Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Tropes (General): Difference between revisions

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* [[Abandoned Warehouse]]

* [[Absurdly Spacious Sewer]]: Though Sunnydale's [[Justified Trope|were deliberately built to be demon accessible]] by the Mayor.

* [[Attack of the Killer Whatever]]: Subverted.

* [[Ax Crazy]]: Drusilla, Faith, Caleb, Warren Mears.

* [[Baddie Flattery]]: In her nightmare encounter with the Master, he comments that Buffy is prettier than the last Slayer. He compliments her aim in "Prophecy Girl", after casually [[Arrow Catch|catching her crossbow bolt]].

** The Mayor concurs with that assessment ("Choices"). "She's pretty, Angel! [[Expecting Someone Taller|A little skinny]]."

* [[But Not Too Gay]]: Willow and Tara were a couple for about eighteen episodes before they so much as kissed on-screen, probably partly for this and partly to avoid claims of sensationalism.

** Although, this is most likely also done so Joss could do it without the Executives advertising it, by placing their first on-screen kiss in The Body.

* [[Calling Your Orgasms]]

* [[Can't You Read the Sign?]]

* [[Cryptic Background Reference]]

* [[Cutesy Name Town]]: Welcome to ''"Sunnydale"'', the most evil and horrible place on the planet, next to [[Running Gag|Cleveland]].

* [[Damned By Faint Praise]]: Willow's excited to hear that since Angel came to our fair shores about eighty years ago, there are no reports of him hunting ("Angel"). She reads this as proof that he is a ''good'' vampire. "I mean, [[On a Scale From One To Ten|on a scale of one to ten]], 10 being someone who's killing and maiming every night, and 1 being someone who's... not."

** In "Prophecy Girl", Xander takes the plunge and asks out Buffy. She's at a loss for words. "Well, you're not laughing, so that's a good start."

** In the same episode, Angelus readies himself to free Acathla as his acolytes look on. Buffy enters quietly behind one of the henchvamps and cleanly decapitates him. O hai!

** In "[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Recap/S3/E15 Consequences|Consequences]]", Faith is straddling Xander in her bed and [[Go Out With a Bang|about to strangle him]]. She hears a sound and looks over to see Angel swinging a baseball bat before [[Smash to Black|the screen goes black]]. Ow.

* [[Embarrassing Cover Up]]

* [[Emergency Impersonation]]: Willow impersonates the captured alternate universe Willow to get her mooks to go outside.

** Ted, and [[The Stepfather]].

** For another example, look at Gnarl from "Same Time, Same Place" and tell us he doesn't remind you of [[Lord of the Rings|Gollum.]] They even have the same habit of referring to themselves in the third person.

* [[Failed Attempt At Drama]]: The Trio do this a few times.

** And Willow in "Doppelgangland", when she meekly explains that she's storming off now. "It doesn't really work if you come with me."

* [[Friendly Neighborhood Vampires]]: But not very many.

* [[Frozen Fashion Sense]]: According to Buffy, this is the dead giveaway. Another one is hilariously outdated dance moves.

* [[Gayngst]]: Despite having four (possibly [[Ambiguously Gay|five]]) homosexual characters, there is very little gayngst on the show. Larry suffers a little before coming out of the closet but by the time it's mentioned again, he's out and quite happy about it. Spike manages to bring out a little gayngst in Willow during "The Yoko Factor" but that too fades rather quickly.

* [[Girl-On-Girl Is Hot]]: Xander certainly thinks so.

** Except that one time, when they were. To kill a smurf.

 

* [[Hair-Raising Hare]]: To Anya, anyway.

* [[Halloween Episode]]: Three of them. In Season 2, "Halloween". In Season 4, "Fear Itself". In Season 6, "All the Way".

** Xander is a massive example. Continuously blows down on Spike at any chance he gets for his past crimes. Yet it's never mentioned that Anya, who is far older than Spike, spent 1000 torturing and killing men, not to mention being a misanthropic man hater. And to make matters worse, Anya has never been sorry for doing what Vengeance Demons do, and caught nowhere near the amount of criticism Xander gave to Spike, or even Angel.

* [[Hypothetical Casting]]: The tabletop RPG made a lot of hay out of the televised nature of its inspiration; the GM position is called 'The Director', and individual adventures are called 'Episodes' and meant to be part of a larger 'Season'. To top it all off, the rulebook encouraged players to identify the actor who would play their character if the game they were in was actually a TV show.

* [[I Don't Like the Sound of That Place]]: Sunnydale's original name, before the Mayor renamed it.

* [[I Just Want to Be Special]]: Xander and Dawn.

* [[It's Not You, It's My Enemies]]: Tried with Riley. Sadly, it fails.

* [[It's Probably Nothing]]

* [[Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique]]: In the Season 2 premiere, Buffy tortures a vamp by making her swallow her silver necklace.

** If Band Candy is anything to go by, Ripper, even years before he was at his worst, was a huge fan of this.

* [[Jerk with a Heart of Gold]]: Larry for Xander, and Percy for Willow.

* [[Karma Houdini]]: Andrew, Drusilla, Willow, Anya, Harmony.

** In the Season 2 finale, Willow asks Xander to tell Buffy to buy some time while fighting Angelus, so that Willow can do the spell to return Angel's soul. Instead, when Xander catches up to Buffy, he says Willow's message is: "Kick his [Angelus's] ass." Buffy ends up having to [[Staking the Loved One|kill a re-ensouled Angel]] to save the world, which leads to a major [[Heroic BSOD]]. Xander's actions are only brought up once, years later, and even then he never suffers any consequences.

* [[Knight Templar]]: The Knights of Byzantium.

** The Watcher's Council.

* [[Lame Comeback]]:

{{quote|'''Buffy:''' Let's be realistic Willow, your basic spells are usually only about 50/50.

* [[Love Floats]]: Tara and Willow do this a few times.

* [[Luck Manipulation Mechanic]]: In the ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'' RPG, Drama Points can be used to increase the chance of success for Heroic Feats.

* [[Mad Scientist]]: Professor Walsh, Warren Mears, Ted.

* [[Magic Floppy Disk]]: Ms. Calendar's spell, Maggie Walsh's data.

* [[My Hovercraft Is Full of Eels]]: "The cow should touch me from Thursday."

* [[My Species Doth Protest Too Much]]

* [[Names to Run Away From Really Fast]] : '''The First Evil'''.

** Um...the '''''Slayer?'''''

* [[Not So Dire]]: Very common gag.

 

* [[Offscreen Afterlife]]: Twice -- Buffy in Heaven and Angel in Hell.

* [[Off to See the Wizard]]: Buffy refers to the hyena-possessed bullies in "The Pack" as the "winged monkeys".

* [[Our Zombies Are Different]]: Season 3 gives us Type V zombies, Season 8 gives us Type O, popped into existence by an angry witch.

* [[Outlaw Couple]]: Most notably Spike and Drusilla, but also Angel & Darla, Evil Willow & Xander and Spike & Harmony.

* [[Parrot Expowhat]]: Both Buffy and Willow do this a fair amount.

{{quote|'''Anya:''' Buffy's got some kind of job there helping junior deviants, Spike's insane in the basement, Xander's there doing construction on the new gym —

** [[The Bus Came Back]]: Oz and Riley both get episodes like this.

* [[Put on a Bus to Hell]]: Oz and Riley.

* [[Ready for Lovemaking]]

* [[Reality Ensues]]: Season 5 final -- Buffy approaches [[The Dragon]] atop a tower. He gears up for a fight, {{spoiler|and she just knocks him off the tower}}.

* [[Ritual Magic]]: Very popular in the Buffyverse, whether it be the gypsies who cursed Angel, or Willow doing incantations.

* [[Rubber Forehead Aliens|Rubber Forehead Demons]]: A lot of demons are pretty much indistinguishable from humans apart from skin tone and horns or some other head feature. There are also a fair number of non-humanoid ones.

* [[Sacrificial Lamb]]: Jesse.

* [[Saving the World]]: The Watcher's Council seems way too uncaring about the amount of apocalypses in Sunnydale.

{{quote|'''Angel:''' [[Captain Obvious|Little wide...]]}}

** Buffy nearly overpowers Angelus in their first encounter ("Innocence"), but can't bring herself to finish him. ..So she settles for a [[Groin Kick|kick to the groin]] instead.

* [[Talking in Your Dreams]]: Buffy and Angel in "Amends", though there's no actual talking involved. The First Slayer also communicates with Buffy and the gang this way in "Restless".

* [[Tangled Family Tree]]: ''[[Angel]]'' has one, which gets even worse on his own show and in ''Buffy'' Season 7. The Master sired Darla, who sired Angel, who sired Drusilla who sired Spike. Angel killed Darla, who was later brought back from the dead on Angel, as a human. Dru then sired Darla, making her Darla's mother grandchild and Darla her own Great Grandchild. This makes Spike her brother and Great Grandchild and Angel her son and Grandfather. Angel and Darla then break the laws of reality, having a child. This child is Angel's brother, child and Great Grandchild. His Grandchild/Brother/Child then has Jasmine with Cordelia, making Jasmine his Grandchild, Great Great Grandchild and Niece. Meanwhile, Spike went on a siring rampage against his will. Some of those vamps can be assumed to have sired others, making them all clean, if numerous, branches on a very fucked up tree. I would imagine Spike and The Master would be looking on with horror as to what's going on behind/in front of them on the family tree.

* [[Two Girls and a Guy]]: With Buffy, Willow, and Xander.

* [[Two Words: Obvious Trope]]: Out. For. A. Walk... Bitch.

* [[Unusually Uninteresting Sight]]: It's amazing how they just walked around Sunnydale High throwing words around like "Vampire", "Slayer", "Witch", "Demon", "Disembowelment", and "Innards" in full view of others with no one paying attention.

** It was implied that most of the town either knew or was in such deep denial that you could dust a vamp in front of them and they wouldn't change their views. Hell, it happened a bunch of times.

* [[Unrequited Love Switcheroo]]: In the Season Eight continuation, {{spoiler|Buffy and Xander}}.

* [[Urban Fantasy]]

* [[Vampire Hunter]]: [[Captain Obvious|No shit.]]

* [[Vampire Invitation]]: You need one if you're a vampire. There exist loopholes though; a hotel is a public accommodation, for instance. For some reason, vampires are never savvy enough to just burn down the house from the outside.

* [[Visit by Divorced Dad]]: Buffy encounters what she thinks is her father in "Nightmares", but is actually a cruel manifestation of all of her own insecurities as a delinquent daughter. She spends the summer with her dad over the first season hiatus, but their relationship remains frosty.

* [[Vitriolic Best Buds]]: Spike and Angel and Willow and Anya.

* [[Wake Up, Go to School, Save the World]]

* [[Walk and Talk]]: The hallways of SHS and UC Sunnydale.

* [[Workout Fanservice]]: Angel doing his shirtless, exercising Tai Chi routine. Plus, this trope is acknowledge by [[Word of God]].

* [[World of Snark]]: Just about every character ever seen is snarky as hell.

* [[X Meets Y]]: Marti Noxon's vision for Seasons 6-7 was "''[[Party of Five]]'' with monsters." Well, that [[Contemplate Our Navels|explains a lot]].

* [[You Have Failed Me...]]: The Master kills one of his minions in episode 2. "[[Eye Scream|You have something in your eye]]."

** The Anointed One and his lackeys try to pull this on Spike. ''Tried.''

** Dracula gets this alot from Spike. To be fair, Drac still owes him money.

* [[Youth Is Wasted on the Dumb]]

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