Bloody good time.
School Bites
is a fantasy/comedy webcomic by Holly Golightly (letterer and colorist to Tarot: Witch of the Black Rose which her husband writes). SB tells the story of Charlotte Webb who, as the story opens up, is shown in the aftermath of being a vampire victim. Now a vampire herself, she is quickly invited to join Shadow Academy to learn how to be a proper bloodsucker. Once there she meets her roommates, some recent undead like herself while others are inherently monsters, and is re-christened Cherri Creeper (as being turned is considered a "new birth"). Thus begins her semester in a world of monsters and magic.
SB was actually started in 2004 as a self-published title part of the Broadsword Comics line before being converted to a webcomic. It still prints volume sets out as well thanks to the extra publicity the webcomic brings in. Additionally the comic started on Keenspot when it moved to the web. But since then has moved onto its own site that has partnered with Pixie Trix. Later it was packed with an unrelated webcomic about her pet cat.
While nowhere near Tarots level, the comic can still be quite Not Safe for Work from time to time so reader caution is advised.
At the current, the series seems to be on hiatus with the last known work being the crossover it had with Tarot. Holly has mentioned that due to running Broadsword with her husband, she hasn't had time to work on it. But does plan to continue it when she can and revamp the website when that happens.
Now has a Character page. Please contribute.
Tropes:
- Adaptation Expansion: The webcomic features a few new comics not seen in the books.
- All-Ghouls School: Shadow Academy is basically a school for young vampires.
- Animesque: A cross between anime, Bratz, and rainbow glitter.
- Art Evolution: Compared to the first few chapters, the art has become less and less deformed as of late.
- Art Shift: The comic loves to do this. Shifting from a regular anime-like style, to chibi style and to a more detailed and realistic style. Here's just one example of many - No, the upper left panel is not supposed to be a flashback to her past.
- Attractive Bent Species: Fujiko's "talent".
- Author Appeal:
- As the comic goes on it becomes increasingly obvious Holly G loves her Pretty Boy designs.
- Holly G made it clear on the forums that she wishes she were a vampire like this.
- The Friday guest strips have become almost entirely Holly's stories about her cat.
- Cat Girl: Kyoko a.k.a Fujiko.
- Crossover: With Tarot Witch of the Black Rose. Not surprising as her husband draws it.
- Cute Monster Girl: A good majority of the cast.
- Cuteness Proximity: Cherri. Especially if Anarchy Bunny is around.
- Dhampyr: Cleo reveals her mother is a vampire while her father is a human. In addition, her mother is Lilith, making her potentially half-god.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: The students are given a potion to "curb their bloodlust", so they only have to drink blood once a month.
- Elegant Gothic Lolita: Has this in spades.
- Eyes Always Shut:
- Regina Sharp a.k.a Cleobatra... in the first few chapters anyway. Later chapters have seen her with them fully open.
- While using her talent, Fujiko often has her eyes closed.
- Fanservice:
- Fantastic Racism: Fujiko firmly believes all humans are just food to her and doesn't seem to really like Imp (though the latter may have just been his initial portrayal as a pervert). There are some indication that many 'born into vampirism' vamps are like this.
- First-Episode Resurrection: The comic starts with Cherri, or as she was know at the time Charlotte, waking up after being drained of her blood and finding out that she was turned into a vampire.
- Form-Fitting Wardrobe: Professor E early on.
- Friendly Neighborhood Vampire: Charlotte is very nice.
- Genki Girl: Jenny a.k.a Sugar Shock.
- Goth: Leila a.k.a Annie Mia as well as Master Le Bon and his entourage.
- Green-Eyed Monster: Hmmmm...
- I Will Find You: What Christopher promises Cherri if she can't return to the human world.
- Love Triangle: ChristopherxCherrixDante, though Dante hasn't won her heart. Yet.
- Meaningful Name:
- Upon initiation into Shadow Academy (and presumably the underworld in general), everyone is given a new name that fits their personality. Cherri and her favorite food, Annie Mia is a Vegan, and Sugar Shock is a Genki Girl. Mind you, if the pattern established with Cherri follows, none of these are their given names. (Cherri's real name is Charlotte Webb, but she isn't very spidery...)
- Professor Embers
- Naked Apron: The 2010 Valentine's Day filler crams in the fanservice tropes.
- Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: In this case a Vampire Catgirl.
- Older Than They Look: Hardly anyone in the strip is under twenty. However, pre-transformation Cherri (even in flashbacks to when she was fifteen) looks more grown-up than the current version. The fact that the first five and a half chapters (though none of pre-transformation Cherri/Charolette) are almost all Chibi probably has something to do with it.
- Older Than They Look and act. They're stated in the cast page to be 18-"Early 20s", and yet they're all giggly and such over seeing a guy naked. Yes, the guy is their substitue teacher, but still...
- Older Than They Look and act. They're stated in the cast page
- Only Sane Woman: Annie Mia prefers to not join in such girly things like Squeeing at the naked guys in the boys' locker room, or the pillow fight afterward.
- Our Angels Are Different: Professor Seraphis and apparently Annie Mia are "Dark Angels" rather than normal vampires. As Anne backstory shows that she willingly became one while trying to save her ailing boyfriend. This invovled doing a spell that allowed her to meet an angel of death, take one of his feather before being sapped her lifeforce, and, I'm guessing, turned her into a vampire as sort of a incubation period. It wasn't until Annie tasted blood for the first time that her vampire features disappeared and she gained the black wings.
- Our Vampires Are Different: Justified as Cherri finds out when she meets Professor E. Most of the vampires look somewhat human while others like Cherri have pale skin and bat wings on their backs. A few don't even look human at all case in point of Imp, a Nosferatu and Fujiko who's basically a vampire were-cat.
- Parental Abandonment: Going by her description, Cherri's parents during her human life weren't exactly the best in town. Especially saying something if you've been on you own since you were fifteen!
- Pen Name: Holly Golightly I'm sure has no relation to the character with the same name from Breakfast at Tiffany's.
- Perky Goth: Cherri.
- Pointy Ears: They're a lifestyle change for newly turned vampires.
- Power Gives You Wings: Annie Mia when she gets her first taste of blood.
- Psychic Dreams for Everyone: Due to the fact Cherri and Le Bon are connected to each other now. Hes the one that turned her after all.
- "Shaggy Dog" Story: Annie's backstory in which she willingly turned herself into a vampire to save her boyfriend from a fatal disease. However once she had the means to cure him, he requested to leave it be and die peacefully. Annie respected his wishes, staying by his side till he passed on.
- Single-Target Sexuality: Fujiko seems mostly Cherri-sexual.
- Shout-Out:
- Harry Potter which one can tell is an inspiration to the series, as well as Anne Rice. There are also a few nods to musicians as well.
- The message here looks familiar.
- Shower Scene: Beginning here and lasting for nine pages
- "Shut Up" Kiss: Here
- Spotlight-Stealing Squad: The Pangar strips (comics about Holly's pet cat) that suddenly started showing up on the Friday strips. It became obvious Holly was liking working on that more then School Bites. Pretty soon there was a Kickstarter for a stand alone book. And it still continues on in the Tarot series.
- Super-Deformed: The vast majority of chapters two through five. Almost unused in the (first half of the) first chapter. Cut back to none halfway through the sixth.
- Sweet Tooth: So far, Imp is the only exception. And he can cook them sweets.
- Take That!: Stake me, I Glitter.
- Trademark Favorite Food: Cherri. Guess.
- Twofer Token Minority: Cleobatra; half African American, half Jewish.
- Ugly Cute: Imp is supposed to be "ugly" in-universe (being a Nosferatu), but is actually kind of cute; IMHO, he looks like a green-skinned, pointy-eared Aang.
- The Unfavorite: Imp explains he's one among his family due to the fact he's not as vampire like as them (He likes to bake sweets for one) and had sent him to the academy to shape him into a more proper one.
- Vampire Hickey: Enforced by the Shadow Academy as one of their classes for newborn vampires. In order to avoid leaving bite marks, the new vampires are to leave clean shallow bites to get at the blood and frowning at methods that haphazardly rip into flesh.
- Wall Crawl: The end of this page. Must come natural to vampires since this is the first time Cherri does it.
- Worth It: When Cherri is called to the principal's office for detention:Annie: Just remember Cherri, whatever happens, it was worth it.note
