Web Video / Slug Street Scrappers

...it would have equal parts awesomeness and brawling babes.

Slug Street Scrappers is a web-video series with a storyline that was created by fight choreographer Micah Brock and the Whirlwind Action independent film group, and was largely influenced by video games of the 1980s and 1990s, including the Final Fight, Streets of Rage, and Double Dragon series. Consisting of equal parts comedy, action, martial arts and back-story, the series consists of nine videos which are available for viewing on YouTube.

The titular Scrappers are street fighters, of varying martial arts disciplines, who have been selected by a mysterious benefactor who is known by many names, but is often referred to as "the Revered One," to compete in a tournament for the title of "Toughest in Town." This reward is an honor which can only go to the strongest Scrapper in the district and which rewards the wielder with a monthly stipend of $10,000. The end result is that Bruiser Bom-Bash (played by Brock), the main character and current holder of the title, frequently gets challenged by other Scrappers desirous of claiming his crown.

However, nobody knows what the Revered One's motives are, or what his intentions are for the "Toughest in Town"...but the tournament he has organized may yet provide answers to those questions.

SPOILERS ABOUND.

Tropes present in this series include:

• Action Girl: All the female fighters; if you're a woman and you're going to be a Scrapper, it's kind of mandatory, after all. Vein is probably the only one who doesn't fit the mold despite being a Scrapper, but she at least has the excuse of being new to the Scrapper scene and still being in training under Venom.
• Afro Asskicker: Hopz.
• Arranged Marriage: Ryuken and Knuckles were set up by their respective families for this.
• Beauty Is Never Tarnished: The girls frequently get blows of varying degrees of severity to the face, but they're not shown to have any lasting after-effects like scars or bruising.
• Break His Heart to Save Him: The third video reveals that Bruiser dumped Peaches right after beating her for the "Toughest in Town" title, in an effort to keep her safe from whatever nefarious plan the Revered One had for the title-holder.
• But Thou Must!: One of the Revered One's rules for all Scrappers is that no fighter can refuse any challenge, and any attempt to do so counts as a forfeit.
  Bruiser: The Revered One's rules say that all challenges must be accepted, otherwise victory automatically goes to the challenger.
• Combat Pragmatist: Bruiser employs this in his fighting style. Therefore, head-butting opponents or hitting below the belt isn't beneath him at all.
• Cool Mask: Billy and Jimmy Broker wear masks that cover the upper right side of the face.
• Cool Shades: Bruiser has a black-lens pair that he sports in flashbacks. Hopz and Bones both own red-lens pairs.
• Cute Mute: Shizuka McBritches, Punchy's younger sister.
• Dance Battler: Punchy McBritches and Hopz both fight using a lot of acrobatics. Justified in Punchy's case since she was an Olympic-level gymnast.
• Distracted by the Sexy: Jimmy Broker claims this is why his brother Billy lost his fight with Knuckles in the second video.
  Jimmy: You let yourself get distracted by her "non-martial" attributes.
• Don't Try This at Home: On the series' web-page, Word of God warns that the fights include a lot of contact hits which take tremendous skill to be able to pull off safely, so one should not attempt these on one's own.
• The Dragon: Mr. Sexy for the Revered One. The former also has Venom as his Dragon.
  • Dragon with an Agenda: Venom is a benevolent version of this.
• Drunken Master: Bones.
• Easter Egg: Many of these are scattered throughout the series, mostly as homages to the games that inspired the Slug Street Scrappers universe. Some of Bruiser's outfits are similar to the outfits worn by Cody and Axel, for example.
• Expecting Someone Taller: Punchy's first reaction to meeting the "Toughest in Town" for the first time—she was expecting someone seven feet tall, 300 pounds, and with a deep masculine voice, none of which fit Bruiser's description.
  Punchy: ...you're kidding. You're Bruiser?
  Bruiser: Hey, uh, you're not exactly what I was expecting, either.
• Eye Scream: Peaches jams her fingers into Hopz's eyes during a fight in a flashback shown in the third video.
• Fanboy: Ryuken is this for Punchy McBritches.
• Friendly Enemy: Punchy is this with Bruiser, somewhat, following the first episode.
  Bruiser: We're semi-friendly rivals...for now.
• Girl on Girl Is Hot: Bruiser seems to think so, as he offers to give up his title of "Toughest in Town" to Venom if she and Vein kiss each other in front of him. Vein is not amused.
• Groin Attack: Happens three times.
  • Bruiser defeats Peaches in the first episode by kicking her square between the legs.
  • Peaches suffers it again during her fight with Shizuka. Except this time she's faking the pain—she learned from the above experience and trained specifically to counter that tactic.
  • During Knuckles' fight with the Slugger Squad, one of them gets in a cheap shot on Knuckles by kicking her in the crotch, from behind, defeating her in the process.
• He Who Must Not Be Seen: The Revered One.
• Hilarious Outtakes
• Hurricane Kick: Ryuken uses a realistic variant of this during his fight with Bruiser.
• I Have Many Names: The Revered One is also known as "The Revered Sah Bum Nim," or "Sifu," or "Sensei," or "Ajarn," or whatever else you call a martial arts master.
• Insult Backfire:
  Peaches: Don't call (Bruiser) a shrimp, you stupid Amazon!
  Punchy: (flexes a bicep) Well, I have been working out.
  Peaches: I mean that as an insult.
• Ironic Echo: Happens in the space of five seconds in the sixth episode—Venom taunts Peaches about her inability to fold clothes properly...then Peaches taunts Venom about her inability to teleport.
  Venom: (looks at badly-folded clothes) Wow. You are really bad at that.
  Peaches: Shut up.
  (moments later, Venom fails to teleport)
  Peaches: Wow. You are really bad at that.
  Venom: Shut up.
• Knowledge Broker: Billy Broker. It's his surname, for crying out loud.
• Locked Out of the Loop: A complicated variation of this is revealed in a flashback set one year prior to the series' main plot. Bruiser knew that the Revered One was planning something for the "Toughest in Town," something that would put Peaches' (the title-holder at the time) life in danger. He therefore asked her to give up the title, but wouldn't tell her why when she asked him—because he didn't want for anyone to find out Venom was digging around for more information on the matter—and only asked that Peaches should trust him. Peaches refused to listen, so Bruiser took the title from her by force. This resulted in them breaking up and Peaches being bitter about it one year later, and still not knowing why Bruiser did that in the first place.
• Mr. Fanservice: Mr. Sexy goes around shirtless most of the time.
• Ms. Fanservice: Peaches, Shizuka and Knuckles all qualify.
• Meaningful Name: Mr. Sexy is revealed by Jimmy Broker to have an actual first name, Drake. The name Drake means "dragon." Guess what Mr. Sexy's role is.
• Mook Chivalry: The Slugger Squad enforce this in the first video when they're sent by Boss Peaches to fight Bruiser, with their field leader explaining that that's how it's done in the video games; it gets further lampshaded when another of their members points out that it would be smarter for all of them just to gang up on him all at once. In the second video, they wise up somewhat and decide to fight in twos when Ryuken challenges them...and even then, they still get their asses handed to them.
• Ninja: Venom.
• Not a Morning Person: Bruiser. His alarm clock rings out the hour of 9:00 in the morning. What's his response? To knock the clock off the night-stand and stomp on it.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Everyone who wants the title of "Toughest in Town" sees themselves as this where that goal is concerned, but Peaches is the only one who actually plays it totally straight, seeing as she was the previous holder of the title before Bruiser, and she wants revenge on him for breaking up with her.
• Pet the Dog: For all the evidently shady motives Mr. Sexy has for doing what he does, he clearly still cares about his childhood friend Sammy, to the point that he actually goes out of his way to warn the latter off from joining the Slug Street Scrappers fighting circuit.
• Psycho Ex-Girlfriend: Peaches Powers, a.k.a. Boss Peaches, is this for Bruiser.
• Random Power Ranking: There are six fighter ranks among the Scrappers in total, including the "Toughest in Town" rank, which is held by a fighter who's considered the strongest Scrapper and which comes with a monthly $10,000 stipend to aid the fighter's training. The other five ranks, weakest to strongest, are Initiate (where the holder is usually a newcomer and gets a monthly stipend of $1000), Thug ($1500), Brawler ($2000), Enforcer ($2500), and Elite ($3000). It's rather fickle, though, since a Scrapper's rank will only be increased or decreased at the Revered One's discretion, so you stand a better chance of a promotion if you sufficiently impress him with your skills. Regarding the "Toughest in Town" rank, the title-holder can lose the rank by being defeated by another fighter of any rank or, if he chooses, he can simply surrender the title to someone else without fighting.
• Rebel Prince: Ryuken ran away from home to escape his overbearing rich family.
• Rebellious Princess: Knuckles is the daughter of a wealthy family, but Word of God says she exhibits subtle hints of this trope as a way of coping with them.
• Shout-Out: Several, mostly to video games.
  • Bruiser is a huge Streets of Rage fan.
  • Ryuken has a whole bunch of Street Fighter and The King of Fighters-related wallpapers in his house.
  • Billy Broker and his older brother Jimmy share the same first names as Billy and Jimmy Lee.
• Smoke Out: Despite her ninja training, this is one skill that Venom hasn't mastered fully, especially since it's revealed that she left her master before her training was complete. On at least two occasions, she's attempted to pull off the move with a standard kneeling motion-jutsu, but the first time she got a delayed smoke-reaction and then wound up still being there, but invisible and stuck, and the second time she simply didn't go anywhere at all. Both Bruiser and Peaches have mocked her for this.
• Statuesque Stunner: Punchy and Knuckles are 5'8 and Peaches is 5'9.
• Talking with Signs: How Shizuka McBritches communicates. Lampshaded by Peaches in the second video.
  Shizuka: (holds up sign that says "My name is Shizuka McBritches")
  Peaches: Uh...what's with the, uh, with the sign?
  Shizuka: (holds up another sign) "This is how I communicate."
  Peaches: Wait! How'd you do that so fast?
  Shizuka: (yet another sign) "Do what?"
  Peaches: THAT! That thing with the sign!
  Shizuka: (another sign) "?"
  Peaches: Never mind.
• Thou Shalt Not Kill: This is actually one of the Revered One's rules for all Scrappers.
• Tiny Guy, Huge Girl: Bruiser is shorter than Peaches and he's 5'7.
• Training Montage: Ryuken undergoes one in the second video, when he decides to become a Scrapper. He starts out unable to do even one push-up comfortably, but as time goes by he naturally gets fitter and more durable, enough so as to be able to dispatch two Slugger Squad gangsters at a time and take on Bruiser in a decent match-up.
• We Do Not Know Each Other: Bruiser and Venom use Type 1, to protect the latter's status as The Mole.
• Who Names Their Kid "Dude"?: A number of the fighters, assuming their names aren't just street code-names. Bruiser lampshades this concerning his wannabe-rival Punchy McBritches (even though his own name isn't any less odd).
  Bruiser: What kind of name is Punchy McBritches, anyway?
  • Eventually averted with Mr. Sexy, whose actual name is revealed to be Drake.
• Wham Line: "You're telling me that the Revered One is a woman in a man's body?"
• Worth It: The Slugger Squad members say as much when, during their fight with Knuckles, they each take the opportunity to fondle her..."non-martial" areas, resulting in them getting a nasty beat-down.
  Slugger Squad member: ...totally worth it. (passes out)
• Would Hit a Girl: Bruiser isn't shy about hitting female opponents. Nor are any of the other male fighters, for that matter.