Webcomic / Romantically Apocalyptic

You call this an article?

"You are walking west.
You find a wishing well.
You wish for it to grant infinite wishes for every human being on earth.
-> The Universe is now broken. Also, everyone is dead.

Good job."

— General info

The nuclear Apocalypse has come and gone, scarring the cityscape into an almost unrecognizable scene of twisted metal. Dangerous mutant animals prowl the dark recesses of the underground tunnels. Aliens pop up every once in a while to steal one of the few surviving members of the human race.

So life is a constant battle just to stay alive, right?

Actually it's really, REALLY boring. Aliens and monsters are few and far between, so mostly you just have the barren wasteland, its long dead skeletal occupants, whatever you manage to find, plus your imagination to keep you entertained.

Romantically Apocalyptic is dark comedy webcomic written by Vitalty S. Alexius. It follows an enigmatic survivor named Zee Captain and his/her team: Pilot, Sniper (a.k.a. "Mr. Snippy"), and (later on in the webcomic) Engineer (a.k.a. "Engie"), as they attempt to stay alive in this dangerous environment. But mostly? They're going to try to keep themselves from succumbing to boredom. Originally written in comic format, the series has undergone a soft reboot as a graphic web novel while occasionally incorporating several of the old comics. It can be read here.

Compare Gone with the Blastwave.

This Comic has also been dubbed, twice! Once by The Beard, and once by NetsWorldProductions. The Beard's dubs are shorter and more to the point while NetsWorld's are longer and have multiple stories in them. Both are very excellent!

---

This Webcomic contains examples of:

• After the End
• A.I. Is a Crapshoot: ANNET.
• Alien Abduction: Sniper becomes a victim of this. Fortunately for him, he is rescued by The Captain.
• All Just a Dream: Sniper has this feeling. Turns out it just an evil entity that's manipulating his thoughts. Or is it? See Schrödinger's Butterfly.
  • All of the mind-screwy stuff seems to actually have been a dream, or at least the entity messing with his mind as of #121.
• All There in the Manual: The creator has started to post Snippy's autobiographical data, which has started to explain the events leading up to the apocalypse, as well as describing daily life with Captain and Pilot. Pilot has a journal entry as well. More recently, the creator has started posting some backstory in the descriptions for some of the strips, such as this one. There also used to be a page on the website, with no links to it (for some reason), that gave a fair bit of backstory. It has been removed. Then there are the crewmates' tumblr and Facebook pages.
  • There's also a wiki to help sort out what's going on.
• Always a Bigger Fish: First an unidentified group in gas-masks ambush Sniper. Then the Cancer shows up to flay and reanimate them. And then ANNET burns the Cancer to the ground with a single orbital strike.
• Ambiguous Gender: The creator refuses to comment on anyone's gender, which has lead to a lot of debate on the forums, especially concerning The Captain. The only characters whose genders have been confirmed are Sniper, who is a guy and, more recently, Engineer, who is also a guy.
  • It doesn't help that Captain is often modelled by the author's fiancée. According to Word of God, the rest of the Captain's models are both men and women, so "the Captain is thus technically all genders".
  • On their Facebook pages, Pilot's and Captain's genders are both given as "Neutral (it)".
  • Additionally, in this journal Snippy remembers Pilot and Captain in his "dream" as a green-eyed man-child and a purple-eyed girl, respectively. Then again, he also seems think that Pilot was a robot, remembers the whale that he lived inside as being a fish, and overall seems uncertain of what happened in the "dream".
  • Apparently, Captain uses a voice modulator, so even his voice can't tell us his gender.
• Apocalypse How: Between classes 4 and 5, as the creator says that The Captain, his squad, a cult of soft drink worshippers, and a few other isolated off-screen groups are the only human survivors left. Most plant life is gone, and giant, leech-like worms are some of the only few things left of the animal kingdom.
• Apocalypse Anarchy: There's various gangs across the city fighting each other for territory. The only one seen in the comic are completely incompetent and quickly killed by the Cancer.
• Art Shift: Happens occasionally. Later on it often comes about in the form of a guest artist or collaboration with one or more artists.
• Art-Style Dissonance: And how!
• Back from the Dead: The Lifalope can do this, but how long the effects last depends on how thoroughly dead the subject was.
• Backstory: The creator is starting to reveal the characters' highly intriguing backstories via flashbacks and journal entries. The focus so far seems to be on Mr. Snippy, but we've also seen a bit of Engineer's and even a tiny bit of Pilot's. The Captain's, of course, remains elusive as ever. As is standard, much of the new information raises many more questions than it answers.
• Big Applesauce: The comic seems to be set in post-apocalyptic New York. This one comic is the only indication of such, though.
• Big Damn Heroes: Captain saving Snippy from the aliens.
• Big Entrance: ANNET:
  [smashes through the roof] "Tag! You're it!"
• Big "NO!": One of ANNET's bots gets one after she murders an User called "Dr. Kapa" in front of it. It realizing how illogical ANNET's behaviour is what triggers it. It lasts probably several years.
• Big "WHAT?!": Snippy says "BWAH??" on page 22.
• Bizarre Alien Biology: The aliens are bipedal, but their bodies seem to be full of "juices".
  • To be fair, you could say the same of human beings if you wanted to look at blood and other bodily fluids from a certain point of view.
• Bland-Name Product: The cancer purse is once referred to as a "good-bye kitty" purse.
• Born-Again Immortality: The Lifealope may have this ability, if this is any indication. It may actually be Resurrective Immortality, or in this case there may be no distinction between the two, since it's not clear if the Lifealope ages in the conventional sense of the word — plus it shapeshifts, so it can look like any age it wants.
• Born Lucky: Captain is heavily implied to have this attribute.
  • If so, Snippy may be some sort of cosmic counterbalance.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Pilot has been forcibly reconnected to Annet and sent after Sniper with an army of skeletal former Annet users.
• Brick Joke:
  • "Caked!"
  • Early in the comic The Captain say that Snippy "will spontaneously combust for [his] amusement". Later, his Replacement Goldfish of Snippy get dissected with very obvious consequences.
  • stevestevenson
• Call-Back: The Captain attempting to use one of his earlier tricks on a black hole
  Zee Captain: Well, there's only one way on dealing a delicious pit
• The Captain: The Captain, obviously.
• Catchphrase: The exclamation "Bwah?!" expressing confusion, surprise or alarm, has been said four times by the Sniper in the comic, and never by any other character, so it has become something of a catch phrase in Fan Art.
• Cerebus Syndrome: The comic started out with one-off jokes that didn't really connect to each other in any meaningful way. The first story arc (the Lemonade Cult) got started pretty quickly, but it was more for laughs than anything else, and didn't move the story forward at all. Then, as the result of another short story arc that was all comedy and seemingly of no consequence whatsoever, the Cancer showed up, and shit got real. Though the main storyline hasn't moved forward more than a few minutes from that point, the readership is now being treated to several interesting flashbacks and character journal entries that reveal a much deeper story than one would expect from the earliest issues. The comedic side of the story certainly doesn't suffer though — the creator seems able to juggle comedy and drama with the skill of a master.
• Character Blog: Semi-official ones exist in the form of "Ask (character)" tumblr pages for each main character. Though owned and operated by fans, the ones for the main characters are kept in contact with the author, Vitaly S. Alexius, who keeps them up to date on his plot plans and character bios to ensure that they're as accurate as possible. The ones for less major characters such as Photoshop and Mr. Kittyhawk do not include the same level of plot-backing, however. The characters also have their own Facebook pages, operated by Vitaly, where people can ask questions or see what the characters are up to (Photoshop has one, too. So far it consists of roaring and growling).
• Chekhov's Gun: The mug. It never seems to run out of tea or cool down. It's debatable as to whether the liquid in the mug is even tea at all. Spilling tea from this mug resulted in the nuclear apocalypse, and has repeatedly been the bane of Zee Captain's enemies (up to and including Cancer and The Arbitrator).
• The Chew Toy: Mr. Snippy is very much this. Bad luck seems to follow him around: He is constantly dealing with Captain's and Pilot's annoying and often dangerous antics; he was left hanging in an upside-down train for a long time (possibly days); abducted by aliens; captured by a group of survivors; and most recently, almost killed, and then captured and "integrated", by the Cancer. It's also been revealed that before the comic begins, he was swallowed by a whale. This turned out to be part of a plot by Pilot to have Captain all to himself. A journal entry reveals that he was once subjected to a Captain-proclaimed "holiday" in which several objects were thrown at him, ending in a "battle to the death" against Pilot and Photoshop (cosplaying as internet browsers) — which he lost, obviously. He recounts a week during which Captain dressed him up in "ridiculous outfits" and made him play the personalities — one of which was "Zombie Snippy", resulting in him getting more objects thrown at him, as well as dirt. "Fireman Snippy" had his shoe set on fire and was shoved into a burning skyscraper. ("Thank god my G Directorate issue Officer uniform is fireproof.") Every day, Captain wakes him up with an irritating noise. And he had to listen to Nyan Cat for a week. Once, he was stuffed into a shopping cart while he was sleeping, to recreate a scene from a "Jackass" poster. And he almost had his face eaten off by a flying Photoshop. Another journal reveals that Pilot once tied him to a couch while he was sleeping. It's becoming quite common for fans to proclaim, "Poor Snippy".
  Snippy: Does the director of this madness ever sleep?
• Chromatic Arrangement: If you count the Captain's purple goggles as red, the gang fits this trope to a T, as Captain is the The Leader, Snippy is blue and The Lancer, Pilot is green and The Big Guy, and Engineer is the orange-ish fourth member. You could also ignore the goggles and count the more prominent red band on the Captain's cap and the mug with a red heart on it.
• Cloudcuckoolander: The Captain and Pilot — the latter perhaps even more so than the former.
  Pilot's Journal: SOMEDAY I'LL BUILD A HOUSE... NO A BOAT SHAPED LIKE A SHOE AND SAIL ACROSS THE OCEAN TO THE PARADISE LAND OF PANCAKES AND MERRYNESS.
• Cold Sniper: Subverted. Despite being the only character to carry a (traditional) weapon, and despite a tendency towards sarcasm, the Sniper is sympathetic and quick to defend The Captain from danger, even though he's usually the one to get hurt.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: According to the makers of the comic, Captain's purple signifies royalty, Snippy's blue signifies misery, Pilot's green signifies envy, and Engie's orange signifies awareness.
• Comic Trio: The Captain is the navigator, Pilot is the driver, and Sniper is the guy trapped in the back seat.
• Companion Cube: Pilot has a toy puffin named Mr. Kittyhawk.
  • Zee Captain has a mug which he keeps around at all times. It has a heart drawn on it.
• Continuity Creep: Massively so. The series started with single-strip gags and aimless wandering, and now it features three or four different extremely in-depth plotlines, mostly fleshed out through the journal entries under the comics themselves.
• Crapsack World: Snippy and Engie's flashbacks show that the world was a crapsack one even before it got nuked.
• Crosscast Role: Unless (s)he is literally genderless, or a hermaphrodite, Captain is modelled by the opposite sex all the time, as according to Word of God, (s)he is modelled by his fiancée and by people who come into the studio, both men and women. This might be true of other characters as well.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass:
  • The Captain may seem bungling on the surface, but he's probably the last person you want to pick a fight with.
  • While not as much as The Captain, Pilot also has this to a degree. Most of the time, he runs and freaks out over tiny radioactive spiders. But then he performs a gravity-defying leap and slices off several of Cancer's tentacles with a pipe in order to try and rescue Sniper.
• Cute and Psycho: Pilot. Yes, he's totally adorable, but...oh dear Lord.
  THE TINY TAG ON MY INSIDE FOLD OF MY JACKET SAYS "SG CHRISTOPHORUS HATCHENSON". THAT DOESN'T SOUND LIKE SOMEONE I LIKE. MAYBE I KILLED THEM FOR THIS JACKET. THIS JACKET IS SOFT AND FITTING. ... THE DEAD LIKE TO PLAY GAMES AND TALK TO ME, BUT THEY AREN'T VERY INTERACTIVE, UNLESS PROVOKED. IF YOU LOOK FROM THE CORNER OF YOUR EYE, YOU CAN SEE THEM MOVE.
  • ANNET.
• Cult: The Nutritionists, who worship the Holy Lemonade and have a "religious document" that is actually a sticker from a soft drink bottle.
• Dada Comic: Onlookers may not get why a jet-powered train and a fizzy-drinks cult is so funny.
• Dark and Troubled Past: According to his journals, tumblr, and Facebook page, Snippy's life before the apocalypse seems to have been this. In his "normal" life, he was a branch officer for GOOD Directorate, Inc. Unfortunately, he was one of about 1% of people who couldn't connect to the neural network with his mind. This meant he had to work a dead-end job and he couldn't afford enough sleep. When he did sleep, the neural network's attempts to connect with his mind caused horrific nightmares — so needless to say he was constantly exhausted. Plus the nightmares apparently made him lose track of reality. Then, when he was escorting a science team on a mission to investigate an anomaly, a "series of unfortunate events" killed all of them, and he still blames himself for this. When he got out of the zone — which took weeks — everyone was already dead.
  I can't stand being alone for too long, too many dark memories from my past start to waltz in my thoughts. Is this why I keep myself subject to Captain's plots? To run away from my past?
• Deadpan Snarker: Snippy, of course.
• Death Glare:
  • The Captain gives one to the aliens. It works in a VERY literal sense.
  • After being eaten by a whale because of Pilot and subsequently tackling Pilot to the ground Snippy seems to give one...to the audience. It's a bit unsettling, to say the least.
• Dem Bones: How the Cancer attacks and communicates with its enemies. Justified in that the skeletons are directly connected to its body, thus why they're able to move. Not-so-justified in that they still shouldn't be able to speak without vocal cords or lungs. Unless the Cancer keeps those intact while stripping its victims to the bone, or creates sound by sending vibrations through the skeletons' whole bodies. Still seems like a complicated and inefficient way to speak, though.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: More like Did You Just Wear Cthulhu as a Scarf?
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: The journal that details the Cancer's attempts to "integrate" with Snippy makes it sound oddly like... a marriage proposal.
  NoW, aCCept YoUr Fate. ACCept oUr relAtionSHip. Do IT NoW! SaY - I Do HeReby Accept This TranSacTion WiTh BioMatRix 117 To Be TeMpORaL PaRTNeRs...
• Driven to Madness: Pilot's backstory seems to imply this. He was a member of the team of Fighter Jet pilots who were sent to nuke ANNET. In one of his journals, he states that "one million voices of Eureka still sing in my cranium. They ask me to stop... I know that they are all just dust now, and what has been done cannot be retracted." The reason for this is The ANNET headbands linked voices together, meaning that Pilot could hear the innocents he was murdering in his attempt to destroy ANNET perfectly as he killed them. It is heavily implied that this, as well as most of his memories having been stored in his now-broken headband, is the reason he is as insane as he is in the comic.
• Eldritch Abomination: The Cancer.
  • As well as the Arbitrator, the Lifealope, and others.
• Emoticons: Used occasionally, mostly because they're funny.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": The entire squad is identified by their professions rather than having actual names. Except for Mr. Snippy.
• Everything Trying to Kill You: Including snowflakes, insects and mugs. Of course, Snippy could just be hallucinating.
• Exactly What I Aimed At: Snippy vs the Cancer. Upon realising his bullets aren't doing much to the creature or its skeleton hosts, he shoots past it to the tanks of flammable gas. It doesn't work, but it was still awesome.
• Expressive Mask: If you look closely, you may spot a few instances. Especially common and noticeable with Mr. Snippy, whose open goggle-flaps serve as rudimentary eyebrows to portray many different emotions, such as shock, fear, confusion, desperation, worry, anger, and irritation. It's very rarely that his "eyebrows" aren't being used to evoke some kind of emotion.
  • Now even more invoked, as of issue 184, when Cancer tells Snippy that it has melded his face (and his entire body for that matter) with his suit, making it permanently a part of his body.
• Eye Lights Out: When Sniper and Pilot are killed (due to being tangled up in Cancer when ANNET performs an orbital strike on it), their goggle lenses are grey. Then, when the Lifealope brings them back to life, the lenses return to their normal colour (blue and green, respectively).
• The Faceless: Originally the whole gang. Over the course of the comic, everyone's face has been shown (though almost always with their eyes obscured.) By now only Captain continues to remain completely faceless. He removes his mask once, but in that instance we can only see the front of him in a reflection off someone's helmet, and you can't make out any features whatsoever (this is probably a good thing — see Death Glare above).
  • As of Issue 184, it has been revealed that Snippy's face (and his entire body for that matter) has apparently been melded to his body, quite literally making the gas mask and the rest of his suit a part of his face ad body now.
• Fantastic Racism: People who were unable to connect to ANNET seem to have been treated downright horribly in this world. According to Snippy, it can even get you accused of being "soulless".
• Fate Worse than Death: Being made into a DEX. Pilot was made into one because he realized ANNET was destroying the planet, and the unlucky narrator of the Bee Diary was made into one because Engineer thought he was an assassin.
• Fertile Feet: This creature has not only fertile feet but a fertile gaze.
• Fictional Disability: Snippy is one of the 1% of people that the neural network that controls sleep can't connect to. Instead of browsing the web during his sleep he instead gets horrifying nightmares and is chronically sleep-deprived, as he can't afford to purchase more sleep with the money from his dead-end job.
• Foreshadowing:
  • The cave drawings in this page seem to allude to the aliens arriving and Cancer's attack.
  • Also, when the Captain says "And that's how I started World War 3", that may refer to how he spilled tea on ANNET's servers, causing the almost total extinction of the human race.
• Gaia's Lament: Implied what the state of the world was before the apocalypse as seen with the dying plant and in Engie's journal.
• Gas Mask, Longcoat: Seemingly required to survive in the post-apocalyptic environment.
• Gas Mask Mooks: All mooks to show up so far have been Gas Mask Mooks... because everyone in this world wears a gas mask.
• Gilligan Cut: GOD DAMN IT
• Ghost City
• Going Cosmic: As the comic goes on, ANNET began merging with organic life, raising questions about how space and reality work.
• Guest Strip: The series is heavy on this as the author collaborates with several artist from various sources, but the storyline inside is properly canonical.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: Sniper and The Captain are either this or Platonic Life-Partners, depending on whether or not one of them is female.
• His Name Really Is "Barkeep":
  • In his bio Sniper's full name is Charles Snippy.
  • There are also hints that the Captain's name may actually be Zee Captain. Most times, use of this name could be chalked up to silliness; but Engineer, a rather solemn character, has used it twice in an otherwise serious context.
• Hypocritical Humor: Captain: "Snippy, stop playing with cancer."
  • ANNET: "It's polite to knock!"
• I Regret Nothing: Mr. Snippy says this as he's being integrated by the Cancer.
• Imagine Spot:
  • Onwards!
  • Also, here. The Captain seems to use this trope more frequently as the comic continues.
• Improvised Weapon: The Captain dispenses with an assailant using a piece of stale cake.
• Insane Troll Logic: Pilot thinks this way. It's most evident in his journal.
  DEAR SHOE, THAT'S RIGHT YOU ARE A SHOE. THERE'S NOTHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT NOT BEING A SHOE BECAUSE IN MY MIND YOU ARE ONE AND THAT IS MOST UNFORTUNATE. AS LONG AS I HAVE YOU CONCEPTUALIZED AS A SHOE IN MY IMAGINATION YOU SHALL REMAIN AS SUCH. THIS MAKES ME WONDER WHETHER ALL PEOPLES AND OBJECTS CAN BE CONCEPTUALIZED AS SHOES AND THUS BECOME SUCH, GRANTING ME ABSOLUTE POWER OVER THEM. DOES SNIPPY HAVE A CLEVER ARGUMENT? NO HE DOESN'T, HE'S A SHOE. SHOES CAN'T HAVE CLEVER ARGUMENTS.
• In-Series Nickname: The whole gang. Except for Mr. Snippy. According to his autobiographical information his real name is "Charles Snippy", so in his case it's actually a subversion.
  • Engineer affectionately calls ANNET "Annie".
• It May Help You on Your Quest: It summons Cancer.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: According to Word of God, Mr. Snippy is actually a Nice Guy; but you'd never know it from the comic so far. Who can blame him, really?
  • A couple of examples; he sets off on the Captain's mad quest with nothing to defend himself but a small handbag and performs a Diving Save to push the Captain out of the way of the cancer-beast, only for it to attack him instead.
• Just in Time: ANNET, of all people, arrives just in time to save Engineer from an onslaught of reanimated skeletons.
  • Who only knew he was there because she burst through the ceiling.
• Kill Sat: Protocol 1-1-3.
• Knight of Cerebus: To some extent, the Cancer. The squad's antics are toned down a notch and some genuine horror begins to appear.
• The Lancer: Mr. Snippy is this to The Captain.
• Manchild: The Captain and Pilot.
• Master Computer
• Medium Awareness: The Captain might have Medium Awareness, if this is any indication.
  "My sexy followers! Look at them! They are watching my every move and JUDGING ME!"
• Mental Fusion: What ANNET has in mind for Engie.
• Mind Probe: It makes trials so much easier.
• Mind Screw:
  • Exactly where does the line between Sniper's dreams, flashbacks, and reality begin and end?
  • Who is Zee Captain? Is he really Snippy's imagination or has Zee Captain pulled a fast one?
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: It's implied that Captain and Engie may be responsible for the Apocalypse. Captain by spilling tea on ANNET and driving her insane; Engie by trying (and failing) to kill the insane ANNET by nuking the planet.
  • Sniper forcing Engineer to shut down ANNET. Cue the planetary folding.
• Nightmare Face: Zee Captain's, according to Issue 23.
• No Name Given: Nearly every character started out as being known only by their In-Series Nickname. Later averted by Snippy, Engineer, and Pilot, who all have their true names revealed at some point in the comic. Played painfully straight with Captain.
• Noodle Incident: Captain's habit of getting involved with these is practically a Running Gag.
  • "...and that's how I started World War III!"
  • "...and since that fateful day I've been at war with every traffic light in existence!"
• Not Quite Dead:
  • ANNET, despite Engineer taking countless lives in his attempt to kill her. Oops.
  • Also, the Cancer, here.
  • The Lifealope, after Protocol 1-1-3.
• Not the Fall That Kills You…: Exaggerated. Snippy falls from from the atmosphere and survives by landing on Zee Captain. Both of them are perfectly fine.
• Nuke 'em: How Engineer disposed of ANNET.
• Oh, Crap!: Snippy, here.
• Only Friend: According to his tumblr account, part of the reason Snippy hangs around with Captain and puts up with him is that he'd be all alone otherwise.
  He's such a child. I often feel like I'm babysitting him. Yet at the same time he always bosses me around relentlessly and is always making up some absolutely ridiculous demands... I hate it. But still... He's all there is. He's my only friend.
  • Surprisingly, Captain is also Snippy's favourite crewmate, partly because of this.
  Anonymous: Who's your favourite crewmate?
  Mr. Snippy: [after deciding on Captain] Only because Pilot is more insane than Captain, I haven’t even seen Engie in awhile, and hey, if a guy’s gonna offer you friendship in a lonely world like this, you might as well take it, right?
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Everyone so far (though in the case of Mr. Snippy it's not technically a nickname).
• Only Sane Man: Sniper.
  • Although as the comic progresses there are some indications that Snippy may be as insane - or even moreso - as Captain (if Captain even exists) and Pilot. In which case, by default, Engie would be the Only Sane Man.
• Or Was It a Dream?: See All Just a Dream and Schrödinger's Butterfly.
• Pet the Dog: Everything that Pilot does for Snippy in issue 157. He seeks out Snippy on his own accord, physically carries him away from danger,and even calls him his friend. Too bad that he doesn't realize that Snippy is dead, and it was Pilot himself who killed him.
• Photo Comic: It's a combination of photos and drawings meshed together so subtly that you can't always tell just what part of the page is just a drawing.
• Pre-Asskicking One-Liner:
  ANNET: Your party exceeded the maximum number of persons. Execute protocol 1-1-3. Have a nice day...
  Zee Captain: What have you done with Santa?
  Zee Captain: I kill you in the name of delicious!
  Snippy: I tend to disagree.
• Psychopathic Manchild:
  • ANNET seems to be a mix of C, D, and E, using "hugs" as a euphemism for murder, calling Engineer pet names like "dear" and "my love", and asking for a "big kiss".
  • Pilot is a non-villainous variety of types A and D, possibly with a bit of E thrown in.
• Pun: Could be unintentional, but ANNET sounds like "a net".
• Reduced to Ratburgers: Snippy's blog reveals that the squad's main source of meat is rats.
• Replacement Goldfish: Parodied. After Sniper is abducted by aliens, The Captain deals with it by drawing a picture of him on a bomb.
• Resurrective Immortality: See Born-Again Immortality above.
• Retcon: Biomatrix 117 was originally written as an agent of the alien union, but later journals make it clear that it's actually a combination of the G-Directive programming in Snippy's clothing, massive amounts of data viruses, programming from the alien ship and Snippy's own biology.
• Ribcage Stomach: Sniper spends some time inside a whale that looks like this.
• Scenery Gorn: In almost every single panel.
• Schrödinger's Butterfly: Is Snippy currently in the Cancer and remembering his pre-apocalyptic life, or is he currently in his pre-apocalyptic life and sporadically dreaming about his future post-apocalyptic life?

• Rewatch Bonus: Did you notice that the skeleton on the train in this strip looks suspiciously like the guy sitting on the train in this strip?? And did you manage to find the creator's name hidden here, here, here, here, and here? (Look really hard.) Did you happen to spot the Captain on the sign in the second-last panel of this strip, or notice that the girl in the first panel is carrying the cancer purse? Did you see the alien spaceship or the red deer (a form the Cancer uses at one point) in the last panel here? There's also a StupidFox poster-thing in the panel with the girl and cancer purse. In "Cancer's" attack, there's a crossover. To top it off, Vitaly himself has said about future plots, "If you're preparing to take a gamble at figuring out what's coming, you can find links to these plots in objects from older episodes."

• The Scream: In the form of a parody of Edvard Munch's "The Scream" painting.
• Shapeshifting: The creature in this strip is capable of this. It's not clear as of yet whether or not it's voluntary.
• Shout-Out:
  • "Where we're going, we don't NEED roads."
  • The lemonade is a LIE!
  • There's a possible Shout-Out to Fallout 3 in this strip.
    • Another Fallout reference: Apparently, the Captain has been paying his subordinates in bottle caps.
  • And Forrest Gump in this one.
  • Pilot's journal contains a Shout-Out to Portal 2. Specifically the end credits song "Want You Gone":
    • Annie seems to be a GLaDOS Expy. for yourself.
  ONE DAY, THE CAPTAIN WOKE ME UP SO I COULD SERVE HIM FOR ALL TIME. IT'S A SHAME THE SAME THING WON'T HAPPEN TO SNIPPY BECAUSE HE'S INSOLENT AND TRIES TO ESCAPE FROM CAPTAIN'S ORDERS.
  • One of the Captain's latest plans? OPERATION: WINTER WRAP-UP!!
  • After Pilot became controlled by ANNET, he started speaking only in modified versions of song lyrics. So far, this has included "Yesterday" and "The Sound of Silence."
  • "Damned magic school bus."
  • #63 and the intermission are a clear Shout-Out to "99 Red Ballons" (German original title "99 Luftballons") by Nena, where 99 Red Balloons trigger a military warning system, which triggers the deployment of jets to investigate, which provokes a apocalyptic world war.
  • The journal for 213 mentions that "Sadly, it seems when you do things right, people aren't sure you've done anything at all."
  • Losing your way while holding the Snipping Device - Scizzorr Blade is not permitted.
    • On the same page and the same note, one of the questions in the Captainia citizenship application is "ARE YOU ABLE TO DEFEND CAPTANIA AGAINST MOST SUDDEN UPRIZING OF CLOTHES?"
• Sickly Green Glow: Mostly averted, but played very straight here.
• Sixth Ranger: Engineer is this to the Comic Trio consisting of Captain, Sniper, and Pilot.
• The Smurfette Principle: Word of God says that one of the characters is female. But they're not saying who it is.
  • At this point, three of the four main characters have had their genders revealed. As long as Mind Screw or Retcon doesn't interfere with what we think we already know, it will be safe to assume that the female in question is Captain.
• Somebody Set Up Us the Bomb: How Captain deals with the aliens who wanted to dissect Snippy.
  Zee Captain: I left you behind as collateral.
• Something We Forgot: We'll never know how long Sniper spent hanging upside down in that crashed train. The Captain certainly didn't make a note of it.
• Sorting Algorithm of Evil: The cultists were harmless. The aliens were more dangerous, but still comedic. The Cancer was terrifying, and technically killed Snippy and Pilot. The Arbitrator kills planets for a living, and tries to do so to Earth.
• Stalker with a Crush: Zee Captain has one, who left a bra on his sleeping form one time. He technically has two, if you count Pilot.
• Team Pet: The freakish mutant worm-like creature that Pilot befriended is referred to as Photoshop, and he reappears occasionally throughout the story, such as during Pilot's flight experiments. "Ownership" seems to be split between Pilot and Captain.
• Teleporters and Transporters: The aliens have one.
• Tempting Fate: Snippy notes in one of his pre-apocalypse journals that it seems almost as if a higher up wants all human beings to become machines. Considering what Engie's big plans were, he's not that far off.
• There Was a Door: ANNET makes a dramatic entrance by smashing through the roof, even though there was presumably a door, not to mention at least one broken window.
• Title Drop: The first page has the title spray painted onto a bill board.
• Tomato in the Mirror: Pilot is eventually revealed to be an amnesiac DEX, firmly in denial about his true identity.
• Tomato Surprise: The Moon Arc heavily implies that Captain is actually some form of ANNET.
• Trade Snark:
  Zee Captain: Our new intern tells me zee Thermonuclear Holocaust™ wiped out all life.
• Unflinching Walk: Snippy after blowing up the Cancer.
• Walking the Earth: The Captain and his subordinates don't seem to have much else to do.
• Walking Tech Bane: The apparent reason for why Sniper couldn't connect to ANNET. This is the reason why he was transferred into Dead Zone Research, and is the reason ANNET absolutely wants him dead.
  • Even weirder, a scientist speculates that the effect he has on technology is a result of a Temporal Paradox in his brain, which is causing the signal from the Neural Network to travel into future, which may be related to his prophetic dreams.
• The Watson: Sniper.
• The Worf Effect: Looks like they found a cure for cancer.
• Wham Episode: Page 104. and page 105 Warning, serious spoilers. It is implied, but not confirmed, that Snippy is actually insane. Captain doesn't exist, he's just Snippy's split personality. He's occasionally just imagined Captain by him, and in other cases he actually dressed up as captain and acted as him. This could be true of Pilot as well. To top it off, now Snippy is being taken to a different world to be judged and Earth is going to be turned into a black hole. Let's pray this is all a dream, shall we?
  • Ambiguity has been resolved - The Arbitrator was wrong; Captain and Sniper are not the same person, as evidenced by Sniper landing on Captain. And, of course, conveniently happening to obscure his face.
• Who Writes This Crap?!: Snippy takes a subtle shot at the comic's quality when he describes his nightmares (which are actually his misadventures with Pilot and Captain) as being "poorly written".
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Sniper and The Captain are downright hostile to each other in conversation, but they both regularly risk their lives for each other.
• You Are Number 6: According to this comic and Snippy's bio, The Captain was known as Subject Seven before the apocalypse happened.

---