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The Fair Folk: Difference between revisions
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* [[Depleted Phlebotinum Shells|Iron]] - Sometimes it means striking them with iron weapons, or simply a frying pan or just exposure will do the job. In some settings where this would be too much of a [[Weaksauce Weakness]], it's specified as [[Cold Iron]], which usually means unworked iron that has not been treated via forging. How effective it is tends to vary.
** Sometimes steel is named instead of iron, which is, of course, the
* [[Can Not Tell a Lie]] - Sometimes. Note that they ''will'' exploit and [[Ambiguous Syntax|twist]] this for all manner of deception, but a trickster hero can take advantage of this.
** [[I Gave My Word]]: A related note, often the Fair Folk ''must'' keep their word once they give it. Again they might exploit a loophole. For example, a favorite trick is for them to lead a mortal to a tree with the insinuation that there's a buried treasure under it; said mortal realizes he needs to go get a shovel, but also realizes he'd neve find the tree again if he leaves. So he decides
* [[Magically-Binding Contract]] - Related to the above. Any deal with the Fair Folk ''will'' be upheld from their end, though they tend to respect only the [[Exact Words|letter]] of any deal they make. God help you if you fail your end of a deal. (God help you even if you don't!)
* [[Pride]] - That bit up there about how they demand to be called the "fair" folk? They're ''all'' like that. To a one, they are proud creatures, concerned primarily with their own grand schemes.
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{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* [[Durarara!!]]'' subverts this trope with Celty Sturluson, an [[Celtic Mythology|Irish]] [[The Grim Reaper|Dulla]][[Headless Horseman|han]]
* The Diclonii from ''[[Elfen Lied]]'' are heavily influenced by the Fair Folk and are in fact the "elves" from the title. They reproduce by secretly altering humans so that [[Changeling Tale|any children they have will be born as diclonii]] and they are all very beautiful or handsome. In feudal Japan they used to live like nobles ruling over normal humans until they were hunted almost to extinction. They are not particularly evil, but when they grow older they develop telekinetic abilities with which they almost always accidentally kill their human families and only survive by becomming deadly killers. Except the only remaining queen Lucy, who can give birth to pureblood diclonii and has the unstopable instinct to [[Kill All Humans]].
* [[Kaori Yuki]]'s ''[[Fairy Cube]]'' is probably best example of this trope being used properly in manga. From the protagonist's [[Fairy Companion]] debating whether or not to eat him in the beginning, to a Tuatha Dunann being weak to a pair of scissors (and being unable to cross fresh water), to the presence of ''changelings'' replacing children, a lot of classic fairy-lore is involved. Granted, some of it is modernized (said fairy companion is played as more of a non-romantic [[Tsundere]], for example), but the effort is easily appreciable.
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* In the backstory of ''[[The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen]]'', it's revealed that not only did the Fair Folk exist in Britain with their own realm, but said realm was even united with England under [[The Faerie Queene]] for a time. Later on however, the Puritans under Cromwell led a great purge, wiping out most of the Fair Folk and driving those who survived away from the human world forever.
== [[Film
* Even though she's usually called a witch these days, Maleficent, of [[Disney Animated Canon|Disney's]] ''[[Sleeping Beauty (Disney film)|Sleeping Beauty]]'', is actually a "wicked fairy".
** To quote ''[[Discworld|Nanny Ogg's Cookbook]]'': "How hard is it to invite her along, give her plenty of drink and a plate of ham rolls all to herself, and keep her out of the way of your posh auntie? Play your cards right and you could be ahead by an extra good wish."
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* ''[[Spirited Away]]'' is a Japanese [[Youkai]] [[Fairy Tale]] that portrays them as acting very similar to The Fair Folk.
* Aisling from ''[[The Secret of Kells]]''. Though she turns out to be much nicer than how the Fair Folk are usually portrayed, she still doesn't take kindly to those who intrude in her forest and initially even threatens to set her wolves on Brendan if he doesn't leave.
* ''[[Labyrinth]]'', the David Bowie movie, not to be confused with the recent ''[[Pan's Labyrinth]]''—see below. When Sarah reaches the outer wall of the Labyrinth, she finds a gardener killing Fairies with a bug sprayer. She calls him a brute, and picks up one of the not-quite-dead Fairies, who rewards her actions by attempting to bite off her finger. When she expresses her amazement and that she thought Fairies did "nice things, like granting wishes", the gardener simply scoffs and says "[[Genre Blind|Shows what you know]]."
** Not to mention [[Magnificent Bastard|Jareth himself]] and his Goblins; the film is essentially a changeling tale.
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* ''[[Were the World Mine]]'', a musical adaptation of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream', about an outcast gay kid cast as Puck in the school play who ends up {{spoiler|making a magic flower and causing people to fall in love with people of their own gender, essentially becoming Puck}}, often in musical sequences that are vague about whether it's a fantasy or not. The English/drama teacher, as well, is {{spoiler|implied to be a fairy, complete with magic that makes the townspeople bend to her will. Granted, this is to give Puck/Timothy a chance to fix everything, but it's still not quite right from a human perspective}}. Overall, the fairies depicted are very sympathetic, but there is definite selfishness and laughing at the trouble being caused to mundane people going on.
* Del Toro does it again with [[Don't Be Afraid of the Dark]]. No wings or sparkles here, the creatures [[All There in the Manual|(officially known as Homonculi)]] look more like [[Our Monsters Are Weird|evil hunchbacked lemurs.]]
* King Brian and the other leprechauns in ''[[Darby O'Gill and the
* The creature in [[Absentia]] is actually a {{spoiler|troll}}. Many of the characteristics of the fae are present in the movie, such as the strict adherence to trading, [[Jackass Genie|the rules of which you'll have to figure out on your own]], living in another dimension, torturing people seemingly for shits and giggles, [[Nothing Is Scarier]], and abducting people. The movie is actually a good example of how to make the faeries terrifying to a modern audience.
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* Certainly, [[Brian Froud]] belongs at the top here. Modern audiences must have had a shock when his collaboration with Alan Lee, ''[[Faeries]],'' hit the shelves. It was one of the first books to include as many scary Fairy stories as nice stories. Froud has vocally emphasized that, while there are indeed evil Fairies and good Fairies in mythology, the vast majority of them are neutral. He actually apologizes, in the introduction, for the self-contradictory title of his follow-up book, ''Bad Faeries/Good Faeries''.
* In [[Aaron Allston]]'s ''[[Doc Sidhe]]'' the Fair Folk are just as morally varied as humans are. Furthermore, the Fairy World has advanced at the nearly same rate as the human world, so fairies in the 1990s have 1930s level technology, mixed with magic (which is no longer called magic because it can be studied scientifically). And they've interbred with humans so many times as a result of changelings and other visitations that most are nearly human height. And one of the fairies is a [[Captain Ersatz]] of [[Doc Savage]]. It's a lot [[Better Than It Sounds]].
* The Moorfolk in ''[[The Moorchild]]'' fit the description to a T. They've an aversion to holy water, Rowan wood, St. John's Wort and other yellow flowers, iron (in the setting,
* [[Poul Anderson]]'s ''The Queen of Air and Darkness'' riffs on this trope by having telepathic aliens on a frontier world use the legends of Faerie against the human settlers, right down to kidnapping children to use as changeling warriors.
** ''[[The Broken Sword]]'' is a fantasy novel about Dark Age Europe coexisting (unknowingly) with amoral elves, trolls, etc. Poul includes a [[squick]]y passage wherein an elf lord creates a changeling using an enslaved she-troll. The changeling gets even, kind of. Several of Poul Anderson's other novels and at least one short story also deal with the Fair Folk.
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*** Titania, his wife, seems to be of the other type thankfully, and is more than capable of controlling her husband. {{spoiler|Unfortunately, she's the instigator for the incident with Alexander. And then also the instigator for the interference of the Gargoyles}}.
*** On the other hand, Puck {{spoiler|is Owen}}.
* ''[[The Fairly
** Also, the April Fool in "Fools Day Out" called causing the Earth to go into an Ice Age by hitting several planets and stuff is a "prank" or "joke".
** One episode also has "Scary Fairies". A state brought on by a fairy being stuck in pitch black for too long, who compulsively desire to eat their Godkid. {{spoiler|Fortunately it's all just a practical joke on Timmy.}}
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* Brian Froud's ''Fairies'' was adapted as a half hour animated special in the 1980's.
* A lot of the spirits from ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]''. Most notably Koh, a giant centipede spirit who delights in [[Face Stealer|stealing people's faces....]]
* The changelings in ''[[My Little Pony:
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