Okashina Okashi

Okashina Okashi (also known as Strange Candy) is a long-running, manga-influenced webcomic by Emi-Chan (artist/writer), Xuanwu, Kourin, and Tanzy (writers). It features six ordinary Japanese young people (five and one exchange student, technically) who, while all visiting visiting Tokyo Tower, were sucked into a portal to an anime-inspired universe (by another cast member who was trying to summon his own harem) and have been dragged to one fantasy world after another.

As you can tell by the above, the comic specializes in skewering anime and manga tropes (with the occasional swipes at Japanese culture in general). The seven principal characters are:

• Keiko Hasegawa: The group's Tsundere. Stand-in big sister to...
• Ellie "Eri-Chan" James: American exchange student, Occidental Otaku, Yaoi Fangirl, Dangerously Wrong Genre Savvy.
• Petra: Lady of War, Gun Nut, socially awkward.
• Hoshiko "Ho-chan" Yamano. not-so Covert Pervert. Keeps a list of "X Ecchi Things To Do With [insert current subject here]"
• Eeichi Shinohara: Ho-chan's Handsome Lech partner-in-crime
• Lycidia: Evil Overlord-in-training
• Daisuke Dohmoto: The cause of the original Plot Hole tower portal. Team Butt Monkey, Lycidia's lackey. Actual Covert Pervert.

Running since 2001, the strip has tackled just about every anime and manga trope there is (and if they haven't, it's probably because they haven't gotten to it yet).

---

Okashina Okashi contains examples of the following tropes:

• All Anime Is Naughty Tentacles: Both played straight and subverted, hard and repeatedly. Also a tentacle monster is chibi and apparently a girl. And some tentacles are quite polite and just need a friend to listen.
• Anything That Moves: Ho-chan and Eeichi
• Bag of Holding: What the group uses Petra's Hammerspace portal for
• Bishonen: The "Beauty Man Garden", full of towel-clad sparkly guys.
• Bunny Ears Lawyer: Not sure if this is the trope, but about Takeshi:

"His abilities as a manager increase when he wears black sunglasses. Especially if he is indoors."

• Catgirl: Teneko
• Cherry Blossoms: Intentionally overused
• Dangerously Genre Savvy: Eri-Chan, Petra
• Dogged Nice Guy (Takeshi, towards Keiko)
• Everything's Worse with Bears
• Evil Overlord: Lycidia (wannabe), Kerisu (actual)
• Everything's Better with Sparkles: If it don't sparkle, it ain't bishonen.
• Expressive Shirt: Eri-Chan
• Fan Service with a Smile: Or in Eeichi's case, a wink and a leer. That and the "Beauty Man Garden".
• Fetish: Several characters have them.
• Future Me Scares Me: Eri-Chan runs into a future version of herself. The fact that "Ellie" outgrew her fangirlishness upsets Eri-Chan greatly.
• Giant Enemy Crab
  • Hit Its Weak Point
    • For Massive Damage
• Hadaka Apron: The uniform of the Beauty Man Garden's kitchen staff.
• Halloween Cosplay
• Hammerspace
• Harmless Villain: Kerisu zig-zags back and forth on this one, at the whim of the comic.
• Handsome Lech: Eeichi (Eri-Chan treats Takeshi this way in an ongoing fit of Wrong Genre Savvy)
• Idol Singer: Takeshi, the Wingmay singers.
• Leeroy Jenkins
• Loads and Loads of Characters
• Long Runners: Rare example of a webcomic that fits the criteria for traditional Long Runner status (10 years) but not Webcomics Long Runners status (1000 strips), due to being a once-a-week strip.
• Logic Bomb: "What kind of ice cream goes in a koan?"
• Love Hotels: The ceiling mirror of one turned out to be a plot hole.
• Meganekko: Minami; Lymaran; Seera Pei-Lin
• Modesty Towel: The uniform of the Beauty Man Garden's wait staff
• Noblewoman's Laugh: A rival appears in this strip doing this laugh.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed
• No Fair Cheating: "Evil Overlord, remember?"
• Noodle Implements: 29 leather straps, 3 pillows, 1 round bed with magic fingers massage system, 7 ferns, 1 potted palm tree, 2 whips, 1 stained glass window, 3 inflatable girls, and doves.
• RPG Mechanics Verse: They get sucked into an MMORPG which enforces RPG mechanics including weapon and armor restrictions. When Petra finds out she's a pacifist healer-type and can't even pick up weapons anymore she's less than pleased.
• Shout-Out: Many. For example, tell me Daisuke doesn't look like a Char Clone here.
  • Also, take a look at the lower left costume, lower right costume, and wand in the upper left here. And a certain line here.
  • And here's one to Axe Cop.
  • How about one to Nanaca Crash?
  • Shortly after that, the password to get into a lab is "Despair! Girls in contacts have left me in despair!".
  • Card games on motorcycles!
  • A world like Yume Nikki gets its own arc
  • Plus, there are plenty of anime characters who get Laywer-Friendly Cameoes throughout. Like the cast of three seasons of Digimon in this Sportsland comic. Which then goes on to include a reference to Harvey of all things.
• Plot Hole: Actually used as part of the plot, the characters travel between trope themed realities by going through Plot Holes.
• Small Girl, Big Gun: Fleur
• The Power of Rock: The Wingmays
• Robot Girl: Minami
• The Ditz: Eri-Chan
• The Faceless: Dahlia
• The Paid for Harem: Kerisu's quit because of the uncomfortable uniforms
• Those Two Guys: The catboys.
• Those Two Bad Guys: Dom and Ed , the same ones.
• Tokyo Tower
• Tsundere: Eri-Chan (thinks she is), Keiko (actually is, and a Type-B), Petra (type A; dere side only seen in flashbacks or when otherwise separated from the rest of the main cast)
• Unsound Effect
• Unwanted Harem: Inverted with Daisuke (the rest of the main cast was his attempt to summon a harem)
• Whole Costume Reference: Lycidia in the MMORPG world, wears a Pimped-Out Dress that looks just like the dress the Queen of Hearts wore.
• Wholesome Crossdresser: Takeshi
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Eri-chan, frequently
• Yandere - Eri-Chan
• You Can't Get Ye Flask