History YMMV / ASeriesOfUnfortunateEvents

* TheChrisCarterEffect: InvokedTrope by the author (one of the major messages of the series being that "not all mysteries can ever be solved, better to accept this and move on"). There is a ''serious'' BrokenBase on whether or not deliberately invoking the Trope ''at all'' (let alone for the sake of AnAesop) and then going ahead with putting a ''massive'' amount of unsolved mysteries on the story makes it any less of a {{Troll}} act on the part of the author.

* AudienceAlienatingEnding: The books' endings are particularly frustrating, because although the series repeatedly [[SnicketWarningLabel goes out of its way to warn you there won't be a happy resolution]], what it doesn't tell you until the last book is just how little will be resolved at all. The TV series rectifies this and, while we don't see what becomes of the heroes, we're told [[spoiler:they're fine, living happily, and raised Kit, Snicket's daughter, who finds Lemony to tell him this.]]

* SeinfeldIsUnfunny: Back in the day, these were some of the [[DarkerAndEdgier darkest]] and most cynical kids books you can find on shelves. The bar has been raised a ''lot'' by some things that came out after the first book.

* AudienceAlienatingEnding: The books' endings are particularly frustrating, because although the series repeatedly [[SnicketWarningLabel goes out of its way to warn you there won't be a happy resolution]], what it doesn't tell you until the last book is just how little will be resolved at all. The TV series rectifies this and, while we don't see what becomes of the heroes, we're told they're fine, living happily, and raised Kit, Snicket's daughter, who finds Lemony to tell him this.

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation:
** Is Count Olaf's marriage ploy just to get Violet's money? Or does he actually hold a long-standing, near-incestuous, [[{{Squick}} ephebophilic]] lust for her? (In FanFic, [[BrotherSisterIncest everyone is incestuous]].)
** Mr. Poe's borderline-pathological stupidity regarding the Baudelaire's safety can lead one to wonder if he is secretly trying to get them all killed for whatever reason, perhaps a cut of the fortune.
** How much of Olaf's bumbling is an act? At first impression, he may come off as an idiot that lucked into being [[AdultsAreUseless surrounded by a society of even bigger idiots,]] but he does have genuine knowledge about things like manipulating mob psychology, marking secret locations, and is well-read enough to quote poetry as his last words. Many fans believe he deliberately cultivated an anti-intellectual persona to stick it to the literature-loving side of the VFD schism.

* CrossesTheLineTwice: The freaks in the ninth book, although some people found it in poor taste.
* DracoInLeatherPants:
** Even before they were given backstories, {{Fanon}} interpreted Olaf's assistants as gay, or certainly something far more complex and sympathetic than they appeared in canon.
** Thanks to her clingy unlucky husband, Esmé often gets this treatment. And Carmelita too, since she acts as her surrogate mother.

* FashionVictimVillain: Esmé wears many elaborate and unusual outfits over the course of the series. Count Olaf also wears strange outfits as part of his disguises.
* GrowingTheBeard:
** The whole MindScrew started and was hinted from the third book onwards, but it's after The Austere Academy when things really [[ParanoiaFuel took off]]. That's because when he was writing the fifth book Handler had finally had his contract signed for 13 installments and could plan ahead the plot.
** You could say that ''The Miserable Mill'' also grew the beard since it revealed there was a connection between Lemony and the life of Count Olaf. Monty's death in ''The Reptile Room'' was also a key emotional step.
* HarsherInHindsight:
** In ''The Wide Window'' Lemony says Josephine's fear of realtors is irrational because nothing bad has ever come out of the industry, which is rather awkward after the 2007 housing bubble collapse. This is actually acknowledged in the Netflix series, as he still says the line but then looks embarrassed by it.
* HoYay: Sir and [[DoggedNiceGuy Charles]] are portrayed as being very close. (see WordOfGay)
* HilariousInHindsight:
** Esme's dress that looks like a fire. A similar concept was used in ''Film/TheHungerGames''.
** Lemony Snicket [[WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy isn't the first character]] of Creator/PatrickWarburton who is friends/acquaintances with people who have the surname [[spoiler:Quagmire]].
** In 1999 ''The Reptile Room'' introduced [[DeathbringerTheAdorable a snake called the Incredibly Deadly Viper, which was given that name as a joke because it's nonvenomous and in fact quite friendly to humans]]. Starting around, oh let's say, [[Film/KillBill four years later]], people are more likely to associate the phrase Deadly Viper with something that genuinely ''[[MurderInc is]]'' "incredibly deadly," though not literal snakes in this case.[[note]]Okay, one of the Deadly Vipers does employ an actual snake as an AnimalAssassin at one point, albeit a black mamba instead of a viper.[[/note]]

* LesYay: "Although sadly I believe it will be quite some time before two women can be allowed to marry and I will love you if you have a child, and I will love you if you have two children, or three children, or even more, although I personally think three is plenty, and I will love you if you never marry at all, and never have children, and spend your years wishing you had married me after all, and I must say that on late, cold nights I prefer this scenario out of all the scenarios I have mentioned."
** For those who don't know, this is the full quote "I will love you if you marry someone else–your co-star, perhaps, or Y., or even O., or anyone Z. through A., even R. –although sadly I believe it will be quite some time before two women can be allowed to marry." This is from The Beatrice Letters and is from LS to BB (Lemony Snicket to Beatrice Baudelaire). "R" is also believed to be R, Duchess of Winnipeg, whose ring both Lemony and Bertrand used to propose to Beatrice.
* MemeticMutation: Handler's SignatureStyle quickly went viral, a phrase which here means "imitated endlessly by the Internet".

* MoralEventHorizon: Count Olaf himself has no doubt crossed the line. The question is: when?
** In ''The Bad Beginning'', he locks Sunny in a cage at the top of a thirty-foot tower and threatens to drop her to her death if Violet doesn't marry him.
** In ''The Reptile Room'' he murders Monty's assistant Gustaf, takes his place then murders Monty too.
** In ''The Miserable Mill'', he and Georgina Orwell hypnotize Klaus to kill Charles to get him and his siblings kicked out of Lucky Smells Lumbermill and be captured by Count Olaf. This is also where Georgina herself crossed it.
** Probably the biggest example would be in ''The Vile Village'', when he kills Jacques Snicket and then frames it on the Baudelaire children.
** Then there's ''The Penultimate Peril'', where Count Olaf kills Dewey Denouement and makes it look like the Baudelaires did it by throwing the harpoon gun, which causes it to go off.

* TheProblemWithLicensedGames: It's not like a series called ''A Series of Unfortunate Events'' would be lucky enough to escape this, anyway.
* RewatchBonus:
** An emotional example: The first time reading the books is easier to laugh at the wacky and absurd situations and the DeusAngstMachina because, in spite of the multiple warnings, it's easy to hope that at the end there will be a somewhat satisfactory conclusion and things will turn out well for the children. The second time around, when you are painfully aware of all the despair and misfortune awaiting the kids at every turn that will in all probability continue long after the end of the books, even the wackiest setback can become a TearJerker.
** There's a surprisingly uplifting bonus: If you followed the series as each book came out, it was pretty easy to forget some of the many references to the future, long after the series finishes, that the narrator made in the earlier books. While the final book pointedly refuses to give a satisfying conclusion, and indeed an unhappy story is what the narrator had often called this entire saga, there are several small hints that the Baudelaires have quite a future ahead of them after all. [[spoiler:In ''The Wide Window'', it's definitively stated that Violet would return to Briny Beach for a third time, and since she hadn't by ''The End'', she must have survived.[[note]]She ''would'' have returned to Briny Beach during ''The End'', but Handler's plans for how the series would end significantly changed between this reference and the writing of ''The End''[[/note]] In ''The Reptile Room'' Klaus is said to, after many years, still be wishing he called the taxi driver to take "Stefano" back, implying, though with much less evidence, that he too survived. And, in the Beatrice Letters, Sunny is mentioned as sharing her recipes on the radio when she grows up to be a young woman, which is the strongest evidence of a happy ending for any of these characters. Suddenly, a book series that's famous for its unfortunate events and inconclusive ending ends up with a heartwarming moment via a good rewatch!]]

* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot: Frequently indistinguishable from AbortedArc and RedHerringTwist.
* TooBleakStoppedCaring: Especially towards the end of the series, the sheer amount of times that PoorCommunicationKills and AdultsAreUseless makes some readers just plain give up.
* ValuesDissonance: Yep, even though it's not that old, this trope exists here. Among the unusual cast of Olaf's theater troupe is a huge henchperson who "looks like neither a man nor a woman", and their appearance is framed as uncanny and frightening, with extra dehumanizing effect coming from the character never speaking words or demonstrating a personality, being an almost bestial hulk who is often referred to as "[[ItIsDehumanizing it]]". With increasing awareness today about gender diversity and gender queerness/nonconformity, having a character being an inhuman threat narratively reviled for scary gender ambiguity can feel tasteless at best and hateful at worst. The [[Series/ASeriesOfUnfortunateEvents2017 Netflix series adaptation]] addresses these concerns and reframes the character as an average-looking person who simply doesn't conform to a clear gender (including showing an interest in gender politics and in questioning norms) and isn't framed as creepy for it in the slightest, and their role is given more personality and likability as well.

* AngstWhatAngst: Averted for the most part. Most of the unfortunate events that happen to the Baudelaire orphans affect them significantly, and they frequently discuss (even under rare good circumstances, as in the early chapters of ''The Reptile Room'') their sorrow over events that have happened a significant amount of time in the past. Their conflicts are treated as sufferings rather than fun adventures, and when characters ''do'' respond with unusual positivity to terrible things, it's noted and generally played up for absurdity.

* ValuesDissonance: Yep, even though it's not that old, this trope exists here. Among the unusual cast of Olaf's theater troupe is a hulking henchperson who "looks like neither a man nor a woman", and their appearance is framed as uncanny and frightening, with extra dehumanizing effect coming from the character never speaking words or demonstrating a personality, being an almost bestial hulk who is often referred to as "[[ItIsDehumanizing it]]". With increasing awareness today about gender diversity and gender queerness/nonconformity, having a character being an inhuman threat narratively reviled for scary gender ambiguity can feel tasteless at best and hateful at worst. The [[Series/ASeriesOfUnfortunateEvents2017 Netflix series adaptation]] addresses these concerns and reframes the character as an average-looking person who simply doesn't conform to a clear gender (including showing an interest in gender politics and in questioning norms) and isn't framed as creepy for it in the slightest, and their role is given more personality and likability as well.

* ValuesDissonance: Yep, even though it's not that old, this trope exists here. There is a running joke about how one of Olaf's henchpeople looks like "neither a man, nor a woman", and about how creepy he/she/they is/are. With increasing awareness today about transgender people, and people with gender dysphoria, and people of non-binary gender, it is hard to view this as funny. (Note, however, that this has been pointed out to Daniel Handler, who has stressed that he is quite aware of the difference between "genderqueer" and "androgynous", and the Henchperson is meant to unambiguously be in the latter category. The [[Series/ASeriesOfUnfortunateEvents2017 Netflix series adaptation]] confirmed this ''and'' made the Henchperson a sympathetic character to boot.)

* AcceptableTargets:
** Adults like Aunt Josephine [[WhyDidItHaveToBeSnakes with crippling phobias]] that make it impossible for them to function, and who refuse to try to combat their fears so that they ''can'' function.
** Characters like Esmé Squalor almost serve as a double-dipping Acceptable Target, mocking both people who live in exceedingly, offensively lavish lifestyles and people who are only interested in jumping on the latest fad.

* IdiotPlot: One of the reasons why the books have plots after the first few is because the Baudelaires are some of the few recurring characters that do not have the IdiotBall. Administrivia/TropesAreNotBad because it adds to the dark humor, and the feeling of bleakness in a world going out of its way to be cruel to these children.

** Even before they were given backstories, {{Fanon}} interpreted Olaf's assistants as YaoiGuys, or certainly something far more complex and sympathetic than they appeared in canon.

** One of the villains says that he had a nice dream of [[EvilIsPetty sneezing and not covering his mouth]] covering everyone in germs. It's less funny after COVID with people intentionally coughing on grocery store food to try to infect people.

* WhatAnIdiot: In the Wide Window, Mr. Poe falls for Count Olaf's Captain Sham disguise, that's all fine because he wasn't the only one, but you'd think that he'd be at least a bit suspicious about "Sham's" associate with the indeterminate gender who isn't even bothering with a disguise standing right next to him.

* TakeThatScrappy: Olaf does this to Poe in the movie while Violet does this in the series proper, politely declining to come with him after the clusterfuck that was the first 7 books. This is more satisfying in the series where Poe is a self-centred, as opposed to the film where he is still bumbling but more well-meaning than his book counterpart.

** Even before we had much BelatedBackstory for them, {{Fanon}} interpreted Olaf's assistants as YaoiGuys, or certainly something far more complex and sympathetic than they appeared in canon.

** There's a surprisingly uplifting bonus: If you followed the series as each book came out, it was pretty easy to forget some of the many references to the future, long after the series finishes, that the narrator made in the earlier books. While the final book pointedly refuses to give a satisfying conclusion, and indeed an unhappy story is what the narrator had often called this entire saga, there are several small hints that the Baudelaires have quite a future ahead of them after all. [[spoiler:In ''The Wide Window'', it's definitively stated that Violet would return to Briny Beach for a third time, and since she hadn't by ''The End'', she must have survived. In ''The Reptile Room'' Klaus is said to, after many years, still be wishing he called the taxi driver to take "Stefano" back, implying, though with much less evidence, that he too survived. And, in the Beatrice Letters, Sunny is mentioned as sharing her recipes on the radio when she grows up to be a young woman, which is the strongest evidence of a happy ending for any of these characters. Suddenly, a book series that's famous for its unfortunate events and inconclusive ending ends up with a heartwarming moment via a good rewatch!]]

* SpoiledByTheFormat: The Baudelaires' fortune will be legally theirs once Violet turns 18. It takes 11 books for her to reach her 15th birthday, and the series ends when she's roughly 16. [[spoiler:Though by that point the Baudelaires stop caring about their fortune and are more concerned with surviving.]]

* DarknessInducedAudienceApathy: Especially towards the end of the series, the sheer amount of times that PoorCommunicationKills and AdultsAreUseless makes some readers just plain give up.