Got Volunteered/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: A character "volunteers" for something against his or her will.

  • Straight: Alice and Bob are "volunteered" for a dangerous or humiliating job by their boss Charlie.
  • Exaggerated: Alice and Bob get volunteered for something that is patently illegal, suicidal, or just plain nuts.
  • Downplayed: When Charlie asks for three volunteers, no one raises their hands, so he assigns Alice, Bob, and David to the task.
  • Justified:
    • No one is willing to do the job Charlie has asked them to do (mainly because it is dangerous), but somebody has to do it.
    • Due to a technicality, Charlie can't legally order his subordinates to do the job, but it needs to get done, so Charlie has them "volunteer" for it.
  • Inverted: Alice and Bob volunteer Charlie to do the job.
  • Subverted: Alice and Bob are not volunteered. Instead, Charlie charges Dorothy with the task of doing the job.
  • Double Subverted: ...However, Dorothy needs assistants to actually do the job, so Alice and Bob are dragged along with her.
  • Parodied:
  • Deconstructed:
  • Reconstructed:
  • Zig Zagged:
  • Averted: Alice and Bob volunteer for the job out of their own free will.
  • Enforced:
  • Implied:
  • Lampshaded: "Just once, I'd like to 'volunteer' for something and have it actually be voluntary."
  • Invoked:
  • Exploited:
  • Defied:
  • Discussed: "No one's willing to do the job. I bet Charlie's going to 'volunteer' one of us to do it."
  • Conversed: "I didn't volunteer. I got volunteered. That's not the same thing."
  • Played For Laughs:
  • Played For Drama:

Aright, I need a volunteer to go back to Got Volunteered. (Beat) No? Bob! Thanks for being such a good sport.