Dead Winter

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Dead Winter is a (mostly lighthearted) webcomic chronicling the Zombie Apocalypse from two points of view: Lizzie, an English major college student working as a waitress, and Badass hitman Black Monday Blues. Monday becomes involved in a vendetta against his former employer, while Lizzie simply tries to survive; eventually the two story arcs merge. Other members of the cast include the optimistic medic Alice, Lou the fat Italian plumber, and Lizzie's Jerkass of a former employer Frank. Secondary plots (mostly in the chapter epilogues) include Lizzie's fiance Trevor, and her cat Cuddles.

You can find it here.

Tropes used in Dead Winter include:

• Action Survivor: Lizzie obviously, though arguably Alice and Lou could qualify as well.
• Actual Pacifist: Lizze wants to be one, but see below.
• Adrenaline Makeover: Lizzie's part of the story revolves around finding her badass survivor self or else she'll get killed like everybody else. Well to be fair, it's about her trying to not have one of these, so she's still recognizable the same person afterwards.
• Alt Text: Starting in strip 285, if you're starting from the beginning.
• Anti-Hero: Monday
• Armies Are Evil: Not played entirely straight, but Cpl. Ross's Army unit got some interesting ideas about repopulating the earth. The National Guard and/or regular Army also ended up fighting a small war with the city Police, although they view themselves as the good guys and it could debatably be considered a huge misunderstanding.
• Art Evolution
• Atomic F-Bomb: Lizzie lets one loose.
• Ax Crazy: Frank
• Badass: Monday, natch.
  • Sixgun Johnny Rhythm is definitely shaping up to be one too, and the hints of his reputation are anything to go by, he may even be more formidable than Monday.
• Badass in a Nice Suit: Monday, most of the time.
• Badass Normal: Lou. He fights off zombies with a plunger. That is all.
• Batter Up
• Berserk Button: Do NOT tell Lizzie that she doesn't have a choice.
• The Berserker: Frank
• Big Fun: Lou
• Blasting It Out of Their Hands: Leaves Monday annoyed, though.
• Break the Cutie: Alice, both in the present and the backstory. However, she never knuckles under.
• Bring My Brown Pants: Watch the ground.
• The Brute: Frank
• Bulletproof Vest: Monday survives a close-range shotgun blast with one and appears to be just a little bruised. He's just that badass.
• Carnival of Killers: Monday's subplot
• Casual Danger Dialogue: The message Mr. and Mrs. Cooper leave for Lizzie while fighting off zombies. "Tell her Mum says to pack clean socks!"
• Cluster F-Bomb
• Continuity Nod: The house Alice and Trenton bring Lizzie to after her accident is the same house the noob lived in. Kind of a stretch, but there's a Counter-Strike poster on a door in Pg. 46, and what looks like the same poster on the door Lizzie closes on Pg. 60.
• Cool Shades: Monday has some red ones.
  • He also has spares if they get broken.
• Crazy Survivalist: Most characters are starting to sport shades of this to some degree, but the Preacher who occasionally appears tops most of them.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Lou
• Deliberately Monochrome: Except for epic red accessories, and Lizzy's dreams.
• The Determinator: Everyone to an extent, given the environment, but boy does Frank hate Lizzie. Also Lizzie's cat, but that's just cute.
• Divided We Fall: Though the zombies/shufflers/infected are a serious threat, the cast often have more problems with other survivors either overtly hostile or just unwilling to share resources. The Military and the Police are prime examples of this, as demonstrated here.
• Dramatic Irony: All the time. This comic loves showing us perspectives of people who are justifiably not communicating with each other, due to mistrust.
• The Engineer: Lou.
• Eyepatch of Power: Discussed by Lou. According to him, pirates wore eyepatches to keep one eye dilated for fighting in the dark below deck.
• Fan Disservice: Nothing serious, but in a couple panels you can very clearly see Lou's buttcrack.
• Fan Service: A little in the beginning, but nonexistent in later chapters. Really, with all the gore going on, would you want it?
• Finger Gun: Lizzie makes her one when she's bluffing.
• Fingore: Hinted at when Liz knocks on the Omnimart door.
• Five Four Man Band
  • The Hero: Liz
  • The Lancer: Monday
  • The Smart Guy / The Chick: Alice
  • The Big Guy / The Smart Guy (yes, also): Lou
• Flipping the Bird
• Fridge Horror: In-universe, Alice has a nasty realization. The implication seems to be that the bloodstain on the wall was there when she and Liz moved in because the last person who lived in there realized they were infected, and A) took their own life, or B) Chantelle took it herself.
  • Most likely A, due to the ah, spray pattern above the couch.
• Frying Pan of Doom: Alice employs one of these on several occasions.
• Funetik Aksent: Mainly Lou and Foite but the author tends to have fun with those.
• Gainaxing: Here, a teensy bit.
• Grievous Harm with a Body: Fight uses Flight as a ball-and-chain on this page.
• The Gunslinger: Monday again. Also Trenton Bradley.
  • Also, Sixgun Johnny Rhythm, one of the killers after Monday, looks like he stepped right out of a Western.
• Hassle-Free Hotwire: Lou teaches the girls how to do this.
• The Heart: Alice
• Henpecked Husband: Ron, the manager
• Heroic Sacrifice: Trenton
• Hidden Depths: At first glance Lou's just a fat plumber, but he knows a lot about Roman history.
  • Hey, man, wouldn't you put some effort into studying the inventors and codifiers of your discipline? 'Sides which, the Romans are one of those classic subjects of study, between the politicking, the wars, the engineering, and the general debauchery of the later empire.
• Hitman with a Heart: See Pet the Dog
• If You Kill Him You Will Be Just Like Him: Lizzie says this, to Monday's exasperation.
• Implacable Man: Frank. Took a steel pipe to the face at several miles an hour, and he's still going!
• Improvised Weapon: Plenty, the most notable one being a soccer ball.
• In Soviet Russia: Uttered by the resident russina, no less.
• Infernal Retaliation: The gang once encountered a horde of zombies that are on fire.
• Jerkass: Rick. He talks Trevor into leaving Lizzie behind in the Zombie Apocalypse. Why? So he can drag Trevor up to a cave outside the city and live out some idiotic college fantasy with his old frat buddies drinking beer and getting laid. Trevor does not take this well at all.
  • Arlen, big time, which leads to...
• Kick the Son of a Bitch: Yeah, we get that Johnny Rhythm is a bad guy, and we know that Arlen's kids are going to miss him, but damn if seeing Arlen get his comeuppance for convincing Chantelle to throw out the group, then disabling their car so they can't get past the zombies isn't satisfying.
• Knife Nut: Frank. Well, more like a nut with a knife; he only has one.
  • Derrick (one of the hitmen competing throughout the city) has a couple dozen of them.
  • Although not a nut, Monday always carries a butterfly knife around, and seems to prefer this over his guns.
• Law of Inverse Recoil: Averted here with an Unsound Effect
• Let's Get Dangerous: All the main characters, in some sense or another. Alice turns out to be extremely competent with guns thanks to childhood training, and Liz's mopslinging abilities also prove useful for fighting off zombies. Lou eventually reveals a lot more toughness than his fat and flatulent exterior implies. Monday is introduced in this way, seeming like just some random guy in a bar about to be killed by a gang until he effortlessly slaughters them all.
• Let's Split Up, Gang!
• Little No
• The Load: Lizzie at first, but she gets better. Justified in that she'd just gotten out of a car accident with serious injuries.
• The Medic: Alice
• More Dakka: This page.
• Not Using the Z Word: Though it's obviously a Zombie Apocalypse, the zombies are referred to as "shufflers" when given a name. Otherwise, people make reference to them being sick, somehow.
  • Judging by the Genre Blindness these people have (they're doing well, but they're still Genre Blind), it seems like zombies were never conceived in this universe.
• Off with His Head
• Oh Crap: Many times, but best one here.
• Papa Wolf: Monday goes on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge after his family is threatened.
• Pet the Dog: Monday gets one when he saves the kid from the zombies. He also adheres to Lizzie's maxim of "Don't kill anybody" for no apparent reason. Until the incident with Ron, that is.
• Police Are Useless: Worse, they're part of the problem.
  • Let's explain: The cops hate the military for taking over the task of containment, the deployed military troops hate them back for defying military orders. To the point where both sides are willing to kill people from the other group.
  • Even before the Police vs Military thing became an issue, the police chief called a "Code Citadel", which apparently means "Abandon the citizens, fortify police station, confiscate supplies". This apparently is still in effect.
• The Pollyanna: Alice
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Monday's is temporarily interrupted by the Zombie Apocalypse.
• Running Gag: Lou and his sandwiches.
• Sassy Black Woman: Chantelle
• Shirtless Scene
• Shout-Out: Monday quotes Dolemite before his Character Development, and more recently the alt text references Guilty Gear.

Alt Text: Heaven or Hell. Duel 1. Let's rock!

• Splash of Color: Monday's shades and Lizzie's headband. And in one very scary frame, Monday's eyes
• Sunglasses at Night: Monday yet again, with the reasoning being handily explained here.
• Team Mom: Alice. She also doubles as The Medic.
• Technical Pacifist: Lizzie
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Page 333.
• Third Person Person: Yuri, in the intermission strips
• This Is for Emphasis, Bitch: Meeting's adjourned, BITCH!
• Too Dumb to Live: The noob on page 46.
  • Ron is operating under the impression that his pitiful role as store manager means jack during the Zombie Apocalypse. As if his employees care about keeping their shitty part-time jobs when there are zombies clawing at the door. Needless to say, his overestimating his authority gets him killed.
• Two Lines, No Waiting
• Unsound Effect: Mop!, Dooooor-Bell!, RECOILLESS, Plunge!
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Monday doesn't seem to be perturbed at all by the fact that he's surrounded by the undead, and Lizzie just doesn't notice for a couple hours.
• Violent Glaswegian: Lizzie's inner personality Fight Foite has the accent, anyway.
• Waistcoat of Style: After ruining his old shirt, Monday now has a three-piece suit.
• Weapon of Choice
  • Improbable Weapon User: Lizzie + Mop.
    • Might be too early to say, but Liz seems to have averted the usual gun tropes and chose a basic, easy to use, automatic pistol for her weapon. She even holds it with both hands. A rarity indeed.
  • Friendly Sniper: Alice.
  • Sawed-Off Shotgun: Lou.
  • Guns Akimbo: Guess.
    • See More Dakka above for all four at once!
• Webcomic Time: As of December 2010, over 40% of the entire comic is about the ill-fated trip to the grocery store and back to the apartment and out again after being kicked out at gunpoint, taking place over the course of a single day.
  • Lampshaded by Liz on page 393.

My every bone is thankful this yearlong day has mercifully come to an end.

• What Do You Mean It's Not Awesome?: Page 300.
  • For further amusement; the author does those animated .gif comics every 100 comics. No. 100 was Monday defending himself from a bad crew in an amusingly badass fashion, while no. 200 was Monday demonstrating why one does not fuck with him. In both cases, pretty damn badass and with explosions. For no. 300, no gunplay, no explosions, just Liz presenting Monday with his bill.
• A Worldwide Punomenon: Alice wasn't listening because:

Alice: Oh, sorry! I was in the zone. T-zone!^[1]

• You Shall Not Pass: Trenton, but Monday successfully pulls one off against Frank and lives to tell about it.
• YouTube: Page 473 has the Alt Text "KQMBz6HvSoM".^[2]
• Zombie Apocalypse: Duh.
• Zombie Infectee: One who's actually competent and at terms with her condition. Unfortunately, she does eventually turn and has to be killed.
  • Averted in the case of Stacy, but this wasn't enough to convince Chantelle. Stacy was last seen going up to the roof of the building, with the door is now sealed from her side. Eventually it is revealed that she escaped to the streets and met up with Cuddles.

1. ↑ The "T-zone" in shooting is formed by the line from the outside of one eye socket to the outside of the other, and the line down from there to the upper lip -- a successful shot to this area basically causes the target to collapse like a puppet with its strings cut.
2. ↑ Kickstart My Heart - Motley Crue.