Webcomic / When She Was Bad

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When She Was Bad is a webcomic about Psycho Lesbian villain protagonist Gail Swanson, who gained superpowers when a mysterious cloaked man zaps her, in a magical girl story gone wrong. It's about her fights, her triumphs, her losses, her lackeys...and maybe her love life. If she can ever get the guts to ask the girl of her dreams out.

It's also about her heroic counterpart, Alpha Bitch Amber Price, who eventually resigns herself to her role and tries to use her powers for good- especially against Gail.

This show provides examples of:

• Abhorrent Admirer: Ben has the hots for Anna, much to her disgust, and Sean warns him to keep away from his adoptive sister.
• Abusive Parents: Amber's cousin Melanie's parents did not approve of her being gay when she came out. Amber's own father is later revealed to be a homophobe, despite her claim in the first chapter that he and her mom regularly make donations to the less fortunate. Max's flashback episode has him say his own parents were no prize either, though his mother was apparently marginally better in the sense that Max received his new name based on their favorite song, “Maxwell's Silver Hammer", when he was younger. Rebecca's parents were not that bad by comparison given that they were only, at worst, pressuring Rebecca to follow something other than fashion despite her wanting to pursue it since she was a little girl.
  • The first crook Amber legitimately thwarted threatened to shoot his little girl alongside his wife if the police didn't back off.
• Accidental Misnaming: Amber got Rebecca's name as "Regina" when the two first met in Interlude 2. A coffee shop employee later mispronounced the former's name as "Umber" in Chapter 24.
• Amicable Exes: Marisol has had romantic history with Max, though neither lets it affect their current relationship. It probably helped that before his memory wipe, Max was the only one to see the real her (before she fully transitioned).
• Animals Hate Him: Gail's cat Torq says Jasper gives him the creeps…and for good reason.
• Armor-Piercing Question: After formally apologizing to Gail for her bullying the latter back in high school, noting she's ready to grow past their differences, Amber asks her nemesis if she's ready to grow up and stop being a criminal. This just makes Gail angry before a phone notification breaks it off. For the moment.
• Art Evolution: From this to this. The proportions are still weird, but you can't say it hasn't improved dramatically.
• Ascended Extra: Rosie was only in two chapters (8 and 11) before she went off the radar for much of the earlier storyline, with not even the Hammond Gang knowing her whereabouts. She resurfaces in Chapter 24 spying on the Robbins Gang's meeting with several of the Westside Brutes' hookers and goes to inform Connor of the situation. From then on, she's gained a larger presence in the comic and even becomes Jasper's unofficial partner once he gets outed from Gail's team.
• Attempted Rape: A flashback reveals that this is one of the reasons Gail hates Amber. Amber's boyfriend attempted to rape Gail. Gail suspected that Amber put him up to it.
• Axe-Crazy: Gail and Coyote. To the point, the latter shoots Marisol due to boredom…barely missing Jasper, of whom also qualifies, while holding a hostage during a tense stnadoff within the Order's hideout. Speaking of Jasper, while somewhat less psychotic, is still mostly an unrepentant sadist whose “friends” have to restrain him from maiming anybody they don't have to.
• Bait the Dog: Ben early on is depicted as a perverted, somewhat annoying but mostly harmless hacker only for him to be gradually revealed to be a fat-shaming, opportunistic, and misogynistic sociopath who goes on to ditch his "friends" and sell them out to Hammond, the BIGGER BAD of the narrative, and feel only for his own safety from the FBI. The author even expressed amusement that so many found him entertaining when first introduced only to slowly but surely become the most hated member of Gail's group by the time he leaves them.
• Bastard Boyfriend: Turns out that Bryan and his cronies acted entirely on their own when they jumped Gail and Amber had no knowledge of what they were going to do. She broke things off with the tool after refusing to sleep with him herself, presumably just before he assaulted Gail. Later, Anna catches Darius sleeping with one of his Siren Lounge girls, much to her outrage. He's done this to her once already and promised to never do it again. Real catch.
• Berserk Button: Gail and Sean appear to share one — sexual threats towards women. Rosie also does not appreciate unwanted advances on her nor having her killer's credentials being questioned.
• Big Beautiful Woman: Tabitha Brooks catches the eye of Villain Protagonist Gail Swanson, who thinks she's cute and eventually forms a romantic bond with her. Only Ben seems to take issues with her weight, much to the chagrin of the others (except Jasper, who couldn't care less).
  • Dee, one of the girls liberated from the Westside Brutes, is a Statuesque Stunner despite being slightly pudgy.
• Big Brother Instinct: Rob landed in jail because he was trying to protect Tabitha from the criminal group her boyfriend-at-the-time was associated with, namely shooting an implied-higher-up within that gang, though Tabby insists he never meant to actually kill the guy. When he's busted out, he attempts to convince his little sister to leave Gail on the count of the latter’s bad choices and when that fails, turns to getting rid of Gail indirectly by ratting her out to the Hammond Gang.
• Big "NO!": "Why does [Gail] get superpowers?" Quoth Oscar in Chapter 8 after she destroys his channeler staff that he would have used to strip her of her powers. Things do not improve for him when Jasper stabs the robe in the back before he can fully teleport to safety.
  • Amber lets one loose when Will reminds her of her mojo wiping/altering others' memories of her just after she makes plans for dating Arturo; She realizes that she'll have to go out with him wearing her armor, which she doesn't think is cute for such occasions.
  • Tabitha failing at winning the lottery at the end of Chapter 45. The winning ticket was all even numbers, which she finds preposterous.
  • Marisol when Jasper psychotically murders Order member Kevin after he was made to promise to leave the Order in peace if they gave him abilities.
• Black Eyes of Crazy: Jasper once he blackmails the Order into giving him powers. Doubles as Black Eyes of Evil.
• Blackmail: Gail caught Ben hacking the school database when they were at Robbins and promised not to tell if he got her the answers for her math final.
  • On a more serious note, Jasper threatens to kill the entire Order (or at least threatens to sic Rosie on them) if they don’t give him the powers that Gail and Amber possess. Oscar begrudgingly acquiesces, only for Jas to start a kill spree regardless.
• Blasting It Out of Their Hands: Sean disarms a cop this way when breaking Jasper out of prison.
• Blessed with Suck: Amber gets super strength and Gail gets... to talk with her cat (and other animals). At least, that's what she first thinks.
• Blood Knight: Coyote, Coyote, COYOTE. Jasper too as he begins to show whenever he gets to be violent. It’s part of the reason Gail decides he's too dangerous to remain in her gang.
• Bratty Half-Pint: In the first chapter, Gail has to suffer through a little boy screaming for his mom to get him a toy meal. Her “happy thoughts” consist of the kid getting chased by a hungry snake. He's heavily implied to be the first of many punks she had to deal with at that crap job.
• Breast Attack: During the armored car robbery; Amber gets honked by Gail while in the middle of threatening to drag the latter in front of a news van.
• Brick Joke: Sue makes a remark to Sean he should get a haircut and later, after they begin a Forbidden Friendship, Rebecca recommends it too, much to his irritation. Come Chapter 36 after the two month break, he has gotten it trimmed somewhat.
• Brutal Honesty: Gail has made it clear to Tabitha that at the end of the day, she looks out for No. 1 (herself) and is mostly unapologetic for the issues and dilemmas that her crime spree has caused to Matron City. Even the nicer Robbins Gang members tend not to mince words with each other, especially whenever Anna calls out her friends for doing something profoundly reckless if not full-on stupid like deliberately challenging Amber to a fight. Deconstructed with Ben’s constant jerkishness which repeatedly annoys his “friends”, even Tabitha, to the point that she starts chucking shit at him for his fat shaming her and misogynic attitude towards women. He leaves the group when they call him out on it.
• Burger Fool: Gail Swanson is introduced miserably standing behind a fast food restaurant counter serving whiny little kids and their parents. Her only entertainment is having the occasional Imagine Spot depicting the kids getting eaten by snakes. All bad guys have to start somewhere, she states.
• By the Hair: Gail's response to Amber ordering the former to turn herself in during their first "fight". Amber pays her back during their third battle when Gail is distracted by Max and Marisol trying to burn them with her new fire-based ability.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Gail Swanson mainly, though she falls more under The Hedonist given that the bigger criminal gangs in the story are infinitely more vile than her with Jakob Hammond at the top of the list. Played straight with Rosie who admits on several occasions that she knows what she does is evil but doesn't care about the morals.
• Car Fu: As seen here.
• Cast from Money: Amber flicks pocket change at Gail hard enough to shatter asphalt during their third encounter. The villain taunts her about this later when Max gets abducted.
• Cats Are Snarkers: Torq in the beginning when Gail could talk to animals. He liked that it would make communicating his needs to her more simple. Soon her ability shifted to shorting out technology and this trait disappeared.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Way back in Chapter 17, Jasper is asking around the Bloodhands for info regarding an Arturo Ramirez, only to be blown off and threatened by the gangsters. You'd normally think that this would be setting up another recurring antagonist connected to Jasper to have a showdown with based on some Dark and Troubled Past of his. Arturo, or Art as he prefers to be called, wouldn't make an appearance til Chapter 40…with a gun, encountered by Amber of all people, quite a bit after Jasper is kicked out of Gail's group and returned to prison. It turns out the gun was for self-defense and his roommate mistakenly thought he was firing it (it was someone else); Artie is shown to be a Troubled, but Cute Nice Guy who goes on to become a Second Love to Amber. Some comments from the Bloodhands goons in the former-mentioned installment implies that Jasper and Art's association was less than positive. Indeed, Arturo and several boys from his neighborhood were used by the Bloodhands for small-time crime until Art’s best friend Gio picked a fight with Jasper for the sake of pride and almost got killed before Art intervened. Said incident landed Jas in prison while Gio died of internal bleeding.
• The Chessmaster: Gail is capable of running some smooth power grabs whenever she isn't getting all flirty or riled up. Resident hacker Ben concedes she was always thinking five or six moves ahead whenever they'd play actual chess.
• The Chosen One: Amber is, according to the Order.
• City of Adventure: Matron City, where the majority of the characters are stationed. Where exactly it's located is kept intentionally mum, according to the creator.
• Complaining About Rescues They Don't Like: Rob is understandably freaked out when he sees Gail forcibly liberating him from his jail cell, and his mood does NOT improve upon seeing that he's now a fugitive associated with a gang of criminals (which is partly how he ended up locked up in the first place) and his sister is now dating their leader. After being forced into hiding for two months, he begins risking everybody's safety by going on night walks and gets into heated arguments with Gail and Tabby, the former even manhandling him when he complains to her face. His failure to get Tabitha to break it off with Gail causes Rob to seek out “help” from the Hammond Gang, of all people.
• Complete-the-Quote Title: Chapter 24 is "Hell Hath No Fury…" "…Like Woman Scorned." It refers to Anna ensuring that the smarmy prostitute who slept with Darius is brought down on criminal charges including the rest of the Westside Brutes barring Anthony.
• The Corruptible: Gail continuously gets more and more careless with collateral damage as her crime spree escalates with the Perception Filter being her and the Robbins Gang's only lifeline. Upon her injuring Sean for starting a Forbidden Friendship with Max and Rebecca behind the others' backs coupled with the growing threat of Amber honing her combat skills, Tony thinks its time for Anna and Sean to leave the gang life behind in case Gail gets caught, injures one of them again, or loses her powers altogether. Tony reiterates by saying "Power corrupts". Given that one of the destined heroines before Amber was earlier revealed to have fallen to villainy and ended up killing several members of the Order before she was brought down, this is not looking to be too ridiculous of a fear.
• Cry Cute: Amber when Will suggests dying her hair in the beginning, only to hear from his cousin she tried that and it doesn't work. Happens again when Rebecca bonks her for not taking her training with Max seriously.
• Cursed with Awesome: Gail's secondary power always changes; This means she has all kinds of weird powers, talking to animals, disabling any technology she nears, telepathy and pyrokinesis.
• Deadly Disc: Gail hurls a manhole cover in turn for Amber power flicking coins at her in their third conflict. Only a block via streetlight keeps the rich girl safe. Their fifth battle has Gail using a streetlight stand as a disc on Max in order to slow him down from chasing Sean.
• Deal with the Devil: Rob ends up throwing his lot in with the Hammond Gang and sells out Gail for protection from law enforcement as well as wanting to get Tabitha out of a life of crime.
• Dirty Coward: Its extremely evident that Ben Haswell only cares for his own safety from law enforcement, and perhaps being recognized in the Matron underworld for his hacking skills, hence why he ends up ditching the Robbins Gang and goes to work for Jakob Hammond, head of the almost-mafia, and in turn betrays his old "friends". This was after Gail warned him not to go blabbing to anybody when he jumped ship. The head of the Order, Oscar, is a bit of a loser himself given he went from scolding Gail for abusing her accidentally acquired abilities to begging the Robbins Gang not to hurt him after he initiated the violence by bonking Gail on the head with his scepter.
• Disability Immunity: Anthony, who's been deaf since birth, is immune to Gail's mind-reading. She can't hear his thoughts because he doesn't associate words with sounds.
• Dissonant Serenity: Rosie is so at ease with murder and torturing that she can show up for work all cheerful without changing out of her bloodied clothes, much to the Hammonds' discomfort. Sometimes it's funny, sometimes it's pretty unnerving such as when a fellow enforcer tries to aggressively flirt with her, only to get savagely beaten for his trouble.
• Does Not Know His Own Strength: Both Gail and Amber, Gail moreso, have issues controlling their Super-Strength early on. Gail was particularly brutal in their third battle that she almost killed Marisol by accident. It was only Marisol's recovery stone that prevented Gail becoming a murderer. This is brought up later when she gets physical with Sean for getting chummy towards Max and Rebecca off the clock, and both he and Anna are frightened on what might happen if she gets anymore powerful.
• Domestic Abuse: The first crook Amber brings down threatens his family with a gun if the police attempt to storm their apartment building. Thankfully, his aim was off.
• Don't Tell Mama: As she's treating Sean's injuries, Anna threatens to squeal to their mother via picture sending, much to his horror.
• Dr. Jerk: Amber's father is a doctor and is later revealed to be homophobic.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: Shrike ends up getting killed by a rogue Jasper for almost robbing his chances of getting even with Gail.
• Early Installment Character-Design Difference: Will had a longer shoulder-length mullet in the early chapters plus Tabitha's chubbiness was considerably less obvious. Its only roughly after Ben is introduced to her, and fat shames her, that Tabby begins looking slightly more rotound.
• Enemy Mine: Amber ends up giving the Robbins Gang the heads up when Jasper breaks away from the Hammond Gang to go after Gail for tossing him back in jail. The groups agree to put their feud on hold in order to cull Jasper until he and Coyote have been dealt with accordingly.
• Enfant Terrible: Jasper Manning allegedly killed his neighbor's dog when he was only nine, at least according to what Connor dug up on him.
• Erotic Eating: How Gail ate ice, from Tabitha's perspective.
• Establishing Character Moment: Jasper Manning is introduced in solitary confinement having offed a fellow inmate and is stoically indifferent to the head guard screaming that he'll never see the light of day. His cold reception to Gail and Sean freeing him coupled with his (fatally?) shooting the guard from before and his turning the gun on his "friend" tells the audience all they need to know about him.
• Even Evil Has Standards: The group's reaction to Tabitha's horrible (drunk) sketch.
  • More seriously on this page.
  • Later chapters establish that Gail and her team draw the line at murder, which is why she decides to send Jasper back to prison.
• Everyone Can See It: Everyone in the gang can see the attraction between Anna and Tony, though she denies it vehemently. Gail and Sean refer to him as her boyfriend on two separate occasions.
• Evil All Along: Jasper Manning, while always characterized as the Token Evil Teammate of the Robbins Gang, at least had Gail and Tabitha to keep him in line and some of his sociopathic tendencies were played for dark laughs. Tabitha even holds out some insane hope that Jas isn’t so bad deep down due to her personal biases. But both of the kidnapping incidents involving Max and Will, the latter of whom he snatched at random, plus his persistence at wanting to get even on all the people who wronged him, finally gives Gail the clarity that both Sean and Anna have been trying to emphasize; Jasper is an unrepentant killer and DANGEROUS to keep around; He enjoys getting into street tussles and only obeys Gail as long as its convenient for him until it isn't. While she does throw him back in prison while breaking out Tabitha’s brother Rob, he doesn’t stay for very long and defies the memory loss of the girls' Perception Filter by cutting Gail's name into his skin, which he makes use of once Jakob Hammond re-breaks him out for the former's own gang. Jasper eventually, alongside Rosie the Coyote, betrays the Hammond Group once endowed with powers from the Order via extortion and eventually goes on a rampage to exact revenge on Gail and also Arturo for the latter squealing on him to the police which is how Jas was imprisoned in the first place.
• Evil Laugh: Gail breaks out in one when robbing a bank for the first time, a second time when she discovers she can read minds, and a third time when she burns Amber with her newly discovered flame ability. She does it again when robbing a jewelry store to help pawn for cash.
• Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: Will finally recognizes Gail as the girl who beat up his cousin's best friend’s boyfriend back when they all attended Elmride High School just after he happily remembers Gail’s face from their shared linguistics class. He quickly pales.
• Eye Scream: Attempted on Max by Jasper when Amber tracks down the bad guys to Sean and Anna's house. Sean refuses to allow it on the count that Jasper may jump fully ahead to killing the poor guy. Jas himself nearly lost his right eye when Arturo gave him a nasty scar there with only the former's glasses ensuring he didn't lose it. Its inferred that this may be the stronger incentive for why Jasper wants revenge on Art rather than the latter simply phoning the police and getting him thrown in jail.
• Face–Heel Turn: Not that they were saints by any stretch when first introduced, but Ben ultimately joins the Hammond Gang not long after he decides to quit Gail's team since he's a pervy jackass who keeps fat-shaming Tabitha followed by Jasper a while later; He wants revenge on Gail after she returned him to prison for being too volatile while they were breaking out Tabby's brother Rob.
• Faking the Dead: Max pretends to die after being shot in the chest by Jasper. However, it doesn't take long for his deception to be uncovered. Jakob also has Jasper recruited into his own gang after the Time Skip this way by bribing the guards into faking his hanging himself in his cell. This is implied to be how the Hammond Gang has gotten some of its other hired guns onboard, such as Rosie.
• Fallen Hero: Chapter 38 reveals that one of the Order's chosen ones went rogue and started abusing her powers instead of using them for justice, necessitating the order having to strip her of said abilities. She managed to kill several of the robes before the process was over. She had apparently withdrawn from her loved ones for uncertain reasons, perhaps the lack of the support structure that Amber has had through Max and her best friends. This heroine's downfall was the reason for why handlers such as Max were inducted into the Order in the first place; Not only to guide and teach, but also to look for warning signs developing of being The Poorly Chosen One.
• Forbidden Friendship: Sean, one of the bad guys, eventually forms a friendship with Max and Rebecca from the good guys, following his kidnapping by Amber plus Will getting taken by Jasper a day prior. It gets uncovered by Gail and Amber following an incident sparked by the Bloodhands and one of Anthony's prostitutes (Sue) texting the wrong person (Max).
• Four Eyes, Zero Soul: Jasper. If you are a loose end to Gail, or much later, just to him personally, he'll go straight for the jugular even if he promises he won't. The Order's members not named Max all discovered this the hard way when he and Rosie mount an attack on their hidden base to acquire powers like Gail and Amber.^note Only Jasper does; Rosie passed on the count of not wanting unnecessary attention
• Four Is Death: Parodied; Will wears a sports shirt with the respective number when he bumps into Gail and Anna at the beginning of the comic. While the two let him go, Amber comes along at the worst possible time and picks a fight with her old school nemesis.
• Flying Brick: Amber has Flight, Super-Strength, and moderate Super-Toughness, explained as being necessary for her to use her strength without hurting herself. She also claims the Most Common Superpower, at least in comparison to Gail.
• Gayngster: Connor Hammond. It is NOT something he shouts from the rooftops, as he warns Tabitha not to say anything regarding his sexuality when she implies the majority of the Hammond Gang doesn't know about him upon his threatening to report Jasper's violence towards enforcer Kristoff. Rosie is the only other one in the criminal underworld who knows his secret, but seemingly doesn't hold it over him and even compliments a couple of Connor's dates.
• Genius Ditz: Gail Swanson can be a romantic ditz off the clock (she admits early on she's a shitty flirt) and have quite the temper. Whenever she gets her head in the game, watch out. She can be quite the Manipulative Bitch when scoping out potential allies, only to throw them under the bus or pit another gang's heat on said “ally” so they’ll take each other out.
• Healing Factor: Max has one for his role as Amber's bodyguard. It's initially very powerful, but decreases over time as Amber becomes stronger and less reliant on him. By the Time Skip in Chapter 36, its almost fully run its course with the last of it being used to heal his gunshot wound from the altercation at In Bloom with Javier's Bloodhands.
• Heart Is an Awesome Power: As fluctuating as Gail's secondary power is, she eventually gets around by always using it in creative ways including sending a bird to hassle Amber, using her anti-techno ability to short out a security camera (before she fully understood the Weirdness Censor around her and Amber), and later using her copy power to duplicate trinkets for selling. As she spells out during their third confrontation with Amber: She's full of surprises.
• Held Back in School: Sean was held back a couple of times during his high school days, seemingly the only one of the Robbins Gang who had such issues (excluding Jasper who was already a dropout, according to Gail).
• Hypocrite: The Order turns women into heroines, yet refuses to allow women into their ranks. They let trans-women in, but constantly identify them as male. Oscar even holds out that Marisol will “go back to being Miguel” (her deadname) someday, much to her chagrin.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: Amber, at first. Max says the empowering is irreversible once done and that none of the former heroines had a say in the matter. Besides, with Gail increasingly becoming a nusance to her's and the public's safety. including her besties and cousin, she eventually gets over it.
• Impractically Fancy Outfit: Amber's first superhero costume. It got turned on her rather embarrassingly.
• Immediate Self-Contradiction: In the first chapter, Hillary goes from wanting to walk away from Gail, plus trying to talk Amber out of confronting her, to viciously screaming at the latter for putting her ex-boyfriend in the hospital:
  Hillary: FUCK YOU BITCH!! You almost killed him!!
  Gail: I'll try harder next time.
  Hillary: Psycho!
• It's All About Me: Gail does her best to emphasize to Tabitha that she is only looking out for #1…though that doesn't stop the occasional Pet the Dog moment from leaking through…usually through Tabitha guilting her into it. Played straight with Ben who refuses to change his behavior against Tabby (who grows to loathe him for his misogyny) and Jasper who is straight up psycho. It'd be easier to list the crooks in this comic who don't follow this mentality to an extent.
• Jerkass: Amber is homophobic and a bully (mellowed out somehow later in the comic), Ben tends often to be an asshole towards people (he even provoked Tabitha, the nicest person of the gang, into throwing stuff at him and threatening to hit him with a chair). Jasper is just plain psychotic threatening to maim and/or flat out murder anybody who gets in his way seemingly or on purpose. Later calling Jasper a jerk would be an understatement once he gains the same abilities as Gail and Max.
• Knight in Shining Armor: Sean to Gail once, after rescuing her from Amber's slimeball ex’s attempt to rape her.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Max had has memories erased before joining the Order. Marisol tells him it was voluntary. Interlude #3 sheds light on this with Max, who was not born with that name, being brought into the Order having been deeply troubled by the weight of his difficult life (long dead Abusive Parents and ex-friends who wanted him dead for undisclosed reasons). Marisol was curious as to who he'd be without the Dark and Troubled Past while pre-amnesia Max thought bodyguarding a burgeoning heroine would be a decent way to atone for his old life.
• I Lied: Jasper is made to promise that he and Rosie will leave the Order in peace if they grant him powers. They give him what he wants, to Marisol's outrage, only for Jas to immediately say this word for word before snapping a poor lad's neck like a twig.
• A Lighter Shade of Black: Gail Swanson is mostly unapologetically selfish in how she uses/abuses her powers, which were (possibly) never intended for her, but she has friends who she cares about, namely Sean and Anna, and finds a somewhat stable romantic relationship with a mostly normal girl Tabitha. Anna is slightly homophoic as shown whenever Gail gets cozy with Tabby, either that or she isn't into the sappy stuff, but is mainly tolerant of Gail's homosexuality and is heavily inferred to have feelings for Anthony. Sean only really qualifies as such to due to his unquestionable loyalty to Gail after rescuing her from being raped and seemingly only follows his best friend’s lead whenever they go thieving. Both he and Gail draw the line at actual murder, even when it comes to dealing with Amber Price, and have to stave off Jasper from carrying any out. Rape is a essentially their “let’s not be totally vicious” trigger. The Hammond Gang, especially Jakob Hammond, himself, help in making the aforementioned Robbins alumni look not too vile by comparison, though Connor is treated somewhat more sympathetically despite his loyalty to his Uncle Jakob.
• Locked into Strangeness: When Amber gets her powers, her hair turns permanently blue.
• Mangaesque
• Master of Illusion: Gail's final power before the Time Skip allows her to project realistic imagery of clothing, false injuries, and even a Nightmare Face. She pulls this on Anna and Tabby by faking being all bloody before quickly giving the game away, much to the others' irritation. It also comes in handy to allow Gail and Jasper to infiltrate Burke Prison and brake out Rob…and reimprison Jasper!!
• Morality Pet: Tabitha is usually the (ignored) voice of reason during Gail's For the Evulz actions and Jasper's psychotic episodes. Unfortunately, she's into bad men/women. Conner is later proven to be Rosie's, as she considers him her sole true friend and threatens to turn on Jasper if he ends up killing the former.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Amber eventually comes to see her old homophobia as this after realizing that Gail's Attempted Rape was carried out by one of her ex's who used her name to get under the latter's skin plus coming to see that Gail's current criminal activities are the result of her being inherently corrupt and selfish. It's later revealed that Amber's cousin Melanie was a lesbian and Amber's own prejudices, coupled with her upbringing plus Melanie's own parents, caused them to drift apart in high school and that Mel's new group of friends went drunk driving one night and all got killed in a crash, which only exacerbated Amber's discrimination due to blaming those friends as bad influences.
• My Sister Is Off-Limits: Or adoptive sister, in this case. Sean warns Ben to keep his pants on whenever he voices his crush on Anna, much to the latter's annoyance. Rob once (jokingly) told his cellmate that Tabitha, his sister, was not his type.
• Mysterious Past: Jasper Manning was already a high school dropout by the time the Robbins Gang met up with him and otherwise no other details are known early on besides him having a strong grudge with an Arturo Ramirez, who evidently was a former member of Javier's gang the Bloodhands. His psycho tendencies have been part of him since he was nine, according to Connor's research, when he killed a dog. It's revealed later that one of Arturo's childhood friends had a scuffle with Jasper over the former’s jealously of the Robbins Gang’s close association with Javier and Julio (who brought up Gail as a child) which Artie tried to stop and scarred Jas in the process.^note Only the scar over his right eye To top it off, Jasper was thrown in prison thanks to Arturo calling the police, which is a big no-no for any street gangster.
  • We know even less regarding Rosie's background on how she even became associated with the Hammond Gang, let alone her life beforehand and why she is so offbeat while murdering other people.
  • The third interlude is vague on a good chunk of Max's life before his memory wipe. He was a Raised Catholic who did not have the best relationship with his mother (his father isn't directly talked about) and most of his friends apparently grew to resent him enough to want his death for unknown reasons. His saying that guarding a fledgeling super hero sounds like the perfect way to atone for his old life and his unwillingness to commit suicide due to his upbringing does enough to showcase how strongly he felt about it. In addition, "Maxwell Fallow" was a name he was given by Marisol after his favorite song as a kid The Beatles' "Maxwell’s Silver Hammer". His birth name remains a mystery.
• Neck Lift: Jasper does this when interrogating a hapless member of Hammond's gang. Jas later finds himself on the receiving end from Amber just after the hostage exchange with Will and Sean is completed.
• Neck Snap: Poor poor Kevin. Jasper tests out his newly acquired Super-Strength via killing him almost immediately after promising the Order he’d leave them in peace once they gave him powers.
• Nerd Glasses: Averted hard with resident psychopath Jasper, but played straight with Ben even if the latter is (was) mostly a harmless jerkoff.
• Non-Action Guy: Ben is only good at "google-fu" and struggles to even lift relatively light loads of boxes. He in a panic lampshades this position when Marisol turns her attention to him during her retrieving of Max. The sole time he tried to smack somebody with a bag, he immediately worries about breaking his computer. Anna also mostly avoids any direct action in Gail's capers due to her having police profile, at least according to her original character bio.
  • Tabitha comes into the group without any combat experience to speak of, though she took some self-defense lessons from Dee while the flower shop was up and running.
  • Connor Hammond is no fighter, always bringing one or more bodyguards along with him during “negotiations” with rival gangs.
• Noodle Incident: Its never fully spelled out what the Hell those federal agents wanted Ben so badly for, but it was serious enough for the FBI to get a warrant for his arrest, which means he's as good as officially expelled from his college.
• Not So Stoic: Max after he begins to get acclimated to Amber's circle of friends, though he earlier went off on Amber for taking unnecessary risks during her first act as a heroine. Jasper's normally frigid demeanor becomes blood-chillingly menacing whenever he gets into an extended fight or whenever somebody annoys him, particularly if its Sean or Rosie being partnered with him.
• Oblivious to Love: Max is ignorant of Amber's obvious, and later Rebecca's, obvious crush on him…at first. He and Rebecca get together with them both breaking the news to Amber. She doesn't take it well initially, but ultimately makes peace with them both and pledges her support for their love. It appears that Max was genuinely slow on the uptake, given his mind wiping as detailed in Interlude #3.
• Oh, Crap!: Max, when Gail is about to drop a car on him. Jasper too when he discovers Gail's fluctuating secondary power has caused changed to telepathy; He had to play the Super Mario Bros. theme tune in his head just to block her out. This applies to practically every character major or minor when confronted with Gail’s ill-gained abilities who either aren't prepared for her or not taking her status as an up-and-coming supervillain seriously.
• Old Shame: Amber feels partially to blame for her gay cousin Melanie's death by car accident after her homophobic upbringing, learned from her father, drove the two of them apart when the latter came out in high school and Mel subsequently joined with a new crowd. She and these new pals got drunk one night and subsequently died, which caused Amber to double down on her hatred and in time got her onto Gail's case.
• One-Man Army: Jasper and Coyote. Once they both team up and invade the Order’s HQ, the robes find themselves almost helpless to stop the killers. Jasper himself proceeds to strong arm the leader into granting him the same power set as the main girls and Max, giving him Super-Strength and healing powers, which allows him to tear through both the robes and betray the Hammond Gang without repercussions. Coyote continues to aid him despite not gaining any powers herself, claiming that she doesn't need the profile such spectacles would likely inspire.
• Orphanage of Fear: Gail grew up in an orphanage where "catching the biggest cockroaches was considered a fun past-time". She ran away from when she was eleven years old.
• Perky Female Minion: Coyote
• Perception Filter: Gail and Amber have this is part of their powers. No matter how public Gail's crimes are, no matter how many witnesses see her, no one can recall her face afterwards. Even when Amber tries to directly tell the police that Gail is the culprit, her calls end up being ignored or forgotten. The same power also protects Amber's identity: when a recording is made of her flying, her face appears as The Blank.
• Perma-Stubble: Sean
• Playing with Fire: Gail, for a time, due to her constantly-changing secondary power.
• Politically Incorrect Hero: One of the reasons Gail thinks Amber isn't as heroic as the Order proclaims is because she is homophobic and bullied Gail in high school for being gay. Amber manages to reason herself out of homophobia after fighting enough crime; Gail and other criminals aren't because they're homosexual - they're just greedy and violent thugs regardless of sexuality.
  • Turns out, Amber's philanthropic doctor dad is a homophobe. Her cousin Melanie's parents were apparently worse.
  • Oscar, seemingly the Big Good of the Order (at least in Matron City's neck of the woods), does call Marisol by her preferred name as seemingly compromise, but refuses to use the correct female pronouns to address her, even when Marisol herself is not present. Max is NOT pleased at his superior. Oscar is even holding out that she’ll go back to being male, much to her irritation, to the point he won't allow her to carry a staff otherwise. It isn't until Order has its headquarters compromised by Jasper and Coyote and most of its members are murdered that Oscar, nearing death himself, correctly addresses Marisol.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: Ben Haswell has a very objectified view of the opposite sex, let's just say. He is an Abhorrent Admirer towards Anna and only finds Gail interesting due to her accidentally acquired powers. Worse, he constantly puts down Tabitha for being slightly chubby, which Anna, who herself doesn't like Tabby that much (at first), tells him to shut up about. Even worse, he voiced wanting to make Rebecca a sex slave when the group makes a move on Amber's apartment (based on Leia Organa's sex slave outfit) which presses Gail’s Berserk Button who threatens to castrate him for it.
  • Downplayed with Anna with regards to Gail's lesbianism; She is quick to show disgust and/or annoyance when Gail shows more tender moments with Tabitha, especially after their Relationship Upgrade, but otherwise, has never had any genuine grievances towards her bestie due to it.
  • All if not most of the Hammond Gang is implied to be this given Connor's status. Only Rosie i.e. the Coyote knows of his orientation within the group.
• Poor Communication Kills: A recurring issue with Gail is her inability to let her friends in on the know with her plans until after they have been played out. Her keeping Jasper around despite him being a loose cannon with his murderous tendencies has not helped matters; She does eventually reimprison Jas, but once again neglects to inform anybody (besides Anna, who assumed Gail would tell the others beforehand). It comes to a head with Sean after Gail discovers his Forbidden Friendship with Max and Rebecca and they lose more than a bit of trust between them as a result.
• The Poorly Chosen One: Discussed at some points; Gail believes Amber to be this due to receiving the brunt of the former's homophobic bullying in their school days, especially after suffering an almost-sexual assault from Amber's ex-boyfriend Bryan and his friends.^note Turns out the jocks were acting on their own volition after getting the info from Amber; She hadn't known what they were going to do, and was majorly pissed when she heard the truth Late in the story, some members of the Order begin debating whether or not Gail accidentally getting endowed with powers alongside Amber was also preordained if only to give the latter an enemy to fight in order to maintain some sort of balance.
  • Its revealed that a previous heroine of the Order did end up falling into villainy, though the circumstances are as of yet unclear; They only just managed to strip her powers after she'd murdered several of their members; Oscar postulates that said fallen one had no support staff to keep up her spirits, unlike Amber's cousin and best friends, and thus withdrew from her loved ones to the point she grew conceited through her newfound gifts. Her downfall is the reason that handlers like Max were recruited into the Order; Not just to guide and teach newly chosen ones, but to look for warning signs if they were to ever go rogue like their aforementioned predecessor.
• Power Dyes Your Hair: Before Amber got her powers, she was portrayed as a blond dickwhaffle, but after the Order gave her her superpowers, her hair turned permanently blue.
• Power Degeneration: Gail finds her power has changed to Teleportation after the Time Skip. When she attempts to warp into her and Tabitha's bathroom for a shower, the power glitches and she finds her left hand stuck in the wall. This freaks the two of the them out with Tabby insisting that her stuck girlfriend use her Super-Strength to punch herself out, but Gail instead uses her teleport ability again with more success. Her hand gets unstuck but finds that it turned pale from the cut-off circulation and it is completely numb. The condition has not reversed itself. Anna insists on Gail visiting a doctor…which she has NOT done. Oscar warned Gail of this early in the story when he tracked her down, but was ignored and beaten down as a result.
• Power Tattoo: Members of the Order have mystic tattoos that allow them to track each others' locations. Marisol's is on her left arm whereas Max's is revealed to have his on his left outer thigh.
• Power Incontinence: Gail. So far she has had the power to talk to animals, electronic disruption, telepathy and pyrokinesis. Later abilities include copying inanimate objects, projecting illusions, and teleportation.
• Pragmatic Villainy: Rosie does not gain, nor even attempt to gain, any powers for herself when she and Jasper invade the Order's hideout and Jas himself orders them to bestow him with abilities. When Jasper asks about why she didn't seize the chance, Rosie casually states she doesn't want the attention such powers would draw to her.
• Psychic Static: When Gail gets telepathy as her secondary power, Jasper blocks her by thinking about the Mario Bros. theme song on a loop.
• Psycho for Hire: Jasper Manning^note after being kicked back into prison by Gail and the Coyote for the Hammond Gang, though its unclear if the former is being paid after Hammond brings him into the fold. A third killer, Shrike, is introduced in Chapter 44.
• Put on a Bus: Literal example; Etoya, Dee, and Sue end up leaving Matron City after the flower shop is compromised when Amber shows up to stop a hold-up by Javier's Bloodhands crew and she discovers Sean's friendship with Max.
• Put on a Prison Bus: Darius gets set up by Gail, in part to cheating on Anna, and subsequently busted when the cops find weapons planted there from Javier's crew, which Gail bought since she was going to throw him under the bus before the cheating.
  • Jasper gets his ass slammed back in jail, during a jailbreak to retrieve Tabitha's brother Rob, no less. Gail has had it with his attempts at backstabbing and eagerness for blood and effectively kicks him out of the group, much to his rage. He doesn't stay incarcerated for long before Hammond bribes the prison guards to list Jas as executed so the former can bring him into his own fold.
• Red Right Hand: Gail as of Chapter 38 loses all feeling in her left hand trying to teleport into her bathroom, only for her alternating secondary power to glitch and trap it in the wall. While she is able to teleport out relatively safely, her hand is still numb and has turned very pale.
• Required Secondary Powers: Gail and Amber have Super-Toughness so that they don't hurt themselves with their Super-Strength.
• The Reveal: Arturo was the one who landed Jasper Manning in jail for fatally beating the former's best friend to death. Jasper more than wants revenge on the Hispanic for breaking the “no snitching” rule ingrained into the gangster lifestyle plus receiving one of his scars from a broken bottle Artie used on him. Turns out that Art ran with the Bloodhands in his adolescence doing petty crime and Gio, the aforementioned friend in the group, grew to resent Gail’s position as the gang’s “favorite” (when it was run by Julio) when they were in high school.
• Reset Button: Gail's ever-changing ability becomes this late in the story which she discovers once Tabitha gets fatally shot protecting her from a sniper, though said ability does manage to save Tabby. It can be triggered by her saying “go back” regardless of the context it's said in, which she accidentally did earlier when discussing the bad guys’ future .
• Samus Is a Girl: Coyote, the fearsome gang enforcer, is revealed to be a woman. Most of the crooks who aren’t in on the know are surprised to learn this about Gail heading the Robbins Gang after thinking that Sean Evans was the one calling the shots.
• Sassy Black Woman: Anna is the only non-caucasian in the group and is the most outspoken to some of Gail's less-than-sensible ideas…especially if it involves her relationship with Tabitha. She's always the first to chastise her adoptive brother Sean whenever he gets hurt from the gang's latest caper, though it's clearly out of love in the latter case. Etoya is able to outsass Anna when the latter attempts to invite her and some of the other Westside Brute girls to join Gail's gang, as part of a deal with Anthony who does not approve of how the girls are treated. The biggest of the girls, Dee, also has a sassy streak after she gets more accustomed to working in the flower shop Gail uses as a front.
• Satisfied Street Rat: Gail, who lived on the streets between being in an orphanage and being in a gang, and whose experiences during that time initially make her a much more effective fighter than Amber.
• Scars Are Forever: Amber receives a slash from a street thug on her right cheek while attempting to save a victim. It affects her badly to the point she's beating herself up for being more upset about receiving the scar than she is about the fact that she almost killed the street tough, though Hillary assures her friend it was self defense. She is always depicted with the scar from that point onwards.
  • Jasper received the scar on his right eye courtesy of Art when the latter tried to save his friend from being killed by a knife himself. Only Jasper's glasses prevented him from losing the eye.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Ben has had enough of his "friends" calling him out for his misogyny and fat-shaming Tabitha and leaves the Robbins Gang behind in Chapter 22, with Gail warning him not to say anything to the cops or Hammond or else she and Jasper will mark him for death. Ben proceeds to join Hammond anyway for protection, who later recruits Jasper,^note He'd been reimprisoned by Gail due to his psychotic behavior and ends up on the receiving end of a chokehold once Jas gains his powers from the Order.
  • The ex Siren's Lounge hookers (Sue, Dee, and Etoya) decide to leave town once the flower shop gets compromised no thanks to Sue calling upon Max, and by extension Amber, instead of Gail for help against some Bloodhand goons. Another pair of them split from Matron City a while prior before Darius got jailed.
• Shouldn't You Stop Stealing?: Tabitha worries that Gail is going to step over a line and become a truly hardened criminal unless something changes. Gail admits she doesn't trust herself to not degrading into an Opportunistic Bastard should the gang dissolve when she discovers that Anna is looking to move away and go to college. She does agree to seriously think on it for the sake of their relationship. One tense alliance later has Amber owning up to her wrongs against Gail and asking her archenemy when she's going to grow up, much to Gail's annoyance.
• Skewed Priorities: Amber Price is more concerned with her looks than actually being a hero early on; Her hair being turned permanently blue made her weep despite also gaining Super-Strength on top of that; She makes Rebecca design her a rather tasteless-looking and revealing superhero costume besides anything practical for the dangerous work she'll be undergoing; There's also her fussing over her nail polish drying when Will informs her of a hostage situation that could result in people dying. It isn't until her third confrontation with Gail, where the latter nearly kills Marisol, albeit accidentally, and shortly thereafter being scarred by a Hammond Gang enforcer, that reality sets in for Amber about what hazardous risks that heroing entails.
• Slasher Smile: Jasper Manning is a master of scary grinning whenever he gets violent with others, much to his victims', or potential victims', horror. The Coyote has an even scarier version since she's better at attacking without warning as opposed to Jas' dour persona. Gail herself used to give these in earlier chapters, until Amber started taking her heroine role more seriously, by effect making the former start to take her more seriously.
• Smarter Than They Look: Gail Swanson appears to be your stereotypical gangster girl with a foul mouth and big ambitions…except, thanks to her having gained superpowers, she can actually act on those ambitions. What’s most dangerous about her isn’t the powers themselves, but how she manages to manipulate the gangs of Matron City by pushing them in a direction she wants, such as infiltrating the Westside Brutes only to set them up by using weapons she got from Javier and his sect to take the former group out without her having lifting a finger herself. Unfortunately for Gail, Rosie the Coyote also has some dangerous street smarts of her own, staying under the cover as one of the Brutes' call girls and even disappearing off the Hammond Gang's radar to make it more effective.
• The Sociopath: Ben is a surprisingly realistic take on the concept, compared to the somewhat hamfisted Jasper Manning. He does not go out actively harming folk, but otherwise he has not shown anything redeeming in relation to the others. He is shown to have need for constant stimulation (mostly through eroticism) to the point he makes unwanted passes at Anna, who finds him revolting, and even suggests kidnapping Rebecca as a Sex Slave based on some stupid Star Wars fantasy, regardless of her clear distress. In addition, he doesn't think nearly about the consequences of his choice of actions or words within his "friend" circle; He frequently belittles Tabitha for her weight and even tears into her All Girls Want Bad Boys despite Ben himself not really having a defined end goal beyond instant gratification. The others calling him out on his behavior subsequently causes him to quit the gang and is warned not to go squealing to anybody or there will be hell to pay. And he instead leaks info to the Hammond Gang i.e. the biggest criminal group in Matron City who doesn't need competition and even joins them for protection from the feds.
• Sole Survivor: As of Chapter 50, Marisol is the only robe left after Jasper's raid on the Order's headquarters, and only after Oscar is (implied) to sacrifice his own to ensure her safety.
• Speaks Fluent Animal: Gail, for a time, due to her constantly-changing secondary power. She sics a bird on Amber which is super effective.
• The Stool Pigeon: Jasper's motivation for wanting revenge on Artie; Art called the cops on him which landed him in jail after beating the former’s best friend in their gang to death for a petty reason. He more likely wants to get even for the eye scar that was inflicted by Arturo via broken beer bottle. Rob also proceeds to blab on Gail to Jakob Hammond since he doesn't want Tabitha, nor himself, to be associated with criminality anymore. Being stuck indoors after being forcibly extracted from jail did no favors to his mindset. Gail is quickly able to piece together what he would do and is not happy.
• Stupid Sexy Flanders: Inverted: Gail has a "stupid sexy Javier" moment.
• Take Over the City: Gail’s ultimate goal started out as making the Robbins Gang the new rulers of Matron City's criminal underworld. However, her increasing recklessness during her battles with Amber, plus Amber's fighting prowess getting better over time, coupled with her willingness to leave out vital details of plans to even her best friends Sean and Anna, have caused issues in achieving this. Both friends begin thinking of ways to seemingly get out of the game for good and Tabitha even tries to persuade Gail not to push things any further but instead set them all up financially with a big job before calling it quits.
• Taking the Bullet: Tabitha shields Gail from a shot curtesy of sniper-for-hire Shrike, much to the latter girl's horror. She is only saved by Gail accidentally triggering her newest secondary power: turning back an instant in time.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Everybody Jasper is forced to work under has this attitude with him. Sean has to continuously restrain him from maiming hostages, as shown with Max and later Will, and Jasper himself is instantly distrustful of Tabitha after Gail brings her into the group. Eventually, Gail decides the psycho is too much of a loose cannon to keep in her gang and throws him back into prison (while they both came to bust out Tabitha's brother from prison, ironically enough), though he isn't back in the slammer for relatively long before Jakob Hammond takes the opportunity to re-bust him out and recruit him for the latter's cause.
  • Ben also qualifies given his misogynistic attitude towards Anna and women in general, especially Tabitha who he continuously fat-shames and needles for having standards despite willingly associating with criminals, even if that latter point is somewhat valid. The otherwise Nice Girl snaps at his insults and causes Ben to storm out of his so called “friends'" lives. Sean, the second-kindest of the group, also found him disdainful.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Jasper makes it clear to all that Gail is his and that nobody else is to interfere with his revenge. He ends up slaughtering Shrike for nearly robbing his chances.
• Time Skip: A two month break happens in Chapter 36 after Gail breaks out Rob and returns Jasper to jail. During which, Gail and Tabitha have more or less become official, Rob is on the lamb, and Sean has gotten a new haircut.
• Too Dumb to Live: Apparently, the robes of the Order never bothered to directly learn any binding or offensive magic spells as they find themselves practically helpless when Jasper and Rosie barge into their headquarters and begin a slaughterfest until Oscar begrudgingly gives Jasper what he wants: powers that will put him on par with Amber and Gail so he may seek vengeance on the latter. At least two robes are killed as a result of this passiveness…when Oscar of all people should've known about how much of a psychotic freak Jas could be.
• Took a Level in Kindness: Sean surprisingly begins to show a softer, albeit still gruff, side, after the Will Kidnapping incident and forms a friendship with Max and Rebecca. Will's phone was left behind by accident and Sean had enough of a conscience to return it to Becca…albeit after he copied her and Max's numbers into his own contacts beforehand.
  • In time, Amber slowly begins to realize how bad her homophobia has affected others, including her nemesis Gail (who she still hates now for putting her friends and cousin in danger), and also begins to embrace her new role as a heroine, even pledging her support to Max and Rebecca's relationship despite her own feelings towards him.
• Uncertain Doom: Ben was last seen being threatened by Jasper in Chapter 49 to tell him where to find Hammond. He hasn’t been heard from since, but given what Arturo has mentioned about Jas having no tolerance for rats…^note Art’s childhood friend picked a fight with Jasper during high school and died of his injuries, which spurred Art to call cops and got Jas thrown in jail
  • Jakob Hammond is last seen with Jasper approaching him with an already bloody knife. Either way, it doesn't look good for the older career criminal.
• Unwanted Assistance: In this strip, "Stop Helping Me" is nearly said verbatim; Ben whacked Max with his computer bag while Gail was fighting Amber (which Gail started by punching Max out of a bus), only to panic once he realizes he could've damaged his laptop.
• Villainous Friendship: Half of the Robbins Gang, namely Gail, Sean, and Anna, are True Companions going back to their high school days. Tabitha, while not really a bad person, ultimately wins the latter two over despite their initial distrust of her; Gail found her cute from the get-go and eventually they become official. Very much NOT the case with Jasper, who Gail eventually returns to prison after deciding he's too dangerous, though Tabby had hoped she'd been able to soften him up, and definitely not Ben who even Tabitha snapped at for insulting her too much and ultimately makes him jump ship.
  • Connor and Rosie appear to be pretty tight as the latter is the only one who knows about his orientation (as a gay man) and they often talk like two pals shooting the shit instead of professional mobsters, which the Hammond Gang is practically on the verge of being. She can even tease him on his attraction to Jasper with him only expressing annoyance at most. She orders Jasper to spare him upon them turning on the rest of the Hammond Gang, or else she’ll kill Jas instead; This is just after the latter had forced the Order to grant him his own set of abilities, showcasing how much Conner means to Rosie that she’d be willing to fight Jas then and there over it.
• Walking Tech Bane: Gail, for a time, due to her constantly-changing secondary power.
• What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: Gail is none too pleased with her initial ability to talk to animals. She comes around when tricking a pigeon into attacking Amber mid-flight. Her second ability causes technology to short out which basically means she can't even call anybody, which she vents out to Jasper. Once again, she uses it to her advantage when she and Jas rob an armored truck by shorting out the security cameras.
• Where the Hell Is Springfield?: Matron City, the stated name of the town, is first mentioned in passing by in news story discussing Gail and Amber's third confrontation in Chapter 15. No specific region, let alone province, is confirmed and the author mentioned that it was left intentionally vague.
• Whole Episode Flashback: There have been three Interlude chapters so far focusing on the backgrounds of some of the characters:
  • The first focuses on Gail Swanson and her childhood, how she became involved in gang life, and how she came afoul of Amber Price and suffered an Attempted Rape at the hands of Amber’s ex-boyfriend after beating the crap out of Hillary's boytoy. Sean rescued her from the jocks and she ended up transfering to his school where the Robbins Gang was formed.^note Its later revealed that Amber had nothing to do with the assault; Said ex had wanted revenge for Hillary's boyfriend and just used the former girl to find out what happened and attack Gail, which Amber was NOT amused about when she discovered the truth years later
  • The second centers on Rebecca Boyd and her feelings of loneliness due to focusing on her studies to please her strict parents and them not supporting her desire to go into fashion design. She got bullied relentlessly for her academic achievements by the popular girls until one day she attempted to slit her wrists before being stumbled upon by Amber. After getting helped by the popular girl, both from cutting herself and standing up to her chief tormenter, Rebecca realizes that Amber isn't as bad as most believe and they become friends.
  • The third details Max Fallow's inauguration into the Order as a handler, having been scouted by Marisol (then Miguel), and having his memories of his previously unhappy life erased by the robes. It is also revealed that "Max" wasn’t his birthname; Marisol gave him the name after the memory wipe when he was singing "Maxwell’s Silver Hammer" while waiting for the mages to complete the ceremony.
• Woman Scorned: Anna was furious upon catching Darius cheating on her with one of his "sirens" and makes sure that the hussy goes down hard with him once the Brutes are taken in. The chapter is even titled "Hell Hath No Fury…"
• World of Jerkass: Its infrequently mentioned that Matron City has a serious crime problem given all various gangs and their turf disputes, so this is a given. As for the main cast: The Villain Protagonist is (for the most part) unapologetically selfish in her criminal acts to the point she wants to use her accidentally acquired abilities to Take Over the City; one of her enforcers is a straight-up Psycho for Hire who nobody, not even said boss, wants around for good reason except for Tabitha, and even she's wary around him at the best of times; one of her best friends is a self-proclaimed Ice Queen who is implied to be slightly homophobic; plus their resident hacker is The Friend Nobody Likes due to his unapologetic misogyny causing him to see nearly all women as sex objects and frequently fat shames the Token Good Teammate to the point she grows to hate him and by then he storms off when nobody will enable his behavior…plus he sells out to the villains despite Gail's warnings. That's not even getting into The Hero chosen by fate apparently having a history of being a homophobic bully towards aforementioned villainess plus being something of a vapid Alpha Bitch even in the best of times (she does grow out of it as the story progresses).
• "You!" Exclamation: Gail late into the comic when Amber asks her if she is going to grow up and bury the hatchet on their rivalry (and cease her criminal life in general). It's seemingly Played for Laughs at the moment, but who knows…?
• You Need to Get Laid: Anna says this to Gail early on. Gail actually agrees, but Anna refuses to hook her up due to the latter's own biases.
• Youthful Freckles: Will has them and is the youngest of the good guys.