Webcomic / Bodysuit 23

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3 things you should never ask a woman:
1. Her Age
2. Her Weight
3. What's Under Her Zipper

— 2018 Tagline

Bodysuit 23 is a Transformation Webcomic by Patricia Barton — known online by the handle "Mehgazone", "Megazone" or "Megazone23", named after but otherwise unrelated to the anime of the same name — originally starting in 2014, with pages releasing usually on a (bi-)weekly basis.

The series follows an ordinary college student, Kevin Spencer, who one day finds himself in possession of a very peculiar device: a realistic full bodysuit that when worn transforms him into a woman. Initially using it to his advantage by getting a taste of the world of femininity, he quickly finds himself having to live out a double life among various friends and acquaintances, both as himself and his female persona, Doris Lang, all while making sure that his secret remains hidden.

By the author's own admission, Bodysuit 23 originally started merely as a "silly fetish comic" without much plot in mind, but it pretty quickly developed an overarching story featuring recurring characters and ever-evolving plot threads and story arcs, in addition to integrating elements of comedic Slice of Life with the occasional wacky detour into other genres for flavor. However, while later comics tend to tone down the Fanservice, it still periodically contains nudity and other adult situations (especially regarding non-canon side-art featuring the characters), so be advised: this comic is Not Safe for Work.

The comic is available on Mehgazone's website, as well as on her Patreon, DeviantArt, and Tapas (the latter two featuring some censorship of more explicit bits, though again, all pages are NSFW).

Mehgazone began a second, unrelated webcomic in 2023 — the more family-friendly action-comedy Transformation Comic, A Kat's (GOD AWFUL!!!) Blessing, which is adapted from her webnovel entry on Honeyfeed.fm of the same name — with the two series running concurrently. Mehgazone also has other novels and webnovels that she's written over the years, most of which also ties into genderbending or transformation in some form or fashion, including:

• Magical Girl Dallas (Episode 1 - 7)
• The Waitresses of Café des Gros Durs (are dudes)
• Magical Knight Lune XY: My HOMIE Swooped Me off My Feet, and Now I Think I Might Be in LOVE?!

(Note: while Kevin and Doris are the same person, Kevin identifies with male pronouns while Doris exclusively with female pronouns. Whichever identity and set of pronouns is to be used per entry description will be dependent on which of them is socially engaging with others in any given moment, with the understanding that Kevin is "Doris" in private, but most other characters simply see Doris as a "she/her"-identifying woman.)

This webcomic provides examples of:

• The Alcoholic: Angela frequently has a glass of something strong in her hands. Ironically, it turns out she can become quite an expressive Sentimental Drunk, a far cry from how she normally acts.
• Ambiguously Evil: Jade Franklin goads Miranda into being her superior over the now-clandestine bodysuit project in a manner that certainly sounds like extortion, but she also keeps her cards close to her chest over what exactly she wants from the exchange, for better and for worse. At the very least, her civil, affable demeanor is tricky to parse out as being sincere or just a thinly-veiled ruse.
• Ambiguous Gender Identity: A steady throughline of the comic since the beginning is the question regarding Kevin's gender identity — from an early age, he enjoyed dressing in girl's clothes, disappointed that his face still looked male, and in the present day uses the bodysuit that allows him to become completely female to live out his mundane fantasies in being a woman. However, he doesn't ever explicitly come out as transgender to his close associates, with Elaine seeing him as a cisgender male who just happens to be okay with periodically crossplaying. This gets deconstructed, after a recent chapter where Owen unintentionally offends Kevin by revealing his assumptions about the latter being transgender...only for Kevin to admit that he's never given any serious thought as to whether he is or isn't. Even bringing up the subject to Miranda doesn't resolve matters, as she points out that only Kevin knows what he is or isn't.
• Animesque: Mehgazone clearly loves anime and has been referencing various series of new and old since the beginning, but as the series went on and Art Evolution took hold, the art style has become increasingly reminiscent of anime and manga from the 80's to 90's. The characters Sofia and Daphne (introduced in chapter 39, well after the style started taking hold for the series) especially look like they've stepped out of the era with their crazy hair, campy outfits, and intense, cartoonishly stylized expressions.
• Art Evolution: The comic originally started as a very amateur effort, but over the decade of progression has become substantially more professional-looking, lightly reminiscent of manga from the 1990's.
• Author Appeal: As admitted in a handful of non-canon side comics, Mehgazone primarily started Bodysuit 23 to explore their fixations for male-to-female transformations as well as anime and video games, to the point that even after the comic started taking itself more seriously as a story, Mehgazone still referred to it as just a "fetish comic" (though funnily enough, she would finally come out as a trans woman in 2024, which she admitted came after almost a decade of denial).
• Bathroom Break-Out: In chapter 6, Doris — fearing that Angela had just spotted the zipper on her back — makes a break for it through the window to avoid further conversation.
• Becoming the Costume: Subverted: while she's willing to draw out non-canon works involving the idea (including the Feghoot below) Megazone has consistently made it clear, even to the point of emphasizing it in an FAQ on her website, that Kevin will never be bonded to the bodysuit and become Doris permanently.
• Bilingual Bonus: The In Medias Res confrontation between Owen and a former friend-turned-terrorist at the start of chapter 13 is initially spoken in German before Owen gets sick of it and they switch back to English, making the sudden exposition of the criminal's evil plans (involving throwing orphans into a black hole) even more ridiculous. The German is, in fact, indicative of such subject matters.
• Black Boss Lady: Jade Franklin is Miranda's superior and government correspondent overseeing the bodysuit project, with her later forcing herself back into an overseeing position even after the project is officially canned when she discovers that Miranda has been continuing R&D on its surviving sample in private. She passive-aggressively extorts Miranda into cooperating by warning her of the consequences of working rogue on government tech, with Miranda sure that Franklin has some kind of hidden agenda for it, but unsure of what it could possibly be.
• Black Box: The comic doesn't go into extensive detail how Kevin's bodysuit works, simply establishing that him putting it on and zipping up enough effectively replaces his body. The only person with any knowledge of how it works is its creator, Miranda, who periodically confirms it to be technological in nature, but the series doesn't concern itself for what exactly the suit is made of that it can convincingly simulate normal flesh, replicate internal anatomy, what exactly Miranda does to "design" or "adjust" it, etc.
• Cannot Spit It Out: By the time Kevin's secret gets revealed to Angela, he's forced to confront the fact that he's been lying to Elaine about who "Doris" is just so his bodysuit isn't revealed, with Angela pressuring him to tell her the truth before it goes further than it already has. This unfortunately doesn't make him any less reluctant — he gets his last opportunity the night before she heads to New York for university as the two have a quiet night walk together, but as Elaine reveals her own feelings — her reluctance to actually leave because of how much she'll miss him, with his approval that she should follow her dreams leading to their First Kiss — he never gets the chance.
• Chekhov's Gun: Chapter 17 shows Miranda on vacation on a beach somewhere, meeting a suspicious man who drops off a briefcase regarding the bodysuit project for her. Chapter 27 has her reveal when questioned by Owen, who was sent to intercept the exchange in Columbia, with him mistakenly believing it was for some kind of bio-weapon, that it was a component for "concealment" for the bodysuit. Chapter 33 further elaborates what that meant: it was for concealing the bodysuit's zipper — due to having limited resources available for testing, Miranda plans to have Kevin remain sealed in the bodysuit for six months.
• Childhood Friends: Kevin is close friends with local Cosplay Otaku Girl Elaine, who he gets to know both as "Kevin" and as "Doris", with her not knowing they're the same person but getting along with them on their own terms. It's established early on that for Kevin, Elaine is his only friend based on his contact list. It's because of this close friendship that Kevin worries about his secret bodysuit and the truth about "Doris" getting revealed to her, and it's why she's so reluctant to leave for New York without him.
• Chuunibyou:
  • Kevin has a degree of this early on, especially when first getting used to his bodysuit and the opportunities it presents to him. He indulges in a bit of edgy, dramatic monologuing as a lead-in before getting dressed in a Magical Girl costume... at least until he realizes he forgot to pull down the blinds to his window. Chapter 8 sees Doris taking strategy for a laser tag date a smidge too seriously, having an Imagine Spot of her and Owen prepping amidst a blasted-out urban landscape before he snaps her out of it.
  • Elaine was very much this in her youth, with her and Kevin first meeting on a playground when they were in middle school as she was living out her anime fantasies, convinced that she mastered ninjutsu when she was six, having come from a long line of ninja (despite her father being Vietnamese). She'd rather you forget that phase to spare her the embarrassment.
• Clingy Costume:
  • A variant; the bodysuit is not a clingy for the most part, and Kevin can remove it easily. However, when he's discovered by Miranda, its creator, she explains that it features a security feature that identifies and locks onto the DNA of the first person to wear it, and as such, Kevin is the sole person who can wear it for its intended purpose without it looking like a deflated sex doll. Kevin is eager to still be able to keep it, but this means that Miranda will have to use him as a test subject for her continual experiments regarding the suit.
  • In chapter 27, Kevin accidentally finds himself unable to zip out due to his use of pink body paint to cosplay Mina Ashido, which unintentionally interfered with the bodysuit's electronics. Miranda heads over in person to activate a failsafe to free him, but in the process, Angela sees Kevin in the bodysuit and accidentally discovers his secret.
  • This is intentionally done as of Chapter 35, where Miranda seals Kevin inside the Doris persona with a special sealant as part of her experiments for at least six months. Doris has to do most of her Kevin-centric activities either online or somewhere she won't be seen until the experiment ends.
• Closet Geek: Angela seems usually pretty dismissive of Elaine's otaku hobbies and work in cosplay, but in chapter 19, after getting convinced by Elaine to watch My Hero Academia with her (along with some vodka), she gets quite hooked on it and suggests that they go to a convention in cosplay together.
• Cold Snap: Chapter 41 sees the town being unexpectedly hit with three inches of snow, with virtually everyone losing their mind (by Kevin's own account, Texans aren't used to receiving snow in any capacity). The first morning after it falls, the neighborhood looks like it's been turned into a warzone with cars having crashed and piled up into each other all over the place.
• Continuity Creep: The comic originally started fairly episodically as a lighthearted ecchi gag series about a young man using his sex-changing bodysuit to do Fanservice-y things and mundane wish fulfillment. Steadily over time, however, Bodysuit 23 has taken its plot and its themes more seriously with a larger focus on character interplay and development, sometimes to the point where fanservice or adult situations in general are absent for chapters at a time.
• Contrived Coincidence: Played for Laughs in chapter 10, which explains the bodysuit's backstory and why it fell into Kevin's hands: It was being developed as part of a government lab experiment, but a janitor mistook it as trash, tossed it into a trashcan which unknowingly contained a functional wormhole that just happened to teleport matter to a random place in the universe (i.e., on top of Kevin). Then the lab was destroyed after the gas station next door exploded, destroying all the prototypes and Miranda's work except for the lost bodysuit.
• Cosmetic Catastrophe: Not a full-blown "catastrophe", but Kevin's first stab at trying makeup in his female form involves attempting to apply lipstick, smudging his mouth, and then quietly putting it off till later.
• Cosplay Otaku Girl: Elaine, who frequents cons and designs costumes for herself, Kevin, and others who commission her.
• Costumes Change Your Size: The ability of the bodysuit isn't a major focus, but Miranda describes the technology as being designed — at least in theory — to be able to make those who wear it to appear significantly smaller when wearing the suit, making it a better disguise tool for spies.
• Creator Cameo: When Doris plays an MMORPG at the start of chapter 23, one of the players in the in-game chat is listed as Patricia.
• Creepy Cave: In chapter 26, Owen is led to the government archives deep within their facility, a route which includes an exit out the elevator into a dark cave and a massive wooden door wrapped with chains and a vaguely demonic-looking red seal. Greg tells him not to worry as that's just an electrical closet — the whole thing was just set-dressing by an overzealous interior designer.
• Damn You, Muscle Memory!:
  • Early in the series, Kevin ends up doing things on reflex while in the bodysuit that don't make sense or otherwise come off as faux pas, such as accidentally introducing himself as "Kevin" when Owen asks for "her" name and ordering "the usual" at a café to a waitress who has no idea who "she" is.
  • Later as the various cover stories for Kevin/Doris' lives get increasingly mixed up, Doris seeks advice from Owen over his situation at home of Miranda moving in, making things awkward with his friend, Elaine, after Miranda blurted something out that made it seem like they were having sex. However, Doris/Kevin forgets that the exchange happened out of the bodysuit and was with him and Elaine — to Owen, he just assumes that Doris was having her cousin move in, and thus finds it bizarre why she'd say something that crass and sexual to a relative.
  • Almost happens again in chapter 39, where during a run, Doris runs into Andrea, a friend of Elaine that Kevin met at a party a while ago. Doris initially claims that they met before, but when she remembers the circumstance, she backspaces and instead claims she was probably very forgettable, saving Andrea the confusion.
• Different for Girls: Kevin is initially very awkward in behaving like a "normal" woman despite looking the part, from "feminine" social customs to simply figuring out how to wear certain clothes and do makeup. This usually happens in public, but it also occurs in private when it comes to indulging his own fantasies, which turn out to be surprisingly more mundane than he expected.
• A Dog Named "Dog": Literally; Owen's dog is just named "Dog".
• Dream Sequence: Chapter 33 opens with what looks like a flashback of a younger Elaine dressing up a younger Kevin in her dress, before his face has suddenly become that of Doris (and she's not wearing the suit), Elaine's mom turns out to be Angela, who scolds and punishes him for not telling Elaine the truth about Doris when he had the chance... then he wakes up.
• Dude Magnet: Being a beautiful blonde based off the attractive and brilliant scientist Miranda, Doris has gained quite a bit of attention from men. Owen initially had an attraction to her until he found out her true identity, although he's still amiable to her, his older brother Jesse calls her cute much to her pleasure, and she also got quite a bit of positive attention from various other men during the comic about her being catcalled (although that ended up being very tiring for her as the catcalls became more frequent and more creepy). It's strongly implied that even Angela was initially interested in her due to her similarity to a blonde girl she had a crush on back in high school though that rapidly vanishes once she finds out about the truth.
• Dumb Blonde: Well, dumb brunette, but Kevin is not the sharpest tool in the shed, and this carries over when he becomes the beautiful blonde Doris. an early chapter has her accidentally being this when a man opens the door for her...only for her to run into the glass next to the door because she was so distracted ruminating on how ladylike she feels that she wasn't paying attention to where she was going.
• Early-Bird Cameo: Madison wouldn't be properly named until chapter 13, but she makes an early speaking appearance in chapter 8, accompanying Owen and wondering what happened to him after Doris kicks him in the junk and runs away with Elaine.
• Erotic Dream: One of the earliest comics has Doris imagining herself having sex with a man, much to her dreaming self's giggly pleasure. The pleasure ends up going away very quickly once the imaginary Doris gets married, pregnant and has a child, with the real Doris waking up with red-veined eyes in response to the idea.
• Exact Words: In chapter 15, Madison shows up in the morning to fix the party's car, with Owen — having spent the night attempting to call her — wondering where she was. She explains "I dropped my phone and it broke." Earlier in the chapter and in the previous night, she hurled it out her window.
• Expy: Greg Oneoff — the deadpan, comically serious office clerk and sole member of the Office of Censorship — who Megazone described as being based on Captain Kiichi Gotō of Patlabor.
• Feghoot: The 2020 Halloween mini-comic features a non-canon scenario of Doris obtaining a bodysuit designed after Madison, attending a costume party where everyone turns out to be Madison, discovering to her horror that her own zipper has disappeared, and realizing "We've all gone mad... ison." The last page is a complete slam-on-brakes interruption between two Author Avatars arguing over the crappiness of the joke.
• Foreshadowing: Page #199 (an epilogue page for chapter 10) is an unexplained image showing a photograph of Owen at a park with an unseen woman sitting next to him, along with a switchblade and a German passport. This would end up hinting to Owen being revealed to be a secret agent in chapter 13, with the unseen woman being his partner, Madison (who had made an Early-Bird Cameo in chapter 8).
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: While Owen does have an understated quirky side to him, he's usually pretty easygoing and professional guy who works a desk job (at least when he isn't an active secret agent). Contrast with his more rambunctious older brother, Jesse, who is a loudmouthed Adventurer Archaeologist who takes every opportunity to explore to irresponsible degrees, often blipping off his brother's radar for months at a time.
• Forgiven, but Not Forgotten: After Angela discovers Kevin's secret, Kevin explains everything and successfully convinces her to keep quiet about his bodysuit, especially from Elaine. However, Angela makes it clear that she likes Kevin even less than before, as being more than just "a boring lame nerd", he's been actively lying to her best friend for months with no effort to ease her into the truth.
• "Friends" Rent Control: Discussed — Kevin lives in a single bedroom apartment and affords a modest amount of luxuries (namely new clothes) in spite of having no day job. Chapter 12 offhandedly mentions that he's been coasting on "multiple life insurance policies", but that since it isn't infinite, he'd been planning on getting a roommate to maintain his lifestyle (in reality, this was just an excuse to explain why Miranda was moving in).
• Full-Body Disguise: The main fantastical element of the series is a full body suit that, once Kevin puts it on, gives him the body, voice, and sensory experiences of a woman (including sexual stimuli), which he uses to live out parts of his life under the alternate identity of Doris Lang. Whatever it's made of, it's extremely lifelike and effectively becomes Kevin's "real" body when equipped, although he is able to unzip out of it with the zipper on its back, which is usually covered up by Doris' clothing and hair. It turns out it's even capable of bleeding when cut slightly, but it appears to have some kind of Healing Factor that patches itself up way faster than a cut on a normal person. It's later revealed to be a prototype invented by (and visually designed after) a Mad Scientist as part of a government project to disguise agents and withstand potential damage — while the operation itself went belly-up, Miranda remains interested in developing the technology and allows Kevin to keep the prototype in exchange for using him as a test subject.
• Gamer Chick: By technicality — Kevin happens to be a gamer, and frequently enjoys using his bodysuit at home to... play video games as normal, just as a chick.
• Gender Bender: While Kevin's normally bodysuit usually allows for two-way sex changes, a non-canon series of pinups in chapter 37 depicts Kevin coming out of the suit still female.
• Gender-Bender Friendship:
  • Downplayed — Kevin and Elaine were already very close, but Elaine additionally befriends with "Doris", unaware that she and Kevin are the same person.
  • Played more straight with Kevin and Angela — Kevin is largely met with snarky annoyance from Angela, but he's able to use "Doris" to better get on her good side, where the worst Angela has to say about her is how in their first meeting, she felt the need to escape out their bathroom window. This gets tossed out when by chapter 26, Angela discovers the truth, though she at least agrees to keep it a secret.
• Gender-Blender Name: Invoked — Kevin accidentally introduced himself as "Kevin" while wearing his bodysuit to Owen, with him being too dazed to realize his screw-up before Owen internalized it. To save face, "she" later claims that she got named "Kevin" by her dad, saying that her parents died after she was born to justify not having an explanation. Due to several close calls as a result of this — including an incident where Doris/"Kevin", Elaine, and Owen ran into each other, with the former's cover almost being blown upon Owen calling her "Kevin" in front of Elaine — he eventually has to set the record straight, and in chapter 14 tells Owen she "changed her name" to Doris to avoid confusion.
• Gratuitous German: The beginning of chapter 13 sees Owen — who is revealed to be a government agent — holding up a terrorist at gunpoint, with the two exchanging words in German... for about two pages before Owen gets sick of it and they continue their conversation in English.
• Green-Eyed Monster: In chapter 38, Madison — having become bored without Owen around for their wacky adventures — begins to suspect that his "secret assignment" he's been working on is just a coverup for him getting a girlfriend, and when she spots him and Miranda out on a drive one night, she expects the worst and trails them with the intent to kill him. It's only cleared up when they make their stop at a spooky lakeside and she dropkicks a "swamp monster" (actually just Kevin/Doris covered in seaweed from a swimming-based experiment), confirming that they are legitimately just work partners.
  Miranda: If this all turns out to be a misunderstanding, then I'll accept that I overreacted a tad. But if it turns out he's been avoiding me these past few weeks to go out and date... I'LL MURDER HIM! THRICE!
• Groin Attack: In chapter 8, when "Doris" and Elaine leave a theatre, they accidentally run into Owen, who still thinks she's named "Kevin", leading her to panic, kick Owen in the crotch, and bolt with Elaine before she could process what just happened. She has significant trouble explaining herself to both Elaine and Owen why she did that.
• Hereditary Twinhood: Brought up in chapter 10, where Miranda — in an effort to explain to Owen why she and Doris/"Kevin" look identical despite the latter's previous claims of having no family — explains that they're "twin cousins"; that their parents were identical twins, happened to be married to different people but gave birth around the same time, and thus they were born around the same time and happened to look identical.
  Owen: That... doesn't make much sense.
  Miranda: We baffle scientists to this day.
  Owen: If you say so.
• Hidden Depths: After Kevin's secret gets out to Angela but he convinces her to keep quiet, Angela reveals that she's quietly passionate about complex costume design similar to Elaine, and is fascinated by the prospects of Miranda's miracle bodysuit being able to accomplish in seconds what currently requires hours in makeup and costuming. She also reveals that she's a bit sensitive about her Resting Bitch Face, feeling like she's always unintentionally scared people off because of how angry she always looks, even when it's not the case.
• High Heel Hurt:
  • In chapter 3, Kevin attempts to walk in high heels for the first time. His experience with them is so clumsy that they're tossed into the trash after three frames.
  • He gives them another try in chapter 8, starting off by Perp Sweating a pair of heels, complete with a desk lamp. He finally gets the hang of walking in heels after three days of practice.
• How Did You Know? I Didn't: A demonstration of how poorly she sees Kevin (and how it appears depressingly well-deserved): in chapter 35, Angela confronts Kevin about him not telling Elaine about the bodysuit when he had the chance.
  Kevin: H-H-How did you find out?!
  Angela: It was quite simple, really. Whenver a situation calls for you to act, you always manage to fumble it at the last second. Also... because you just admitted it.
  Kevin: But whenever I tried, something would come up, and then we kissed and—
  Angela: DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE...
• Identical Stranger: Justified with Doris and Miranda — the bodysuit that gives the former her appearance was designed after the latter (the sole distinguishing detail is that Doris has a mole on her left cheek, Miranda on her right). Miranda ends up being able to pass the two off as twin cousins.
• Idiot Hero: Kevin is good-natured and compassionate, but happens to be extremely clumsy with how he handles himself in his bodysuit, ending up in a labyrinth of sustained Snowball Lies in part due to his own lack of foresight. Fortunately, this is partly what allows Miranda to trust him to be her test subject in continually developing the bodysuit — he's too kindhearted and dumb to do something actively dangerous or malicious with it. This however is not regarded as kindly by Angela, as while she recognizes that Kevin is well-meaning, she's much less patient with his antics after she finds out about his secret. She points out that his idiocy has lead to a massive breach of trust with Elaine, since he's going around pretending to be someone else entirely while being her "new friend", and that given the massive amounts of deception involved with his secret double life, this whole mess could cause serious emotional harm, if not irreparably damaging their relationship if Elaine finds out the truth before Kevin can fess up to her.
• Intoxication Ensues: In chapter 40, Doris gets encouraged by Angela to fill in for a modelling gig, and when she gets nervous appearing on camera, Angela offers to loosen up her nerves with brandy. She accepts the shot... and a few more, and very quickly, both of them get pretty sauced, much to the cameraman's annoyance. Then it turns out that Doris wasn't drunk — Miranda specifically designed the bodysuit to high alcohol tolerance to prevent it from happening, and thus all of Doris' flirty antics were all her.
• If It's You, It's Okay: By chapter 28, Owen discovers that "Doris" is actually a random male college student running around in Miranda's bodysuit, but he decides to continue to treat her simply as Doris since she's been nothing but kind and well-meaning to him, and she was never even distrustful about her secret, so there's no point in forcing it. He opted to eventually allow her to come out on her own terms or just keep it a secret, and while Miranda swiftly decides to reveal it entirely, Owen doesn't mind, and they still remain friends.
• Internal Reveal:
  • Chapter 26 sees Owen discovering the existence of the bodysuit project, realizing that Miranda was in charge of it all along, and that "Doris" isn't real, just a test subject in a disguise, though he has no idea who the "Kevin" beneath it is, how much he knows, and why his latest mission was abruptly cancelled in relation to this operation.
  • Chapter 27 has Angela accidentally discovering Kevin dressing and undressing from the bodysuit, in turn realizing that "Doris" isn't real. This also comes with another reveal to the audience that Miranda's brief "vacation" from a few chapters ago was to Columbia, and it was her who was the supposed target of Owen and Madison's aborted mission.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold:
  • Angela is a perpetually grumpy jerk to Kevin, but it's clear in some moments (especially when she's had a few too many) that she can be quite caring and friendly when she wants to be, and cares very much for Elaine.
  • Miranda is also as much of a jerk towards Kevin at times, being somewhat willing to subject him to really stupid and ridiculous tests and experiments due to him being the only one who can wear her bodysuit. However, she's also revealed to have far more altruistic intentions regarding the suit, wanting it to be a means to help regular people in addition to its project function as spy gear. Plus given that her life has taken some rather ridiculous turns as a result of Kevin's antics, her irritation towards him is not without reason.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Angela's dressing down of Kevin in regards to his double life as Doris is noted as being rather harsh, partly influenced by her pre-existing anti-pathy towards him due to his NEET tendencies and annoying behavior, but she is correct that he's risking Elaine's trust and his friendship with her by being so cavalier with his lies as Doris. Especially noting that if Elaine ever found out the truth about "Doris's" true identity, then their friendship could be irreparably damaged. Kevin to his rare credit, is much more aware of this than she expects, admitting that he just hasn't been able to find a good way to tell her, since he's also not allowed to actually tell anyone lest he wants to also get Miranda in serious trouble with her bosses, leaving him in a tough spot.
• Living a Double Life:
  • Kevin initially uses the bodysuit to live life as a woman for his own sake, but thanks to his carelessness and bad luck, he ends up in a tangle of lies and deception that makes him live as his original male self as "Kevin", as well as the artificial female self as "Doris", with much of the series being his attempts to maintain the façade without getting caught.
  • Owen also has a bit of this when it's revealed that — while seemingly just an average joe — he's actually a secret agent who periodically gets involved in dangerous, over-the-top operations in other countries on behalf of the government, something he keeps strictly confidential and out of the knowledge of Doris and her friends.
• Major Injury Underreaction: During one of Miranda's tests, Kevin demonstrates a high amount of flexibility while in the bodysuit that he normally doesn't have, able to do the splits with no problem. Then Miranda removes his mask, disrupting the suit's circuitry while he's still in position.
  Miranda: Huh. I guess the muscles continue to be loose for a bit even after shutting the bodysuit down.
  Kevin: (calmly) Actually, I'm in severe pain right now.
• Man, I Feel Like a Woman:
  • Kevin's very first experience in the suit, with the intense sensations of a woman's body becoming his own being... pretty overwhelming, with her quickly taking to feeling herself up. Later as revealed byMiranda, the sensation of all the sensory technology of the bodysuit activating when fully worn is supposed to feel mildly orgasmic, though Kevin doesn't demonstrate as nearly an intense a reaction later on.
  • Discussed in chapter 34, where in response to Kevin explaining why he enjoyed the feeling of becoming a woman, Miranda brings up that all the other male-to-female test subjects of previous bodysuits played with their breasts, as well as a female-to-male subject who played with his new member.
• Misapplied Phlebotinum:
  • Kevin primarily uses the suit to act out his mundane fantasies of being an attractive woman, but it's revealed in chapter 10 that Kevin's bodysuit was originally made to disguise secret agents to seemingly impossible degrees, as well as designed to withstand potential damage and act as impromptu armor, hence its Healing Factor.
  • Miranda also revealed that she also created a functioning dimensional wormhole... for ExxonMobil (for some unexplained reason), which a janitor mistook for and used as a trashcan (which, admittedly, was because she built her prototype out of a trashcan).
• Ms. Fanservice: Doris is noted repeatedly as quite beautiful, with many of the earlier chapters and pinups capitalizing on that by having her flaunt her appearance with cute clothing and partial nudity. Angela's friend Daphne implicitly calls Doris supermodel material by pinching her thigh and considers dragging Doris along to night clubs to try to get some hot men for her own interests.
• Must Make Her Laugh: A variant of this happens in chapter 8, where Kevin realizes that Angela actually smiles as a QuakeCon attendant, but willfully refuses to do so to Kevin just to spite him. He attempts to get around this by going as Doris instead, which works... but only after she realizes that she was the girl that jumped out her bathroom window a while ago.
• Mythology Gag: Chapter 10 features a brief cameo of a cat on a pirate ship that is lifted from "Captain Meinas", a pilot pitch that Megazone submitted as part of a contest by Nickelodeon in 2015 (incidentally, said cat protagonist also happened to be named "Kevin").
• Mysterious Backer: A subdued case of this with Jade Franklin, Miranda's government correspondent overseeing the bodysuit project. Following Miranda's laboratory burning down and the project being shut down, Franklin later discovered that Miranda had secretly recovered the last surviving bodysuit and continued developing it in a private, unsanctioned capacity, offering to protect her from the consequences of going rogue on a government operation and potentially lobby to revive the project in exchange for Miranda reporting to her on a regular basis. Miranda is clearly unsettled by this implicit blackmailing, but she ends up finding that she has no choice but to go along with it lest she and her project be put in even bigger danger.
• Never Suicide: Parodied — when Owen asks Greg, who appears to be the only member in the Office of Censorship, if he has any coworkers, and Greg dryly answers that he did, but he committed suicide "by shooting himself twice in the back of the head while simultaneously stuffing themself in a duffel bag and locking it from the outside." After an unimpressed lack of response from Owen, he admits he was just joking.
• No Periods, Period: Briefly discussed in chapter 5, where Kevin contemplates whether or not his bodysuit is even capable of having a period. He doesn't know for sure what the suit is capable of, but just the mere thought of it squicks him out.
• Old Shame: Elaine discusses her love of anime and past with cosplay to Owen in chapter 15, going down memory lane of her first Halloween, her first con with Kevin... a time when she pretended to be Haruhi Suzumiya in the middle of class at the first day of middle school, persuading Kevin the first time he visited to wear her panties as part of crossplay, before suddenly horking in embarrassment.
  Elaine: Shit! I've remembered too much!
• Only Friend: Despite Kevin's claims of having plenty of friends at the start of the series, he begins with having only Elaine in his phone contacts list.
  Elaine: I can't tell if you're trying to be funny or screaming for help.
  Kevin: A little bit of both.
• Only One Name: Miranda is only addressed by her one given name, which gets lampshaded when Kevin decides to act like her for a night alone — making up an introduction calling themselves "Mrs. Miranda", before realizing that he doesn't actually know her last name.
• Only Sane Man: Angela isn't this among the main cast, who are all fairly level-headed, but she's definitely this to her other circle of friends from high school introduced in chapter 39, namely Daphne and Sofia, respectively a Hot-Blooded nymphomaniac and an equally-hotblooded manhater, both of whom look like they belong in an entirely different anime.
• Otaku: Kevin (and by extension, "Doris") and Elaine are huge anime nerds, and Kevin's date with Owen leads to "her" oversharing a massive infodump about "her" favorite series.
• Overt Rendezvous: Whenever Jade requests to speak with Miranda over the highly confidential, illegitimately-restarted bodysuit project, it's always in a public area, first in a Starbucks, later at an Outback Steakhouse. It's parodied in the second instance when Owen asks if it's alright to speak about it in the open, where Franklin casually reveals that everyone else in the restaurant is on her payroll, affirmed by everyone going "Hi!" to him all at once.
• Parental Abandonment: Kevin offhandedly mentions that he's getting by on multiple life insurance payments, and in chapter 17, he briefly meets his mom up in heaven thanks to Angela's attempt at chiropractic adjustment, suggesting that both of his parents have passed away.
• Perpetual Frowner: Angela is almost never seen smiling, always having an unamused and disinterested scowl, unless it's for a job where money's involved. In a non-canon pinup, Kevin wears a bodysuit based off of her and seems confused by its inability to smile. Later on, she reveals that she's a bit upset by having a "Resting Bitch Face" ever since her youth, aware that people are scared of her, and annoyed by constantly being told to smile when it usually strains her.
  Kevin: Sorry, it's just that I don't think I've ever seen you smile like, at all.
  Angela: I smile when I'm paid to smile.
  Kevin: Why aren't you smiling now, then?
  Angela: Because I'm not paid enough to smile at you.
• Photographic Memory: Greg Oneoff, a government worker in the "Office of Censorship", is known for being in charge of classifying information and of having a photographic memory, conveniently meaning he remembers all the details he scrubs out. When Owen finally meets the guy, he insists that "photographic memory" isn't a real thing — his memory just happens to be better than average.
• Plot Allergy: Miranda turns out to be severely allergic to dogs, which becomes a problem when Kevin agrees to take care of Owen's dog while he's away without consulting her. She ends up spending the entire duration of Dog's stay in a full hazmat suit.
• Post–Wake-Up Realization: Chapter 4 begins with Kevin oversleeping, waking up in a daze to Owen knocking at his door, answering it (not fully realizing he's in his bodysuit), and — in response to being asked out on a date — autopilots his way through the conversation. It's not until he closes the door and starts brushing his teeth does he realize that "she" just agreed to go on a date with a stranger.
• Potty Emergency: Miranda reveals that the bodysuit has a built-in "bladder suppression" unit that allows for the wearer to not have to worry about using the bathroom... which presents a problem when in chapter 15, after downing too many sodas at the movies, it seemingly malfunctions, and Doris finds herself suddenly needing to go at inopportune times.
• Power Perversion Potential: Downplayed — one of the first things Kevin did after gaining the bodysuit was masturbating as a woman, but the vast majority of his actual preferred uses are surprisingly innocent in nature, namely for dressing in cute, girly clothes he wouldn't otherwise be able to wear. In chapter 2, Kevin excitedly puts on the suit to "enjoy [himself]", and then simply plays video games while dressed up. Even when he accesses more fanservice-y material that appeals to him in a fetishistic way, he often quickly hits a brick wall of not knowing what to do from there (i.e. getting a School Swimsuit, putting it on, and simply sitting in his tub). When asked much later if he's capable of having sex with the suit, he embarrassingly asks them to change the subject.
• Rage Breaking Point: Miranda hits this in response to the ridiculous situation she's in after the area is hit by a snowstorm, pretty much being absolutely fed up with the constant delays she's suffered to her research, people's sheer inability to handle a few inches of snow without society falling apart, and nearly getting hit by an out of control vehicle. After only being outside for two hours at the most.
• Queer Establishing Moment: In chapter 39, Angela's friends from high school blab to Doris an embarrassing story about how Angela was caught sniffing a female friend's underwear from her gym bag, with Angela's clarification that they made up, became friends, and actually ended up dating for a while revealing to Doris that she's a lesbian. Angela is surprised that it took Doris that long to learn that about her.
• Secret Identity: Kevin goes by the name "Doris Lang" (named after the Vampire Hunter D character) while in the body suit, at least when not around Owen (who he mistakenly identified to as "Kevin", which he had no choice but to play along with).
• Secret Identity Blunder: Kevin isn't the greatest at keeping his secret alter ego as "Doris" a secret. One of his earliest mistakes is unknowingly accepting a date while in the suit and reflexively saying her name was "Kevin", something she ends up having to roll with, with results in further complications down the line, such as Elaine meeting and befriending "Doris" from scratch, thus requiring him to find an excuse for why his alter ego has two different names, one of which isn't particularly ordinary and would be extremely suspicious if found out by Elaine and her friends.
• Secret-Keeper:
  • In chapter 27, Kevin unknowingly undresses and redresses in the bodysuit in front of Angela, along with accidentally blabbing his whole phone call conversation with Miranda about its purpose not knowing Angela was in the room. After much pleading and explaining everything, Angela agrees to keep it a secret in exchange for the privilege of allowing her to better his "Doris" persona as to not keep lying to Elaine.
  • Owen becomes this by the end of chapter 28 — he knows fully well through classified information that "Doris" isn't real; she's just some random guy named Kevin wearing a bodysuit for a long-term experiment run by Miranda. However, after learning from Miranda that Kevin is a perfectly innocent idiot with no malicious intent, he decides to play dumb and continue treating her as Doris as she's been nothing but a dear friend to him who never told him herself. Owen admits that regardless of whether she'll come out and reveal her secret on her own terms or simply take it to the grave, he'll be fine either way. However, chapter 30 sees Miranda ousting Kevin with the knowledge that Owen knows his secret in order to ensure no one keeps lying to each other in the operation — fortunately, when Kevin and Owen do meet, the two do find common ground and remain friends, Kevin accepting that Owen knows the truth while Owen accepting that Kevin and Doris are one and the same.
• Sex Shifter: The comic hinges around a form of this: the male Kevin Spencer has access to a skin-like bodysuit that gives him a female body, allowing him to go under the alias of Doris Lang. The First Law of Gender Bending is absent for the most part as Kevin frequently goes in and out of the suit on the regular, but the artificial body is realistic enough that the only thing that gives its away is the zipper on the back.
• Shameless Fanservice Girl: Played with for Miranda, as while she doesn't get particularly lewd, she has no compulsions making "Doris" — who looks identical to her — dress provocatively or get naked for various experiments, nor does she particularly care about the idea that Kevin will do weird things in a copy of her body (by her own word, if she did have a problem with it, she'd have the bodysuit be designed after someone else). She also lacks a filter when discussing such matters, not appearing particularly bothered by shouting at Kevin to "hurry and get your butt back here and strip!" in front of Elaine (who to her knowledge just assumes the two to be simple roommates).
  Kevin: She probably thinks we're fucking or some shit!
  Miranda: Wow. You make it sound like having sex with me is the end of the world. Talk about hurting my self-esteem.
• She Is Not My Girlfriend: Despite the two having gone on several dates by the time he first showed up, Owen denies that Doris is his girlfriend to his older brother, Jesse, knowing how much he'd like to rub it in his face.
• Shout-Out: Lots.
  • Chapter 1: The clothing store Kevin visits plays the lyrics to "Your Guts (I Hate 'Em)" by Reel Big Fish and "Opportunities" by Pet Shop Boys. He also has a poster of Megazone 23 in his room.
  • Chapter 2: Elaine idly discusses Super Smash Bros. during a conversation with Kevin.
  • Chapter 4: Kevin can be seen playing Team Fortress 2 and later watching The Big O. During his first date with Owen, he ends up going on a massive splurge of various anime he's a fan of, starting from Dragon Ball Z to mentioning works like FLCL, The Castle of Cagliostro, Patlabor, Urusei Yatsura, and others.
  • Chapter 5: Kevin and Elaine contemplate doing cosplay based on Parn and Deedlit of Record of Lodoss War (outfits of which we see Elaine making in the following chapter, and finished in chapter 11). Kevin also brings up Bakemonogatari as an anime he should show to Owen.
  • Chapter 6: Kevin-in-suit jumps out of bed in the same pose as Mega Man. He ends up naming his female identity "Doris Lang" after the character in Vampire Hunter D.
  • Chapter 8: Doris briefly mentions Team Fortress 2 and Overwatch as games she's currently playing, and later Kevin/Doris attends QuakeCon. Later, she and Elaine leave a theatre, having watched Swiss Army Man, and Elaine also presents Kevin a copy of Only Yesterday.
  • Chapter 9: Sees Doris playing Pokémon GO throughout town.
  • Chapter 11: Has Kevin invite Elaine to watch Batman: TAS together.
  • Chapter 15: The main crux of the chapter follows the main characters watching a 50th-anniversary screening of The Castle of Cagliostro.
  • Chapter 19: Elaine and Angela binge-watch My Hero Academia together, with Angela later suggesting that the two of them and Kevin cosplay based on characters from it at an upcoming convention. Chapter 25 sees them in the convention proper, with Elaine cosplaying as Deku, Angela as Uraraka, and Kevin as Mina.
  • Chapter 20: Jesse is introduced swigging a beer in the exact same manner as Misato Katsuragi's memetic Beergasm from Neon Genesis Evangelion.
  • Chapter 21: Kevin and Elaine discuss Streets of Fire, and how its villain appears to have inspired Kuwabara from YuYu Hakusho.
  • Chapter 26: Owen and Greg's visit to the government archives involves an elevator trip, which features the same background and framing as the infamous Leave the Camera Running moment from Neon Genesis Evangelion.
  • Chapter 33: Kevin's attempt to try and break the ice with Miranda has the two discussing their experience with Pokémon.
  • Chapter 36: The Castle of Cagliostro is referenced again, with Kevin-as-Doris gushing to Owen about a 4K HDR re-release. Also, Jesse's story of getting lost on an island in the Mediterannean is a Whole-Plot Reference to Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana, complete with crappy drawings of the Ys VIII party and Jesse bringing back artifacts that functioned as upgrades from the game. In fact, the chapter's title - "Sunshine Coastlines of Seiren" - references Sunshine Coastline, the first overworld theme off Ys VIII, and the Isle of Seiren the game takes place on
  • Chapter 41: Jesse briefly explains how he got into treasure hunting, beginning by how it all started back in 1992 when he met a man named Earnest Evans (we don't get to hear the rest of the story).
• Snowball Lie: Kevin steadily finds himself more into this as "Doris" gets to know more and more people, and especially those who also know "Kevin", having to navigate around the two identities without getting caught. By chapter 11 when Miranda gets involved with her lost experiment, they end up having to make efforts to untangle the lies, which unfortunately results in further complications later on. Miranda's increasing frustration of having to keep up with the increasing blunders leads her in chapter 30 to oust to Kevin that Owen knows that he's Doris against both of their wishes, simply so they don't have to think about how to continue lying to each other.
• Spotting the Thread:
  • The only flaw in Kevin's otherwise flawless "female body" suit is the zipper on its back. While he's usually able to keep it covered by his clothes and hair, he's nervous about it being spotted during more vulnerable moments where he has less on (such as getting fitted for a bra), which would likely bust his secret wide open.
  • In chapter 6, while getting his top fixed by Elaine in her apartment, Kevin-as-Doris panics at the possibility of Angela sneaking a peek at the zipper, and after getting her clothes back and changing in the bathroom, she decides to bolt out of being confronted about it by escaping out the window. Later in chapter 28 — when Angela properly discovers that Doris is just Kevin dressed in a bodysuit — she recalls this specific incident and reveals that she did, in fact, see the zipper on her back, but at the time just assumed that "Doris" had a surgical scar or some embarrassing birthmark that she was sensitive about and thus didn't want to push it.
• Spy Catsuit: Almost literally: in chapter 26, Madison shows up before Owen wearing a skintight black catsuit way in advance for an operation because it's comfortable, plopping herself on his desk and Faux Pawing at him like an actual cat.
• Stylistic Suck: The series has undergone substantial Art Evolution over the years, but one place where it does not apply is Owen's dog, which remains looking like an abstract, weird-looking orange doodle that looks very out-of-place among the increasingly professional-looking artstyle.
• Take That!: In chapter 5, Kevin brings a DVD of Record of Lodoss War to show to Owen on a date, but realizes that he accidentally brought the TV series, which he and Elaine find to be far worse than the OVA.
• Tempting Fate: Chapter 25 sees Kevin, Elaine, and Angela at a convention as a last hurrah before Elaine leaves for New York, with Kevin excitedly proclaiming "There's nothing that'll get in the way of our good time!" Cut to elsewhere, where Owen has come into a dossier of one Dr. Miranda Hayes.
• Thanks for the Mammary: Doris gets on the receiving end of this by Angela after she discovers that "Doris" is just bodysuit worn by Kevin. Intrigued by how flawless his female body is — with soft, realistic skin capable of blushing — she gropes his chest to test if it feels like implants, which it does not. Kevin feels it very much for real.
• That Cloud Looks Like...: Chapter 6 sees Kevin — after oversleeping while in his bodysuit, having no time to change, and being forced to rush to his class as is — shouts out "Fuck you, powers that be!" to the sky. He's immediately treated to a sight of clouds forming in a way that resembles a middle finger.
• Those Two Girls: Daphne and Sofia, two of Angela's friends from high school. They look insane, like they've stepped out of some bizarre gag anime from the mid-80's, Daphne being a bratty loudmouth who's desperately looking for a guy to fuck, Sofia being equally hot-blooded Know-Nothing Know-It-All who Does Not Like Men, and the two get into over-the-top fights with each other constantly. One's left to wonder if putting up with them is the reason why Angela's a fan of the sauce.
  Sofia: (engaged in a Big Ball of Violence) Just because one is not as educated about cars as other does not make one a dumbass!
  Daphne: You're so dumb that you've confused "one" with "I"!
  Doris: Are they always like this?
  Angela: Yes.
• Voice Changeling: While not immediately obvious due to the the non-auditory medium, the bodysuit is capable of changing Kevin's voice when out as Doris. One page sees him speaking as Miranda removes the mask segment, which sees the normally-black text changing from red to blue to indicate his voice changing.
• Wholesome Crossdresser:
  • Even before obtaining the bodysuit, Kevin has had a history of dressing in girls' clothing, but only in private and in the company of Elaine, largely for when they went out cosplaying together. While Elaine is comfortable dressing him up and Kevin himself enjoys it, he's privately remained uncomfortable with the fact that he stayed obviously male, with the sex-changing bodysuit being a godsend in allowing him to wear women's clothes "as intended".
  • Elaine, for her part, also expresses comfort with crossplaying as male characters, offering to go as Parn from Record of Lodoss War, and later attending a con as Deku from My Hero Academia.