Darth Wiki / Space Verona

"This week on Sexy Verona..."

Megan

Two tropers, both alike in an abiding and perhaps overzealous love for the Hungarian incarnation of Romeo et Juliette: De La Haine a l'Amour ,

In various instant messengers lay their scene:
Where they play out an increasingly Off the Rails Alternate Universe version of Shakespeare's Verona,

Because one of the tropers had slashy dream.

From forth the heated keyboards of these two friends,

A sort of Schizo Tech Renaissance comes to life,

Wherein they focus almost exclusively on the supporting cast.

The plot eventually progresses to include totally non-canonical sex, wars, Alternate History, and strife.

The tropes present in their squee-marked roleplay

Are now the content of this page.

And now, if you would like to read them,

Just scroll down; this page will be subject to continuous amends.

An unpublished, Author Appeal-tastic roleplay based on an already rather bastardized adaptation of Romeo and Juliet that first came into being when Megan (one of the players) told Sarrin (the other) about a... we'll say interesting dream of Slash Fic between a mostly film-based version of Adrian Veidt and Szilveszter Szabó's portrayal of Tybalt. It was agreed that this was really, really hot and needed to be RPed, though Veidt was swiftly replaced by a namesake expy, Adriano Della Scala, who also occupies the role of the Prince of Verona from the original story but sort of gradually became less of a straight-up Veidt insertion and more like Veidt's much less successful and more doubtful twin brother. (It's practically a Running Gag for Megan to point out how disgusted the actual Veidt would be with a lot of Adriano's actions.)

As time progressed on the game, something approaching an actual timeline and story began to emerge, along with other characters (mostly based, as with Tybalt, on their portrayals in the Hungarian musical, though some of them are original to the story). Most prominent among them is Mercutio, Adriano's nephew, based on Zoltán Bereckzi's portrayal, and later joined by Giovanna, his niece and Tybalt's eventual wife (after all of a day of acquaintance). After about six months of play, it's gotten complicated enough that the players frequently make jokes about it being prime fodder of a TV show along the lines of The Tudors or The Borgias.^note Logic would state that such a TV show would be called The Della Scalas, but Adriano ended up being way more of a Decoy Protagonist than anticipated. That doesn't change the fact that even before The Borgias premiered, Megan once described the game as "that awkward moment when you kind of turn Adrian Veidt into a Borgia."

Despite the name, it is not in fact Verona IN SPACE, but was rather simply nicknamed Space Verona based on how borderline Dune-ish the Hungarian costumes look. If you're looking for an actual sci-fi Romeo and Juliet that also, coincidentally, happens to have a vastly more sympathetic Tybalt than in Shakespeare, please see Romeo × Juliet.

There are also tropes organized by character on the handy-dandy character sheet.

TROPES FOUND BANDYING IN VERONA'S STREETS:

• Adorkable: Valentine, the middle brother in Mercutio's family.
• Anachronism Stew: They have photographs, small handheld pistols, coed armed forces, actual trousers, and implied Steampunk or perhaps Clock Punk technology, but the Victorian era has been referenced as coming centuries after this story. Neither player has officially decided what the hell's going on with that.
• Angrish: There are probably people in Verona who think this is Tybalt's first language.
• Badass Longcoat: Tybalt's uniforms, as well as just general Tybalt attire.
• Badass Normal: Both Adriano and Tybalt.
• Beast and Beauty: Tybalt and Giovanna. He's in his mid-twenties and already beginning to get some grey in his hair, Covered with Scars, blind in one eye, in the habit of wearing a rather intimidating mask that hides some facial disfigurement and the aforementioned blind eye, epileptic, frighteningly short-tempered with anybody but Giovanna, sado-masochistic (once again, apparently except with her) and self-loathing. She's a pretty fifteen-year-old, albeit one who's recently undergone quite the Traumatic Haircut at the time of their marriage (which she thinks makes her considerably less of a beauty, even if Tybalt strongly disagrees) and with definite Royal Brat tendencies. They adore each other, in their own ways.
• Becoming the Mask: See this page's entry for Perfectly Arranged Marriage.
• Belligerent Sexual Tension: Mercutio and Tybalt used to have quite a lot of hatesex.
  • Adriano and Tybalt's relationship has managed to downgrade to this.
• Big, Screwed-Up Family: Comes with Capulet territory, and then the Della Scalas get in on the act to an even greater extent. The Montagues almost got here, but Lady Montague conveniently disposed of her husband when it seemed he was determined to raise his son and nephew under the same system that Capulet used to break and reshape Tybalt into the blood knight he ended up becoming, and despite the fact that that meant a little spousal murder in the family it kept the boys normal and happy.
• Bifauxnen: Clara the Younger in her brother's clothing. She even reenacts the first half of the original love story with Juliet in Romeo's place, pretending to be a boy at the ball.
• Blood Knight: Tybalt, though he's coming down from that a bit.
• Brother–Sister Incest: When Adriano and Clara were children, all the stories they were read involved the prince and princess getting together in the end. Um... let's just say they headed into adolescence a little confused.
• Buffy Speak: If angrish is Tybalt's native tongue, Buffy Speak is Giovanna's.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Adriano.... has tendencies in this direction, though it's mostly just eccentricity.
• Captain Smooth and Sergeant Rough: Both played straight and subverted by Adriano occasionally nodding to Tybalt to back off so he can be the one showing his displeasure with a troublemaker by throwing them into things.
  • And Tybalt enjoys the show.
• Cast Incest: Bereczki Zoltán and Szinetár Dóra are married IRL. Mercutio and Júlia are actually cousins in the AU due to Júlia's secretly being Adriano's child from his and Diana's affair.
• Casual Kink
• The Chains of Commanding: Adriano has been sleeping uneasily for the last year or so, despite how Tybalt attempts to calm him.
• The Charmer: Mercutio. He's pretty hard to turn down.
• Chick Magnet: Romeo.
• Christianity is Catholic: Justified by the setting.
• The Clan: The Capulets. The Montagues kind of fuse with the Della Scalas, who would count if they didn't all apparently hate each other too.
• Cleans Up Nicely: Several instances with Tybalt, the first moment he sees him in the RP hilariously close to that in how Tybalt was on a balcony in formal attire and Adriano looked up at him below and realized how well he grew up. Tybalt's first appearance in his uniform fit this pretty well, too.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Párisz. The other characters never know when he's serious or not.
• Clueless Chick-Magnet: Though most of them are scared of him, a few of the maids apparently think it'd be kind of fun to be his wife, if servant gossip is to be given any weight.
• Coitus Uninterruptus: Adriano and Tybalt. Frequently.
• Combat Sadomasochist: Tybalt, though again, he's calming down somewhat.
• Comforting the Widow: Adriano's courtship of Veronica Montague somehow manages to feel like this despite her being widowed for over a decade by the time he gets to her. The fact that he is mainly interested in her for heirmaking and casual sex mixed with friendship rather than love with a side of what a regal-looking couple they'd make, and that she killed her first husband, probably doesn't help.
• Conveniently Common Kink: The triumvirate of Mercutio-Adriano-Tybalt tends to have all of the same ones.
• Costume Porn: True, some of the clothing is so damn hot that this is almost literal, but for the most part, Sarrin and Megan just freaking like clothes okaaay.
• Crazy-Prepared: Tybalt, and how he's always got like a billion weapons on him.
• Crossover: After seven months of playing, the dramatis personae of The Borgias became supporting characters.
• Cursed with Awesome: Admittedly, losing the sight in one eye is terrible, but Adriano finds Tybalt's scorched eye mesmerizing.
• Custom Uniform of Sexy: Tybalt. Then when he got a boost in rank he got an upgrade.
• Cuteness Equals Forgiveness: Mercutio's secret superpower is being adorable.
• Dances and Balls
• Dead Guy Junior: Clara the Younger.
• Deadly Upgrade: Tybalt was already well-known in Verona for being a mix of instability, rage, and years of discipline and training. After being prepared by Adriano for war, he's gotten better. Or worse.
• Death Glare: Tybalt's default expression.
• Decoy Protagonist: Or deuteragonist, rather. Regardless, both authors were rather surprised to realize as time went on that this wasn't the dual and equal story of Tybalt and Adriano and their sex life, but rather more strongly Tybalt's personal story all along. Adriano is really just an important supporting role.
• Deliberately Cute Child: Mercutio, and unsurprisingly Adriano, were both this as children. Adriano attempted this once to seduce his tutor. It didn't work, partially because he was still ill at the time and partially because while relationships between adults and pretty-much-adult-looking mid-to-older teens might be okay by Renaissance standards, Adriano still looked all of eleven or twelve at age fifteen.
• Destructo-Nookie: Tybalt and Mercutio. All the time.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: Tybalt, being, well, Tybalt, owns a lot of whips, chains, leather gloves, knives... you know, various items of danger and badassery. He keeps them all in the top door of his dresser. Which is also where he keeps a bottle of, um, oil. Adriano couldn't resist a few jabs at Tybalt when he went to retrieve it, which Tybalt didn't have much to comment on.
  • Adriano: "Is this a ball gag?"
• Don't Make Me Take My Belt Off!: When Tybalt first came to the Capulet household as a child.
• The Dragon: Tybalt becomes this to Adriano when the prince goes all Anti-Villain Well-Intentioned Extremist on Italy's collective asses.
• Embarrassing First Name: That whole "Prince of Cats" thing in Shakespeare regarding Tybalt wasn't just the Bard being poetic, it was because there actually was a popular fairy tale figure named Tybalt who was, in fact, the prince of cats. Much like a modern kid saddled with the name Anakin or Harry, Tybalt really hates it.
• Embarrassing Nickname: See the above.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: This manages to happen even in an RP based mainly on roles that are themselves only supporting in Shakespeare- namely, both players think Paris is hilariously awesome.
• Ethical Slut: This seems to be fairly close to how Adriano sees himself, or at least tries to. Yes, he's sleeping with Tybalt and his wife at the same time, but he also made sure Veronica was totally aware of the situation before she married him. The problem is that Tybalt wasn't fond of this idea to begin with, and when it became obvious that Adriano and Veronica genuinely had chemistry, Veronica became increasingly averse to the concept of sharing Adriano too...
• Even the Guys Want Him: There always seem to be a couple of male servants and soldiers under Tybalt's command carrying a torch for him, not that he notices. Though this also applies to Adriano and Mercutio, it's less demonstrable.
• Everyone Is Bi: An alternate description of this AU could be "That version of R&J where it's not a tragedy because everyone ends up in gay relationships instead." The only characters this doesn't seem to apply to are Ladies Capulet and Montague, Benvolio and Giovanna (who are entirely straight) and Valentine (who just might be asexual.
• Everyone Is Related: Giovanna deduces this as she becomes more comfortable with the idea of marriage to Tybalt.
• Evil Uncle: Well, more like Blatantly Insensitive And Careless Uncle.
  Mercutio: I'm sure she wants to marry the notorious Captain Valentio from Verona. Who wouldn't. What a catch.
  Adriano: Large words from someone who wanted to keep him all to himself.
  Mercutio: Well, this Della Scala knows he's a screw-up. That one is very much used to feeling otherwise.
  Adriano: I did take her feelings into account, you know.
  Mercutio: I'm sure you did. And this is why the whole nest of baby Della Scalas loathes uncle Adriano.
• Expy: Adriano is Adrian Veidt. Or at least started that way. He kind of sucks at Veidting. Clara the Younger is Rosalind from As You Like It, namely, the film version with Bryce Dallas Howard.
• The Fighting Narcissist: Although thankfully not all the time, Adriano is so this on the battlefield it's perfectly ridiculous, and though he finds Tybalt's scars beautiful, he admits he'd have lost it if he'd been wounded on the face. Wait....how are these two the protagonists, again?
• First Boy Wins: Mercutio is Romeo's childhood friend. In this version, he ends up his lover instead of losing him to Juliet.
• Freakiness Shame:
  • Tybalt angsts to no end about his damaged face after the war, but his minorly-scorched, albeit blinded eye looks like something you'd see through a telescope, and Adriano entreats him to remove his mask whenever they're alone.
  • Tybalt himself really likes how Giovanna looks with most of her hair cut off, despite how much she herself hates it.
• Freaky Is Cool:
  Giovanna: (while looking at Tybalt maskless) I like your weird.
• Geeky Turn-On: Adriano's fanboying of Alexander the Great, which he infected Tybalt with, has lead to role-playing as Alexander and his lover Haephestion. In bed.
• Getting Hot in Here: Mercutio visited during a heat spell. Adriano was unwittingly hot as he kept trying to battle against getting overheated by pulling at his collar.
• Handicapped Badass: Tybalt's already epileptic at the start of the story and later loses his vision in one eye. He can still kick your ass.
• Hands-On Approach: Adriano teaching Tybalt anything. Tybalt tends to get kind of distracted.
• Handsome Lech: Can anyone turn down Mercutio? Really, now.
• Hell-Bent for Leather: Tybalt. Does he own anything else?
• High-School Hustler: Mercutio, albeit one who is not in high school.
• Hot Consort: Veronica.
• I Control My Minions Through...: There seems to be a lot of variety in Verona. Adriano is pretty convincing as an authority figure (though he wasn't able to end the feud until he could pull Tybalt out of it): he is feared, admired, powerful, and of noble birth. He's also got that whole idealism thing going for him. And then there's his second-in-command, Tybalt, who's just terrifying. Tybalt is controlled through being in love with him to the point of being pretty much whipped, sometimes literally.
• I Was Quite a Looker: Diana Capulet takes this attitude rather bitterly.... even though she's gorgeous.
• If It's You, It's Okay: Romeo with Mercutio could potentially be read as this.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Tybalt's pretty skilled at dishing this out on the battlefield.
• Important Haircut: Unique in this case in that the cutting itself is what was significant, the moment in which Adriano accidentally nicked a strand of Tybalt's hair so that it falls in his eyes counts, namely because Tybalt was under the impression that he was about to cut his throat, when that was just a bluff trying to get Mercutio to release him.
• In Love with Your Carnage: Mild example, but still present in the fact that Tybalt and Adriano seriously get off on it when watching the other beat the crap out of someone, or even just intimidate them.

• Interplay of Sex and Violence: Unsurprisingly, Mercutio and Tybalt.
• Iron Woobie: Possibly the best Woobie trope for Tybalt.
• Ironic Echo: Very early on in their relationship, Adriano told Tybalt, "I would not mind... keeping you" while holding him close. Fast-forward two years: Tybalt and Adriano's relationship has fallen apart pretty badly, Tybalt and Giovanna are married, and Tybalt soothes his frightened young wife with the same words.
• Jerkass Woobie: Mercutio can come off like this, depending on which light you see him in. From the perspective of his friends, Mercutio's carefree and maybe just a bit irresponsible, if headed for a drinking problem. If you only saw him from the perspective of Tybalt and Adriano...
  • Actually, Tybalt fits this trope much better than Mercutio. Adriano, Júlia, Lady Capulet and sometimes Mercutio are the only people in Verona he shows anything like kindness to; other people hardly exist in his eyes and as such he's got a terrible habit of abusing and terrifying the servants; political rivals have it even worse. At the same time, his traumatic childhood and evident self-loathing kind of make it hard to hate him.
• Just Friends: Romeo and Mercutio both insisted they were this.
• Kick the Dog: Mercutio is nasty to Tybalt. At the same time, though, Adriano is nasty to Mercutio.
  • And Tybalt tends to be intentionally terrifying toward servants, sometimes going so far as to threaten severe cruelty toward them. Sometimes Adriano adds to this or watches in amusement at their predicament; other times he plays good cop and offers raises or a day off in exchange for their trouble.
  • Veronica's general behavior toward Tybalt absolutely reeks of this. She views him as utterly Axe-Crazy and will not hesitate to put him in his place just to maintain some sense of control.
• Knight Templar Older Cousin: Tybalt is probably ninety percent of the reason Julia isn't The Lad-ette, unlike most of Verona's other young women.
• Lady Drunk: Diana Capulet.
• Law of Disproportionate Response: Tybalt.
  • "We were throwing rocks at Júlia's window -" "THEY WERE THROWING ROCKS AT JÚLIA'S WINDOW!!"
• Literal-Minded: Tybalt, though not quite to the fullest extent of the trope. He'll picture the literal meaning, and then rather than blithely accepting it, he'll know it's not right and stare blankly and/or ask for an explanation.
• Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places: Um, pretty much everyone in Verona, but namely, Romeo and Mercutio, who do this pretty much exactly as it's written. Then they end up together.
• The Lost Lenore: Clara the Elder, Mercutio's mother and Adriano's sister, though she was not quite as great as either of them pretends she was.
• Lovable Nerd: Oh, Valentine, y so cute, y so awkward.
• Loveable Rogue: Mercutio.
• Make-Out Kids: Romeo and Mercutio, to Benvolio's extreme discomfort.
• Mama Bear: Diana Capulet's attitude towards her nephew when she thinks Adriano is using him just to get his way in demolishing the feud. Not that she's been as good for Tybalt as she thinks she is.
  • Veronica Montague poisoned her own husband when it became obvious he had intentions that would hurt her son and nephew, and is a good mother besides.
• Master Poisoner: Adriano, his mother and his wife.
• May–December Romance: Well, more like May/July, as Giovanna's 15 and Tybalt's 25.
  • Not to mention that Adriano has 23 years on Tybalt...
• Meaningful Rename: Tybalt reverting to his father's family name, Valentio, after his break with the Capulets.
• Memetic Badass: Tybalt, in-universe. He finds it patently ridiculous and rather confusing, wondering how one is supposed to floss with lightning in the first place, among other rumors.
  • Giovanna's commentary on Tybalt being less scary (to her, anyway) once she gets to know him, is "I guess you can't frown the sun into setting.
• Memetic Mutation: Well, memetic between the two authors, anyway, but definitely present:
  • Mercuteface
  • NNG.
  • IT'S FUCKING IRIDESCENT!
  • He is Tybalt Valentio, and he is in your nightmares.
  • THIS WEEK ON SEXY VERONA
• Missing Mom: Clara the Elder. It's generally agreed that had she lived, she'd've still become the emotionally-absent version.
• Mistress and Servant Boy: Diana and her... whatever his name is. They're pretty inseparable and he genuinely seems to love her, though whether she will admit this or not is up for grabs. She's had it kind of bad with men.
• Nepotism: Adriano is never as judicially hard on his relatives as he is on others. Subverted in that he has very special ways of messing with their lives.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Adriano, in attempt to keep Mercutio away from Tybalt (and himself), told Romeo Mercutio loved him. This very nearly led to a) Mercutio killing Tybalt, or b) Tybalt leaving Adriano for Mercutio, and c) Mercutio and Romeo's friendship being in utter ruins. They did hook up, but it certainly hasn't kept Mercutio away from him, nor is all forgiven.
  • Two years later (or so), Adriano, his sister Rosa, and her husband Giorgio arrange for Tybalt to marry Adriano's niece Giovanna for political purposes. Tybalt is wracked with self-loathing at the idea, Giovanna hacks off her own hair in hysterics to try to be less attractive so Tybalt won't want her... and then they end up deciding that this is still a better marriage than any other either is likely to be forced into, so Tybalt breaks romantic and sexual ties with Adriano in order to devote himself to his new wife. Karma's a right beast, isn't it, Adriano?
• No Name Given: Mercutio's eldest brother. Mercutio has referred to him from time to time as "the asshat", and Megan prefers using this in meta discussion.
• No Social Skills: Tybalt. Which makes how hard he tries to act like a devoted husband to Giovanna sometimes cringe-inducingly awkward but always brain-bustingly adorable.
• Oblivious to Love: It should be obvious that Mercutio is in love with Romeo, but Romeo can't believe this even after Adriano betrays Mercutio's trust to tell him so. Likewise, it's obvious to Adriano that Romeo returns those feelings, but Romeo still doesn't get it.
• Old Man Marrying a Child: How Tybalt and Giovanna both initially view their Arranged Marriage. (Considering he didn't buy her or arrange the match himself as per the usual trope, he's as horrified as she is.) Of course, the age difference is actually just slightly less than ten years, and once Tybalt starts treating Giovanna with the utmost care- bordering on gingerly- and she realizes he's a mere 25 to her adult-by-Renaissance-standards 15, this trope fades out of the picture.
• One-Man Army: Tybalt. In fact, early in the relationship, enjoying a bit of sparring, Tybalt's idea of a compliment was telling Adriano that he was hard to take on despite being only one man.
• Only One Name: Mercutio (and his siblings) do have a last name. We just never figured out what it was, because their father is so unimportant to the plot.
  • Giovanna only averts this trope by how swiftly she became Giovanna, Baronessa Valentio.
• Only Sane Man: Tybalt, scarily enough, when the Della Scalas start unnravelling.
  • Veronica seems to be good at playing the voice of reason... when it suits her, anyway.
• Parent with New Paramour: Veronica and Adriano.
• Perfectly Arranged Marriage: Tybalt and Giovanna are a weird variation on the trope. They both resisted the idea of marriage to each other (actually, Tybalt resisted the idea of marriage at all), but when they realized how much worse the other potential suitors Giovanna's father could try to give her away to were, they ended up actually eloping after knowing each other for two days in order to keep Giovanna from that possibility. (Not to mention to deny the arranging parties the chance to make the wedding a complicated affair. By the next day, they're intentionally acting like Sickeningly Sweethearts in order to preserve the masquerade that they're deeply in love. Before long, they are.
• Pet the Dog: Adriano has a few moments that approach this with Mercutio, but as they tend to be motivated by guilt, sometimes they're a big diluted. Mercutio gets a moment with Tybalt as well.
  • Tybalt's entire relationship with Giovanna.
• Property of Love
• Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil: Tybalt is a deeply fucked up person with a lot of blood on his hands, but when he realizes his threat to hold Veronica down and chop all of her hair off in an argument sounds like a thinly veiled rape threat, he nearly breaks down with guilt, despite not intending to harm her in that way.
• Royally Screwed Up: The Della Scalas. Hoo boy.
• Running Gag: Tybalt's inability to name animals anything but their species. His horse is named Horse.
• She Is All Grown Up: When Tybalt realized this about his cousin Juliet, the ensuing feelings pretty much horrified him.
  • He Is All Grown Up: Adriano's reaction to seeing Tybalt smouldering away broodily at a party of his, having not noticed this earlier.
• Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: Adriano, when he was younger. This tends to be Tybalt's justification for exhibitionism in the Dragon era.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Beautiful!: Mercutio tends to take this attitude. He certainly gets away with a lot, though it helps that his uncle is the prince.
• Sleep Cute: The morning after Romeo and Mercutio's initial just friends makeout, Mercutio found he had been sleeping with his head turned toward's Romeo's, who was resting on his shoulder with an arm around his chest. Now that they're a couple, it's pretty much constant.
• Spell My Name With An S: Whether Tybalt's cousin is named Juliet or Julia (pronounced "YOO-lee-ah") seems to vary from paragraph to paragraph.
• Still the Leader: In an odd subversion, Adriano seems faintly bitter by the fact that Tybalt is more leader than he is, more skilled in battle and more feared and respected by their army - yet Tybalt frequently reminds him that he's still Tybalt's prince. It's interesting to note that a substantial portion of Italy by now thinks Tybalt will eventually end up betraying him, and Adriano himself notes that he potentially could rule in his place - Tybalt just isn't have any of it.
• Straight Gay: Everyone.
• Straight Man: Pooooor Tybalt.
  • Benvolio, while in Romeo and Mercutio's presence, tends to be this. And after they hook up, he turns into this quite literally, completely weirded out by the fact that his two, male, best friends are dating, and hilariously immature about it too.
• Subordinate Excuse: Tybalt is Adriano's Dragon for a reason.
• Tangled Family Tree: Tybalt is Lady Capulet's nephew. Julia, her daughter, is his cousin, and also secretly Adriano's daughter. Mercutio, Valentine, Clara, and Giovanna are Adriano's nieflings. Romeo is Veronica's son and Benvolio is her nephew. Adriano marries Veronica, making him Romeo's stepfather and Benvolio's stepuncle and Mercutio, Valentine, Clara and Giovanna Romeo's stepcousins. After the birth of Veronica and Adriano's son Alessandro, Romeo and Julia have a half-sibling in common (though they don't know this, and their possibility of falling in love like in Shakespeare is pretty scuppered by the fact that Julia and Clara are Happily Married). Tybalt ends up married to Giovanna, which technically makes Julia his cousin by marriage and by blood at the same time, and which makes the whole Della Scala family his in-laws. It's... it's probably a good thing this is pretty much all by marriage, or things would get even squickier even faster.
• Teacher/Student Romance: Adriano had it baaad for a tutor when he was about 15, but it was unrequited. When Tybalt was about 17, Capulet hired an English mercenary (an Expy of Eddie Blake) to help train him; in this case, however, it was only Tybalt's attraction to him that prevented what ensued to be especially traumatizing.
• Too Many Belts: Tybalt wears about a billion; they can be a pain to remove. Sometimes he and Adriano don't even bother.
• Traumatic Haircut: Invoked when Tybalt and Veronica exchange a volley of harsh words out of mutual jealousy regarding each other's relationship with Adriano. Tybalt has a bit of a moral code as regards hitting women, but he doesn't shy away from reminding Veronica that if she were still just Lady Montague and not a princess, he wouldn't hesitate punishing her for her comments by holding her down and hacking her long hair off. He realizes how much that sounds like a thinly-veiled rape threat almost immediately afterward, though, and predictably hates himself for it.
  • Giovanna inflicts this on herself the night she's betrothed to Tybalt, intentionally trying to make herself unattractive so that he won't want to marry her by shearing her hair to an uneven, tufty mess. Despite it being her choice, she's still seriously upset, even after Mercutio trims it to an even inch long or so for her. Fortunately, when it turns out she and Tybalt are more compatible than they expected, he finds her short hair a Charm Point.
• Two-Person Pool Party: Whenever Tybalt and Adriano claim they need to wash off, they're not that likely to emerge from the pool all that much cleaner than before...
• Unequal Pairing: Guess.
• Unkempt Beauty: Played with; Mercutio's not above personal grooming but his hair has led to duckling comparisons, and Tybalt is patently just that gorgeous even when he looks like a madman, it's just that it wasn't until he saw him all cleaned up that Adriano thought he was bedroom-worthy (though Mercutio'd figured that out a couple years before him). Romeo, however plays this pretty straight.
• Unusual Euphemism: Since Verona is so unusual by the standards of the other city states, it's one of the few places where abortions are legal. In universe, a "Veronese doctor" is someone who specifically performs abortions. This euphemism causes Valentine some deep chagrin, as he is a Veronese doctor, but not like *that*.
• Used to Be a Sweet Kid: When Tybalt first arrived at House Capulet, he was a tiny seven-year-old crushed by the trauma of losing both of his parents in a boating accident. By the time he was ten, you could barely call him a child anymore.
• Very Loosely Based on a True Story: The ruling family of Verona in the Middle Ages was actually called Della Scala. Everything else in this is pure invention.
• Violently Protective Boyfriend: Careful what you say about Prince Della Scala in Captain Valentio's presence. You don't want to hurt yourself.
• Virginity Makes You Stupid: Consciously averted with Giovanna- she's a virgin when she's introduced, and somewhat naive just as a natural result of being quite young and sheltered, but she also already knows how sex works, she just hasn't had it yet. And she's quite the snark knight, as well as quite good at figuring out what's going on around her even if nobody else tells her.
• Walking Armory: The weapons tend to be light, but Tybalt's always got several.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Adriano's not the most heroic of creatures to begin with, but after he approves of the idea of an Arranged Marriage between Tybalt and Giovanna, Mercutio becomes genuinely appalled with him and calls him on it.
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: This tends to be Tybalt. He's getting better.
• Working with the Ex: Tybalt and Adriano, after the former marries Giovanna.
• Wretched Hive: "You think this place isn't famous throughout Italy as the place where the screw-ups live? I'm sure she wants to marry the notorious Captain Valentio from Verona."