History Film / HomeAlone

''Home Alone'' is an American Christmas family/crime comedy film series originally created by screenwriter Creator/JohnHughes (who produced and wrote the first three installments) and director Creator/ChrisColumbus. It started with the first film of the same title and its sequel, both starring Creator/MacaulayCulkin, Creator/JoePesci, Creator/DanielStern and Creator/CatherineOHara. Both films were huge successes in theaters and remain the most popular from the series. Music/JohnWilliams composed the score for both films.

* ''Film/HomeAlone1''
* ''Film/HomeAlone2LostInNewYork''
* ''Film/HomeAlone3''
* ''Film/HomeAlone4TakingBackTheHouse''
* ''Film/HomeAloneTheHolidayHeist''
* ''Film/HomeSweetHomeAlone''

* ''VideoGame/HomeAloneSega''

''Home Alone'' is an American Christmas family comedy film series originally created by screenwriter Creator/JohnHughes (who produced and wrote the first three installments) and director Creator/ChrisColumbus. It started with the first film of the same title and its sequel, both starring Creator/MacaulayCulkin, Creator/JoePesci, Creator/DanielStern and Creator/CatherineOHara. Both films were huge successes in theaters and remain the most popular from the series. Music/JohnWilliams composed the score for both films.

* SameStoryDifferentNames: The original was so popular that beyond the sequels, John Hughes wrote other family comedies for various studios--''Film/{{Beethoven}}'' (1992, though under a pseudonym), ''ComicStrip/{{Dennis the Menace|US}}'' (1993), ''Film/BabysDayOut'' (1994), the live-action ''Film/OneHundredAndOneDalmatians1996'', and ''Film/{{Flubber}}'' (1997)--that all had bad guys getting outwitted by kids, animals, etc. at some point, usually as violently as possible.

''Home Alone'' is an American Christmas family comedy film series originally created by screenwriter Creator/JohnHughes (who produced and wrote the first three installments) and director Creator/ChrisColumbus. It started with the first film of the same title and its sequel, both starring Creator/MacaulayCulkin, Creator/JoePesci, Creator/DanielStern and Creator/CatherineOHara. Both films were huge successes in theaters and remain the most popular from the series.

[[caption-width-right:350:Making home invaders' life a living hell since 1990.]]

-->''"Keep the change, ya filthy animal."''

[[caption-width-right:350:Making home invaders' life a hell since 1990.]]

''Home Alone'' is an American Christmas family comedy film series originally created by screenwriter Creator/JohnHughes (who produced and wrote the first three installments) and director Creator/ChrisColumbus. It started with the first film of the same titl and its sequel, both starring Creator/MacaulayCulkin, Creator/JoePesci and Creator/DanielStern. Both films were huge successes in theaters and remain the most popular from the series.

''Home Alone'' is an American Christmas family comedy film series originally created by screenwriter Creator/JohnHughes (who produced and wrote the first three installments) and director Creator/ChrisColumbus. It started with the first film of the same title starring Creator/MacaulayCulkin.

[[caption-width-right:350:Making burglars' life a hell since 1990.]]

Culkin (unofficially) reprised the role of Kevin [=McCallister=] in 2015 for the first episode of the webseries '':DRYVRS'', [[https://youtu.be/yh7-wAy_8ss "Just Me In The House By Myself"]], then reprised it more blatantly for a [[https://youtu.be/-lfHXKbsMLE Google Assistant commercial]] on Christmas 2018, which saw immense popularity on the Internet.

The films' simple premises usually go like this: a kid protagonist is left alone at his home (hence the title) by mistake and has to defend it against home invaders.

The films usually have a kid protagonist who's left alone at his home (hence the title) by mistake and has to defend it against home invaders.

[[caption-width-right:350:Giving burglars hell since 1990.]]

''Home Alone'' is an American Christmas family comedy film series originally created by screenwriter Creator/JohnHughes (who produced and wrote the first three installments) and director Creator/ChrisColumbus. It started with the first film of the same title starring Creator/MacauleyCulkin.

''Home Alone'' is an American Christmas family comedy film series originally created by John Hughes (who produced and wrote the first three installments) and started with the first film of the same title.

--> '''Kevin:''' This is my house. I have to defend it!

--> '''Kevin:''' You can mess with a lot of things, but you can't mess with kids on Christmas.

''Home Alone'' is an American Christmas family comedy film series originally created by John Hughes and started with the first film of the same title.

* A fourth sequel, ''Home Alone: The Holiday Heist'', was released during ABC Family's Countdown to 25 Days of Christmas in November 2012. Much like ''Home Alone 3'', it focuses on a completely different family, but sticks to the standard formula.
* A sixth film, ''Home Sweet Home Alone'', was released on Creator/DisneyPlus on November 12, 2021. The film features Creator/EllieKemper, Creator/RobDelaney and ''Film/JojoRabbit'''s Archie Yates; Devin Ratray, who played Buzz [=McCallister=] in the first two films, returns as the character. Prerelease material has generally stated the film is a remake of the original, though Ratray's appearance makes it a DistantSequel set in the same universe as the original movies. Though he doesn't appear physically, Kevin is name-dropped by Buzz, and we learn that he's now a successful businessman specializing in home security systems.

[[folder:In general]]

* LaterInstallmentWeirdness: Both ''Home Alone 4'' and ''Home Alone 5'' differ significantly from the first three, starting with the fact that both are TV movies that were made without John Hughes' involvement. 4 recasts the original characters with different actors and {{Retcon}}s a lot of the family's original dynamics (the parents are divorced, two of Kevin's older siblings are closer to his own age and the other two [[BrotherChuck aren't seen or mentioned]]), Harry is replaced with Marv's girlfriend, while Marv looks and acts like Harry. 5 was made well after the series was considered finished, and involves an entirely different cast of characters (much like 3, but John Hughes wrote and produced that one).

* The third sequel, ''Home Alone 4: Taking Back the House'', is a 2002 Made-For-TV sequel ([[NegativeContinuity but any continuity is absent]]). It brought back the original characters, but they were again [[invoked]][[TheOtherDarrin all recast]] with actors who often looked nothing like the original ones, like Buzz and Megan (originally late teenagers, now somehow preteens) and Marv (now played by Creator/FrenchStewart, who ironically looks more like the original Harry). Much of the family is somehow missing, and Harry has been replaced with Marv's wife, Vera (Creator/MissiPyle).

Culkin (unofficially) reprised the role of Kevin in 2015 for the first episode of the webseries '':DRYVRS'', [[https://youtu.be/yh7-wAy_8ss "Just Me In The House By Myself"]], then reprised it more blatantly for a [[https://youtu.be/-lfHXKbsMLE Google Assistant commercial]] on Christmas 2018, which saw immense popularity on the Internet.

The movie was followed by a few sequels, as well as a [[VideoGame/HomeAloneSega licensed game]]:

* The second sequel, 1997's ''Home Alone 3'', had a completely different cast and characters (i.e. Kevin was replaced by [[invoked]][[TheDanza Alex Pruitt]], played by Creator/AlexDLinz, but was otherwise still similar to the first movie. In fact, many of the characters are [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute very much like]] the characters of the previous movies, with one exception: the [[TheFamilyForTheWholeFamily stupid burglars]], wanted by the local police, were replaced with a ring of four intelligent spies wanted by the FBI, making the traps less believable. John Hughes still wrote and produced it, but Chris Columbus didn't return to direct - that role was given to Raja Gosnell, editor of the first two films (and future director of ''Big Momma's House'', the live-action ''WesternAnimation/ScoobyDoo'' movies, and ''Beverly Hills Chihuahua'').

This series is the {{Trope Namer|s}} and TropeCodifier of HomeAloneAntics.

[[folder:''Home Alone 4: Taking Back the House'']]
* AmicablyDivorced: Subverted, Kate and Peter are in the middle of getting divorced, but still seem to get along after their separation, likely leading to them [[DivorceIsTemporary getting back together at the end of the movie.]]
* ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: Kevin's brother Jeff and sister Linnie aren't in this movie at all.
* CosmeticallyAdvancedPrequel: Or rather, midquel. Along with the early 2000s aesthetic, the film shows obvious technological advances (mainly Natalie's remote-controlled house) that were either not around or common in the early 90s.
* DerailingLoveInterests: Apart from forgetting to cancel her appointment with a tree decorator, Natalie doesn't exactly do anything too mean until she threatens to kick Kevin out of the house for ruining her and Peter's engagement party.
* DivorceIsTemporary: Come on, who didn't figure out that Peter and Kate would get back together?
* FriendlyEnemy: Marv and Kevin seem to be on first-name basis with one another. Also, once their first attempt to break into the house fails, Marv casually introduces Vera to Kevin.
* LeftTheBackgroundMusicOn: Kevin, Peter, and Natalie decorate the tree while "Jingle Bells" plays in the background. When Natalie gets a phone call, she needs someone to turn down the music.
* TheMole: Kevin suspects someone in the house is letting Marv and Vera into the house. He's right, but it's the last person he suspected: [[spoiler:Molly the maid who happens to be Marv's mother.]]
* MsFanservice: Vera, Kate, and Natalie are all beautiful women.
* NeverTrustATitle: It's a reboot rather than a sequel like the title suggests.
* OutlawCouple: Vera and Marv.
* ProtagonistCenteredMorality: Again, this is the main reason Natalie is seen as a bad guy: Kevin wants Peter to get back with Kate and doesn't want him to be with someone else, Kevin is the protagonist, ergo, Natalie is bad.
* RichBitch: Natalie has shades of this.
* WritersCannotDoMath: An extremely weird example: Kevin is only 9 in this film even though he was 8 in the first one and 10 in the second. There's no sign this is meant to be a prequel or anything (indeed, if it were, it would raise a bunch of other issues such as where is Harry? and where did Vera go between movies?) as such, we can only assume it was some sort of bizarre oversight on their part.
* WrongGenreSavvy: Kevin thinks TheButlerDidIt. [[spoiler:It was actually the maid.]]
* YouDontLookLikeYou: Since the original actors would have been too old to reprise their roles, they had to recast everybody. The worst offender has to be Marv, played by Creator/FrenchStewart. Rather than look like Daniel Stern, who declined the offer to reprise his role in the film, he looks a lot more like Harry.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:''Home Alone: The Holiday Heist'']]
* AffablyEvil: All of the three villains.
* BrotherSisterTeam: Finn and Alexis, once the latter is informed about the villains trying to break into the house.
* FingerPokeOfDoom: Finn places his index finger to Sinclair's forehead to gently shove him down the stairs while Sinclair is off balance.
* HumanSnowman: What Mason, the family's neighbor, turns Jessica (one of the art thieves) into when it is all over (minus the face, which remains exposed).
* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Alexis picks on Finn and pranks him and is sometimes a bully, but despite all that, she truly loves him deeply and cares about him.
* IntergenerationalFriendship: Finn's a child, Simon's an adult, and the two of them are good online friends, with the latter mentoring the former when it comes to gaming.
* LethalChef: One of the booby traps that Finn uses against the art thieves are "gingerbread men" baked with spicy mustard, spicy horseradish, salt, sour vinegar, and jalapeño peppers.
* MistakenForPedophile: What Simon's (Finn's online gaming buddy) conversation with Mrs. Baxter sounds like when Simon tries to warn her that Finn and Alexis are in danger when the art thieves are breaking in.
* MistakenForUndead: While Finn thinks the house is haunted, he interprets the Art Thieves' first break in attempt as a ghost coming in. Later on, the art thieves think Finn's traps are the ghost working against them (at first).
* MsFanservice: Debi Mazar as the female burglar is rather good-looking.
* OneDialogueTwoConversations: When Finn asks for advice on how to handle the villains, his web friend thinks he's talking about a new game.
* ParentalBonus: Appropriately for this series, the painting is said to have been by Edvard Munch. As the ending points out, he was behind ''The Scream'' painting.
* TooManyHalves: When Sinclair's accomplices believe the house they're breaking in is haunted, they demand a bigger share than the initially agreed 25% for each of them. Hughes suggests 50% for him, 50% for Jessica, ''and'' 25% for Sinclair. They eventually settle for one third each.
* WouldntHurtAChild: Once the villains grab Finn, they just lock him in their car rather than threaten him or hurt him like Harry or Marv would have.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:''Home Sweet Home Alone'']]
* AbnormalAmmo: Max's makeshift firearm discharges billiard bills.
* AgonyOfTheFeet: Marv in the first film gets off ''easy'' compared to poor Pam here. Many of the traps and attacks that she encounters target her feet, from having them set on fire to being crushed by weights, and even stepping on Legos barefoot.
* AntiVillain: Unlike past antagonists, Jeff and Pam aren't malicious; they're just desperate to pay off their mortgage, and [[spoiler: they think]] Max stole the thing they were going to sell to do it. [[spoiler: They've even become good friends of Max's family by the end.]]
** If one considers Jeff and Pam the film's true protagonists, then likewise Max could be considered this. As harsh as his booby traps against them are, [[spoiler: he genuinely believes them to be HumanTraffickers who want to kidnap and sell him, so one can hardly blame him for pulling out all the stops to defend himself.]]
* BadSanta: Jeff dresses up as Santa when he and Pam break into Max's house.
* BeautyIsNeverTarnished: Played with. Despite the very telling injuries they suffered the night before, both Pam and Jeff look almost none-the-worse for wear outside of the still-healing welt on Jeff's forehead when they speak with their family the next morning.
* BlandNameProduct: Homebot is presented as a stand-in for Google or Alexa.
* CryingWolf: Buzz gets a phone call about Max being left home alone, but he immediately dismisses it as Kevin prank calling him, since he was just at the house and Jeff and Pam were there, pretending to be the owners. It also seems that Kevin pulls such a prank every year, hence Buzz being more willing to ignore it.
* DistantSequel: Is one for the first two films, as Buzz [=McCallister=] appears as a police officer and references Kevin and the events of them.
* EasilyForgiven: For all of the pain Max puts them through, Jeff and Pam are almightily quick to forgive him and take him under their wing at the end. Not only that but they pay for Max's house to be repaired, arrange for their family to have Christmas dinner with Max's family the following year, and there's no indication that they sought any legal action against Max's mom for their injuries despite the fact that, even though they were technically committing burglary, they'd be well within their rights to and would probably win the lawsuit since booby traps and unsupervised children are kind of, you know, illegal. Of course, the fact that they ''were'' still committing burglary presumably helped them decide to let bygones be bygones once everything was straightened out.
* FallingChandelierOfDoom: The last thing to happen to Jeff, Pam, and Max after their realization and reconciliation. This surprises even Max, who said that it was unintended.
* FiveSecondForeshadowing: [[spoiler: Jeff and Pam's nephew Ollie stole an ornament from a stand at the Christmas fair. It is later revealed that he is the one that swiped the valuable doll.]]
* GenreSavvy: Max points out a ladder to Jeff. Jeff retorts by asking if Max thinks he's stupid, and jumps for the trampoline below instead. At which point Max collapses the legs on one side of the trampoline, causing Jeff to bounce off the side into a tree, and yes, Max does think he's that stupid.
* GrievousBottleyHarm: One of the implements Max uses against Pam are plastic soda bottles with Mentos. The bottles either fizz in her face when opened or fly into her.
* HumanPincushion: One of Max's traps is Nerf guns that shoot foam darts with thumbtacks. Pam even says the words pincushion afterwards.
* LosingAShoeInTheStruggle: Pam's boots get burned right off of her feet when Max ignites the lighter fluid-drenched foyer she's standing on.
* MamaBear and PapaWolf: The entire motivation behind Pam and Jeff's actions is to keep a roof over their children's heads without having to uproot them. At one point Pam even outright says she'll do whatever she has to for her family.
* OneDialogueTwoConversations:
** When Jeff and Pam first break into Max's house, they refer to stealing the ugly boy (meaning the doll) to sell to an old lady (likely a collector). Max thinks they want to sell ''HIM'' to old ladies.
** Similar to the first example, when Pam is imagining her kids and the doll motivating her to go through with the attempt, she loudly shouts ugly boy. Jeff and Pam's son thinks she is referring to him.
** When Max is describing being left home alone, he uses words that are vague enough to make the woman he is talking to while at church believe that his parents are dead.
* MistakenForPrankCall: When Buzz gets the call about Max being left home alone, he thinks that it's Kevin prank calling him like he does every year and ignores it.
* PunctuatedForEmphasis: Pam speaks to Jeff in this manner as a pep talk to encourage them to get into Max's house for the first time.
* RecycledInSPACE: The first installment's [[ShowWithinAShow Angels With Filthy Souls]] is redone on a spaceship in color for this release.
* ShaggyDogStory: [[spoiler: Jeff and Pam believe Max stole a doll that they could easily sell for six digits. However, he only stole a can of soda, and their nephew swiped the doll.]]
* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome: In the original films, whenever the police were made aware of Kate and Peter leaving Kevin behind they never suffered any legal consequences for child endangerment. Here, Max immediately rules out calling the police for help against Jeff and Pam because he immediately realizes doing so would alert the police to his parents leaving him home alone and they'd be arrested.
** Some of the injuries due to the traps are much more realistic instead of cartoonish like the original film. Poor Jeff's on a wrong end of a billiard ball to the head, and the large weeping goose egg on his head turned off a lot a viewers.
* TookALevelInJerkass: While Jeff and Pam never try to physically harm Max, they understandably grow considerably more hostile towards him after all the torture he puts them through with his booby traps. This of course makes it seem to him all the more like they're out to get him. Still, their level of "angry" is nowhere near that of previous home invaders and once they realize it was all a big misunderstanding they're rather [[EasilyForgiven quick]] to forgive Max.
* WhamLine: "I'm ten years old, why would I want a doll?". At which point Jeff and Pam [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone realize they've made a serious mistake]].
* WouldntHurtAChild: [[spoiler: Jeff and Pam almost never touch or get close to Max during their attempts to get the doll. After the realization that Max never took it and that he is home alone, they pull what can be considered a HeelFaceTurn, express regret and sympathy, and let him stay with them until Max's mother gets back.]]
[[/folder]]

[[quoteright:315:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/home_alone_poster.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:315:''"This is ''my'' house. I have to defend it!"'']]

%% This is how the quote formatting is supposed to look: One indent, then dialog, then two indents, then the source. Don't mess with it.
->''"Yesterday, he was just a kid. But tonight, he's a home security system."''
-->-- '''Creator/DonLaFontaine''', trailer for ''Home Alone''

Kevin [=McCallister=] (Creator/MacaulayCulkin) is an eight-year-old boy from Winnetka, Illinois, an affluent suburb of UsefulNotes/{{Chicago}}. He's a normal, active kid, though he sometimes feels like his family notices him only when he's underfoot or in the way.

During the Christmas holidays, his extended family comes to stay overnight with his already-large immediate family to prepare for their vacation to France (where ''more'' of their relatives are temporarily living). Kevin causes trouble during dinner, pushing his oldest brother, Buzz, in anger for eating his cheese pizza. As punishment, Kevin is forced into the attic where he was intended to sleep with his bed-wetting cousin, Fuller. Before he goes, he angrily tells his mother that he [[IWishedYouWereDead never wants to see her or anyone else in the family again]].

The next day, the family oversleeps due to a power outage, and they hurry to the airport to catch their flight to France, accidentally leaving Kevin behind. He wakes to find that he has the house to himself. After a brief moment of panic, he [[KidsWildernessEpic exults in his new freedom]], gorging on junk food and watching [[UnabashedBMovieFan violent movies]]. However, a pair of burglars named Harry Lime (Creator/JoePesci) and Marv Merchants (Creator/DanielStern), the self-proclaimed "Wet Bandits" (after the fact that Marv likes to flood the houses they rob), are planning to put a hit on his house for its valuables.

The rest of the movie is about the efforts of the robbers to sack the house, the efforts of Kevin to foil them (notably through the use of {{booby trap}}s), Kevin befriending an [[MisunderstoodLonerWithAHeartOfGold elderly neighbor rumored to be a serial killer]] along the way, and Kevin's mother frantically trying to get back home after she and his father realize mid-flight that they are missing a son.

[[folder:''Home Alone'']]
* OneDimensionalThinking: There is no justification whatsoever for Harry to insist on climbing the icy stairs instead of going around.
* ThirtyMinutesOrItsFree: Little Nero's has a twenty-minute guarantee. The delivery boy DrivesLikeCrazy to fulfill this, especially the first time as he's delivering $100 worth of pizza.
* AccidentalTheft: Kevin goes to buy a toothbrush at the pharmacy. While there he runs into old man Marley. Kevin backs away in fear, then runs away while still holding the toothbrush, leading to one of the employees calling him a shoplifter. It's never indicated or shown if this ever gets resolved.
* ActorAllusion:
** Harry and Marv's van says "Oh-Kay Plumbing and Heating", an allusion to Creator/JoePesci's character, Leo Getz, in the ''Film/LethalWeapon'' sequels, whose favorite catchphrase is "Okay, okay!"
** Old Man Marley, played by Creator/RobertsBlossom, is rumored to be a serial killer. Blossom's most notable role prior to this film was the lead role in ''Deranged: Confessions of a Necrophile'' as a fictionalized version of serial killer Ed Gein.
* AgonyOfTheFeet: Marv stepping on the nail, and then stepping in glass ornaments not long afterward.
* AllThereInTheManual: According to the novelization:
** Peter is a successful businessman and Kate is a fashion designer, explaining how the family could afford the trip to Paris as well as the presence of the mannequins and sewing machines Kevin uses to thwart the Wet bandits.
** Buzz's spider is named [[Music/GunsNRoses Axl]].
** Old Man Marley's bandaged hand at the store? He tells Kevin he cut it on his shovel.
* AndYouThoughtItWasReal: Kevin tricks both a pizza delivery boy and the Wet Bandits into believing that they overheard a murder by playing the soundtrack of a violent gangster movie.
* AnkleDrag: Marv manages to grab Kevin by his ankle until the latter places a tarantula on his forehead.
* AnswerCut: After the [=McCallisters=] board the plane, Kate says "I hope we didn't forget anything." Cut to Kevin opening the door from the third floor.
* AsideGlance:
** "This is it. Don't get scared now."
** "I made my family disappear!" (eyebrow waggle)
** Also gives a straight-ahead one of exasperation when his grocery bags split open on the walk home.
** There are two scenes in the movie where Kevin runs directly towards the camera and screams into it. The first is when running around the house screaming for joy at being free. The second is after confronting Old Man Marley when he claimed [[TemptingFate he wouldn't be afraid anymore]].
** The driver of the airport van when Mitch Murphy from across the street bothers him with questions.
* AttackAttackRetreatRetreat: As Harry and Marv sidle their way across the rope towards Kevin's treehouse, Kevin holds out a pair of clippers to cut the rope. In reaction, the duo tries to sidle back, but Kevin cuts the rope, swinging the rope away and slamming the two into the wall.
* AudibleGleam: Made by Harry's GoldTooth TwinkleSmile. Also present in the Game Boy game; Harry's tooth twinkles on the game over screen.
* BadassBoast: Attempted by Kevin when he shouts "I'm not afraid anymore" (after coming out from hiding under the bed when he first is aware of the Wet Bandits). Subverted afterwards when he sees Old Man Marley shortly afterward.
* BaitAndSwitch: Kevin tells the "Santa" he meets that he knows he's not actually Santa and that he's old enough to know how it works. He then says he knows that the actor actually works for the real Santa, [[SureLetsGoWithThat which the actor goes along with]].
* BangBangBang: PlayedWith when Kevin tricks Harry and Marv into thinking they've overheard a violent murder in progress when in reality it's a gangster-movie soundtrack and a packet of firecrackers to amp up the noise. Bear in mind, Kevin uses the same "gangster-gunfire-turned-all-the-way-up" trick to fool the pizza delivery boy earlier.
* BavarianFireDrill: Harry poses as a police officer to find out when the [=McCallisters=] will be away and what home security measures they have.
* BeCarefulWhatYouSay: Megan is feeling regretful that she called Kevin helpless when he's at home on his own, and he's the youngest.
* BigDamnHeroes: Old Man Marley [[ShovelStrike takes his snow shovel to the back of the Bandits' heads]] when they have Kevin hung up on a coat hook.
* BigShutUp: Kevin to Jeff after he's been told to go upstairs for spilling milk over the passports, and Jeff calls him a disease.
* BlandNameProduct: The [=McCallisters=] have pizza delivered from "Little Nero's" instead of Little Caesar's. This actually had a brief [[TheRedStapler Red Stapler]] moment when, on November 6, 2015, [=UberEATS=] [[http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/entertainthis/2015/11/05/no-fiddlin-little-neros-pizza-home-alone-coming/75216914/ ran a promotion]] allowing fans to order pizza from local restaurants but delivered them in Little Nero's boxes by drivers wearing Little Nero's hats.
* BoomHeadshot: One of Kevin's methods of dispatching the Wet Bandits involved him shooting Marv in the forehead with a B.B. gun when he poked his head through the doggie door. Unsurprisingly, the best it did was leave a stinging sensation on his forehead rather than killing or even injuring him.
* BrickJoke:
** Kevin's father tells Kevin that "If he needs something to do, he should pick up his Micro Machines, mentioning that his aunt almost slipped on them near the beginning of the movie. Much later, Harry and Marv slip on those same Micro Machines.
** When Kevin wakes up and finds himself alone in the house, he runs outside and sees the garage open with his family's car still inside. Later on, when Peter and Kate are trying to figure out what they forgot to do in their haste to leave, Peter realizes he forgot to close the garage.
** Kevin climbs up his brother Buzz's storage shelves, which collapse under his weight, thereby destroying his brother's room and releasing his pet tarantula, Axl, who turns up later at an opportune moment to scare Marv (almost to death) during the climax. He then goes grocery shopping with Buzz's life savings and the movie goes on as planned. At the end of the movie, all seems right until the very end of the movie when after the family has come home, Buzz yells "KEVIN!! WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY ROOM?!"
** Kevin rhetorically asks his father if he burned down the house after using the glue gun to make ornaments. When the family returns from Paris, Buzz praises Kevin for not burning the house down.
** Harry chews out Marv when the latter floods another house, who counters that, as the "Wet Bandits," they need a CallingCard. In the climax, the Wet Bandits are arrested, and the police tell them they know which houses they robbed due to the floods, with the strong implication of serving a lengthy prison sentence.
** When Harry gets hit in the face with a paint can, his GoldTooth is knocked out. Kevin's dad, Peter later finds it on the floor, and is understandably confused about it.
** Marv tells Harry there could be toys worth stealing in Kevin's house. In the first house they rob later on, Harry plays with a remote-controlled car.
* BondOneLiner: "Keep the change, ya filthy animal."
* BrokenAesop: Old Man Marley. It's supposed to be a "Don't believe everything you hear" aesop, but if an old guy with a notorious reputation just stared at you sinisterly without saying a word, you'd be creeped out, too. Let alone if you were an 8-year-old who was by himself.
* CallBack: Harry demonstrates knowledge about the holiday light timers on all the houses on the [=McCallisters=]' street; he's not afraid of them. On the night Harry and Marv seek to rob Kevin's house, Kevin hurries home to ready his battle plan. The camera catches all of the holiday lights on Kevin's street turning on. It's a warning to the audience that Harry and Marv will be arriving shortly.
* CallingCard: The Wet Bandits (or rather, Marv, as Harry expresses irritation that Marv would actually resort to such a thing like that) often flood the houses they robbed. This bites them in the butt later in the film when they are arrested for attempted robbery and the cops tell them that thanks to the floods, they know all the robberies they were responsible for which will result in a longer prison sentence.
* TheCameo: Several members of director Chris Columbus' family appear: his mother-in-law and his then-infant daughter Eleanor Columbus are both passengers on the plane. His wife Monica Devereux-Columbus is a flight attendant, and his father-in-law plays the police officer who gives the line "Tell them to count their kids again."
* CardboardPal: Kevin uses several tricks, one of them a cardboard cutout of Michael Jordan, to fool the bandits into thinking the house is occupied and having a party.
* CerebusRetcon:
** The ending shows Kevin happy to be with his family and forgiving his mom for what she had done. This [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yh7-wAy_8ss video]] shows an adult Kevin (played by Macauley Culkin) is actually traumatized from being left by himself for a week at age 8 and having to defend himself against psychopathic home invaders. He also ignores his mom's calls due to a grudge against her for supposedly not caring about him and having become a groupie with a traveling polka band rather than try and save him (he apparently never heard the whole story mind you). He also seems to have pretty much become a sociopath as a result.
** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSmGxRGut6w Daniel Stern made a video in response]] where it's implied that Kevin has hunted down Marv and done something very unpleasant to him.
* ChaosOfTheBells: A choir-sung "Carol of the Bells" transitions into the Music/JohnWilliams composition "Setting the Traps" -- which is heavily influenced by the aforementioned carol -- as Kevin [=McCallister=] booby-traps his house in preparation for the villains' arrival.
* CharacterDevelopment: In the beginning, Kevin is [[EstablishingCharacterMoment established]] to be rather sheltered and pampered at times, such as when he asked if anybody could help pack his suitcase, and is legitimately [[FauxHorrific appalled]] at the idea of packing his own suitcase. But during his ordeals throughout the movie, he learns to be independent and self-reliant. Towards the end, he even surprises his own family when he tells him he bought groceries all by himself.
* ChekhovsBoomerang: The gangster movie that Kevin watches. He first uses it in order to fool and scare away the pizza delivery boy. He later uses it again to scare off the Wet Bandits.
* ChekhovsGun:
** You just ''knew'' that Axl crawling around through the entire movie is going to save Kevin's hide in the end...
** The ''Angels with Filthy Souls'' movie.
** The firecrackers from Buzz's room.
--> '''Kevin''': Cool, firecrackers! [[LampshadeHanging I'll save these for later]].
** A literal one. Buzz's BB gun.
** In the first basement scene you can see some mannequins before we see the furnace. The ones that Kevin later uses to fool Harry and Marv into thinking the rest of the family have come home after he first encounters them. The Michael Jordan poster from Buzz's room fulfills the same purpose.
** The laundry chute. Kevin shoots sports figurines down it early on, then it's used for the iron trap.
** Peter telling Kevin to pick up his micro machines because his Aunt Leslie stepped on one and almost broke her neck. These come back later.
** The morning flight home from Paris. Kate doesn't want to wait for it, but in the end, the rest of the family used it to get home.
** The Murphy house. Harry and Marv break into it, and it's where they almost run Kevin down with their van shortly after. [[spoiler: Finally, Kevin leads Harry and Marv there at the end and it's where they are arrested.]]
** Old Man Marley's snow shovel.
** Averted when Peter warns Kevin to stop making ornaments out of fishhooks with his glue gun. It seems like the setup for a boobytrap, but the fishhooks are never used, and the glue gun is only used for easily the mildest booby trap in the series (the fan blasting feathers onto Harry). This scene does serve as an EstablishingCharacterMoment, however, as it shows Kevin as being resourceful and capable of using tools.
* ChekhovsGunman:
** Harry is introduced as a policeman who checks if the family has taken precautions against burglary. He is later revealed to be a burglar.
** Old Man Marley.
* CherubicChoir: The scene inside the church features a children's choir singing. One of the singers is Marley's granddaughter.
* ClosestThingWeGot: An example that's funny and nice at the same time. Santa gives Kevin some Tic-Tacs since he's all out of candy canes, but he still says "Everyone who sees Santa should get a little something."
* ColorMotif: To promote a stronger Christmas feel, red and green are major reoccurring colors throughout the movie, appearing quite conspicuously in almost every scene. This includes furniture, clothing, food containers, and all wallpaper.
* ComeOutComeOutWhereverYouAre:
** When Kevin first wakes up to the empty house, he walks through the house calling for his parents, siblings, cousins, and Uncle Frank before getting scared out of the basement.
** When Kevin is going through Buzz's things: "Buzz, I'm going through all your private stuff. You'd better come out and pound me."
** When Kevin is watching [[ShowWithinAShow Angels With Filthy Souls]]: "Guys, I'm eating junk and watching rubbish. You'd better come out and stop me."
** Marv and Harry: "We know that you're in there and that you're all alone..."
** When Harry comes into the house: "Where are you you little creep?!"
* ComicallyMissingThePoint: Kevin looks at Buzz's Playboy collection and declares: "No clothes on anyone. Sickening!" {{Justified}} as he's only eight years old.
* ConfiscatedPhone: The family, in a panic, forces a woman at an airport off the phone.
* ConvectionSchmonvection: The doorknob is hot enough to glow red, but Harry doesn't feel the heat that should come off it before he touches it.
* ConvenientlyTimedAttackFromBehind: Old Man Marley and his shovel.
* CoolPet: Buzz [=McCallister=] has a tarantula ''(Grammostola rosea)'' as a pet.
* CountingToPotato:
** When Heather is counting off the family (with neighbor Mitch Murphy unwittingly standing in for Kevin), Buzz attempts to trip up her count by shouting: "Eleven, Ninety-two, twelve."
** In [[ShowWithinAShow Angels With Filthy Souls]], Johnny counts off one, two, ten before pumping Snakes's guts full of lead.
** As the [=McCallister=] family members wonder about Kevin from Paris, Megan asks Buzz if he's not the least bit concerned about his well being, or something bad happening to him.
-->'''Buzz:''' No, for three reasons: A) I'm not that lucky. 2) We have smoke detectors. And D) We live on the most boring street in the United States of America, where [[TemptingFate nothing remotely dangerous will ever happen, period]].
* CreepyBasement: Contains the furnace that is scary for Kevin. Subverted later on in the movie, where Kevin rigs up with traps that Marv must get through--icy stairs in from the outside, and tar-coated steps with an [[AgonyOfTheFeet upward nail]] leading out on the inside.
* CreepyUncle: A deleted scene revealed Frank to be (possibly) one of these, as he gets enjoyment out of pulling Kevin's pants down. Which would be ironic, since in the sequel he accuses Kevin of being an inversion of this, calling him a "nosy little pervert" for recording him singing in the shower.
* CrosscastRole: The picture that Kevin finds of Buzz's girlfriend is actually a picture of a boy (the son of one of the crew members) in drag--director Chris Columbus thought it would be too mean to use a picture of an actual girl.
* DarkIsNotEvil: Double-subverted with Old Man Marley. He dresses in dark clothing for much of the film and is rumoured to have murdered his family years before, but it turns out the rumours about him are not true and he's not on speaking terms with his family because of an argument he had with his son.
* DeathCourse: The villains are forced to cross one, designed by the protagonist. Amazingly, they make it through them with [[MadeOfIron only superficial wounds]].
* DeathGlare:
** On the first night, Fuller takes a gulp of Pepsi and looks gleefully at Kevin. Kevin gives him one, knowing that now Fuller will wet the bed and he will have to sleep in it.
** Shortly after that, Kevin gets one from everyone else for him bum-rushing Buzz and causing milk to be spilled over the passports.
** What Kevin thinks Old Man Marley is giving him before [[spoiler: Marley tells Kevin about the falling out with his son years ago.]]
* DeathlyDiesIrae: Can be heard during the first three times we see Mr. Marley.
* DelusionsOfEloquence: Linnie uses French phrases to sound intelligent, but she comes off as pathetic. Linnie's actual mistake is using the plural form instead of the singular when referring to Kevin. She should have called him "l'incompétent".
* DeniedFoodAsPunishment: Kevin gets angry at Buzz and shoves him into some drinks which spill over, creating a mess in the kitchen. Chaos thus ensues among the family, and everyone directs their anger towards Kevin. As a result, Kate makes him sleep in the attic (Kevin is scared of the attic) without dinner.
* DescriptionCut: While Kevin's siblings show concern for Kevin's well-being, Buzz thinks he'll be alright, claiming that [[NothingExcitingEverHappensHere nothing remotely dangerous happens on their street]]. Cut to the pizza delivery guy [[RunningGag hitting the statue in front of the house]].
* DisapprovingLook: Uncle Frank tries to console Kate after she realizes that they left Kevin behind by comparing that to him forgetting his reading glasses, earning a scowl from his wife, Leslie.
* DisorganizedOutlineSpeech:
-->'''Megan''': You're not at all worried that something might happen to Kevin?
-->'''Buzz''': No, for three reasons: A, I'm not that lucky. Two, we have smoke detectors and D, we live on the most boring street in the United States of America, where nothing even remotely dangerous will ever happen. Period!
* DisproportionateRetribution: Kevin's vigilante justice against Harry and Marv. Admittedly, also Kevin being chased on foot by a cop for unintentionally shoplifting a toothbrush.
* DoesntKnowTheirOwnChild: When Kate laments that she's a bad mother to the leader of the polka band, he answers that she's surrounded by bad fathers, citing that one of them forgets the names of his children half the time.
* DonutMessWithACop: One of the policemen that Kate calls is busy eating a donut while she tries to explain the situation.
* DreamingOfAWhiteChristmas: The movie depended on this trope as a setup. Not that this would be terribly unrealistic for Christmas in Chicago, a city known for its occasional blizzards (although actual white Christmases are bit hit-and-miss).
* DrivesLikeCrazy: The Little Nero's delivery guy, because he only has 20 minutes to fulfill each order or else it's free. He also does this after Kevin plays [[ShowWithinAShow Angels With Filthy Souls]] to when receiving the delivery while by himself.
* DudeNotFunny: When Kevin's parents realize they left him behind, Uncle Frank attempts to cheer them up by telling them he forgot his reading glasses. His wife and Kevin's parents then give him this reaction.
* EasterBunny: An actor playing Santa Claus gets served with a parking ticket on Christmas Eve. "What's next?" he grouses. "Rabies shots for the Easter bunny?"
* EiffelTowerEffect: In the scene where Peter tries to call home from his brother's house in Paris, the Eiffel Tower is visible right outside the window.
* EnemyEatsYourLunch: Buzz eats Kevin's pizza on the first night, and not only does [[KarmaHoudini he get away with it]], but for [[RageBreakingPoint losing his temper and bum-rushing Buzz]], [[MisplacedRetribution Kevin]] is sent to the third floor and [[DeniedFoodAsPunishment doesn't get anything to replace his pizza]]. No wonder he thought everyone in the family hated him.
* EveryoneHasStandards: Even Uncle Frank is at least responsible enough to not let his eight-year-old nephew watch a violent gangster movie.
-->'''Kevin:''' It's not even rated R. He's just being a jerk.\\
'''Kate:''' Kevin, if Uncle Frank says no, then it must be really bad.
* EvilLaugh: When doing laundry, Kevin seems to hear one coming from the furnace.
* ExactEavesDropping: Kevin opens the window at the right moment to overhear the baddies outside talking about their plan to rob the house and the time they intend to start. Doubles as AcousticLicense for the fact that Kevin is able to understand the burglars from quite a distance away.
* ExactWords: Defied by Kate.
--> '''Kate:''' Get upstairs.\\
'''Kevin:''' I ''am'' upstairs, dummy!\\
''(Kate opens a door, revealing stairs to the third floor)''
* {{Expy}}:
** Old Man Marley is an Expy of Boo Radley from ''Literature/ToKillAMockingbird''.
** Creator/JohnCandy's character (Gus Polinski) seems a lot like [[Film/PlanesTrainsAndAutomobiles Del Griffith]].
* FaceYourFears: Kevin has to face his fear of his basement furnace. He manages to overcome this fear, and incorporates the basement into his battle with Harry and Marv at the end of the movie.
* FearsomeFoot: When Kevin is in the pharmacy, there is a lingering shot of Old Man Marley's snow boots as he enters, as well as when he comes up behind Kevin (Kevin still thinks he is a SerialKiller at this point).
* {{Fingore}}: Harry attempts this on Kevin as payback for the many injuries from Kevin's traps, before Marley knocks him out cold.
* FiveSecondForeshadowing: As Kevin climbs up Buzz's shelves to reach the baseball tin, the second shelf creaks when Kevin steps on it. Ten seconds later, just as Kevin reaches the baseball tin, all the shelves come crashing down.
* FloatingAdviceReminder: PlayedStraight when Kevin at first reacts with anxiety when he believes that "I made my family disappear!" But then a series of floating heads of various family members remind him that they had said hurtful things to him the night before (including a fake one of Buzz threatening to feed him to his tarantula) - and he repeats, with a broad smile, ''"I made my family disappear!"''
* {{Foreshadowing}}:
** Kevin's fit about living alone when he grows up. He will be living alone for the next few days thanks to the power outage.
** Kevin's brother Jeff throws his bag down the stairs and just barely avoids hitting Harry standing at the front door. The next time something comes down the stairs to meet him, he isn't so lucky.
** Viewers familiar with the Chicago area will notice that the uniform worn by the police officer visiting the [=McCallisters=] has several inconsistencies with the ones actually worn by the local police. Turns out the uniform was just a disguise.
** When Old Man Marley is first seen, Buzz tells Kevin and Rod that he murdered his family, which is why they're no longer around. As it turns out, he's not on good terms with his family because of an argument he had with his son years before.
** In Paris, Peter says the only thing they have is a booking for the whole family on Friday's morning flight. Kate doesn't want to wait for it. However, at the end it's revealed this is how everyone else managed to get home.
** Marv suggesting they could steal toys from the [=McCallister=] house. In the second film, the two set up a plan to rob Duncan's Toy Chest.
** In the beginning, Peter tells Kevin to pick up his micro machines because Aunt Leslie almost broke her neck stepping on one. Later on, Kevin uses his micro machines as one of the traps.
* ForWantOfANail: All the events of the movie can be traced back to Buzz playing a prank on Kevin (by eating his pizza), which results in Kevin being sent to sleep in the attic and being forgotten the next morning.
* FreezeFrameBonus: When Peter is blotting up spilled milk, Kevin's plane ticket can be seen in the wet napkins he throws in the trash bin.
* FriendlyNeighborhoodSpider: Buzz [=McCallister=] has a tarantula ''(Grammostola rosea)'' as a pet, which gets released after Kevin is left home alone. This is eventually used as one of Kevin's {{Improvised Weapon}}s against the Wet Bandits. In fact it could be argued that the spider, like the cellar was part of Kevin's childhood fears which he had to overcome in order to rely on himself more and protect his home. And what better overcoming is there other than using the once source of mortal terror into a weapon of defense against the real enemies? In the end, the tarantula does not receive damage and it was found by Buzz when he came back home with the rest of his family (or at least is implied).
* FrozenDinnerOfLoneliness: Kevin's meal before he enacts his plan to defend his house against the robbers is a plate of frozen macaroni and cheese. He treats it as a fancy meal, to show that he's, well, [[TitleDrop home alone]] and doesn't know anything more complex.
* GenreBlindness: Harry and Marv--who, under the assumption that ThisIsReality, assume that "Kids are stupid."
%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.
* {{Gonk}}: Kevin recoils at a photo of older brother Buzz's girlfriend. We see the picture too and she is very much this trope. Her "actress" was actually a boy in drag; this way, director Chris Columbus could play up "her" ugliness as much as he wanted without humiliating an actual girl.
* GratuitousFrench: The family (''sans'' Kevin) watching ''Film/ItsAWonderfulLife'' in French.
* TheGreatestStoryNeverTold: Impressed that Kevin went grocery shopping by himself while the rest of the family was in Paris, Peter asks him what else he did while they were gone. Instead of telling them about his experiences with the Wet Bandits and Marley, Kevin tells the family he just hung around the house.
* HeelRealization: Kate asks "What kind of mother am I?" in movie one, giving a ThousandYardStare. Pete tries to stay calm and reassure her that it wasn't her fault.
* HellYesMoment: When Kevin wakes up and finds the family missing, after he flashes back to bad things the other family members said about him, he has one of these, consisting of him gleefully saying, "I made my family disappear!", and an eyebrow raise.
* HeroicBystander: Gus Polinski, Polka King of the Midwest, plays this role. Upon hearing Kate desperately trying to get back to Chicago, he selflessly offers a place in his band's rented van to her, thus allowing her to make it home. Gus has no idea who Kate is, but he recognizes that she's in distress, and that's enough for him to help.
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: When the Wet Bandits are finally caught at the end, the cops are able to identify which houses they robbed since Marv would leave the houses' sinks running as a calling card. Marv is proud of this, while Harry shakes his head. This is also how the Bandits plan to punish Kevin before Old Man Marley intervenes--by putting him through his own traps.
* TheHomewardJourney: Kate goes through great lengths to get back to Chicago to her son, including hitchhiking with a polka band. Subverted in that the rest of the family manages to get back at the same time by waiting for the next available return flight.
* HurryingHomeForTheHolidays: After the family leaves home without Kevin, his mom tries to get home to be with him for the holidays.
* HypocriticalHumour: Harry and Marv chew out Kevin about road safety after they nearly run over him, but that only happened because they were too distracted arguing with each other to watch where they were going.
* IdiotBall: Harry and Marv probably could have gotten away with their crimes a lot longer and avoided a ''ton'' of unnecessary physical punishment if they'd simply just left Kevin alone in the first two films.
* IWishedYouWereDead: "I made my family disappear!"
* ImpersonatingAnOfficer: Harry dresses himself as a policeman to know when the residents of the neighborhood are going to leave for the holiday.
* {{Improv}}: John Candy improvised most of his lines.
* ImprovisedZipline: Kevin uses a bike handle to slide from his window to his treehouse.
* InnocentInnuendo: While combing his hair after showering, Kevin mentions washing "everywhere between my toes and my belly button, [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything which I never did before but sort of enjoyed]]".
* {{Irony}}:
** The Wet Bandits drive around in a plumbing van, and their calling card is to leave their victims' water running.
** While posing a police officer in order to get information on the [=McCallisters=] security systems and when they will be leaving, he claims the reason he's asking is that he's checking to make sure that people are taking proper precautions due to the high rate of burglaries around the holidays, when he in fact is a burglar himself intending to rob the house.
* ItsPersonal: After each trap, Harry's malice for Kevin increases, but it reaches its climax when his GoldTooth is knocked out.
* JerkassHasAPoint:
** Peter has a right to be annoyed with Kevin for using his new fishing tackle to make Christmas ornaments. Besides the obvious -- they're brand-new -- it's also not safe for a child to use them.
** At the start, Kevin complains that Uncle Frank won't let him watch the gangster movie with the older children. Considering Kevin is only 8, and the film has at least one violent murder scene (which terrifies Kevin the first time he watches it), Frank did have a point.
* JustPlaneWrong: There are several plane scenes that are incorrect if you are an aviation expert.
** American Airlines has no morning flight from Chicago-O'Hare to Paris-Charles de Gaulle. Both American Airlines and United Airlines operate flights from Chicago to Paris, but they all depart in the evening, between 5:30 PM and 7:30 PM Central Time (which, due to the fact that the planes are then passing through seven time zones, allows them to land in Paris sometime between 8:30 AM and 10:00 AM local time). However, most westbound flights from Europe to the United States tend to leave in the early morning, say before 10:00 AM local time there. Due to the time zone change, they end up landing in Chicago around lunchtime.
** The plane in the scene of the family's flight departing from O'Hare is a [=McDonnell=]-Douglas DC-10-10, which was flown by American Airlines up until the early 1990s. Except that it was only used for domestic flights due to its limited range of 3,500 miles. There was a long range version used for intercontinental flights, the DC-10-30. The difference is that the DC-10-30 had three main landing gear bogies (two four wheel bogies and one middle two-wheel bogie). It is clearly visible during the takeoff scene that this plane only has two sets of rear landing gear, so it is definitely a DC-10-10 which could have never made the trip from Chicago to Paris.
** The stock footage of Kate's flight out of Paris taking off is of a DC-9, which doesn't have the fuel range to fly across the Atlantic Ocean.
** The plane shown landing at the Scranton Airport is a DC-10. [=Scranton/Wilkes-Barre=] Airport has never had regular service from a DC-10 by any airline. The largest planes to land at Scranton are Boeing 737s and Airbus A320s. DC-10s are far too large to be accommodated by the airport for non-emergency situations.
* KarmaHoudini: Kevin steals a toothbrush by accident (due to Old Man Marley showing up in the store before Kevin can pay for it) and despite being chased by a police officer, he gets away scot-free after losing the officer and nothing else ever comes of it.
* KarmaHoudiniWarranty: Buzz initially gets away with [[ItMakesSenseInContext taunting Kevin over pizza, which causes Kevin to bum rush him afterward]]. But he later gets his comeuppance in the form of Kevin destroying his room and using his life savings to buy food.
* LetsGetDangerous: Kevin when tricking the bandits would previously use illusions to make them think the house is occupied. Then when he finds out they're coming to rob the house anyway, he decides that he must protect it with everything he's got. And does he deliver!
* LockedOutOfTheLoop: Kevin was apparently never told the family would be using a van service to get to the airport. When he sees all of the cars are still in the garage, he takes it as evidence that they didn't leave for Paris and their disappearance is a result of his wish.
* ManMadeHouseFlood: Deliberately invoked by the Wet Bandits. See CallingCard.
* MistakenFromBehind: Mitch Murphy, who bears somewhat of a resemblance to Kevin, has his back turned to Heather when she adds him into the [=McCallister=] family headcount.
* MonochromeCasting: The only non-white character in the movie is a staff member at the airport gate.
* MuggingTheMonster: The climactic burglary scene can qualify.
* MyFriendsAndZoidberg: Kevin asks the "guy who works for Santa" for his family back, and lists them by name. "And, if he has time, my Uncle Frank."
* MyGodWhatHaveIDone:
** Kate has one when, still on the plane to Paris, she suddenly realizes they've left Kevin at home. Throughout the movie, she repeatedly beats herself up for being a bad mother. In the novelization, Kate is terrified that, because they had punished Kevin the previous night, he would think that his family had left him home on purpose.
** Kevin has one after accidentally stealing a toothbrush, after he gets away from the officer chasing him.
** Old Man Marley admits that he regrets fighting with his son and saying that he didn't want to see him anymore.
* NeverFoundTheBody: Buzz's story about Old Man Marley being the Shovel Slayer says he wasn't arrested for killing his family because the authorities never found the bodies. Turns out they're just fine and he's always alone because he had an argument with his son years ago.
* NeverTrustATrailer:
** In the trailer, when Kevin's buying groceries, he talks to a store manager who's beside a cashier. In the actual movie, it's Kevin and the cashier only. (Fun fact: The man who played the manager later wrote a letter to Roger Ebert, explaining that, even though his scene didn't make the film, his role in the trailer allowed him to join the Screen Actors Guild.)
** The "Jingle Bells"-themed trailer shows Kate shouting "Pick up!" into a pay phone. Taken out of context, it ''looks'' like Kate is calling their house and shouting for Kevin to answer the phone. In the film, she is actually calling the police, asking them to send an officer to check on Kevin. After being put on hold for the second time, she is shouting for somebody at the police station to pick up the phone.
* NiceJobFixingItVillain: Marv flooding the houses that he and Harry rob. It later comes back to bite them both when they are arrested.
-->'''Officer:''' Nice move, leaving the water running. Now we know each and every house that you've hit.
* NoPoliceOption: The phones are out due to a tree falling in the lines. Pre-cellphones obviously.
* NothingExcitingEverHappensHere: Buzz thinks his family lives on "the most boring street in the whole United States of America", so there's no chance of anything dangerous ever happening to Kevin. Of course, Kevin ends up getting attacked by the Wet Bandits.
* NotSoDifferentRemark: When Marley relates to his own family problems after revealing himself to be a MisunderstoodLonerWithAHeartOfGold, Kevin realizes he and Marley are a lot alike and the consequences of not wanting to see their families again.
* ObviousStuntDouble: In the scene where Kevin [[https://youtu.be/Xw6tX9YhQLo?t=1 rope-slides to the treehouse]], the stunt double is noticeably older than Macaulay Culkin.
* OhCrapSmile: Marv does this when he sticks his head through the doggy door and finds himself staring into the barrel of a BB gun.
* TheOperatorsMustBeCrazy: The Chicago police are shockingly lackadaisical when Kevin's mom calls to alert them to his situation.
* PartingWordsRegret:
** Kate remembers that the last thing Kevin said to her was that he didn't want to see her or anyone in his family again for the rest of his life. Kevin regrets it after scaring the crooks off with the dinner party display. Kate also regrets that she essentially told Kevin he should ask for another family if he doesn't like this one, and all he does is cause trouble. Kate apologizes to Kevin when she returns and doesn't expect one in return, because causing a dinner fight seems small in hindsight to leaving your child alone for three days.
** Old Man Marley describes the argument he had with his estranged son years ago after they both lost their tempers and agree they do not wish to see each other anymore. Thankfully Kevin advises Old Man Marley to call him.
* PlotHole: A big plot mechanic is that the [=McAllister=] phones are down due to a power line accident in the middle of the night, and Kate is told it would take "at least a week" to sort it out. This creates the conflict that the family can't reach Kevin by phone, but Kevin is able to call out to the pizza guy in one scene and the police during the climax. One possible theory is that the phone lines could still work locally but unable to take long-distance calls due to the multiple communication transfers, but is not addressed in the film proper.
* PoliceAreUseless:
** An officer comes by to check if Kevin is home but fails to announce himself and only scares the child off with his heavy pounding on the door.
** A heavy-weight police officer chases Kevin for shoplifting but is easily shaken off on a slippery ice track.
** The burglars have free rein for days to rob the neighborhood until Kevin calls 911.
* PoorCommunicationKills: The scene where Kevin accidentally swipes a toothbrush relies on this. It starts when Marley slams a bleeding hand on the counter while Kevin is searching for money. Kevin backs away slowly with the toothbrush, still uneasy from meeting him the night prior. Marley doesn't say a word and continues to give a confused stare at Kevin. The owner reminds Kevin to pay for the toothbrush which makes him panic and run out of the store with it. Not understanding why he's so scared, she orders an employee to stop Kevin. Said employee [[FromBadToWorse yells "Shoplifter!" to a nearby officer who pursues Kevin on foot]]. Through it all, Marley makes no attempt to clear anything up.
* PoorlyLitPareidolia: Kevin envisioning the furnace in the basement as a monster.
* PornStash: Having not yet hit puberty, Kevin has no appreciation for Buzz's collection of ''Magazine/{{Playboy}}s''.
--> '''Kevin:''' No clothes on anybody. Sickening!
* PreAsskickingOneLiner: When the Wet Bandits show up at Kevin's house at nine pm on Christmas Eve, Kevin walks to the back door, cocks the BB gun and says: "This is it. Don't get scared now."
* ProtectThisHouse: "This is my house! I have to defend it!"
* PuppyDogEyes: Kevin tries this on Kate to avoid being sent to the third floor. It doesn't work.
* RageBreakingPoint: After having the entire evening spent being ignored, insulted and treated with contempt by his family, Kevin finally snaps when Buzz eats what was supposed to be his pizza.
* RedGreenContrast: The film packs nearly every scene with red and green objects to make the whole movie feel more like Christmas. This doesn't just include the in-story Christmas decorations: even the wallpaper and furniture are often red and green. (In ''WebVideo/CinemaWins''' video on ''Home Alone'', [[https://youtu.be/R_I98Y9Xees?t=8m13s Lee counts 237 unique red and green objects over the course of the whole film.]])
* RedIsHeroic: Kevin wears a red jumper for much of the film. Additionally, he wears a red scarf in the scenes he is outdoors. On a final note, Kevin wears red pajamas in the near final scene [[before his mother and, eventually, his family return.]]
* RepeatAfterMe: After Kevin gets in trouble for retaliating against Buzz's taunting, his mother forces him to go to bed early:
-->'''Kate''': Say good night, Kevin.
-->'''Kevin''': Good night, Kevin.
* RevealingReflection: When Harry comes to peer in the window of the house, Kevin sees him reflected off a glass ornament and pretends to call for his dad. Harry isn't fooled, and realizes he's there by himself.
* RuleOfSymbolism: The state of Old Man Marley's right hand throughout the film may well symbolise his relationship with his son, and by extension, the rest of his family. When he appears in the pharmacy, his hand is heavily wrapped in a bloody bandage, because at that moment, he hasn't spoken to his son in years and there is no sign of this changing. When Marley shakes hands with Kevin in the church, there is only a Band-Aid on his hand, because he is there to see his granddaughter sing in the choir, he has just told Kevin about the falling-out he had with his son years earlier, Kevin has just advised him to reconcile with his son, and Marley decides to give it a shot. [[spoiler:And in the final scene, Marley has indeed reconciled with his family and his hand is seen to have completely healed.]]
* RunningGag: The statue in front of the [=McCallisters'=] house getting knocked over repeatedly.
* SafeUnderBlankets: Subverted then played straight. After the thieves come the first night, we see the bed in the master bedroom in the morning with a child-sized lump on it. Then the camera pans down to show Kevin under the bed. He then decides he's not going to be afraid and marches outside... where he runs into Old Man Marley. Kevin runs screaming back into the house, into the bed and pulls the covers over his head. He stays there, refusing to move, even when a police officer comes by to check on him.
* SanctuaryOfSolitude: Kevin is lonely on Christmas Eve night, so he goes to the church to hear the choir sing.
* SilenceOfSadness: Referenced. The Polka singer who gives Kate a ride back to Chicago tells her about how he once left his son alone at a funeral parlor all night. The kid was okay... after about six weeks, at which point he finally started ''speaking'' again.
* ShaggyDogStory: Kate's subplot of her getting back home on her own. She refuses to wait for the first available flight out of Paris and barters her way onto a late-night flight while the rest of the family stays behind in Paris to leave together. It falls out of padding since Kate's MamaBear determination redeems her sympathetically after the opening sequence doesn't portray her in the best of lights, but after a draining journey including hitching a ride from Pennsylvania to Illinois through another night, she arrives home [[spoiler: a mere sixty seconds from the rest of the family.]]
* ShoutOut: This isn't the only [[Literature/AChristmasCarol Christmas story with a spooky character named Marley...]]
* ShovelStrike: Old Man Marley dispatches the Wet Bandits with a blow to the head from his snow shovel.
* ShowWithinAShow: ''Angels with Filthy Souls'' (made specifically for the movie). The title is actually a parody of a real '30s gangster flick, ''Film/AngelsWithDirtyFaces'', though the fake movie scenes don't parody any scene from that film.
* SmallRoleBigImpact: Mitch Murphy, the neighbor from across the street. If he was not there during Heather's headcount, the family would have understood that Kevin was not there and would not have left without him.
* SnowMeansLove: Although there's snow in the yards, the weather is mild until the ending. Fresh snow is falling when Kevin's family return and he reconciles with them, and when [[spoiler:Old Man Marley]] notably reconciles with their family out in the crisp-white snow.
* SpottingTheThread: Kevin sees a van in the Murphy's house, though they're supposed to be out of town, but shrugs. When the van nearly runs him over, however, Kevin recognizes the driver as the cop that visited his house, and seems to [[OhCrap put two and two together]]. Then when the van chases him to church, he realizes they were the robbers from the night before.
* StealthPun: Kevin was left behind because milk was accidentally spilled the tickets and his was accidentally thrown away, all while he had an argument with his family. It all began because the family ''cried over spilled milk''.
* SureLetsGoWithThat:
** An interesting variation, where Kevin tells a man dressed in a Santa suit, "I'm old enough to know you're not the real Santa Claus, but I also know that you work for him." The Santa actor just goes with it.
** When the Wet Bandits taunt Kevin from the back door, Marv says, "It's Santy Claus and his elf!" Harry laughs at this and plays along.
* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome:
** Marv thinks that flooding the houses that they rob is an immensely clever CallingCard. This means that when they're arrested, the cops easily identify which houses they hit. And no doubt add destruction-of-property charges to the burglary charges.
** Harry and Marv scream loudly outside several times, owing to Kevin's pranks. This raises a ruckus; the only reason no one calls the cops sooner is that the neighborhood has cleared out, excepting Old Man Marley. [[spoiler:Old Man Marley comes home from his granddaughter's choir rehearsal and sees the antics. This motivates him to go rescue Kevin]].
** For all of Kevin's ingenuity, he is a young child facing off against two adults, who get angrier and angrier with every trap they fall into and suffer injuries as a result. Unsurprisingly, the burglars end up getting the upper hand, and were it not for Old Man Marley's intervention at the end, Kevin would have been in very real danger.
** It might have been brief, but Kevin doesn't immediately run to his mom Kate because she and everyone left him behind. It took Kate to genuinely apologize for him to forgive her and return to being happy to her return.
* SweepingTheTable: After Kevin comes home from church on Christmas Eve, he sweeps the toys off his desk and places a map he drew to layout all the booby traps.
* TapOnTheHead: Both Harry and Marv are rendered unconscious by a single blow from [[spoiler: Old Man Marley's shovel.]] Neither is seriously injured by this, and both are loaded into a cop car instead of an ambulance.
* TeethFlying: The blow from the paint can knocks out Harry's GoldTooth.
* TelevisionGeography: The estimated travel times to get from the [=McCallister=] family house to O'Hare International Airport are laughable to any native Chicagoan: as they're leaving, Frank tells Peter, "There's no way on Earth we're gonna make this plane. It leaves in 45 minutes." Peter tells him "Think positive, Frank." Even taking the fastest route (Willow Road to I-294 to I-190), it takes about a half hour at minimum, and more if there's traffic. And it would take another half hour for everyone to check in, check their bags, and clear security, and maybe five-ten minutes to rush from security to their boarding gate in Terminal 3 (where American Airlines flights from O'Hare are boarded). Not to mention that on international flights, American requires bags to be checked in no less than one hour to departure.
* ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill: Not in the movie itself, but in ''[[ShowWithinAShow Angels With Filthy Souls]]'', Johnny empties the Tommy Gun on Snakes, even after Snakes is on the floor and no longer moving.
* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodSandwich: Kevin makes a nice, hot, steaming bowl of mac n' cheese. He brings it to the table, sits down, picks up his knife and fork... and the robbers show up. He promptly leaves it on the table without touching it.
* TimeMarchesOn: Modern trip planning apps like Expedia or Travelocity would have enabled Kate to find a way home better than waiting three days for the next direct flight or her semi-random journey across the US that turned out to be no faster.
* TitleDrop: The other [=McCallisters=] mention that Kevin is "home alone" ''at least'' three times. One of his sisters says so at the airport phones, and Kate says it at least twice to people when trying to get home. Harry says it too.
* TwoDecadesBehind: Peter claims that locks for the doors and electronic timers for the lights are about the best anyone could do for home security. Even at the time the movie was released, home security systems were available, and an affluent family like the [=McCallisters=] would be especially likely to have one.
* UnbuiltTrope: This was the movie that kickstarted the "kid empowerment" genre of the 1990s, but at the same time, it felt like a deconstruction. Instead of having wild and improbable fantasies like most other kid-empowered films, Kevin does mostly rather mundane things around the house, such as... jumping on the bed, sledding down the stairs, or eating tubs of ice cream while watching (somewhat) violent films. Also, because he was, well, home alone, he needed to find food and steal Buzz's money to survive. Furthermore, AdultsAreUseless not because of plot stupidity but because Kevin refused to trust them: he hated his extended family (especially Uncle Frank); he was scared that the police -- who were trying to help -- would arrest him after he (accidentally) stole a toothbrush; the Wet Bandits were constantly stalking him; and he was downright terrified of Old Man Marley. And despite all the traps and hilarious injuries Kevin inflicted on Harry and Marv, he actually ''failed'' to stop them in the end, and would have been killed [[spoiler: if it weren't for Old Man Marley coming in to rescue him]].
* UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom:
** Mitch Murphy, the neighborhood kid. By poking around the van the [=McCallisters=] take to the airport and digging through their luggage while the family was taking a roll call, he gets mistaken for Kevin at the deciding minute before they rush off, leaving the real Kevin behind.
** Goes a little further back during the dinner scene. After Kevin rushes Buzz during the disastrous pizza prank, the confusion and cleanup causes Peter to accidentally throw Kevin's boarding pass in the trash.
* VanInBlack: The baddies operate out of a blue van, disguised as a plumbing and heating business.
* VillainsOutShopping: A discussed and an implied example:
** Since they're not going to return to the [=McCallister=] house until 9 pm, Harry suggests they grab dinner first.
** Also, Kevin scares off Marv by playing the shootout scene from ''Angels with Filthy Souls'' and lighting firecrackers. Marv says that the voices sounded familiar, suggesting that he's seen that movie too and because it's obviously decades old, it may have been too long for him to instantly remember it.
* WeWillMeetAgain: After the bandits are arrested, Harry gives Kevin a look that seems to say this from the back seat of a police car. Doubles as a SequelHook.
* WhamLine: "Merry Christmas." [[spoiler:It's from Old Man Marley, revealing he's not as bad as he was previously made out to be.]]
* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: We never find out where Axl the tarantula went after he scared the two crooks, either. Though it looked like he crawled back to Buzz's room. Fortunately for most arachnophobes, he does not appear in the second film.
* YoungerThanTheyLook: Kevin is 8, but looks around 10 or 11.

[[folder:''Home Alone 3'']]
* ActuallyPrettyFunny: When Jernigan and Alice find what turns out to be a distraction involving a toy monkey, Jernigan starts laughing.
* AffablyEvil: Earl Unger.
* ArtisticLicenseAnimalCare: Doris the white rat doesn't have any cage-mates to live with. Fancy rats (and any brown rat for that matter) are ''extremely'' social animals that, barring temperament problems, should never be kept as solitary individuals.
* BarbellBeating: One of Alex's traps is a large weighted barbell that falls from the house's roof onto the heads of two of the robbers.
* BatmanGambit: Many of Alex's traps rely on either A) the crooks underestimating him because he's a kid B) noticing a more obvious trap and trying to circumvent it and/or C) being fed up enough from triggering previous traps that they will act hastily on a chance to capture him.
* BilingualBonus: When Peter Beaupre learns that Alex took the chip from the toy car, he gets angry and starts yelling at the boy in Polish: "I'm gonna crush you like a cockroach! Where's the disk?"[[note]]Rozgniotę cię jak karalucha! Gdzie jest dysk?[[/note]] (Yes, he actually called the chip "disk".) It helps that Beaupre's actor Aleksander "Olek" Krupa was born in Poland.
* BloodlessCarnage:
** Burton Jernigan has a ''running lawnmower'' dropped onto his ''face''. We hear agonizing screaming and the scene cuts away. The next time we see him, all he has is a wacky new haircut.
*** And before that, Beaupre and Unger get a ''trunk full of books'' dropped on them ''from a floor up''. They act more like they were each hit in the head with a single book.
--->'''Alice:''' You got hit with a book?\\
'''Unger:''' ''Books''. Plural, a ''trunk'' full of ''books''. And a set of weights. We got hit ''twice'', ya dumb broad.\\
'''Alice:''' [[DeadpanSnarker Excuse me, Mr. Unger. I didn't get taken down by an infant.]]
*** That being said, it did look as if they might have deflected some of the impact with their arms.
* BoundAndGagged: Alice binds and gags Mrs. Hess with white duct tape to a loan chair in a garage.
* CallBack: Alice hitting Jernigan in the nads with a crowbar while trying to hit Doris the rat is a call back to the first film where Marv whacks Harry in the sternum while aiming for the tarantula.
* CassandraTruth: Alex gets blown off by the police officers when he tries to tell them about the spies after they escape for the second time.
* TheCavalry: Essentially Defied since Alex has things pretty well wrapped up by the time Agent Stucky arrives. However, the fact that he arrives with a convoy consisting of two snowplows, his own car, four police cars, Alex's family in their car, and a fire engine with all sirens blaring definitely invokes this image.
* ChekhovsGun:
** The pet parrot and rat were clearly there to assist Alex in his battle against the spies.
** Stan's firecrackers. Possibly also a ShoutOut to the way they are used in the first film by Kevin.
** PlayedForLaughs with Beaupre eating a single cracker from a pack of two and slips the other in his pocket. When the parrot begins to light the firecrackers and give him away, he offers it the cracker as a bribe, but the parrot has been trained to respond to treats with "double or nothing." When Beaupre admits he only has one, "we have ignition!"
* ChickenpoxEpisode: The main character Alex gets chickenpox (which he discovers after scratching himself silly in public), and while staying home from school, he discovers North Korean spies outside his home, kickstarting the plot. The spies end up catching his chickenpox at the end of the movie.
* ChildHater: Unger. This is best seen when he fails to catch Alex hiding in a closet, and in his anger, he punches a picture of Stan, Molly and Alex, breaking the glass.
** [[WouldHurtAChild He also has no problem with the idea of whacking every kid in the neighborhood and burning them.]]
* ComedicUnderwearExposure: Happens to Alice when her pantsuit rips.
* DarkerAndEdgier: Taken to whole new levels. The new villains aren't petty house robbers, they're part of a terrorist organization! Alice actually ties Mrs. Hess up in a garage and then leaves the door open, exposing her to the freezing weather conditions. She's not far from unconsciousness when she's finally rescued.
* DeadpanSnarker: Unger, even when he's half-frozen.
* EekAMouse: Alice is terrified of Doris the rat.
* {{Expy}}: Alex is mostly recycled from Kevin. Also a SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute.
* EyeScream: Alex sprays black paint over Beaupre's eyes through the front door's letterbox (mail slot).
* {{Fanservice}}: The scene where Alice's pants rip, exposing her underwear.
* FartsOnFire: Happens twice to Unger when he is being shocked with sparks shooting from his ass both times.
* FirstNameBasis: Alice is always referred to by her first name, as opposed to her surname like her male compatriots.
* FlowerPotDrop: Alice trips two wires releasing pointsettia plants from a neighboring house. The first hits her on the head and the second lands on her face.
* FoodAsBribe: The brother's parrot only plays along with the scheme if you have TWO crackers.
-->"''Double, or nothing''"
* FourElementEnsemble: This may be completely unintentional, but the AmusingInjuries the four spies suffers at the film cover are related to the four elements. Unger is electrocuted, which made his suit (and [[FartsOnFire farts]]) burn (''fire''); Jernigan is sprayed with freezing hoses (''water''); Alice is covered in dirt after several incidents in mud (''earth''); and Beaupre has black paint in his face, coming from a gas-powered spray can (''air'').
* FourTemperamentEnsemble: The crooks - Beaupre is choleric, Alice is sanguine, Jernigan is melancholic and Unger is phlegmatic.
* GreaterScopeVillain: The North Korean terrorist.
* GroinAttack: Beaupre gets one from a boxing glove in the foyer's closet, causing him to fall on his gun. Then there's Alice giving one to Jernigan with a crowbar by mistake while trying to hit Doris the rat.
* HastilyHiddenMacGuffin: The MacGuffin is a stolen computer chip that the villains hid in a remote control car to escape suspicion. After a mix-up at O'Hare, Mrs. Hess ends up with the car and gives it to Alex as payment for shoveling her drive.
* HeroAntagonist: Alex can count, as the main focus seems to be the criminals trying to get the chip.
* HollowSoundingHead: Alice. Any of the [[SlapstickKnowsNoGender many times]] she hits her head or is hit in the head by something the audience hears a loud, suspiciously empty sounding *thunk*.
* HypocriticalHumor: Before cutting a live wire, Unger comments on how stupid kids can be.
* ICanSeeYou: When the thieves reach the attic, Jernigan finds the television and cameras that Alex had been using.
-->'''Jernigan''': He's been watching us the whole time.
-->(his colleagues groan)
-->'''Jernigan''': Got a camera on us.
* IFellForHours: Jernigan enters through a second-story window in search of Alex and falls through holes in the floors to the basement. While that should be three stories, he appears to go down seven floors.
* InformedAbility: Remember, the StupidCrooks of this movie are supposed to be ''veteran master spies and assassins'' taking on a kid, and the CurbStompBattle is in favor of ''the kid''.
* InstantSoprano: After Doris the rat climbs up Jernigan's pant leg and Alice tries to club her.
* JawDrop: When Agent Stucky relates to Alex's family what is going on, his brother's, sister's, and the police chief's jaws all drop.
* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Sure, Stan and Molly like to pick on Alex. However, when he's placed in a dangerous situation, their [[BigBrotherInstinct Big Sibling Instincts]] kick in. Shown when they refuse to let the Feds leave without explaining why Alex is in danger.
-->'''Karen''': Why is Alex in danger?
-->(''[[ArmorPiercingQuestion Stuckey doesn't respond]]'')
-->'''Stan''': She asked you a question, sir.
-->'''FBI Agent Stuckey:''' I'm not at liberty to discuss it, son.
-->(''Molly runs over and slams the door shut'')
-->'''Molly:''' The "it" you're referring to is ''my little brother''.
-->(''Stuckey realizes he has to tell the truth, even if it is a matter of National Security'')
* KissOfDeath: Alice kisses Mrs. Hess on the forehead, after gagging her and taping her to a chair and then leaving the door open so the winter air will freeze her to death.
* LastNameBasis: Beaupre, Unger and Jernigan are all referred to as "Mr. (surname)", or by their surnames alone. Only Jernigan gets a single mention of his given name (Burton). The former two's first names are revealed by Stuckey to be Peter and Earl, respectively.
* MacGuffin: The microchip that the North Koren terrorists are after.
* MisunderstoodLonerWithAHeartOfGold: Mrs. Hess fills the role this time, though unlike her two predecessors, who just have undeserved reputations, she's rude and surly until the chips are down and she realizes there's real danger. From her point of view, Alex is this; she sees him as a brat and his entire involvement in the plot starts when she gives him the car because she doesn't want it and didn't want to properly pay him for shoveling the walk, but as she tells him later, "you're a very sweet young man, I just never took the time to know you."
* MsFanservice: Regardless of her mean spirit - Alice is a highly attractive woman. Admirers should be pleased with with the sight of her rear end in form-fitting pants. It's most noticeable when she's running in yoga pants while pushing a phony baby stroller, and again [[spoiler: when she bends over to pick up a hat and rips her pants. A red thong is seen underneath.]] A less appealing example occurs when [[spoiler:she squeezes into a dumb waiter. Her butt hovers directly over the camera for a brief second.]]
* MoodWhiplash: After the spies suffer through most of the traps which is humorous, Alex's mom Karen calls him. The film gets a little tense because at this point Alex is trying to get her to not come home while Alice, Jernigan and Unger begin to search the house. Also Beaupre listens to the conversation between Alex and Karen using the basement phone so he can plan his next move.
* MythologyGag: Alex, when he discovers that he has the chicken pox, lets out a scream that gives Kevin a run for his money.
* NeverTrustATitle: It has nothing to do with ''Home Alone'' 1 and 2.
* NoTimeToExplain: Alex ends up doing this a lot near the end, since he's spent days by this point giving full explanations to the authorities but are quickly dismissed.
* OddballInTheSeries: The only film that doesn't take place on Christmas, and the only one where the antagonists are international terrorists instead of just local thieves.
* OnlyOneName: Subverted. The full names of all four of the bad guys are revealed by Stuckey: Peter Beaupre, Earl Unger, Burton Jernigan and Alice Rivens.
* ParentalObliviousness: The parents aren't on vacation, they're just at work. Several of the booby traps were already there when they leave on the final day; in fact, at one point Alex has to fetch his mom's coat so that she doesn't find out about one trap in the closet.
* ProperlyParanoid: After suffering through several of his traps, the mercenaries pull their weapons and start clearing the house for Alex, though they end up grabbing the IdiotBall toward the end.
* RearWindowWitness: Alex is home sick from school and witnesses the burglary of a neighbor's home. Unfortunately for Alex, the authorities disregard his explanations.
* RuleOfPerception: Beaupre can't tell he's holding a toy gun spray-painted black, despite it being about three pounds lighter than the Glock he'd been carrying and having a suction cup sticking out of the barrel. Granted, Alex apparently stores this particular toy gun in what looks like an actual gun case, so barring the suction cup ammunition it may have been modified to be much more realistic than most toys.
* SchmuckBait: Alex's homemade electric fence is overlayed with red yarn and a very deliberately childish sign warning everyone that it's an electric fence and not to touch it. Unger falls for it hook, line and sinker.
* ScrewTheRulesImDoingWhatsRight: After the police fail to catch the spies twice, Alex decides to deal with the burglars himself by using his remote control car to film their next burglary in the act. When that eventually leads to the discovery of the chip, he calls an Air Force recruiting office (which then alerts the FBI). When he realizes the spies know where he lives, then he sets up the booby traps.
* SequelEscalation: Big time! In the previous two movies, the stakes were that the Wet Bandits might pull off a robbery (either the [=McCallister=] House or a Toy Store). In this one, North Korea might blow up the world!
* SneezeOfDoom: Subverted. Alex hides in the closet but avoids detection by Unger, even after he sneezes.
* UnderestimatingBadassery: Practically all of the initial AmusingInjuries the crooks suffer are a direct result of dismissing Alex as JustAKid.
* VillainousBreakdown: The spies get angrier and angrier the more they suffer the traps to the point that they pull out their weapons once they are inside Alex's house. Beaupre tries to remain calm but when he finds out the microchip is not in the toy car he starts to yell at Alex in polish and threatens him with his gun (which was the fake one).
* VillainExitStageLeft: Subverted when three out of four of the terrorists are captured by the police at the end, but it seems like Beaupre, their leader, got away. However, it turns out he was just hiding inside a mini-igloo in the backyard when the [[PollyWantsAMicrophone snarly parrot]] exposes him.
* VillainProtagonist: Beaupre and his team can count, as the main focus seems to be them trying to get the chip back.
* VillainRespect: Beaupre listens in on a call between Alex and his mother. During the call, Alex talks his mother into not returning home quickly and therefore keeping her out of harm's way, to which he remarks:
-->'''Beaupre''': What a brave little fellow. (grins)
* WatchWhereYoureGoing: Alice chases after the remote controlled car towards a hedge, unaware that Beaupre is running from the other side to intercept it. They jump from opposite directions at the exact same time, and their heads collide.
* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: After Beaupre speaks with the terrorists' employer, the latter disappears and is never seen or mentioned again.
* YouDirtyRat: Averted by Doris, the white pet rat.

[[folder:''Home Alone 4: Taking Back the House'']]
* AmicablyDivorced: Subverted, Kate and Peter are in the middle of getting divorced, but still seem to get along after their separation, likely leading to them [[DivorceIsTemporary getting back together at the end of the movie.]]
* ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: Kevin's brother Jeff and sister Linnie aren't in this movie at all.
* CosmeticallyAdvancedPrequel: Or rather, midquel. Along with the early 2000s aesthetic, the film shows obvious technological advances (mainly Natalie's remote-controlled house) that were either not around or common in the early 90s.
* DerailingLoveInterests: Apart from forgetting to cancel her appointment with a tree decorator, Natalie doesn't exactly do anything too mean until she threatens to kick Kevin out of the house for ruining her and Peter's engagement party.
* DivorceIsTemporary: Come on, who didn't figure out that Peter and Kate would get back together?
* FriendlyEnemy: Marv and Kevin seem to be on first-name basis with one another. Also, once their first attempt to break into the house fails, Marv casually introduces Vera to Kevin.
* LeftTheBackgroundMusicOn: Kevin, Peter, and Natalie decorate the tree while "Jingle Bells" plays in the background. When Natalie gets a phone call, she needs someone to turn down the music.
* TheMole: Kevin suspects someone in the house is letting Marv and Vera into the house. He's right, but it's the last person he suspected: [[spoiler:Molly the maid who happens to be Marv's mother.]]
* MsFanservice: Vera, Kate, and Natalie are all beautiful women.
* NeverTrustATitle: It's a reboot rather than a sequel like the title suggests.
* OutlawCouple: Vera and Marv.
* ProtagonistCenteredMorality: Again, this is the main reason Natalie is seen as a bad guy: Kevin wants Peter to get back with Kate and doesn't want him to be with someone else, Kevin is the protagonist, ergo, Natalie is bad.
* RichBitch: Natalie has shades of this.
* WritersCannotDoMath: An extremely weird example: Kevin is only 9 in this film even though he was 8 in the first one and 10 in the second. There's no sign this is meant to be a prequel or anything (indeed, if it were, it would raise a bunch of other issues such as where is Harry? and where did Vera go between movies?) as such, we can only assume it was some sort of bizarre oversight on their part.
* WrongGenreSavvy: Kevin thinks TheButlerDidIt. [[spoiler:It was actually the maid.]]
* YouDontLookLikeYou: Since the original actors would have been too old to reprise their roles, they had to recast everybody. The worst offender has to be Marv, played by Creator/FrenchStewart. Rather than look like Daniel Stern, who declined the offer to reprise his role in the film, he looks a lot more like Harry.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:''Home Alone: The Holiday Heist'']]
* AffablyEvil: All of the three villains.
* BrotherSisterTeam: Finn and Alexis, once the latter is informed about the villains trying to break into the house.
* FingerPokeOfDoom: Finn places his index finger to Sinclair's forehead to gently shove him down the stairs while Sinclair is off balance.
* HumanSnowman: What Mason, the family's neighbor, turns Jessica (one of the art thieves) into when it is all over (minus the face, which remains exposed).
* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Alexis picks on Finn and pranks him and is sometimes a bully, but despite all that, she truly loves him deeply and cares about him.
* IntergenerationalFriendship: Finn's a child, Simon's an adult, and the two of them are good online friends, with the latter mentoring the former when it comes to gaming.
* LethalChef: One of the booby traps that Finn uses against the art thieves are "gingerbread men" baked with spicy mustard, spicy horseradish, salt, sour vinegar, and jalapeño peppers.
* MistakenForPedophile: What Simon's (Finn's online gaming buddy) conversation with Mrs. Baxter sounds like when Simon tries to warn her that Finn and Alexis are in danger when the art thieves are breaking in.
* MistakenForUndead: While Finn thinks the house is haunted, he interprets the Art Thieves' first break in attempt as a ghost coming in. Later on, the art thieves think Finn's traps are the ghost working against them (at first).
* MsFanservice: Debi Mazar as the female burglar is rather good-looking.
* OneDialogueTwoConversations: When Finn asks for advice on how to handle the villains, his web friend thinks he's talking about a new game.
* ParentalBonus: Appropriately for this series, the painting is said to have been by Edvard Munch. As the ending points out, he was behind ''The Scream'' painting.
* TooManyHalves: When Sinclair's accomplices believe the house they're breaking in is haunted, they demand a bigger share than the initially agreed 25% for each of them. Hughes suggests 50% for him, 50% for Jessica, ''and'' 25% for Sinclair. They eventually settle for one third each.
* WouldntHurtAChild: Once the villains grab Finn, they just lock him in their car rather than threaten him or hurt him like Harry or Marv would have.
[[/folder]]

This 1990 family comedy made Creator/MacaulayCulkin a [[StarMakingRole celebrity]]. It was written and produced by Creator/JohnHughes, known for his teen comedies, and directed by Creator/ChrisColumbus, with a Christmasy soundtrack by the one and only Music/JohnWilliams.

* The first sequel, ''Home Alone 2: Lost in New York'', is mainly a rehash of the original, only it's [[RecycledInSpace set in]] [[BigApplesauce New York]].

[[folder:''Home Alone 2: Lost in New York'']]
* FiveFiveFive:
** It's brief, but when Kevin looks up Uncle Rob's address, his phone number in the book has 555 in it. There's also a dumpster near his house with a 555 number.
** Averted with the phone number Kevin calls to reach the Plaza Hotel: 1-800-759-3000. However, the Plaza's real area code is 212, rather than being a toll free 800 number.
* ActuallyPrettyFunny:
** When Kevin tells his parents that Uncle Frank told him that if Kevin saw him in the shower, he'd "grow up never feeling like a real man", Peter chuckles and immediately clams up when Kate shoots him a disapproving look.
** Kevin tells the Pigeon Lady that if she wants to meet other people, she should not wear something covered in pigeon poop. The lady laughs and says, "I have been working very hard at keeping people away, haven't I?"
* AesopAmnesia: Marv apparently learned nothing from the first movie.
-->'''Marv:''' [[TooDumbToLive What can he do? He's a kid. Kids are helpless]].
** Kevin's parents didn't learn either. They try to be GenreSavvy a few times, but they didn't learn the most important lesson: to hold onto Kevin's hand like a vice until they see him sitting in a plane seat.
** Neither did they learn to set several alarm clocks, at least one of which should not depend on mains power.
** When Kate confronts Kevin in the attic after the choir debacle, she uses the exact same passive-aggressiveness that she did with Kevin in the first film, even knowing how well that had worked out before.
** Double Subverted with Kevin, since he says he wants to be on his own again (partly because he was still mad at Buzz and partly because didn't want to spend his Christmas in Miami), but later attempts to find his family when he gets separated at the airport, and even acknowledges that the whole ordeal from the first film nearly wrecked his Christmas. However, he later enjoys how he is far away from his family, and eventually has to learn all over again that being on his own, with his family nowhere to be found, isn't all fun and games like it seems to be at first. At the end, he is, just like in the first film, desperately wishing for a chance to be with his family again.
* TheAllegedCar: The car Harry lands on top of, which smashes into a million pieces as if Harry was a five-ton statue.
* TheAllegedHouse: Uncle Rob's townhouse is a dirty wreck, which is why it's being renovated. This works out in Kevin's favor since he's able to use the building's problems and construction supplies in his traps.
* AnswerCut: After Peter wonders whether Kevin would know enough to see if his brother Rob was in town since he had a home in New York City, and in the next scene, Kevin is indeed at his uncle's house. Also, In a later scene Marv wonders why anyone would soak a rope in kerosene. Cut to Kevin lighting a match.
* ApatheticCitizens: Hardly anyone reacts to Harry and Marv chasing Kevin through the streets during the day, or at night.
** The infamous Christmas pageant scene. Buzz humiliates Kevin, unbeknownst to Kevin, causing the entire audience (save for Kate, Peter and Aunt Leslie) to erupt in laughter. It could be arguable why they could be doing this, either they think Buzz is just doing something funny, or are personally demeaning Kevin, but either way, it seems pretty sadistic that this would occur in a school performance. Apparently, everyone was just too polite to violate the (ostensibly) formal atmosphere of the Christmas pageant.
* ArtifactTitle: While he ''is'' alone in this film, Kevin's not home, so the franchise's title doesn't quite apply.
* ArtisticLicenseGeography: The film has several instances of this, as detailed in [[http://flavorwire.com/491106/the-frustrating-geographical-inaccuracy-of-home-alone-2-lost-in-new-york this article]]:
** When Kevin arrives in New York, at [=LaGuardia=] Airport, he looks out the terminal's window and sees the Midtown Manhattan skyline for the first time. While the direction is accurate (facing west from [=LaGuardia=] across the East River to Manhattan), the film makes Manhattan appear to be much closer to [=LaGuardia=] than it actually is (in reality, the airport's Central Terminal is about 5 miles from Midtown as the crow flies).
** Shortly after Kevin arrives in New York City, the film presents a montage of his sightseeing adventures that attempts to cram in every interesting location in Manhattan. Kevin is seen taking a picture outside of Radio City Music Hall, which is in Midtown Manhattan, and then at the Empire Diner in Chelsea. Next, he is shopping in Chinatown (which is in Lower Manhattan), and then looking at the Statue of Liberty from Battery Park, which is all the way on the southernmost part of the island, and heading up to the World Trade Center's observation deck. Then, he visits Central Park (back near Midtown), and finally arrives at the Plaza Hotel. And Kevin somehow manages to do all of this ''in just a couple of hours.''
** Duncan's Toy Chest is a stand-in for the real life F.A.O. Schwarz toy store. While the exact location of Duncan's isn't specified, at the time of the film, F.A.O. Schwartz was located directly across the street from The Plaza hotel on 59th Street. [[JustifiedTrope Unless Kevin was doing some sightseeing]], he wouldn't need a limo to go there.
** The bandits chase Kevin from Duncan's (presumably on 59th Street, or somewhere nearby in Midtown) to his uncle's house on West 95th street on the Upper West Side. The distance between F.A.O. Schwartz and his uncle's address is about 2.5 miles in real life.
** Initially, and at the very end of the film, the Pigeon Lady is shown roaming around the southern end of Central Park (near West 59th Street), which is close to the Plaza Hotel and Carnegie Hall (on West 57th Street), where she is shown to live. However, at the climax of the film, when Kevin flees from from his uncle's house on West 95th Street, he runs inside the park and ends up at the Inscope Arch (which is in real life located on East 62nd Street, on the east side of the park and a few miles away from West 95th St), and the Pigeon Lady happens to be there to save him from Harry and Marv. After they are subdued, Kevin seemingly walks from West 95th Street down to the Christmas Tree at Rockefeller Center, a distance of almost 3 miles.
* ArtisticLicenseGunSafety: Prior to apprehending Harry and Marv, one of the cops fires his gun in the air to scare away the pigeons. A real cop (hopefully) wouldn't do this, that bullet is going to come down somewhere in the vicinity and would potentially be fatal.
* AshFace: After Harry soaks his burning head in a toilet full of paint thinner, the entire first floor of the house blows up, but luckily Harry survives with only a burn on his scalp and a damaged hat and ash on his face.
* AsideGlance:
** Upon finding out that he's in New York, he repeats this to the audience and then grins.
** Also, when the passenger next to him on the plane starts speaking French.
** Kevin's parents give one after finding out they overslept again.
* BannisterSlide: Kevin goes down the emergency exit stairs to the Plaza this way.
* BehindTheBlack: Marvin becomes very susceptible to this, missing both a ten-foot hole that should be illuminated from Christmas and street lights coming through the door and an equally large bright-green area of slippery goo, even though he can see a rope hanging across the room...
* BeQuietNudge: How Aunt Leslie tries, and fails, to stop Uncle Frank from laughing during the Christmas pageant.
* BigApplesauce: Of course.
* BigBadEnsemble: Mr. Hector poses a rather significant threat to Kevin, but it's Harry and Marv who serve as the primary villains.
* BigDamnHeroes: The pigeon lady has Marv and Harry let Kevin go just as they are about to kill him.
* BigNever: Marv, although in a context that just makes him look foolish.
-->'''Kevin''': You guys give up? Have you had enough pain?\\
'''Marv''': [[LargeHam Nevah!]]\\
'''Harry''': (shakes head at Marv)
* BigNo:
** Harry screams one while Kevin throws a rock through a window to trip the toy store alarm, and expose the Bandits.
** Kevin earlier in the movie when he realizes he's leaping right into Harry's hands, complete with a good shot at the burn from the doorknob.
* BigOMG: One of the police officers when he sees the pigeons attacking Harry and Marv to the point where he fires his gun to scare them off.
* BigShutUp: Harry keeps yelling at Marv to shut up when he keeps blabbing to the cops.
-->'''Marv:''' He made us hide out in the store so we could steal all the kids' charity money.\\
'''Harry:''' ''(elbows Marv)'' Shut up, Marv! We have the right to remain silent, you know!\\
'''Marv:''' He's a little cranky. We just broke out of prison a few days ago.\\
'''Harry:''' ''(elbows Marv again)'' SHUT UP, MARV! Geez!
* BigWhat: Peter upon finding out that Kevin's not with the family in Miami.
* BilingualBonus: The French tourist sitting next to Kevin on the flight to New York. His response to Kevin's question is "What's that? I'm from France and I'm a tourist here, it's my first time coming to America. Do you know a good restaurant? Or maybe your parents, they know a good place? Why aren't you responding? You speak a bit of French right? I don't speak English at all, give me a bit of help at least. My name is Andre, what's your name?"
* BitchSlap: Kate, already thoroughly pissed that Mr. Hector and his staff literally chased her 10-old son out onto the mean streets of New York, smacks Hector across the face when he attempts to [[HypocriticalHumor advise her]] against looking for Kevin alone on said streets.
* {{Bowdlerise}}:
** Channels like ABC Family and Creator/CartoonNetwork seem to love editing out certain parts of the final act.
** Marv getting hit on the head with four bricks, for example, was cut down to only one.
** The aforementioned {{Angrish}} Harry mutters whenever Kevin injures him.
* BrandX: Duncan's Toy Chest is very obviously meant to be [=FAO=] Schwarz, a real-life massive toy store in exactly the same location.
* BrickJoke:
** Kevin uses Peter's credit card to check into the Plaza Hotel, where he enjoys the room service. After Kevin escapes the concierge having called the credit card 'stolen', the movie continues on with Kevin befriending the pigeon lady and his family is given a complimentary suite once they arrive in New York. At the end of the film, Kevin gives the pigeon lady one of the turtle doves he got at Duncan's Toy Chest ([[ThePowerOfFriendship because friendship is valuable]]), Buzz gets something from the bellhop that is also high in price: Kevin's [[ShockinglyExpensiveBill room service bill]]. Kevin then hears Peter yell out "KEVIN!! YOU SPENT $967 ON ROOM SERVICE?!!!!!?"
** Right before the goons are set to invade the trap-infested house that Kevin has set up, Kevin throws several bricks down at the pair, with all of them hitting Marv. After the pair have made it through the gauntlet to the top of the house, with Kevin now on the sidewalk, Marv attempts to get revenge on him by tossing a brick at him.
** In the first movie, Kevin recounts to Marley how a friend of his got beaten up for wearing dinosaur pajamas. Guess what kind of pajamas Fuller is wearing during the finale?
** The gangster movie Kevin watches mentions Cliff as one of the men Johnny's girlfriend hangs out with. When Kevin uses the movie to scare the Plaza hotel staff, one of the security guards happens to be named Cliff. Even better, Kevin pauses the movie right after Johnny says his name so the staff can react.
* BumblingSidekick: Marv is this to Harry and Cedric the bellboy is this to Mr. Hector, the concierge.
* ButtMonkey: The sequel also has the hotel staff (though to a much lesser extent than Harry and Marv, obviously).
* CallBack:
** In the first film, Marv agrees with Harry's plan to attack at night saying "kids are scared of the dark." Here, it's "kids are scared of the Park." (Central Park, specifically.)
** The scene where Kevin records his Uncle Frank taking a shower was meant to be a call back to [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSfZQEkb0IU this creepy as fuck deleted scene from the first film]].
** In the first film, Marv points out that some of Harry's teeth got knocked out. In this one, he says, "Hey! You didn't lose any teeth."
** The paint cans on the stairs get a LampshadeHanging:
-->'''Harry:''' Wait a minute, wait a minute. Don't you remember what happened from last year?
-->'''Marv:''' ''({{beat}})'' No.
** Kevin's family are stuck in a motel room watching a Spanish dub of ''Film/ItsAWonderfulLife'', just like in the first film when they were stuck watching the French dub of the same movie.
** Near the end, Kevin slips on ice, allowing the bandits to catch him, and Harry says "how do you like the ice, kid?" This was probably a reference to Kevin's icy staircase trap in the first film.
* CaliforniaDoubling: While some of the film was shot on location in New York, the scenes with Duncan's Toy Chest were filmed in Chicago, and Kevin's uncle's house was set on the Universal Studios backlot in Los Angeles.
* TheCameo:
** UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump, the then-owner of the Plaza Hotel, appears in the second film as the man who directs Kevin to the lobby.[[note]][[http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/matt-damon-suburbicon-donald-trump-home-alone-2-cameo-hotels-films-george-clooney-charlottesville-a7925411.html According to]] Creator/MattDamon, this is because Trump always demands a cameo from anyone who wants to film in one of his buildings.[[/note]] Oddly enough, the directions he gives Kevin are incorrect.
** Chris Columbus himself makes an uncredited cameo holding his daughter Eleanor in the Toy Store.
** Creator/AllySheedy as the airport clerk who tells Kevin he's in New York.
* CarCushion: Kevin tricks Harry and Marv into getting onto a makeshift see-saw, launching Harry into the air and onto a car.
* CerebusSyndrome: The film is still pretty light in the first half, up until Harry and Marv finally discover Kevin is in New York with them and his credit card fraud is exposed, thus forcing Kevin to flee from the hotel and be on the run from his two old enemies. After that the DarkerAndEdgier aspects start becoming much more noticeable.
* CharacterDevelopment: Kevin in the first movie was a bit cool when his mother returned, having figured out that they went to Paris without him. When they reunite here, Kevin is the first to apologize, for everything. Kate's smile and apology in turn signals that she appreciates it, even though she's relieved Kevin isn't hurt and that he didn't need to say sorry. 
* ChekhovsBoomerang: Kevin watching a gangster movie again. This time, he uses it to scare off the hotel staff. It actually works!
* ChekhovsGag: It's established that Kevin's cousin Fuller is a notorious bed-wetter, and thus, no one wants to share a bed with him. Toward the end, Kevin and most of the other [=McCallisters=] (besides Kevin's parents, who have a separate room) are seen sleeping squashed together everywhere other than the bed. Guess who's got that huge bed all to himself (with Coke cans all over it, no less)?
* ChekhovsGun
** The inflatable Bozo the Clown. It’s given to Kevin at the start of the film as a gift from his grandmother, then he uses it in the hotel to fool the concierge that there’s someone in the shower.
** "Angels With Even Filthier Souls." Kevin watches it before the concierge shows up at his room, then he uses it to scare off the hotel staff before he flees.
** The fireworks Kevin buys in Chinatown. [[spoiler:He sets them off in Central Park at the end to alert to police as to where Harry and Marv are.]]
** The "Monster Soap" Kevin buys at the toy store. He uses it for two of the traps in Uncle Rob's house (smearing it on a ladder and dumping it on the basement floor).
** The birds in the park. [[spoiler: The bird lady sics them on Harry and Marv before the police show up to arrest them.]]
** Most (if not all) of the stuff Kevin records on his Talkboy ends up being used later.
** The conspicuously-shown Plaza Hotel commercial that Kevin watches. When he ends up in New York, he winds up getting a room there.
** The varnish which falls on the crooks and [[spoiler:causes birdseed to stick to them and jams Harry's gun, preventing him from shooting Kevin and the pigeon lady]].
** Uncle Rob's house. Early on, he notes that Uncle Rob lives in New York and decides to drop in, but the house is empty because it’s undergoing renovation. It’s where Kevin sets his traps later.
** Kevin's love of Christmas trees. [[spoiler:It's how Kate knows where to find him at the end.]]
** Peter's credit card, [[spoiler:which helped the Miami police to find Kevin when it was used.]]
* ChekhovsGunman
** The blonde woman that Marv keeps trying to flirt with. She later saves Kevin by punching out the bandits [[MisplacedRetribution when it was Kevin who actually touched her]].
** The pigeon lady. At first Kevin sees her as some "sick" creep, but she later saves him from the bandits' attempt on his life.
* ClothingDamage: After Harry soaks his burning head in a toilet filled with paint thinner, blowing up the first floor of the house, he winds up with a charred coat collar and most of his knit cap burned away.
* ComicallyMissingThePoint: Kevin takes a Polaroid of the crooks as they're robbing the toy store. Harry shouts [[NarratingTheObvious "He took our picture!"]], and Marv replies, "How's my hair look?"
* ContrastingSequelSetting: Whereas the first film was largely set in the Chicago suburbs, the sequel takes place in New York City.
* ContrivedCoincidence: Not only do Harry and Marv just so happen to be in New York at the same time as Kevin, they just so happen to run into him on the street, multiple times. And Kevin just so happens to befriend the owner of the very same toy store that Harry and Marv plan to rob.
* CrazyHomelessPeople: Kevin eventually befriends a bird lady that turns out to be not so scary after all.
* DarkerAndEdgier: Compared to the first movie, this one is much darker and more serious.
** Almost all of Kevin's traps are now deadly, and obviously so.
** Harry and Marv plan to rob a gigantic toy store instead of homes.
** This time, Harry has a gun and tries to use it on Kevin when they have him cornered in Central Park. Even before he does, he said doing so won't mean much to him.
** Not classically dark, but the fact that Harry and Marv plan to steal charity money rather than just robbing someone's house. Made worse when Kevin visits the children's hospital where the money is supposed to be donated, and he exchanges waves with a patient in a window.
** At one point Kevin ends up wandering the streets of New York alone at night, where he encounters some creepy adults, including two trashy women who mockingly offer to "read him a bedtime story", a homeless man who yells and laughs at him and a scary-looking cab driver. At least Kevin always had his warm and (relatively) safe house in the first movie.
** In the first movie, while Kevin was left [[TitleDrop home alone]], his family at least knew exactly where he was. Here, Kevin actually gets to the airport with his family. It's not until they're collect their baggage in Miami that they realise he's missing and, after the Miami police confirm he's not at O'Hare, they can only sit around and wait for them to find his location. No wonder Kate fainted this time.
* CreditCardPlot: Kevin uses Peter's credit card while on his own. In the end, it's revealed that he spent almost $1,000 on room service alone.
* DelayedReaction: Once the rest of the [=McCallister=] Family touched down at the Miami airport, Peter hands Kevin's bag down the line of relatives to pass on to Kevin. Once it's noticed Kevin isn't there, the bag is passed back up with the message "Kevin's not here." Then once Kate says it...
--> '''Kate:''' Kevin's not here.
--> '''Peter:''' ''({{Beat}})'' ... [[BigWhat What!?]]
--> '''Kate:''' Ah hahahahaha! ''({{Beat}})'' ... KEVIN!!! ''([[FaintInShock Faints]])''
* DelegationRelay: When the family arrives in Miami, Peter gives Kevin's bag to Kate...and it is relayed all the way down the chain of children, the camera panning and following it the whole time, (except for Buzz (the second time) and Uncle Frank) down to Fuller...[[OverlyLongGag who then relays the bag all the way back]] ''[[OverlyLongGag up]]'' [[OverlyLongGag the chain to inform them that Kevin's not here]].
* DemotedToExtra: The titular house is only featured in the first 10 minutes of the film, and then never seen again. It is the only film in the franchise where the house does not play a significant role.
* DescriptionCut: Kate tells the Miami police officer she doesn't think Kevin knows how to use a credit card, only for the scene to cut to him using Peter's credit card to check into the Plaza hotel. Later, upon discovering that Kevin indeed used a credit card at the Plaza Hotel in New York, Peter suggests that maybe Kevin would know to look for his Uncle Rob who has a place in the city, although Kate is hesitant because they're not only out of town, but the place is being renovated. Cue the next scene where Kevin finds the place, but sees it under renovation with no one home.
* DidntSeeThatComing: PlayedWith. Harry predicts that Kevin will reuse the paint can trap from the first movie, and he and Marv successfully dodge the attacks. They just don't count on Kevin upgrading the trap with a ''sewer pipe''.
--> '''Marv:''' [[OhCrap Oops.]]
* DiggingYourselfDeeper: Peter and Kate receive an icy glare from a security officer when they crack a joke about losing Kevin. Peter tries to explain what he meant, prompting Kate to grab him in an effort to get him to stop.
* DisasterDominoes: Kevin's shoving of Buzz in the second movie somehow causes an entire choir to collapse as they grab each other while falling. Everyone but Kevin goes down, including those right in front of him.
* DistinctionWithoutADifference: The black/white mafia movie that Kevin watches (and includes in the security system) has one of the criminals claim that they're convinced the other character is innocent... except the gun they have isn't convinced and opens fire on them.
--> "Alright, I believe ya. But my [[TriggerHappy Tommy Gun]] don't!"
* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: In a house full of children, Uncle Frank takes a shower without even shutting (let alone locking) the bathroom door and also implies to Kevin that he has a big penis. And in a creepy deleted scene from the first movie, he plays a prank on Kevin by pulling down his pants, leaving Kevin standing in his underwear. Probably best they left that one out.
* DoubleTake: UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump directs Kevin to the lobby, goes on about his business, and then pauses to stare after Kevin. Doubles as a FunnyBackgroundEvent.
* DramaticDrop: When Harry greets Kevin in front of Duncan's Toy Chest, Kevin drops his pocket knife and map of New York City.
* DramaticallyMissingThePoint: After Kevin escapes from Harry and Marv, he tells the concierge at the Plaza: "You've gotta help me! There's two guys after me!" The concierge takes it to mean that someone caught onto him using the stolen credit card and seizes the opportunity to hand him over to the authorities, not realizing Harry and Marv are after him.
* DudeNotFunny:
** Kevin says Uncle Frank told him not to go into the bathroom while he's taking a shower, because "he says if I walked in there and saw him naked, I'd grow up never feeling like a real man." Peter laughs at this, but his smile disappears when Kate glares at him.
** Kevin gets on the wrong plane and his parents find out while checking their baggage. They report to security where Peter jokes that at least they don't lose their luggage. Kate laughs but the head of security answers with a disapproving stare.
* DumbassHasAPoint: At the climax, Marv warns Harry that they should leave when he notices all the pigeons. He proves right when the pigeon lady appears.
* DutchAngle: A shot of Harry and Marv getting up from the street is shot this way.
* EvilLaugh: "Watch it, kid! [[EvilIsHammy Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!]]"
* ExplainExplainOhCrap: Kevin does [[InvertedTrope an opposite one.]]
--> "''(panicked)'' Oh no. My family's in Florida and I'm in New York. ''(calming down)'' My family's in Florida... and I'm in... New York." ''([[CallBack smiles cleverly and waggles his eyebrows]] as he starts getting cool vacation ideas)''
* FaintInShock: Kate faints at the airport when she realizes that her entire family has somehow neglected to bring Kevin along on their trip for a ''second time''.
* FamilyFriendlyFirearms: When Harry tries to shoot the pigeon lady, his gun jams due to the paint and varnish that fell on him after he let go of the burning rope. This was probably the filmmaker's way of reassuring the audience that Harry wouldn't have been able to shoot Kevin even if he tried.
* {{Flanderization}}: Harry is a lot meaner and grouchier, and Marv dumber and sillier. Justified for Harry as the two of them just spent nine months in prison due to Kevin's involvement. As for Marv... well, getting hit by an iron on top of being shot in the forehead with a BB rifle will do that to a person.
* ForWantOfANail: Kevin chooses to change the batteries to his Talkboy while on the way to the gate instead of waiting until he is seated on the plane. In doing so, he follows somebody else to the wrong gate.
* {{Foreshadowing}}: While Kate is handing out the plane tickets, Megan notes that none of them will be sitting together. So naturally, when they realise Kevin is missing, no one can say he was with them.
* FriendshipTrinket: Kevin gives the Pigeon Lady (whom he had befriended earlier on in the movie, and even saved him from Marv & Harry's clutches) another Turtle Dove Ornament. Said act is rumored that if one person gives a very special person another Turtle Dove, the 2 who have the turtle dove ornaments will always be friends.
* GaveUpTooSoon: Kevin's mother looking for him. If she had stayed outside of Uncle Rob's townhouse for about 5 seconds longer, who knows how Kate would have reacted seeing Kevin getting chased down by Marv and Harry.[[FridgeHorror Or she might have tripped one of Kevin's traps if she had investigated further into his townhouse.]]
* GeorgeWashingtonSleptHere: Cedric the bellboy tries to impress Kevin with the history of the hotel by telling him UsefulNotes/HerbertHoover once slept there. In fact, Kevin doesn't know who Herbert Hoover was and assumes from the name that he was the inventor of the vacuum cleaner but he still seems pretty impressed by that.
* GilliganCut: When learning that Kevin has all of Peter's credit cards, Kate expresses that she thinks Kevin doesn't know how to use a credit card. Camera cut to Kevin completing a transaction.
* GratuitousFrench: Marv attempts to flirt with the blonde woman when they bump into each other the first time by speaking to her in French. She smacks him.
* GratuitousSpanish: The family (''sans'' Kevin) watching ''Film/ItsAWonderfulLife'' ''en Español''. Justified as Florida has a considerable Spanish-speaking population.
* GroinAttack: One of the traps Marv encounters is a fake doorknob with a string attached to it and a staple gun. Marv first gets a staple to the butt, then to the groin, and finally one to the nose.
* HamToHamCombat: Harry and Marv during the brief scene where they try to trick Kevin into thinking they've been hit with paint cans (only for them to be hit with an iron pipe for real a moment later).
* HeartwarmingOrphan: One patient waves to Kevin from a window of the children's hospital and Kevin waves back, just before Kevin sets off to foil Harry and Marv's plan. This one's actually the impetus for Kevin going out and opposing this plan to start with, as this is when the pieces fall into place for Kevin and he realizes who Harry and Marv are actually going to be stealing from by robbing Duncan's Toy Chest (and it's not the owner Mr. Duncan). [[ThisIsUnforgivable "You can mess with a lot of things, but you can't mess with kids on Christmas."]]
* HereWeGoAgain: Like in the previous movie, Kevin is forced to spend Christmas going up against Marv and Harry.
-->'''Kevin:''' ''(takes out messaged brick)'' This is it. No turning back. Another Christmas in the trenches.
* HeroicBystander:
**  Kevin in the first movie was defending his house. Here, he decides to foil Harry and Marv's attempts at robbing Duncan's Toy Store, knowing that the money was going to charity. To seal the deal, he tosses at brick at the window, with a note apologizing to Mr. Duncan and saying if the store has no insurance and he makes it back to Chicago, then he'll pay for the damage. 
**  The pigeon lady pulls a BigDamnHeroes moment when she sees two strange men threatening Kevin at gun point. She shouts YouLeaveHimAlone, tells Kevin to run, and empties her whole bag of birdseed on them. Then she and Kevin split before the cops come.
* HomelessPigeonPerson: That homeless pigeon-caretaker woman that Kevin befriends in the second movie.
* HotelHellion: Kevin.
* HouseSquatting: Kevin briefly stays in his uncle Rob's townhouse, which is vacant as he's on vacation in Paris.
* HowManyFingers: Provides the page quote. After Kevin hits Marv with the first brick, Harry holds up two fingers and a thumb and asks Marv this.
-->'''Marv:''' Eeiiiiigggghhht?
* HypocriticalHumor: Mr. Hector attempts to advise Kate against looking for Kevin alone on the mean streets of New York, in spite of him and his staff having just chased the boy out onto those very streets. Kate righteously [[BitchSlap smacks]] him for his idiocy.
* IHaveJustOneThingToSay: Buzz at the end, who points out that if Kevin hadn't screwed up ''again'', they wouldn't have gotten to spend Christmas at the Plaza Hotel with tons of free gifts from Duncan's Toy Chest. He then decides that Kevin should open the first gift.
* InformedJudaism: "Merry Christmas, Harry." "Happy Hannukah, Marv."[[note]]Marv said this to himself.[[/note]] Marv also makes a reference to the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Promised_Land Promised Land.]] [[ItMakesSenseInContext considering that Daniel Stern is Jewish and ad-libbed a lot of Marv's lines and antics...]]
** That and the "right in the schnooz" comment.
* InspectorJavert: The hotel concierge seems a little over-eager to bust Kevin for allegedly committing credit card fraud. He should have just notified police or child social services and let them take care of the matter.
* InstantEmergencyResponse: Kevin calls 911 while being chased, and in only about four minutes, the police arrive at the scene to arrest Harry and Marv. That kind of response time in New York City? Doubtful, although it's always possible that some cop cars just happened to be in the area when it was radioed in. Helped by the fact he made a point to tell the dispatcher that the call was about the guys who robbed Duncan's Toy Chest -- there were certainly cops out already investigating the burglar alarm, so when Kevin called in a tip on their exact location, a sign of how to find them ("watch for fireworks"), and warned they were armed with a gun, it makes sense the police would respond as soon as possible.
* InsultBackfire:
-->'''Kate:''' What kind of idiots do you have working here?
-->'''Mrs. Stone:''' The finest in New York.
** And this one.
-->'''Kevin:''' You guys give up? Have you had enough pain?
-->'''Marv:''' (triumphantly) NEVER!
* IronButtMonkey: Harry and Marv really shouldn't have survived most of the stuff that happened to them. Fortunately, the physical unlikelihood of a ten-year-old kid lifting a 70-pound pipe section probably prevented a number of children across the nation from killing their older siblings with pranks.
* {{Irony}}: Kevin's family wanted to spend Christmas in Florida to enjoy gorgeous weather, only to arrive in the middle of a bleak tropical rainstorm worse than whatever kind of weather they would've had in Chicago.
* ItOnlyWorksOnce: Harry and Marv tried to invoke this when they remembered Kevin smacking them in the face with paint cans in the first movie, only for Kevin to up the trick with a heavy iron pipe...[[GroinAttack which he then dropped on their privates]].
* JustBetweenYouAndMe: Marv blabs to Kevin their plan to rob the toy store, justifying it by saying they're going to kill him soon anyway. Later when he and Harry are caught, [[IdiotBall he blabs about the plan to the cops who caught them]].
* KarmaHoudiniWarranty: In the first movie, Uncle Frank stops Kevin from explaining why he went after Buzz by yelling "Look what you did, you little jerk!" No one calls Frank out on it, and Kevin is sent to the third floor. Kevin finally gets back at Frank in this movie by calling him a cheapskate, all but proving that Frank is using his parents just so he can score a free trip to Florida. As an added burn, the vacation's a total disaster thanks to the nasty weather.
* KarmicJackpot: Kevin thinks he's been terrible over Christmas and decides to stop the Duncan's Toy Store bank robbery both to do a good deed and protect the kids in the hospital. He even leaves a note to apologize to Mr. Duncan for breaking the window, so as to trip the burglar alarms. Mr. Duncan eyes the paper, noting that it's Plaza stationary, and he's grateful to Kevin for saving the donation money. So he sends enough presents to fill several bedrooms to the Plaza, to the suite where the family with the surname [=McCallister=] will be staying. Kevin wasn't expecting any presents, let alone one as a reward for doing good.
* KingIncognito: Mr. Duncan, the owner of Duncan's Toy Chest, poses as an ordinary employee while talking to Kevin, who doesn't wise up until he sees a portrait of Duncan.
* LampshadeHanging: The cast loves to remind the audience just how much of what happened in the first movie is happening again.
* LargeHam: Mr. Hector. No surprise, as he is played by Creator/TimCurry.
** '''"HARRY, I'VE REACHED THE TOP!"'''
* LaserGuidedKarma: Kevin's negative feelings about the family vacation in Florida get vindicated ''and'' serves as their karma when everyone (sans Kevin) discover the weather's completely miserable and they're forced to stay in their hotel watching a TV that only gets Spanish-language channels. Considering how obnoxious and unsympathetic Kevin's siblings and extended relatives tend to act towards him, it's hard to feel bad for their trip being a total bust.
* LastSecondWordSwap: "All right, enough with this gooey sh...ow of emotion."
* LittleNo: Harry gives a particularly sad one when he sees a big pipe is about to fall on him.
* LooseLips: Marv does this.
--> '''Marv''': (to Kevin) At midnight tonight, we're hitting Duncan's Toy Chest, five floors of cash. Then after that we get a couple of phony passports then it's off to Rio...
--> '''Harry''': Marv! ''Marv''! You want to shut up?
** Another example, at the end of the film:
--> '''Marv''': (to the cops who are arresting them) He made us hide out in the store so we could steal all the kiddies' charity money.
--> '''Harry''': (kicks Marv) Shut up, Marv! You got the right to remain silent, you know.
--> '''Marv''': He's a little cranky. We just broke out of prison a few days ago.
--> '''Harry''': (kicks him again) ''SHUT UP, MARV''! Jeez!
* MamaBear:
** The pigeon lady. When Marv and Harry are preparing to shoot Kevin in Central Park, she approaches them with a bucket of pigeon feed and throws it on them, which causes the nearby pigeons to fly at them and pick at the feed stuck to their bodies.
** Kate. In her words, she's so mad about the hotel letting her son leave, she ''will'' hit the mean streets of New York to look for him because, "Right now, no mugger or murderer would ''dare'' mess with me!"
* MatchCut: When Kevin is watching ''WesternAnimation/HowTheGrinchStoleChristmas'' and it gets to the part where the Grinch makes his famous smile, the scene fades to Mr. Hector making a similar smile after catching Kevin using a stolen credit card.
* MickeyMousing: The orchestra plays three stings when Kevin dials each of the numbers in 911.
* MissedHimByThatMuch: Kate knocks on the door to the building where Kevin has set up his traps. Nobody answers, so she hails a cab and exits the scene. Only a few seconds later, Kevin runs up to the building. Then again, Kate couldld have easily set off the booby traps and gotten injured.
* MistakenFromBehind: Kevin loses track of his father in the airport and follows someone wearing the same coat, which is how he winds up on the plane to New York.
* MisunderstoodLonerWithAHeartOfGold: The pigeon lady.
* MoodWhiplash:
** The moment where Kevin is walking the streets of New York on Christmas Eve, stopping by the children's hospital. It's a heart-rending TearJerker as he and a young patient wave to each other while "Christmas Star" plays in the background--and then Kevin remembers that [[GoldfishPoopGang Harry and Marv]] are planning to rob the money that is to be donated to the hospital. Cue "Setting the Traps" as Kevin [[LockAndLoadMontage prepares for battle]].
---> '''Kevin:''' [[LetsGetDangerous You can mess with a lot of things, but you can't mess with kids on Christmas.]]
** The ending. Kevin shares one of the turtle doves with the pigeon lady, and the two hug. Cut back to the Plaza Hotel, where Buzz gets the hotel bill that Kevin racked up. Cut back to the park, where Kevin's dad is heard yelling from the hotel: "KEVIN! YOU SPENT $967 ON ROOM SERVICE?!"
* MundaneUtility:
** Kevin uses fireworks as emergency flares.
** He uses the variable-speed playback on his Talkboy tape recorder to fool the hotel staff into thinking they're talking with Peter so he can reserve a room. The recorder was originally built only as a non-working prop, but enough kids wrote in asking about it that Tiger Electronics eventually started to produce it.
* NeverRecycleYourSchemes: Except for the paint cans (which lure Harry and Marv into a false sense of security before Kevin throws in a painful twist at the end), Kevin doesn't reuse any of the traps he set in the first movie -- many are similar, but not the same (ex. a blowtorch set off by a light switch instead of opening a door). This is why Harry's attempts to avoid setting off traps don't work.
* NiceJobFixingItVillain: Marv blabs his and Harry's entire plan of robbing the toy store (escape plan included) to Kevin. When the latter breaks free from them in the park, he forgets about the two thugs until he visits the hospital where the money is supposed to be donated. If Marv had stayed quiet, Kevin would've spent the rest of the night wandering the streets of New York (and would've likely fallen prey to the more unsavory characters), or gone to Rob's place and broken in to spend the night there. Either way, he wouldn't have bothered antagonizing the thugs any further which probably would've let them get away with robbing the toy store.
* NonFatalExplosions: Kevin lights Harry's head on fire, Harry puts it out in the toilet, not knowing it is filled with paint thinner (which looks like water at first glance), and blows the entire first floor up. Luckily, Harry only has second-degree burns on his scalp ([[AshFace as well as soot on his face and teeth]] and a damaged hat) to worry about.
* NoOneShouldSurviveThat: Oh so many, the most egregious instances being Harry surviving an explosion after sticking his burning head in a paint thinner-filled toilet, Marv getting electrocuted by an arc welder connected to a sink, and Marv getting hit with four bricks ''dropped from a four story height.'' Likewise, the pigeons should have picked them both clean of skin.
* OhCrap:
** Kevin's mom has one after realizing Kevin is missing once again.
** Kevin himself when Harry and Marv spot him and decide to say hello.
---> '''Harry:''' ''(approaches Kevin from behind)'' Hiya, pal!\\
'''Kevin:''' ''(gasps and drops his map)''
* OhNoNotAgain:
** This movie hangs lampshade after lampshade about something from the previous film happening ''again''. The family wakes up late ''again'', Kevin gets inadvertently separated from his family ''again'', he faces off against Harry and Marv ''again'', and so forth.
--->'''Peter and Kate:''' WE DID IT AGAIN! AAH!\\
'''Kevin:''' Yikes, I did it again!
** Harry has clearly learned to anticipate some of Kevin's traps from the previous movie, such as a blowtorch to the head. He's actually on guard for this one...but when his guard slips and he looks in a mirror and sees his head on fire, he shouts "AHH! AHH! HE DID IT!"
* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: Peter is normally the laid-back parent who tries to keep Kate calm and did so last year when Kevin went missing. He goes full PapaWolf at the concierge and the staff for endangering his son over a "fraudulent" credit card, telling them off for their ego trip. Last time he was that angry, Kevin had messed up his fishing ornaments.  
* OutOfTheFryingPan: Kevin escapes the Plaza Hotel staff pursuing him for credit card fraud, only to run straight into Harry and Marv.
* PoliceAreUseless: ''Heavily'' averted in this movie. Unlike the ones in the first movie, who showed indifference when Kate explained to them her situation and made little effort to resolve the matter, the police officer whom Peter and Kate meet within Florida is a completely different story. Not only is he highly sympathetic to them about their plight, but when he learns that Kevin has Peter's bag containing his wallet, he comes up with the idea of notifying the credit card companies so that they can get a location on Kevin when he uses them and notifies the family immediately upon discovering that he is in New York. A cop in New York at first doesn't want to help, but he goes ReasonableAuthorityFigure when Kate points out he understands as a parent and drives her to the Rockefeller center.
* PredatoryProstitute: Kevin encounters some frightening New Yorkers while wandering the streets at night, including a pair of streetwalkers who make fun of him and laugh like crones.
* PreMortemOneLiner: "I never made it to the sixth grade, kid, and it doesn't look like you're gonna either." [[spoiler:Except he doesn't get to actually kill Kevin, although he does come perilously close]] (see also: WouldHurtAChild and OhCrap).
* ReCut: A few scenes were removed for some television broadcasts. The most prominent was the scene where Kevin goes to the top of the World Trade Center, [[UsefulNotes/TheWarOnTerror which was taken out for obvious reasons.]] Also, some of Kevin's tricks (the three extra bricks hitting Marv, the staple gun door handle, and the tool chest on the stairs) were removed, presumably for time.
* RecycledINSPACE: ''Home Alone 2'' was basically ''exactly'' the same movie as ''Home Alone'', just set in New York. Even the scary neighbor got a direct counterpart. This was even {{lampshade| hanging}}d by Harry, who mentioned that Kevin threw two paint cans the last time they tried to climb up a flight of stairs, and saw it coming. Unfortunately for them, the second time around, a sewer pipe followed immediately afterward. There are also several lampshades hung by way of OhNoNotAgain.
* RedStapler: Kevin's Talkboy tape recorder; it was originally a non-working prop made for the movie, but Tiger Electronics made a real version which hit store shelves on Black Friday the same year the movie was released.
* RefugeInAudacity: What Kevin first uses to get into the hotel.
-->'''Mrs. Stone:''' Can I help you?
-->'''Kevin:''' A reservation for [=McCallister=]?
-->'''Mrs. Stone:''' A reservation for yourself?
-->'''Kevin:''' Ma'am, my feet are hardly touching the ground. I'm barely able to look over the counter. How can I make a reservation for a hotel room? Think about it. A kid coming into a hotel, making a reservation? I don't think so.
** Counts also as SuspiciouslySpecificDenial.
* RevengeBeforeReason: Harry and Marv have successfully walked out of prison and given that they're burglars and not mass murderers or anything like that, probably no one would give them a second look if they saw them on the street if their ability to move freely in a New York crowd is any indication. Their plans to stay free and rob a ton of money promptly go to hell once they see Kevin and decide to pay him back for the punishment he put them through in the previous film.
** In Central Park, Marv warns that they should leave when he notices pigeons mysteriously eyeing them, but Harry is too busy taunting Kevin and trying to savor shooting him to listen.
* SamePlotSequel: The film is basically the first ''Film/HomeAlone'' again, beat for beat. Complete with traps, MisunderstoodLonerWithAHeartOfGold, Kevin playing pranks with an old gangster movie, and so on.
* SarcasticConfession: Uncle Frank slips twice that he's using his brother and sister-in-law to score a free trip to Florida. The first time, it's aimed at Kevin after he refuses to accept Buzz's apology. The second time, he tells Kate this while saying she gives the worst wake-up calls. Of course, Kevin is the only one who calls him out on it.
* SelfParody: Has shades of this with several scenes being very similar (if a bit exaggerated) to the previous film with several characters lampshading it.
* ShesGotLegs: Mrs. Stone and the blonde woman Marv tried to flirt with.
* ShoutOut: Mr. Hector breaks into a SlasherSmile that matches [[WesternAnimation/HowTheGrinchStoleChristmas the Grinch's]]. Kevin also watches that movie in both films.
* ShutUpHannibal: When Uncle Frank tells Kevin not to ruin the trip because his father's paying a lot of money for it:
--> '''Kevin''': Oh, wouldn't want to spoil your fun, Mr. Cheapskate.
* SingingInTheShower: Kevin records Uncle Frank doing this, [[ChekhovsGun which comes in handy later]]...
* SmallRoleBigImpact: The man whose coat is identical to Peter's. If not for his presence at the airport, Kevin wouldn't have boarded a plane to New York.
* SoapOperaRapidAgingSyndrome: ''Home Alone 2'' takes place a year after the events of the first film, and naturally we'd expect the returning characters to look more-or-less the same. Yet Kevin has slightly deeper voice, Buzz is noticeably taller, skinnier, and has a ''really'' deep manly voice, and Kate is sporting wrinkles around her eyes, things that don't just spontaneously happen within year. In RealLife, it's because the film was made in 1992, two years after the making of the first film.
** This trope may not count, as Kevin says in the first movie that he's 8 years old, but says that he's 10 in the second - so it's actually been two years in the movie's time as well as in real life.
* SoLastSeason: Exploited by Kevin in the film's climax. He uses the paint can trick from the first film to lull Harry and Marv into a false sense of security when going up the stairs. After he uses the paint cans, he tosses a steel pipe at them when they're off guard. Also, instead of setting up a blowtorch to be activated by opening a door, he uses a light switch. Harry gets torched again specifically because he was expecting a door to activate it.
* SoundtrackDissonance: In the second film, Andy Williams's "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" plays when the family (sans Kevin) arrives at their hotel in Florida, where it's pouring rain and the hotel is looking rundown.
--> '''Uncle Frank''': It didn't look this bad on our honeymoon...
* StupidCrooks: Subverted. The reason Harry and Marv plot to rob Duncan's Toy Chest looks odd, but really isn't.. They need cash, but since they just broke out of prison they don't have the resources to rob high security places like jewelry stores. Harry then shoots down Marv's suggestion to rob hotel rooms as they have no way of knowing what the guests are keeping there. Duncan's makes the most sense for them to rob as it sees a high volume of sales on Christmas Eve and won't be able to deposit the cash due to shortened bank hours for the holiday.
* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome:
** Given that Kevin ''did'' mess up Buzz's room in the first movie (and didn't clean it up before everyone got home), it's little wonder their rocky relationship is back to square one.
**  The concierge suspects Kevin of having stolen a credit card from his father, and confirms it by entering the number into his register. He calls the cops and confiscates the card from Kevin, who is asking for help and saying two men are chasing him. As a result, Kevin runs into the streets with only some cash, cookies and his backpack. This essentially means he endangered a minor over a power play. Kate and Peter, freshly arrived in New York, go YouHaveGotToBeKiddingMe when the concierge is forced to fess up and trying to cover up by offering them the best suite. As Peter angrily puts it, they scared a minor with no money on one of the coldest nights of the year, in one of the largest and busiest cities. That's not just irresponsible, it's ''stupid''.
** This is also mentioned by Peter and the concierge; even if Kate has her wits and money at hand, it's unlikely she'll find Kevin just by wandering around on one of the coldest nights in New York. Kate retorts that she has to ''try'' because she's Kevin's mother, and no one else would look out for him. She does at least have the sense to go to Uncle Rob's place first to see if Kevin went there and leaves when she realizes the area is vacant. (This is fortunate for her since Kevin booby-trapped the whole area and she could have easily fallen prey to the traps.) Sure enough, it takes a EurekaMoment and a hunch for her to go to the Rockefeller Center, where Kevin is praying to see his mom again.  
** "Good thing I have my own ticket, in case you guys try to ditch me". Of course, Kevin would be (if slightly) bitter about what happened last year, compounded with what happened the night before.
** Kevin's AesopAmnesia makes a lot more sense given the rest of the family's AesopAmnesia. If his parents, older siblings, and extended family are still treating him like a burden even after everything that went on last Christmas than it's only natural Kevin would get angry and want to be away from them. You can't expect Kevin to keep forgiving his family that quickly if they're still acting like assholes, especially Buzz and Uncle Frank.
* TapOnTheHead: Marv is clearly concussed by all those bricks Kevin throws at his head, but he completely recovers in less than five minutes.
* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech: Kate gives one to the hotel staff for actually believing Kevin's obviously fabricated story and for basically terrorizing him when they thought he had stolen the credit card.
* TheTapeKnewYouWouldSayThat: In an interesting take on the trope, we see both the setup and the payoff in that order. We first see Kevin recording his end of the conversation into the Talkboy. Then he plays it [[{{Overcrank}} at a slower speed]] for the person taking the hotel reservation, and it ''works''.
* TelevisionGeography: Kevin calls a Limo from The Plaza to be taken to a toy store, which drops him off at Duncan's Toy Chest, a BrandX stand-in for FAO Schwarz (it was even filmed inside). At the time the film is set, the ''real'' FAO Schwarz was right across the street from The Plaza[[note]]The location closed in 2015 and the store is now located in Rockefeller Center.[[/note]] and would be clearly visible from where Kevin got into the car.
* TemptingFate: "You want to throw bricks? Go ahead; throw another one!" and "You got any ''more''?!" Both of which result in more bricks thrown at Harry and Marv. Harry becomes a bit of a KarmaHoudini in this instance in that while he is the one taunting Kevin, both of the subsequent brick throws hit Marv instead.
** Marv says that at least this time, Kevin doesn't have a house of dangerous goodies to get them with. Turns out he does in fact have access to one, and the "goodies" are far more dangerous than before.
* TheFreelanceShameSquad: When Buzz starts using his electric candle to mock Kevin during the school Christmas Pageant, the entire audience (except Kevin's parents and Aunt Leslie) think the equivalent of giving Kevin "bunny ears" is ''hilarious'' and start laughing at Kevin.
* ThirdPersonPerson: When Kevin talks to Mr. Duncan about Mr. Duncan, not realising he is talking ''to'' Mr. Duncan, Mr. Duncan plays along and talks about Mr. Duncan as if he's a seperate person.
* ThisIsGonnaSuck: The family's (sans Kevin) look on their faces to see the hotel they are staying at in Miami apart from Frank who implied to pick the hotel due to staying there for his honeymoon.
* ThisIsUnforgivable: Kevin's realization that Harry and Marv are planning to rob a toy store that intends to donate its proceeds to a children's hospital on Christmas Day.
-->'''Kevin:''' ''You can mess with a lot of things, but you can't mess with kids on Christmas.''
* TooDumbToLive:
** Marv opens a door and ''does not look at the ground'' before taking a step....[[FailedASpotCheck that leads to him falling through a huge gaping hole that nobody with half a brain cell could possibly miss]]. Justified, Marv had multiple bricks thrown at his head a few moments before opening the door and falling, and likely wasn't thinking straight.
** The hotel staff, who decide to chase a ''kid'' out of their hotel and ''into the streets of New York, alone'', instead of asking him where he got the credit card and just keeping him until a relative could come and get him. Kate and Peter are understandably upset when they find out, and the former actually ''slaps'' the concierge for being an idiot.
-->'''Kate:''' What kind of IDIOTS do you have working here?
-->'''Mrs. Stone:''' [[InsultBackfire The finest in New York.]]
* TripTrap: Kevin makes one of the invaders trip over a rope taut across the upper corridor.
* TwoFacedAside: Buzz apologizes (insincerely) to the family, then whispers "Beat that, you little trout-sniffer" to Kevin before he tries to do the same... leading to the rant that gets Kevin into trouble in that movie.
* VillainBall: Harry and Marv start carrying it the moment they encounter Kevin in front of the toy store. They likely would have gotten away with the heist had they not gotten him involved.
* VillainsOutShopping: Marv wanting to go to the Central Park Zoo, while waiting to kill time before the robbery of the toy store. And earlier, before he and Harry discuss their plan to rob the toy store, Marv is ice skating in the park.
* VillainyFreeVillain: The hotel staff, especially Mr. Hector. He clearly knows Kevin's story about his father being in New York on business is fabricated. And, when the hotel staff confronts Kevin about the credit card, it was because Kevin had committed credit card fraud by using his father's card without permission. But Mr. Hector is such a smug jerk about finding out all of this that the sympathy still rests with Kevin. His reaction to finding out an unescorted minor has been committing fraud to stay at the hotel is essential to chase said minor out onto the streets rather than calling any kind of social services or police. He told Kevin that he was going to call the police, prompting Kevin to run. He probably did, given that Kevin's family knew where he was staying later on. Though by that point he probably phoned the NYPD because (thanks to Kevin playing the ''Angels With Even Filthier Souls'' video with the volume turned all the way up) he thought an armed maniac was living in that room. Thinking the maniac was of higher priority, he allowed Kevin to escape by running onto the streets.
* TheVoiceless: The woman Marv flirted, except for the "hmph!".
* WeAreNotGoingThroughThatAgain: Discussed after Kevin is sent to the third floor for refusing Buzz's apology. Kate tries to warn Kevin about him getting in trouble the year before which led to their travel plans getting jeopardized. Kevin is still upset about Buzz getting preferential treatment and outright tells her that he doesn't care if they spend this Christmas apart as well. Kate even gives him more chances to apologize or at least think about what he's saying, but she stops when Kevin shows no signs of budging. This is ultimately subverted when Kevin makes it to the airport with his family but gets on the wrong plane.
* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: We never do find out what happens to Uncle Rob's house. I mean, when the construction workers get back to remodeling the house once Christmas and New Year's are over, I think they're going to notice that there are bricks (likely with blood marks due to hitting Marv's head as well) all over the sidewalk, a doorknob that's pulled out of the door, a big gaping hole in the entryway, varnish all over the side of the house, paint and silly soap all over the basement floor, a broken ladder, etc.
* WhyDontYouJustShootHim: Harry catches on to this, but fortunately [[BigDamnHeroes he never gets a chance to]].
* WritersCannotDoMath: Takes place a year after the first movie, yet at one point Kevin says that he's ten years old rather than nine.
* XRaySparks: In a rare live-action version, Marv uses a sink to wash off the paint Kevin spilled on him... except Kevin hooked up the taps to an electric arc welder. While shaking and screaming in agony, Marv actually becomes ''a skeleton puppet''. When Kevin cuts the juice, Marv is back and collapses on the ground, shaking and smoking.
[[/folder]]

[[index]]
* ''Film/HomeAlone1''
* ''Film/HomeAlone2LostInNewYork''
* ''Film/HomeAlone3''
* ''Film/HomeAlone4TakingBackTheHouse''
* ''Film/HomeAloneTheHolidayHeist''
* ''Film/HomeSweetHomeAlone''
[[/index]]