Trope Workshop:Indelible Reputation

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Sometimes a character has a reputation they can't shed. It can be annoying, or harrowing. In some cases they get embarrassed on a regular basis. For some reason, that one bit of history (or falsehood) keeps popping up.

The In-Universe version of Never Live It Down, the Indelible Reputation is one that a character cannot shake off. They may have done something to earn it. Or they may be very unlucky or the victim of Malicious Slander. In either case, it tends to be more negative than positive, the opposite of Remember When You Blew Up a Sun?

Examples of Indelible Reputation include:

Film

• Big Hero 6 has Wasabi mutter that he got his nickname due to spilling wasabi on his shirt one time. Some dubs amp this by revealing he ate an entire spoonful of wasabi and reacted appropriately.

Newspaper Comics

• In Calvin and Hobbes, Calvin for some reason is attributed with a Noodle Incident at school. He insists that he was framed, and the details are left up in the air. Unlike most of Calvin's mischievous activities, Bill Watterson chose not to elaborate.

Western Animation

• Arthur has a few of these:
  • A Running Gag is that people assume that Binky hates reading. This is even why Arthur assumes that he is the only kid who couldn't have stolen his library copy of The Mysterious Hand. Turns out that Binky enforces this trope, as he hides any books he's reading behind comics and tries to hide his interests in botany.
  • Despite the fact that Mr. Ratburn is an ordinary guy, just a Stern Reacher, the kids in season one believe for a while that he eats nails for breakfast that come in a cereal box and hates the screws.
  • D.W. for a long time blames Arthur for her snowball disappearing, even though it turns out he had nothing to do with it. Arthur, of course, keeps reminding D.W. of this.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender
  • Sokka won't let Aang forget the time the Avatar made him and Katara suck on frozen frogs when they were sick.
  • Book 3 has Katara hold a grudge against Zuko for a long time for betraying her in Ba Sing Se. When he switches sides proper, it takes four episodes for him to earn her forgiveness.
• Ducktales shows this in "The Impossible Summit of Mount Neverrest" and deconstructs it; the reason why Scrooge is determined to reach the top of Mount Neverrest, even as he battles with common sense and the need to protect the kids is that he was the Neverrest Ninny that George Mallardy cut loose a long time ago, and who was blamed for Mallardy's disappearance. Huey gets through to him by pointing out that no one knows who the Neverrest Ninny was, let alone caring about ninnies these days.
• Rick and Morty features a few of these with the title characters:
  • Season 1 Jerry from dimension C636 and being Morty's original Jerry won't let it slide that Beth is a horse surgeon and not a human one in the pilot.
  • Jerry brings up that it's ridiculous Rick is scared of an ocean deity when he "fucked a planet" in "Mort Dinner Rick Andre". Rick has a sour look when the former mentions that.