All Quiet on the Western Front: Difference between revisions

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'''Orderly:''' Bed 26, amputated thigh.

'''Doctor:''' How should I know anything about it? I've amputated five legs today! }}

** {{spoiler|Paul}} is killed on a day that was "so quiet and still on the whole front, that the army report confined itself to the single sentence: [[Title Drop|All quiet on the Western Front]]."

** {{spoiler|Paul Bäumer}} is killed on a day that was "so quiet and still on the whole front, that the army report confined itself to the single sentence: [[Title Drop|All quiet on the Western Front]]."

* [[Butterfly of Death and Rebirth]]: In the movie, when Paul goes home he sees his sister's butterfly collection. In the final scene {{spoiler|Paul is shot and killed while reaching for a butterfly}}.

* [[Cloudcuckoolander]]: This is one of the few works ~~that this troper has found~~ which [[Deconstructed Trope|deconstructs]] the trope, using Paul as an example.

* [[Cloudcuckoolander]]: This is one of the few works which [[Deconstructed Trope|deconstructs]] the trope, using Paul as an example.

* [[Cool Old Guy]]: Kat. He's 40, but still counts, as he's old compared to the people around him.

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* [[Dead Hand Shot]]: The 1930 film depicts {{spoiler|Paul's death}} like that.

* [[Despair Event Horizon]]: Paul has crossed it by the end of the book. He describes his feelings like this: "Let the months and years come, they can take nothing from me, they can take nothing more. I am so alone, and so without hope that I can confront them without fear."

* [[Dies Wide Open]]: The French soldier that Bäumer stabs dies like this.

* [[Distracted From Death]]: {{spoiler|Kat dies while being carried to the hospital, and Paul doesn't notice until a medic at the hospital points it out.}}

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* [[Does That Sound Like Fun to You?]]: In the 1930 film, when on leave, Paul goes back to his old classroom to see Kantorek using the same speech he told his class on another group of young innocent students. Excited to see one of his former students drop in, Kantorek encourages Paul to tell them how grand being in the front lines are. To his credit, Paul was really uncomfortable and insisted he had nothing to say, but caved to his teacher's demands... and flat out told the students that [[War Is Hell]] and [[Take That|that their teacher was going to send them to their deaths like his class before them]].

* [[Drill Sergeant Nasty]]: Corporal Himmelstoss, who trained Paul and his friends. Himmelstoss does a [[Heel Face Turn]] after having been forced to actually serve in the trenches.

* [[Dwindling Party]]: Starts off slow, but picks up the pace near the end.

* [[Fatal Family Photo]]: After Paul kills a French soldier, he finds pictures of his wife and daughter (which makes him feel even more guilty).

* [[Get a Hold of Yourself, Man!]]: A newbie in the trenches is getting hysterical to the point of trying to leave the bomb shelter. Everybody else in the shelter beats him up until he doesn't try to leave any more. Paul tells us that it's not pleasant, but it's the only thing that helps.

* [[Getting Crap Past the Radar]]: Tjaden is occasionally described as "delivering the most famous quote from ''[[Götz von Berlichingen (historical figure)|Götz von Berlichingen]]''." Quoting Goethe seems harmless enough, right? Wrong, since the quote in question is: {{spoiler|"Er aber, sags ihm, er kann mich im Arsche lecken". This is German for "But he, tell him that, he can lick me inside my arse!"}}

* [[Gray and Gray Morality]] : Full stop.{{context}}

* [[Heroic BSOD]] : Paul has a very memorable one {{spoiler|after stabbing the French soldier trapped with him in a crater to death and then listening to him slowly die during the entire sleepless night. [[Must Make Amends|After he examines the dead soldier's personal belongings, he repentantly promises to secretly support his family once the war ends]]. [[Tear Jerker|Then he realizes he can't, because they'd eventually find out who's the mysterious donor and realize he's the one who killed their relative]].}}

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* [[If You Die, I Call Your Stuff]]: A pair of good boots are passed around among the soldiers.

* [[In Medias Res]]: The story starts with the characters already in the trenches. Paul later reminiscences about their training.

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* [[Insert Cameo]]: In the 1930 film, {{spoiler|Paul's death scene shows his hand reaching for a butterfly; then a shot is heard, and the hand goes limp in death.}} The hand in the scene belonged to director Lewis Milestone.

* [[Instant Death Bullet]]: Averted; a character is shot shot point-blank in the stomach with a flare gun, and he is dying for half an hour "quite conscious and in terrible pain".

* {{spoiler|[[Kill'Em All]]:}} [[An Aesop|Just to drive the point home]] that [[Finagle's Law|war is absurd, unpredictable]]... and with NO real [[War Is Glorious|glory]] in store for anyone...

* [[Last-Name Basis]]

* [[New Meat]]: Paul says that the new recruits are almost useless, because they have no knowledge about trench warfare; "A man would like to spank them, they are so stupid, and to take them by the arm and lead them away from here where they have no business to be."

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* [[Not Even Bothering with the Accent]]: In the film, the German characters are played by American actors, who speak with American accents. This, however, is intentional [[Translation Convention]], in order to show American movie-goers [[Not So Different|just how much like us the German protagonists really are]].

* [[Old Soldier]]: Kat.

* [[Only a Flesh Wound]]: Averted ''hard''. A character dies from a leg injury, another is hit by a shrapnel on his hip, and quickly bleeds to death.

* [[Only Electric Sheep Are Cheap]] : An interesting non-sci-fi example. One of the soldiers in the story is overjoyed when he discovers ''an actual cherry tree in bloom'' during a march across the countryside to a new position. Since he (and the others) have spent entire weeks at the frontline, this is hardly surprising - the frontline being [[Mordor|a lifeless war-torn muddy wasteland]] and all.

* [[Peaceful in Death]]: When {{spoiler|Paul}} dies at the end, his facial expression is described as "calm, as though almost glad the end had come."

* [[Politically-Motivated Teacher]]: Kantorek, who encourages his students to join the army, greatly romanticizing it as [[War Is Glorious|something glorious.]] [[Foregone Conclusion|Of course, he couldn't be farther from the truth.]]

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* [[Popcultural Osmosis]]: The famous "butterfly" scene from the film is parodied by people who may well have never heard of the film, let alone the book.

* [[Precision F-Strike]]: in the (unabridged) English translation, the word "fuck" appears only once. Other profanities are not terribly common (with "shit" being used sparingly).

* [[Redshirt Army]]: As the protagonist explains it, the training of the time didn't really prepare soldiers for the war, so newbies got mowed down by the score. A few survived by blind luck long enough to learn proper survival strategies, and they formed a core constantly supplemented with [[New Meat]].

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* [[War Is Hell]]: The original title is literally "Nothing New in the West". Now think about what happened, the setting, and ''why'' there's nothing new.

* [[Wide-Eyed Idealist]]: One [[Mauve Shirt]] character.

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* [[Dead Hand Shot]]: The 1930 film depicts {{spoiler|Paul's death}} like that.

⚫

* [[Does That Sound Like Fun to You?]]: In the 1930 film, when on leave, Paul goes back to his old classroom to see Kantorek using the same speech he told his class on another group of young innocent students. Excited to see one of his former students drop in, Kantorek encourages Paul to tell them how grand being in the front lines are. To his credit, Paul was really uncomfortable and insisted he had nothing to say, but caved to his teacher's demands... and flat out told the students that [[War Is Hell]] and [[Take That|that their teacher was going to send them to their deaths like his class before them]].

⚫

* [[Insert Cameo]]: In the 1930 film, {{spoiler|Paul's death scene shows his hand reaching for a butterfly; then a shot is heard, and the hand goes limp in death.}} The hand in the scene belonged to director Lewis Milestone.

⚫

* [[Not Even Bothering with the Accent]]: In the film, the German characters are played by American actors, who speak with American accents. This, however, is intentional [[Translation Convention]], in order to show American movie-goers [[Not So Different|just how much like us the German protagonists really are]].

⚫

* [[Popcultural Osmosis]]: The famous "butterfly" scene from the film is parodied by people who may well have never heard of the film, let alone the book.