Tropescilloscope: Chekhov's Gunman

Earlier-introduced minor character is actually very important. (read more at tvtropes.org)

More Tropes La Résistance Jerkass The Bad Guy Wins Pretty in Mink An Aesop Wounded Gazelle Gambit Very Loosely Based on a True Story Henpecked Husband Rated M for Manly Extremely Short Timespan Parental Incest Creator Cameo Pyrrhic Victory Mind Screw Call-Forward Chuck Cunningham Syndrome For the Evulz Anguished Declaration of Love Blatant Lies Pragmatic Villainy Boom, Headshot! Rasputinian Death The Stoic The Stoner Fatal Flaw Morality Pet Girl-on-Girl Is Hot Evil Brit Cat Fight Villain with Good Publicity Soundtrack Dissonance The Chessmaster Hell Is That Noise Yandere The Voiceless Crazy Jealous Guy Fantasy Films Peek-a-Boo Corpse The Great Depression Alliterative Name Bittersweet Ending The Un-Reveal Jerkass Has a Point Broken Pedestal Twist Ending Bond One-Liner Reckless Gun Usage Cloudcuckoolander Adaptation Name Change Ambiguous Ending Improbable Infant Survival aka: Infant Immortality Tranquil Fury Eagleland Mundane Made Awesome Fire-Forged Friends Police are Useless Red Herring Insane Troll Logic Nothing Is Scarier Scary Black Man Bad "Bad Acting" Red Right Hand I Did What I Had to Do Never Trust a Trailer Big Brother Instinct Ascended Extra Unusual Euphemism Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold Diabolus ex Machina The X of Y Book-Ends War Is Hell Scare Chord Honor Before Reason Nice Job Breaking It, Hero! Country Matters Cool Guns Protagonist Title Dirty Cop Becoming the Mask The Hero Dies Mad Scientist Dull Surprise The Load Not Using the "Z" Word Science Fiction Films Throwing Your Sword Always Works Villain Opening Scene Gainax Ending Shipper on Deck Badass in a Nice Suit Dirty Old Man Demonic Possession Thriller Would Hit a Girl Works Set in World War II Author Avatar Ghost Fiction Motor Mouth Gory Discretion Shot Babies Ever After Horror Films Major Injury Underreaction Historical-Domain Character The '70s Colour-Coded for Your Convenience aka: Color Coded For Your Convenience Accidental Murder Off with His Head! The Mole Five-Man Band Pet the Dog Attempted Rape Spiritual Successor The Big Guy Kubrick Stare Foil Batman Gambit Artistic License – Geography Television Movie Index The Bully Spared by the Adaptation Sinister Minister For Want of a Nail Time Skip Maybe Ever After Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane timeperiod Unspoken Plan Guarantee Faux Affably Evil Jerk with a Heart of Gold Deus ex Machina Artistic License – Military No-Holds-Barred Beatdown Pun aka: Incredibly Lame Pun Psychological Thriller Bullying a Dragon One-Word Title Manly Tears Department of Redundancy Department Evil Plan German Films Left the Background Music On Moment Killer Married to the Job A Date with Rosie Palms Product Placement Freeze-Frame Bonus French Films Man on Fire Soft Glass Scenery Gorn Wrong Genre Savvy Revenge Sassy Black Woman Affectionate Parody The Ace Video Credits Here We Go Again! Grey and Gray Morality Hair-Trigger Temper Creative Closing Credits Logo Joke The Vamp Danny Peary Cult Movies List Fun with Acronyms Shut Up, Hannibal! Star-Crossed Lovers Politically Incorrect Villain Gorn Dark and Troubled Past Enemy Mine Big "NO!" Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass Not So Stoic Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy Fish out of Water Tap on the Head Defiant to the End Show Within a Show Abusive Parents Serial Killer Drives Like Crazy He Who Fights Monsters Cluster F-Bomb The Alleged Car Unusually Uninteresting Sight Took a Level in Jerkass An Axe to Grind In the Back Double-Meaning Title Animated Credits Opening Tempting Fate Closed Circle Anyone Can Die Brainless Beauty The Ghost Race Against the Clock May–December Romance Failed a Spot Check Disguised in Drag Pragmatic Adaptation What Happened to the Mouse? The Smurfette Principle Brother–Sister Incest Title Drop Alpha Bitch Last-Name Basis Chase Scene Arch-Enemy Cowboy Cop Everyone Has Standards Four-Temperament Ensemble Anti-Villain Death Glare Black Comedy Rape Captain Ersatz Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome Due to the Dead Only Sane Man B-Movie Artistic License – Law Sadistic Choice Immune to Bullets The Stinger Authority Equals Asskicking Vampire Fiction Brutal Honesty Blood from the Mouth It Will Never Catch On Determinator aka: The Determinator Dirty Coward Adaptational Badass Hooker with a Heart of Gold Good Is Not Nice Action Survivor Crazy-Prepared And Starring Zombie Stories Unwitting Instigator of Doom Storming the Castle The Brute Ironic Echo As the Good Book Says... Greater-Scope Villain Adorkable Whole Plot Reference Bitch in Sheep's Clothing Badass Grandpa Nice Job Fixing It, Villain! Gender Flip Half the Man He Used to Be Didn't Think This Through Leaning on the Fourth Wall Adaptational Attractiveness Obviously Evil Off-into-the-Distance Ending Ms. Fanservice Jump Scare The Place Evil Is Petty Only in It for the Money Idiot Ball Ugly Guy, Hot Wife Developing Doomed Characters Body Horror Screw the Rules, I Have Money! Parental Neglect Slasher Movie Mexican Standoff Shower Scene Suddenly SHOUTING! Evil Cannot Comprehend Good Chekhov's Gunman Real Life Writes the Plot Rule of Symbolism MacGuffin Badass Normal I Have Your Wife Final Girl Arranged Marriage Establishing Character Moment Awesome, but Impractical All Men Are Perverts Dramatic Gun Cock Wham Line The Smart Guy Dutch Angle Funny Foreigner Up to Eleven Evil Counterpart Belligerent Sexual Tension Empathic Environment Humans Are Bastards Dual Wielding This Is Gonna Suck Jerk Jock Take That! Horror Comedy Broken Aesop Award-Bait Song Mr. Exposition Documentary Loads and Loads of Characters Mistaken for Gay And the Adventure Continues Not Even Bothering with the Accent Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil Take a Third Option Slashed Throat Nice Guy Retcon Cool Old Guy Suspiciously Specific Denial Freudian Excuse Light Is Not Good Slasher Smile Overly Long Gag Index of Film Westerns Public Domain Feature Films Chekhov's Gun Darker and Edgier Dying Moment of Awesome Outrun the Fireball Taking You with Me Suspiciously Similar Substitute The Cavalry Pay Evil unto Evil Catapult Nightmare Imagine Spot Hong Kong Films Cassandra Truth The Casanova Vacation Films Deadpan Snarker No Ending Air-Vent Passageway Amusing Injuries Reasonable Authority Figure After the End Beware the Nice Ones Laughing Mad Badass Bookworm Scenery Porn In Medias Res Skewed Priorities Insistent Terminology Badass Boast Black Best Friend NO INDOOR VOICE Not So Above It All Fingore Blood Knight Crapsack World Stealth Pun Bland-Name Product Knight Templar Ambiguous Disorder Artistic License – Gun Safety Running Gag Malevolent Masked Men The Alcoholic Shown Their Work Disappeared Dad Rule of Cool Redshirt Army Exactly What It Says on the Tin Break the Haughty Downer Ending A Minor Kidroduction Large Ham Stalker with a Crush Pretty Little Headshots Unresolved Sexual Tension Disproportionate Retribution Auto Erotica Spell My Name with an "S" Parental Abandonment No-Sell Parental Substitute Once More, with Clarity! Ominous Latin Chanting Blonde, Brunette, Redhead Butt-Monkey Ambiguously Gay Eldritch Abomination Australian Movies The Dog Bites Back Dressing as the Enemy Does This Remind You of Anything? Fantastic Racism Beta Couple Recap / RiffTrax aka: Riff Trax Movies Those Two Guys Race Lift Adaptation Dye-Job Affably Evil Creepy Child The Mafia Sports Stories Alas, Poor Villain Cool Old Lady Leitmotif Driven to Suicide Funny Background Event Drowning My Sorrows Evil Sounds Deep The Chick The Musical Wham Shot Playing Gertrude Hollywood Darkness Aluminum Christmas Trees Our Zombies Are Different Double Entendre Armor-Piercing Question Recycled IN SPACE! Fat Bastard Hero Antagonist Kill 'em All Accidental Misnaming It's All About Me Berserk Button Meet Cute Kick the Dog Truth in Television Your Head A-Splode Karma Houdini Manic Pixie Dream Girl Fainting Blackmail Agony of the Feet Woman Scorned Dies Wide Open Anachronism Stew "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue Stealth Hi/Bye Bowdlerise Bar Brawl All There in the Manual '80s Hair Needs Wiki Magic Love Meaningful Echo Ship Tease Vomit Discretion Shot Translation Convention And I Must Scream Early-Bird Cameo Romantic False Lead A.I. Is a Crapshoot Make It Look Like an Accident Neck Lift Big Fancy House Shell-Shocked Veteran Bolivian Army Ending My Beloved Smother Action Girl Adult Fear Advertised Extra Be Careful What You Wish For Made of Iron Mystery and Detective Films Almost Kiss Rule of Funny Rousing Speech Would Hurt a Child Frame-Up I'm a Humanitarian You Have Outlived Your Usefulness Call-Back Death by Sex Small Name, Big Ego Token Minority Costume Porn Pre-Asskicking One-Liner Mooks Nice Hat Epic Movie The Lost Lenore A God Am I Screw the Money, I Have Rules! Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique Pimped-Out Dress Worthy Opponent As Long as It Sounds Foreign The Reveal Guile Hero Disney Villain Death Rule of Three Film Noir Annoying Younger Sibling Expy Taking the Bullet Casting Gag Lighter and Softer Precision F-Strike Ripped from the Headlines Red Shirt Bloodless Carnage Bald of Evil Kill It with Fire Animal Title Index Plot Hole Put on a Bus Sexy Discretion Shot Crucified Hero Shot Genre Throwback Sci-Fi Horror Tagline Cool Car Eyepatch of Power "Awesome McCool" Name Cat Scare Expository Hairstyle Change My Greatest Failure Aside Glance Cold-Blooded Torture True Companions Police Brutality As Himself Eye Scream Artistic License – History Adapted Out Psycho for Hire Sanity Slippage Martial Arts Movie Roger Ebert: Great Movies List Age Lift Manchild Naïve Newcomer Made of Explodium Bring My Brown Pants Irony Celebrity Paradox Decoy Protagonist Even Evil Has Standards Bad Boss Credits Gag Broken Bird The Ditz Evil vs. Evil There Is No Kill Like Overkill It Can Think Wretched Hive Adaptation Distillation Those Wacky Nazis No Name Given Intrepid Reporter Let's Get Dangerous! Cool Shades 20 Minutes into the Future Demoted to Extra "The Reason You Suck" Speech Deliberately Monochrome Black Dude Dies First Action Prologue Actually Pretty Funny Roaring Rampage of Revenge The '60s Destination Defenestration Italian Films Mercy Kill Important Haircut Action Genre Smoking Is Cool Fan Disservice Evil-Detecting Dog Ass Shove Informed Ability Adults Are Useless Took a Level in Badass Heel–Face Turn The Atoner All Just a Dream Noodle Incident He Knows Too Much The Un-Favourite aka: The Un Favorite Shirtless Scene Stepford Smiler Heterosexual Life-Partners Card-Carrying Villain Kick the Son of a Bitch She's Got Legs No Antagonist Big Eater No Good Deed Goes Unpunished Obstructive Bureaucrat The Dragon Monumental Damage Did Not Get the Girl Music Stories Kids Are Cruel Poor Communication Kills Every Car Is a Pinto Distracted by the Sexy The Cameo Film Noir Index Camp Gay Never Trust a Trailer aka: Trailers Always Lie Red Eyes, Take Warning Beard of Evil Christmas Movies Index Jitter Cam Implacable Man Meaningful Background Event Based on a True Story Hoist by His Own Petard Car Fu Our Vampires Are Different Bottomless Magazines Bait-and-Switch Death by Adaptation Actor Allusion Happily Married Male Gaze Genre Shift Manipulative Bastard Adaptational Heroism Gilligan Cut From Bad to Worse Fate Worse than Death Punch-Clock Villain Mood Whiplash Intergenerational Friendship All There in the Script Break the Cutie Wicked Cultured Undying Loyalty Canon Foreigner Cruel and Unusual Death Corpsing Visual Pun Fanservice Extra Hidden Depths Genre Savvy Slap-Slap-Kiss Sole Survivor Posthumous Character Heroes Want Redheads Match Cut Handicapped Badass Silence Is Golden Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism Grievous Bottley Harm Arc Words Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking Pre-Mortem One-Liner As You Know Laser-Guided Karma Leave the Camera Running Say My Name Training Montage Facial Horror Anachronic Order Bond Villain Stupidity Chiaroscuro Only One Name Red Oni, Blue Oni Despair Event Horizon All for Nothing Neck Snap Never Found the Body Covers Always Lie Adaptation Expansion Badass Longcoat Sir Swears-a-Lot Improvised Weapon The Oner Stylistic Suck Animal Motifs Friend to All Children Market-Based Title Spiteful Spit Back from the Dead Spanner in the Works Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping Captain Obvious Drugs Are Bad Male Frontal Nudity The Starscream Does Not Like Shoes Biopic How We Got Here Extreme Doormat Line-of-Sight Name Antagonist Title A Father to His Men Ungrateful Bastard Woman in White Dark Reprise The '50s Toilet Humour aka: Toilet Humor Totally Radical Ragtag Bunch of Misfits Fatal Family Photo Heroic Sacrifice Corrupt Corporate Executive Determinator Sequel Escalation Combat Pragmatist Sacrificial Lion Dogged Nice Guy One Steve Limit Obfuscating Stupidity No Celebrities Were Harmed Meaningful Name Disney Death Fake Shemp Face Death with Dignity You Killed My Father Villain Song Bury Your Gays Mighty Whitey Psychopathic Manchild Same Language Dub Historical In-Joke Properly Paranoid Together in Death Dropped a Bridge on Him An Arm and a Leg Ax-Crazy "Shaggy Dog" Story Offscreen Teleportation Love Triangle Mugging the Monster Love at First Sight Russian Films Getting Crap Past the Radar Black Comedy Early Installment Weirdness Dark Action Girl Word of God Curse Cut Short The Remake Superhero What You Are in the Dark Older Than They Look Retirony Shout-Out Better to Die than Be Killed From Nobody to Nightmare Improbable Aiming Skills Military and Warfare Films Shoot the Shaggy Dog The Faceless Sealed Evil in a Can Earn Your Happy Ending Sequel Hook Breaking the Fourth Wall Big Bad Only Known by Their Nickname Bilingual Bonus Anti-Hero Coming-of-Age Story Retired Badass Missing Mom Fiery Redhead Exact Words Adaptational Villainy Camera Abuse Karmic Death Reality Has No Subtitles Only a Flesh Wound Heroic BSoD Romantic Comedy Evil Laugh Foreshadowing Guns Akimbo Have a Gay Old Time Bavarian Fire Drill Humiliation Conga BFG Get Out! Darkest Hour Death Seeker Sir Not-Appearing-in-This-Trailer Heel Realization Brick Joke Flashback Famous Last Words Femme Fatale Face–Heel Turn Film Series Green-Eyed Monster Victoria's Secret Compartment Lampshade Hanging Apocalypse How Damsel in Distress Well-Intentioned Extremist The Lancer Interrupted Suicide Unreliable Narrator Oh, Crap! Amoral Attorney Domestic Abuse Comically Missing the Point Really Gets Around Easily Forgiven She Cleans Up Nicely Dark Is Not Evil Mythology Gag Cain and Abel Even Evil Has Loved Ones The Dreaded Vitriolic Best Buds Screw This, I'm Outta Here! Black and Gray Morality Continuity Nod Composite Character Villain Protagonist Fourth Date Marriage Those Two Bad Guys In Name Only Stock Footage Hate Sink Death by Irony I Want My Beloved to Be Happy Dissonant Serenity Insult Backfire Rewatch Bonus Self-Deprecation Depraved Bisexual Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas Madness Mantra O.O.C. Is Serious Business The Film of the Book Eiffel Tower Effect Killed Mid-Sentence Horror Doesn't Settle for Simple Tuesday Bare Your Midriff Contrived Coincidence Hero of Another Story Hollywood Law Straight Gay Room Full of Crazy The Power of Love Artistic License – Biology Dwindling Party Gold Digger Bound and Gagged Smug Snake Artistic License – Physics Villain Ball Conspicuous CG Not What It Looks Like The Hero Homage Reality Is Unrealistic No OSHA Compliance Gratuitous English The '80s Historical Hero Upgrade More Dakka Narrator You Have Failed Me Epic Fail Plucky Comic Relief Curb-Stomp Battle Refuge in Audacity Knife Nut Rape as Drama Flipping the Bird Hope Spot Why Don't You Just Shoot Him? Defrosting Ice Queen Central Theme Silent Movie Dramedy The Sociopath Setting Update World of Ham Deal with the Devil Daylight Horror Never My Fault Paper-Thin Disguise Serious Business Catch-Phrase Big Bad Duumvirate Redemption Equals Death I Need a Freaking Drink Why Did It Have to Be Snakes? Foregone Conclusion Naked People Are Funny Evil Is Hammy Historical Villain Upgrade Bloody Hilarious Real Life Hypocritical Humor You Have Got to Be Kidding Me! Super Strength Bunny-Ears Lawyer Calling the Old Man Out Re-Cut Gone Horribly Right Trailers Always Spoil I Just Shot Marvin in the Face British Films Punctuated! For! Emphasis! Canadian Movies Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene Improbable Weapon User Punny Name Deconstruction Villainous Breakdown Author Appeal Men Are the Expendable Gender Big-Bad Ensemble Eureka Moment Deliberate Values Dissonance Rich Bitch Framing Device All Girls Want Bad Boys Novelization Bi the Way Betty and Veronica Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep" N-Word Privileges Children Are Innocent Stuff Blowing Up Names to Run Away from Really Fast Japanese Films Chewing the Scenery Daddy's Girl It's Personal My God, What Have I Done? Fanservice Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds Lock and Load Montage Reality Ensues Groin Attack Big Applesauce Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right! Character Development Big Damn Heroes Too Dumb to Live Drill Sergeant Nasty "Well Done, Son!" Guy Dramatic Irony Random Events Plot Mama Bear Offscreen Moment of Awesome Hypocrite Loophole Abuse Not Quite Dead Chekhov's Skill Vomit Indiscretion Shot One-Man Army Aww, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other What the Hell, Hero? Beauty Is Never Tarnished The '90s Overprotective Dad Your Cheating Heart Non-Indicative Name Impaled with Extreme Prejudice Instant Death Bullet Mr. Fanservice Not So Different The Quiet One Riddle for the Ages Dumb Blonde Faking the Dead Asshole Victim The End... Or Is It? Death of a Child Abhorrent Admirer Papa Wolf Bloodier and Gorier folderlabel Toplessness from the Back