Trivia / SWAP Ensemble

• Creator's Favorite: Claire Inez and Harry Boisen show up or are mentioned in the author's works far more frequently than any of the other contestants. They star in the unreleased work "Back to the Basement", and Harry has a major role in the first part of Behind Closed Doors. This openly-displayed fondness doesn't prevent Harry from being eliminated second and getting sidelined (and getting seriously injured in Behind Closed Doors), nor does it save Claire from being eliminated when the author introduces a flawed one-off voting system in the interest of getting more votes.
• Fandom Life Cycle: Stage 0 (a). For a comic that relies heavily on Audience Participation, almost none of the votes are from actual readers.
• Meaningful Release Date:
  • Day 16 concluded on the comic's sixth anniversary with an intricate celebratory drawing on its final page.
  • Day 18 concluded on April 20, Corbin's birthday. Corbin subtly brings up a Noodle Incident that happened on a past birthday.
• No Budget: Over the years, each page has been drawn on yellow printer paper with the same sets of colored pencils. There would sometimes be digital editing with free software and a simple drawing tablet that the author has had since 2015.
• Post-Release Retitle: Day 12: "Round Robin Reading" was originally titled "Class v. Jazz Round" as a cross-reference to Day 2. It was changed to be less redundant and catchier.
• Reality Subtext: Certain events happen in the story because they happened to the author. The number of votes is especially dependent on the school calendar and whether the author has been to social events. Everyone wears red and green in Day 7 because it started just at the end of the Christmas season.
• Schedule Slip: After the first few pages of SWAP took a year to make, the author started putting out a schedule for pages in hopes of speeding up the process. It did not work for long, and the schedule no longer exists.
• Series Hiatus: There is always at least a week of downtime between "days" to collect votes. Sometimes a hiatus is announced, but those can be shorter than the wait time between some pages.
• Serendipity Writes the Plot: The author got actual musicians to play the challenge track in Day 19. Securing the musicians caused a roadblock that was cleared when there were enough of them, regardless of what they played. As a result, Braeden conveniently knows how to play the tenor sax and Bessie plays the alto sax because she's an experienced jazz musician who shouldn't need pre-written solos like those of the oboe and clarinet. Claire plays the oboe and Guilla plays the clarinet until the flute recording arrives to replace the oboe, at which point their solos are switched.
• Similarly Named Works: Day 17: "The Power of Three" shares a title with the third arc of Warrior Cats. This was unintentional; the author was not actively reading those books at the time, and the title was a shout-out to Battle for Dream Island: The Power of Two instead. With that said, Warrior Cats gets a shout-out in Finale.
• What Could Have Been: Many character details change before they can even make it into the story. In particular, Corbin had short hair with a tail like Braeden, Claire had brown eyes and a blonde streak, Guilla was a brunette instead of a ginger, the Tempo siblings had gold streaks, and the Violon brothers had lighter skin. Alfred was short, but not due to a disability.
• Writing by the Seat of Your Pants: The general structure may have been planned out, but the scripts for each day are written after the previous day is finished. Because of audience participation in elimination, it's a necessity. Some pages are even released while the author is still "scripting".