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Dan Green is the master of awesome cheesiness.
"Part of Resident Evil's charm is that it still takes itself seriously, despite having the most atrociously written story and dialogue of any product of human endeavor, since Hulk Hogan took one too many clotheslines to the head and decided he could act." —Ben 'Yahtzee' Croshaw, on Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles
You're watching a show, and there's a Narm moment. Someone said a line too emphatically, or the alien is obviously a guy in a rubber suit.
So why aren't you laughing?
Perhaps the rest of the work is so good, you're too wrapped up in it to notice. Or what's cheesy is more the fun kind of cheesy, so you're grinning, not laughing. Or maybe Rule Of Cool is working its magic.
This is Narm Charm, something that by all reason should kill the drama, but doesn't. Of course this is subjective. Some people will still find them to be true narm anyway. But to some, it's just part of the fun.
This can separate So Bad Its Good from So Bad Its Horrible. It can keep a Large Ham from falling into Feed Me.
Compare Mostly Narmless.
A close cousin to Camp.
If a remake does away with the Narm Charm, it can result in I Liked It Better When It Sucked.
Examples
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Anime and Manga
- Lots of the dramatic scenes in One Piece are incredibly over the top even for manga. Because the rest of the story is just as exaggerated and fantastic, and the characters and situations themselves are uniquely compelling, there's still a rather moving effect. All the snot, tears, and loud broken groaning are usually indicative of Narm, yet here it makes the story more raw and emotional.
- Arguably, the drama works not in spite of how over-the-top it is, but because of it. The story is already wild and imaginative, defying common sense and rules applied in more conventional manga, so a more toned-down approach could easily end up being disastrous because it would seem terribly out of place.
- Plus, remember how in Eragon everyone cries "a single tear"? Yeah, just try that with One Piece and see if it works.
- Ultimate proof that any attempts to make One Piece 'realistic' in that sense would never, never work. For this series, the wilder, the better.
- Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. Many anime fans groan from usual Power Of Friendship speeches. However, here they were pulled off with
charm awesome.
- Narm Charm is why this troper likes Shattered Angels , expys, cliches, a Large Ham and more.
- G Gundam. It wouldn't be half the awesome it is if it wasn't corny.
- Sekiha Love Love Tenkyoken is easily the cheesiest attack in the history of anime. It's also among the most awesome.
- This attack is such narmy goodness that it, along with the series in general, is parodied/referenced just as much, if not more, in as many seperate shows as any other Gundam series.
- "I'm one of the tomatoes!" Both pulled off surprisingly well, if you'd seen the rest of the series, but The Big O was all about Narm Charm in the first place. It's a show where Batman drives a giant robot and waxes philosophical before calling out In The Name Of The Moon and beating the snot out of baddies.
- The Narm from Trigun's Vash and Knives is entirely appropriate for their childlike, naive personalities. Vash is an idealist who honestly believes that all the evil and suffering of the world can be conquered by love and peace, takes harm on himself to spare others, and wants nothing more than for people to stop hurting each other. Meanwhile, Knives can casually kill anybody that he pleases — including his brother whom he actually does love — but collapses in incredible fear and confusion when he himself is hurt. This arguably makes Knives' psychopathy that much more terrifying, hating pain but happily inflicting it on everybody he considers "beneath" him, as though they were mere insects undeveloped enough to experience pain themselves.
- Code Geass: "You fellas know full well what this badass mother can do!"
- "Did I...did good?" Good luck laughing at the final sugaryness through your tears, bitches.
- Any time
Norio Wakamoto Emperor Charles gives a speech, it is bound to masticate scenery left, right and center, especially whenever said Big Bad uses the corny but Badass Catch Phrase of his Empire: ALL HAIL BRITANNIA!
- Try just about all of Code Geass. Lelouch as Zero is the biggest ham ever and that actually helped it to reel in legions of followers.
- In episode 19 of R2, his villainous breakdown can be a little...overdone, but that scene where he dumped the cellphone to the ground and his rant at Rolo after that, now that's real acting.
- This troper cracks up every time she thinks of Mao's infamous "I'll make you compact" line. It's also become slightly memetic among his fans.
- Everyone makes fun of the infamous potato-chip scene in Death Note, or the somewhat "overexpressive" anime in itself. Still, it is a very popular and critically acclaimed show with a ton of fans.
- This is especially evident in the final episode, in which the over-the-top fashion in which Light and Mikami break down runs a weird line between comical and horrifying.
- The opening theme song of Black Lagoon is incredibly Engrish-ridden, barely even making sense... yet still sounds incredibly badass, and sets the tone for the show brilliantly.
- Speed Racer.
- The official English translation of the Mahou Sensei Negima manga has some rough spots, but it's also responsible for several great lines from Negi, such as asking if he can have a cookie after getting wedged between Shizuna's boobs, and yelling "Damn my charisma!" upon getting mobbed by a group of high school girls who think he's the cutest thing ever.
- Not to mention Evangeline's: "They who have the most guns, kick butt."
- It's over nine THOUSAAAAAAAND! Anyone who ever claims to have hated Dragon Ball Z ironically is probably a liar. More likely, they stuck through all the grunting, multi-episode power up scenes, and ridiculous voice acting both because it was part of the appeal, as well as knowing they'd get to witness something genuinely awesome in the end.
- I don't know where you're getting at this, but if you're referring to a specific i.e. Over Nine Thousand and the power-up scenes can be Narm... in a good way.
- I don't know about you, but when you're 10 years old and watching Dragon Ball Z on a weekday morning before school, one tends not to care to much about things like that.
- The second episode of Darker Than Black has a line where Mao comments that the protagonist's coat is "bulletproof, but only when he wears it". This is simultaneously inexplicable and really badass. This line was altered in the dub to be a statement that the coat is "not just a fashion statement".
- And then there's the ever so memetic NOW I'VE LOST IT/I KNOW I CAN KILL mantra just before the OP kicks in. Ridiculous? Maybe, but you're probably too busy gleefully chanting along to care.
- In Gundam 00, during the original Lockon Stratos's death scene, the little robot Haro crying "Lockon! Lockon!" was a tad bit narmy. At the same time, though, it was rather effective. I mean, come on, even the robot was sad!
- In the first episode of the second Yu Gi Oh series, Yugi summoning Exodia is narm charm enough. Then watch the uncut video, especially past 3:00.
- The dub dialogue is on fire, helped by Dan Green's delicacy...
Kaiba: "Draw your last pathetic card so I can end this game!"
Yami: "My deck has no pathetic cards, Kaiba. But it does contain... the unstoppable Exodia!"
Kaiba: " Exodia? Impossible! No-one's been able to summon him!" * Yeah, there wasn't a whole lot of search back then. Shut up.
Yami: "Exodia, OBLITERATE!"
- In the second sequel series Yu Gi Oh 5Ds, the English dub always has to remove stuff. Naturally, they edit out weapons, text, add horrible puns to what should be relatively serious dialogue, but the main reason I still watch the dub simply because the Narm is so goddamn concentrated that it must be intentional. In one scene where the main character Yusei is in a motorcycle accident, when his friends go to help him he visibly has shrapnel sticking out of his chest. But not in the dub, no.They edited it out, and added the cheesy "Augh, my gut!" line instead. They turned what was supposed to be internal bleeding into "Thanks, Pepto Bismol!"
- Also, because of the habit of ignoring most FATAL things a lot of issues were changed. Even though, by the time of a certain episode beginning to explain the plot, the season finale has occured in Japan. And literally only 2 people STAY dead.Rex and Rudger/Roman Go(o)dwin, the Xanatos Gambler and Dragon, essentially. So to protect the children, the plot got so warped that they got a new "Shadow Realm" in "The Underworld." Still, not as bad as GX's "Sent to the stars". It's not gonna scar 6-year-olds to know the bad guys die, is it?
- Sailor Moon has a good example of this. One episode had Nephrite's death, and the line that comes next has Narm written all over it: "I'm so sorry, Naru... I guess I won't be taking you out for a chocolate parfait." It Makes Sense In Context, but still sounds silly when taken by itself. No one cared because they were sniffling...
- There is plenty of Narm Charm in the dub: After apparently escaping Zoicite and her mooks Molly mentions the local Cafe makes exquisite Cholote Parfaits and asks if Nephrite if they could go have one sometime,which he agrees to.Then she asks him if he has "Holidays in that Evil Society of His". The sheer silliness of the second question,already silly in japanese, gets funnier with Molly's goofy Brooklyn Accent, Nephrite and even Molly herself have a bit of a laugh about it. Instead of ruining the scene, it somehow manages to keep the drama and pathos of the japanese version wonderfully.
- Why wasn't Jojo's Bizarre Adventure put on this list earlier? From the FAAABULOUS character designs, to the outrageous abilities (fighting with a bladed hat, putting zippers everywhere, turning rocks into mud, stopping time), to the characters themselves...then there are the manly tears, such as when Polnareff cried when Abdul took a bullet for him, to when Joeseph saw his daughter's stand turning on her, et cetera. Yet, somehow, Jojo manages to work.
WRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!
- Conan's use of broken English while telling his former idol, Ray Curtis that his circumstances do not justify turning to drugs and murder would otherwise be funny, but it, combined with the music and his facial expressions, effectively conveys how he feels, and Ray Curtis's response in perfect English makes it clear that the grammar mistakes are Conan's, rather than the writer's.
Comic Books
Fanfiction
Film
Literature
- This Troper, being the few who liked Angels And Demons (without pissing his pants and whining over the poor science), loved the speech by the carmelengo condemning the terrorists, even though he's seen better dramatic speeches.
- Any speech given in Sword Of Truth. Pick one.
- Certainly the newbie Tatooine pilot Gavin Darklighter's response to seeing Coruscant for the first time was narmy, but it helps illustrate just how young the kid is.
"It's just a city, the whole thing, one big, huge, really big city. It's all city."
Live Action TV
Music
Other
Professional Wrestling
- In pro wrestling, many a character will go from Narm to Narm Charm if all the right things are in place. For example, this troper remembers the only thing he liked about Ring Of Honor's Hammerstein Ballroom debut ("A New Level") being the debut of Rhett Titus' "Addicted To Love" gimmick... because he was so completely into it that despite the complete ludicrousness of the gimmick (hearkening back to both "Ravishing" Rick Rude and Val Venis), he did it with such complete belief... this troper was dragged along for the ride.
- The '80s and '90s (between the time of Hulkamania and the Attitude Era) was home to some of the most ridiculous gimmicks in pro wrestling history. Many are best forgotten. But some, due to the wrestler's commitment to the gimmick, are now regarded as Legends.
Close Professional Wrestling
Tabletop Games
- Da Orks of Warhammer 40000 have their existence based around this trope. In the grimdarkness of the far future, where everyone is fighting for survival or conquest or For The Evulz, the Orks fight for the hell of it and treat the whole thing as one big laugh, their interstellar campaigns of genocide compared to a pub crawl. Their relentless obsession with More Dakka, ability to perform amazing physical and technological feats solely because they believe they can and ridiculous Funetik Aksent combine to create a faction that can never be taken seriously, and are infinitely more enjoyable because of it. The Orcs of Warhammer on which they are based invoke this trope as well, but not to the level of the Orks.
Video Games
- The super Super Deformed look in Final Fantasy VII got noticed even when the game was raking in accolades. Yet it was an understandable consequence of Square getting to know the system. And even the game's detractors rarely use that as a negative against the game.
- Aerith's death. The dialogue is nonsense, but between that music and the scene of Cloud gently letting her body fall into the pond, it still manages to make people sob into their controllers.
- The ridiculous simlish mumble in Banjo-Kazooie was so well loved that by the time Rareware had the money and technology to do full-on voice acting in the up-and-coming sequel, the fans wouldn't hear of it. The corny mumbling was part of what endeared the Banjo series to them. Rare noted the fans' remarks, and opted to keep the mumble.
- Similarly, Okami has a gibberish language for all of the characters, but for many this fits the game's painterly style of graphics. Oh, and also because all human characters don't have mouths, and instead their heads stretch and squash to indicate that they're speaking.
- People in Metal Gear Solid fandom who complain about the guy covered in bees, the fourth wall breaking, the possessed arm, Big Boss being defeated by an aerosol can and a lighter or the poison Zanzibar hamsters (or even the endless melodramatic dialogue) are usually quietly resented (read: pitied) by the other people in the Metal Gear Solid fandom, who love the games because they're really quite silly. Check out Video Game Narm, and notice the sheer proportion of the page dedicated to Metal Gear, and you'll get some idea.
- House Of The Dead is well known for its bad voice acting. ("Suffer like G Did?"). The latest game in the series, House Of The Dead OVERKILL, took the Narm football, ran it back for a touchdown, and ended up with a perfectly corny narrator, a Bond One Liner dropping agent, and a Cluster F Bomb dropping detective. Not to mention the deliberate grindhouse B-Movie look for the game and cutscenes...
- On that note, Devil May Cry, which seems to run on Campy Narm nearly as much as it does the Rule Of Cool.
- This troper would have had no interest whatsoever in Clive Barker's Jericho if the trailer hadn't sounded like an action figure commercial.
- Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is a classic for many reasons, one of which is the hilariously over-the-top voice acting. This is so well-loved that some fans actually complained about Konami redoing the dialogue scenes when the game was ported to the PSP as part of Dracula X Chronicles.
- This troper fully believes that Star Fox 64 is far superior to all the Star Fox games in the series that came after. There are several reasons, but chief among them is the awesomely corny voice acting.
- One of the songs featured in the Jet Set Radio Future soundtrack yells at you to: " Understand the CONCEPT of LOVE!" What saves it is the extreme enthusiasm the MC shows while yelling it.
- Rugal's arranged '95 theme had it first. Nothing says "Get ready for the fight of your life!" like THE CONCEPT OF LOVE!
- This troper thought what saved it was more how groovy and catchy the song is in general. But hey, Your Mileage May Vary.
- "Extra sugar, extra salt, extra oil and the MSG. OH JUST SHUT UP AND EAT! YOU KNOW MY LOVE TASTES SWEET!"
- Mark danced crazy!
- Eternal Sonata is a game that ran on narm. It was didactic, pretentious, and overflowing with irritating characters who had the common sense of a carton of bricks. But the ending, where Fredric dies, and his soul rises from his body, slowly sitting down to play the ending theme Heaven's Mirror, while his final visitor rises to sing somehow loops around and becomes one of the most heartbreaking game endings this troper has ever seen.
- The comm officer of the Colossus during the "Their Finest Hour" mission of FreeSpace 2 delivers some horrific Narms, but somehow the shock and horror of the pride of the Galactic Terran-Vasudan Alliance being destroyed right before your eyes outweighs terrible voice acting.
- Nobody steals our chicks... and lives!
- Every Silent Hill game contains what can perhaps be best described as lacklustre voice-acting coupled with some truly silly lines, the first game being by far the worst offender ("Huh? Radio?") although the second is certainly not bereft either ("You're not friends with that red, pyramid thing, are you?"). The charm comes from a combination of the characters being steadily and constantly Mind Raped (and/or completely fucking nuts to begin with) and thus one can hardly expect them to be particularly articulate, the slight reprieve it provides from all the High Octane Nightmare Fuel, and that it makes the important scenes, most of which are completely devoid of Narm, all the more effective by comparison (see anything involving James and Mary in the second game).
- A rather silly plot, low production values, spotty acting, and it being FMV made a lot of the story in Crusader endearing at best... but occasional moments, such as Ely chewing you out if you fail the mission where Andrews dies, have real emotional resonance.
- If videogame music can have Narm Charm, then the music for Daytona USA definitely qualifies. The Engrish makes it so hard to take seriously, but it sounds so adorable nonetheless. Come on everybody: DAAAAYYTOOONNNNNNAAAAAAAA (it's going)!
- The Dynasty Warriors series would be a LOT less fun to play if they ever got rid of the outrageously hammy voice acting, the atrocious pronunciation of Chinese names, the anachronistic dialogue and the across-the-board commitment to What Do You Mean Its Not Awesome moments.
- COW COW.
- From around about Warriors Orochi onwards they've started getting that one right. Shame.
- Also: COW PEE.
- Cao Ren's line in DW6, "Our allies have arrived!", sounds less like a beseiged general trapped in a flooded castle, than a guy noting the arrival of his dinner party guests.
- Zhao Yun's cry for help in DW6 "Someone! I am in NEED of ASSISTANCE!" leaves it unclear whether the player should save him from enemy troops or bring him his Xanax, but remains highly amusing either way.
- I think you're gonna need backup.
- Even Super Robot Wars has this. The opening to Super Robot Wars Alpha shows the robots looking so chibified that at first it's impossible to take seriously, which isn't helped by the music (voiced in what sounds like slightly lisped English). Once the music picks up, it immediately swings right around to being kickass, and everything I found rather stupid becomes rather charming (especially the part where a Chibi EVA-01 goes completely berserk, and the AVF's from Macross avoiding Massive Macross Missile Massacres.
- Most of the music in SRW falls under this. There's the sheer Hot Blooded bravado of the Neppu! Shippu! PSYBUSTER (Masaaki Andoh) and Everywhere You Go (Ryuusei Date/R-1), and the fantastic Engrish of Ace Attacker, and a hundred other examples, but nothing quite outdoes Kotetsu no Cockpit, the theme of the Grungust Type-2, a completely unabashed homage to every cheesy Super Robot cartoon of the '70s, describing in loving detail the Nishiki and each of its attacks, in the grand tradition of Mazinger Z, Combattler V, Brave Raideen, and all the other classics.
- As noted in the page quote, this is one of the reasons why fans love Resident Evil. You'd expect a zombie game to have a basic plot that says "Zombies! Shoot them!" but Resident Evil has a winding detailed story that makes little logical sense. Combine this with characters ripped from B movies, awkward dialog and even more awkward voice acting. Then put it all in between two slices of self unawareness and you've got a delicious
Jill narm sandwich.
- As is noted by the fandom, a prime appeal of Team Fortress 2 is that it couldn't be serious if it was in HP Lovecraft. The characters look like 50s art, the dialogue is absurd, the violence is stupidly over-the-top, the characters are all from Cloudcuckooland (along with about eight other countries) and the whole of the canon is "Nine mercenaries working for holding corporations who control the world fight repeatedly." And it works, in part because it isn't too easy to rage at...
- The overall silliness was a deliberate design decision, as Valve figured that players wouldn't nitpick as much about the game's setting (Why are the two enemy bases located right next to eachother? Why do the two factions hire the same people, only in different clothes?) if they excused the game as being generally exaggerrated and cartoonish - plus, they knew from the get-go that the fanbase would be doing silly things in general with the game (such as comedic machinimia), so the atmosphere encourages that as well.
- The Lusty Argonian Maid play from The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, written (In-Universe) by the perverted politician Crassius Curio, was so amusingly out-of-place and corny that one can't go far in an Elder Scrolls discussion without someone referencing it.
- In Sonic The Hedgehog 2006, Mephiles is given some pretty bad dialogue, but Dan Green manages to make it work.
- Most Sonic dialogue falls under this. This narm is awesome narm. (Especially Sonic Adventure Series narm.)
- For example, This Troper thinks that the strange, over-the-top expression in Shadow's various I Am Speeches, particularly "THIS is WHO I AM" underscores his mental instability. So does his whining, five-year-old like protests to Rouge about his identity in Sonic Adventure 2 and his lame puns in Sonic Heroes.
- Phoenix Wright. 'Nuff said.
- Strangely, this Troper finds Shredder saying "Turtle Soup, my favorite!", Not funny, but the definition of awesome.
- Many people claim the voice-acting in Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Sea is bad and makes narmy moments, but I disagree. The voices to me were very good, and the saddest scene in the game, when Kalas flashbacks to when his brother died, I was very much moved to tears.
- Many considered the Blind Idiot Translation of Final Fantasy Tactics to be this, which is why the PSP version's Purple Prose was so controversial. Of course, some consider the often over the top Prose to have Narm Charm itself.
- "Hi! I like shorts! They're comfy and easy to wear!"
- Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box - especially the climax and The Reveal. There are at least two extremely lackluster voice actors; there's a fair amount of melodrama; and if you're smart enough to have played through the game to this point, then you're smart enough to spot the plot holes. And you'll still bawl your eyes out.
- Okami: You'd think that God herself getting shrunk to the point where brooms are deadly and The Thing That Goes Doink is usable for platforming would be sillier than it is, yet it works. Even when you have to jump down the Emperor's throat while he snores and fight a boss in his stomach.
Webcomics
- In Questionable Content, the big reveal — that Faye's dad committed suicide in front of her — is so dramatic that even the big, cartoony sound effect "BLAM!" doesn't ruin the scene.
- The bits of comedy that Mega Tokyo contains post Cerebus Syndrome often slip into this. For example, in this recent strip, Ed is taunting and tormenting Ping with text messages while planning to kill her; meanwhile he strikes up a pleasant conversation with our favorite Cloud Cuckoo Lander Largo and (among other things), complements him on his Nice Hat.
Western Animation
- Ace Lightning was just one big constant dose of Narm Charm for its fans. Mostly from the CGI characters (who were really supposed to be narmy, since they came from a videogame and were deliberately based on stereotypes) and from the... occasionally dry acting of over enthusiastic humans.
- Avatar The Last Airbender: "Prepare...To... DIE!" is one of the most Narmish things to say. Somehow Ozai makes it work.
- The fact that while he said it to the person while engulfing him in fire probably helps.
- Ditto Katara's Calling The Old Man Out scene in the first episode of Season 3. Her "Why did you leave me, Daddy?" Angst comes across as genuinely heartfelt.
- Made more heart-felt by the fact that she doesn't ACTUALLY call him out. Her father is a smart enough man to realize she's not JUST annoyed her friend insists he has to leave his loved ones to protect them, as well as strengthen his character, as he proves he's a good enough father to admit his faults and INVITE the Angst.
- As does Zuko and Azula's Wangst towards their father and mother respectively.
- And Azula's line while getting her Important Haircut. "Alright, hair, prepare to meet you doom!"
- This troper was under the impression that Azula was trying to improve her bad mood and general feelings of helplessness by sardonically mocking herself. Of course, it doesn't work too well, given what happens next...
- In "Nightmare and Daydreams," there's Aang's hallucination about confessing to Katara. It simply would not have been as funny if it wasn't so darn cheesy. "Baby, you're my forever girl!"
- The kids in the Peanuts TV specials were voiced by kids who were too young to understand — or sometimes even read — their lines, but their delivery somehow seems to fit the precocious nature of the characters.
- The first special, A Charlie Brown Christmas, features poorly mixed sound, choppy animation, and sloppy editing, but that's part of what makes it a beloved Christmas classic. In fact, director Bill Melendez was embarrassed to see it repeated every year and wanted to "fix" it years later, but Charles Schulz vetoed the idea.
- The Stop Motion Christmas specials produced by Rankin/Bass are full of these. At one point in Santa Claus is Comin' to Town, a character is looking at her reflection in a fountain... which is a cardboard cutout of the character placed under the fake water.
- Super Robot Monkey Team Hyperforce Go! has narm charm almost every episode, intentionally. It even gets away with playing The Chosen One completely straight, Star Wars style.
- Captain Planet And The Planeteers lives and breathes this trope. Missing the mark on its beloved Green Aesops with every line, it instead creates a level of awesome simply because it's hysterical to consider a supervillain with nothing better to do with his time but dump a tub full of oil into the ocean because he hates the environment. Also, any episode that attempted to deal with an issue difficult to explain to children, let alone to adults.
- "AIDS stinks!"
- And the green mullet. You can't forget the mullet.
- In the middle of Wilt's Cluster Big No in "Where There's A Wilt There's A Way," he throws in a teeny, tiny little "NUH-UH!!" for no apparent reason. This never fails to make me giggle, nor does it distract from the awesomeness of the scene.
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