Bouquet Toss

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

Ah, the Bouquet Toss. It's finally happening. The young couple is finally tying the knot, and now it's for real; no gatecrashers, neither one chickening out, they've finally said their vows, they've kissed, and maybe, just maybe, they'll live Happily Ever After. One thing left to do: The lighthearted tradition where the blushing bride tosses her bouquet of flowers behind her back where a group of wedding-goers cheerfully try to catch it to determine who is the next one to get married. However, in fiction, one of the following will usually occur:

  1. The bridesmaids all tackle each other to what transforms into an all-out brawl for the bouquet, or
  2. No one wants the bouquet at all, or
  3. Somebody who no one expects to catch the bouquet does, where then after Hilarity Ensues. Often, having a man catch it is expected to be an adequate joke in and of itself.

The bouquet toss usually happens outside of the building where the ceremony is held, immediately after the wedding has taken place. Real-life bouquet tosses, however, are often executed as part of the reception, hours after the ceremony. 99% of the time, the bouquet toss occurs in slow motion to emphasize the importance of the event. Also, while it doesn't have the same exposure, the groom will toss the bride's garter, with similar results (though result 1 is considerably less common).

Examples of Bouquet Toss include:

Anime and Manga

  • Occurs at Keitaro and Naru's wedding in the Distant Finale of the Love Hina manga. Ema, the new and shy intern at the inn, is the one who catches it.
  • In the 3rd Fushigi Yuugi OVA, Mayo Sakaki goes to Taka and Miaka's wedding, along with the other girls on the Yotsubadai Basketball Team. She's the one that catches the bouquet, before becoming the Apocalypse Maiden of the OVA.
  • One episode of Sailor Moon sees one of Usagi's teachers getting married. When the bouquet is tossed, Usagi, Rei and Makoto all jump for it, but it bounces off all their hands and into the arms of Ami. Everyone is surprised by this.
  • One of those happens at the last chapter of the Shugo Chara manga at Nikaidou and Yukari's wedding. Amu, who formed an Unwanted Harem throughout the story, obviously catches it.
  • Yes! Pretty Cure 5 episode 32. The fact that Milk was the one to catch the bouquet surprised all characters.

Comic Books

  • In X-Men, at Scott and Jean's wedding, Rogue catches the bouquet, due to the advantage of being able to fly. (Gambit proceeds to use his powers to make damn sure he's the one who winds up with the garter.)

Fan Works

Film

  • Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer: At Reed and Sue's impromptu Korean wedding, Johnny's girlfriend is about to catch the bouquet, much to Johnny's shock, so he shoots it in mid-air.
  • The Boat That Rocked: One character catches the bouquet, frowns at it, and tosses it to another character. That character tosses it to another, then another, seeing how no one wants to get married.
  • At the end of Clueless, the girls have a minor catfight over Ms Geist's bouquet.
    • Helped by the rather large bet on who would get the bouquet.
  • In Addams Family Values, Debbie the Gold Digger tosses the bouquet at her and Uncle Fester's wedding, and of all people, Wednesday catches it. However, she promptly notes, "It's not binding."
  • At the end of the first Shrek film, Fiona tosses her wedding bouquet into the crowd of fairy tale characters. Snow White and Cinderella slap each other in the face while trying to catch it, but the ultimate victor is the dragon who then proceeds to nuzzle with Donkey.
  • A weird example of the third variant: at the end of Corpse Bride, Emily throws her bouquet over her shoulder after letting Victor and Victoria be together. Although it's obvious she's aiming for Victoria, the person who catches it is a nameless extra woman. Who then gets leered at by Maggot, resting on her shoulder. The woman promptly yelps, tosses the bouquet away, and Victoria catches it.
  • Muriels Wedding provides another example of the third variant, when the title character catches the bouquet, and the bridesmaids demand that she throw it back so that someone "more deserving" can catch it.
  • The Princess and the Frog culminates in the wedding of Tiana and Naveen as humans, and when Tiana tosses her bouquet from the wedding car, a throng of girls try to catch it - only to be completely outdone by the marriage-and-princess obsessed Charlotte.
  • The Nutty Professor II: The bouquet was tossed and the landed on the Dean carrying boxes of gifts.
  • At the end of the 1987 movie Mannequin, the two main characters are married in a store window display (natch), and the bouquet is caught by Hollywood Montrose, the store's Camp Gay employee.
  • In The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Betty Munroe-Hapschatte throws the bouquet after the wedding that the movie opens with. Janet catches it. The audience can participate by chanting "Who's got the clap?" and clapping while she throws it. Janet will "answer" the audience's question by shouting "I got it! I got it!"
  • The two friends in Bride Wars were about to catch it but they never showed who was the one who managed to catch it.
  • In the 1978 film A Wedding, Muffin tosses her bouquet and it is caught by the groom's sister. She tosses it to another bridesmaid, and she tosses it to another. This continues until it lands in the hands of the news reporter. No one really notices or applauds.
  • Susan from Monsters vs. Aliens never gets to throw her bouquet, but as she's suddenly growing into Ginormica her garter snaps off, hitting her groom in the head and knocking him out.
  • Being about a wedding, Ghosts of Girlfriends Past ends with the bride tossing the bouquet. It's caught by Keiko, the Asian archer who hasn't shown up since the beginning of the movie, who shoots it out of the air.

Literature

  • The Doctor Who Virgin New Adventures novel Sleepy ends with a wedding at which the bouquet is caught, to her obvious surprise and alarm, by the Doctor's companion Bernice. In the novel immediately following, she falls in love and decides to leave the TARDIS and get married.
  • In the final chapter of The Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing, the narrator, who's at her best friend's wedding and has just felt sparks fly between herself and another guest, plays along with this ritual for the first time. When her friend sees her, she doesn't even bother to turn her back, just throws the bouquet directly to her.
  • In Island in The Sea of Time, after the wedding of the town police chief and the librarian we see type three of this trope when a Butch Lesbian coast guard captain sees it flying at her face and grabs it on reflex. Guess who gets talked flat by the pre-British princess half her age within a month or so.

Live-Action TV

  • An episode of Sex and the City had Carrie and her friends attend a wedding. The bouquet lands at Carrie's feet. She looks at it, turns to the others and says, "Well, see you guys later." She leaves the wedding, with the bouquet still on the ground where it landed.
  • In an episode of 3rd Rock from the Sun, it's mentioned that Dick got into a brawl with the maid of honor.
  • Scott Baldwin, Laura's ex-husband, famously caught the bouquet at her wedding to Luke on General Hospital. This was after he has been off the canvas for months.
  • In a That '70s Show episode, the gang attends a wedding, and Jackie helps Fez to pick up a girl. In return, she asks him to help her catch the bouquet; unfortunately, his new girlfriend asks the same. Fez decides to "do the right thing", and pushes Jackie out of the way.
  • Wedding Bouquet disasters are a staple of home video shows.
  • In The Closer, oft-divorced Lt. Provenza initially catches the bouquet at Brenda and Fritz's wedding reception. He immediately tosses it away in disgust.
  • In Castle's "A Rose For Everafter", Castle's New Old Flame is getting married. Suffice it to say that Castle and Beckett end up attending the wedding, and when said New Old Flame tosses the bouquet, Beckett catches it. This right after Kira had told her, "He's all yours." Anvil much?
  • Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon‍'‍s Special Act ends with one. Motoki, of all people, catches it. He then uses it to propose to Makoto.
  • At Phyllis's wedding on the American version of The Office, Ryan swats the bouquet aside to stop Kelly from catching it.
  • An episode of Dead Like Me where a guy was accidentaly crushed by desperate guys trying to catch the banquet.

Theatre

  • Happens offstage in Avenue Q, at Brian and Christmas Eve's wedding:

Kate: Look, Princeton! I caught the bouquet! ...Well, actually a little girl caught it, but she wasn't holding it very tight.

Web Comics

  • During Nick and Ki's wedding in General Protection Fault, Sharon has PROMISED to very carefully NOT catch the bouquet, since her boyfriend, Fooker, has some severe hangups about marriage... and of course, the bouquet just lands in her hand by accident anyway.
  • Heather's second appearance (the first was one panel) in Misfile happens when she catches the bouquet at Harry and Kate's wedding.

Web Original

"Oh, and one other thing: I want to catch the bouquet at the end. I don't care how you work it out, but I want to be the guy who does that. If anybody else lays a finger on those flowers, I will murder them!"

Video Games

  • In one Mario Party 5 minigame, a newlywed Koopa bride throws a bouquet into the air... followed by a bunch of flowers falling from the sky, which the players must collect. The winner (or winners if there's a tie) will have the actual bouquet(s) fall into their hands, gets ten coins, and ends up married in the next Mario fanfic that is written.
  • In Mitsumete Knight, this is one of Sue Grafton's Special Events. She's very happy when she catches it, as she desperately wants to have a lovely husband and fears to become a Christmas Cake.

Western Animation

  • In one episode of Rugrats, the babies have wandered off (of course) during a relative's wedding. Stu and Didi wander into another wedding looking for them, and Stu accidentally catches the bouquet. Didi throws it back, yelling "He's already married!" Bridesmaid pile-up ensues, of course.
  • Batman the Animated Series: Bruce Wayne, having caught the garter, chats up a woman who caught the bouquet and strikes up a romance with her. She turns out to be part of a plot by Poison Ivy to Take Over the World.
  • Played with on Futurama, when Bender attends his own (fake) funeral and throws his bouquet of flowers when he angrily storms out. It lands in the Professor's lap, and Amy playfully says she knows who's funeral they'll be attending next, causing the professor to giggle.
  • Done twice in the season two finale of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. The first was a Go Fetch technique/gag to distract some brainwashed bridesmaids, the second for real. Rarity winds up catching it the second time.
  • In Aladdin and the King of Thieves, the movie ends with Aladdin and Jasmine's long-delayed wedding. When the bouquet is tossed, Genie splits into several different women clamoring for it. Who ends up catching it? Razoul.
  • The Smurfs special "Smurfily Ever After"; Smurfette spends most of the episode dreaming of who would be the perfect Smurf to marry and not finding the right one among her prospects. At Lacona and Woody's wedding, which happens at the end of the special, she ends up being the one who catches the bouquet that Laconia tosses. As might be expected quickly gets a lot of attention from the other Smurfs right there.
  1. ↑ She had previously informed them that she had put her wrench in with the flowers to represent "Something Old"
Retrieved from "https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Bouquet_Toss?oldid=1954240"