Torg

Torg is the protagonist in most storylines of Sluggy Freelance, having appeared in more than half of the site's comics at last count. He's impulsive and not so bright, and yet he sometimes comes up with surprising but clever solutions to problems. Torg is the prototypical all-around good guy, who is well-liked by everyone who isn't evil.

Biography
Torg says he has some Viking heritage, which may explain his name. His family has never been introduced in the comic, but it was revealed that his parents died when he was a child. Torg grew up with his best friend and current roommate Riff. As a child he displayed the same flair for good-natured mischief that he continues to have in his adult life. He presumably went to college and after college became a freelance web designer. Torg was a freelance web designer for many years before his business went bankrupt. Since then he has had little success with jobs, having a severe problem with a regimented work schedule or the very concept of having to be up before 9 AM. He started working for Adversion Advertisement in May 2005, but was fired in January 2007 for constant absences from work.

Because Torg has been a character in almost every story in Sluggy, the easiest way to understand his story is just to read the Sluggy archives from beginning to end. Included here is only a list of some of the more important stories for him personally.

Torg's middle name has been revealed to be "Sluggy," connecting him both to the bun-bun lookalike god of fighting of the same name and the code name given to Riff by Hereti-Corp.

Torg's first appearance is in the very first strip. Soon he buys Bun-bun, which starts a long relationship of antagonism and good times (Along Came a Bunny).

Early on, Torg was transported by the DFA into the Dimension of Science Fiction Cliches, where he met Aylee. He eventually hired her as a secretary, and the two became friends.

Not long after, the DFA sent him to the Dimension of Pain, but he escaped to the Dimension of Lame and was eventually sent back to his own dimension by the DoL's alternate Bun-bun.

Back in our world, Torg had started slowly getting closer to Valerie, Sam's wife. Eventually he fell in love with her. It soon became apparent that she was a vampire who loved him only for his close resemblance to her deceased husband from several hundred years ago, and that she wanted to turn him into a vampire. Eventually Torg had to stake her in order to save his friends. Torg and Valerie met again when Torg and Zoë traveled back in time to stop K'Z'K. He failed to save her however, and she still became a vampire.

Then he goes camping with Bun-bun and Kiki and they run into Oasis who (accidentally?) falls in love with him but then explodes.

Torg travels quite a bit, visiting not only the Dimension of Pain and the Dimension of science fiction cliches, but also the Dimension of Lame, the Punyverse, Hell, a universe where earth has been taken over by zombies, and Wispydale.

Personality
Torg is marked by his amiable personality and his unwavering loyalty to his friends, which sometimes causes him to act in selfless (and sometimes reckless) ways. He has taken on an increasingly heroic and deep personality as several of his adventures have taken him far away from friends for long periods of time in ever more lethal situations. He was emotionally shattered after spending much of 2004 in the middle of a demonic invasion of a parallel universe.

His most normal and natural behavior, however, is of a bumbling and cheerful geek that usually (though unintentionally) cause all sorts of confusions around himself, a habit that often upsets his friends (particularly Zoë). However, they all acknowledge that Torg is good-hearted and never meant harm to them, and they tend forgive him after a short time. Despite this numerous signs of stupidity, Torg has proved on more than one occasion to be very cunning and creative when needed and has saved the day several times because of this. Sasha once even pointed out that Torg is much more clever than his immature antics lead other people to believe, borderline to downright genius level of intelligence.

Torg seems to have problems with steady or stable relationships, as most of the women with any romantic designs on Torg have generally found themselves dead, emotionally traumatized, or generally not very well-off. For example, when Torg gave Zoë a necklace found in a lost Egyptian pyramid, it turned out to be cursed and turned her into a camel. This pattern of girlfriend-destruction itself can even be seen as self-perpetuating, since one of the reasons Torg has not actively pursued a relationship with Zoë (or broken it off when it got too intimate) is that he fears that if he lets her become close she too will fall victim to one of the many weird dangers that Torg constantly finds himself surrounded by. This fear was increased after Alt-Zoë was killed in front of him in 2004, but after confronting this fear in the shadow world during the Wayang Kulit adventure, he has moved past it. He is now attempting to track down Oasis and sort things out to remove any danger to Zoë.

Despite his good nature, Torg can be quite vicious if angered. For exemple in Broken, after Torg was presented with evidence that seemed to point to Zoë's death, he apparently covered up the memory. When a psychologist forced him to face the memory, Torg snapped and beat up the man. He later repressed the memory again. Also, in Safehouse, after Torg's garden was eaten by woodland animals, he become outraged and started to daydreaming to make the animals suffer in Saw stile, much to Zoe's disgust. Also, in recent times, Torg has become seriously determinated to bring down Herit-Corp, making Torg display a darker aspect of his personality that upsets Zöe to no end.