My Car Hates Me: Difference between revisions

[[File:carthrash.jpg|link=Fawlty Towers|right]]

 

 

The [[Big Bad]], [[The Dragon]], and everything with teeth are just outside the character's locked car door, salivating and howling to get in. Naturally, the car will not start. No doubt the character is thinking "My car hates me."

Note that even if the car is stalled during an earthquake on a burning railroad track with two trains coming and a nuclear warhead heading toward the area, the driver will keep turning the ignition key, hitting the gas pedal, and praying, "Please start, please start..." but not simply get out of the car and run for it. Chalk it up to either [[Genre Blindness]] or being horrifically attached to personal property. Some may even get out only to apply [[Percussive Maintenance]] to the hood, which has a higher success rate than you would guess.

 

 

[[Plot-Driven Breakdown]] is the supertrope to this.

 

{{examples}}

* Parodied in [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BcjWMvwKXg this] Volkswagen ad.

* ...and in [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-7gb0jU0WU&feature=related this] Chevrolet ad.

 

* The French-Canadian movie ''Elvis Gratton'' [[Playing with a Trope|spoofs this trope]] with a literal version of it. It involves a [[Cool Car|talking limousine]] which actually ''insults'' the titular character. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cood3ZnRJk8 See for yourself] (in Québec French with lots of swearing). He has a pretty bad record with [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJWQCN5BKfc talking limousines] anyway.

* ''[[Into the Night]]'': Inverted. Insomniac [[Jeff Goldblum]], who drove to the airport after finding his wife in ''flagrante delicto,'' has decided to go back home, but he can't get his car started. Enter Michelle Pfeiffer, being chased by Iranian diamond smugglers. She jumps into his car and tells him to go—and the car starts right up!

* In ''[[Poltergeist]] 2'' when the father is cursing his car, Taylor tells him that his car is literally angry at him and refuses to work properly because of that. This of course leads to a dramatic situation when the family is trying to escape.

 

* In [[Stephen King]]'s ''[[Cujo]]'', mom and son are trapped for several days on a yard in a Ford Pinto by the eponymous dog. It's a Ford Pinto. They're (un)lucky the car got them there in the first place, (they went there to get it fixed) and it's surprising the dog jumping on the back of the thing didn't [[Every Car Is a Pinto|cause it to explode]]. As King himself owned a Ford Pinto at one time, the choice of car is probably a [[Take That]] at Ford.

* ''[[Needful Things]]'': Later called back, as one of the characters ends up next to the same house where the events of ''Cujo'' happened. Then she thinks she hears a dog growling. Then she thinks she sees glowing red eyes to match the growling. Then her car won't start. Then, as whatever it is starts moving towards her...{{spoiler|the car finally starts and she gets away. Phew.}}

** Justified, in that a side effect of Harry's magic is that he is a [[Walking Techbane]]. His abilities (and consequently, his anti-tech aura) are enhanced by emotion, and this trope practically requires that the victim be upset/frustrated/scarred out of their wits when trying to start the car.

*** Also in that his car has been shot at, spun out into a wall, run into ''and'' over a chlorofiend, infested by mold demons, jumped by werewolves, and clawed by something Harry either can't or won't name. He freely admits the only reason the Beetle is still moving is courtesy of his ridiculously talented mechanic.

* Parodied in ''Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex (But Were Afraid To Ask).'' In a segment parodying horror movies, Woody Allen discovers at an inopportune time, "The battery's dead and we're out of gas, oil, and water."

 

* It's pretty much a [[Running Gag]] that the cast and crew of ''[[Destination Truth]]'' are simply incapable of using a vehicle without having it break down or otherwise run into trouble. Pretty much every vehicle they've used on screen over the course of multiple seasons has had these troubles. They've lampshaded it recently,{{when}} as it's now fairly common to hear somebody say "Can't we just get a car that works? Just once?"

 

* The narrator in the song [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDy3kV8Kuu4 ''Two Ton Paperweight'' by Psychostick] is under the impression this is the case ("You never get me very far, when you decide driving to the store is a mortal sin"), and assures that, like in Fawlty Towers, the feeling is indeed mutual ("I guess I'm just a little angry, but for some reason getting stranded kinda chafes my hide").

* Referenced in "Stuck In A Movie!" by the Aquabats:

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Applied Phlebotinum]]

[[Category:Chase Scene]]

[[Category:Finagle's Law]]