5 Color Control is a Magic: The Gathering Fan Web Comic written by Taylor Connor and drawn by Steve Zaffke and Kenny Weeden. Its first strip ran in early 2009. Actually, it's really two webcomics rolled into one: Kenny draws a Magic-themed Gag-Per-Day strip called "No Shyfts!", and Steve draws a plot-heavy arc-based comic called "5Knights". The main 5 Color Control website posts and archives them both.
Like its predecessor UG Madness, its name comes from a popular tournament deck.
Tropes used in 5 Color Control include:
- Alt Text: Lampshaded in the first comic's Alt Text: "Sorry, we're not cool enough to do rollover jokes."
- Art Evolution
- Aside Glance: The shopkeeper does it in the last panel of #194 [dead link].
- Big Ball of Violence: Seen when Tezzeret fights Squadron Hawks.
- Blah Blah Blah: Pizza.
- Call Back: In the Pro Tour, Vlad waits in vain for Dave's chair to break, and Dave points out that Vlad's deck was missing a card the whole time.
- Doomy Dooms of Doom: Delivered by Thrun in Comic #125.
- The Everyman: Dave.
- Everyone Comes Back Fantasy Party Ending: Parodied in Comic #200, where all the planeswalkers get together for a party. Venser, who is dead in canon, is present...as a coffin (with the name "Venser" printed on the side).
- Filler Strips
- Fridge Logic: Often applied In-Universe to Magic: The Gathering.
- Gamer Chick: Jules.
- Grotesque Cute: Ichorclaw Myr. You're so cute! I just want to hug all the blood out of you!
- Guest Strip
- Halloween Cosplay: [1] [dead link]
- Hammerspace: Percy pulls a safe out of nowhere. Lampshaded.
- Hijacked by Ganon: It's ALWAYS Nicol Bolas!
- Hypno Trinket: Licids.
- Incredibly Lame Pun: A "Splendid Genesis", even!
- Jossed: In-Universe in comic 206 [dead link], where Taylor flips out after Word of God confirms that the four Elder Dragons other than Nicol Bolas are dead and not just hiding.
- Munchkin: Vlad.
- Noob: The little kid.
- Older Is Better: "The OLDER something is, THE MORE POWERFUL IT BECOMES!"
- Painting the Fourth Wall: Planeswalking is represented by walking outside of the comic frame.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: The Elder Dragon Legends, Nicol Bolas and Arcades Sabboth, disguise themselves as the CEO of Hasbro and Richard Garfield, respectively, by attaching photographs to their faces.
- Picture Pastiche: Elder Dragons Playing Poker
- Shout-Out:
- In this strip, Nicol Bolas claims to be keeping MaRo and Thomas under Mind Control.
- This comic is a pastiche of Rocky's iconic Training Montage.
- This strip's Alt Text, "THERE CAN ONLY BE ONE...at a time..." is a reference to Highlander
- Here we have a reference to Rocky Horror's "Time Warp" in the alt text.
- Single Tear: Tibalt cries a single tear of sorrow at the end of this strip.
- Stock Underwear: The White Knight's polka-dotted boxer shorts
- Training Montage: Gideon does one in this strip to prepare for the Magic 2012 Core Set, in a Rocky Shout-Out.
- The Triple: In #206 [dead link].
- Unsound Effect: Ka-Trade!
- Who Dares?: Who dares attack Nicol Bolas?
- Willing Suspension of Disbelief: Lampshaded
- You Can See Me?: Dave does not understand why there are dragons playing in the Pro Tour.