High School Dance: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
{{quote|''The Sadie Hawkins Dance.''
''In my khaki pants.''
''There's nothing better. (Oh, oh, oh!)''
''The girls ask the guys.''
''It's always a surprise.''
''There's nothing better''
''Baby, do you like my sweater?''
|'''Sadie Hawkins Dance''', [[Relient K]]}}
The
There's certainly never any bumping or grinding at one of these. However, unless it's a comedy with [[Middle School]]-aged kids, it's unlikely to go boys' side / girls' side.
Since many dances nowadays don't feature refreshments or proper "dates", the
If this is a teen movie, the climax has to happen at a big dance.
This trope can be an example of [[Truth in Television]], however, since some real-life high school dances contain elements of this. Except "inappropriate" dancing, which seems to crop up pretty much everywhere.
{{examples}}▼
Subtrope of [[Dances and Balls]].
== Anime & Manga ==▼
* In ''[[Revolutionary Girl Utena]]'', [[Alpha Bitch|Nanami]] invites Anthy to the dance and tells her she's a candidate for Dance Queen, but it's just a pretext to embarrass her in front of the whole school.▼
▲{{examples}}
▲* In ''[[Revolutionary Girl Utena]]'', [[Alpha Bitch|Nanami]] invites Anthy to the dance and tells her she's a candidate for Dance Queen, but it's just a pretext to embarrass her in front of the whole school.
==
* Mercilessly parodied in ''[[Not Another Teen Movie]]'', where the entire cast has a musical number all singing about the coincidence of everyone's respective plotlines all leading up to the big dance.
** And lampshaded by [[How I Met Your Mother|Ted Mosby!]]
* The Enchantment Under the Sea Dance from ''[[Back to The Future]]'', or the [[Expospeak Gag|"rythmic ceremonial ritual"]] as Doc calls it. The lack of inappropriate dress and dance is pretty well justified, seeing how the dance takes place in [[The Fifties|1955]]. On the other hand, [[Seemingly
* Appears in ''[[
* Subverted in, of all places, ''[[High School Musical]] 3'', where there is a graduation dance and at least one of the big song and dance numbers relates to picking out the perfect costumes and how much it sucks/is great, only to completely skip actually showing the school dance when Troy decides to visit his love interest halfway across country. Of course this being ''High School Musical'' there's still tons of dancing happening all over the place.
* The plot of ''[[Mean Girls]]'' is wrapped up at the Prom.
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* ''[[Grease]]'' takes the trope [[Up to Eleven]] with all the expected cliches, including a scheming [[Alpha Bitch]], cheesy decor, and a hoodlum who spikes the punch. Quite unusually (for 1950s or any era), the dance is broadcast live on television, with Vince Fontaine and Johnny Casino & The Gamblers (the [[Kayfabe]] identities of Sha-Na-Na) on hand to entertain. Also unusually for [[The Fifties]], there is some decidedly "dirty dancing" on the floor - and it's implied to be commonplace, because the principal even warns the students not to do any vulgar dances before the show begins (and, of course, everyone ignores her).
* In ''[[The Rose Tattoo]]'', Rosa meets Jack at her high school dance and, misinterpreting her mother's advice, dances too closely with him. (This is only mentioned in the play, but shown in the film.)
* The school dance is a key event in ''[[Better Off Dead]]'', allowing Monique and Lane their first moments alone together, while at the same time suggesting that Frankensteinian nerd Ricky possesses [[Hidden Depths]] of his own.
== Literature ==
* The Yule Ball in ''[[Harry Potter and
== Live
* ''[[The Brady Bunch]]'': Like many [[Dom Com|DomComs]], ''The Brady Bunch'' had several episodes depicting either "boy asks girl" situations leading to a dance, or the family preparing for some theme dance:
** "Brace Yourself": One of the earliest "dance" episodes, with Marcia not wanting to go because she's "ugly, ugly, ugly!" and not because she's a hermit-like girl who kissing reminds one of licking an ashtray or some insensitive classmate cruelly told her as much ... but because she just got braces and is convinced that her date, Alan, won't want to take her now to the sixth-grade dance. It's never implicitly said, but Alan indeed backs out, claiming he's going to visit his sick grandmother out of town; whether this is a "yeah, right" moment is left to the viewer, because nobody investigates the claim. Instead, Mike, Greg and Alice each try to set up Marcia with substitute dates, only for the whole thing to be ruined due to a lack of coordination. Eventually, Alan is able to go to the dance after all, after he too gets his own set of braces!
** Other episodes involving
* ''[[Family Matters]]'': With several episodes themed around high school dances, the most famous was arguably the one that introduced Steve Urkel to the world. The episode "Laura's First Date" aired December 15, 1989, and was similar to the ''Brady'' episode "Brace Yourself," in this case Laura unable to get her crush, Mark, to ask her to the dance; when he doesn't ask her and Laura frets about her predicament, the rest of the family pitches in to find Laura a dance date. It is her father, Carl, who makes the call that will forever change his life (and the course of the series): He calls up Urkel's dad to set up the date.
** In a crossover with sister show ''[[Step
* ''[[Step
* ''[[
* The world of ''[[Lizzie
** In "A Gordo Story", the "boy has to ask a girl as his date" theme is used. Gordo asks a girl he likes to go to the school dance with him, but she turns him down because he is too short.
** It's a plot point in "Just Friends", too, where Lizzie is nervous about asking Ethan to the Sadie Hawkins dance.
* In ''[[Naturally, Sadie]]'', when Sadie was planning the school dance for komodo dragons. The end product was a room festooned in blue-and-white streamers, a refreshments table complete with punch bowl, and dancing so G-rated the teens barely touched hands.
* ''[[Life
* All of the ''[[Degrassi]]'' series have had at least one or two of these per season. There might be drugs or alcohol, but never any sexual subtext. Mostly just relationship drama.
** And ''other'' kinds of drama; the school burned down at one, the police were called to one for a knife incident, a gangbanger shot up the most recent prom. It's been said in the fandom that Degrassi dances are cursed.
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* ''[[My So-Called Life]]'' has the "World Happiness Dance" in "Life of Brian". The only two characters who actually dance there are Rickie and Delia.
** That was a much more realistic example than the others on this list, since at most real High School Dances, there are just as many kids sitting/standing around on the sidelines and talking as there are kids actually dancing.
* ''[[
== Music ==
* The Sylvers had a disco song that shares the title of this
* The Statler Brothers' 1972 country hit "Do You Remember These," a nostalgic look back at the 1950s, includes a lyric about "the Sadie Hawkins dance" (a common high school-dance type, this being a girl-ask-boy event).
* [[
* "Teenage Dirtbag" by Wheatus:
{{quote|
It's prom night and I am lonely
Lo and behold
She's walking over to me }}
* The video to [[Taylor Swift]]'s ''You Belong With Me'' has [[Nerds Are Sexy|nerdy]], [[Tomboy and Girly Girl|sneaker-wearing]] [[Hair of Gold|blonde]] Taylor get an upgrade from [[Unlucky Childhood Friend]] status at the
* [[XTC]]'s "Life Begins at the Hop".
* This is the setting of [[Fall Out Boy]]'s "Dance, Dance"
== Theatre ==
* The premise of the musical ''Best Foot Forward'' is the invitation of a movie actress to one of these.
== Web Comics ==
* ''[[A Magical Roommate]]'' provides us with the Festival of Swords. Which features dancing. [[Cool Sword|With swords]].
== Web Animation ==
* Spoofed on ''[[Homestar Runner]]'', in a Strong Bad Email where Strong Bad is asked about his [https://web.archive.org/web/20131027140836/http://www.homestarrunner.com/kotpoptoon.html senior prom], and Strong Bad talks about the time he crashed the "Entrapment All Up on the Moon Dance".
== [[Web Original]] ==
* The big Halloween dance, complete with costumes, at Whateley Academy in the ''[[Whateley Universe]]''. Although the invasion by dozens of Syndicate dropships and the attempted assassinations make it a bit more messy.
** There's another one a couple of weeks later, in "Dreams and Awakenings," which goes a bit better. We also get to see what a
* ''[[The Descendants]]'' had one of these. On the way there, they had to fight cyborg nerds.
* In ''[[Survival of the Fittest]]'', the lead up to and eventual event of the
== Western Animation ==
* The first batch of ''[[Kim Possible]]'' episodes ended at The
** Later in the series (after Kim and Ron were well established) there was a complicated episode where the sub-plot was the [[Alpha Bitch]] (Bonnie) had rigged the Homecoming vote so she and Ron would be the royalty, which turned into helping her get a boyfriend. The main plot being Señor Senior, Jr. kidnapping a Programmer. Episode turns out that there was no big evil plot and all Señor Senior, Jr. was looking for was a girlfriend, and the episode ends with Bonnie and Jr. dancing at homecoming. Now, this is just plain WEIRD.
* An episode of ''[[The Simpsons]]'' involves Lisa being pressured into planning a school dance at the request of some of her classmates. After a brief "oh no, I need a date!" period, she got her courage up, entered the
* ''[[Family Guy]]'': A running gag in the series involves homely Meg frequently asking a popular jock to a high school dance, only for the boy to come up with some crazy excuse (or in at least one situation, fake his shooting of a 2-year-old brother) so he doesn't have to go with her. One episode -- "Barely Legal"
* The whole premise behind one of the most infamous ''[[X
** That and Nightcrawler accidentally brings a bunch of monsters from another dimension to crash the dance. Hey, it's X-Men.
* ''[[The Spectacular Spider-Man]]'', where, after agonizing over who to bring Peter has to go leave Mary Jane in the lurch to fight Green Goblin. ''What a twist!''
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* An episode of ''[[The Weekenders]]'' focused on the group preparing for a school dance (Middle School, but the trope still applies) and their attempts to overcome "Lateral Gravity Syndrome", which invariably pulls boys and girls towards opposite walls for the duration of the dance.
* No less than ''three'' times in ''[[Code Lyoko]]'', each with their own set of dating dramas:
** The 'prom' of "Teddygozilla"
** The 'techno party' of "Final Mix"
** The 'End of Year Dance' in "The Key"
* A ''[[Teen Titans (
* The series finale of ''[[Clone High]]'' was a giant two part episode that lampshaded every prom-related trope there is. [[Word of God]] said that had the series gone on, it would have revealed that there are dozens of different dances and proms throughout the year, and that the finale just took place during 'winter prom'.
* In the ''[[Ed, Edd 'n' Eddy]]'' episode 'May I Have This Ed,' the Eds, well, [[Captain Obvious|go to a school dance]]. Edd is terrified of going, but Eddy assures him his brother's book on picking up chicks will help! It does, sort of. The end result? The Eds end up destroying the gym used for the dance.
* ''[[Daria]]'' used the school dance as the "uncool" component in a [[Party Scheduling Gambit]].
* ''[[The Venture Bros]]'' wrapped up their season with one, though it played with it alot:The Prom was homeschool so the only guests were The Boys themeslves, Hank's friend Dermott, Triana as Dean's date(though just as friends) with the rest being Dr.Ventures freinds and paid escorts. The only small bit of teen drama is Dean being jealous of Triana's boyfriend and getting tipsy on punch, causing her to leave. The three boys head out after her and go with Dermott's crazy plan to burn her name on giant straw letters in the lawn while Dean dresses up as a ghost and ends up getting mistaken for a KKK member.
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{{reflist}}
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[[Category:Party At My Index]]▼
[[Category:Dancing Tropes]]
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