Hello and welcome to the Sluggy universe.
As you might have realized, the world of Sluggy is a huge place, with daily strips dating back to 1997 (about 5000 strips), so reading through the entire archives is a major task. Fortunately, you don't have to do that, since all the information you will need to follow the daily strip updates is right here.
A good place to jump into the comic is chapter 66, where many things are summed up inside the comic. Click "Sluggy Freelance: 7/14/2014".
Reading the "current situation" section will allow you to start reading one of the latest chapters without missing much.
Alternatively, you can spend some time reading "A Nifty Sluggy Events Timeline", which covers all major events in the comic. The timeline is not completed though.
Reading the archives[]
If you want to take the plunge into the archives, you might want to check out the storylines presentation. Here are links to jump into the most dramatic storylines of the comic, for example by following all appearances of Oasis.
Another option is to go to the archives page. This is a page that intends to give an overview of the Sluggy archive, keeping the structure from the comic homepage with books, chapters and stories. Every story has a short flavor text, that might get you interrested enough to dive into the archives at that point.
The last part of this page is a nifty sluggy events timeline. Instead of presenting flavor text, this maps all the important events that happen in each chapter. If you want to skip some chapters when you are reading the archives, you can extract all the facts from those chapters here.
If you'd rather start with the newest strips, and you don't mind spoilers, read below to get appraised on the current situation.
Current situation Full House[]
Need to know before reading Chapter 67: Full House
You will need to know that the Grab-All company have made a habit of selling secret information to the highest bidder. The secretive leaders of Grab-All have just now been revealed to be the Black Ops Elves, who used to be under Santa Claus and Bun-bun, alternatively.
Bun-bun is a tough mini-lop, who use violence to get his way, and have gone up against Santa Claus and many others in the past.
Hereti-Corp is an evil R&D Company. Their greatest weapons are designs stolen from Riff, one of the main characters of the strip. Riff and the rest of the gang (including Bun-bun) have a history of conflict with Hereti-Corp, and their one-time friend Dr. Schlock have become the leader of Hereti-Corp.
Speaking of the usual gang: Most of them are gathered together after an adventure in which Gwynn gained an anti-magic plant. Gwynn is a witch, and have an unfriendly connection with the world-threatening demon K'z'k. On the romantic side, Torg and Zoë have been friends for many years, and recently begun dating.
Torg have been a minion of the Minion Master, where he became an expert at living undercover. He also owns the demon-killing sword Chaz.
For some reason Slaughteresa (who goes by Theresa or Slaw) hits on Torg. She is a master thief, and used to be employed by the defeated villain Crushestro.
Got all of that? Then jump to the beginning of chapter 65 here: "Sluggy Freelance: 4/13/2015".
Current Situation Mohkadun[]
need-to-know before reading Chapter 65: Mohkadun
You need to know that main characters Torg and Riff were trapped in a pyramid in Tunisia belonging to the ancient Mohkadun civilization. In there, Torg found a necklace which he gave as a gift to Zoë. The necklace turned out to be cursed, however, so that Zoë turned into a camel every time a person uttered the word "shupid". The word "Kwi" turned her back into a human.
A bit of research revealed that this had to do with a love story in ancient Mohkadun, where Kron would use the necklace to get Queen Siphaniana out of sight of her husband, King Fahran.
Zoë was liberated from the necklace during a complicated story in the Dimension of Rain. Now she only has a tattoo where the necklace was, and the necklace is being held by Gwynn.
On more than one occasion the world has been on the brink of ending due to the demon K'z'k. He was originally released by the magic powers of Gwynn, and fragments of his soul have been with her ever since.
Allied with K'z'k are the demons Chilus and Skippy, though they are also working at cross-purposes. Chilus runs the Cult of K'z'k, and Skippy has not been seen for a while.
Torg and Riff found the pyramid in the first place because of an email from Riff's mysterious father, which has not been seen before this chapter.
Also, Torg owns the awesome demon-killing sword Chaz, and Riff is a master inventor, specializing in weapons, robots and explosions.
In the group are also three badass characters: Super-powered mini-lop Bun-bun, shape-shifting alien Aylee and strong but dorky vampire Sam. Last in the group is the adorable hyperactive ferret Kiki.
Apart from the demons, the protagonists have also had a lot of trouble with a criminal R&D group called Hereti-Corp. They only play a minor role in this chapter, however.
The assasin Nash Straw used to work for Hereti-Corp, but betrayed them and went renegade. He is skilled and dangerous with all kinds of weapons, but favors a long-range sniper rifle. Nash goes by the name "Agent strum" in this chapter.
Got all of that? Then jump to the beginning of chapter 65 here: "Sluggy Freelance: 3/11/2013".
A Nifty Sluggy Events Timeline[]
Alright, so you've probably realized that Sluggy's history is huge, and going back and re-reading the archives is a daunting aspect even to dedicated Sluggites. So for new Sluggites who aren't up for an archive dive just yet here is a timeline of events that have taken place in the various stories.
Note that this is a) a poor excuse for the real thing and the comic itself is infinitely better than this timeline, which only contains bare-bones need to know stuff and b) extremely long, but far shorter than an archive trawl. Also unmarked spoilers from semi-recent stories lie below. Consider yourself warned.
Chapter 1 - 10[]
- Chapter One: Is It Not Nifty?.
+ Riff, Torg, Bun-bun, Teddy Weddy and Zoë are introduced.
+ Riff and Torg successfully summon a demon with the Book of E-Ville, but later throw it away.
- Chapter Two: The Sci-fi Adventure.
+ Riff and Torg attempt to use the Dimensional Flux Agitator (which Riff just invented) to get rid of Bun-Bun, but end up fluxing themselves to a random dimension.
+ Riff and Torg meet Aylee in the dimension and accidentally bring her back with them when they return.
- Chapter Three: Holiday Seasons.
+ Sam Sein, Gwynn, Dr. Irving Schlock, Dr. Lorna and Kiki are all introduced.
+ Sam throws a Halloween party, which Aylee crashes.
+ Schlock loses his eye to Bun-bun.
+ Bun-Bun's ongoing feud with Santa is introduced, with both trying to kill each other.
+ We learn that Dr. Lorna is Riff's mother and her overbearing nature is part of the reason why he is such a mad scientist.
- Chapter Four: The Slug-Files
+ Sam sets Torg up on a blind date with someone on the internet so he can go out with Zoë, and he promptly vanishes.
+ Riff has his first (of many) disastrous dates with Gwynn.
+ Aylee tracks down Torg and gets a job as his secretary, later fighting with Bun-Bun and attracting (and losing) the attention of the government.
+ Riff begins his long-standing animosity with Aylee, feeling that she doesn't belong to their dimension and that as the one who brought her there, he is responsible for keeping her in line.
- Chapter Five: Valerie
+ Torg and Riff go looking for Sam, to find that he has married a woman named Valerie
+ Sam kicks Kiki (his pet ferret) out, and she moves in with Riff.
+ Torg and Valerie begin hanging out and discover that they have a mutual attraction to one another.
+ Bun-Bun steals one of Riff's robots and goes on a rampage, accidentally killing the Easter Bunny.
- Chapter Six: Torg Goes to Hell
+ While fixing his robot Riff accidentally activates the DFA and sends Torg to the Dimension of Pain.
+ Horribus, Psyk, Mosp, and Reakk are introduced.
+ Torg escapes the demons and gets to the Sacred Circle of Protection, from which he is rescued by Alt-Riff and Alt-Zoë of the Dimension of Lame.
+ Riff and Zoë accidentally save an alternate Portuguese-speaking Torg from the Dimension of Sham-Pain.
+ Torg leaves the DoL and returns to his home dimension, where he sends his alternate self back home as well.
+ A dimensional pinhole to the Dimension of Lame is left in the Dimension of Pain protected by the Sacred Circle of Protection.
- Chapter Seven: Summer Vacation
+ Aylee reveals that she changes form repeatedly to adapt to her environment, causing Riff to grow even more suspicious of her. She later cocoons herself for a major change.
+ The group goes to Nag's Head South Carolina for a vacation.
+ Gratuitous bikini-shot Sunday!
+ Jaya is introduced.
+ Bun-Bun is lost at sea during a storm, the gang goes back without him.
+ Aylee emerges into her new form: a long snake-like form that sprouts sharp spines and claws when she tenses her muscles. Riff isn't amused by this.
+ Bun-Bun comes back after a lengthy time at sea.
- Chapter Eight: Vampires (First real spoilers start here.)
+ Sam and Valerie are revealed to be vampires serving an ancient vampire queen: Lysinda. They aren't married, and only posed as a married couple to get close to their targets for future conversion: Zoë and Torg.
+ Torg and Zoë are abducted, but Sam betrays the other vampires, sparing Riff's life, killing another vampire, and giving Riff the means to find the rest of them.
+ Valerie reveals that she loves Torg because he reminds her of her long-dead husband, and after his death she went with Lysinda to become a vampire.
+ Riff, Bun-Bun, Aylee, and Kiki track down and kill all of the vampires. Torg kills Valerie and Zoë finishes off Lysinda. Sam survives after Kiki accidentally frees him.
- Chapter Nine: Return of the Holiday Seasons
+ The demons of the Dimension of Pain try to send a demon (Reakk) to Torg's dimension on Halloween to kill him and steal his soul, but fail miserably (at the killing and stealing part -- they do succeed at the sending part).
+ After problems with Gwynn and Zoë, Riff heads to an ancient tomb in Tunisia to return a relic from his past to where his dad retrieved it from. Torg tags along and they are trapped in the pyramid with a mummy and rapidly dwindling population of snakes.
+ Santa tries to outmaneuver Bun-Bun by sending the Ghosts of Christmas at him, but they fail rather spectacularly and Bun-Bun blows up Santa's workshop but misses killing him. Riff and Torg have a Sluggy Mummy Christmas in the tomb.
+ Riff and Torg are rescued by Laura Croft-Macaroni-and-Cheese.
+ Gwynn begins messing around with voodoo and other dark arts.
+ Berk is introduced.
+ Torg turns into 'Torgo of the Jungle' in response to all of the stress in his life.
Chapter Ten: K'Z'K
+ Gwynn is shown to be using the power of the book of E-Ville to gain supernatural talents.
+ Berk apparently goes crazy, tries to kill Torg and uses some kind of device on Aylee to freeze her in time before running off.
+ It is revealed that Gwynn began to summon a demon to get even with Riff for his earlier actions and needs to complete the spell. She does and the demon, known as K'Z'K possesses her.
+ After he is killed, the gang discovers that Berk was a soldier from the future where K'Z'K won and was sent back to try and stop the demon from taking over. He went after Torg because of faulty intel stating that he was the one who released the demon onto the world in the first place.
+ The gang splits up and re-unites in New York to confront the demon, where Torg accidentally frees it by exorcising it from Gwynn (who enters a coma afterwards). Riff uses Berk's re-charged time weapon on K'Z'K but instead of pausing him it sends him into the past.
+ Bun-Bun sells the time-frozen Aylee to an eccentric radio host.
Chapter 11 - 20[]
- Chapter Eleven: Mecha Easter Bunny
+ Santa and the dead Easter Bunny's family create a cyborg Easter Bunny to take over the job and kill Bun-Bun, however the mini-lop manages to destroy it, Bun-Bun is blown up and apparently killed while attempting to kill Santa in retaliation.
- Chapter Twelve: The Time Machine
+ Dex, Zoë's crush at college, is introduced.
+ Riff and Torg are tinkering with Berk's time weapon and decide to send Torg ahead to the year 2000 to see if the Y2K bug messes up anything important, Zoë, tired of being 'boring' comes along with a shotgun.
+ Torg and Zoë are accidentally sent to the past and not the future, where they find K'Z'K is in power.
+ Sam teams up with Muffin the Vampire Baker to take on some vampires, but ends up making things worse.
- Chapter Thirteen: Loose Ends
+ Bun-Bun is shown to have survived but has amnesia, which he quickly gets over. He soon returns to the gang.
+ One of Santa's elves, Squeekybobo, is shown to have died in the explosion and entered the Dimension of Pain.
+ Santa launches himself into space to evade Bun-Bun.
+ Aylee wakes up and Riff comes to get her after hearing that a time traveler is expected to appear on the show of the man who bought her.
+ Riff meets the old version of Dr. Schlock, who is from the same future as Berk and went back in time to escape the demon (and make tons of money).
+ They agree to work together to try and find Torg and Zoë, but the results leave a lot to be desired.
+ Bun-Bun is told by the dead Easter Bunny's family that he is the new Easter Bunny, because he killed the last one (actually the last two). Bun-Bun says "Fine", unknowingly sealing a magical deal.
- Chapter Fourteen: The Storm Breaker Saga
+ Torg and Zoë are separated in the past, being taken by separate, feuding nations. Zoë assumes the role of the Stormbreaker, the one destined to defeat K'Z'K. Torg is mistaken for the leader of the soldiers who captured him, and is brought back to his 'home'.
+ Torg meets Valerie before she was a vampire and Lysinda. She is married to the leader that Torg has been mistaken for (they look identical except Torg doesn't have the beard)
+ The two nations go to war, with Torg leading his nation masquerading as its leader (who is very ill). He uses a very special sword during the war. He and Zoë meet up during the battle and leave with a cleric from the nation Zoë stayed with.
+ The trio collects a bard who helps them find the Cave of Yffi, wherein lies the book of Güd, one of the few things that can kill K'Z'K. However the demon catches them quickly.
+ Zoë kills K'Z'K and releases all of the souls he had imprisoned, including Gwynn's, which returns to her body and revives her.
+ Riff finds Torg and Zoë and brings them back forward in time, Torg has to choose to leave Valerie to her inevitable fate.
+ Gwynn is shown to retain some magical powers from her possession.
- Chapter Fifteen: The Isle of Dr. Steve
+ Bun-Bun, Torg, and Kiki head into the woods, but quickly begin fighting amongst themselves.
+ Oasis and Dr. Steven Hereti are introduced.
+ Dr. Steve has Oasis under some sort of mind control, using a watch to relay commands to her. He has a compound set up in the middle of the woods where he is apparently performing some sort of ongoing work (lasting thirty odd years) related to Oasis. He also claims to have built Oasis' mind.
+ Dr. Steve orders Oasis to fall in love with Torg, which she does. Unfortunately due to Bun-Bun and Kiki's antics at his computer this is the last command he ever gives her. The system also deletes all data and self-destructs the base, with Oasis and Dr. Steve getting caught in the blast.
+ Torg goes on a single, disastrous date with Gwynn, but the police interrupt when the Corvette Torg stole from Dr. Steve was called in as stolen.
+ The gang throws their annual Halloween party, Percy, the man-eating wooly mammoth, is introduced.
+ Val's ghost apparently returns to plead for her redemption at Torg's hands, but it is only Squeekybobo sent on behalf of the Dimension of Pain. He reveals the the DoP will keep sending demons after him on Halloween until they finally kill him because they have nothing better to do. He attempts to possess Zoë, but Gwynn uses the power of the Book of E-Ville to force him out. This also renders her completely possession-proof.
+ Zoë and Gwynn get in a disagreement over her residual powers, marking the beginning of a rift in their relationship.
+ Aylee attends Cannibals Anonymous to deal with her habit of eating people along with Percy. After many setbacks the two become friends and her habit of eating people is broken.
- Chapter Sixteen: 2000
+ Bun-Bun sets his annual trap for Santa, but instead finds Mrs. Claus, who reveals that Santa has vanished and it was up to her to perform his duties. She manages to talk her way out of Bun-Bun killing her.
+ The gang watches the New Year pass, and immediately fall into a coma along with Jaya, Bun-Bun, and Aylee. Sam is temporarily afflicted with a headache and sets out to find the others. Future Dr. Schlock starts bleeding from his nose and ears and claims that a million people are about to die.
- Chapter Seventeen Kiki's Virus
+ Dr. Schlock, Kiki, and Sam all meet up, and Schlock (using his future knowledge) reveals that this Virus struck down people with comas in phase one, then two days later they awoke as carriers. Two days after that they and everyone they had met since awakening met died of this disease. Kiki is apparently 'patient zero' of the disease.
+ Bun-Bun exposes young Schlock to Kiki, forcing Dr. Schlock to find a cure for the disease. Kiki is revealed to have participated in research with Dr. Crabtree that killed all of her old friends.
+ Dr. Catherine Crabtree is introduced as a researcher in the field of nano-robots, which is the source of the disease. The only solution for the dilemma lies in Kiki's mind and her memories of her time as a research animal.
+ After picking her brain they realize that the 'Y2K Bug' accidentally caused the dormant nanites from her tests to re-boot into old programming (which unintentionally kills those they invade). Kiki runs off after learning that she is the source of the Virus. Dr. Schlock fixes the problems, everyone wakes up, and Kiki returns home to her family. Sam and Riff reconcile enough so that Riff won't kill him on sight.
+ Dr. Crabtree kills young Schlock and decides to clean house on everyone who had contact with her nanites, starting with old Schlock.
+ The DoP seals Squeekybobo in a ball, and drop off the radar for a while.
- Chapter Eighteen Love Potion
+ Gwynn begins an online chat with someone named Kenny, a fellow former demon-possessee that was left with residual powers.
+ All of Gwynn's friends make fun of her within earshot of her, driving her further away. Kenny suggests that she make a love potion, and use it for her friends' and her own benefit, making them accept her for who she is.
+ Gwynn creates the potion (which is supposed to get weaker as time goes on and wear off by the full moon) and gives a batch to Zoë's crush Dex, who immediately falls for Zoë and sets up a date. However the potion begins to adversely affect Dex, driving him from thoughts of love to thoughts of murder.
+ Things go further downhill when Bun-Bun accidentally takes the potion and falls for Gwynn, Riff falls for Crystal the bartender, and Crystal falls in love with Torg. What happens next can only be described as pure, untainted hilarity as the love-sick tangle runs all over the countryside causing havoc.
+ Torg and Zoë escape the others for a while and accidentally sip some punch spiked with the potion. Fortunately Gwynn manages to keep them from looking at anyone, which spares them the effects. However their 'admirers' soon catch up and the two have to flee with their eyes closed. The pair eventually decide to open their eyes while looking away from each other to make sure they aren't on the highway or something. They end up staring directly at one another under the light of the full moon right as the potion wears off (the others don't remember anything). They agree to go on a date the next day.
+ Oasis shows up at Torg and Zoë's date, and Torg has to pretend he doesn't care about Zoë to save her from Oasis' wrath. Zoë doesn't understand this, and end up in tears. Oasis kidnaps Torg.
+ Gwynn curse Torg slowly into a donkey, so he can't tell Riff she is using magic again.
+ Oasis attempts to forcibly marry Torg, but ends up in a battle with Gwynn (who she thinks is Zoë), who kills Oasis by using magic to impale her with a tree and throw her off a cliff.
+ Gwynn leaves the gang, ostensibly because the gang doesn't trust her with using magic, but really because she has been posessed by K'Z'K again.
+ Torg and Zoë realise that K'Z'K is still active and has got a great deal of influence over Gwynn.
- Chapter Nineteen K I T T E N
+ Aylee have morphed into a new double form. When low on energy she is in "giant head" form, after eating enough potatoes she releases an EMP and turns into dragon form.
+ Aylee's EMP wipes all of Bun-bun's Baywatch tape collection, causing Bun-bun to seek revenge on the other housemates.
+ Zoë and Torg hide from Bun-bun by going on a retreat with her college friends, and end up in Wispydale, where The EVIL is killing people.
+ The EVIL turns out to be kittens fathered by Satan in a drunken party with the Wispydale satanic cultists.
+ The kittens are made docile again with milk, and the Torg and Zoë escape Wispydale.
- Chapter Twenty On the Run
+ Bun-bun is still mad about the tapes, and the housemates flee to the carribean.
+ Bun-bun has taken over Santas Black Ops Elves, and uses them to track down and hunt the housemates.
+ Dr. Catherine Crabtree has turned into a nanite-powered monster. She attempts to track down and kill Dr. Schlock, which leads her to Sam and Kiki.
+ Crabtree runs into several accidents and ends up being killed by Aylee's EMP before she can kill Kiki.
+ The Black Ops Elves accept an apology from the housemates, and Bun-bun is pacified by labeling a new collection of unmarked Baywatch tapes.
Chapter 21 - 30[]
Keep on Truckin', not done yet...
Current situation (old)[]
need-to-know before reading Chapter 64: The Research and Development Wars.
The main characters (good-guy Torg, genius inventor Riff, likeable Zoë, violent bunny Bun-bun and ever-enthusiastic ferret Kiki) have recently come together from their individual adventurers to plan their next move.
Riff just visited a parallel dimension (the dimension of Rain) where the world was almost destroyed due to a war between two corporate factions: Hereti-Corp (the winners) on one side, and Crushestro (weapons manufacturer) and the Nofun mutants (mutants created by a bio-engineering company) on the other. Zoë was in (sort-of) a coma the entire time, and is generally not updated on the events.
In the main Sluggy dimension, Torg has been responsible for setting up Crushestro and NoFun mutants against Hereti-Corp to get revenge for various crimes that Hereti-Corp has committed. When Torg heard about Riff's experiences he realised that he might have lead their own dimension to its doom.
Torg and Riff are now trying to handle the situation in such a way that neither Hereti-Corp or the NoFun mutants can achieve world domination. Torg maintains his contact with Crushestro and NoFun, while managing his 3 undercover agents: Dorkish vampire Sam, girl engineer Sasha and mindless zombie-head-on-a-stick ZOHAS.
As the chapter begins, the leaders of Hereti-Corp (Dr. Irving Schlock, Kusari, Dr. Shankraft, Frog, Dr. Biyu Daiyu and Dr. Newguy) are realising that their company is beset with spies and saboteours, and try to think up a plan for self-defence.
Background information[]
good to know before reading Chapter 64: The Research and Development Wars.
The current leader of Hereti-Corp is Dr. Irving Schlock, a cowardly scientist from the future whom the main characters know well. He has an unknown "triangle plan" involving Torg, Riff's inventions, and the super-assasin Oasis. It was Schlock's betrayal of Riff that stranded him in the Dimension of Rain, and almost killed Zoë in the process.
Oasis is a key mystery. She is an assassin that Hereti-Corp wants to capture for unknown reasons, and she keeps coming back from the dead for equally unknown reasons. She uses knives to deadly effect, and can start fires with her mind. Oasis, or at least her mind, was "made" by Dr. Steven Hereti, who gave her a subliminal mental conditioning to kill all Hereti-Corp employees and ordered her to love Torg - this made her murderusly jealous of Zoë. She has been a threat to the main characters several times, most recently in the battle against Riff and Zoë that standed them in the Dimension of Rain.
Hereti-Corp employs the super-assasin Kusari, who is "made in the image of Oasis, and improved". However, there are unknown key differences that makes Kusari insufficient for Schlock's plan. Oasis was last seen when Nash betrayed Hereti-Corp and cut off the head of the paralyzed Oasis in their possession. He intends to cash in a bounty on her head, set by a criminal organization.
Torg was formally a minion of a super-villain called the Minion Master, but in reality Torg called the shots in what missions the minions of the Minion Master undertook. His undercover agents were also minions.
Also, Zoë may have once again realized that she is in love with Torg, but the details aren't clear. The memory of her first realization was erased during her visit with Riff to the Dimension of Rain. Torg has expressed feelings for Zoë, but also promised Oasis to marry her in order to protect Zoë from Oasis' murderous jealousy.
There are two characters who are part of the usual gang but do not appear in the current storyline: Gwynn, a good-looking but rather aggressive witch, friend of Zoë and ex-girlfriend of Riff. Aylee, a likeable shapeshifting green alien who currently looks like a woman.
Got all of that? Then jump to the beginning of chapter 64 here: "Sluggy Freelance: 3/11/2013".