Trainspotting/YMMV
- Complete Monster:
- Francis Begbie, who brutally and mercilessly attacks people with no provocation. He carries knitting needles around instead of knives, using them to stab people "because they won't get stuck in the ribcage". In one scene he repeatedly kicks his pregnant girlfriend in the groin for no reason, and with no remorse (he made another girlfriend have a miscarriage). He also was a sadist since childhood, fondly remembering the fun times of setting pigeons on fire and blowing up white mice - though animal abuse seems fairly regular for his set, with only Renton showing any remorse for this fact.
- Begbie is something of a deconstruction: Renton acknowledges that he used to be fairly easy-going, until he started to believe the things he and his friends said about him being a total psycho.
- Begbie's friends Lexo and "Ghostie" Gorman also fall into the Complete Monster category. They only have bit appearances in this book, but are the antagonists of Welsh's later books Marabou Stork Nightmares and Filth.
- Alan Venters in the book. In his first appearance, he is an absolute piece of shit who beats up his wife in public, but keeps her addicted to drugs so she never leaves him. Later on, he catches HIV and knowingly infects Davie's poor girlfriend by violently raping her for an entire night. She eventually gets over the traumatic rape, but not before unknowingly spreading the disease to Davie. However, Davie's revenge on Venters is suitably horrific.
- Francis Begbie, who brutally and mercilessly attacks people with no provocation. He carries knitting needles around instead of knives, using them to stab people "because they won't get stuck in the ribcage". In one scene he repeatedly kicks his pregnant girlfriend in the groin for no reason, and with no remorse (he made another girlfriend have a miscarriage). He also was a sadist since childhood, fondly remembering the fun times of setting pigeons on fire and blowing up white mice - though animal abuse seems fairly regular for his set, with only Renton showing any remorse for this fact.
- Crowning Moment of Funny:
- Spud and the hilariously disgusting bedsheets incident, which results in him accidentally showering his girlfriend's family with his own piss and shit.
- Renton shoots a sleeping dog in the nuts, with an air-rifle. This causes the dog to wake up in a rather bad mood to say the least.
- Renton and Spud casually walking into a nursing home amongst the old people and simply carrying away the TV. Irvine Welsh spent time with junkies before writing Trainspotting. That was a true story.
- The job interviews, when Renton and Spud try to become "normal" hard-working people. Renton is hilariously clueless in his, while Spud (who overcomes his shyness by taking cocaine) blathers fast and incoherently about completely random subjects.
- Crowning Music of Awesome:
- Iggy Pop's "Lust for Life" in the opening, where Renton is sprinting from the cops.
- Blur's "Sing" being played over the same footage partway through the film.
- "Nightclubbing", also by Iggy Pop, and "Think About The Way" by Ice MC also deserve mentions.
- Lou Reed's "Perfect Day" during Renton's overdose.
- Underworld's "Born Slippy" when Renton steals the money from Begbie and walks away into the sunrise in the film's finale.
- Iggy Pop's "Lust for Life" in the opening, where Renton is sprinting from the cops.
- Memetic Mutation: The "Choose life" opening spiel was much imitated in Britain for a while after the film came out, but not as much as the distinctive poster.
- Misaimed Fandom: For a movie with such unsympathetic portrayals of addiction, it has an awful lot of fans in the drug community.
- Plenty of real-life opiate addicts are big fans of this movie for several reasons: one, it's about as accurate as movies get in its portrayal of the heroin experience, ups and downs both, and two, it's not overly Anvilicious about it in the way that, say, Requiem for a Dream is; it takes more of a neutral, observational stance, rather than outright saying "Drugs Are Bad and everyone who does them will inevitably die horribly" or "hey, drugs are great and nothing bad ever happens to people who do drugs!" It's simply an objective, realistic look at addiction that doesn't try to patronize or hammer a moral into your head.
- Nightmare Fuel: Renton's dream sequence when his parents lock him in his room to get him off heroin. The baby in particular.
- It's quite a lot worse in the book. Welsh's writing style is extremely visual and truly horrifying in its description of the hallucinations.
- Older Than They Think: The concept of waiters (or waitresses) tainting the food of customers they dislike is probably most closely associated with Fight Club, but this did it first.
- The Woobie: Poor Spud, other than his self-destructive drug habits he doesn't do anybody any harm, yet he gets sent down while the considerably more deserving Renton escapes prison by enrolling in rehab in a quite cynical attempt to make the judge think he's attempting to reform of his own volition, and then he gets his wrist sliced open by Begbie and nearly bleeds out, while his so called mates refuse to call an ambulance for him
- Tommy, who ends up getting AIDS from using heroin after his girlfriend dumped him (though notably he uses it far less than some of the other addicts who are still in fairly good health). Not only is he dying, but he ends up with hate messages scrawled all over his walls too. His acceptance of his fate and lack of hatred for the guy who gave him that first shot ( Renton) makes it in some ways a Crowning Moment of Heartwarming, but all the more tragic that such a nice guy should end up this way.