Mega Man Dissonance is a Mega Man Sprite Comic by Blackhook, which was originally intended to be a fan game.
In the year 20XX, the relationship between humans and robots continues to be maintained, despite the actions of madmen having shaken it. During this time, a new prodigy scientist called Dr. Biwa Hook has introduced her revolutionary Ultimate Savebot project, in order to control the environment and protect the people.
However, shortly after a visit from the robotics expert Dr. Light, Dr. Hook's 5 special robots suddenly turn on her and decide to conquer the city they are in, with her 8 other robots in tow. Not taking this lying down, Mega Man steps up to stop them and save the world once again, with the help of his friends and family.
The comic can both be read here
and at Smackjeeves.
Mega Man Dissonance provides examples of:
- A God Am I: Mirage Man, despite ranking lower than the Element 5.
- All Your Base Are Belong to Us: After all the non-Element 5 Robot Masters are defeated, Requiem attempts to assault Light Labs until Mega Man and Proto Man show up.
- Anti-Villain: Every Robot Master that isn't Requiem. This includes Biwa Hook.
- Art Shift: Tends to happen when the characters have close-ups.
- Author Avatar: In the Q&A comics, Blackhook appears in the form of a robotic black hook.
- Beware the Nice Ones: After 7 of the rogue Robot Masters have all been defeated by Mega Man and Proto Man, Rain Woman completely drops her demure, melancholic nature and lashes out against Mega Man.
- Big Bad: Requiem is leader of the Element 5 and the one behind the latest robot rebellion. Except Requiem is actually working for Dr. Biwa Hook, who is actually a robot created by Dr. Wily.
- Big Damn Heroes: Mega Man and Proto Man tend to do this for the Light Numbers. They return the favor in the last arc, by fighting off the remaining Element 5 members so that Mega Man and Proto Man can go after Dr. Hook.
- Call-Back: Biwa's backstory reveals that she was present for the events of 7 and 8, with the latter being the catalyst behind the plot of this webcomic.
- Closed Circle: All teleportation in the city has been disabled (except for the Element 5, naturally), so Mega Man and Proto Man must find out the source of the jamming.
- Co-Dragons: Grave, Presto, Adagio and Piano.
- Continuity Nod: Oil Man's design wears the red scarf that he has in the Archie comic book. Agents Stern and Krantz also make cameos.
- Cut Lex Luthor a Check: As Dr. Hook was initiating her plan, she started having reservations about harming people and causing so much damage, preferring the new life she had settled into over trying to get Dr. Wily's attention.
- Darker and Edgier: While not without its light moments, this comic takes itself more seriously than most Mega Man sprite comics.
- Decapitated Army: After Requiem's shutdown and the Light Numbers managing to defeat Presto, Adagio and Piano, Grave thanks them for what they've done, saying he and his brothers are free from Requiem's influence. Then he leaves with his brothers' remains.
- Disc-One Final Boss: Requiem. This gets subverted in the last chapter, though.
- Distracted by the Sexy: Splash Woman uses this kind of tactic against Piano. It goes poorly for her.
- Dragon-in-Chief: Requiem is this for Dr. Hook.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: In the first few chapters, the paneling isn't properly spaced apart, the text font wasn't settled on, some assets are clearly reused from the games and a few explosions are not 8-bit. The presentation became much more clean and uniform afterwards.
- Evil Costume Switch: Drastic example with Reaper Man, who apparently used to be a nursing robot before becoming a grim reaper and rebelling with his fellow DHN Numbers.
- Extremely Short Timespan: The events of the entire plot take place over the course of a single day.
- The Faceless: Warp Man, due to his unique vortex-patterned face.
- Faux Affably Evil: For the most part, Requiem puts on a polite, courteous face when conversing with others. Then he does things like destroying an inhabited building to demonstrate his power, or attacking Mega Man's family.
- Filler Arc: Blackhook half-jokingly sees the comic as this, since Dr. Wily isn't present.
- Final Boss Preview: When Requiem decides to pay the Light household a visit.
- Fourth-Wall Mail Slot: Played with in the Q&A comics, as Dr. Hook introduces them, then lets Blackhook himself answer the reader-submitted questions.
- From Nobody to Nightmare: At first, Biwa was meant to be Dr. Wily's assistant for his plans. After being left behind following the destruction of Wily's Evil Energy, she realised that she essentially had her own free will and decided to blend in among the humans, eventually earning enough clout to become a reknowned scientist and prepare her own scheme in secret.
- Generation Xerox: Proto Man lampshades this by telling Dr. Hook that he hopes she doesn't turn out like Dr. Light (which causes the latter to look sorrowful). Ironically, she wound up closer to her creator Dr. Wily, up to and including her strongest creation Requiem acting of his own volition.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Dr. Wily, as usual. He created Biwa, but doesn't actually attack this time.
- Hijacked by Ganon: Both Mega Man and Proto Man invoke this by wondering if Dr. Wily is responsible behind the chaos. Sure enough, he was behind the creation of Biwa Hook, but he otherwise has nothing to do with the plot at all and doesn't appear outside of a flashback. In another twist, Biwa's not even the last foe our heroes have to fight, as Requiem hijacks her plan himself.
- Hurricane of Puns: Tends to occur during battles. In other words, business as usual for Western Mega Man works. That said, the series makes fun of Mega Man's own attempts at them.
- Internal Reveal: In chapter 11, Dr. Hook turns out to have been giving orders to Requiem. Dr. Light is made aware of this in chapter 13, and Mega Man and Proto Man find this out in the next and final chapter.
- It's All My Fault: Dr. Hook's general attitude towards her creations (especially Requiem) having rebelled. She isn't wrong.
- Just a Flesh Wound: After his defeat, Requiem was still willing to have a rematch with Mega Man and Proto Man despite being heavily damaged. Too bad he didn't count on Dr. Hook deactivating him to prevent any casualties to the heroes.
- Killer Rabbit: Roll, with her broom. It actually works surprisingly well, but it's a pity that her portable Buster cannon didn't work on Requiem.
- Man Behind the Man: Gender-inverted with Dr. Hook.
- Naïve Newcomer: Dr. Hook, when it comes to coping with a robot attack, particularly when she notices Roll's almost nonchalant reaction to Mega Man and Proto Man risking their lives.
- No Plans, No Prototype, No Backup: Averted; while Dr. Hook did invent a prototype body for the Ultimate Savebot, dividing its abilities into 5 distinct robots was necessary to keep its powers in check.
- No-Sell: Requiem seems to be immune against energy weapons, as Roll unfortunately finds out.
- Obviously Evil: With his dark grey color scheme, horns and red eye on his chest, you'd think that Dr. Hook would have come up with a friendlier design for Requiem.
- Opt Out: See Decapitated Army above.
- Original Flavor: The intent for the series is to have a story that would be just like the games, enhanced by 8-bit visuals.
- Pragmatic Adaptation: Sort of. Some elements had necessary changes and omissions for the sake of turning a game concept into a sprite comic, such as Reaper Man not having a "stage" of his own and the final chapter completely skipping a storming of Dr. Hook's fortress in favor of a straight-up final confrontation.
- Psycho Prototype: Inverted, in that it's the latest of Dr. Hook's creations (specifically, Requiem of the Element 5) that went out of control first.
- Recursive Creators: It eventually turns out that the roboticist Dr. Hook is actually a Robot Master herself.
- Restraining Bolt: ...Which is why the Element 5 were programmed to interfere if one of them went rogue. It didn't work.
- Robotic Reveal: After Mega Man saves Dr. Hook from the destruction of her capsule, he notices that she's much heavier than a human being her size should be. She goes on to reveal that she was a creation of Wily's all along.
- So Last Season: Averted with the Mega Arm, which is one of the few things that allows Mega Man to actually hurt Requiem (before he gets his Reprise form).
- The Starscream: Averted. Requiem ends up hijacking Dr. Hook's plan in the last chapter specifically because he wants her to succeed, whether she wants to or not.
- Superior Successor: The Element 5 to the Dr. Hook Numbers. Not that this makes any difference to Mirage Man.
- Technical Pacifist: After Dr. Hook (unconvincingly) announces her intent to use her Weather Unifier device to cause environmental disasters across the world, Mega Man calls her out on this, believing that she doesn't want to hurt anyone, citing her help in repairing him and Requiem's shutdown.
- Theme Naming: As always for the series, some of the new characters have musical terms as names. Not only do Requiem, Grave, Presto, Adagio and Piano have them, but Dr. Biwa Hook * as well. There's a reason for that...
- Unfinished, Untested, Used Anyway: Thanks to some advance planning, Requiem gained access to the Ultimate Savebot in the final chapter, with a copy of his memory chip uploaded into it.
- Unknown Rival: It doesn't appear that Dr. Wily even knows about Dr. Hook trying to get his attention.
- Verbal Tic: Requiem has a habit of describing positive things as "day" and negative things as "night", via adjectives.
- Villainous Breakdown: Requiem has a minor one when he sees that Dr. Hook has helped to repair Mega Man, but quickly snaps out of it and realises she meant for him to fight Mega Man at full power, on equal terms.
- Wake-Up Call Boss: Presto. The first few DHN Numbers get taken down with relative ease early on, but then he personally appears and shows how much of a different class the Element 5 are.
- Well Done Daughter Guy: Dr. Hook's main motivation is to achieve what her creator Dr. Wily couldn't, and prove herself useful to Bass at the same time.
- Willfully Weak: After barely managing to break Grave's arm and forcing him to retreat, Proto Man wonders this about him.
- You Don't Look Like You: Dr. Light's 8-bit sprites are designed much more differently than how they usually look.
- You Have Failed Me: Right before the heavily-damaged Requiem can fight Mega Man and Proto Man one last time, Dr. Hook types the deactivation code on him, abruptly ending the possible confrontation.
