Main Tropes Index

Troperville

Editing Help

Tools

Toys

Narrative

Genre

Media

Topical Tropes

Other Categories

Custom Search

Do you really want to break me?

"Why am I not leaving, Dr. Reid? Because I don't want to miss you breaking down and weeping in front of everyone! Oh, here it comes! Great big tears! Great big crocodile tears!"
Dr. Kelso, Scrubs

Twisting and turning
Her feelings are burning
You're breaking the girl...

Red Hot Chili Peppers, "Breaking the Girl"

A series introduces a character as sweet and lovable, more comic relief than anything, who likes nothing more than to pet little puppies. They make you adore them, root for them and love them.

Then they proceed to slowly break them in front of your very eyes. They destroy everything important to them, kill everyone they love and make them suffer from horrible accidents, diseases and acts of violence. They beat the character with one cruel stroke of fate after another until they are just a shell of their former cheerful, careless self.

Be careful about tormenting sweet little things, though — sometimes instead of breaking, they snap. If they do, you'd better hope your life insurance policy is up to date.

This technique is sometimes used to build The Woobie. Writers have to be careful though, else it seems The Cutie becomes the universe's Butt Monkey.

Contrast: Break The Haughty, where bad things happen to an arrogant person (who had it coming), or the even worse variation Kill The Cutie.

On a positive note, sometimes breaking the cutie can result in a cute but weak character Taking a Level in Badass; on a less positive note, prepare for the advent of a Woobie Destroyer Of Worlds if the cutie was quite the badass to begin with. Or it can fail entirely, creating The Pollyanna.

Sometimes it can be Corrupt The Cutie, where via Pygmalion Plot or a Hikaru Genji Plan the girl in question breaks it by herself. Frequently occurs when the character crosses the Despair Event Horizon.


    open/close all folders 

Examples:

    Anime & Manga 

    Comics 

    Fan Works 

    Films 

    Literature 

    Live Action TV 

    Music 

    Theater 

    Video Games 

    Web Comics 

    Web Original 

    Western Animation 

    Real Life