21st Century Fox (webcomic)

21st Century Fox by Scott Kellogg is a science-fiction Furry Comic that calls itself a "Romantic Comedy of the Future". Takes place in the year 2066, but every animal down to insects is sapient. Characters include Jack Black (no resemblance to the actor), a red fox and traveling robotics engineer; Cecil Stewart, a giraffe and Jack's partner in his travels; Jenny Curtis, a rocket scientist vixen who starts dating Jack (after getting over her abusive ex), and Barb Kendall and Beth Regina, giraffe programmers who are both enamored with Cecil (and now both married to him, see below). Has many, many shout outs. Also several cameos from other comics, most often Freefall, The Suburban Jungle, or Newshounds.

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Tropes used in 21st Century Fox (webcomic) include:

• Alt Text: It seems to have been dropped sometime around April 2008; before then, some comics had different alt text for each panel.
• Amoral Attorney: Willy Nixon, as well as a thief and hacker.
• Animals Not to Scale: Generally averted, though Veronica the vampire bat was originally the same size as the foxes.
• Art Evolution: Compare the ancient archaeology strips to the current one.
• Artificial Limbs: Tora Scobee's right eye, right arm, right shoulder, spinal column, pelvis, tail, and both legs.
• Carnivore Confusion: It's perfectly acceptable to kill and eat another sentient being, but predation was temporarily banned in one arc due to the invention of a genetically modified organism without a nervous system called SPAM (Scientifically Produced Animal Matter).
• Church of Happyology: The Disney Fundamentalists, especially John Walker Bambi's sect.
• Compound Interest Time Travel Gambit: The crew of station "Tsing Tsingatsong" are planning this through the use of cryogenics.
• Cybernetics Eat Your Soul: Averted, apparently any personality changes are due to post-traumatic stress disorder, though there is some prejudice against cyborgs.
• Dude Looks Like a Lady: Dr. Tangent, being a male French Poodle.

Jack: (whispering) *PSST!* Cecil! All French Poodles have long eyelashes...!

• FemBot / Robot Girl: Starting here, we have examples of gynoids go-go-bots on a ship headed for a Chinese-controlled location.
• God Guise: When the land-dwelling species made First Contact with the fish, they largely outgrew the worshiping but the Devonian (shark) God-Emperor is still said to "swim on land".
• Heroic Sacrifice: Jack does this when he realizes that his injured friend needs immediate help, the helpless victims need to get out of the hurricane, and rescue plane would be too heavy to if he gets on board. But Jack gets better later on.
• Humongous Mecha: North Korea actually made AT-ATs capable of riverdancing; eventually they were redesigned as med-evac vehicles.
• Heroic BSOD: Jack's realization of WHO is Jenny's previous boyfriend after she told Jack not to fight him ... even as Crazy Jealous Guy Tora Scobee verbally abuses her right in front of him!
  • Complicated even more when Jack is troubled to figure out what to diffuse the situation.
• Interspecies Romance: There are some examples, such as Johann (mouse) and Veronica (vampire bat), but overall it's not as big a part of the story as many other furry comics.
  • Also, there are no hybrids, though there is a genetic procedure that allows interspecies couples to have kids.
• Mobile Suit Human: Veronica, a realistically sized bat, uses something like that to assist in a rescue operation on the Moon. More conventional powered exoskeletons are also used in several emergencies.
• Mohs Scale of Sci Fi Hardness: Fairly hard; it is just the mid-21st century, after all. There's no interstellar travel (though the Prometheus rocket Jenny's working on might allow slow travel), the farthest object colonized is the moon, and nanobots are really fragile and can only be used in a few specific environments...
• Nanomachines: Yes, but they're delicate, usually used for medical purposes.
• Ridiculous Future Inflation: In one early strip, it's remarked that $70 for one gallon of gas is the lowest they've seen in a while, and apparently a can of Coca=Cola costs $20.
  • Though to be fair, that's not too ridiculous — (very) roughly 6% inflation per year, on average, would give prices close to that.
• Scooby-Dooby Doors: Complete with Lampshade Hanging here
• Shout-Out: Far too many to count, mostly to various sci-fi.
• Sliding Scale of Silliness Versus Seriousness
• Sweet Polly Oliver: Jenny briefly disguises herself as "Ace" Curtis to retrieve Jack from a Chinese space station.
• Tenchi Solution: Apparently the norm with some species, most notably giraffes.
• "Three Laws"-Compliant: All robots, though the safeties can be bypassed using certain code phrases (such as "define the word 'is'", and "I am not a crook") that lock AIs out of their own systems.
  • That one was a case of "they didn't change the factory default password".
• Twenty Minutes Into the Future: Circa 2066.
• Unusual Euphemism: What the heck is "Johnny Freakingouter" supposed to mean anyway?
• Unusual User Interface: The standard personal computer is a pair of heads-up-display glasses that seem to respond to brainwaves, though characters are often seen voicing commands. These glasses are frequently used for full VR, but some claim that a true virtual experience requires a neural jack.
• Wave Motion Gun: Parodied with some firefighters and their Wave Water Gun.
• We Can Rebuild Him: Tora as part of his backstory, with a parody of the Trope Namer in this guest strip
• Zero-G Spot: Apparently one of the reasons why Cecil, Barb and Beth had their honeymoon in space.