History Literature / TheBFG

* WolverineClaws: Mild example. The Fleshlumpeater's design in the animated version sports a long, sharp index nail on either hand. He uses them to pluck sleeping children out of their beds, rather like a gigantic aye aye.

* FemmeFatalons: Male example: Fleshlumpeater has a single long, sharp nail on each index finger, which he uses to pluck children out of their beds to eat them.

* CallAPegasusAHippogriff: There ''are'' of course early examples of child-eating giants, but the evil giants (BFG aside) look much more like ogres than giants, being less humanlike.

* OcularGushers: When the BFG hears about Sophie being locked in the cellar at her orphanage, he sheds a tear that would fill a bucket, making quite a puddle.

* {{Heartwarming}}: Just before the BFG leaves Sophie alone on the Queen's windowsill, he suddenly and unexpectedly kisses her cheek.

* ContainerCling: * Subverted when the BFG's cave is invaded by the man-eating Bloodbottler giant, and Sophie hides behind a snozzcumber (a giant foul-tasting vegetable). When she realises that the snozzcumber would not hide her if the Bloodbottler picked it up, she hides ''inside'' it. The Bloodbottler does indeed pick it up, and bites a huge hunk off it, while Sophie is still inside.

* BeastAndBeauty: Sophie and the titular character form a platonic example.

** Then again, it's possible that The BFG is the last of his kind and the other giants are a different race of giants which would explain the way they look down on him.

* EvilIsBigger: Subverted by the BFG himself, but played straight in that his murderous neighbours are much larger than ''he'' is. [[WildMassGuessing Presumably, because giants seem to be carnivores by nature, BFG is smaller due to malnourishment.]]

* ForeignQueasine: Snozzcumber, which tastes absolutely repulsive. As he refuses to eat humans, or steal their vegetables, it's the only thing that the BFG can eat, as it is the only thing that grows in Giant Country.

* GentleGiant: The giant named "[[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin The Big Friendly Giant]]" [[note]]or BFG for short[[/note]], though he does have some DeadpanSnarker-ish moments. Actually, so do most of the characters.

* HumanoidAbomination: The giants are effectively this.

* InvisibleStreaker: one dream describes a boy who makes himself invisible, while he is naked in the bath. Later he puts on his dressing gown and slippers (which are still visible) and walks in the streets, scaring people, who say "A ghost! A ghost!"

* {{Malaproper}}: The BFG is a constant malaproper ("Right as snow!" {Right as rain}, "Two rights is not making a left" (Two wrongs don't make a right). Both these cases ''aren't'' examples of the BFG being stupid, but are because (as he has no parents) he is self-taught. Quite an impressive feat all in all, given that in the original book, he managed to teach himself to read and write from a single book -- Charles Dickens' ''Nicholas Nickleby''. In the book, he eventually gets tuition and doesn't do this anymore. The evil Giants, however, aren't interested in such pursuits and play the tropes pretty much straight ("I is now going to search the primroses!").

* MeaningfulName: Not Sophie (who was named after Dahl's granddaughter), but all the giants have very obvious names relating to their characters (e.g. Bloodbottler, Bonecruncher, Childchewer, Fleshlumpeater, Maidmasher... and the BFG himself).

* OneGenderRace: The Giants are exclusively male; this is a trope Dahl plays with at least twice, as in ''Literature/TheWitches'' the villainous race of that piece is all female (and a few all-male races are mentioned in it too). Giants simply come into being. The Giant race is pretty small, actually -- there's only 10 of them.

Sophie comes up with a plan to capture the other giants: Making the Queen of England dream about the Giants and also that they can be stopped by a little girl called Sophie and a friendly Giant. Thus, when she appears on the Queen's windowsill, Sophie is instantly believed (with the additional backup of a recent ring of child massacres that the Queen also dreams about on the same night that they happen). The Queen calls on the Army and the RAF to capture the Giants, which they do with the help of the BFG and Sophie.

* HollywoodAtlas: Let's see... the Queen of England runs everything and can overturn any decisions that her military commanders try to make... Sweden is such a small community that everyone notices if three of them suddenly disappear... and Baghdad is run by a Caliph.

* InsaneTrollLogic: Used by one of the British pilots to understand where Giant Land is located; he turns to the blank page at the back of the atlas and explains it must be there. Of course, in this world, TheCloudcuckoolanderWasRight.

%%* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: Ahem, "whizzpopping".

* SquareCubeLaw: A blink-and-you-miss-it example in the book. When the BFG is visiting the queen, the butler reasons that, since the BFG is four times a normal human's size, he'll need four times the food when they go to cook breakfast for him. This turns out to be far from sufficent.

* ForeignQueasine: Snozzcumber, which tastes absolutely repulsive. As he refuses to eat humans, it's the only thing that the BFG can eat, as it is the only thing that grows in Giant Country.

The other Giants are child killers, and downright terrifying. Sophie is very nearly eaten by one (the Bloodbottler) but survives when he spits out the disgusting vegetable she's hiding in. The BFG lets Sophie in on his secret job -- catching dreams from Dream Country, then mixing them up and distributing them to children (blowing them through a big trumpet). He also locks away any nightmares he finds, to make sure they don't find a way to kids by themselves.

* SealedEvilInACan: At the end, [[spoiler:the evil giants are trapped in a deep pit and given only disgusting vegetables for food... save the one occasion three drunk men scaled the fence and fell in.]]
** Also, the nightmares the BFG catches.

[[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant NO! Not that kind of]] {{BFG}}! Not to be confused with Music/TheNotoriousBIG either. ''The BFG'' is a book by Creator/RoaldDahl. "BFG" in this case stands for Big Friendly Giant, and is the name of one of the protagonists. He is a Giant, the magic mythological kind who lives in Giant Country and is the only member of his race who doesn't eat humans. The other protagonist is Sophie, a little orphan girl who the BFG kidnaps (an action he later regrets) because she catches a glimpse of him -- she's terrified at first, but, once she learns he's nice, she's actually quite glad to be out of the [[OrphanageOfFear horrible orphanage]] she lived in.

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* InfantImmortality: The plot is built around averting this trope. Children ''do'' die in this book, though never on-screen.

* MasochistsMeal: The snozzcumber, a disgusting vegetable that tastes of frogskins and rotten fish. Since the BFG refuses to eat humans or steal from them, he can only eat snozzcumbers, since they're the only plants that grow in Giant County. [[spoiler:At the end, the other giants are fed snozzcumbers after being trapped in a giant pit.]]