History Characters / GarthMarenghisDarkplace

* VileVillainSaccharineShow: ''Garth Marenghi's Darkplace'' is a light-hearted and goofy satire of cheesy '80s TV, but Dean Learner is a seriously disturbing murderer and paedophile whose villainous traits are often decidedly not PlayedForLaughs.

* InformedAttractiveness: Sanchez claims Dagless is more attractive, even though conventionally, it's the other way round. Dagless and both his fictional actor and his ''real'' actor aren't ugly, of course, but Dagless' attractiveness is rather overstated.

* BadassMustache: Dean wears a seventies-style 'tache to make Reed look like he's supposed to be older than the others.

%%* InfallibleNarrator

%%* EightiesHair: Par the course.

* TheAlcoholic: Todd Rivers, who hasn't worked since this show.

%%* MundaneMadeAwesome: Every word out of his mouth.
%%* {{Narrator}}: [[{{Troperiffic}} Oh, boy...]]

* TheSociopath: Dean Learner indicates that he has no sense of morality and throughout the series implies that he has murdered a number of people in order to stay close to Garth Marenghi. He's proudly vocal about his past acts of animal and child abuse, such as when he stepped on his cat's head after dropping a sofa on it. Worse, he's very heavily implied to be a paedophile as he gives his [[{{Understatement}} unpopular opinion]] that girls who lie about their age should be imprisoned or sent to correctional institutions. This possibly gives context for his status as the worst actor on the show, because he doesn't feel authentic emotions.

* AuthorExistenceFailure: In-universe, Madeline Wool is missing, presumed dead. Judging by the other actors' uncomfortableness about the subject, they may or may not have had something to do with it.

* BlackHoleSue: Invoked.

* DontYouDarePityMe

* GodModeSue: Invoked.

* InfallibleNarrator

* MundaneMadeAwesome: Every word out of his mouth.
* {{Narrator}}: [[TropeOverdosed Oh, boy...]]

* SympatheticSue: Invoked.

* AccentUponTheWrongSyllable

* EightiesHair: Like every other character on the show.

* LipLock: The most frequent offender.
* MrFanservice: ''Another'' InvokedTrope.

* EightiesHair: Par the course.
* GaussianGirl: Used in most of her shots.

* GiftedlyBad: In case you haven't noticed, he's an utterly atrocious writer whose unwarranted success has driven his ego into the stratosphere, when all is said and done
* IJustWriteTheThing: Similar to one of his inspirations, Creator/StephenKing, Marenghi's splurges out a single draft of a story with total spontaneity, hence his self-proclaimed profession as "The Dreamweaver".

* LoveableSexManiac: Accusations of Todd being a sex pest severely damaged his already fading career, which he seems to be most bitter about and stringently denies.

* TallDarkAndHandsome: He certainly sees himself as this, as he goes out of his way to wear all-black and writes every other character to praise Dag's unrivalled sex appeal.

* OnlySaneMan: Only when compared to Garth and Dean, of course, but Rivers seems to be the only person involved in the production that realized that it was awful, but is too polite to mention it.

* StalkerWithoutACrush: Is way too into Garth Merenghi to the point that he admits to having punched a child for having disrespected him and its implied he murdered Garth Merenghi's manager in order to stay close to him.

* AffablyEvil: If you somehow ignore his torrents of horrible opinions and criminal inclinations, Learner almost seems like a harmless dandy.

* BilledAboveTitle: When it comes to his novels, Garth Marenghi's name is evidently more important than whatever lame OneWordTitle is beneath it.

[[folder:Dr. Rick Dagless MD/Garth Marenghi]]

* CopiouslyCreditedCreator: InUniverse. The show credits Garth Marenghi as writer, director, producer, star and even sneaks in a composer credit ('based on tunes whistled by').

* DarkAndTroubledPast: Hinted at. He had a son, who was part-grasshopper, who jumped too high one day and [[HelicopterBlender didn't see the helicopter passing overhead]].

* InCaseYouForgotWhoWroteIt: Marenghi is ''very'' fond of this trope.

* InformedAttractiveness: Sanchez claims Dagless is more attractive, even though, conventionally, it's the other way round. Dagless and both his fictional actor and his ''real'' actor aren't ugly, of course, but Dagless' attractiveness is rather overstated.

* TheNapoleon: Not Dagless, for once. Garth Marenghi insists in interviews that he is six feet tall. Cut to Todd Rivers laughing hysterically.
-->"He's barely five foot and wears lifts!"
* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: He's a send up of notoriously schlocky British horror writers who were popular in TheEighties, such as Creator/JamesHerbert and Shaun Hutson.
* NobleBigotWithABadge

* SmallNameBigEgo: One of the more entertaining parts of the show is just how far up his own ass Garth Mahrenghi is and how outlandish his justifications are.

* TheAlcoholic: Todd Rivers, who hasn't worked since this show.

* ClassicallyTrainedExtra: Is a classically trained actor who obviously doesn't think much of the show, which explains why his lines are so often poorly done or dubbed over. In the extras, he talks about the challenges of acting on stage.

* OnlySaneMan: Only when compared to Garth and Dean, of course, but Rivers seems to be the only person involved in the production that realized that it was awful, but is too polite to mention it.

* TokenGoodTeammate: Garth is a raging misogynist, narcissist, and miser, while Dean is a SerialKiller who has a history of child and animal abuse. Outside of being TheAlcoholic, Todd is a reasonably normal guy, and he doesn't say anything negative about ''Darkplace'' despite being clearly embarrassed by it.

* AuthorExistenceFailure: In-universe, Madeline Wool is missing, presumed dead. Judging by the other actors' uncomfortableness about the subject, they may or may not have had something to do with it.

* DroppedABridgeOnHim: [[spoiler:The (fictional) actress, Madeleine Wool, disappeared without a trace after the filming of ''Darkplace''. She is (emphatically) presumed dead by her fellow cast members. Dean Learner speculates that she's "buried somewhere in the [[UsefulNotes/{{Russia}} Eastern bloc]]. If she got a burial." The awkwardness of the remaining cast members around the subject and the fact that they're all incredibly shady to begin with suggests that there's a pretty sordid story behind the disappearance.]]

* EightiesHair: par the course.

* NoodleIncident: Madeline Wool is implied to be murdered, and the other actors' hesitance suggests they had a hand in it.

* AmbiguouslyGay: Learner is quite camp, but denies in almost a SuspiciouslySpecificDenial that he is gay.

* BadBadActing: Learner says he's not an actor, and he means it.

* CigarChomper: Learner doesn't smoke cigarettes, though. He doesn't want to get cancer.

* DullSurprise: He has almost no ability to act with his face.

* FilmingForEasyDub: Learner is such a poor actor that his lines are redone constantly.
* {{Jerkass}}: Bordering on SociopathicHero, although this is more of an InformedAttribute. He once punched one of the on-set child actors, and it's implied he murdered the person who financed the show ("Achmed", who was interested in "moving pictures"), Garth's second publicist, and Liz's actress.

* TheSociopath: Dean Learner indicates that he has no sense of morality and throughout the series implies that he has murdered a number of people in order to stay close to Garth Marenghi. He also is the worst actor on the show possibly because he doesn't feel authentic emotions.

* WaistcoatOfStyle

* TheWorfEffect

* CopiouslyCreditedCreator: The show credits Garth Merenghi as writer, director, producer, star and even sneaks in a composer credit ('based on tunes whistled by').

* MartyStu: It's telling that being the world's greatest doctor is only the tip of the iceberg.

* SmallNameBigEgo: Marenghi treats the show as one that could have changed the world of television forever. [[SoBadItsGood The reality is quite different]].

* BroughtDownToNormal: After her psychic rampage, Dag performs a lobotomy on her to disable her telekinetic abilities with no apparent side effects to her intelligence. [[DownplayedTrope However]], she still retains PsychicPowers, such as mindreading.
* ButtMonkey: A frequent victim of Marenghi's very misogynistic writing.

* LargeHam: There is no one hammier than Todd Rivers as Sanchez. [[http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=X6iJRNHUOT4&feature=related "So, what happened between you and this Renwick customerrrrrr?"]]
"''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6iJRNHUOT4 So what happened between you and this Renwick customerrrrrr?]]''"

* BadassLongcoat: His white doctor's coat.

* {{Jerkass}}

* KnowNothingKnowItAll

* ParodySue: Of both the heroes of old low-budget horror and sci-fi shows and films like Quatermass, and of shows like Casualty or E.R.

* WouldHitAGirl: Slaps Liz to calm her down from her hysterics.

* ClassicallyTrainedExtra: Todd Rivers is one.

* DashingHispanic: He tries to [[InvokedTrope invoke]] this by wearing eye makeup and foundation to make him look like he might be Hispanic.

* LargeHam: "''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6iJRNHUOT4 So what happened between you and this Renwick customerrrrrr?]]''"

* DaChief: In a hospital setting.

* {{Jerkass}}: Is something of one, although this is more of an InformedAttribute/ProtagonistCenteredMorality.

* TheSociopath: Learner in real life is strongly implied to be a serial killer.

->Played by: (Creator/RichardAyoade)