Line #42 Literature/JohnnyMaxwellTrilogy


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/pratchett_johnny_maxwell_trilogy.jpg]]
2	->''"Of all the forces in the universe, the hardest to overcome is the force of habit."''
3	-->-- ''Johnny and the Dead''
4
5	To look at him, you'd think that Johnny Maxwell is just an ordinary twelve-year-old. But weird stuff keeps happening to him. Of course, you could blame these Trying Times -- his parents are in the middle of an acrimonious divorce -- but really, the kinds of things we're talking about aren't part of a normal kid's routine. I mean, what would you do if...
6
7	...the aliens in your favorite video game surrendered instead of shooting back? At first, Johnny and his friends think it's part of the programming. But this scenario isn't in the manual. Then Johnny starts having incredibly lifelike dreams -- where he's at the controls of a starfighter, and the alien fleet, hanging in space before him, is waiting for him to lead them safely home. As hard as it was trying to save Mankind from the Galactic Hordes, it's even harder trying to save the Galactic Hordes from Mankind. But hey, it's only a game, isn't it?
8
9	...Or if you started seeing the dead -- just as their cemetery was about to be demolished? Not many people can see the dead (not many would want to). But Johnny can, and he's got bad news for them: the town council wants to sell the cemetery and put up an office complex. But the dead have learned a thing or two from Johnny, and they're not going to take it lying down, especially since tomorrow is Halloween...
10
11	...And what if your local bag lady turned out to be a time traveler? Johnny and his friends discover Mrs. Tachyon semi-conscious in an alley. It seems there's more to Mrs. Tachyon than a squeaky wire cart and a bunch of mysterious black bags. Somehow this wizened little woman holds the key to different times and different eras-including the Blitz of 1941. Suddenly ''now'' isn't the safe place Johnny thought it was as he finds himself bound up more and more with ''then''...
12
13	The ''Johnny Maxwell Trilogy'' is a series of three books comprising ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', ''Johnny and the Dead'' and ''Johnny and the Bomb'', written by Creator/TerryPratchett. It concerns the adventures of Johnny Maxwell and his friends, Wobbler, Bigmac, Yo-less, and Kirsty, as they deal with whatever weird thing the Universe throws at them this week. ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' has been adapted for radio, the other two for TV (''The Dead'' for ITV in 1995 and ''The Bomb'' for Creator/TheBBC in 2006). There's also been a [[AllMusicalsAreAdaptations stage musical]] of ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', with accompanying soundtrack CD.
14
15	----
16	!!Johnny Maxwell Trilogy contains examples of the following tropes:
17
18	* TheAce: Kirsty is a deconstruction; despite being good at anything she turns her hand to, her arrogance and aloofness kept her friendless until she met Johnny.
19	* AcePilot: Kirsty in the video game world in ''Only You Can Save Mankind''.
20	* ActionGirl: Kirsty.
21	* AirVentPassageway: Johnny and the Captain in ''Only You Can Save Mankind''. Lampshaded that it only exists because Johnny expects it to and the video game world is a consensus reality. Subversion, the Captain complains about it being hard to navigate.
22	* AlmostFamousName: A running joke in ''Johnny and the Dead'' in regard to the local cemetery. For instance, Einstein is buried there -- not UsefulNotes/AlbertEinstein the physicist, but Solomon Einstein the taxidermist.
23	* AndYouWereThere: Johnny's imagination calls up imaginary versions of his friends to pilot the cargo ships delivering food to the [=ScreeWee=], putting them in the unenviable position of being [=NPCs=] in an EscortMission.
24	* ArtificialStupidity: Lampshaded. Johnny points out that the [=ScreeWee=] vastly outnumber and outgun the human player in all the programmed missions but the whole point of a video game is the enemies are stupid and incompetent, [[MookChivalry lining up one by one to be killed]]. When the Gunnery Officer takes over and decides to fight the war against the humans for real, every mission suddenly becomes a CurbStompBattle in the [=ScreeWee=]’s favour.
25	* ArtisticLicenseNuclearPhysics: Yo-less and his "fridge molecules". (Fridge Molecule Logic?)
26	* AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence: Having learned to use telephone lines, then airwaves, for high speed worldwide travel, the dead realise their metaphysical bodies' dimensional transcendence. On return to the cemetery [[spoiler: in bodies of blue lightning, they bid farewell to Johnny, and, in various forms of transport, prepare for boundless exploration.]]
27	* AuthorAppeal: Creator/TerryPratchett was [[JustForFun/OneOfUs a huge fan]] of the {{VideoGame/Elite}}, VideoGame/XWing and VideoGame/WingCommander franchises in real life, and based the fictional ''Only You Can Save Mankind'''s marketing and gameplay heavily on his experiences.
28	* AWinnerIsYou: Wobbler's homemade computer game, ''Journey to Alpha Centauri'', entails a journey through space which, if played for three thousand years, will present a small dot, with the message:
29	--> Welcome to Alpha Centauri. Now go home.
30	* BadassBookworm: Kirsty isn't just brainy -- she also knows karate.
31	* BedsheetGhost: One of the gang dresses as one for Halloween. In a pink bedsheet with flowers on it.
32	-->'''Wobbler:''' What are you, a gay ghost?
33	* BewareTheNiceOnes: Placid, unassuming Johnny is capable of [[SuddenlyShouting getting very angry]] if sufficiently pressured. Even he notes, prior to his TheReasonYouSuckSpeech towards Kirsty, that he doesn't get angry often, but when it happens he can't stop himself from letting it all out.
34	* BerserkButton: Try and call Kirsty "little lady". See what happens.
35	%%* BlackAndNerdy: Yo-less, to the point where him not acting like a stereotypical black jock is what earned him his nickname - he literally doesn't say "Yo".
36	* BlandNameProduct: The game ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' is clearly mostly a knockoff of VideoGame/WingCommander, with the [=ScreeWee=] a parody of the AlwaysChaoticEvil bad guys the Kilrathi were invented as.
37	* BlitzEvacuees: Johnny and his friends meet a few in 1941. One of them [[spoiler: turns out to be Wobbler's grandfather]].
38	* BusinessOfGenericImportance: United Amalgamated Conglomerated Holdings.
39	%%* ButterflyOfDoom: Both played straight and subverted.
40	* CanonWelding: The shop from ''[[Literature/NomesTrilogy Truckers]]'' has been relocated to Blackbury. It might well be a different branch of Arnold Bros, as in their heyday big department stores had multiple branches in nearby towns and cities. The local newspaper makes a big point of serving both Grimethorpe and Blackbury, suggesting that these are neighbouirng towns.
41	* CatchPhrase: Mrs Tachyon has "that's what ''you'' think," uttered at random times that [[TalkativeLoon seem to have nothing to do with the conversation she's having.]] Johnny eventually realises that [[spoiler: she's speaking to the universe itself. You can't go back in time? That's what ''you'' think...]]
42	* ChangedMyJumper: Perhaps it would have been a better idea to keep it on.
43	* TheChosenOne: Johnny. Pretty much by the process of elimination.
44	* ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: Kirsty is not even referenced in the second book.
45	* TheCityNarrows: Bigmac's home tower block, Joshua Che N'Clement, built in 1965, is a nook of litter, theft and general dodginess.
46	%%* CityOfAdventure: Blackbury.
47	* CoincidentalBroadcast: Parodied. While Johnny is watching a boring newscast on TV, he has a [[OrWasItADream brief moment of reality distortion]] causing the commentator to segue into discussing the [=ScreeWee=] surrender.
48	** HeroWithBadPublicity: In this very brief glimpse of Earth in the video game world, the humans seem highly suspicious of both the [=ScreeWee=] and Johnny.
49	* ComicallySmallBribe: Blackbury's cemetery is about to be sold for fivepence. Johnny walks into the town council meeting and offers a counterbid of one pound.
50	* CommonalityConnection: Kirsty thinks she has this with the alien captain who is female; Johnny, trying to recruit her support, does not mention that she's wrong about sexism being the captain's problem because it's a matriarchial species.
51	* CondensationClue: Wobbler writes down the license plate number of some thugs' van by huffing on a car window and using his fingertip, then keeps huffing on it so it'll remain visible.
52	* ConspiracyTheorist: Kirsty.
53	* ConversationalTroping: If TV Tropes existed in the Johnnyverse, all five of the main characters would be regulars.
54	* CopyProtection: ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', the in-story game, has it. There's a detailed description of how [[TruthInTelevision utterly ineffective]] it is.
55	* CrazyPrepared: For a while Johnny kept a bucket of water in his room in case he [[SpontaneousHumanCombustion spontaneously combusted]].
56	%%* TheCrocIsTicking: Mrs. Tachyon's squeaky-wheeled shopping cart
57	* CulturalRebel: Yo-Less
58	* DeadpanSnarker: The [=ScreeWee=] Captain has her moments, especially when dealing with the Gunnery Officer.
59	* DeathIsASlapOnTheWrist: Johnny appears to be able to resurrect in a new ship an infinite number of times, since for him it's only a game. Averted for the [=ScreeWee=], who die for good if killed. This creates a dilemma where Johnny only gets a break from his constant vigil if he dies -- and [[MundaneUtility this is the only way to replenish his limited stock of missile ammo]] -- but during that time the [=ScreeWee=] fleet is totally vulnerable.
60	** Also played with in a YankTheDogsChain moment where Johnny gets knocked out, expecting to wake up in his own bed, only to regain consciousness, still slowly bleeding to death, fully expecting to die for real -- and only ''then'' waking up in his own bed.
61	* DefensiveFailure: That's what the Gunnery Officer ''thought'' would happen.
62	* {{Determinator}}: Kirsty, because anyone calling her {{plucky\|Girl}} would live to regret it.
63	* DidIJustSayThatOutLoud: During social studies class, Johnny, without even realising it, goes on an eloquent tirade about how the portrayal of the Gulf War in the media is blurring the line between reality and fantasy for those watching, thus distorting [[GrayAndGrayMorality the true nature]] [[WarIsHell of the conflict…]] and then realises his whole class is staring at him.
64	-->”…anyway, that’s what I think.”
65	* {{Dreamland}}: In ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', Johnny, on falling asleep, finds himself in a highly realistic version of the starship depicted in the game. Having encountered Kirsty here, the two establish having both dreamed themselves into "game space," whereupon they dream themselves onto the Screewee command ship.
66	* DueToTheDead: Discussed in ''Johnny and the Dead''.
67	* EarlyBirdCameo: Mrs. Tachyon is briefly mentioned in ''Johnny and the Dead'' before she and her time travel abilities become a major part of the plot of ''Johnny and the Bomb''. Apparently she was the only resident of the town to regularly frequent the cemetery (in hindsight, most likely because she knew everyone buried there when they were alive).
68	* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: In the first book, Wobbler is a legitimate computer wiz, and Big Mac is, if not a real badass, then at least capable of convincingly pretending to be one.
69	* EasyEvangelism: Averted. Here is Johnny trying to teach Kirsty about nonviolent approaches:
70	-->'''Kirsty:''' Do you know, there was an African tribe once whose nearest word for 'enemy' was 'a friend we haven't met yet'?\
71	'''Johnny:''' Right. That's how...\
72	'''Kirsty:''' But they were all killed and eaten in eighteen hundred and two. Except for those who were sold as slaves. The last one died in Mississippi in eighteen sixty-four, and he was ''very upset''.
73	* EinsteinHair: In ''Johnny and the Dead'', Albert Einstein's distant cousin Solomon (who was a taxidermist by trade, but also something of a philosopher; after all, you have a lot of time for abstract thought when you've got your hand up a dead badger) is described as having "a mass of white hair in that dandelion-clock style known as a Mad Scientist Afro".
74	* ElectromagneticGhosts: Having learned with Solomon Einstein how to manipulate electricity, Addison Fletcher, via radio telescope, takes a brief trip to the moon. The two then show the other dead how to ride telephone signals and airwaves.
75	* EscortMission: The ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' game becomes one of these -- under the terms of the [=ScreeWee=] surrender they are now barred from firing back against attacks from human ships, meaning Johnny is solely responsible for protecting them.
76	* EmbarrassingFirstName: Kirsty doesn't like her name. Or any of the other names she comes up with after a week or so.
77	* EmpathicEnvironment: [[DownplayedTrope Slightly]] - on Johnny's arrival on the [=ScreeWee=] command ship, the Captain's features are non-threatening. On Kirsty's arrival, the Captain's teeth and claws seem more emphasised; [[DoNotCallMePaul Kir]]... Sigourney being keen on the ''[[Franchise/{{Alien}} Alien]]'' films. The corridors also suddenly seem to have fewer nuts and bolts, and acquire a [[OrganicTechnology moist, cave-like curvature]].
78	* ExpospeakGag: The Captain's food order, which includes such delights as "pressed wheat extractions treated with sucrose". [[spoiler:Breakfast cereal.]]
79	* {{Expy}}:
80	** Part of the premise of ''Johnny and the Dead'' is the local dead people are all Expys for other, more famous people who resemble them in appearance or name (e.g. Solomon Einstein for Albert Einstein).
81	** The overall concept of the afterlife in the graveyard in ''Johnny and the Dead'' is borrowed from ''Theatre/OurTown'', and the one dead man who actually is a "ghost" and unwilling to move on to the afterlife -- because, it turns out, he died by suicide -- is an expy of Simon Stimson.
82	** ''Cobbers'', a [[AddictiveForeignSoapOpera vastly popular]] Australian soap opera, parallels ''Series/HomeAndAway'' and ''Series/{{Neighbours}}''.
83	* FictionalGenevaConventions: A lot of humor is derived from the RealLife Geneva Conventions being applied to the [=ScreeWee=] surrender. For instance, the law that enemy [=POWs=] must be given the same rations as one's own troops means the [=ScreeWee=] get a shipment of stereotypical gamer junk food ([[TakeThat which they find borderline inhumane]]).
84	%%* FieryRedhead: Kirsty.
85	* FlatEarthAtheist: William Stickers, despite acknowledgement of his own death and proximity to his own gravestone, dismisses the notion of life after death.
86	-->'''Solomon Einstein:''' You don't tzink... that it is worth reconsidering your opinions in the light of experimental evidence?
87	-->'''William Stickers:''' Don't think you can get round me just because you're accidentally right!
88	%%zce* For Want Of A Nail
89	* AFriendInNeed: In ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', when Johnny realizes Bigmac has seen his friends crash the car they stole, he is running after him before he even thinks; he stops Bigmac from getting too close.
90	* FriendToAllLivingThings: Johnny is a bit of a soft touch, and his compassion for those in need is what drives the plot of all three books. ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' even mentions he rescues spiders that fall into the bathtub, which makes him bristle at the Captain characterizing him as a ruthless killer because of his actions in what he thought was only a game. This makes Johnny all the more disturbed when his desperation not to let anyone get hurt during the game drives him into an UnstoppableRage, validating the Captain's HumansAreWarriors[=/=]HumansAreBastards view of him.
91	* FromTheMouthsOfBabes: Johnny's role in ''Johnny and the Dead'', when he shows up at the meeting to finalize the sale of the cemetery. Everything Johnny says, naive and clumsy as it is, only serves to make the adult onlookers realize how grasping and cynical the corporation's actions have been and how shameful their own complacency has been. (It starts with pointing out that the corporation rep insisting all questions be held for after the long, boring presentation is just a way of running out the clock and discouraging any citizens from actually participating in the meeting.)
92	** Happens also in ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', when his teacher leads a class discussion on UsefulNotes/TheGulfWar that breaks down into the predictable patriotism vs. pacifism sides, only for mediocre, quiet student Johnny to suddenly burst out in a surprisingly eloquent speech based on his dreams about the game, ranting not only about how WarIsHell and [[GrayAndGrayMorality makes easy moral judgments impossible]], but the distorted way the war is being fed back to non-combatants in the media means those who aren't there can never understand that.
93	** In the course of his TheReasonYouSuckSpeech at Kirsty in the same book, he points out the unfairness of how, despite not being an AcePilot like her, he has died over and over again simply because he was the only one who cared enough to listen to the [=ScreeWee=] and see the situation as more than a video game, causing a major toll on his grasp of reality, while she blithely accepted the whole thing at face value and thus sacrificed nothing. As he bitterly puts it, “Winner types don’t lose, they just come second!”
94	* FreePrizeAtTheBottom: A RunningGag in ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' is characters finding plastic alien action figures in their cereal. One of them is noted to look a bit like a [=ScreeWee=].
95	* FruitCart: Lampshaded in ''Only You Can Save Mankind''. Johnny wonders if it's actually the same marketplace each time and what the stallholders must think.
96	* FurAndLoathing: Subverted. Kirsty was noted for calling on old ladies for wearing fur, but she [[PrettyInMink puts on a fur coat]] as a disguise going back in time.
97	* TheGameComeToLife: The plot of ''Only You Can Save Mankind''.
98	* [[spoiler: GameOver: Johnny finds out in the end of ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' is a giant "GAME OVER" screen. For him, it marks the end of his adventure; for the [=ScreeWee=], it's a portal that lets them escape this universe for one [[AndTheAdventureContinues where they can chart a new destiny]].]]
99	* GenreSavvy: [[ConversationalTroping Continual references to movies]] make it clear the kids have some idea of what to expect.
100	* GetBackToTheFuture: Wobbler gets stranded in the forties by a GrandfatherParadox which the rest of the kids then have to repair.
101	* GhostAmnesia: The living need to remember. The dead need to forget.
102	* GoodWithNumbers: Bigmac has a natural ability at mathematics, which distresses him because "[[TallPoppySyndrome he tries really hard to be a big thicko]]".
103	* GrandfatherParadox: While visiting 1941, Wobbler inadvertently prevents his grandfather and grandmother getting together. He doesn't cease to exist outright, but finds that he's stuck in 1941, unable to return to the 1990s, until he fixes it.
104	* HauntedTechnology: Premature computer pioneer Addison Vincent Fletcher and Solomon Einstein, taxidermist cousin to [[UsefulNotes/AlbertEinstein the famous one]], seem able to directly commune with a telephone's inner workings. By the canal, they attune a broken old telly to the ghosts of its inner workings, and get a crystal-clear broadcast of ''[[Series/{{Neighbours}} Cob]][[Series/HomeAndAway bers]]''.
105	-->'''Johnny:''' It's the ''ghost'' of a television? ...But... look... machines aren't alive, so how can they have ghosts?
106	-->'''Solomon:''' But zey have ''existence''. From moment to moment. Zo, we find the right moment, yes?
107	-->'''Johnny:''' ...Nothing ever finishes. Nothing's ever really over.
108	* HitlersTimeTravelExemptionAct: After giving it some thought, they decide not to kill Hitler after all.
109	* HomelessPigeonPerson: Mrs. Tachyon and Guilty
110	* HumansAreBastards[=/=]HumansAreWarriors: The [=ScreeWee=] see humans as both, with the Captain being amazed that humans created “rules of war” (the Geneva Convention) and remarking several times on how eager humans are to fight compared to her own race. This causes friction between her and Johnny, who takes umbrage with being labelled as a bloodthirsty warrior due to his actions when, as far as he knew, he’d only been playing a video game.
111	* HypocriticalHumor: After Johnny successfully saves Wobbler's grandfather from dying in the bombing of Blackbury as a child, Wobbler then tries to prevent his grandfather's future death by motorcycle by warning him never to buy or ride one, which the child scornfully rejects. Wobbler loses his temper and declares the kid deserves to die in the future [[UngratefulBastard for being so rude to someone who was just trying to help]]. He then glances at the detailed list of life advice his older self from the alternate timeline left for him, crumples it up and tosses it.
112	* IHaveManyNames: Kirsty can't seem to make up her mind on what names she likes.
113	* ImMrFuturePopCultureReference: Yo-less' friends explain his presence to the Forties people in ''Johnny and the Bomb'' as him being a foreign prince -- "Prince Creator/{{Sega}}, all the way from Creator/{{Nintendo}}".
114	* ImplacableMan: the Screewee Empire are genuinely fearful of the protagonist's ability to keep coming back every time they kill him.
115	* InformedAttribute: As Johnny points out when he first meets the [=ScreeWee=], the box copy of their game says they're a race of [[TheConqueror genocidal conquerors]] who have already [[ApocalypseHow destroyed several human planets]], and therefore the humans killing them is justified self-defense. The [=ScreeWee=] dismiss all of this as [[WrittenByTheVictors in-universe propaganda]]. The written backstory of the game doesn't seem to become ''real'' the way the [=ScreeWee=] themselves do under the influence of Johnny's imagination -- possibly a TakeThat toward the paper-thin {{Excuse Plot}}s of games like this that [[GameplayAndStorySegregation have no relevance to the actual game experience]].
116	* InsistentTerminology: The dead people in ''Johnny and the Dead'' are very insistent that Johnny [[OurGhostsAreDifferent not refer to them by the term "ghosts"]], because "a ghost is something different... something very sad." It eventually transpires that the one dead person who committed suicide is, in fact, a ghost -- which seems to mean he is unable or unwilling to move on to the afterlife when the others do.
117	* InSpiteOfANail: In ''Johnny and the Bomb'', the protagonists overcome their worries about For Want of a Nail and save a couple dozen people from getting bombed. As a result a couple streets have different names and a few shops have changed, but that's about it.
118	* InsufferableGenius: Kirsty is smart, but shows no respect for other people.
119	* InventorOfTheMundane: [[spoiler: Wobbler]] is left in the past, unable to return to his time due to a paradox. While taking TheSlowPath, he uses his knowledge of the present to "invent" fast food restaurants and become wealthy.
120	* IronicEcho: Kirsty rather thoughtlessly blows off Yo-Less' aggravation when he's a victim of 40s-era institutionalized racism, telling him that "you people" should stop taking it so seriously. When she's later a victim of equally institutionalized 40s-era sexism, Yo-Less glibly tell her the exact same thing back.
121	* ItsForABook: The universal "out" for getting grownups to let you do things: "I'm doing a project on it."
122	* IWishItWereReal: Nobody made any wishes, but the aliens still gained some semblance of reality.
123	* JiveTurkey: Yo-less gets his nickname because he ''isn't'' one, and never says "yo".
124	%%* KillHimAlready: Johnny and the Gunnery Officer.
125	* LetsMeetTheMeat: A variation is discussed, Yo-less doesn't trust ice cream that wants you to eat other ice cream.
126	%%* LittleMissBadass: Kirsty.
127	* MagicalHomelessPerson: ''Johnny and the Bomb'' has Mrs. Tachyon, a crazy bag lady with the ability to travel in time.
128	* MagneticMedium: Johnny. In ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', he wonders if the [=ScreeWee=] have, from game space, come through a [[OurWormholesAreDifferent wormhole]] in his head. Yo-less and Wobbler suggest that Johnny may be some kind of shaman; a mediator between the realm of spirit and matter. In ''Johnny and the Dead'', this extra-dimensional faculty draws the attention of "post-senior citizens."
129	* {{Malaproper}}: Often comes from Johnny's supporting cast.
130	* MeaningfulName: Mrs. Tachyon. Tachyons are theoretical particles that move faster than the speed of light, which means they're also moving backwards in time.
131	* MediumAwareness: A big part of ''Only You Can Save Mankind''.
132	* TheMenInBlack: Referenced several times.
133	* MichaelJacksonsThrillerParody: See MoonwalkDance.
134	* MoonwalkDance: Johnny Maxwell and his 1990s gang teach the ghosts in the local cemetery -- all of whom died in the period 1850-1948 -- how to do the Moonwalk dance. (an affectionate parody of the Thriller video with real Undead). The sight of a corpulent Victorian mayor and a suffragette who died for her beliefs getting really into it is one that provokes much amusement.
135	* MookChivalry: Lampshaed by Johnny, who points out the only reason the [=ScreeWee=] are losing the war is because enemies in video games are programmed to line up one by one this way. This gets hideously subverted by the Gunnery Officer when he takes over - the massive wall of [=ScreeWee=] ships, all firing at once, wipes out any player character mere seconds after they spawn in.
136	* MrImagination: Johnny, to the point that his imaginations spills over into the real world.
137	%%* MurphysBullet: Of all the places to hit...
138	* NamesakeGag: In ''Johnny and the Dead'', [[StrangeMindsThinkAlike two unconnected people]] think that the telephone was invented by Sir Humphrey Telephone.
139	* NeverTheSelvesShallMeet: Johnny successfully avoided his past self. Very lucky for him and his lamp.
140	%% * NewspaperDating
141	* TheNicknamer: Johnny is the "official nickname generator".
142	* NighInvulnerability: Johnny and his Thousand Extra Lives.
143	* TheNineties: The books were written and (TimeTravel aside) set at this time. UsefulNotes/TheGulfWar is going on in the background in the first novel.
144	* NonActionGuy: Johnny and his friends, even Bigmac, who does his best to play TheHeavy. Kirsty, with her martial arts classes, is in fact the most combat-ready of all of them, although they are all barely-adolescent children.
145	** The [=ScreeWee=] Gunnery Officer is an interesting example of this trope -- all the males of his race are supposed to be [[NonActionGuy Non-Action Guys]], and his job title in particular means someone responsible for maintenance and training related to weapons ''outside'' of combat, with no direct role in battle. Despite this -- or perhaps [[BewaretheQuietOnes because of this]] -- he's the one who goes over the edge first and becomes a raving BloodKnight who tries to take over the fleet by KlingonPromotion.
146	* TheNondescript: Johnny's (un)defining feature. He's so painfully nondescript that when trying to tell Kirsty over the phone which one he is of the group of boys she saw at the store earlier, he can't do any better than "that other guy who just sort of tags along and who no one really notices."
147	-->'''Kirsty:''' Huh? [[CaptainObvious I didn't notice any guy like that.]]\
148	'''Johnny:''' Exactly! That was me!
149	* NoodleIncident: Johnny found the Loch Ness Monster in his goldfish pond, discovered a lost city behind Tescos and found a cave which may have had a wizard sleeping in it. We don't get told much more.
150	** The 'lost city behind Tesco' bit might be a reference to the Nomes series. Especially since this was later retconned as taking place in Blackbury.
151	* NoOSHACompliance: The alien spaceships after Kirsty gets there become quite dirty.
152	* NotAGame: War, that is. ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' goes into it several times.
153	* NothingExcitingEverHappensHere: It seems in-between their adventures the heroes are quite bored for most of the time.
154	* ObliquelyObfuscatedOccupation: In the second book, people keep asking representatives of the holding company trying to buy the cemetery what they actually do. Nobody ever gets an answer.
155	* OminousFog: Or rather mist, and [[DownplayedTrope Downplayed]] - when darkness nears, as Johnny brings his friends to the cemetery, a slight mist prefixes the arrival of a large crowd of dead. Johnny is at first terrified, although quickly realises there's nothing to fear.
156	* TheOneGuy: The Gunnery Officer is the only male member of the command crew on the alien ship.
157	* TheOnlyOne: Inverted. The players of the video game respawn, while the aliens are KilledOffForReal. Also, you're not the only one who can save mankind, and mankind isn't really in that much danger -- the aliens are.
158	* OntologicalInertia: Present but not absolute.
159	* OopNorth: Blackbury
160	* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: As noted in ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', Johnny rarely gets angry - but when he ''does'', people take notice. His rant on the Gulf War gets his class staring at him, and his TheReasonYouSuckSpeech against Kirsty leaves her open-mouthed in shock.
161	* OpeningScroll: Parodied, and described as "the bit [the developers of the titular computer game] stole from ''Franchise/StarWars''".
162	* OldSchoolDogfight: Though the spaceships in ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' have a few missiles, most of the work has to be done by guns.
163	* OneManArmy: In the original ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' game this is the (predictable) premise of the game, with the player as humanity's last pilot in an experimental SuperPrototype craft. Subverted and played straight at the same time in the story -- Johnny becomes a OneManArmy as the only human player who accepted the [=ScreeWee=] surrender and gave them safe passage, but finds he has to fight against identical clones of his own supposedly unique vessel, piloted by other players of the game.
164	* OneWingedAngel: [[spoiler: The Gunnery Officer, once he fully embraces his species' original purpose of being monstrous antagonists, becomes a grotesque amalgam of every sci-fi horror alien in Johnny and Kirsty's memories.]]
165	* OnlyKnownByTheirNickname: Bigmac, Wobbler, and Yo-less. We do eventually find out Wobbler and Bigmac's names, though Johnny has to stop and think about it for a while before remembering what they are.
166	* OrWasItADream: It seems Johnny's adventures are taking place in between his own imagination and the real world. Although Kirsty and her [[spoiler: pickled onion]] point towards the latter.
167	** WordOfGod [[http://www.lspace.org/books/apf/johnny-and-the-bomb.html sums it up]]: "Is what happens in the books real? Yes. Does it all happen in Johnny's head? Yes."
168	** At one point Johnny is referred to as the 20th-century suburban equivalent of a shaman, someone with the gift for mediating between the real world and the world of dreams and spirits.
169	* OurGhostsAreDifferent: And resent the term.
170	** While they tend to look grey, as though by a trick of the light, older ones look less substantial; some variably transparent. Mr Vicenti claims the cemetery's dead to be something other than ghosts; and that Johnny's attention somehow rouses them to engage with the living world.
171	* PaintingTheMedium: Kirsty can pronounce ''italics'' [and brackets].
172	* PatrioticFervor: Bigmac in ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', which is set during the First Gulf War. His attempts to inspire it among the other boys, especially Johnny, aren't successful.
173	* PhoneCallFromTheDead: Just outside the cemetery, the dead study a phone box. Shortly afterwards, Wonderful Radio Blackbury's Mike Mikes Radio Show is disrupted, on all lines, by several voices aggrieved at the cemetery's planned demolishing. Alone at home, Johnny's grandfather later takes a call from a local joke shop proprietor not seen since 1958...
174	-->'''Johnny:''' Maybe being dead's like... electricity or something.
175	* PoliceAreUseless: Not only do they get in the way, but they fail to get in the way very successfully.
176	* PoliticallyCorrectHistory: Averted in a scene in which a shopkeeper in 1941 uses a racial insult to refer to Yo-less. He is about as impressed as you'd expect.
177	* ProudWarriorRaceGuy: The [=ScreeWee=] are ''supposed'' to be this because of the role they were invented for in the game, but it turns out most of them hate fighting and only want the war to be over. In the Captain's opinion, it's ''[[HumansAreWarriors humans]]'' who are the BloodKnight race. When Johnny protests that he's no killer and to him the war is only a game, she merely asks [[YouBastard what kind of species would find amusement in playing games based on war]].
178	* PunnyName:
179	** [[http://blog.debiles-grinsen.de/?p=39 William Stickers]].
180	** In addition to being a {{portmanteau}} of real [[OopNorth Northern English]] place names, "Blackbury" is (in most UK dialects) pronounced the same as "blackberry", a fact which is {{lampshade\|Hanging}}d in ''Johnny and the Dead'' when "The Blackbury Preservation Society" and "The Blackbury Conservation Society" are both rejected as names due to sounding too much like jam.
181	* RainOfSomethingUnusual: In ''Johnny And The Bomb'', a bomb lands on the pickle factory during the Blackbury Blitz, causing a short rain of vinegar. Kirsty also mentions a mysterious rain of fish from last September ("You mean, when there was that gas leak under the tropical fish shop?")
182	* RammingAlwaysWorks: Johnny realizes he's completely outmatched by Kirsty as a pilot and this is the only way to stop her rampage through the [=ScreeWee=] fleet. Even then, it only works because he distracts her by speaking to her.
183	* RealityWarper: Johnny when in a state of extreme stress. Or sick with the flu.
184	* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech: Johnny loses patience with Kirsty and delivers one of these calling her out on multiple levels; her InsufferableGenius tendencies, her mistaken CommonalityConnection with the Captain, her [[RefusalOfTheCall ignoring of the surrender plea due to her obsession with winning]] and the fact that she, a more talented player who could have easily saved the [=ScreeWee=], sat back and watched while he, a clumsy and less-skilled UnlikelyHero, died multiple times doing the same thug. It leaves Kirsty [[JawDrop open-mouthed in shock]].
185	* RefusalOfTheCall: Kirsty actually got the [=ScreeWee=] surrender message first, but ignored it due to being hyper-fixated on winning the game. Johnny chews her out on this [see above), pointing out that had she listened, she could have done a much better job of protecting them than he had.
186	* ReptilesAreAbhorrent: The [=ScreeWee=] are LizardFolk (crossed with having some amphibian traits) mainly because of this trope, being a stereotype of AlwaysChaoticEvil enemies, although under Johnny's influence they gain a bit more depth. Notably the "abhorrent" traits get played up when Kirsty is contributing to the fantasy.
187	** The Captain draws Johnny's attention to some of the irony of this trope -- because they are cold-blooded and sedentary creatures, the [=ScreeWee=] are much less suited to war and have much less taste for it than humans seem to.
188	* ResignedToTheCall: Johnny. As contrasted with Kirsty, who tends to [[JumpedAtTheCall Jump At The Call]].
189	* RespawningEnemies: Played with. It turns out the [=ScreeWee=] ''seem'' to respawn indefinitely but their numbers are, in the "reality" of Johnny's imagination, finite. Confirmed horrifyingly when Johnny finds out that after his dad's generation all stopped playing VideoGame/SpaceInvaders, the Invaders' civilization went extinct.
190	* RiddleForTheAges: We never find out what United Amalgamated Consolidated Holdings actually ''does''.
191	* RippedFromTheHeadlines: The plot of ''Johnny and the Dead'' comes straight from a contemporary scandal when Westminster Council sold three cemeteries for 5p each.
192	** In a subtler example, ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' was inspired by the wall-to-wall TV footage of smart bombs hitting Iraq during the UsefulNotes/TheGulfWar, coinciding with heavy coverage of VideoGame/WingCommander and its imitators as being among the first truly "cinematic" space combat sims. As Pratchett said in his preface to the 2004 reprint, "Games looked like war and war looked like a game", which leads to the reality slippage between the two Johnny experiences.
193	* RippleEffectProofMemory: But only for Johnny [[spoiler: and Kirsty]].
194	* RubberBandHistory: To a degree.
195	* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Johnny pulls one after losing his temper with the Captain, offended by her remarks on what she perceives as [[HumansAreWarriors the savagery of humans]]. This backfires horribly when he is blown up by enemy players, leaving the fleet open to a particularly devastating attack.
196	* SchrodingersButterfly: At one point in ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', Johnny briefly becomes uncertain whether he's a boy who's having recurring dreams about being a space pilot or a space pilot who's having recurring dreams about being a boy.
197	* SeinfeldianConversation: While discussing the possibility of TeleFrag (see below), they use the example of your body being teleported into occupying the same area as a fridge, and then get sidetracked by arguing about whether you can say a fridge is made up of 'fridge atoms' or 'fridge molecules' or not.
198	* SeriousBusiness: The entire series revolves around Johnny taking a serious look at things other people dismiss as unimportant. Also, Kirsty takes ''everything'' seriously.
199	* SesquipedalianLoquaciousness: The Captain trying to talk about Earth food. "Pressed wheat extractions treated with sucrose" indeed. [[spoiler:Breakfast cereal.]]
200	* SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong: Present.
201	* ShipperOnDeck: Kirsty's mom for Kirsty and Johnny, although she may just be happy Kirsty is interacting with other people at all.
202	* ShootEmUp: ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', the game-within-the-book, is this, which makes negotiation difficult -- "they don't make joysticks with a Don't Fire button".
203	* ShoppingCartOfHomelessness: Mrs Tachyon's shopping trolley.
204	* ShoutOut: Quite a few: [[http://www.lspace.org/books/apf/only-you-can-save-mankind.html]], [[http://www.lspace.org/books/apf/johnny-and-the-dead.html]], [[http://www.lspace.org/books/apf/johnny-and-the-bomb.html]].
205	** Mrs. Tachyon would like you to know [[Literature/FeetOfClay MILLENNIUM HAND AND SHRIMP!]]
206	** The dark-robed boatman who collects one of the dead at the end of the second book [[AC: sounds awfully familiar]].
207	** The basic setup of the graveyard in ''Johnny and the Dead'' appears to be modeled on the afterlife in Theatre/OurTown, with the dead people keeping vigil at the location of their graves, idly discussing their lives on Earth. (It even has the most cynical and misanthropic of them be the one who committed suicide.)
208	** ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' mentions VideoGame/SpaceInvaders by name, and retcons the blocky alien sprites as modular space habitats.
209	** Kirsty has a poster of a [[Franchise/{{Alien}} Xenomorph]], and in game space, goes by the name of [[Creator/SigourneyWeaver Sigourney]].
210	** Around Halloween, the Blackbury Odeon screens ''Film/{{Ghostbusters\|1984}}'', ''[[Film/LivingDeadSeries Wednesday of the Living Dead]]'', and one of the ''Franchise/ANightmareOnElmStreet'' films.
211	* ShroudedInMyth: In ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', Johnny helps Bigmac after he saw his friends crash their stolen car; this gets mutated, by the next morning, into his having pulled him from the wreck.
212	* TheSlowPath: [[spoiler:Wobbler]] gets trapped in 1941 and has to get back to the 1990s the long way.
213	* TheSmartGuy: Kirsty. Yo-less sometimes fills in.
214	* TheSmurfettePrinciple: Kirsty absolutely refuses to fit this trope, instead referring to the others as "four token boys".
215	* SnapBack: Neither ''Johnny and the Dead'' nor ''Johnny and the Bomb'' ever mention the weird events in the previous books. (The events of ''Johnny and the Bomb'' are themselves subject to LaserGuidedAmnesia but no such thing is mentioned about ghosts and the [=ScreeWee=].) Particularly blatant with Kirsty persistently acting as an AgentScully when the video game coming to life in ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' is the only reason she and Johnny ever even met.
216	* SoapBoxSadie: Kirsty is a ruthlessly efficient version.
217	* SoleSurvivor: Only one of the "Blackbury Pals" made it home from UsefulNotes/WorldWarI.
218	* SpaceFighter: In ''Only You Can Save Mankind''
219	* SpaceIsNoisy: Johnny finds out that space has a background noise, a low frequency hum. But since that part of the book may or may not take place in his dreams, it cannot be taken at face value. [[MindScrew Maybe.]]
220	* StealthPun: Johnny's sometime nickname, revealed in ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', is "Rubber". For those unfamiliar with British slang, a "rubber johnny" is a condom.
221	* StereotypicalNerd: Note the Geeky Wobbler's ambitions which invokes the trope: "Wobbler wanted to be a nerd, but they wouldn't let him join. He wanted to be the kid in a deformed anorak and milk-bottom glasses who designs killer software and is a millionaire at thirty. Failing that he'd settle for being someone whose computer [[WalkingTechbane didn't smell of burning plastic whenever he touched it]]."
222	* StrangeMindsThinkAlike: In ''Johnny and the Dead'', both Bigmac and the Dead come up with the idea that the telephone might have been [[NamesakeGag invented by Sir Humphrey Telephone]].
223	* SubliminalSeduction: Wobbler once returned a Music/CliffRichard record (changed to Pat Boone in the US edition), claiming that when he played it backwards he could hear messages about staying in school and going to church.
224	* SuicidalPacifism: The main issue Johnny has with protecting the [=ScreeWee=] in ''Only You Can Save Mankind''. Because the Captain thinks that surrendering to Johnny is the same as surrendering to mankind as a whole, the fleet won't fire back on ''any'' player character despite vastly outnumbering any and all player characters. Many of the [=ScreeWee=] soon take umbrage with this due to the losses this incurs, and the Gunnery Officer uses it as a platform to get dissidents to rally around him.
225	* SuicideIsShameful: In ''Johnny and the Dead'', this seems to be the attitude of most of the spirits toward [[spoiler:Mr. Grimm]]; they aren't willing to talk about his death when Johnny asks, and merely darkly mutter that it's not a suitable topic for discussion. Justified by the fact that, of course, it was the prevailing attitude when they were alive. At the time [[spoiler:Mr. Grimm]] died, the newspaper wasn't willing to give it any significant coverage -- it takes Johnny until more or less the end to learn the truth -- and he was buried with a tiny gravestone that simply gave his name and the dates of his life.
226	* SuspiciouslySpecificDenial: In ''Johnny and the Bomb'', Wobbler is unconvinced by Bigmac's claim that he doesn't know a thing, especially not about burgers.
227	* TalkativeLoon: Mrs. Tachyon.
228	* TalkingInYourDreams: In ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', Johnny has recurring dreams of being a fighter pilot in the world of the video game. Then he recognizes the voice of another pilot as a girl he's seen around the game shop, and is able to strike up a conversation that leads to them meeting in the real world.
229	* TakeThat: The [=ScreeWee=] Captain takes pains to point out how lacking in nutrients Johnny's diet of sterotypical gamer junk food is. Although, by her admission, her species' diet of waterweed isn't much better, being much higher in nutrients but tasting foul.
230	* TeleFrag: It is theorized that occupying the same place as a solid object might be a very bad idea, for reasons involving [[StuffBlowingUp the atoms fusing together]].
231	* TheTetrisEffect: Johnny initially believes his starfighter dreams are merely an example of this.
232	* ThereAreNoTherapists: Johnny is shocked to find this is the case in 1941 after a street is bombed; the victims are offered tea and start picking up the rubble almost immediately.
233	* TheUnchosenOne: In ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', Johnny finds out Kirsty actually received the [=ScreeWee=] surrender message before he did, and was their original choice for the "Chosen One", but was too fixated on winning the game and [[RefusalOfTheCall ignored it]]. See "Unlikely Hero" below.
234	* TimelineAlteringMacGuffin: Averted.
235	* TimeMachine: A shopping trolley of all things.
236	* TimeMaster: [[spoiler: Johnny, but only for a little while.]]
237	* TimePolice: Referenced but averted.
238	* TimeTravel
239	* TimeTravelForFunAndProfit: [[spoiler: Wobbler opens a fast-food restaurant after being trapped in the past.]] Also whenever someone gives Mrs Tachyon a coin, she goes to whatever date is printed on it to spend it, getting the maximum value for money, e.g. if a 10p given in the '90s is dated 1961, it can be spent as 2 shillings or 24pence in 1961.
240	* TimeTravelersAreSpies: Both Bigmac and Wobbler get mistaken for spies.
241	* TheTimeTravellersDilemma: A brief concern soon forgotten.
242	* TimeTravelTenseTrouble: "There's an old windmill up there. It was some kind of look-out post during the war. Is, I mean."
243	* TogetherInDeath: A non-romantic example in ''Johnny and the Dead'', when at Tommy Atkins' funeral the spirits of his old comrades in the Blackbury Pals (all of whom had died in the WWI trenches) show up to greet him. Tommy, now looking like the young man he was when he fought alongside them instead of the nonagenarian he died as, happily takes his place in their ranks, and they all march off back to the old battlefield in France where the other Pals died.
244	* {{Tradesnark}}: The opening scroll of the in-story game ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' has TM signs liberally scattered across it. Only You Can Save Mankind™ from the Screewee Empire™! In a bonus joke, the small print at the end reveals that it's the words "Mankind" and "Empire" that are trademarks of the software publisher, not the whole phrases.
245	* TwoDSpace: ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' is a post-VideoGame/WingCommander space shooter and thus takes place in a true 3-D environment (unlike Johnny's dad's beloved VideoGame/SpaceInvaders). However, most of the players (like [[Film/StarTrekIITheWrathOfKhan Khan]]) instinctively think two-dimensionally, only thinking to move along the Z-axis after awkwardly positioning themselves in 2D space. When Johnny sees that Kirsty ''doesn't'' think like this and flies around in 3D as naturally as a bird he has a major OhCrap moment.
246	* UnlikelyHero: The whole point of Johnny's character is this. None of the people who are obsessed enough with the ''Only You Can Save Mankind'' game to be ''good'' at it would ever think to see the game from the aliens' perspective; only a loser like Johnny would end up in his situation. Same with ''Johnny and the Dead'', where the all the local politicians and businessmen who understand the situation just let the cemetery acquisition happen and only Johnny cares enough to stop it. Made explicit in ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', where he throws a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech at Kirsty -- about how unfair it is that the world is set up so that the people with the useful skills and resources are also the ones who, in the course of acquiring them, have come to accept the world the way it is, and it's up to naïve, clumsy outsiders like him to actually care about fixing things.
247	* UnstoppableRage:
248	** At Kirsty's prioritising of her ego over helping the [=ScreeWee=], Johnny succumbs to a rare, brief outburst.
249	** On finding [[spoiler: the war-crazed Gunnery Officer to have shot dead several officers]], the Captain engages him in a [=ScreeWee=] dual of teeth and claws.
250	** When two hired vandals manhandle Johnny and Yo-less, Bigmac grabs a detached cemetery railing and runs screaming towards them. [[spoiler: He bites one of the goons on the ear, and gets punched in the stomach]].
251	-->'''Bigmac:''' ''Yer what?'' ''Yer what?'' ''Yer what?'' ''I'm MENTAL, me!''
252	* UnstuckInTime: Mrs. Tachyon's mind.
253	* UnusuallyUninterestingSight: Johnny reacts to seeing the Captain in his room by remarking that his neighbour will go spare if she’s parked in front of their driveway. Granted, he's suffering a high fever at the time and assumes he’s hallucinating.
254	* UrbanFantasy
255	* UsedFuture: Johnny's imagination paints the inside of his starfighter as having a kind of "grimy cleanliness" about it. The alien ship is cleaner and shinier when he visits, because that's the way alien ships look in his head, but gets dirtier when Kirsty visits, because her idea of a spaceship is influenced by movies like ''Alien''.
256	* VanInBlack: One chases Johnny and Kirsty.
257	* VillainousAdviceSong: "What Are We Waiting For?" by the Gunnery Officer in the musical adaptation of ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', as he tries to persuade his fellow [=ScreeWee=] to side with him against the Captain's wish for peace.
258	* WalkingTechbane: Wobbler, half the time.
259	* WeirdnessCensor: People find it difficult to notice anything amiss, even when it's staring them right in the face. Johnny's complete lack of one is a major factor in the books.
260	* WeirdnessMagnet: Johnny.
261	* WellIntentionedExtremist: The Gunnery Officer is initially this, before turning AxCrazy. Kirsty can sometimes get carried away as well.
262	* WhatMeasureIsANonHuman: Perhaps the entire point of ''Only You Can Save Mankind''
263	* WhenAllYouHaveIsAHammer: An accusation leveled at Kirsty by Johnny.
264	* TheWhitestBlackGuy: Johnny and his friends nickname their black friend "Yo-less", specifically because he doesn't talk, dress, or behave like the then-current stereotypes of a black male ([[DontExplainTheJoke including the then-considered-black-specific slang "yo"]]).
265	* WhereTheHellIsSpringfield: The location of "Blackbury" is never specifically mentioned, but it is a decaying post-industrial town of the sort whose decay was accelerated in TheEighties by UsefulNotes/MargaretThatcher. It is usually thought of as being OopNorth: the name is a portmanteau of genuine Northern English placenames: Blackburn, Bury, Dewsbury. Interestingly enough, one of the local papers slso serves a neighbouring town called [[Literature/NomesTrilogy Grimethorpe]], suggesting Johnny Maxwell and the Nomes live in the same universe not too far away.
266	* WinToExit: More accurately, "Exit To Win". The 'Border' that the Screewee must cross is revealed to be [[spoiler:a giant screen with the words "{{GAME OVER}}" on it.]]
267	* WithDueRespect: In ''Only You Can Save Mankind'', the Navigation Officer ends her objection with "With respect."
268	* WomenAreWiser: Kirsty thinks this, being a bit of a StrawFeminist. Interestingly this seems to be the case with the [=ScreeWee=] officers, with the only male, the Gunnery Officer, being the one who goes off the deep end. But it's an inversion, with the [=ScreeWee=] being a matriarchy where the females are larger and stronger; indeed, the Captain theorizes it's the stress of going outside his prescribed gender role that caused the Gunnery Officer to crack.
269	* XenomorphXerox: [[InvokedTrope Invoked]]. In game space, whose structure is affected by Johnny and Kirsty's expectations, the war-crazed Gunnery Officer [[spoiler: abruptly appears larger, with barely visible eyes; huge teeth, and [[InsectoidAliens insectoid]] features. Defensively shot dead by Johnny, the Gunnery Officer reverts to his smaller [=ScreeWee=] form]].
270	%%* YouGoGirl: Kirsty.
271	* YourTomcatIsPregnant: The goldfish Adolf and Stalin, who had offspring.
272
273	!!The TV adaptations additionally contains examples of the following tropes:
274
275	* AccidentalKiss: Kirsty gets overexcited and kisses Johnny.
276	* AdaptationNameChange: In ''Johnny and the Bomb'', Wobbler's first name is changed to Walter.
277	* PromotedToLoveInterest: In the ''Johnny and the Bomb'' movie, Kirsty is sweet on Johnny, though the book never explicitly stated such a thing.
278	* SexySoakedShirt: Kirsty's clothes get wet in ''Johnny And The Bomb''. As if she wasn't upset enough about having to wear a [[BerserkButton frock.]]
279

Context Literature / JohnnyMaxwellTrilogy