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* CanadaDoesNotExist: Averted. To the untrained eye there is nothing distinctively Canadian about the locations, and Nicki Brand is played by the openly American Debbie Harry, but
** Nicki Brand's radio show is stated to come from Toronto.
** The final scene takes place on a boat bearing a sign saying [[AC: Condemned By The Toronto Harbour Authority]].
** Nicki Brand's radio show is stated to come from Toronto.
** The final scene takes place on a boat bearing a sign saying [[AC: Condemned By The Toronto Harbour Authority]].
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* InterplayOfSexAndViolence: This film is rife with it. In fact, it could even be seen as the main theme of this film.
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* BrainwashedAndCrazy: [[spoiler:Max eventually becomes compelled by the Videodrome tapes to murder his partners at Civic TV in cold blood. When he goes after Bianca O'Blivion, she reprograms him to kill her enemies (the people who programmed Max to become an assassin in the first place) for her.]]
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* BedmateReveal: Played for horror. When Max wakes up in his bed late in the film after an extended Videodrome hallucination, he finds someone laying next to him. When he removes the sheets it turns out to be the corpse of an associate of his, tied up and tortured to death. He calls up a friend to come over and look, [[spoiler:but it turns out he was again hallucinating and his bed is empty.]]
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* HemoErotic: When Max learns that Nicki is a masochist, she asks if he wants to try out something. He pierces her ear with a needle, and licks off the blood.
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!!This film provides examples of:
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* MrViceGuy: While Max is mostly a good person, he is quite a sleazy guy, whose vices are mostly associated with lust.
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* [[NamesToRunAwayFrom/{{Nouns}} Names To Run Away From: Nouns]]: Brian O'Blivion and his daughter Bianca O'Blivion. While their alligment is very hard to make out due to the unreality of the movie [[spoiler:and Brian is a resonant phantom living in the television world]], they are engaging in a counter war against the brain-destroying, people-corrupting Videodrome syndicate by reprogramming the "video word made flesh" (an outside innocent, sleazy TV executive Max Renn) for their own sinister purposes.
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* SpiritualSequel - ''[[{{existenz}} eXistenZ]]''. This is made particularly clear because it starts with a scene that looks very like the climax to this movie.
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* SpiritualSequel - ''[[{{existenz}} ''[[Film/{{EXistenZ}} eXistenZ]]''. This is made particularly clear because it starts with a scene that looks very like the climax to this movie.
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Moved to the Trivia tab.
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* OldShame - One of the Japanese porn dealers is played by David Tsubouchi. Just over a decade later, he'd be elected as a Member of Provincial Parliament in Ontario, where he was appointed Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations. This made him responsible for the [[MediaWatchdog Ontario Film Review Board]], the agency which assigns film ratings in the province. Cronenberg butted heads with the OFRB and other Canadian review boards many times in the late '70s and early '80s and accused them of censorship.
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* OrganicTechnology
to:
* OrganicTechnologyOrganicTechnology: The television sets start to breathe and pulsate, the video cassettes are eventually made out of living flesh, and Max's hand morphs together with his gun.
* PhallicWeapon: When Max grows a cancerous vagina on his abdomen, he uses his gun to have sex with it.
* PhallicWeapon: When Max grows a cancerous vagina on his abdomen, he uses his gun to have sex with it.
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* ShowWithinAShow
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* ShowWithinAShow ShowWithinAShow: ''Videodrome'', which is ostensibly a SnuffFilm, but later turns out to be a sinister movement.
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* VisualPun: Max's ''handgun'' becomes overtly literal later on. There's also a literal handgrenade at one point.
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* TheMole: [[spoiler: Harlan]] is revealed to have been a plant sent in by Barry Convex [[spoiler: in order to expose Max to Videodrome]]
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* AffectionateParody / NoCelebritiesWereHarmed - Brian O'Blivion is a parody of Marshall [=McLuhan=], whose ideas are the central theme of the movie. He only exists in video tapes, parodying [=McLuhan's=] famous proclamation: "I refuse to appear on television, except on television."
to:
* AffectionateParody / NoCelebritiesWereHarmed - Brian O'Blivion is a parody of Marshall [=McLuhan=], whose ideas are the central theme of the movie. He only exists in video tapes, parodying [=McLuhan's=] famous proclamation: "I refuse to appear on television, except on television."television," a line O'Blivion quotes verbatim in his first appearance
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* TwentyThree: The first scene is Max's secretary telling him his schedule for the day, Wednesday the twenty-third. On video tape.
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* NothingIsScarier - The orange letters of the title card of the titular TV Show, with nothing but [[HellIsThatNoise the buzz of your cathode ray-tube]] to accompany it.
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!!''Videodrome'' provides examples of:
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A DavidCronenberg film. A surreal movie, one of the poster children for BodyHorror. Like all of Cronenberg's movies, it has a strong intellectual undercurrent. The film deals with Marshall [=McLuhan's=] philosophies and examines the relationship between television and its audience. Cronenberg was greatly influenced by [=McLuhan's=] theories.
to:
It is a surreal movie, one of the poster children for BodyHorror. Like all of Cronenberg's movies, it has a strong intellectual undercurrent. The film deals with Marshall [=McLuhan's=] philosophies and examines the relationship between television and its audience. Cronenberg was greatly influenced by [=McLuhan's=] theories.
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* HeadTiltinglyKinky: Nicki gets off on mutilating and piercing herself, as well as watching TorturePorn.
-->'''Nicki:''' What's this? "Videodrome"?
-->'''Max:''' Torture. Murder.
-->'''Nicki:''' Sounds great.
-->'''Max:''' Ain't exactly sex.
-->'''Nicki:''' Says who?
-->'''Nicki:''' What's this? "Videodrome"?
-->'''Max:''' Torture. Murder.
-->'''Nicki:''' Sounds great.
-->'''Max:''' Ain't exactly sex.
-->'''Nicki:''' Says who?
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* GreyAndGreyMorality: There's never any clear evidence that Bianca O'Blivion is better than Barry Convex. At the very least, she's willing to use Max just as Barry is.
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* MoreThanMindControl: The opposing factions use Max by "programming" him with VHS cassettes.
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* PlaceWorseThanDeath: Pittsburgh is treated this way throughout the film. It is where the videodrome signal comes from, and "See you in Pittsburgh" is later used in lieu of the regular "SeeYouInHell".
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!!''{{Videodrome}}'' provides examples of:
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* ScienceIsBad / NewMediaAreEvil - The seeming surface moral is that modern information technology is ''eeevill''. But, later it turns out: [[spoiler:not so much]].
to:
* ScienceIsBad / NewMediaAreEvil - The seeming surface moral is that modern information technology is ''eeevill''. But, later it turns out: [[spoiler:not [[spoiler:[[AvertedTrope not so much]].much]]]].
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* ActorAllusion: Reiner Schwartz's character is named Moses, a reference to City TV founder Moses Znaimer.
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* ExploitationFilm - Civic TV's stock in trade ins exploitation ''TV''.
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* ExploitationFilm - Civic TV's stock in trade ins is exploitation ''TV''.
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More specifically, the film follows the CEO of a small cable station who stumble upon a broadcast signal that is broadcasting extremely violent and horrific things. He investigates. As you might expect from Cronenberg, [[ItGotWorse things get worse]]...
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More specifically, the film follows the CEO of a small cable station who stumble upon a broadcast signal that is broadcasting extremely violent and horrific things. He investigates. As you might expect from Cronenberg, [[ItGotWorse things get worse]]...worse...
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* ChekhovsGun - Max Renn loses his gun in an early hallucination inside the cavernous tumor in his stomach. [[BodyHorror Guess where he gets his gun from before the climax.]]
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* PunnyName - Brian O'Blivion? Barry Convex? Is this a comedy? [[spoiler:No.]] Possibly a ShoutOut to ThomasPynchon. {{Justified}} in the first instance because Brian O'Blivion has explicitly renamed himself.
to:
* PunnyName - Brian O'Blivion? Barry Convex? Is this a comedy? [[spoiler:No.]] Possibly a ShoutOut to ThomasPynchon. {{Justified}} {{Justified|Trope}} in the first instance because Brian O'Blivion has explicitly renamed himself.
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This reads like a Shoehorned Example.
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* GoodPeopleHaveGoodSex - Sort of averted. No one has "good" sex, but then again few of them are "good".
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Unfitting tropes.
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* ArcWords - "Long live the New Flesh!"
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* CanadaEh - Like many of Cronenberg's films, it's set in his hometown of Toronto.
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* EvenEvilHasStandards - The politely corrupt Masha refuses to deal with Videodrome as soon as she finds out how bad it is on the surface. If she knew how bad it was beneath that...
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* GainaxEnding
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* MrsRobinson - Masha likes younger guys. As in, barely legal.
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* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness - The film is shown from the perspective of the protagonist, Max Renn, who has certainly gone batty at some point. Everything up to the first Brian O'Blivion tape he watches can be assumed to be real as he's still only slightly affected by the signal. But when Bianca tells him that his life could become "100% video hallucination", suddenly it looks more and more likely that the bizarre plot twists ([[spoiler:i.e. an evil conspiracy operating out of an opticians', his best friend being part of said conspiracy, murdering people with flesh/metal hybrid weaponry]]) is all part of a massive psychotic break triggered by the Videodrome signal. Maybe.
to:
* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness - The film is shown from the perspective of the protagonist, Max Renn, who has certainly gone batty at some point. Everything up to the first Brian O'Blivion tape he watches can be assumed to be real as he's still only slightly affected by the signal. But when Bianca tells him that his life could become "100% video hallucination", suddenly it looks more and more likely that the bizarre plot twists ([[spoiler:i.e. an evil conspiracy operating out of an opticians', his best friend being part of said this conspiracy, murdering people with flesh/metal hybrid weaponry]]) is all part of a massive psychotic break triggered by the Videodrome signal. Maybe.
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[[quoteright:317:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/147136_3.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:317:Television can change your mind... Videodrome will change your body!]]
->''"Death to Videodrome! Long live the New Flesh!"''
A DavidCronenberg film. A surreal movie, one of the poster children for BodyHorror. Like all of Cronenberg's movies, it has a strong intellectual undercurrent. The film deals with Marshall [=McLuhan's=] philosophies and examines the relationship between television and its audience. Cronenberg was greatly influenced by [=McLuhan's=] theories.
More specifically, the film follows the CEO of a small cable station who stumble upon a broadcast signal that is broadcasting extremely violent and horrific things. He investigates. As you might expect from Cronenberg, [[ItGotWorse things get worse]]...
----
!!''{{Videodrome}}'' provides examples of:
* AffectionateParody / NoCelebritiesWereHarmed - Brian O'Blivion is a parody of Marshall [=McLuhan=], whose ideas are the central theme of the movie. He only exists in video tapes, parodying [=McLuhan's=] famous proclamation: "I refuse to appear on television, except on television."
* ArcWords - "Long live the New Flesh!"
* BodyHorror
* BrownNote - Videodrome itself. We get to see why, and it's as horrible as it is said to be.
* CanadaEh - Like many of Cronenberg's films, it's set in his hometown of Toronto.
* DoubleEntendre - "Civic TV, The one you take to bed with you."
* DeconstructorFleet - For late '70s exploitation movies. Oddly enough, it is now [[WeirdAlEffect much better known]] than films like ''Mondo Cane'' or the first ''Faces Of Death''.
* ExploitationFilm - Civic TV's stock in trade ins exploitation ''TV''.
* EvenEvilHasStandards - The politely corrupt Masha refuses to deal with Videodrome as soon as she finds out how bad it is on the surface. If she knew how bad it was beneath that...
* FantasticAesop - Not used by the film itself, but by the bad guys, who figure that if they make a torture porn show that kills the viewer, nobody will watch torture porn anymore.
* GainaxEnding
* {{Gorn}} - Played with.
* GoodPeopleHaveGoodSex - Sort of averted. No one has "good" sex, but then again few of them are "good".
* IJustShotMarvinInTheFace - Done on purpose for extreme horror. At one point James Woods basically has sex with the cancerous vagina growing out of his own belly with a gun.
* MaybeMagicMaybeMundane - Yes, they're visions, but... is that ''really'' Nicki talking to him beyond the grave, or just his own psychosis?
* MindScrew - The blurring between fiction and reality only increases during TheClimax.
* MoralGuardians - The purity league headed up by Barry Convex.
* MrsRobinson - Masha likes younger guys. As in, barely legal.
* NewMediaAreEvil - Deconstructed
* NonActorVehicle - [[Music/{{Blondie}} Deborah Harry]]
* OldShame - One of the Japanese porn dealers is played by David Tsubouchi. Just over a decade later, he'd be elected as a Member of Provincial Parliament in Ontario, where he was appointed Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations. This made him responsible for the [[MediaWatchdog Ontario Film Review Board]], the agency which assigns film ratings in the province. Cronenberg butted heads with the OFRB and other Canadian review boards many times in the late '70s and early '80s and accused them of censorship.
* OrganicTechnology
* PunnyName - Brian O'Blivion? Barry Convex? Is this a comedy? [[spoiler:No.]] Possibly a ShoutOut to ThomasPynchon. {{Justified}} in the first instance because Brian O'Blivion has explicitly renamed himself.
* ScienceIsBad / NewMediaAreEvil - The seeming surface moral is that modern information technology is ''eeevill''. But, later it turns out: [[spoiler:not so much]].
* ShoutOut - To several famous exploitation movies.
** That, and CIVIC-TV is a play on City-TV (a Toronto-area station that played porn movies at the time when ''Videodrome'' was made).
*** It still does, only now it's not just a "Toronto-area" Station, but has a City-Tv Vancouver, Montreal, etc.
* ShowWithinAShow
* SmugSnake - [[spoiler:Barry Convex]]
* SpiritualSequel - ''[[{{existenz}} eXistenZ]]''. This is made particularly clear because it starts with a scene that looks very like the climax to this movie.
* SnuffFilm - Videodrome is snuff ''television''.
* SurrealHorror - As Max's [[ThroughTheEyesOfMadness psychological descent steepens]], plot points and settings grow more and more absurd.
* TheTapeKnewYouWouldSayThat - TV prophet Brian O'Blivion communicates solely through videotaped messages--even in order to participate in an interview early on in the film.
* TheTelevisionTalksBack: Nicki disappears when going to check out Videodrome, then appears to Max in his TV, and asks for a kiss. He does...and then things start to get really bizarre. Brian O'Blivion also starts to directly converse with Max in this way later on.
* ThereAreNoTherapists - The only person coming close in the movie gets corrupted the fastest.
* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness - The film is shown from the perspective of the protagonist, Max Renn, who has certainly gone batty at some point. Everything up to the first Brian O'Blivion tape he watches can be assumed to be real as he's still only slightly affected by the signal. But when Bianca tells him that his life could become "100% video hallucination", suddenly it looks more and more likely that the bizarre plot twists ([[spoiler:i.e. an evil conspiracy operating out of an opticians', his best friend being part of said conspiracy, murdering people with flesh/metal hybrid weaponry]]) is all part of a massive psychotic break triggered by the Videodrome signal. Maybe.
* UnreliableNarrator - See ThroughTheEyesOfMadness, above.
* VaginaDentata - Just about the only trope played straight. Except that it's on a man. In his abdomen.
----
[[caption-width-right:317:Television can change your mind... Videodrome will change your body!]]
->''"Death to Videodrome! Long live the New Flesh!"''
A DavidCronenberg film. A surreal movie, one of the poster children for BodyHorror. Like all of Cronenberg's movies, it has a strong intellectual undercurrent. The film deals with Marshall [=McLuhan's=] philosophies and examines the relationship between television and its audience. Cronenberg was greatly influenced by [=McLuhan's=] theories.
More specifically, the film follows the CEO of a small cable station who stumble upon a broadcast signal that is broadcasting extremely violent and horrific things. He investigates. As you might expect from Cronenberg, [[ItGotWorse things get worse]]...
----
!!''{{Videodrome}}'' provides examples of:
* AffectionateParody / NoCelebritiesWereHarmed - Brian O'Blivion is a parody of Marshall [=McLuhan=], whose ideas are the central theme of the movie. He only exists in video tapes, parodying [=McLuhan's=] famous proclamation: "I refuse to appear on television, except on television."
* ArcWords - "Long live the New Flesh!"
* BodyHorror
* BrownNote - Videodrome itself. We get to see why, and it's as horrible as it is said to be.
* CanadaEh - Like many of Cronenberg's films, it's set in his hometown of Toronto.
* DoubleEntendre - "Civic TV, The one you take to bed with you."
* DeconstructorFleet - For late '70s exploitation movies. Oddly enough, it is now [[WeirdAlEffect much better known]] than films like ''Mondo Cane'' or the first ''Faces Of Death''.
* ExploitationFilm - Civic TV's stock in trade ins exploitation ''TV''.
* EvenEvilHasStandards - The politely corrupt Masha refuses to deal with Videodrome as soon as she finds out how bad it is on the surface. If she knew how bad it was beneath that...
* FantasticAesop - Not used by the film itself, but by the bad guys, who figure that if they make a torture porn show that kills the viewer, nobody will watch torture porn anymore.
* GainaxEnding
* {{Gorn}} - Played with.
* GoodPeopleHaveGoodSex - Sort of averted. No one has "good" sex, but then again few of them are "good".
* IJustShotMarvinInTheFace - Done on purpose for extreme horror. At one point James Woods basically has sex with the cancerous vagina growing out of his own belly with a gun.
* MaybeMagicMaybeMundane - Yes, they're visions, but... is that ''really'' Nicki talking to him beyond the grave, or just his own psychosis?
* MindScrew - The blurring between fiction and reality only increases during TheClimax.
* MoralGuardians - The purity league headed up by Barry Convex.
* MrsRobinson - Masha likes younger guys. As in, barely legal.
* NewMediaAreEvil - Deconstructed
* NonActorVehicle - [[Music/{{Blondie}} Deborah Harry]]
* OldShame - One of the Japanese porn dealers is played by David Tsubouchi. Just over a decade later, he'd be elected as a Member of Provincial Parliament in Ontario, where he was appointed Minister of Consumer and Commercial Relations. This made him responsible for the [[MediaWatchdog Ontario Film Review Board]], the agency which assigns film ratings in the province. Cronenberg butted heads with the OFRB and other Canadian review boards many times in the late '70s and early '80s and accused them of censorship.
* OrganicTechnology
* PunnyName - Brian O'Blivion? Barry Convex? Is this a comedy? [[spoiler:No.]] Possibly a ShoutOut to ThomasPynchon. {{Justified}} in the first instance because Brian O'Blivion has explicitly renamed himself.
* ScienceIsBad / NewMediaAreEvil - The seeming surface moral is that modern information technology is ''eeevill''. But, later it turns out: [[spoiler:not so much]].
* ShoutOut - To several famous exploitation movies.
** That, and CIVIC-TV is a play on City-TV (a Toronto-area station that played porn movies at the time when ''Videodrome'' was made).
*** It still does, only now it's not just a "Toronto-area" Station, but has a City-Tv Vancouver, Montreal, etc.
* ShowWithinAShow
* SmugSnake - [[spoiler:Barry Convex]]
* SpiritualSequel - ''[[{{existenz}} eXistenZ]]''. This is made particularly clear because it starts with a scene that looks very like the climax to this movie.
* SnuffFilm - Videodrome is snuff ''television''.
* SurrealHorror - As Max's [[ThroughTheEyesOfMadness psychological descent steepens]], plot points and settings grow more and more absurd.
* TheTapeKnewYouWouldSayThat - TV prophet Brian O'Blivion communicates solely through videotaped messages--even in order to participate in an interview early on in the film.
* TheTelevisionTalksBack: Nicki disappears when going to check out Videodrome, then appears to Max in his TV, and asks for a kiss. He does...and then things start to get really bizarre. Brian O'Blivion also starts to directly converse with Max in this way later on.
* ThereAreNoTherapists - The only person coming close in the movie gets corrupted the fastest.
* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness - The film is shown from the perspective of the protagonist, Max Renn, who has certainly gone batty at some point. Everything up to the first Brian O'Blivion tape he watches can be assumed to be real as he's still only slightly affected by the signal. But when Bianca tells him that his life could become "100% video hallucination", suddenly it looks more and more likely that the bizarre plot twists ([[spoiler:i.e. an evil conspiracy operating out of an opticians', his best friend being part of said conspiracy, murdering people with flesh/metal hybrid weaponry]]) is all part of a massive psychotic break triggered by the Videodrome signal. Maybe.
* UnreliableNarrator - See ThroughTheEyesOfMadness, above.
* VaginaDentata - Just about the only trope played straight. Except that it's on a man. In his abdomen.
----
