How To Draw Madness Combat Characters

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Acceptable Targets: Smokers are nearly always the first to die in a given scene, and are always killed in ways that make them look weak and unobservant.
Alternative Character Interpretation:
- POWERLESS.fla implies that Deimos was alive when Hank used him as a shield. Did Hank not know or not notice it? If he noticed, did he think Deimos was beyond saving or did he choose to not even try because he needed a decoy?
- In Expurgation, was Sanford screaming from pain or frustration? Or both?
Anti-Climax Boss: Mag Agent: N, the Final Boss of Project Nexus: Part 1. While he can take a lot of hits, he's an easy target due to being large and slow, and his attacks are very predictable and easy to dodge, while his backup serves more as a source of ammo than an actual threat. Especially notable in that the boss just before him is arguably harder.
Awesome Music: Sean Hodges, aka Cheshyre, is considered to be one of the greatest musical artists of all time on Newgrounds, and for good reason. His music fits perfectly within the dark and gritty universe of Madness Combat.
- Calliope, the theme song for when the series truly became Madness Combat.
- Apotheosis. Hot damn. Combined with the instantly-noticeable Art Evolution, you know this is the beginning of something epic.
- Train Madness from Antipathy. Not only is it pretty infectious, but it's also incredibly chaotic and fully suits the scene that plays along with it.The first song isn't too bad either.
- Consternation too. Not only does it have a bit of a primal feel to it, but it just reeks of a sense of finality, considering that this is the end of Tricky's saga of the series, even having a dark remix of Antipathy's Train Madness.
- Abrogation is probably the best of the lot. It features a few distorted snippets of BGMs from prior episodes, which may serve as a Boss Remix, and screams absolute finality given that it plays in what was originally intended to be the Grand Finale.
- Expurgation bears a similar vibe of finality, but is overall much darker in tone. You can hear the almost animalistic insanity in the song, punctuating incredibly much that Tricky has returned for one last round against Hank and Sanford - and this time, in the form of a body-hopping ruler of Hell itself .

Badass Decay: As a result of the series' escalation, enemies that get introduced as a threat tend to fade into the hordes as time goes on. As an example, one Agent was capable of putting Hank on the defensive, and when the same Agent is raised as a Zombie by Jesus, he managed to score a fatal wound. About one episode later, they're getting mowed down by the hundreds.
Broken Base: While not many people appear to outright dislike them, there are a few who prefer the old character sprites to the ones introduced in DedmosRebuilt, while other fans happily welcomed the new ones.
Catharsis Factor: After Deimos had been at Hell's mercy for the majority of his shorts, being impaled and transported across various places, it is utterly satisfying to see him hack all of Hell itself, and become a Pint-Sized Powerhouse that brutally beats down his enemies with nothing more than Super Reflexes and Super Strength in the finale.
Cargo Ship: Hank is sometimes jokingly shipped with the giant blender from Incident:001A due to his incredibly giddy excitement upon seeing it.
"Common Knowledge":
- It's common to assume that any character with a plain design is a grunt, and therefore that Hank, Sanford and Deimos were grunts before they got unique clothes. In reality, characters with plain designs can be many things, including civilians; "grunt" is simply the lowest rank in the AAHW and they just so happen to have a plain appearance.
- Fans were quick to call the giant skeleton from Expurgation a "MAG skeleton", even though nothing suggests that he's a magnified skeleton rather than being directly created as giant.
Continuity Lockout: Trying to watch the episodes out of order makes it impossible to understand just what's going on — Dedmos Adventure in particular is hard to appreciate without knowledge of the main series.
Crack Pairing: Internet shipping being what it is, Tricky and Hank have been paired up quite a lot even though the two absolutely hate each other and have murdered each other several times. But then the Tricky's crossover mod with Friday Night Funkin' included a brief Cry for the Devil moment where, during the bonus track, an unwillingly-resurrected Tricky calls out for Hank in fear and confusion shippers (both new and old) took this brief hint and ran with it, continuing to ship Hank and Tricky. Then it got even weirder...
Crazy Is Cool: Tricky, who fights with a stop sign and likes to wear peoples' heads as hats.
Crosses the Line Twice: Easily one of the bloodiest things ever, but you'll probably be too busy being awed to be horrified or offended. It helps that the art style makes the graphic violence easier to digest.
Demonic Spiders: Abominations from Nexus. They're fast, have plenty of health, completely ignore your TAC (shield) bar, and can start a Cycle of Hurting very easily. The best way to defeat them? Pack a Hand Cannon (eg. the Colt Revolver or Desert Eagle), Punch-Packing Pistol (eg. the M1911A1 or Glock 20), accurate SMG (eg. the Thompson or HK MP5), a powerful Assault Rifle (eg. the AK-74 or FN FAL) or a Shotgun (eg. the Norinco 97k)-you'll need it.
- The. Fucking. Zombies. They're a newbie trap in every way. Getting sandwiched between two is certain death.
- The ATP Soldats will dodge all your attacks unless you fire fast enough and will fire at you in small squads, easily decimating your Tac-Bar.
  - Riot Cops are even worse, and they have even longer Tac-Bars, so if you're running a gun build then pick your poison: wasting ammunition on copious amounts of nothing, or lots and lots of frustrating pistol-whipping. Their one saving grace is that Nexus Bolts kill them instantly.
- The G03LM units can only be defeated by knocking their mask off with a melee attack then firing at their exposed heads until their faces crack and die, which wouldn't be terrible except their melee attacks ignore your Tac-Bar and deplete your health directly, and they're not averse to packing melee weapons. Even the ones with guns can knock you over with their weapons, making you drop whatever you're holding. And that's only the regular ones. The worst are the special red and black ones, which carry miniguns as standard issue and to get to their heads first, you have to hit them hard enough to crack their mask open, then shoot them-which can take a very long time, since their masks are over twice as tough as that of a normal G03LM.
Ensemble Dark Horse: 2BDamned, the enigmatic masked man that helps Deimos in DedmosRebuilt.fla. He doesn't really do much on-screen, but is still memorable due to his unique look and being yet another ally to Hank, Sanford, and Deimos. Krinkels confirming that we will see more of him also helps. His side-episode, DISSENTER, only served to make him more popular. Throughout the episode, 2BDamned gains the upper hand over the ATP Engineers and Soldats sent to kill him through misdirection, hacking skills and sheer trolling, with a neat display of sniping skills as well. The nickname "Doc" has actually been confirmed by now, appearing in the login information during the beginning of 9.5.
Everyone Is Jesus in Purgatory: Taken Up to Eleven throughout the series, considering the nature of the animation. The dull-yet-vivid art style, barebones storyline, Grey And Red Morality, and the fact that Jesus himself literally makes an appearance really seals the deal on this trope for many viewers. This is without mentioning the so-called "Higher Powers" that consistently resurrect Hank and other characters.
Fandom-Specific Plot: The plot of many fan animations consist of having one or multiple OC protagonists assaulting an AAHW or Nexus building. This is also a plot point that often appears in the canon animations, but the assaults in fan animations often aren't interrupted by unexpected events, unlike in canon.
Fanon:
- For some reason, fans seem to pin Sanford as an alcoholic.
- If the fanart will be detailed enough to include these, Deimos' teeth will be drawn as very sharp and pointy.
- Tricky is often portrayed with an habit of flipping the bird in fan works, even if he never does that in any official Madness Combat works.
- In Abrogation and Expurgation, Hank protects Sanford several times despite being noted as much less intelligent than before. This has lead the fandom to occasionally headcanon that Hank has Papa Wolf (or to some, Mama Bear) instincts towards his allies, Deimos and Sanford in particular.
Foe Yay Shipping: There are people who enjoy Tricky/Hank and The Auditor/Hank, and while less popular Tricky/Auditor has its fair share of fans as well. Most people ship the former as a joke.
Fountain of Memes: The Monster Clown himself, to the point that his Friday Night Funkin' mod has an entire page about the memes he spawned.
Fridge Brilliance:
- The way dialogue is portrayed in the Incidents is strange at first; A stop in the action to display a black screen with just the subtitles for an otherwise silent exchange. Especially weird when the main series has no problem displaying their dialogue in-frame to keep the action going. But think about why Madness is so monochrome to begin with; because it started as a pastiche of early films, which were primarily silent aside from music. In order to portray dialogue, a common practice was to simply have an actor clearly articulate that they're saying something, then splice in a card with the dialogue. Since the Incidents themselves exist primarily just to explore a single setpiece or joke, much like the original Marshmallow Madness, it's almost bringing it back full-circle.
- Tricky notwithstanding, Inundation is essentially a final act of Shooing Out The Clowns for the Madness storyline by killing off the only character of the main roster whose existence is inherently parodic in nature. Jesus being, well Jesus, he was always meant as a satire of overly-religious types, slinging around magic and raising people as zombies. So, when he gets the Auditor to destroy the final Improbability Drive even at the cost of his life, that death is literally reining in the Madness universe's outlandishness a bit more by having him "go the way of the Sheriff".
- Doubles as a case of Meaningful Name. Antipathy. A strong dislike, an aversion. Antipathy is also when things start to go downhill for our protagonist. Conversely, Hank himself starts to show a more marked dislike, an ANTIPATHY to his opponents, if his more brutal kills are anything to go by. The universe itself is starting to express an antipathy for Hank, and vice versa.
Goddamned Bats: Sleepwalkers from Project Nexus. They're relatively weak, lack a Tac-Bar, and tend to not have any weapons. However, they can steal your weapons and have to be killed three times before they stay dead. And they explode on their third death. This doesn't do too much damage, but does knock you back and make you drop your weapon, which will most likely be picked up by another Sleepwalker due to their tendency to spawn in groups. Fortunately, decapitating them will prevent them from reviving/exploding, so pack a big gun and aim for the head - you'll need it.
Growing the Beard: Apotheosis is generally regarded as when the series went from a mildly above-average Flash fight series to something special.
I Am Not Shazam: The mustached beings with actual faces from Romp.fla have commonly been referred to as "Romps", but they're never referred to as such in-universe. This mostly stems from the fact that these beings have not been named as of yet and that "Romp" is merely the name of the short.
The Law of Fan Jackassery: Unfortunately, the Madness Combat fandom is filled with unsavory, toxic people due in part to its awkward mix of obscurity, and being a relatively large fandom (of around 2,000 individuals or so). Ask just about any of the fans who know what's going on and you'll find that everyone has a beef with someone. There is also a huge gatekeeper mentality where old fans act hostile towards newcomers simply because the new users try a novel approach to their creations, or if they discovered the series from something else that happened to reference Madness. Ultimately with how terrifyingly self-demonstrating this is, Madness Combat could probably even be used as a case study for this trope, since the jackassery levels are right about at their peak. That, and many egotistical fan animators who are highly skilled, but disagree with each other, tend to forego simple camaraderie simply because they feel they are "the best".
- Krinkels himself has expressed displeasure with this behavior and "tribalist" mindset on some occasions, but would rather not do anything about it because he sees the risks with getting involved, and would rather just keep churning out more content and focusing on things that actually matter.
LGBT Fanbase: While there are no men or women in Madness Combat (If Word of God is to be believed), the series has a healthy number of gay fans because of the entire cast being predominantly composed of male (or at least male-presenting) characters. With most of the shipping being predominantly made up of gay couples ^note (although there's a scant few straight couples but that involves OCs or Rule 63 shenanigans). Not to mention the Ho Yay between Sanford and Deimos. They're arguably the series' Fan-Preferred Couple due to being the first example of teamwork in a series where most main characters fought solo. Their "serious guy and joker guy" dynamic also greatly helps.
Memetic Mutation:
- The ladder Hank and Sanford climb down in Abrogation became memetic in the fandom, who joke that it's responsible for the time gap between episodes 10 and 11 by claiming that they were climbing down it for the entire seven-year gap between those episodes. Doesn't help that in 11 by the time we get back to Hank and Sanford it's the two of them finally reaching the end of that ladder.
- Deimos's death is subject of several jokes and memes in the Madness Combat fandom, likely because he dies without much fanfare in the middle of the episode he's introduced in. His comedic personality in a world of violence also generally makes him easy to make memes of.
- When the Deimos Adventure mini-series started, it became a meme to call Deimos, "Dedmos" (Something Krinkels himself did). With the last episode, people now call him Rockmos because of his new rock form. With some fans even going further with the joke by outright putting Deimos outfit (and cross face) on a rock and calling that Rockmos.
- "Remember when it started with a fight over a boombox?" or any other sentence that references said boombox. It's something fans often say in the episodes, shorts or even in the comments of fan animations. Pointing out the contrast between the silly Excuse Plot of the first episode compared to the later episodes and all the subsequent fan animations made of the series.
- Tiky ^Explanation A meme from Among Us that was refitted into Madness Combat's characters, but instead of someone saying "Amogus", there is a Grunt saying "Tiky" in front of a much smaller and silly looking Tricky. Then a bass-boosted version of Madness plays after the Grunt says "Tiky" in video forms of the meme.
- "HANK! HAAAANK! GET THE SWEET AND SOUR SAUCE HANK!" ^Explanation A meme that was formerly ◊ related to Breaking Bad and originated from 4chan. Due to the name being screamed out on the post, it was immediately overtaken by the Madness Combat and Friday Night Funkin' community. With AetherDX and Kira_Supernova making a voiced version of the meme. Naturally this has only led to many artists and animators creating animated shitposts of the audio. There's even a few where Tricky is replaced by other cast members of MC.
- Thiccy ^Explanation Another byproduct of the Friday Night Funkin' crossover (see Crack Pairing above) coupled with the internet's insatiable desire for Rule 63 / 34 resulted in exactly what you would expect; Tricky re-drawn as a curvaceous woman to make the ship with Hank both more and less weird at the same time... Some even just use this meme name on drawing of Tricky where he's just given a big butt for no apparent reason.
- Sadness Combat ^Explanation A meme started by Red Labs and [1], with the latter even making the art that would spawn this meme but was colored and touched up by someone else. It depicts a small chibi-fied sad grunt with a wide sad eyebrows and frown, alongside a tear under one of their "eyes" in reference to SpongeBob's sad expression from the episode "Christmas Who?". It has since made rounds in the fandom as either pictures or videos.
- Madness Combat is an anti-smoking PSA. ^Explanation In reference to the Running Gag of smokers dying first in most episodes.
Mexicans Love Speedy Gonzales: Jebus was initially created as a shallow Take That! against Christians when he appeared in the very first episode. Since then he became The Dragon during the Sheriff arc before establishing himself as Hank's chief rival and a totally badass Religious Bruiser. After Inundation (an entire Main-series episode centered around him and involving him going toe-to-toe with the Auditor and blowing up his HQ) and a later Retcon in Project Nexus (he's not actually Jesus, but a former Nexus scientist who went rogue after seeing what his research was being used for), many Christian madness fans consider him one of their favorite characters of the whole series.
Narm: The first minute of Redeemer shows Hank sneaking around The Sheriff's office and making silent kills on some grunts. It's a genuinely suspenseful and tense scene... right up until Hank kills one of the grunts by shoving him into another one. It's clearly intended to come across as disturbingly chilling, yet just looks unintentionally ridiculous in such a serious scene.
Nausea Fuel: With the breathtaking body count in this series, it stands to reason that some deaths would be more gruesome and graphic than others. Special mention goes to things like Hank tearing part of a mook's face off in Consternation, Jesus ripping out a Mag Agent's brain in Incident: 110A, and around half of Deimos's kills in Dedmos Rebuilt.
Recurring Fanon Character: The fandom has been around for quite a long time. With several fan animators having their own sonas or fan characters, some have left quite an impact. With even two Fandom wikis dedicated to keeping track of most of them.
The Scrappy: Even according to Krinkels' blog, the Sheriff is universally recognized as the most useless and hated character who Krinkels was glad to be rid of. Krinkels even used the term "going the way of the Sheriff" to allude to being Killed Off for Real.
- Which became Hilarious in Hindsight given that the Sheriff is making a comeback in Project Nexus 2, with a few new levels in badass to boot.
Self-Fanservice: The characters are regularly drawn with more humanoid bodies in fanart. Common depictions include Hank and Sanford being jacked, Deimos being skinny but having some muscle, and Tricky being chubby. It helps that Krinkels also draws his characters this way, particularly the former three examples, himself.
Sequel Difficulty Spike: The transition in difficulty from Episode 1 to Episode 1.5 in Madness: Project Nexus (Classic) isn't so much a spike as it is a sheer cliff. The enemies are much more dangerous, the levels are much longer, and the number of enemies you have to deal with is borderline unfair at times.
Sequel Displacement: Madness Consternation has become the iconic episode of the series. With even the fan game (made by the Tom Fulp and MindChamber themselves) Madness Accelerant being essentially a playable version of the episode and of Hank's many designs over the course of the series, he usually shows up in his Consternation-era getup, in any crossover and game, with even Krinkels acknowledging this as various Incidents and other non-canon shorts showing Hank in the same get up. This is mostly because Consternation has left quite the impact on the series, such as said Consternation-era Hank design being his last before his MAG form was introduced.
- Many other concepts and elements in later episodes have also become a mainstay in the series and its fandom, such as the MAG Agents, Tricky's demon form, the ATPs and the Auditor.
Ships That Pass in the Night: Hank/2BDamned is a semi-popular ship, but as of Madness Combat 9.5 both of them have yet to interact.
That One Boss:
- The G03LM Mk 2 in the campaign of Project Nexus. As mentioned above, you have to go up to him and knock his helmet off with melee attacks, in order to expose his head and allow you to damage him. Problem: this guy's packing a giant axe that can kill you in two hits on Normal difficulty, which also ignores your Tac-Bar and cannot be blocked. Enjoy.
- MAG Agent: Gestalt, the boss of the Muta-Lab in Project Nexus Episode 1.5. You have to shoot through his armor in order to actually damage him, but he'll constantly be throwing out punches and body-slams that will disarm you and knock you down, making it very possible for him to put you in a Cycle of Hurting as you try to retrieve your weapon. It doesn't help that Abominations spawn continuously throughout the fight and can easily finish you off after Gestalt knocks you down.
That One Level: Really, the entirety of Project Nexus Episode 1.5 could count, but the Muta-Lab is where the game really starts getting frustratingly hard. Most of the enemies are Abominations, and there's a lot of them; if you run out of ammo at any point (which is very probable), you're dead.
Viewer Name Confusion: The G03LM units from Project Nexus are sometimes written as "G0L3M" by fans, reading it as "golem" mostly because of the confusing acronym and Leet Lingo used in the name.
Visual Effects of Awesome: Krinkels spent half a year working on the first minute or so of Abrogation, and good lord does it show.
- Most of the series has a level of quality to its animations and detail that is a step above most other Flash animated movies on Newgrounds. The result is that the series can communicate body language and emotions without even having faces on their characters for the most part.
What an Idiot!: For some reason, The Auditor thought it was a good idea to fire a high-explosive rocket at Jebus while he was standing directly next to the main Improbability Drive. Predictably, he damages the Drive and begins the normality restoration process.
The Woobie: The sheer amount of crap Deimos goes through in his own sub-series led to a lot of viewers expressing sympathy for him.