The Dresden Files/Tropes A-M: Difference between revisions

* [[All Myths Are True]]: Yep, all of them. Particular emphasis tends to be given to the Western mythologies and beliefs (Christian, Celtic, Greco-Roman, Norse, et cetera).

** A fourth [[Our Vampires Are Different|type of vampire]], the Jade Court, is briefly mentioned, but hasn't been seen yet. As the name would indicate, they operate out of East Asia. One can only assume that, given the cosmopolitan nature of [[The Windy City|Chicago]], they and possibly other Eastern myth creatures will be showing up.

* [[Anchored Ship]]: Harry/Murphy. {{spoiler|The anchor looked to be being pulled up right at the end of ''Changes'', but [[The Hero Dies|subsequent events]] again put the end destination in question.}}

* [[Angels, Devils, and Squid]]: There are angels (and [[Fallen Angel|Fallen Angels]]). Both of these are separate and distinct from the demons, [[Fair Folk|sidhe, wildfae]], old gods, demigods, vampire lords and [[Eldritch Abomination|Outsiders]] hanging around the place, to the point where it reaches [[Fantasy Kitchen Sink]] levels.

* [[Badass Family]]: The Carpenters. There's the [[Knight in Shining Armour|father]], [[Mama Bear|mother]], [[Master of Illusion|eldest]] [[Action Girl|sister]] and now, as of ''Ghost Story'', [[Badass Normal|her younger brother]]. With plenty of other siblings to come.

* [[Badass in Distress]]: Harry gets stuck in [[James Bondage]] on a regular basis and can not always get out on his own.

** He started out with a canvas one; the leather one was a gift from Susan. It has some of the same practical enchantments, but lacks the "extra billow" and in general is kind of the poor-man's knockoff of the leather one in terms of both utility and effect.

*** For added hilarity, when the coat needs to be cleaned after getting hit by slime demons, Harry takes the most practical route: [[Mundane Utility|he throws it in a fire.]] I mean, hey, when you enchant something to be the next best thing to wearable indestructibility...

* [[Black Magic]]: Killing someone using magic, necromancy, using [[Mind Control]] and summoning an Outsider are the main forms we have seen. Addictive, and it comes with a death penalty if you get caught. [[Word of God]] states that every time a [[Muggle]] is killed with magic, indirectly or otherwise (as in throwing someone off a building using a magic gust of wind), it breaks the first law and makes the forces of darkness even stronger. If the RPG previews are correct (and they have enough [[Word of God]] on their side to say it is), even ''seeking'' information about '''anything''' beyond the Outer Gates is a no-no. Exceptions probably exist for the Merlin and the Gatekeeper, and definitely exist for the Blackstaff (that ''is'' his purpose).

* [[Blessed with Suck]]:

** The Archive knows everything that has ever been written or committed to paper (yes, this means Porn, Hate Speech, [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|and even]] [[Purple Prose]]), and the Archive itself itself is passed down from mother to daughter along with the personal memories of each previous Archive. This means that, in addition to knowledge and power, one woman gains all the trauma, heartbreak and memories from countless previous lives.

* [[Blue and Orange Morality]]: The Fae, who simply do not view the world the same way humanity does. Lea, for example, honestly does not understand why Harry would object to being "protected" by being turned into a faerie dog.

** The fact that Harry never finished high school probably has less to do with his intelligence and academic aptitude and more with the whole shebang with Justin DuMorne, He Who Walks Behind and the Doom of Damocles that hit the fan when he was 16.

* [[Boom Stick]]: Harry's blasting rod is basically a stick he uses to burn everything in sight.

* [[Brass Balls]]: "You can say what you like about Gentleman Johnny Marcone, but he has a set of brass balls that drag the ground when he walks."

* [[Brown Note]]: Harry does not respond well to some of the stuff he sees with his Sight. He just about broke his brain at least twice looking at very powerful, incredibly nasty things, and you ''never '''ever''''' forget what you see...

* [[Buy Them Off]]: Weregilds, which are paid for deaths throughout the supernatural community.

* [[Call Back]] / [[Brick Joke]]: In the early novels, Lea wants to turn Harry into one of her hounds, in order to protect him. {{spoiler|She gets her chance in ''Changes'', when the group needs to get to Chichen Itza from the Ways quickly.}}

* [[Canis Latinicus]]: Lots of it, Harry uses it for ''all'' his spells. {{spoiler|Elaine}} uses Dog-Babylonian and Egyptian. Morgan uses Ancient Greek. As of ''Changes'', {{spoiler|Molly}} seems to prefer Japanese. The explanation given in ''Fool Moon'' is that they provide a wizard's mind with "an extra layer of protection against the magical energies coursing through it". The protection is thinner if you use words you are too familiar with, as the words will be close enough to your thoughts that the two are near impossible to separate. Thus, wizards use words that are either made up or from languages they do not really understand.

* [[Cannot Spit It Out]]: If Harry could just fit his mouth around "I can't tell you, it's a 'Wizard Thing'", 99% of the angst with Murphy could be dispelled. This actually becomes less of a problem in the books after ''Summer Knight'', when Harry finally spills the magic beans to Murphy about the supernatural world.

** Harry and Susan as well, because pleasure makes her lose control and {{spoiler|might lead into biting him and turning into a full vampire.}} Eventually, Harry solves the problem by tying her up.

** Soul Fire, which burns the soul itself - and no soul means no life. {{spoiler|Nice thing about the soul, though: It's a renewable resource.}}

* [[Catch Phrase]]: Harry has two: "Hell's bells!" and "Stars and stones!" Thomas has, "Empty night." [[Word of God]] has said that those three phrases will also be the titles of the Apocalyptic Trilogy that ends the series. In Butcher's own words, "there's a reason those are curses."

** It should be noted however that those three are not completely exclusive as Elaine has been seen to use the first two and Lara (presumably along with other Raiths) use the latter.

* [[Cerebus Syndrome]]: The ratio of funny to horrendously depressing has changed in the last few books. To the point where, before reading a new book, one might ask "Is it worth the [[Crazy Awesome]] to have my heart ripped out and stomped on?"<ref>The answer, of course, is yes.</ref>

* [[Character Development]]:

** Know that [[J. R. R. Tolkien|JRR Tolkien]] quote about wizards? Harry's always had the "quick to anger" thing pretty much covered, but over time he is getting better at the "subtle."

*** He's also getting much more magically powerful. The first two books had him struggling to use magic after a few powerful bursts, and ''Fool Moon'' has a point where he's worried he may have burnt out his magical batteries permanently. Since ''Grave Peril'', he's been throwing around more and more major mojo without showing any signs of weakening, to the point that the only thing that stops him from using magic is lack of consciousness or severe pain.

** Billy and Charity both start out a bit flat, but become full three-dimensional characters by their second and later appearances.

* [[Chaste Hero]]: Averted. Harry likes sex just fine, the trouble is that the majority of women who are eager to sleep with him would kill him or enslave him. Plus, he would rather not indulge out of sheer carnal pleasure, but love. As if this were not handicap enough, he is also kind of clueless about women. Taken to tragicomic extremes at the end of ''Changes'': {{spoiler|Harry and Murphy, both traumatized by events, agree to meet up and have mindless sex in an hour... but just before he goes to meet her Harry is shot dead.}}

* [[Complexity Addiction]]: If your plan is not insanely complicated the White Court vamps will not respect you for it. Needless to say, they do not respect Harry very much.

* [[Cool Big Sis]]: Molly. Subverted by Lara.

* [[Cool Pet]]: Mister and Mouse. Mouse is a Temple Dog / Fu Dog with unspecified magical powers and human level (at least) intelligence. Mister is an enormous house cat (30+ pounds, but no excess fat) who loves Coca-Cola and food from Harry's favorite pub. He is so awesome that his true form and the way he appears to normal sight are ''exactly the same''. Mister is too dignified to abide by such silly things as the laws of physics.

* [[Cool Sword]]: The swords wielded by the Knights of the Cross, each imbued with Holy might and one of the nails of the Crucifixion. They're named Amoracchius, Fidelacchius, and Esperacchius. Or, if you wanna go by their more famous names, {{spoiler|Excalibur, Kusanagi, and Durendal}}.

== D-F ==

* [[Deadly Decadent Court]]: The White Court Vampires, complete with institutional [[Complexity Addiction]].

* [[Death of the Old Gods]]: Most of the old gods have effectively gone into hibernation over the last few centuries. The Lord Almighty (as Harry calls the Christian [[God]]) is still very active in modern times, and not ''all'' the Old Gods are completely out of the game.

* [[Debt Detester]]: The fairies, although it's not so much that they ''dislike'' being in debt as that if they make bargains they're compelled to keep them.

* [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?]]: Michael Carpenter has a history of this. He is known to have rescued his wife-to-be by slaying a dragon. (See Our Dragons Are Different.) Holy swords are particularly good at that sort of thing.

* [[Dirty Business]]

* [[Damsel in Distress]]: The subject of what amounts to a [[Running Gag]], with Harry inevitably helping her (even when it is unwise) because he has a chivalrous streak he [[Fatal Flaw|can not seem to override]]. He even puts himself back under the {{spoiler|Doom of Damocles}} again to save a girl.

* [[Divided We Fall]]

* [[Even Evil Has Standards]]: More than a few villainous characters have worked with Harry for this reason.

** Thomas Raith's motivation for helping Harry out. {{spoiler|He lied. It is actually because Harry is his half-brother, through their Mom.}}

** Mab and Bob, both of whom are highly amoral, are disgusted with Heinrich Kemmler, who singlehandedly engineered [[World War I]] just to get a supply of bodies to work with.

* [[Even the Dog Is Ashamed]]: Mouse's remarkable degree of common sense leads to a few instances of this, especially in ''Turn Coat''.

* [[Evil-Detecting Dog]]: Mouse.

* [[Evil Feels Good]]: [[Black Magic]] and vampires.

* [[Evil Overlord List]]: [[Lampshaded]] Harry suspects Nicodemus of having read it.

* [[Evil Plan]]: A case could start out as somebody hiring Harry to look into why their sock got lost in the wash, and by the end of the book it'd still turn out to be connected to one of these.

** Everyone knows there is no such thing as magic, so witnesses are never believed. Most just convince themselves they imagined it because the alternative means that the world doesn't work the way they think it does, challenging their entire concept of reality.

* [[The Fair Folk]]:

** Harry also has two Queens of [[Faerie]] furious with him at the moment: Titania, one of the Queens of Summer, {{spoiler|because he killed her daughter, Aurora, in ''Summer Knight''}}, and Mab, one of the Queens of Winter, {{spoiler|because Harry managed to rain destruction on her capital, Arctis Tor, in ''Proven Guilty''...and used Summer fire to do it.}}

** On the other hand, [[Fairy Companion|Toot-Toot]] the fairy and his pixie buddies are quite fond of Harry, to the point of putting together the "Za Lord's Guard". As a result of ''Summer Knight'', he also has a faerie housekeeping service he can never mention (except to the reader) or they will leave forever.

* [[Fertile Feet]]: The more powerful Summer fae like Eldest Brother Gruff or the Summer Lady do this.

* [[Fiction 500]]: The White Court in general, and Lara Raith in particular.

* [[Fingore]]:

** One way Mab shows to Harry that she really has control of him, and then she freezes the wound just for spite.

* [[Flat Earth Atheist]]: Sanya (see [[Church Militant]] example above). Sanya has a pretty sophisticated and logical personal philosophy on all the supernatural stuff. He lives in a world with ridiculously powerful beings who are not actually worshipped or called gods, and it is possible for mere mortals to gain near-godlike power. So why assume that one particular powerful entity really is a god, or God? And his mission, as he points out, is worthwhile whether he was given his task by a real angel or not, because either way he is still [[We Help the Helpless|helping the helpless]].

* [[Flowery Elizabethan English]]: [[The Sidhe]] and other immortals have a tendency to talk this way.

* [[Foreshadowing]]: Tons of it, all throughout the series. One-off commentary by a character in one book becomes a whole lot more meaningful when re-read a second time, with knowledge of how the plotlines develop. There is a lot of material that gets subtly foreshadowed, particularly in ''Grave Peril'' and ''Proven Guilty''. The latter, for example, has a moment where Harry and Ebenezar discuss the traitor within the White Council, and Harry comments that no one has shown up with mysterious sums in their bank accounts. {{spoiler|Morgan's frame-up in ''Turn Coat'' involves exactly this.}} Murphy and Harry's discussion about their relationship foreshadows {{spoiler|Harry's daughter}} in ''Changes'' and Murphy's {{spoiler|taking up of Dresden's mantle as the protector of Chicago}} in ''Aftermath''.

* [[Formally-Named Pet]]: Harry Dresden's cat is named simply Mister.

* [[Held Gaze]]: There's even has a name for this - the Soulgaze, where two people catch a glimpse of each other's souls because they share a gaze. One of them has to be a wizard to trigger it, though.

{{quote|"For me, meeting someone's eyes is always risky. Every human being knows what I'm talking about. Try it. Walk up to someone, without speaking and look them in the eyes. There's a a certain amount of leeway for second, or two, or three. And then there's a distinct sensation of contact, of intimacy. That's when regular folks cough and look away. Wizards, though, get the full ride of a soulgaze." Harry Dresden, ''White Night''. }}

** Michael Carpenter, The Fist of God. {{spoiler|Retired as of ''[[The Dresden Files/Small Favor|Small Favor]]'', but Sanya still counts}}.

** Karrin Murphy and the rest of SI.

** Warden Morgan.

* [[Honorary Uncle]]: Harry to the Carpenter clan.

* [[Hope Spot]]: Seems to happen at least once per book.

* [[Horny Devils]]: White Court vampires of House Raith.

* [[Hot for Teacher]]: Molly for Harry. Also Morgan towards Luccio. Both times unrequited.

* [[Huge Guy, Tiny Girl]]: Harry is 6'9'' tall, while Murphy is five foot even. Also Kincaid and Ivy.

* [[Hurting Hero]]: Harry's life sucks.

* [[Hyperspace Is a Scary Place]]: The Nevernever, or at least the parts closest to the mortal world, are fraught with faeries, demons and other dangerous creatures. The parts further away from the mortal world are ''worse.''

* [[I Know Your True Name]]: True names (i.e. a person's name pronounced ''exactly'' the way they do so themselves) grant a wizard power over the one named, to the point that demons will consider a portion of a person's name from their own lips to be worthy payment for a service. Some dragons are apparently so powerful they only need part of the name, and Harry wonders what he could do with the full one. However, it is pointed out that humans are far more mutable than supernatural beings, so a human's True Name can change over time.

** Wizards, being human, are also subject to their True Names changing, but because they are long-lived, it takes a significantly longer amount of time to do so.

* [[Inhumanly Beautiful Race]]: The White Court of Vampires, and the fae. The Red Court of Vampires ''look'' like the beautiful people in their flesh masks, but they are ''really'' not.

* [[Inspector Javert]]: Morgan. He harasses Harry at every turn, accuses him of black magic and cavorting with demons and vampires (which, to be fair to Morgan, Harry ''does'' do with Lash and Thomas), and ''eagerly'' looks for an excuse to execute him, but this is all because he legitimately believes that Harry is a threat to others. Their relationship mellows (slightly) over the books, and comes to a head in ''Turn Coat''.

* [[Join or Die]]: Nicodemus gives Harry an offer: {{spoiler|take up one of the [[Artifact of Doom|30 silver coins]] and join the [[Names to Run Away From Really Fast|Order of the Blackened Denarius]], or have his throat slit after breakfast.}} Nicodemus believes very strongly in [[Dangerously Genre Savvy|pragmatic villainy]].

* [[Killed Off for Real]]: Several characters, notably {{spoiler|Shiro}}, {{spoiler|Morgan}} and {{spoiler|Susan}}.

* [[Knight in Shining Armor]]: Michael is a ''literal'' embodiment of the title and elso exemplifies its meaning, as Harry himself says that he is the closest anybody will ever get to meeting an Honest-To-God ''angel''. {{spoiler|Well, ''most'' people. Harry has hung out a few times with the archangel Uriel.}}

** And Michael is armed with a magic sword to boot, ''Amoracchius''. The sword's ''real'' name? {{spoiler|Excalibur. Yes, ''that'' Excalibur}}.

** Molly's wands and Harry's staff and rod are both foci, and depending on preference other wizards might use, say, a soup ladle or a pair of earrings. None of them are strictly necessary; fitting with the general [[Clap Your Hands If You Believe]] nature of magic, they're just tools to make it easier. For example, Harry casting a fire spell without his blasting rod is like trying to carve a butter sculpture with your bare hands; possible, but difficult.

* [[Magnetic Hero]]: Harry draws people into his orbit and transforms them without even realizing it.

** {{spoiler|Lara Raith}} eventually comes to rule the entire White Court in this way, after {{spoiler|learning her father is unable to feed thanks to Margaret Dresden's curse on him, and then proceeds to literally [[Mind Rape]] him into her slave.}}

{{quote|Lara (of Carlos to Harry): A virgin?...Is he a present?}}

* [[Magical Underpinnings of Reality]]: The Fae courts control global climate change.

* [[A Magic Contract Comes with a Kiss]]: {{spoiler|With Mab, it's a ''[[Sarcasm Mode|bit]]'' more than just a kiss.}}

* [[Master Swordsman]]: Shiro of the Knights of the Cross is said to be an artist with his blade. The RPG codifies this, giving him a Weapons skill of 6, with stunts to boost it further in certain situations (for reference, skills top out at 4 or 5 for most non-wizard, non-"[[Plot Device]] level" characters), and outright says if you try to take him on one-on-one, you are going to lose. Even Nicodemus, who hates Shiro, grudgingly respects Shiro's abilities. Nicodemus himself is also pretty good due to having more then 2000 years to practice.

* [[May-December Romance]]: Kinda-sorta Harry and Luccio--though she's in the body of a 20-year-old coed by the time their relationship starts, she's actually a 200+ year old wizard who grew up in Italy in the early 1800s.

*** Harry and Luccio are more in the [[May-December Romance]] Trope as she may be centuries older but he will live just as long.

* [[Mayincatec]]: The cover for ''[http://jim-butcher.com/books/dresden/12/ Changes]''.

* [[Meaningful Name]]:

* [[Monster Progenitor]]: The Red King to the Red court Vampires.

* [[Mood Whiplash]]: Harry likes to tell jokes to lighten tense scenes. In ''Death Masks'' Harry was being tortured and refused to take a bribe to end the pain with, "Sorry, I follow the Tao of Peter Parker." He then followed up by saying the nonplussed villain "must be a DC comics fan." However, it is not always inentional, and it often takes Harry himself by surprise. There is a scene in ''Storm Front'' when Harry goes to ask Bianca, a beautiful vampire, about the death of one of her girls. {{spoiler|The second he says what he is there for she lunges for him, shifting partially into her real form, assuming he is there to kill her. After he drives her back and explains himself, she changes back, and Harry leaves as she is having a snack. All he can now see is the monster who wants to be beautiful.}}

* [[More Hero Than Thou]]

* [[Mr. Exposition]]: Bob on anything magical. Waldo Butters on anything medical, up to and including trying to give scientific explanations for some of the weird stuff that happens to and around Wizards... ''and succeeding''. The RPG has Exposition and Knowledge Dumping, a Trapping (sub-skill) of Scholarship; on a successful roll, the [[Game Master]] can "borrow" the [[Player Character]] to use as a mouthpiece to [[Info Dump]] about the relevant subject. This effectively cuts out the middleman effect witnessed in most RPG knowledge skill checks (Player 1 rolls, GM relates info, Player 1 says "I tell everyone else".)

* [[Muggles Do It Better]]: An ongoing theme is that plain old vanilla mortals could crush all of the supernatural monsters if they were aware of them, thanks to superior technology and [[We Have Reserves|an overwhelming numerical advantage]]. The various [[Badass Normal|Badass Normals]] are pretty good evidence for this. Harry himself takes advantage of it; there are several wizards, vampires, grendelkin and other supernatural nasties that make the mistake of thinking Harry's only as powerful as his magic, only to find out he is a pretty good shot with a .44, or that his six foot oak staff doubles as a pretty good bludgeon.

* [[Multiple Reference Pun]]: Most of the titles.

* [[My Car Hates Me]]: The Blue Beetle is prone to giving out at very inconvenient times. However, this is partially due to the law of averages, since [[The Alleged Car|it dies the rest of the time, too]], and partially justified by the fact that since magic is fueled by emotion, the more distress Harry is in, the more likely he is to [[Walking Techbane|make the car short out]].

* [[My Greatest Second Chance]]

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Split Trope Lists]]