The Adventures of Dr. McNinja

The Adventures of Dr. McNinja
McNinja in mid leap Dr. McNinja atop Gordito's pet raptor, Yoshi
Author(s)	Chris Hastings, formerly inked by Kent Archer (2006-2010), inked by Christopher Hastings (2010-present) colored by Carly Monardo (2008-2009), colored by Anthony "Nedroid" Clark (2009-2011)
Website	http://www.drmcninja.com/
Current status/schedule	Weekly: Monday, Wednesday, Friday
Launch date	Summer 2004: Issue 1/2
Publisher(s)	Raptor Bandit Industries
Genre(s)	Action, comedy, superhero

The Adventures of Dr. McNinja is a webcomic written and drawn by Christopher Hastings, and inked formerly by Kent Archer and since 2010 by Hastings himself . Published three times a week on its own website, it features the fictional adventures of a character named Dr. McNinja, a thirty-five-year-old doctor who is also a ninja. Dr. McNinja is highly story-driven, with twenty- to ninety-page issues. The first story was published in the summer of 2004 as a one-off, and the comic has been in regular publication since late 2005. The site also sells Dr. McNinja merchandise.

The Adventures of Dr. McNinja is a member of Dayfree Press. An August 31, 2006 announcement in the news section of the Dr. McNinja website indicates that an exclusive monthly installment of Dr. McNinja will appear in the British magazine .net.

History

In 2003, when Chris Hastings was a forum member of Something Awful Forums, his screen name was "Dr. McNinja". During a drawing contest involving a characterization of user screen names, Hastings drew an image of Dr. McNinja behind his desk with a sword on his wall and a speech bubble reading, "Should anyone need the services of a ninja or a doctor, my office is always open." Shortly afterward, Chris made a full-length comic about McNinja for an art class.

Strips were presented in a high contrast black-and-white, and then for a period of time were shaded digitally. Starting on 11 August 2008, comics began to be drawn in full color, provided by Carly Monardo. On February 9, 2009, Monardo stepped down to focus on her job on The Venture Bros. Anthony "Nedroid" Clark was chosen to replace Monardo.

Characters

Dr. McNinja

The eponymous character. His first name is never given, and cannot be revealed as per the wizard. He is a cliché ninja, with the exception that he is a practicing medical doctor as well. He has amazing speed (fast enough to dodge bullets) and agility, plus superhuman strength (the latter of which is attributed to the fact that he is a doctor as well as a ninja). He studied under the clone of Benjamin Franklin in medical school, and his medical expertise ranges from general medicine to podiatry and dentistry. In fact, he has a degree in virtually every field except agricultural science thanks to a cloning experiment during his college days with the help of his professor, Ben Franklin II. He is usually seen wearing slacks, a button-down shirt and tie, a lab coat, a ninja mask, and a stethoscope around his neck. He is 35 years old.

While a skilled superhero, Dr. McNinja has several personality quirks. He desperately wants to be Batman and has obsessively studied his movies, comics and TV shows to that effect (despite this, his personality is rather more similar to Spider-Man in terms of lighthearted banter), even telling others he trained with Batman (which is patently false, even in the McNinja universe) and owning a pair of Batman pajamas. He is also highly sensitive to criticism by his parents, who are disappointed their ninja son is wasting his time as a doctor. The fact that he is both a doctor and a ninja has also caused several problems for him, chiefly due to his twin obligations to heal and to kill. He also has an intense hatred for pterodactyls, having encountered members of the species on an isolated Pacific island, and in an alternate future ruled by dinosaurs from space.

Though Dr. McNinja's full face is never seen, he has blue eyes and auburn eyebrows.

Donald McBonald

An evil mime who owns a fast-food empire. Posesses superpowers that allow him to actually apply the invisible things he mimes. Similar to Ronald McDonald in appearance, but blue-haired and with thinner, blood-red makeup.

Gordito Delgado

A 12-year-old Mexican boy whom Dr. McNinja took on as a sidekick at the end of the third storyline. He was able to grow a full moustache with sheer force of will due to his desire to become a "man", as he puts it. Normally, Gordito is the only person Yoshi lets ride him. He uses two revolvers and is an excellent shot. Gordito inherited his guns from his father, who was killed by a P.E.T.A. assassin. He is also a decent hand-to-hand fighter, besting one of Dark Smoke Puncher's robots after using all of his bullets up.

His last name, Delgado, was revealed on his grave stone on Hastings' April Fool's page. His first name means "little fatty" in Spanish, while the last name is the Spanish adjective for "thin" (Making his name an oxymoron). In "The Dark Tower" series, which Gordito has quoted and is familiar with, one of the primary characters shares the surname Delgado.

Judy

A large gorilla and Dr. McNinja's secretary and receptionist. She is extremely strong and can not only understand spoken English but also read and write. She can also communicate with sign language, but Dr. McNinja cannot understand sign language and never knows what Judy is saying. Judy is also seen to be able to drive a car and operate earthmoving equipment.

She apparently understands at least a few medical procedures. When Dr. McNinja was possessed by an ear ghost, she knew enough to use the correct medical tools to remove it. She also transfused Dr. McNinja's blood soon after he was shot by several of Frans Rayner's ninja henchmen.

Benjamin Franklin II

A clone of the original. Some time ago he cheated death through cloning, earning the interest of Death himself, and has spent the intervening years attempting to cure death. Ben taught Dr. McNinja various schools of medicine, and considers him his best student. He was killed (again) by Frans Rayner's drug-enhanced ninja, but has returned to life thanks to his "Eternal Life Serum" which he ingested prior to his second death. However, as a side effect, bodies in graves near his returned to life as zombies, including the original Benjamin Franklin. The serum was apparently created in collaboration with Dracula, explaining the problems it has caused.

This serum gave Ben the blood of a Headless Horseman. He became required to ingest hair to prevent him from turning into a Headless Horseman, but on a flight to Transylvania, he ran out of hair to eat, and transformed into a Horseman, crashing the plane. He rode out of the plane wreck on the horse that was stalking him. He appears on the Moon after Dracula summons him to his Moon Base. Dracula questions Franklin about the afterlife, and becomes upset when Franklin reveals that he has only been to purgatory, "A restaurant with poor service...the worst." Dracula throws Franklin's head to earth, and Franklin is seen chasing after it. In the Epilogue Part II it is explained that, like all ghosts, a Headless Horsemen is bound to our realm by its last unfinished affairs. The last thing Benjamin Franklin II had been doing before he was killed by Franz Rayner's men was going to get pizza with Gordito so Dr. McNinja brings a pizza to the graveyard which transforms into Franklin's missing head. In Epilogue III, Benjamin Franklin II returned to the Purgatory restaurant with a resigned, but not altogether unhappy look on his face.

Yoshi

A Velociraptor who wrecked McNinja's office in a previous storyline. McNinja, upon finding out that similar raptors had riders, claimed the unconscious raptor for his own. He was named by Dr. McNinja after the Nintendo character Yoshi, since Yoshi serves as Mario's steed. Yoshi does not like having McNinja ride him. Gordito can ride him with no trouble, but Yoshi will only allow Dr. McNinja to ride him when Gordito is in danger.

Yoshi is also a valuable fighter. He has engaged Frans' drug ninja in a major battle and won. He also attacked the zombies roaming Dr. McNinja's hometown since dinosaurs are immune to zombies (see episode 5, page 28). He even single-handedly defeated the Raptor Force, the dinosaur president's elite bodyguard, in order to save the McNinja brothers. In this alternate timeline, Yoshi can speak, albeit in fragmented sentences.

He has served as comic relief several times, such as engaging in a battle with Judy over hot dogs (which Yoshi ate, despite Judy clearly marking them). He especially got in trouble when he nearly ate Judy's kitten named Ice Cream Cake.

Yoshi can be more accurately described as a Deinonychus or Utahraptor, and should be portrayed with feathers, but Chris Hastings has stated in the alt-text of "There is a Raptor in My Office" on page 7 that this confuses his brain and he is just going by the Jurassic Park version.

Dan McNinja

Dr. McNinja's father. A ninja with an impressive moustache. He is very talented as a ninja, but his conduct as a father is notably average- or below it, though he's generally better than his wife is. He is disappointed at his son's choice to be a doctor, but he isn't as hard on his son about it as his wife. At one point he took control of the American Ninja's Guild after defeating his rival Frans Rayner, winning over the other ninjas with the sheer power of his moustache alone.

He sometimes works with the FBI, as seen when he aided them in getting rid of a dangerous drug that gives people ninja-like abilities. He is a powerful ninja, perhaps the doctor's equal in combat, and uses bizarre tactics; one of his favorites is to set himself on fire so other people can't catch him. He can also, oddly, suck poison out of food with his body and store it in his eyes, where he shoots it out later, similar to a horned lizard's ability to shoot blood from its eyes (although Dan claims it is "like a toad"). He, his wife Mitzi, and their son 'Dark Smoke Puncher' live together in a house located deep in a cave.

Mitzi McNinja

Dr. McNinja's mother. Like Dan, she is a ninja who disapproves of her son's choice to be a doctor- unlike Dan, she is exceptionally angry about it, and lets him know at every possible opportunity. She is one of the best ninja in the family, and guards the entrance to their home. Every time Dr. McNinja wants to visit, he must either sneak past or fight her. She has expertise with both pickled beets and precisely aimed demolitions (though according to Gordito, the beets taste absolutely terrible; possibly from them being poisoned though Dark Smoke Puncher states that they were always bad-tasting).

Sean "Dark Smoke Puncher" McNinja

Dr. McNinja's younger brother. He is named after the author's brother, Sean Hastings. His attire consists of a mix of ninja gear and modern gangster styles of clothing. Dr. McNinja openly mocks both his name and his poser-like ways, and even Dan admits that his skills are inferior to those of Dr. McNinja, though this is probably because he is younger. However, he is a genius with technology. In Dr. McNinja's letter to Gordito after sending him near his parents place, he implies that the deadly robot animal guards that have been modified by Sean are more dangerous than the average deadly robot animal guard. He also uses technology to imitate magic like a "technomage" even creating a freeze ray. This is similar to Babylon 5 but Sean refuses to admit it. He recently confided to Gordito that his 'gangster' attitude is mostly a front, to hide his geeky interests. He is a fan of Stephen King's The Dark Tower series.

In the Dinosaur Future timeline, Sean leads the human resistance with an adult Gordito and King Radical against the dinosaurs and takes the name "Dr. McNinja." When Doc asked if it was an homage to him, he angrily rebuked that it was because he was a Technomage. His suit contains an advanced holographic disguise and various weapons. He has a scar over his left eye and, initially, a deep resentment for his brother's failure to prevent the dinosaur takeover years before.

Frans Rayner

A former member of the Guild of American Ninja who quit and began a genocide of ninja (and made movies about it) after he lost leadership of the guild to Dan and his moustache. Frans later distributed a drug that gave people ninja powers in an extremely convoluted scheme to become President of the United States. He employs a midget scientist named Knickerbockers as well as numerous ninja who become ninja with his drug. He supposedly died when Dr. McNinja's anti-ninja drug stripped him of his powers and he got thrown off a cliff. He later returned and used cloning and the Inverse Ninja Law in attempt to kill Dr. McNinja.

He is one of Dr. McNinja's most deadly enemies as he is both an extremely skilled ninja, but also holds that ability to manipulate his organs and bones so only one part of it is weak (originally it was the center of his left butt cheek.) He actually feared Dr. McNinja because he could find the weak point when other ninja couldn't. Later, after being thrown from a cliff, he gained a prosthetic rocket leg (and, having transferred it to the real leg prior to its amputation, removed his weak point) and a laser eye, but also a severe fear of death. He appears to be inspired by parodies of Michael Dudikoff (especially the American Ninja movies) and Jean-Claude Van Damme.

Death

Portrayed as a skeleton with a pencil thin mustache and a maître d’ outfit, he brings people to purgatory, a restaurant with bad service where people eat their sins to cleanse them. Dr. McNinja seems to have gained the ability to see him after he refused to die.

Dracula

An old Transylvanian vampire who was become bored with life and wishes to see what happens in the afterlife. However, unlike most versions of the famous vampire, this Dracula has a teleporter, a moon base, a moon laser, and a cure for cancer hidden on Mars. The moon base holds many of Dracula's treasures and science projects including baby Dracula, super Dracula, Hitler, the real Paul McCartney, the real Michael Jackson, Tupac, and Bruce Lee (whose final act of superhuman feats was jumping to the moon.)

Dracula funded Benjamin Franklin's experiments in an attempt to see what the afterlife holds and after that failed, attempted to kill Dr. McNinja (who has previously come back from the dead) and tell him what happened. He is apparently still on decent terms with Dr. McNinja as he didn't try to kill him with his moon laser when Dr. McNinja sat outside and wrote "We Cool?" with giant letters.

Martin Monster

The owner of a series of supermarkets who attended the same college as Dr. McNinja and was part of the same superhero team. Dr. McNinja hated him early in the comic because Marty revealed the team's secret identities in a trick to discover who they actually were (and the action figure contract was for figures with removable masks.) He eventually came to Dr. McNinja to get help when he had trouble transforming between his human and monster forms. It was revealed that his stupidity in monster form is what caused him to reveal his team's secret identities and also caused him to become indebted to the Cumberland mafia. With Dr. McNinja's help he is freed from the mafia and regains his control over his transformations.

He has the ability to change in a giant purple ogre, reminiscent of The Incredible Hulk. His powers are a result of his father's attempts to cure his paralysis (which failed) and relies on high emotionality to transform. He becomes very stupid when transformed and leaves as an overly emotional brute. Stress causes his transformation to become unstable eventually leaving him stuck between his human and monster form.

King Radical

"The most radical man in the Radical Land". A crime boss that dresses in a style similar to a stereotypical king, the Burger king, or even the Bicycle Playing card Joker with sunglasses and tattoos on his fingers that read "MOST RAD." He is the head of the Cumberland Mafia, and has invoked Dr. McNinja's ire by blowing his office up as retribution for his refusal to treat one of Radical's thugs. In a secret epilogue page, it is discovered that he had also hired one of McNinja's ex-girlfriends to sabotage his most recent mission and secure for him a book detailing highly advanced technology. In an ironic twist, despite antagonising McNinja and fulfilling the basic role of an arch-nemesis, Radical is technically not a villain as all his activities are intentionally beneficial to Cumberland. However, since his operations are performed illegally (and since he blew up McNinja's office and has repeatedly taunted him), McNinja persists in trying to defeat him and take down his operations. Though King Radical's intentions have usually been on the right side, Dr. Mcninja distrusts him and his intentions and both future and present King Radical have admitted at a hidden agenda Dr. Mcninja would not approve of. There have been ongoing hints as to what this agenda, as well as implications that Radical is a time traveler. He has obvious ties to the ancient Inoctek people from "Death Volley" and may have personally founded their civilization.

Hortense

Dr. McNinja's ex-girlfriend from college. Dan and Mitzi both view her as one of the family and want so badly for her to get back together with their son that when she was seemingly hired to unwittingly stop Dr. McNinja from saving the world, both McNinja and Hortense assumed it was some ploy by Dan and Mitzi to get them back together. It was revealed that she actually was hired by King Radical to replace a book full of ancient technology with a useless substitute.

Chuck Goodrich

The mayor of Cumberland, plays an integral role after he is introduced during the Zombie plague. He is a former astronaut, and devised a zombie-defense plan long before zombies were proven to exist. This is because he is actually a time traveler, and came from a future where zombies have taken over. Even after the zombies are defeated, more versions of Chuck start popping up from alternate apocalypses; one comes from a future where Dinosaurs have taken over Earth. This Chuck works alongside Doc to prevent this alternate timeline, but ends up dying at the end of the story. The original Chuck goes into hiding when a demon samurai starts hunting him, causing a hobo to take over his position through an obscure legal act.

Nasaghasts

These are the result of a NASA mission gone horribly wrong. The Nintendo 64 mission (named by a fourth grader) exploded in flight, and exposed the astronaut to "space radiation". The astronauts turned in to the Nasaghasts and now protect all astronauts at the Kennedy Space Center. They have the physical properties of astronauts surrounded by black smoke that follows them wherever they go. They can also use this smoke to change their size and form, indicating that they can make the smoke solid or gaseous at will. Inside their helmet is a floating skull which is capable of movement. Nasaghasts communicate telepathically, and use that communication multiple times with Chuck Goodrich. All but one of the Nasaghasts were killed by Dr. Mcninja.

Universe

Dr. McNinja exists in a universe which is similar to ours in most ways, but departs radically from it on certain points - not only regarding the existence of certain geographical locations, but also in certain basic ways of functioning (apart from the existence of magic, that is).

Law of Conservation of Ninjutsu

Cliches from old fighting movies are akin to laws of nature when it comes to fights involving ninjas. As according to the "inverse ninja law" one ninja is an unstoppable force, whilst a horde of ninjas is just cannon fodder for one heroic foe. One of the series' recurring villains, the 80's-movie martial artist Frants Reyner uses this to his advantage when releasing a horde of Dr. McNinja clones to make the original a faceless and easily beatable 'stormtrooper' in the crowd. The advantage is cancelled out when Dr. McNinja conforms to the trope laws and pairs up with Frants (against the villain's will) to form a dynamic fighting duo. This allows Dr. McNinja to survive (by killing his own clones) until only he and Frants are left, which again makes him an individual ninja and hence unbeatable.

Multiple timelines

Characters are on several occassions sent back into time in order to fix a problem of the present by going to its roots in the past. It is, however, not possible to alter the future the time-traveller is sent from. If the time-traveller succeeds in altering the course of history, an alternative timeline will instead branch off from the point where the problem is "fixed", and its future exist in parallell to the home timeline of the time-traveller.

Mustache of Authority

Certain individuals manage to grow impressive mustaches through sheer force of will. Examples include Gordito Delgado (who grew it at age twelve, no less) and the doctor's father Dan. The commands of such people are uncommonly hard to resist. Frants Rayner, the martial arts guru, has been trying to understand the secret of the mustache after Dan McNinja beat him to the leadership of their old dojo partially through the commanding power of his impressive mustache.

Paul Bunyan's Disease

The doctor is frequently called out to cure children afflicted with this nefarious disease which causes people to transform in to skyrise-high, raging lumberjacks. A key challenge of the doctor is to cure the children before they are hunted down by poachers who stuff them and sell their corpses to roadside taverns, gasoline stations and amusement parks. The cure has the unfortunate side of making the patient unable to ever grow facial hair. The doctor posseses a serum which re-triggers the disease, and he on one occassion uses this to raise an army of giants.

Pirates vs. Ninjas

In the Dr. McNinja universe, this is a real and ongoing conflict which dates back to the formation of the McNinja clan. Their village was attacked by pirates, but they resisted by demonstrating a genetic predisposition to ninjutsu through their fighting style and by instinctively picking up frozen shamrocks to apply them as shurikens. A passing ninja observed this, and taught them the arts of ninjutsu.

Purgatory

Purgatory is a real, existing place which we see several characters be transported to. Upon dying, one is met by Death, who escorts one to a table in an infinitely big restaurant with exceptionally slow service (there is only one waiter, and all of humanity is being served). The menues are individual and consist of eating one's cardinal sins.

The existence of dinosaurs

In the McNinja universe dinosaurs are not extinct, but still alive and thriving on a remote island owned by Rupert Murdoch and a deserted, Pacific island housing the ruins of an old Amerindian civilization. Also, when Earth was hit by the meteor that killed off most of the original dinosaur population, some of them were flung into space and exposed to "space radiation" which allowed them to live until they crashlanded on another planet, and develop human-level intelligence. There are at least two timelines where the dinosaurs have returned to Earth and subjugated the human race, having become enfuriated by our usage of fossil fuels.

Story arcs

Dr. McNinja's story has many absurd plot twists, and often makes allusions to outside works, most prominently Dr. McNinja's quote of "What would Batman do?" Starting with "So What Is A McNinja?", each page also uses alt text to add background information and in-jokes, such as the author comparing the comic's visual style to Frank Miller's comic Sin City.

Dr. McNinja vs. McDonald's

Dr. McNinja must face off against McDonald's, which happens to be a corporation of robot workers run by evil mime Donald McBonald. McDonald releases a new product, the McNinja burger, which contains large amounts of methane and nitrogen, since a corporate advisor mentions that "kids like farts.....and ninjas." Naturally, the product offends Dr McNinja, who hunts out McDonald at a local McDonald's filled with "Burger Zombies" and the McDonald's robot workers. McNinja finally enters a showdown in McDonald's "Final Boss Lair." After the clown stops McNinja's ninja stars with a mime shield, McNinja has "no problem fighting fire with fire" with a mime rocket launcher. Despite being written and presented first, the website urges readers not to read this story first and instead, to read the first two "official" issues before reading this one.

Chris Hastings later edited the trademarked names and logos to avoid legal issues. "McDonald's" was changed to "McBonald's", "Big Mac" to "Big Mike", and the iconic golden arches logo was edited to include a rounded "B".

Meet the Doctor and His Friendly Staff

The first official comic: Dr. McNinja is called upon to investigate a young boy's illness. The boy, whose condition causes him to frequently vomit large amounts of maple syrup, is soon diagnosed as Paul Bunyan's Disease. The boy then turns into a giant lumberjack and bursts through the ceiling, enraged at how many trees stand within the area. Dr. McNinja infiltrates a facility (rather violently) to get a lotion that removes the lumberjack facial hair permanently, thus returning him to normal. Judy also fights off a group of poachers that hunt giant lumberjacks for a living. Ten years later, the former patient's girlfriend leaves him due to his inability to grow a beard, and he swears revenge on McNinja.

So What Is a McNinja?

File:Mcninja.jpg

Dr. McNinja slaughters pirates in "So What is a McNinja?"

Dr. McNinja returns home for "Katanakka" (a Ninja holiday celebrated on the same day as Thanksgiving so "that we still get the day off"). After a heated discussion with his mother and father, McNinja storms out and (after getting drunk) betrays his family to a crew of pirates. After sobering up and revelation through hallucination, Dr. McNinja storms off again to save his family and restore his own honor at the same time.

There Is a Raptor in My Office

Dr. McNinja comes to work and finds that a Velociraptor has wrecked his office. A trio of raptor-riding banditos attack Dr. McNinja in order to try to get their raptor back, but are foiled and retreat. The following day, Dr. McNinja gets an anonymous tip on Myspace, and follows the leads to a self-obsessed villain the riders dubbed "Ab Man," upon whom they have sworn vengeance for "stealing their leader's internet girlfriend". Dr. McNinja assists them. They find "Ab Man" at a warehouse filled the McNinja burgers that he uses to power his organic jetpack. Battle ensues, but a mysterious third party shooter, who is actually the weather reporter shown earlier in the story arc, claims the final shot. Afterwards, the riders depart as promised, but leave Gordito in McNinja's care.

D.A.R.E to Resist Ninja Drugs and Ninja Violence

A two-issue story involving a drug that heightens one's ninja skills, the McNinja family's attempts to handle the situation, Dr. McNinja's training of Gordito, a clone of Benjamin Franklin who is working to make eternal life medically possible, and an evil Danish martial arts film star named Frans Rayner. Twenty years ago, Rayner fought Dan McNinja for leadership of the American Ninja Guild and almost won, until a young Doc determined Rayner's weak spot. Now, Rayner is plotting to kill Dr. McNinja with the aid of his midget henchman, Knickerbockers, in hopes of baiting McNinja's father into the open. The goons succeeded in dispatching both Dr. McNinja and Benjamin Franklin, resulting in Dr. McNinja splitting into two different spirits (one for his ninja half and one for his doctor half). However, when Death came to claim their souls, the two work together to dispatch Death and reunite in their old body.

The second half of this storyline involves Dr. McNinja's return to life and mission to get revenge against Rayner and his ninja minions. Teaming up with his father (disguised as a pirate to evade detection) Dr. McNinja synthesizes a drug to temporarily rob ninja of their abilities, and launches an attack on Rayner's mansion. The entire story is an homage to 80's action movies. Specifically, 80's films that involved ninjas as disposable enemies, as this is referred to as "The Ninja Holocaust of 1980", which Rayner was responsible for.

Revenge of the Hundred Dead Ninja

Focused around the consequences of the events in D.A.R.E. It is a spoof and homage to horror movies with an opening sequence that parodies the video clip to Michael Jackson's Thriller. It's also revealed that Dr. McNinja's home city is Cumberland, Maryland, and has an anti-zombie defense system which was put in place by Dr. McNinja and Mayor Chuck Goodrich.

I Told You That Story So I Could Tell You This One

While Gordito is sent away to train with Dr. McNinja's family, Dr. McNinja continues to search out the cause of the zombie outbreak. Also, a superhero called Beeman is shot to death and ends up in Purgatory where he has a conversation with the deceased Ben Franklin.

Here, we learn that Ben completed (at least with enough confidence to ingest it) his eternal life serum, and Dr. McNinja digs up Ben's grave to pull a very thirsty resurrected Franklin from his coffin. Currently, Ben's original body (circa 1700's) is a "deanimated" zombie, shot in the head by Gordito.

The title of this story is a tribute to the webcomic Achewood.

Spooky Stuff

The origin of Gordito's mustache is revealed. Dr. McNinja observes that the resurrected Benjamin Franklin is "an undead creature who feeds on hair and is being tormented by visitors from the spirit realm." Franklin had unwittingly obtained his eternal life serum from Dracula, so the Doctor investigates at the Red Cross headquarters, run by vampires. A vampire reveals that Ben is now part Headless Horseman, with hair consumption serving as the trigger preventing him from transforming fully. Dr. McNinja and Ben Franklin take a plane for Transylvania to confront Dracula. Meanwhile, Sean and Gordito are being trained by Dan and Mitzi for their upcoming battle with the Ghost Wizard, which The Catholic Church has hired them to defeat. On the plane, Ben hungers for hair, but Dr. McNinja cannot get any in time, so Franklin is transformed into a full Headless Horseman. The plane crashes and Ben Franklin rides away.

Punch Dracula

Dan, Mitzi, Dark Smoke Puncher, and Gordito isolate and fight the Ghost Wizard in a stolen submarine. Meanwhile, Dr. McNinja is teleported to Dracula's moon base from Transylvania. Dracula explains that he made Franklin into a headless horseman so he could gain knowledge of the afterlife. When Franklin returns with insufficient information Dracula decides to kill Dr. McNinja, hoping that he can defy death like he did in D.A.R.E. and return with more information. In response, Dr. McNinja punches Dracula and tries to escape. Dracula corners McNinja and reveals that he controls the Ghost Wizard. He threatens to command the Wizard to use a secret fourth power on Gordito, but due to the vagueness of Dracula's command the Ghost Wizard possesses Dark Smoke Puncher instead. Gordito saves Dark Smoke Puncher and destroys the Ghost Wizard. Dr. McNinja dons a spacesuit and surfs a robot copy of Dracula back to Earth. Some time afterward, McNinja goes to Ben Franklin II's grave to help the spirit conclude its earthly business. After obtaining a new head, Franklin fades away and returns to Purgatory.

Monster Mart

The first volume to be published in color opens with Dr. McNinja, Gordito, and Yoshi defeating and curing a young girl with Paul Bunyan's disease. Martin Monster, a former friend of Dr. McNinja, shows up requesting his help, stating that he has trouble controlling his transformations into a giant ogre-like monster. Dr. McNinja advises Martin that his problems are likely stress-related. Soon afterward McNinja's office is triggered for explosion, and the culprits implicate Martin. Martin admits that he joined the Cumberland Mafia (led by King Radical) as hired muscle to pay off a debt, although he was not involved in blowing up McNinja's office. King Radical had his men do so in retaliation for turning away a suspicious patient in the mafia. McNinja and Gordito help Martin in concocting a plan to remove a rival gang. When Dr. McNinja and Gordito are captured by the rival gang (led by the humanoid lobster man, The Robster), Martin becomes enraged and regains his power, destroying the enemy gang. In the aftermath of the fight, King Radical appears to pronounce Martin's debt settled.

Death Volley

Doctor McNinja is hired by the NSA to enter an ancient Inocktek Indian temple. Inside the temple is a wounded man – a champion tennis player – who must win a ritual tennis match with the temple's robots or the world will be destroyed. The mission is complicated by the temple's many death traps and Dr. McNinja's ex-girlfriend, Hortense (her story debut). Meanwhile, Gordito and Judy supervise the rebuilding of Doc's office and try to prevent a half-plumber, half-spy from installing surveillance equipment. A Secret Epilogue revealed that Hortense had been hired for the mission, not by Doc's parents (in an effort to bring them together), but by King Radical. The storyline references Zelda and Shrine of the Silver Monkey several times in both the characters' actions and in the alt text.

Doc Gets Rad

Dr. McNinja is determined to catch Cumberland Mafia boss King Radical. As soon as Doc decides that he needs a motorcycle to keep up with Radical's dirt bike, a stranger crashes his white rainbow-striped motorcycle in Doc's parking lot. Doc claims the motorcycle for himself, and becomes more and more violently obsessed with thwarting Radical's plans. He also dreams of riding a rainbow-maned unicorn. Gordito is concerned with Doc's behaviour, and discovers that the motorcycle's previous owner was driven mad by it. Radical and Doc duel through the streets of Cumberland, and then through the tunnels under the town. Radical reveals that Doc's motorcycle was originally an evil unicorn named Sparklelord, and implores Doc to shake off the influence of the motorcycle and help Radical banish it.

Army of One

Through a flashback, it is revealed that Dr. McNinja used an experimental cloning procedure in college to study a wide variety of disciplines simultaneously. In the process of amalgamating the clones back into one person, a time-traveler from the future arrives and destabilizes the machine used to bring them together, causing one clone to remain. The time traveler's suit is damaged during the explosion, sending him back to 1979. The time traveler is revealed as Chuck Goodrich, whose mission is to prevent Franklin's Zombie Ninja Apocalypse.

In present time, steampunk sky pirates kidnap the clone of Dr. McNinja, and during Dr. McNinja's attempted rescue, both of them are taken captive by Frans Rayner. Rayner has successfully created countless clones of Dr. McNinja. Dr. McNinja must defeat his own clones and then fight Rayner. Rayner is defeated, but escapes. The only clone that survives is the one from Dr. McNinja's college years.

Judy Gets A Kitten

While shopping for groceries, Judy the gorilla acquires a pet kitten. She brings it back to the office, only to turn her back for a moment and find that Yoshi has eaten it.

Stolen Pizza, Stolen Lives

A crossover with the popular Web comic Axe Cop, inked by both artists. Axe Cop summons Doctor McNinja and together they discover why pizza is turning people into monsters.

Space Savers

Chuck Goodrich reveals himself to be a time traveler, sent back in time to stop the zombie apocalypse. Unfortunately his success only created an alternate future, and more Chuck Goodriches continue to arrive from the future to stop different types of apocalypses. The newest Goodrich reveals that he is attempting to stop an imminent invasion by intelligent space dinosaurs.

Dr. McNinja, with Judy and the newly arrived Chuck Goodrich's help, attempts to steal a warhead to blow up a dinosaur scout ship that is supposed to appear in 48 hours. However, King Radical shows up to steal the warhead himself. After explaining they need the warhead to blow up the space dinosaurs, Radical lets them have it.

McNinja formulates a plan to sneak Chuck Goodrich into a NASA space shuttle. However, the plan fails when Mcninja knocks out Goodrich's partn and Goodrich and McNinja are attacked by Nasaghasts, ghosts that defend the space center. Dr. McNinja is forced to board the shuttle himself along with Goodrich. They successfully fire the missile at the dinosaur ship, but one of the Nasaghasts follow them into space, catches the missile, and hurls it back to their space shuttle. The shuttle is destroyed in the explosion, leaving Dr. McNinja's fate unknown.

Futures Trading

The story begins with a young Dr. McNinja investigating strange noises in his closet, seeing himself in the future during his chase with King Radical from the previous story, "Doc Gets Rad." Chuck Goodrich shows up and explains to Doc that his mind is stuck in the past and needs to find his present body. Doc finally catches up with his body in the shuttle, where Chuck smashes his Temporal Stabilizer to jump in time just before the shuttle gets blown up.

Doc and Chuck reemerge in Doc's family's cave, to discover that Space Dinosaurs have taken it over, along with the entire planet. They are captured by the dinosaurs, but escape when they learn that Dr. McNinja in this timeline is one of the leaders of the human resistance. Chuck and Doc discover, however, that this Doc is actually Doc's younger brother, Sean "Dark Smoke Puncher". With the help of King Radical, Gordito, and some of Doc's former patients, the brothers assault the dinosaur's stronghold to free a dinosaur named "The Ultimate Diplomat" to bring peace between the humans and dinosaurs and end the war. After assaulting the Dinosaur President's fortress with the help of some Paul Bunyan giants and a Nasaghast, they free the Diplomat using Dracula's Moon laser to break him out of his prison. The diplomat seems to have superpowers however and was able to convince everyone to lay down their arms. With a speech that was able to convince everyone that heard it that peace was the best option, the relations between dinosaurs and humans ended peacefully. Doc, Sean and Gordito return to the cave so the Doc can return home using the time warp underground. Though contemplating whether murdering the innocent scout was the right thing to do or not (because of the diplomat's words) King Radical rebuffed him immediately. He had not heard the rousing speech and thusly still resented the dinosaurs taking over Earth and murdering all their friends. Doctor McNinja jump into the time warp, but not before giving King Radical one more dirty look. The story wraps up with the Triceratops scout getting murdered by Doctor McNinja and him calling his family to see what was going. The epilogue states whilst the Doctor is on a plane (presumedly back home) that now instead of human jetpack hunting (which occurs in the Dinosaur future), there is rollerskate hunting which the Doctor makes a note to stop.

AWOL M.D.

With Doc still missing and the mayor Goodrich still in hiding, things in Cumberland start to get chaotic. The King of Hobos and his deputy, a mummy, take over as mayor and start shutting down King Radical's businesses. Mitzi contracts the deadly mummy's curse and is slowly dying. Dr. McLuchador, a former rival of McNinja, attempts to steal McNinja's patients and practice his controversial form of medicine. McBonalds starts selling the McNinja Burger again. A demon samurai is hunting for mayor Goodrich and want s to claim his soul.

Dan, Sean and Gordito try to find out what the demon samurai is up to so that they can find Goodrich & Doc again so they can cure Mitzi, while King Radical takes it upon himself to fight McNinja's former enemies and bring order back to Cumberland.

In Print

The first three volumes of Dr. McNinja are published and sold online by Topatoco, whereas the fourth volume will be printed by Dark Horse Comics as early as April 2011. All of the printed comics include comics not available on the Dr. McNinja website.

• Volume 1, The Adventures of Dr. McNinja, contains the first three issues Meet the Doctor and his Friendly Staff, So what is a McNinja?, and There is a Raptor in My Office, as well as some bonus material including a comic created for .Net Magazine and alt text for Meet the Doctor and his Friendly Staff, not present in the original web version.
• Volume 2, Dr. McNinja: Surgical Strike, contains parts one and two of D.A.R.E. To Resist Ninja Drugs and Ninja Violence, with bonus comic Black Ninja White Ninja.
• Volume 3, Operation Dracula! From Outer Space contains the issues Revenge of the Hundred Dead Ninja, I Told You That Story so I Could Tell You This One,, Spooky Stuff, and Punch Dracula, with bonus comic A Death in the Family.
• Volume 4, Night Powers, will include Monster Mart, Death Volley, and Doc gets Rad, with bonus comic Beyond Winter Wonderdome.

Awards

Dr. McNinja won the 2007 Web Cartoonist's Choice Award for Outstanding Superhero / Action Comic.

Cameos

Dr. McNinja has been featured in a few other webcomics, examples of which are listed below:

• Bunny - February 3, 2006 (here )-The comic depicts a bunny in Dr. McNinja garb with the caption "The Adventures of Dentist MacNinjaBunny."
• Shortpacked! - August 31, 2006 (here )- Dr. McNinja is shown in a single-frame reference to "Filthy Cartoonists." The reference indicates that Dr. McNinja is an exception to "those who pose as ninja."
• EddEgg - July 12, 2006 (here )- In the eighth frame, the artist has a list of potential comic ideas. One of the ideas is "A doctor who is also a ninja".
• Hookie Dookie Panic - #112 (here [2])- Dr. McNinja is seen in the background with wide eyes as Wilcow is in a fight with a mysterious fighter.
• Overcompensating - Multiple (here, here, and here ) - Several references to Dr. McNinja and author Chris Hastings.

• Bigger Than Cheeses - #737 (here [3])- One shot image of Dr. McNinja in a group of webcomics characters. He also made a cameo on #793 (here [4]) like in the previous cameo, he is shown with other webcomic characters.
• Diesel Sweeties - #2133 (here [5])- Zoha tells Dr. McNinja what it's like to be a Muslim on Halloween.
• I Was Kidnapped By Lesbian Pirates From Outer Space - (here [6])- A special one-story arc called The Search for the Fourth Wall features Dr. McNinja.
• Least I Could Do - DrMcninja appears in the April 10th, 2009 comic [7], along with a variety of other webcomic characters.
• Flaky Pastry - #153 (here [8])- The Neighbour is dressed as Dr. McNinja for Halloween.

Dr. McNinja also appeared on CBS's How I Met Your Mother on the second episode of the sixth season as a poster in the back of Barney Stinson's room.

Dr. McNinja also appears in the special features of the movie Ninja Assassin in the history of the ninja segment.

Dracula, as drawn by Christopher Hastings, appears on the cover of the Halloween album "The Worst Music Dracula Ever Heard".

Dr. McNinja had a crossover appearance with Axe Cop in Stolen Pizza - Stolen Lives.

See also

• Pirates versus Ninjas

External links

• The Adventures of Dr. McNinja
• Chris Hastings' myspace based on the fictional character
• The Adventures of Dr. McNinja RSS Feed
• TheWebComicList's entry on the comic
• The Adventures of Dr. McNinja profiled by io9