Tropescilloscope: Wrong Genre Savvy

A character thinks they're in a genre with different rules than the one they're actually in. (read more at tvtropes.org)

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