Beetle Bailey: Difference between revisions

Line 27:

----

=== Includes examples of the following Tropes: ===

== Includes examples of the following Tropes ==

* [[Abhorrent Admirer]]: A few one-shot characters, Killer to some women, but most of all Sgt. Louise Lugg to Sgt. Snorkel. They actually sort of dated at one point, but the only explanation given to how that ever happened was that she forced him into it. It's ironic, anyway, as an earlier strip shows him imagining his ideal woman as a female version of himself, which Lugg was (admittedly without the bodybuilder figure).

Line 48:

* [[Big Ball of Violence]]: Almost any Sarge/Beetle fight. Beetle also manages to make one once by himself, when it appears he has attacked Sarge but is actually not even touching him because he's not ''that'' crazy. (They're sometimes portrayed as able to actually have a fight, sometimes so that Sarge is far superior.)

* [[Big Eater]]: Sarge.

* [[~~BLAM~~ Episode]]: '''[http://joshreads.com/?p=284 CAMP SWAMPY CONSTRUCTION AREA]'''. (A big sign saying that has crashed into the middle of the panel, and there's general mayhem around it... for some reason.)

* [[Non Sequitur Episode]]: '''[http://joshreads.com/?p=284 CAMP SWAMPY CONSTRUCTION AREA]'''. (A big sign saying that has crashed into the middle of the panel, and there's general mayhem around it... for some reason.)

* [[Blinding Bangs]]: Beetle's old but since disappeared by the looks of it best friend in the army Bammy had these, making him a little like Beetle in never showing his eyes.

* [[Brawn Hilda]]: Sergeant Lugg from is [[Distaff Counterpart]] to Sarge, so what else could she be? The biggest difference between them is that she's sexually aggressive, whereas he's afraid of women.

Line 65:

** General Halftrack has a tendency to end up being the recipient of the death glare from his wife or secretaries.

* [[Delusions of Doghood]]: Beetle once hypnotises Sarge to think he's whatever he secretly wants to be, making him act like a lion. He also accidentally affects General Halftrack, but he doesn't "become" an animal: "Have you gone mad! I'm an airplane!" (Paraphrased.)

* [[Dirty Old Man]]: Let's put it this way... Ms. Blip once remarks that no, the General probably isn't going to say anything about Ms. Buxley's pants being too tight, because it's hard to speak with your tongue hanging out. It was not always as ~~extreme -- sometimes~~, it was even subverted when his secretaries were ''expecting'' ~~it -- and~~ was toned down later.

* [[Dirty Old Man]]: Let's put it this way... Ms. Blip once remarks that no, the General probably isn't going to say anything about Ms. Buxley's pants being too tight, because it's hard to speak with your tongue hanging out. It was not always as extreme—sometimes, it was even subverted when his secretaries were ''expecting'' it—and was toned down later.

* [[Dream Sequence]]: Sarge gets a really trippy one about being a food-themed superhero.

* [[Drill Sergeant Nasty]]

* [[Driven to Suicide]]:

** [[Subverted]]/parodied: Killer has threatened to kill himself after being told off by his girlfriend. The others find him "doing it slowly" ~~-- smoking~~ cigarettes, two at a time.

** [[Subverted]]/parodied: Killer has threatened to kill himself after being told off by his girlfriend. The others find him "doing it slowly"—smoking cigarettes, two at a time.

** Left hanging another time, in one variation of a reused gag where Beetle overhears the guys planning to pull a prank on him by calling in pretending to be Sarge. Of course, then the real Sarge calls in and buys it when Beetle pretends to be the General and tells him to do something absurd. In this one instance, Beetle says he's disappointed in him and he can just go tie a rock around his neck and jump into water. The last panel shows Sarge about to do so. Of course, it's entirely [[Played for Laughs]] and forgotten immediately afterwards; presumably he didn't do it.

* [[Engineered Public Confession]]: Not intentionally invoked, but in one strip, General Halftrack orders Beetle to find Sarge and bring him to his office in regards to something. After searching around the camp, he reports that he can't find Sarge, but then Halftrack tells him that he knows where he is, causing Beetle to be baffled about why Halftrack wanted him to find Sarge when he already knew where he was. That's because while Beetle was searching for Sarge, Sarge entered the room with Corporal Yo discussing getting front row seats for a Baseball game, and states to Yo to tell the General that he went to the Pentagon to look for a dog, with Yo joking that the General would believe anything. As Beetle had to put him on hold to look for Sarge, Halftrack heard the whole conversation.

Line 108:

Third Frame: Sarge breathlessly arrives at the General's office. '''The General''': Too late. {{spoiler|The report is on the floor with a footprint.}} }}

** Ms. Buxley when she was being portrayed as dumb.

* [[Medium Awareness]]: There are all kinds of weird gags involving the characters interacting with comic strips elements that are supposed to be only ~~symbolic -- such~~ as Sarge eating a "Z" produced by a sleeping Beetle in an effort to get to sleep himself, or characters managing to produce empty speech bubbles.

* [[Medium Awareness]]: There are all kinds of weird gags involving the characters interacting with comic strips elements that are supposed to be only symbolic—such as Sarge eating a "Z" produced by a sleeping Beetle in an effort to get to sleep himself, or characters managing to produce empty speech bubbles.

* [[Mildly Military]]: Among other things, 40+ years of the characters in basic training and largely no suggestion that the characters will be ever shipped out on assignments in any of the major US wars that have happened during the life of the strip.

* [[Mistaken for Gay]]: One of the strip's minor characters is Julius, Gen. Halftrack's chauffeur. He originally had a larger role as the camp's resident [[Neat Freak]], but when angry readers demanded to know why Walker had introduced a "homosexual character" in the strip, he was more or less [[Demoted to Extra]].

Line 118:

* [[Obstructive Bureaucrat]]: Lieutenant Fuzz. His ambition is to become the U.S. Army's greatest desk officer.

* [[Only One Female Mold]]: Along with [[Only Six Faces]], the strip is guilty of this. Apparently, all of Killer's girlfriends have a small slender build.

* [[Pin-Pulling Teeth]]: General Halftrack once tried to do this as a "This is how we did it back in my day!" ~~demonstration -- but~~ just ended up throwing the still-pinned grenade along with his teeth (he wears dentures, obviously). Also played straight once when Beetle and Killer are very casually going through a training course they've done a million times.

* [[Pin-Pulling Teeth]]: General Halftrack once tried to do this as a "This is how we did it back in my day!" demonstration—but just ended up throwing the still-pinned grenade along with his teeth (he wears dentures, obviously). Also played straight once when Beetle and Killer are very casually going through a training course they've done a million times.

* [[The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything|The Soldiers Who Don't Do Anything]]: By [[Word of God]], the strip is specifically about the foibles of the ''peacetime'' army. Accordingly, we never see the soldiers do any soldiering.

** Used to be [[Justified Trope|justified]] in-comic: General Halftrack's superiors know how bad he is (or they have even suppressed his existence), and don't want to risk anything by involving him in it. It was a running gag that the General would wait anxiously for "orders from Pentagon" that would never arrive because of this. When they did, in an album story, the eventual inspection was such a disaster the Pentagon felt at a liberty to go on ignoring him. Paraphrased conversation from the story:

Line 173:

[[Category:The Fifties]]

[[Category:Comic Strip]]

[[Category:~~{{PAGENAME}}~~]]

[[Category:Beetle Bailey]]