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{{trope}}{{Needs Image}}
Similar to [[Hollywood Homely]] and [[Hollywood Dateless]], and typical of [[High School]] shows, this is when a character who is smart, funny, fashionable and good looking is portrayed as being much less popular than they would be in real life. Done deliberately to limit the [[Three Amigos|circle of friends/cast]] as much as possible, thereby erasing the hassle of writing multiple, varying characterizations, while at the same time making the main character likable to the viewer. If this character is female, she is frequently a target of the [[Alpha Bitch]].
Unlike people who are [[Hollywood Homely]], Cool Losers are not supposed to be considered unattractive, and unlike the [[Hollywood Nerd]], the '''Cool Loser''' is not a geek or lacking in social skills. They just don't have many friends, don't get invited to the cool parties, and are generally treated like losers by most of their peers.
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{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* Minako in ''[[Sailor Moon]]'' seems to be a victim of this; unlike the other girls she lacks any other obvious traits that would make her unpopular. It's likely [[The Artifact]] from working solo in her own comic to being retrofitted into the new storyline, as she originally started out as an admiration object turned comedically [[Broken Pedestal]].
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** Then, its Averted, HARD, by the new Big Time era, complete with his alter ego Spider-Man begining to become a trusted and respected hero amongst New York.
* For some reason, this is played straight in the ''[[X-Men: Evolution]]'' tie in comics, written by Devin Greyson (Yes, [[Nightwing|THAT]] Devin Greyson), in that, twice people reffer to the Xavier kids as freaks or make a deal about how 'weird' they are...Despite the fact that Jean is shown to be VERY popular in the actual TV series, and Scott and Kurt, while not shown as particularly popular, are shown to be very good at [[Nice Guy|making girls dig them]]. While its once mentioned that Jean is considered 'Ok', and someone makes refference to having a crush on Scott, it really comes off as weird that its made into a minor plot point despite it never coming up in the series...until, you know, [[The Reveal]], but the comics are based before that happening.
* ''[[Minimonsters]]'' has [[Surfer Dude|Momses]]. While the rest of [[True Companions|Frank's Gang]] do have "loser" traits, Momses is pretty much the "cool dude" who is only a loser for associating with them. His only real flaw is his clumsiness, and even ''that'' is countered by his [[Super Strength]].
== Film ==
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== Literature ==
* [[J. K. Rowling]] even makes a few stabs at this in the ''[[Harry Potter]]'' series. Harry's famous, a pretty nice guy, and is regarded as a hero. Yet in ''Chamber of Secrets'' he's ostracized because he can talk to snakes, in ''Goblet of Fire'' he's ostracized for entering the Triwizard contest ("Harry is a cheating cheater!"), and in the next book he's looked down on because he's the only one who notices ''there's a frickin' war going on.'' In the sixth book, he ''does'' become hugely popular, but finds it annoying.
** Ron fits this trope even better than Harry. By the age of 13, he's helped Harry defeat Voldemort (in one form or another) twice, and has been given an award for special services to the school. He's a [[Deadpan Snarker]] who's best friends with the [[Chosen One]], his brothers are all ultra-cool (
*** Explained by Hermione in ''[[Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (novel)|Goblet of Fire]]'' that Ron gets pushed off to one side in favour of Harry because of Harry's fame. Besides the other students in their year who have classes with them and some friends of Ginny's, no one spends enough time with Harry or Ron to realise that Ron is cool, too - they're just in awe of Harry.
*** His family is another problem. As mentioned above, all of his older brothers are ultra-cool, but Ron can't (or at least, feels like he can't) ever live up to them or find a particular skill that sets him apart. Even some of the things that make him "cool," like Quidditch, are things his brothers were already well-known for before him. Throw in that his other best friend/{{spoiler|eventually girlfriend/wife}} is a verifiable genius and he's just generally [[Overshadowed by Awesome]].
*** There's also that Ron has the social skills of... someone without particularly good social skills. Ron's 'cool' older brothers are quite glib and charming under pressure, while Ron's only noteworthy social aptitude is an astonishing ability to say exactly the wrong thing at the wrong time.
* [[Perry Mason]]. His only admirer is his secretary, Della Street. This one ''especially'' boggles the mind, considering that he's an incredibly rich, handsome, powerful, world famous lawyer that is well known for being on the side of justice. He has hundreds of attractive, young female clients, who go through life and death situations with him, where he's always there to comfort and save them in their time of need. Yet ''none'' of them ever fall for him. If they flirt with him, it's always because they're just trying to manipulate or trick him. Apparently, no woman during those days wanted to chase and marry an insanely rich, prominent lawyer.
* The ''[[Eerie, Indiana]]'' books attempt to justify this: the charming but unpopular town bum, liked only by the main characters, used to be the mayor before he [[Curse|irritated a witch]].
* In Maggie Furey's ''[[Shadowleague]]'' books, it's mentioned that Kazairl and Veldan were seen as this when they were young in Gendival.
* The ''entire'' main cast of [[Stuck]], Tre, Allie, Nora and Max being the largest examples.
* Kent
** There are hints Sam's little sister Izzy will grow up to be like this - she refuses to go to speech therapy for her lisp, even though the other kids laugh at her.
== Live Action TV ==
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* Buffy in ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'', although she was initially accepted by the in-crowd before her Slayer duties led them to disowning her. In the end, she only really had two friends at school - Xander and Willow.
** In "The Prom", however, Buffy receives a special Class Protector award for saving the other students' lives on a regular basis.
** Xander himself, as well. In any normal high school someone with his looks, athleticism, and outgoing personality would have to deliberately work at ''avoiding'' becoming popular. In Sunnydale High he ranked socially somewhere between the school lunch special and carpet lint. Granted that he's an unapologetic geek, the high school period of this show is set in the late 90s. The age of the geek is already starting. And he's a geek, not a nerd.
*** Xander is probably the only student in the history of high school who could publicly save the life of another student, join a varsity sports team and win a championship, and date the head cheerleader... and not only avoid gaining any popularity but then go on to ''remove'' the head cheerleader's popularity simply by association with him. He managed to turn one of the show's most expert social manipulators, whose father was also the richest man in town, into a temporary social outcast ''simply because she was dating him''. And even after Cordelia gets a measure of her social mojo back none of it remotely falls on Xander (and if anything, he actually ends up in a worse public position than before). It's like he radiates some kind of active Anti-Popularity Field.
*** Xander's also faced down and beaten up his school's worst bullies and yet somehow didn't earn renown as either chief [[Bully Hunter]] or else the new alpha bully himself,
*** All of this is capped by the end of season 3 and Graduation Day. It's an explicit plot point that by this point Xander and his accomplishments are so familiar to every clique in Sunnydale High, from the jocks to the geeks to the burnouts to the faceless masses, that Xander can not only successfully serve as Buffy's emissary to every single one but also persuade them all to take up arms and join the battle vs. the Mayor -- under Xander's leadership, no less. And yet he ''still'' can't get a date to the prom, to the point he actually accepts the offer of a 1000+-year old man-hating ex-demon to go with because there are only four girls who even speak socially to him at this point and Anya's the only one not already dating someone else. It's like Xander somehow had every qualification for and all the effects of high school popularity... except for actually ''being'' popular. With anyone.
* Sabrina in ''[[Sabrina the Teenage Witch (TV series)|Sabrina the Teenage Witch]]'': Despite being an attractive do-gooder and a model student, she was treated with contempt by both Libby and Vice-Principal Kraft. Libby at least might have seen Sabrina as a threat to her own popularity, but Kraft... [[Sadist Teacher|well some people are just jerks.]] That and he dated her aunt.
** And then he dated the other aunt. Poor Sabrina...
** Aside from just plain being evil, Libby hated Sabrina because she was jealous of her. She tried many times to steal Sabrina's boyfriend, Harvey, and practically leaped for joy every time there was a chance that Sabrina didn't get a perfect grade. In the episode "When Teens Collide" after Sabrina and Libby switch pesonalities, a couple of popular cheerleaders explain to Sabrina that while everyone likes Sabrina for being nice, smart and pretty, Libby is popular because everyone fears her.
* Samantha from ''[[Popular]]'': Despite being gorgeous and smart, she was unpopular. A snarky recapper on [[Television Without Pity]] actually pointed out that for all her supposed outsiderness Sam generally had more stylized hairstyles and make up than the actually popular Brooke who looked like she just ran a comb through her hair every morning.
* ''[[The OC]]''
** Seth Cohen is clearly an attractive, talented, funny and ridiculously rich young man, yet he couldn't get a date for most of his life, despite living in a town full of golddiggers, and was constantly being beaten up by jocks. Not only this, unlike the majority of examples on this list he apparently had ''no'' friends at all prior the arrival of Ryan.
*** It's implied that Seth would probably be popular if he lived anywhere besides Orange County. This is particularly obvious when he briefly moves to Portland, and apparently has no trouble making friends. It's just that he's surrounded by people who are pompous and shallow. There is also a suggestion that he can be slightly self-centred and petty despite himself sometimes.
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** Once again, ''Buffy''-style, at the end of the second season, she's given a minor ovation from her classmates as she accepts her diploma.
** Wallace Fennel, Veronica's best friend is also an example of this. He's at best marginally popular, despite being the star on the basketball team, very nice, funny and dating the super hot daughter of a baseball legend.
** In Veronica's case, it's arguably on purpose. She's pissed at them for essentially abandoning her when she needed her friends the most. The ones she eventually forgives are generally the ones who had their own issues regarding Lily's death (Logan and Duncan are pretty much the list). The theme song was well-chosen.
*** In Wallace's case, it's at least partly intentional. As he said, he'd rather hangout with the chick who cut him down when duct-taped to the flag pole than the people who just stood and laughed at him.
* ''[[Dawson's Creek]]'': Almost all of the attractive major characters are depicted as being stereotypically uncool, particularly the beautiful and intelligent Joey.
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** In early episodes at least Lilly is portrayed as a sk8tergirl tomboy.
* Claire's friend Zach on ''[[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]]''. [[Justified Trope|Justified]] in that the student body seemed to [[Mistaken for Gay|regard him as homosexual]], and this ''was'' a bunch of high school students we're talking about.
* ''[[Lizzie McGuire]]'' and her friends are considered losers. Roger Ebert makes a crack at this trope's expense, wonder how a girl whose smile "shines brighter than all the stars in the sky" could be unpopular.
** [[Alpha Bitch|Kate Sanders]]
* Julie from ''[[Sorority Forever]]''. This may be justified by the fact that Bridget, the head of Phi Chi Kappa, takes a disliking to her for her rebellious and inquisitive tendancies.
* ''[[Boy Meets World]]'''s Cory Matthews. This guy lives and breathes this trope.
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* In fact, it seems to be a staple of [[Disney Channel]] [[Made for TV Movie|original movies]], glaringly so in ''Alley Cats Strike'', wherein the otherwise cool captain of the school bowling club is regarded as some sort of misfit outcast (that is, until the movie's main events kick into gear).
* This ''is'' ''[[Glee]]''. Everyone in the Glee Club is automatically unpopular for being part of it, even though three of them are cheerleaders, several of them are on the football team, and the rest are just pretty friendly. They just seem pretty fun and cool and yet everyone seems to dislike them. They'd probably be popular in any other high school!
** As of season two the entire club is/has been on the cheerleading/football team or dating somebody who is. Logically, these are the most popular people in school. It makes the whole "We're all misfits!!" thing hard to swallow.
** In the episode "Original Song," the Glee club, minus Rachel, write a Cool Loser anthem for New Directions appropriately called [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB9m2mdg1cs "Loser Like Me."]
** Then again, it's mentioned for Rachel specifically that she's so ''insanely'' annoying that she's an outcast. Kurt's the [[Camp Gay]] in a small conservative town in Ohio, Tina goes out of her way to avoid people, and Artie's in a wheelchair which he even admits puts a lot of people off.
*** Which explains those four. The rest of the club are perfectly relatable and unrealistically good looking.
** On two occasions, they have elicited practically a cheering riot from the assemblies they perform at. Yet no one except hecklers show up to the concert that they put together in "A Night Of Neglect."
* Lance Stone from ''[[Dark Oracle]]'' although this is at least partially deliberate on his own part. He's capable of being socially functional, but his interests in role-play and video gaming, combined with an antisocial streak and the fact that his girlfriend, [[Adorkable|Sage]] is one of the most picked on girls in the school keep him pretty isolated.
* Mia Jones from [[Degrassi]] is the would-be [[All Guys Want Cheerleaders|spicy cheerleader]] but being a teen mother stands in the way until she becomes a model.
* Jenna Hamilton on ''[[Awkward (TV series)|Awkward]]''. The whole series could be summed up as a Cool Loser realizing how cool she actually is.
* Josh from Netflix's ''[[Daybreak]]'' is a clear example. He's meant to be an unpopular geek with no tribe or clique, yet is conventionally attractive, has a conventionally attractive girlfriend, dresses like a skater, listens to punk rock music, speaks like a college-educated social-media-addicted hipster despite being an high-school student, and his only claim to nerd-hood is a collection of Pokemon cards (which is merely mentioned and apparently is not even with him) and knowledge of the names of three or four Pokemon.
== Video Games ==
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* Mike Cosley from ''[[Bardsworth]]'' was one of these in high school. When he gets to college ([[Wizarding School|magical]] college, at that), he's not as actively mocked as he was, but he isn't exactly Mr. Popularity.
* Candi from the [[Ciem Webcomic Series]] may be really pretty and all, but the town of Viron just gets a [[Evil Feels Good|real thrill]] out of being very abusive to her. While she is a closet nympho, she does her best to control her urges, and keeps her releases restricted to her monogamous relationships. Still, she gets treated like a slut frequently, [[Urban Legend Love Life|by those who would have no way of knowing anything about her actual level of experience]]. Given that some of the region's residents are clearly [[Brainwashed]] by the Hebbleskin Gang, Candi has [[Justified Trope|an excuse]] to not want a whole lot of friends.
* ''[[Nedroid]]'': Everyone, especially the main character Reginald.
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== Western Animation ==
* Ron Stoppable from [[Kim Possible]] is certainly one of these. He's not stupid, he's not a klutz, and he doesn't lack in social skills. He's often confident and he knows how to pick up the ladies. (They just reject him anyway). In addition, he's just as much a hero as Kim. The problem is possibly that he's a rather lanky, which makes him look younger than he is (until he gets his great new hairstyle) and extremely dorky. At least until season 4.
** Kim is an interesting example. On the one hand, she's the insanely popular captain of the cheerleader squad, a model student and involved in a ton of extra-curricular activities; she's attractive and fashionable, yet she seems to be oddly shunned by the popular people Bonnie surrounds herself with.
*** That's simple to explain; Bonnie not only hates her, but puts so much effort into ostracizing Kim and encouraging her followers to do likewise ''precisely because'' Kim could take away her position as queen of the high school if she ever seriously exerted herself in that direction. Since Kim also has to routinely ditch on popularity-maintaining activities in order to go save the world, this lets Bonnie succeed at it.
* A [[Signature Style|staple]] for Butch Hartman's protagonists:
** Timmy Turner of ''[[The Fairly
** In ''[[Danny Phantom]]'', while Tucker and Sam fit the bill, Danny seems to be bigger loser than both put together for no other reason than the sake of it. That and to allot for a lot of scenes with the [[Jerk Jock]]/school bully. His parents' reputation as loony ghost hunters may have something to do with it, initially, but that excuse goes right out the window as soon as ghosts become a genuine threat to the town.
*** Actually Danny becomes more and more popular subtly as the seasons progress; girls are willing to talk to him and express interest in him. So while he isn't seen as popular later he isn't shown as as much of a loser.
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*** And...Danny is pretty shy early on in the show, or not all that great at communicating when he's not with his close friends. That would definitely lead to being called a loser by impatient and very outgoing teenagers like those of the A-List.
** In the never-picked-up ''[[Crash Nebula]]'', the main protagonist is just as surprised as the viewer when he is informed of his immediate loser status.
* Arthur from ''[[Shrek]] The Third'' seems fairly normal, maybe a bit introverted, but he's picked on by everyone, including the stereotypical [[Dungeons
* Being an aversion of [[This Loser Is You]], the writers of ''[[Static Shock]]'' indirectly but clearly illustrate that the only reason Virgil only had about [[Limited Social Circle|two or so friends at a time]] was because they were too lazy to make any more.
** In "They're Playing My Song", Richie and another African-American kid were laughing together at Virgil while he was working at [[Burger Fool]]. Maybe he's ''another'' friend of Virgil, Richie, and Frieda.
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[[Category:Popularity Food Chain]]
[[Category:School Tropes]]
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