Daily Trope

Two characters meet to do battle on the field of honor, watched by someone in a position of authority over them. Maybe they are gladiators, fighting for the amusement of the King and his people. Maybe they are two students fighting for the right to learn from a master. In any case, they fight tooth and nail to defeat each other, and eventually one comes out on top, tasting victory while the opponent lies helpless and defeated.

As he enjoys his hard fought victory, he is congratulated by the onlooker, who then coldly orders him to finish the job and finish off his opponent, killing them and taking the rightful place as the most brutal and powerful fighter in the land.

If the winner is The Hero (especially if he is The Messiah), he will more often than not refuse to kill his opponent, and attempt to leave without any more blood on his hands, earning the ire of the onlooker (unless it was a Secret Test of Character all along). If the heroic fighter is more aggressive, he may instead kill the captive to establish his character as being more inclined to brutality, to the amusement and satisfaction of the watcher (who may not know that he is next).

Stuff Blowing Up in movies and TV is cool and very common. When the hero isn’t calmly walking away from an explosion, they’re running away from it while still being caught by the blastwave and sent flying several meters onto conveniently located soft materials. Characters who become Genre Savvy to this method of Explosive Propulsion will devise plans (improvised as often as not) where their escape or pursuit of the bad guys is accelerated by blowing stuff up behind them.

Naturally, the only harm from having a powerful explosion detonate very near is mild singeing on their clothes. Occasionally, this is justified by the character in question being Nigh Invulnerable or using a ship designed to be propelled this way. Sometimes this trope can be used to just move objects and not people attached to them. This is a bit more logical, since for obvious reasons this is not something you should try at home.

Telepathy/Mind Reading is a psychic power that allows a character to read another person’s thoughts and/or communicate with them mentally. At its most basic level, it functions as a short range radio, allowing the character to pick up the thoughts of those around him. Sometimes, it has limitations such as touch or proximity, or only being able to ‘hear’ rather than ‘see’ thoughts.

A common hurdle comes from being unable to probe deeper into the minds of those around them, as well as being something of a Fainting Seer whenever an especially strong willed or horrifying character is around. Psychic overload is also common in crowds, represented by a Psychic Nosebleed. Being a passive receptor and not being able to shut other people’s thoughts out can easily drive a psychic insane, making this potentially Blessed with Suck.

More advanced uses of telepathy involve receiving and transmitting thoughts and memories, and probing beneath surface thoughts into memories, or outright going into a Journey To The Center Of The Mind or dream travel. Some telepaths may be able to use Astral Projection, or at least see through other people’s eyes.

At its strongest, a telepath will be able to Mind Control others, sometimes even to the point of possessing their bodies, create Fake Memories after applying Laser-Guided Amnesia, create a Split Personality and let it take over, or in general be a terrifying god who can Mind Rape their opponents.

Classic Big Bads have the tendency, when push comes to shove, to turn into big honking monsters. A mad scientist in a fit of urgency might down his own mutagen, or a cyborg turns his body into a living bomb, or a mild-mannered enemy reveals her terrifying true form. Bets are good they’ll become way more bloated, ugly, or plain disfigured. Sometimes this is more subtle, and the character will look perfectly normal (or even attractive) save for a few glaring monstrosities that give them a scary Game Face.

This shows the villain means business and it’s time for the heroes to end it. And for those with firmer morals, this qualifies the villain as a monster, making it fine to kill him. (See also Karmic Death.) This is probably why item 34 in the Evil Overlord List says “I will not turn into a snake. It never helps.”

Usually accompanied by the stock phrase. “No one who has seen me in this form has lived to tell about it!!!”, “I have only begun to fight!”, or “Now you’ll face my true power!”

If there’s one final final form after the heroes beat the bad guy, and it loses handily, it was a Clipped Wing Angel.

In various media, characters kissing someone’s hand is used sometimes for romance, and other times to show humility. Sometimes, though, it’s not the hand they kiss, but they aim much lower …no, they don’t stop there! Get your mind out of the gutter!

They kiss the foot. While kissing hands can mean romance or humility, kissing feet can mean many different things. It often means an even greater humility than hand-kissing, or can be used to show submission (“now you have to kiss my feet!”) or devotion. Less often, it is used romantically. In period settings, kissing the hem of a woman’s gown is a common substitution. Even when it’s not meant to be… romantic, some people see it that way.

Not to be confused with It Tastes Like Feet, although Ross Geller might claim that there’s some overlap.

The tendency for all aliens, within a given species, to look almost identical. This is contrary to human expectations, where the diversity of appearance within even single families of humans is remarkable. With extraterrestrials there is no evidence of this racial or ethnic diversity. Everyone from the same species will look almost exactly alike.

The technical reasons for this stem from the aliens’ real-life origin. If they’re Rubber Forehead Aliens, then the rubber forehead, if it is of sufficient weirdness, makes every actor who wears it look alike. If the aliens are Serkis Folk, the modelers got lazy and only designed one computer model (this is also why this is common in video games). If the aliens are Big Creepy Crawlies, well, all bugs look the same anyway.

If anyone tries to point this out, an alien character may retort, “to me, all humans look the same.” Alternatively, they may accuse you of racism. Counterintuitively, this is one way in which Human Aliens are more realistic than the more “complicated” types.

You’ve got to pick yourself an advisor, but, you have a problem. Everyone around you is a Yes Man: spineless, coddling, and/or too concerned with gaining your favor our attaining their own aims to give the truth. But, luckily, there’s at least one person who isn’t afraid to tell it like it is.

This kind of advisor isn’t actually cruel, just blunt and outspoken. They’ll never let their charge take the easy way out, and never sugar coat the truth, and never afraid to criticize. As a result, their wisdom is either completely appreciated by their students, or violently rejected if said student is the egotistical type.

If he isn’t a mentor, but a regular part of the group instead, then he’s usually the Deadpan Snarker, the constant criticizer, and more or less the one that annoys everyone but still gets their complete respect. All in all, this is who you want when it comes to finding a most trusted ally, and it’s probably better to find people like this than rather than your average minion.

The Verdict is out on some Precursors. Others however, are not just guilty, they are guilty with extreme prejudice.

Abundance of Sealed Evil In A Can with flimsy seals and easily found keys? They did it on purpose. They even labeled the can as Happy Fun Time For All! To make sure you’d open it. There’s even some odds that THEY are the evil in the can. Plagues? Oh, they made it. Then even stored it with crates of candy to make sure you’d catch it. They did not just leave a Lost Super Weapon for villains to acquire; they gave the villain a manual, tech support and a 10,000 millenium powertrain warranty for the superweapon. In short, the Abusive Precursors cause problems through more direct acts than their neglectful equivalent, with the clear intent of doing so. To make it worse, it’s likely they are still around and powerful enough that you can’t do a thing about it.

If a setting has both Neglectful and Abusive Precursors, expect them to have been at war, and that the Abusive Precursors either won or ended up as Sealed Evil In A Can or Only Mostly Dead. Now that their sworn enemies have become Energy Beings and moved to another plane of existence they might be ready to come back. Also, there are very good odds that both types of precursors share origins somehow, with either one race creating the other, both races being offshoots of one another or of a third race, or both being different cultures of the same race.

Right before a duel, brawl, battle, or war would start between two misled fractions, the heroes arrive just in time, and tell everyone to try and be friends instead.

They might reveal some sinister Big Bad who manipulated them into the fight, explain to them how the Cycle Of Hatred leads nowhere, or just break the ice by being heartwarmingly idealistic. The speech itself may share rhetorical devices with the Whoopi Epiphany Speech, the Kirk Summation, Shaming The Mob or a Not So Different speech. It could be considered a Missed Moment Of Awesome if you would prefer to watch a badass battle, but also a Crowning Moment Of Awesome for the characters at the middle, who dared to stand up against two forces that are stronger than the heroes.

If it’s a fight between two people, more than likely over a love interest, and the love interest or a side character intervenes at the wrong moment, this trope can lead to a What Have I Done moment.

Demons. Monsters. Fallen Angels. Door-to-Door Salesmen. There is a place where they go to, and a place from which they spring. Simply calling it Another Dimension doesn’t do it justice.

Their numbers are legion and their powers are diverse. Sometimes Mooks of Satan or a God Of Evil who depending on the setting and author’s worldview may or may not be the same person/thing, and residing in Fire And Brimstone Hell in Televisionland (or the real deal). There may or may not be heavenly equivalents, and either one can be treated in a Crystal Dragon Jesus manner. Heck, they may even have Naughty Tentacles.

The Shinto version of the afterlife is markedly different from the Christian version; thus, in anime not influenced by western notions of Hell and demons, Hell acts more Chaotic Neutral than evil regardless of how it looks, especially the classic Buddhist and Chinese versions. Demons will be more like administrators than tormentors, often taken to the extreme.

Basically, a pandemic disease. The Plague stories come in several different types. In the first, the protagonists are usually trying to find a cure or preventing it from spreading further. The second is where The Plague is the cause of an After The End plot. Either the disease happened before the beginning of the story or the story begins with The End Of The World As We Know It. In both cases the heroes are usually just naturally immune and are unable to stop The Plague killing everyone who isn’t.

Sometimes, The Plague overlaps with The Virus and turns its victims into horrible degenerate mutants. The difference is that The Virus tends to be a sentient entity with a Hivemind, while The Plague is simply a spread of disease acting without malice (although it might have been released maliciously initially).

For artificially and magically created diseases, see Synthetic Plague and Mystical Plague respectively. Compare Depopulation Bomb. The Black Death is a particularly famous case. (In fact, technically speaking the word “plague” refers specifically to the Black Death, aka the bubonic plague, although “plague” is more loosely used to describe any devastating epidemic.)

Raygun Gothic is an ubiquitous aesthetic of early- and mid-20th century Science Fiction, roughly from Metropolis to Star Trek: The Original Series. Raygun Gothic architecture is modeled after Art Deco, Streamline Moderne, and/or Populuxe (aka Googie). Everything is slick and streamlined, with geometric shapes and clean parallel lines constructed of shiny metal and glass, lit prominently by neon. Sweeping curves, parabolas, and acute angles are used to suggest movement — movement into The Future.

And of course, futuristic fancy-pants technology of the future is ubiquitous. Ray Guns, jet packs, flying cars, Video Phones, Space Clothes, atomic-powered everything, cigar-shaped Retro Rockets and other Shiny Looking Spaceships, and “electronic brains” capable of calculating complex equations in mere minutes, all decorated with little blinking lights that don’t really serve any purpose (but they sure look futuristic!). This is the bright, optimistic vision of The Future that, until sometime in the mid-60’s, the Western world believed was just around the corner. Our failure to make these dreams a reality means that works featuring Raygun Gothic are highly prone to Zeerust. Retro-Futurism is a George Lucas Throwback to this vision. Stick “Atomic Power” logos on everything, and you’ve got Atom Punk.

The standard all-encompassing explanation for any continuity errors noticed by hardcore fans of any given fantasy show. If it doesn’t make sense, A Wizard Did It. Move on, nothing to see here.

Can be used to Hand Wave away minor nitpicks and Contrived Coincidences that should really be covered by Willing Suspension Of Disbelief. However, using it to excuse major Plot Holes that the creators really should’ve caught beforehand will make people rightly angry. Often used in the literal sense, as in the page picture, where something that would be impossible happens because someone explicitly used magic to make it happen. This is actually not the same thing, and shouldn’t be treated as such.

This explanation can also often bring some extra Fridge Logic into a story, when A Wizard Did It is given as an explanation and the wizard laters fails in a situation in some way that could have easily been solved by the the wizard just doing what he apparently did before. This can also lead to Reed Richards Is Useless when you realize the possible, fantastic uses of that random magic trick nobody seems to care about.

Sometimes a character feels like they are worthless, and does not belong somewhere they value and is fit only to be a villain, no matter how much the idea frightens him.

Eventually, their friends or mentors learn what is troubling him and confront him saying something along the lines of, “Don’t be so hard on yourself. You are better than you think you are, and I’m going to prove it.” When that challenger proves it with irrefutable evidence, the hero ends up feeling much better with the knowledge that someone he deeply respects believes in him more than he did himself.

The Power Of Friendship and Power Of Trust may come into play. Sometimes, though, you’d need a Magic Feather. Similarly, a Naive Newcomer and Cowardly Lion may have a sager character explain that fear is not proof that they are cowards; only the Fearless Fool really feels no fear.