Spoilers for the original series will be unmarked. You have been warned.
ReBoot: Code of Honor is a three-part webcomic sequel to ReBoot, written by Jeffrey Campbell.
The comic picks up after a Time Skip from the ending of My Two Bobs (aka the second half of Season Four), with Megabyte still in control of the Principal Office, and Mainframe now completely devastated and overrun with Megabyte's Zombinomes. The Users have seemingly abandoned the Net, there haven't been any upgrades or games in "hours".note
Megabyte's "Hunt" has escalated into a Net-wide Viral War that has seen countless systems fall or be infected, either by Megabyte himself or other viruses that have been empowered by Megabyte. After rescuing Phong, Bob and co. evacuate Mainframe, planning to take refuge in the Supercomputer.
Shortly thereafter, the Guardian Collective receives a message from the Code Masters, who say they have a plan to deal with the virus epidemic: a firmware upgrade named "Gnosis", which they claim can eradicate any virus located anywhere in the Net.
The comic can be read here
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ReBoot: Code of Honor provides examples of:
- Aborted Arc: Since the comic was Cut Short, the subplot about Turbo recruiting Matrix into some new iteration of, or replacement for the Guardian Collective ultimately went nowhere.
- Almost Kiss: Bob and Dot almost share a kiss before Bob gets transmitted to Gnosis, but Lens interrupts them.
- Ascended Extra: Lens the Code Master only appeared once in the original series, here he's been promoted to Supporting Protagonist.
- Body of Bodies: Gnosis's face is made up of the bodies of several sprites.
- Call-Back: The Code Masters were the focus of the episode "High Code" of the original series, here, they are major players in the plot.
- Canon Foreigner: The Guildmaster and Code Masters (besides Lens), Gnosis, the Guardian Cadets (besides Little Enzo), Vector, and Exidy are all original characters.
- Cut Short: Ironically, like its parent series, Code of Honor was also cut short and had to drop at least one subplot. Unlike the original series, however, Code of Honor did have a resolution.
- Demoted to Extra: Despite being the main threat at the end of Season Four, Megabyte is largely irrelevant in the story.
- Fan Sequel: Code of Honor was the winning pitch of a contest held by Rainmaker Entertainment to make a webcomic based on ReBoot. It was written and drawn entirely by fans, and hosted on the official ReBoot website.
- Great Offscreen War: It's said that Megabyte's "Hunt" from the end of Season Four eventually escalated into a Net-wide Viral War, which affected tens of thousands of systems. Very little of it is shown, though, as the comic begins in the last days of it.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: The Guildmaster gave Gnosis the ability to eliminate any threats that prevented it from carrying out its mission. It then deleted him when he is opposed to deleting the Guardian Collective.
- Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: In the original series, Turbo was a Reasonable Authority Figure who once saved Mainframe from destruction by delaying the detonation of a bomb the Guardians planted on Mouse. Here, Turbo is a straight-up Knight Templar, berating Bob for the latter's beliefs in reformatting viruses instead of outright deleting them, blaming that for the Viral War getting as bad as it did. Turbo also complains about the Guardians being Obstructive Bureaucrats, despite them not really being portrayed as such in the original series.
- Loose Canon: Code of Honor's status in ReBoot canon is unclear. It was written entirely by a fan without any input from ReBoot's creators but was officially commissioned and hosted by Rainmaker Entertainment. Furthermore, no other ReBoot material has ever resolved Season Four's cliffhanger ending. ReBoot: The Guardian Code is an In Name Only Sequel Series that has nothing to do with the original series's story whatsoever. Even the now-canceled movie trilogy that was announced when Code of Honor was being written was to going to be a Soft Reboot itself, so it wouldn't have resolved the cliffhanger either.
- Moment Killer: Bob and Dot almost share a kiss towards the end of the comic, but Lens shoots Bob with a beam that dematerializes and transmits him before they do, though."Hmph. Kissing. Disgusting."
- Never Found the Body: Sprites hit with a Code Master's Gibson Coil Pike are believed to have been deleted, but in reality, they are transported directly to Gnosis's data storage.
- Post-Script Season: Despite being promoted as a resolution of Season Four's cliffhanger ending, the bulk of the plot focuses on a completely new threat from the Code Masters. Megabyte is barely relevant or even present in the comic.
- Reality Warper: "Code Commands" allow those who know them to affect the fabric of the Net. The Guildmaster's objective is to compile "The Codex", a tome of every single Code Command, essentially making him as powerful as the Users themselves.
- Shout-Out: The chapter names are plays on the titles of classic works: Paradigms Lost, The Day the Net Stood Still, and Apocalypse Gnosis.
- Third-Person Person: Downplayed. The Guildmaster goes back-and-forth from referring to himself as "Guildmaster" and "I" or "Me".
- Time Skip: Code of Honor picks up "hours" after the end of Season Four, with Mainframe being completely devasted and overrun by Megabyte's zombinomes.
- Title Confusion: The comic is often referred to as "ReBoot: Paradigms Lost". "Paradigms Lost" is only the title of the first chapter.
- Zombie Advocate: Bob's beliefs on reformatting viruses instead of deleting them outright inadvertently led to the rise of "Viral Sympathizer" groups, which are outright opposed to the Guardian Collective's efforts in the Viral War.
