Nothing Nice to Say (or NN2S as it is often shortened to) is a webcomic about Punk Rock by Mitch Clem. It's mostly gag-based, but has a few brief storylines, including a parody of superhero comics that involves Glenn Danzig, the formation of a bike punk gang and the "selling out" of the strip's artist.
The characters include:
- Blake - Often the Only Sane Man and Author Avatar, named after Blake Schwarzenbach from the band Jawbreaker. Expect a lot of Lampshade Hanging over the bizarre size of his eyebrows.
- Fletcher - A crazy bald Small Name, Big Ego, Blake's best friend. Blake and Fletcher together are the main characters.
- Alice - A Perky Goth who goes out with Karen.
- Karen - An overly serious Riot Grrrl who starts dating Alice to get attention for her feminist agenda, but actually develops feelings for her. Although initially something of a Straw Feminist, Karen later becomes a harbinger of common sense.
- Chris/Charlie - A vegan guy with a mohawk who appears whenever a spare character is needed. His name is disputed. The most conventionally "punk" looking.
- Phillip - An emo kid who turns down dates on Valentine's Day so that he has something to complain about and draws on his sideburns in pencil.
The first book collecting the strips in paper form was released on October 15, 2008.
The website is no longer online, but thanks to the Internet Archive, you can read it here
, as well as Mitch Clem's Web site, with links to his other comics.
This comic provides examples of:
- All the Good Men Are Gay: Fletcher actively attacks this trope in one strip, when a woman at a bar utters it practically word for word. His response? "You mean, why are the only guys you find non-threatening the ones with no possible ulterior motives to sleep with you? Yeah, the mind boggles." Fletcher is, perhaps rather obviously, far from the best counterexample to trope...
- Animal Wrongs Group: Preachy veganism is often mocked in the strip. Here's one of the earliest examples.
- Art Shift: Since the relaunch in fall 2011, the characters have become far less boxy and more fluid-looking. Compare this to this
- Big Ol' Eyebrows: There's a minor running gag involving Blake's eyebrows.
- Burger Fool: Fletcher works as at Burger World, where he's fired from in the first appearance for insulting a customer's mullet hair, but still works there later.
- Fake Crossover: The Doctor shows up in a strip!
- Girl on Girl Is Hot: Averted (and also serving as a Take That! to misogynistic fans) in this strip.
- A Good Name for a Rock Band: The Negative Adjectives.
- Hate Plague: The "Law And Order" arc reveals that Phillip, the resident emo, suffers from something called "Whiny Bitch" pheromones, which makes it impossible for anyone not to beat the shit out of him, as discovered when Fletcher ends up in court for assaulting him, and the judge and his own lawyer can't resist attacking him either. The authorities end up tossing him in solitary confinement to keep him out of people's hair.
- Les Yay: Parodied with Alice and Karen. Karen originally started a relationship with Alice for the sole purpose of establishing a strong lesbian base in the punk rock scene, but the relationship later blossomed into a permanent and solid romantic partnership (aside from a brief story where Moral Guardians forced them to break up to make the strip palatable to syndicated newspapers).
- The Man Is Sticking It to the Man: Played straight in an early strip, then lampshaded more recently.
- Naked People Are Funny: Karen in this strip where she "dresses up" as Lillith for Halloween.
- New First Comics: The earliest comics have been redrawn, but this is due to the originals being in a file format that prevents them from being usable for the upcoming book. The original first strips are still online so anyone can see the Art Evolution if they want.
- Only Sane Man: While not COMPLETELY above the strip's idiocy, Blake plays this role, and is pretty much the only reason Fletcher hasn't gotten himself killed yet.
- Radiation-Induced Superpowers: One story involves a radioactive skunk spraying Fletcher in the eyes with radioactive skunk juice, blinding him but giving him superhuman senses and leads to him embarking on a career as a crime-fighter. Well, mostly fighting the post-Trent Reznor Misfits, but still! Except he was never blinded at all, he just couldn't see because of the bandages over his eyes, and it's left ambiguous whether he had powers at all.
- Self-Deprecation: A Band, Part 1Fletcher: I'm just so bored with the state of punk rock today. I should start something. Like a zine maybe. No — a band! I'll start a band.Blake: I know, you could start a comic strip! You'll make fun of people more successful than you and draw funny pictures of emo kids and the like.Fletcher: ...uh — okay. So band it is then.
- Serious Business: Parodied, the comic loves poking fun at how seriously punk fans takes the scene.
- Small Reference Pools: If you aren't into the punk scene, you're going to have one hell of a time getting some jokes.
- Smoking Is Cool / Smoking Is Not Cool: Fletcher begins to smoke to give himself more punk cred. The strip itself doesn't pull any punches about what an idiot he's being.
- Smug Straight Edge: Bort the lapsed Straight Edge hasn't abandoned two parts of the straight edge lifestyle; taking himself too seriously and beating people up.
- Take That!: Extremely common in NN2S, happening in practically every other strip; see the numerous "I Hate The ____" strip titles.
