the horrors of the post-Wake world, including her friends that have been strung up and eaten by the Dragon and the fact that her parents are both dead.
• Civilized Animal: Several of the newly Awake animals think themselves this, establishing a military and various communities.
• Cyborg: One of the Kings of Texas is a bull rebuilt into a humanoid form with artificial arms and legs. His presence balances the other two kings (a human and tiger), illustrating that, for all its evils, Texas is quite the egalitarian place.
• Dark Secret: Sandor is the one who killed Jesse's father.
• Deconstruction: Of the Uplifted Animal en masse. The story begins when every animal on the face of the Earth spontaneously develops both human intelligence and speech, and society goes to hell as a result. Animals who were abused by humans set out to make them pay, the notion of eating meat quickly turns into a sensitive topic since the meat has a say in the matter, several creatures demonstrate questionable at best morals, and the question of whether all animals are equal gets tossed around a lot, especially in the arc with the giant beehive.
• Death Seeker: Implied in the case of great pandas. The species is only seen once, right as the Wake hits, demanding to know why humanity kept them around for so long. This is, of course, in the middle of massacring each other with firearms stolen from their former wardens.
• Despair Event Horizon: Zarzammora the goat almost crosses this following the death of her final family member at the hands of the Dragon, following the rest of her family being massacred for meat.
• Driven to Suicide: Jesse's mom, about a year before the Wake, due to her estrangement from the rest of her family. Sandor saves her by running to a neighbor in the same apartment building.
• Fantastic Slurs: "Sape", for "Homo Sapiens". Zarzammora the goat is a fan of this one.
• Hollywood Acid: While the stomach acid of a bearded vulture has a pH of 1 (battery acid has a pH close to 0), it's not likely the acid the 'dragon' spits is caustic enough to instantly burn through the wings and skin of a poor stork who it hits.
• Humans Are Bastards: One of the first things that most non-domesticated animals did after the Wake was attack their captors or would-be consumers. Many domestic animals, however, choose to protect their owners.
• Humanlike Animal Aging: Zig-zagged. Animals age normally for their species after the Wake, but they Woke up with intellectual capabilities roughly equivalent to a human being of the same relative age — most two-year-old animals are about as functional as a normal human adult. However, Sandor, being a purebred dog, is in danger of dying soon.
• Human Pet: Kyle Khahn, when we first meet him, is a quasi-prisoner of the Animilitary. Mimico compares him wearing shackles to dogs wearing collars.
• Lobotomy:
  • The American military lobotomizes Pearl, a member of the Animilitary in order to turn them back into a normal animal. This causes the Animilitary to attack the humans.
  • In the next issue, it's revealed that the humans didn't lobotomize Pearl, but saved her from the mutinous members of the Anmilitary when she found out what they were planning.
• The Medic: Pallas; they learned medicine to take care of themselves, because Pallas Cats have a weak immune system.
• No Ending: The series ends at the twenty-eighth issue with no resolution due to the publisher going out of business.
• No Periods, Period: Averted. Jesse has her first period a year after the Wake.
• Overpopulation Crisis: Discussed in both this and Evolution — the rabbits alone would outnumber humanity in months, and now that most animals are reluctant to eat one another due to being sapient, it's going to get worse.
• Platonic Declaration of Love: The first words Sandor says to Jesse post-Wake is "I love you".
• Precision F-Strike: The first three words after the introduction pages are "Oh Holy Fuck", reflecting the thoughts of the suddenly-aware animals.
• Predation Is Natural: Zig-zagged. Most animals seen in the story so far don't want to eat one another, but Vegetarian Carnivores just aren't possible.
• Prisoner Exchange:
  • The Animilitary is willing to exchange some scientists they've captured for one of their own that the American military has. However, when the military lobotomizes their captive, Mimico order the hostages to be killed.
  • However, in the next issue, it's revealed the Military didn't lobotomize the captive, but saved her from the traitorous Animilitary members when she found out they were plotting a mutiny against Mimico.
• Riddle for the Ages: What caused the Wake? The story only briefly gets close to the answer, but so far hasn't hinted at what the truth might be.
• Sapient Cetaceans: Even more so after the Wake — Jesse, Sandor and company use a friendly humpback whale for transportation across water.
• Shout-Out:
  • In issue #2, there's a rabbit counseling their brethren that they must be cunning and full of tricks to survive, a collective of proselytizing Animalist Pigs wearing Maoist hats while talking to a horse, and an ape grumbling about his shoddy gun and the damn, dirty — who sold it to him.
  • In issue #3, a farmer warns about dogs becoming "nasty", mentioning a St. Bernard in Castle Rock.
  • Sandor, a bloodhound, is named after Sandor "The Hound" Clegane from A Song of Ice and Fire.
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Sandor disposes of the Dragon by force-feeding it a live grenade.
• Token Human: Kyle is the only other human in the whole group, apart from Jesse.
• The Un-Reveal: A group of scientists held hostage by the Animilitary claim to know what caused The Wake, and that it can be reversed. We've not learned what it was.
• Vegetarian Carnivore: Zig-zagged. Soy and tofu have enough protein in them that carnivores can survive off of them, but Sandor and Pallas still eat the victims of the Dragon after burying their friends.
• What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Discussed during a Breather Episode when the group meets a pangolin pondering whether or not animals have souls post-Wake.
• Whole-Plot Reference: Animals gaining intelligence and disrupting human society was also a feature in Brain Wave by Poul Anderson.
• The Worm That Walks: Some of the followers of the Dragon are actually groups of animals that have amalgamated themselves into human shapes, for the sake of luring and killing humans they find to feed to the Dragon.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Sandor points out to Oscar that the Wake is not like the Zombie Apocalypse, as in the movies people can hunt game, but here hunting sentient animals is murder.
• You Are Not Alone: Jesse tells this to Zarzammora following her breakdown at Hourglass Falls.

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Animosity: The Rise and Animosity: Evolution contain examples of:

• Apocalypse How: Compared to the rest of the world, San Francisco only has a city-wide societal disruption — "only" 144,000 dead in the transition, while Paris is overtaken by Rats, Chicago gets bombed, and New Dehli burns.
• An Arm and a Leg: Wintermute's front left leg and eye get blasted off by another dog in the first issue of Evolution.
• Artificial Limbs: Wintermute intends to eventually possess proper hands, as we see at the end of The Rise. By the end of issue #1 of Evolution, she gets what she wants.
• Bat Out of Hell: Keekirikee, Adam's animal guardian.
• Devious Dolphins: In issue #1 of The Rise, we see a pod of dolphins post-Wake attacking a boat, butchering its passengers, saying that they want human women, and tearing the flipper off of a sea lion. They're essentially Always Chaotic Evil.
• Fake Rabies: Keekirikee scares Adam with this, due to foam around their mouth from brushing their teeth.
• Felony Misdemeanor: All crimes are punishable by death under Wintermute's rule.
• Human Pet: Under Wintermute's Control, no human in San Francisco can go outside without their animal guardian.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: All Adam wants is to go back to treating animals again.
• Interspecies Romance: Between Adam and Wintermute, where it is eventually hinted that Adam's loyalty to Wintermute was partially out of genuine romantic love for Wintermute, though Adam feared openly showing any kind of affection to Wintermute such as petting her. Wintermute is shown to reciprocate his love, by her secret dream/message programmed into Adam's cybernetic Animata upgrades where she rips off her own skin to take her possibly ideal humanoid form, and laments that this was the only way for them to share a true 'kiss'. During their final night together before Wintermute was executed, she calls Adam her 'sweetheart'.
• Interquel: Currently set about one month after the Wake, whereas the story of the main comic starts up about a year after.
• Kindly Vet: Adam North — at least, he was before the Wake.
• La Résistance: Adam is contacted by one in The Rise. It turns out to be a Secret Test of Character by Wintermute.
• Overpopulation Crisis: Wintermute acknowledges this as inevitable, and ends up banning breeding for one year post-Wake.
• Predation Is Natural: Wintermute uses the meat of executed criminals to feed carnivores.
• Shout-Out:
  • Several places are named after various creators or pieces of media featuring intelligent animals — the Hoppswilde Hotel, the Lewis Building, and Pullman Hospital are just a few that show up.
  • The yellow poison dart frog which kills Deacon is referred to as "That Yellow Bastard".
• Swallowed Whole: Almost all of the Kangaroo Rat sisters. Thankfully, the snake that ate them gets decapitated and cut open before any real harm is done.

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