The Adventures of Dr. McNinja
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| The Adventures of Dr. McNinja | |
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 Dr. McNinja strikes an epic pose atop Gordito's pet raptor, Yoshi. |
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| Author(s) | Chris Hastings, inked by Kent Archer |
| Website | http://www.drmcninja.com/ |
| Current status / schedule | Weekly: Monday, Wednesday, Friday |
| Launch date | Summer 2004: Issue 1/2 |
| Publisher(s) | Dayfree Press |
| Genre(s) | Action, Parody |
The Adventures of Dr. McNinja is a webcomic written and drawn by Chris Hastings and inked by his former roommate[1] Kent Archer. Published three times a week on its own website, it features the adventures of a thirty-five-year-old ninja who also happens to be a doctor. Strips are presented in a high contrast black-and-white, but for a period of time were shaded digitally. Dr. McNinja is highly story-driven, with twenty- to sixty-page issues. The first story was published in the summer of 2004 as a one-off, and the comic has been in regular publication since late 2005. The site also sells Dr. McNinja merchandise.
The Adventures of Dr. McNinja is a member of Dayfree Press. An August 31, 2006 announcement in the news section of the Dr. McNinja website indicates that an exclusive monthly installment of Dr. McNinja will appear in the British magazine .net.
Contents |
[edit] Characters
Dr. McNinja, the title character. He is a cliché ninja, with the exception that he is a practicing medical doctor as well. He has amazing speed and agility, plus superhuman strength (the latter of which is attributed to the fact that he is a doctor, not a ninja). He studied under the clone of Benjamin Franklin in medical school, and his medical expertise ranges from general medicine to podiatry and dentistry. He is always seen wearing slacks, a button-down shirt and tie, a lab coat, a ninja mask, and a stethoscope around his neck.
While a skilled superhero, Dr. McNinja has several personality quirks. He desperately wants to be Batman and has obsessively studied his movies, comics and TV shows to that effect (despite this, his personality is rather more similar to Spider-Man in terms of lighthearted banter), even telling others he trained with Batman (which is patently false, even in the McNinja universe) and owning a pair of Batman pajamas. Whenever he attempts to disguise himself as someone else, he never removes his mask, which makes the disguise useless. He is also highly sensitive to criticism by his parents.
The fact that he is both a doctor and a ninja causes several problems for him, chiefly due to his twin obligations to heal and to kill. In fact, after being confronted by death, his personality took the form of two spirits - one in full ninja garb who spoke of vengeance, and another in surgical scrubs who correctly diagnoses his bullet wounds as flesh wounds only. (Death found this interesting, but was going to take McNinja anyway.)
The two spirits came together to beat the spirit of Death, the doctor healing McNinja and the ninja thrashing Death, but their ultimate conflict has yet to be resolved.
Due to Dr. McNinja being a certain asset to society as a crimefighter, the Cumberland police force has deemed that he is automatically acquitted of all crimes and misdemeanors committed while superheroing, provided that he is able to reach his office and claim "base" before getting caught. He drives a Honda Accord with a useful sunroof and a "fine leather interior" and enjoys listening to Pavarotti and Johnny Cash. Much to McNinja's rage, his car was destroyed by his enemies in a recent storyline.
Gordito, a 12-year-old Mexican boy who McNinja took on as a sidekick at the end of the third storyline. According to Gordito, he was able to grow a full moustache with his sheer force of will. He uses two revolvers, and is an excellent shot. He's also the only person Yoshi normally lets ride him, though Yoshi has allowed McNinja to ride him when Gordito is in trouble.
An amusing situation with Gordito is that, due to McNinja's obsession with Batman, the doctor only took Gordito on as a "happy" sidekick to rival his "dark" side. Unfortunately, Gordito is considerably darker than McNinja himself – just as McNinja is thinking about a counter to his "darkness", Gordito remarks, "I don't kick. I shoot people. That makes them die."
Gordito is an incredible shot, able to hit targets such as ninja leaping onto a fast-moving car; he is also a decent hand-to-hand fighter, besting one of Dark Smoke Puncher's robots after using all of his bullets up. His main desire is to be a "man", as he puts it; this was the dream that gave him the force of will required to grow his mustache.
The current storyline details that Gordito got his guns from his father, who apparently worked in a circus and got killed by a P.E.T.A. member, though he later states that he is uncertain that it was truly P.E.T.A who was responsible for killing his father and more likely that it was his own fault for not reloading his fathers' guns that got his father killed.
His last name is Delgado, as partly seen on his grave stone on Hastings' April Fool's page.[2]
Judy, a large gorilla and McNinja's secretary and receptionist. She is extremely strong and has the ability to understand her boss. She also can communicate with sign language- unfortunately, McNinja cannot understand sign language, and never knows what Judy is saying. She is also apparently a very efficient worker. She is shown to be of human intelligence, and can read.
In the story "Revenge of the Hundred Dead Ninja", Judy is also seen to be able to drive a car, and even make it fly over several burning cars using a ramp. According to Chris Hastings in the alt text, "This is why the gorilla is Dr. McNinja's receptionist. Because she is a PROFESSIONAL and she BEHAVES LIKE ONE."
She also apparently understands at least a few medical procedures, as when Dr. McNinja was possessed by an ear ghost, she knew enough to use the correct medical tools to remove it.
Clone of Benjamin Franklin, who is exactly who he sounds like. He sometime ago cheated death through cloning, earning the interest of Death himself, and has spent the intervening years attempting to cure death. Ben taught Dr. McNinja various schools of medicine, and considers him his best student. He was killed (again) by Franz Rayner's drug-enhanced ninja, but has returned to life thanks to his "Eternal Life Serum" which he ingested prior to his death. However, apparently as a side effect, bodies in graves near his returned to life as zombies ala "Thriller" which includes the original Benjamin Franklin. The serum was apparently created in collaboration with Dracula, using the alias of Alucard, explaining the problems it has caused.
He is now alive again, though being stalked by a spooky horse. In the latest update, it has been revealed that he had been given the blood of a Headless Horseman. He must ingest hair to prevent him from turning into a Headless Horseman, but on a flight to Transylvania, he ran out of hair to eat, and transformed into a Horseman, crashing the plane. He rode out of the plane wreck on the horse that was stalking him. He appears on the Moon after Dracula summons him to his Moon Base. Dracula questions Franklin about the afterlife, and becomes upset when Franklin reveals that he has only been to purgatory, "A restaurant with poor service...the worst." Dracula throws Franklin's head to earth, and Franklin is seen chasing after it.
Yoshi, a Velociraptor who wrecked McNinja's office in a previous storyline. McNinja, upon finding out that similar raptors had riders, claimed the unconscious raptor for his own. He was named by Dr. McNinja after the Nintendo character Yoshi, since Yoshi serves as Mario's steed.
Unfortunately, Yoshi does not like having McNinja ride him, and so often throws him off or otherwise attempts to keep the ninja from using him as a steed. Gordito, who was Yoshi's original rider and for whom Yoshi has great fondness, can ride him with no trouble, but it takes a situation with Gordito in danger before Yoshi will allow Dr. McNinja to ride him.
Yoshi is also a valuable fighter whose teeth and strength serve him well. He has engaged Franz' drug ninja in a major battle and won, supporting Dr. McNinja's assault on Franz' mansion home, and he has also attacked the zombies now roaming Dr. McNinja's hometown; it seems that dinosaurs are immune to zombies' infectious bite, and so Yoshi is having a grand time chasing and devouring the hapless zombies.
He has served as comic relief several times, such as engaging in a battle with Judy over hot dogs (which Yoshi ate, despite them being Judy's).
Yoshi can be more accurately described as a Deinonychus or Utahraptor, and should be portrayed with feathers, but Chris Hastings has stated in the alt-text of "There is a Raptor in My Office" on page 7 that this confuses his brain and he is just going by the Jurassic Park version.
Dan, Dr. McNinja's father. A ninja with an impressive moustache. He is very talented as a ninja, but his conduct as a father is notably average- or below it, at times, though he's generally better than his wife is. He is disappointed at his son's choice to be a doctor, but he isn't as hard on his son about it as his wife.
He sometimes works with the FBI, as seen when he aided them in getting rid of a dangerous drug that gives people ninja-like abilities. He is a powerful ninja, perhaps the doctor's equal in combat, and uses bizarre tactics; one of his favorites is to set himself on fire so other people can't catch him. He can also, oddly, suck poison out of food with his body and store it in his eyes, where he shoots it out later, similar to a Horned lizard's ability to shoot blood from its eyes (although Dan claims it is "like a Toad"). He, his wife Mitzi, and their son 'Dark Smoke Puncher' live together in a house located deep in a cave.
Mitzi, Dr. McNinja's mother. Like Dan, she is a ninja who disapproves of her son's choice to be a doctor- unlike Dan, she is exceptionally angry about it, and lets him know at every possible opportunity. She is apparently one of the best ninja in the family, and guards the entrance to their home. Every time Dr. McNinja wants to visit, he must either sneak past or fight her. She has expertise with both pickled beets and precisely aimed demolitions (though according to Gordito, the beets taste absolutely terrible; possibly from them being poisoned though Dark Smoke Puncher states that they were always bad tasting).
Dark Smoke Puncher, Dr. McNinja's younger brother. His real name is Sean, after author Chris Hastings' brother, Sean Hastings. His attire consists of a mix of ninja gear and modern gangster styles of clothing. Dr. McNinja openly mocks both his name and his poser-like ways, and even Dan admits that his skills are inferior to those of Dr. McNinja, though this is probably because he is younger. However, it seems that he is good with robots. In Dr. McNinja's letter to Gordito after sending him near his parents place, he implies that the deadly robot animal guards that have been modified by Sean are more dangerous than the average deadly robot animal guard. He recently confided to Gordito that his 'gangster' attitude is mostly a front, to hide his geeky interests. He is a fan of Stephen King's The Dark Tower series.
Ronald McDonald, a rival and sometime unwilling ally of Dr. McNinja. CEO of McDonald's, he is secretly a mime as well as a powerful fighter, with good hand-to-hand combat skills. His greatest power, however, is his mime-based abilities, which can form invisible walls to stop projectiles and invisible parachutes to save himself from falling, among other things.
He is responsible for the creation of the disastrous McNinja burgers, which are high in methane and nitrogen; as it turns out, they are excellent fuel for people with organic jetpacks. McDonald did not know this, and gave McNinja the location of the warehouse so he could stop the organic jetpack man.
Though initially an antagonist in Dr. McNinja's very first storyline, McDonald showed up later as a quasi-ally; unwilling to help the man who brought down his McNinja burger plan, he was eventually convinced both through sheer bullying and the fact that someone was stealing his McNinja burgers to aid Dr. McNinja.
Frans Rayner, AKA The Great Dane. Evil Danish martial arts film star and longtime rival of Dr. McNinja's father, Dan. "Almost solely responsible for the ninja holocaust of the '80s," according to Dr. McNinja, who then notes that Rayner proceeded to make movies about it. According to rollover text, "Every Chuck Norris movie was one Frans Rayner turned down first."
Death, the personification of death and guide to the afterlife, who has a mustache and a British accent. Apparently dresses to suit various deaths, such as swimming trunks for drowning. Because of the tuxedo he wore upon his first appearance, the alt text was quick to point out the several differences between him and Manny Calavera. In the afterlife, he is also the only waiter in the Restaurant of Purgatory, wherein souls eat their venial sins to cleanse them.
Chuck Goodrich is the fictional former astronaut and mayor of Cumberland, Maryland. He's known to have put spacesuits in the people's houses and implemented a zombie defense system which protects the town while simultaneously trapping the zombies inside by springing up gigantic walls around the city. He is terrified of zombies.[3]
The mayor is not a reference to Charles Goodrich, the space researcher at Boston University. The similarity in their fields of work is purely coincidental.[4]
Beeman, a rather unsuccessful hero who meets the clone of Ben Franklin in the Restaurant of Purgatory after being shot to death by bank robbers. After the murder of his parents, he "vowed to spend the rest of [his] life fighting criminals like the one who [had] orphaned [him]." He proceeded to travel the world, training to become a martial artist and master detective ala Batman. Unfortunately, he lacked the terrifying mascot/namesake said superhero had, and hence felt something was missing. That is, until he watched the death scene from the Macaulay Culkin film "My Girl" on late-night TBS. It was at that point he became the masked crimefighter known only as The Beeman. Little is known about his superhero career except for what is listed under the menu of his venial sins in the Restaurant of Purgatory. It is known, however, that at one point he caused the death of a sidekick, but "for a good reason." He also, apparently, once "pooped on a guy." Whether this is related to his superhero career or not remains uncertain.
He was last seen before Ben (the clone) rose from the dead. Ben had offered to include Beeman in his additional testing of his eternal life serum, and Beeman expressed interest in this.
[edit] History of the Comic
In 2003, when Chris Hastings was a forum member of Something Awful Forums, his screen name happened to be "Dr. McNinja". During a drawing contest involving a characterization of user screen names, Hastings drew an image of Dr. McNinja behind his desk with a sword on his wall and a speech bubble reading, "Should anyone need the services of a ninja or a doctor, my office is always open." [1] Shortly afterward, Chris made a full-length comic about McNinja for an art class (here).
[edit] Story
Dr. McNinja's story has many absurd plot twists, and often makes allusions to outside works, most prominently Dr. McNinja's quote of "What would Batman do?" Starting with "So What Is A McNinja?", each page also uses tooltips to add background information and in-jokes, such as the author comparing the comic's visual style to Frank Miller's comic Sin City.
Dr. McNinja Vs. McDonald's: Dr. McNinja must face off against McDonald's, which happens to be a corporation of robots run by evil mime Ronald McDonald.
Meet The Doctor And His Friendly Staff, the first official comic: Dr. McNinja is called upon to investigate a young boy's illness. The boy, whose condition causes him to frequently vomit large amounts of maple syrup, is soon diagnosed with Paul Bunyan's Disease. The boy then turns into a giant lumberjack and bursts through the ceiling, enraged at how many trees stand within the area. Dr. McNinja infiltrates a facility (rather violently) to get a lotion that removes the lumberjack facial hair permanently, thus restoring him back to normal. Judy also fights off a pair of poachers that hunt giant lumberjacks for a living. Ten years later, his girlfriend leaves him due to his inability to grow a beard, and he swears revenge on McNinja.
So What Is A McNinja?: Dr. McNinja returns home for "Katanakka" (a Ninja holiday celebrated on the same day as Thanksgiving so "that we still get the day off"). After a heated discussion with his mother and father, McNinja storms out and (after getting drunk) betrays his family to a crew of pirates. After sobering up and revelation through hallucination, Dr. McNinja storms off again to save his family and restore his own honor at the same time.
There is a Raptor in my Office: Dr. McNinja comes to work and finds that a Velociraptor has wrecked his office. He knocks out the dinosaur and soon discovers that this raptor is not the only one abroad. Their riders attack Dr. McNinja in order to try and get their raptor back, but are foiled and retreat. The following day, Dr. McNinja gets an anonymous tip, and follows the leads to figure out who the riders are, why they're riding raptors, and what their motives are. These all lead to a self-obsessed villain dubbed "Ab Man" by the riders, whom they have sworn vengeance upon due to him having "stolen their leader's internet girlfriend", and Dr. McNinja assists in exchange for the riders leaving. Battle ensues, but a mysterious third party shooter, hinted to be the weather reporter shown earlier in the story arc, is the one that claims the final blow. Afterwards, the Riders show their gratefulness by bestowing McNinja with Gordito.
D.A.R.E To Resist Ninja Drugs and Ninja Violence, a two-issue story: It involves a drug that heightens one's ninja skills, the McNinja family's attempts to handle the situation, Dr. McNinja's training of Gordito, a clone of Benjamin Franklin who is working to make eternal life medically possible, and an evil Danish martial arts film star named Frans Rayner. Rayner is plotting to kill Dr. McNinja with the aid of his midget henchman, Knickerbockers, in hopes of baiting McNinja's father into the open. The goons succeeded in dispatching both Dr. McNinja and Benjamin Franklin, resulting in Dr. McNinja splitting into two different spirits (one for his ninja half and one for his doctor half). However, when Death came to claim their souls, the two worked together to dispatch Death and reunite in their old body.
The second half of this storyline involves Dr. McNinja's return to life and mission to get revenge against Rayner and his ninja minions. Teaming up with his father (disguised as a pirate to evade detection) Dr. McNinja synthesizes a drug to temporarily rob ninja of their abilities, and launches an attack on Rayner's mansion. The entire story is an homage to 80's action movies.
Revenge of the Hundred Dead Ninja: Focused around the consequences of the events in D.A.R.E. It is a spoof and homage to horror movies with an opening sequence that parodies the video clip to Michael Jackson's Thriller. It's also revealed that Dr. McNinja's home city of Cumberland, Maryland,[5] has an anti-zombie defense system which was put in place by Dr. McNinja and Mayor Chuck Goodrich.
I Told You That Story So I Could Tell You This One: While Gordito is sent away to train with Dr. McNinja's family, Dr. McNinja continues to search out the cause of the zombie outbreak. Also, a superhero called Beeman is shot to death and ends up in Purgatory where he has a conversation with the deceased Ben Franklin. Here, we learn that Ben completed (at least with enough confidence to ingest it) his eternal life serum, and Dr. McNinja digs up Ben's grave to pull a very thirsty resurrected Franklin from his coffin. Currently, Ben's original body (circa 1700's) is a "deanimated" zombie, shot in the head by Gordito.
Spooky Stuff: The good doctor becomes temporarily possessed by an evil spirit. The origin of Gordito's mustache is revealed. Also, Ben II is actually "an undead creature who feeds on hair and is being tormented by visitors from the spirit realm." According to Dr. McNinja, life is crazy, and that's why he has the barber on emergency speed dial. The clone of Ben Franklin actually works for a shady character named Alucard, which, unbeknownst to Ben, is a pseudonym for Dracula ("Dracula" spelled backwards). The Doctor investigates at the Red Cross headquarters, which is revealed to be run by vampires. Once there, one of the vampires reveals that Ben is now part Headless Horseman. McNinja and Franklin decide to head for Transylvania, but the trip takes a turn for the worse when Ben is told by security that he cannot take a bag of hair on the plane. Meanwhile, Sean and Gordito have reached a new understanding and have begun to form a friendship - just in time for Dan and Mitzi to train them rigorously for their upcoming battle with the Ghost Wizard. When Dan runs out of obstacles for them, evidenced by his failure to duplicate the "KNIIIIIIFE EEEEEYYYYE ATTAAAACK"- (here), he reveals their employer is The Catholic Church. The Church has given Dan a Bo staff that is the largest remaining piece of the One True Cross, sais for Mitzi made from St. Peter's sword, and nunchucks for Sean made out of Mother Theresa's bones. Mitzi gives Gordito bullets that had been in the Pope's mouth. McNinja, in the mean time, decides to try and get hair for Ben Franklin to eat. He's too late, however, and Ben Franklin is transformed into a full Headless Horseman by a number of ghosts. The plane crashes, McNinja successfully rescues the survivors from the remains, and Ben Franklin rides away.
Punch Dracula Current story. State Attorney Dick Whitestone is running for Senate. While attempting to make a speech at Niagara Falls, he is blown into the water by a number of fans where he is picked up by a submarine which he mistakes for the afterlife. The man who had been seen setting up the fans earlier in the story is revealed to be Dark Smoke Puncher in disguise, as he and Dan (as well as Mitzi and Gordito) used the submarine to isolate Whitestone, who turns out to be the Ghost Wizard they were training to fight in the previous story. Meanwhile, McNinja attempts to gain access to Dracula's castle in Transylvania, but is ambushed by Dracula and teleported to his moon base, where he is given a guided tour. After Dracula reveals his plan, McNinja punches Dracula and tries to escape.
[edit] Awards
Dr. McNinja won the 2007 Web Cartoonist's Choice Award for Outstanding Superhero / Action Comic.
[edit] Cameos
Dr. McNinja has been featured in a few other webcomics, examples of which are listed below:
- Bunny - February 03, 2006 (here)-The comic depicts a bunny in Dr. McNinja garb with the caption "The Adventures of Dentist MacNinjaBunny."
- Shortpacked! - August 31, 2006 (here)- Dr. McNinja is shown in a single-frame reference to "Filthy Cartoonists." The reference indicates that Dr. McNinja is an exception to "those who pose as ninja."
- EddEgg - July 12, 2006 (here)- In the eighth frame, the artist has a list of potential comic ideas. One of the ideas is "A doctor who is also a ninja".
- Hookie Dookie Panic - #112 (here)- Dr. McNinja is seen in the background with wide eyes as Wilcow is in a fight with a mysterious fighter.
- Overcompensating - Multiple (here, here, and here) - Several references to Dr. McNinja and author Chris Hastings.
- Bigger Than Cheeses - #737 (here)- One shot image of Dr. McNinja in a group of webcomics characters.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- The Adventures of Dr. McNinja
- Chris Hastings' myspace based on of the fictional character
- Dr. McNinja RSS Feed
- TheWebComicList's entry on the comic
