Mama Didn't Raise No Criminal/Playing With

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Basic Trope: "The family members of a criminal deny that he is a criminal even in the face of proof."

  • Straight: A lot of evidence is collected that points to Charlie as Bob's murderer. Alice, who is Charlie's mother, says that Charlie wouldn't do such a thing.
  • Exaggerated: Everyone had seen Charlie set off a bomb on live television, killing hundreds of people. Alice sees the broadcast, but says that it couldn't be Charlie.
  • Justified: Charlie's sibling volubly deny that Charlie could have done it, because if he did, their mother would die from a broken heart.
  • Inverted: Charlie clearly didn't kill Bob, but Alice frames him because she hates her son.
    • Alice refuses to acknowledge Charlie as her son because he refuses to become an assassin, which has been the family's profession since ancestral times.
  • Subverted: After getting over her initial astonishment, Alice accepts the evidence that Bob was killed.
  • Double Subverted: ...except she just says this to get the police to leave her alone.
    • ...Just not that it was Charlie who did it.
  • Parodied: Charlie mugs his own mother. She refuses to recognize him even when he tells her it's him, and later on she still denies that he did it.
  • Deconstructed: Alice is a Stepford Smiler who brooks no argument from the rest of the family that Charlie is anything but her darling boy. Her other children resent the favoritism and are driven to follow in Charlie's footsteps.
  • Reconstructed: ???
  • Zig Zagged: Alice demonstrates Ping-Pong Naivete regarding her son's activities, always knowing precisely enough about his life to suit the plot or her own motives.
  • Averted: When Alice is told about Charlie, she accepts it right away.
  • Enforced: The writers decide to show just how some parents are clueless.
    • The writers need a frame narrative for Charlie's Start of Darkness and a sobbing mother sets the mood.
  • Lampshaded: "Alice keeps insisting that Charlie is innocent." "Of course she does: she's his mother. No parent wants to believe their kid is capable of [insert crime here]."
  • Invoked: Alice puts on an act of injured innocence to prevent herself being suspected as an accessory to Charlie's crimes.
  • Exploited: Charlie exploits his mother's trust in him to steal her life savings. (Truth in Television all too often, alas.)
  • Defied: "Do you expect me to say 'Oh no, officer, that couldn't be my little Charlie, he was always such a good boy!'? Your mother isn't an idiot!"
  • Discussed: ???
  • Conversed: ???
  • Played For Laughs: ???
  • Played For Drama: Alice keeps denying that Charlie is a criminal. As a result, Charlie manages to kill her. Even in the afterlife, Alice denies that Charlie was her murderer.

Hold it! Your mama didn't raise you to be no troper!

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