Follow TV Tropes

Following

Planet of Hats

Go To

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/greasy_grandma_world2.png
"Ever since Tai-tastigon was built back in the days of the Old Empire, folks in these parts have loved puzzles. Once their whole culture was built on them, social conventions and all, and the highest form of art was the labyrinth."

On their Wagon Train to the Stars, our intrepid heroes come across a planet whose inhabitants all share a single defining characteristic. Everybody is a robot, or a gangster, or a Proud Warrior Race Guy, or an over-the-top actor, or has the same name, or wears a silly hat. To some degree, this is unavoidable; you only have so much screen time or page space to develop and explore a culture. This is especially true in episodic series where the heroes travel to a new planet each week and you have to both introduce a planet and tell a story all within a single episode. If planets are revisited, it also provides an easy way for viewers to keep track of which planet is which and remember where the story is set.

A Planet of Hats is a convenient way to make it so that the viewer's brain doesn't explode, but planet-wide monocultures seem a tad unlikely based off the best-known planet for Earthlings. Just for comparison, within the 29% of Earth's surface that's solid land, our planet hosts just under two hundred sovereign states, with an estimated 5,000 ethnicities and 7,000 living languages. There is no reason to suspect that alien life forms would be any different, but in media they are nowhere near as diverse as one might expect. If anything, aliens tend to be surprised by the amount of diversity among humans.

Earth itself is sometimes portrayed as a Planet of Hats.note  Defining human characteristics have included "pluck", "sheer cussedness", creativity, and sometimes even "diversity", though "evil" and "stupidity" are more misanthropic answers to the question. Sometimes it's stated that Hattery is the natural state and it's humans that are aberrant, or rather that humanity's Hat is not having one.

Writers love to use the hat planet to represent controversial issues in society whenever they can. This way the show's characters can take a thinly disguised public stand on an issue that the network execs would otherwise consider too taboo to openly discuss. We can't have our heroes discussing euthanasia, but should they stumble across a Planet of Hats where everyone who gets sick is put to death, then it's okay. Eventually the plots will run out with an entire race of identical people so one or more of the species will have their hat fall off, declaring My Species Doth Protest Too Much. Alternately, the show may explore why Klingon Scientists Get No Respect. For maximum typing, the characters can also be physically uniform, as in People of Hair Color.

The Planet of Hats may also be an unintended result of a Character Exaggeration type Plot Tumor applied to an entire race, when the audience had previously only seen a single representative who the writers now wish to market. For cases where a planetary hat is extrapolated retroactively from a single character, see Planet of Copyhats.

Occasionally justified in settings with relatively convenient transportation methods. On Earth, humanity developed separate cultures while scattered across the continents in an era when few people travelled. The absence of cheap and fast transportation and communication caused populations to exchange little information with each other until they had already developed persistent cultural differences. If a like-minded group of space colonists settled an uninhabited planet, they could attempt to preserve cultural unity with the aid of mass communication, trade, and travel from day one. Less happily, a non-spacefaring planet controlled by a world-conquering empire set on centralization could perhaps also impose such a worldwide monoculture, even if the planet once had many cultures. In even more mobile settings, populations might naturally tend to "sort" themselves by moving to like-minded worlds.

Compare: Gang of Hats. Contrast: Multicultural Alien Planet. Often overlaps with Single-Species Nations. See also Rubber-Forehead Aliens, Intelligent Gerbil, Scary Dogmatic Aliens, Tribe of Priests. May result because or into Apathy Killed the Cat. If the planet's hat is being evil, it's an example of Always Chaotic Evil. Serious Business is what happens when the show's setting gets a hat. This trope in itself is a good example of Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Scale. See Single-Biome Planet when the planet is unnaturally uniform physically. One-Product Planet is a subtrope, but focuses on economics rather than culture.

For the webcomic of the same name, see here.


Example subpages:

Other examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Anime & Manga 
  • The districts in ACCA: 13-Territory Inspection Dept. are somewhere between this and Fantasy Counterpart Culture, with a nice helping of Rule of Quirky. Jumoku is the place where everything is bigger. Suitsu is preserved Les Misérables-era Paris (complete with frequent coup attempts). Yakkara is basically Vegas. And on and on. There's even Theme Naming for everyone from those districts (e.g. Korore residents are named after colors, Peshi residents are named after fish, Furawau residents are named after flowers, Rokkusu residents are named after rocks).
  • Blue Ramun: All members of the Blue Ramun tribe of the Silkdeep Empire are doctors. The Blue People are an ethnic group defined by the innate healing powers of their blood, and the tribe's culture is structured around practicing medicine and ensuring the continuity of their work as healers. Adults and older teenagers live scattered throughout the empire in cities where they serve as doctors; children are raised in communal caravans where they spend their formative years in an extended apprenticeship learning how to augment the power of their blood with herbal medicine and surgical techniques; and the tribal elders who have retired from practicing medicine travel in the caravans to care for and teach the children.
  • Cowboy Bebop:
    • In the episode "Mushroom Samba" (itself the name of another trope), the crew of the Bebop finds that the terraformed moon Io has developed a culture apparently inspired by 1970s Blaxploitation films.
    • Bebop used the different planets as either Fantasy Counterpart Culture or a planet of hats. Venus was US-run, while Callisto was Russian, the Jovians were mostly European, and Earth was SE Asia.
  • Dragon Ball Z gives us two Planet of Hats races, the Namekians and the Saiyans. Both with justifications:
    • We are introduced to the Namekian race by Piccolo and God, who were original one person. Everyone in the race is green, reproduce asexually, is one gender (male), have mystical abilities, and is peace-loving with the exception of Piccolo who was the Nameless Namekian's evil side that was corrupted by living on Earth. Part of the reason for the uniformity is that the Namekians we see in the main story, with the exception of the Nameless Namekian, all came from one father after the race was brought to the brink of extinction. Which means any culture or other unique differences would be all but lost since everyone came from the same gene pool and raised by the same person. However, there are still subtypes or 'classes.' There are two castes; the Dragon Caste (consisting of those with magical abilities and being able to create Dragon Balls i.e. Dende and God) and the Warrior Caste, those who are powerful in combat (Nail). The reincarnated Piccolo (the now good one) could be considered a hybrid due to being a fusion (but lacks God's abilities of creating the Dragon Balls).
    • The Saiyans were introduced by Goku. Once Raditz comes we learned that all Saiyans are freaking strong, transform into giant monkeys under a full moon, are prideful, and are Blood Knights. Goku is unique among his race because he doesn't have the Saiyan bloodlust for killing. This is a combination of being raised on Earth, a head injury, and inheriting his mom's good nature (the last part being only revealed more than a decade after the original series ended). Part of the justification for the Saiyans is that there were good Saiyans, but they were banished or repressed by the more violent parts of their race. The Saiyans' dark nature was also exploited by Freeza who used them to wipe planets and made them advance too fast so they never evolved past their barbaric ways. Dragon Ball Super: Broly features a few more mild natured Saiyans who aren't warriors, even if the civilization as a whole is still a military-focused society.
  • Galaxy Express 999: We have planets where everyone's a beggar, fat, angry, lawless, sad, glows in the dark and so on. Subverted with Planet Fury, which appears to be a Crapsack World whose hat is fighting. Its real hat is candor. The constant fighting is just a side effect.
  • In Kino's Journey, each country is a separate Planet of Hats, such as a country devoted to nothing but the construction of a tower, or one inhabited by people who do nothing but secretarial work. Most amusing is the town which doesn't have a hat, and is trying desperately to get one. They show off some different 'ancient tradition' to every traveler who passes through. Kino remarks that this is their hat.
  • The three Invading Countries (actually planets) from the second season of Magic Knight Rayearth. Autozam is all about the mental power-based technology, Fahren is a thinly-veiled Fantasy Counterpart Culture for Imperial China, and Chizeta's culture is entirely Arabian Nights-based.
  • Major spoilers for Martian Successor Nadesico. The Jovian Lizards are revealed to be a long forgotten human colony in the orbit of Jupiter that rebelled and became an independent nation after the federation forsook it. The Jovians' hat is that their entire society and culture is based on Gekiganger 3, an old Super Robot anime within an anime, which they treat essentially as sacred scripture.
  • The various Monster Musume species are defined by one particular trait: lamias are lascivious, harpies are incredibly dumb, centaurs behave like medieval knights, mermaids are obsessed with the concept of "tragic love", arachnes are basically dominatrixes, dullahans are chuunibyous, and so forth.
  • In Nyaruko: Crawling with Love!, Earth's hat is specifically noted to pretty much be our entertainment industry, which is so popular out there its a controlled substance and we can't know how incredibly big our audience is, both due to lack of supply, although the nature of our fans also factored into their decision to hide while taking advantage of our funny hat.
  • One Piece has dozens of 'islands of hats', deriving plenty of its comedy from the various islands the characters visit and explore. Some examples include a Lady Land, a Venice expy, an Island of Weather-wizards, and an Island of Cross-dressers.
  • Puella Magi Madoka Magica: No other planets are seen, but according to Kyubey, Earth's hat is having emotions, which in turn allows Magical Girls to exist. All other intelligent lifeforms in the universe are supposedly The Spock compared to humans. Unfortunately, this makes humans by far the most attractive option for exploitative energy production.
  • In Tsubasa -RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE- by CLAMP, the characters must visit different worlds in search of Princess Sakura's feathers. Roughly every world they visit will be a Planet of Hats (although some of them aren't as easy to notice).
  • Vandread:
    • The two main planets are Taraak (the planet of men), a barren world where the locals are concerned with things like uniforms, practicality, appearing manly, and eating nutrition pellets (think hamster food), and Mejere (the planet of women), which looks like Las Vegas and has locals concerned with appearing nice, who eat foods that are basically dessert.
    • There's a darker side to this as well, as every inhabited planet was marked by a unique physical trait representing which organ was supposed to be harvested by Earth. Taraak and Mejele were male and female reproductive organs respectively.

    Asian Animation 
  • Happy Heroes:
    • Planet Guling from Season 6 has a prehistoric theme, complete with cavemen and dinosaurs inhabiting it.
    • Planet Woof from Season 7 is inhabited by anthropomorphic dogs. Planet Miao, its rival planet, is inhabited by anthropomorphic cats.

    Comic Books 
  • Top 10 (by comic book writer Alan Moore)
    • The comic takes place in a city where everyone — the cops, the bus drivers, the bums on the street — is a superhero or some other "science hero" trope. This does have lots of room within it, however, as the titular team has a talking dog in an exoskeleton, the world's only Yazidi superhero, and a sarcastic Mazinger Z, amongst others. Did we mention it's a police procedural?
    • It's eventually revealed that the "10 Precinct" (hence the "10" in "Top 10") is so called because it's the 10th in a series of alternate dimensions. Each dimension has its own precinct, and its own hat. The 10th is superheroes; other precincts include robot dinosaurs and Romans.
      • It's also revealed in a prequel that the city was set up after World War II and beings with superpowers were exiled to it.
  • DC Comics has a lot of Hat Planets:
    • In the Legion of Super-Heroes, most planets are like this, with their "hat" being related to their super-power; Naltor, planet of precogs, Titan, planet of telepaths, Colu, planet of geniuses, et cetera. There used to be a rule that there could be no two members from the same planet, because "planet" and "superpower" were that synonymous.
      • They also have two characters from Winath who (at least some of the time) share a superpower, but that's not Winath's hat — almost all the people of Winath are identical twins, and the two Legionnaires, Lightning Lad and Lightning Lass, are Half-Identical Twins, so similar that by deeping her voice and keeping the Most Common Superpower bound, Ayla managed to impersonate Garth. In some media, the whole planet is devoted to farming.
      • Ultra Boy comes from Rimbor, which is The Planet Of Dark Alleys and Biker Gangs. They don't have powers, though: Jo Nah got his powers from a Space Whale.
      • And of course, the planet Bizmol, whose hat is eating things.
      • This is all justified in Legion of Super-Heroes Annual #2, which shows that all of these planets were specifically colonized a thousand years earlier by advanced humans with similar power-sets after Invasion! happened.
    • Also occurred at least once in a Superman comic in which Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen is transported to the Planet of the Capes. Seriously. This comic came out in the wake of the Planet of the Apes film, so they were probably going for the pun.
    • Lobo occasionally encounters hat planets, such as planets made entirely from highway (in the Lobo comic series), a vacation planet (The Last Czarnian mini-series), and a planet populated by religious fundamentalists who immediately explode upon contact with any infidels by triggering an apparently inherited power through pushing down their head onto their shoulder.
    • The Hat of the Daxamites is violent xenophobia. Daxamites who don't try to kill aliens on sight are considered outcasts, and in one case was brainwashed by his own parents so that he would be a xenophobe. And just to complicate matters for aliens, they're on offshoot of Kryptonians, who win the Superpower Lottery when exposed to a yellow sun. The few notable Daxamites like "Mon-El" and "Julia" are white sheep whove gone so far as to mostly ditch their Daxamite names.
    • Mars was a planet of two hats, before the war. The Green Martians were almost exclusively pacifist philosophers, and the White Martians were almost exclusively brutal warriors looking for battle. They loved battle so much their nearly wiped out both races in a massive civil war.
    • Blackest Night explains that Earth's Hat is in fact that it doesn't wear a Hat; Earth is the most diverse planet in the universe. This is due to it being home to the Entity that brought Life to the universe. (Though Lex Luthor argues that he should get the Orange Lantern of Greed because Earth is all about consumerism and acquiring stuff.)
    • Wonder Woman (1942): Back in the Golden Age before there was a shared DCU Wondy often came across planets where not only were all the inhabitants similar but also all wore the same outfit. A recurring planet in her tales was Venus, where the inhabitants were all butterfly winged women with matching outfits and rules similar to the Amazons but most of the planets she interacted with had a hat of misogyny instead.
  • Marvel Comics has its fair share of Hat Planets, too:
    • The Kree's traditional hat has been an obsessive love of warfare. Mar-Vell and other sympathetic Kree characters we've met have been defectors from decadence.
    • The Skrull's hat as a race of shapeshifters seems to be infiltration and subterfuge or wholesale cultural impressionism like the Star Trek example. During Secret Invasion a religious extremist sect wages war with Earth and argued that the cultural diversity of humans was their shortcoming.
      • Even weirder, the Kral Skrull colonies have a Foreign Culture Fetish for various Earth time periods. Kral IV, for instance, is modeled on Great Depression gangsters, while another is based on medieval ages (though the Skrulls! one-shot speculates that it might just be a specific section of Kral IV again), and yet another is enacting the 60's civil rights movement complete with dupes of Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. The other Skrulls consider consider the Krallians' Cultural Cringe disgusting and sacrilegious.
    • Rounding out the alien empire trifecta, the Shi'ar have a warlike hat similar to the Kree. They also have a biological bias against art and storytelling; the Shi'ar do not dream and consider artistic expression to be deviant. The Shi'ar empire, though, has its own hat: It's cosmic Marvel's most diverse nation. The Shi'ar believe in raising up the races they conquer. Any Shi'ar-aligned group (like the Imperial Guard) will tend to have every member belonging to a different alien species.
    • X-Men: The Mojoverse is an entire Dimension of Hats organized around television. Whoever has the best ratings is the Dimension Lord.
    • The Dire Wraiths' hat is evil! Seriously, they're a race of evil magic-users who revere evil as a concept in its own right. We meet a grand total of one Wraith who decided he was sick of it and wanted to just settle in as a human on Earth, and his fellow Wraiths murder him for daring to think such a thing.
  • The Polish comic Tytus, Romek I A'Tomek has an issue where the protagonists visit several "Nonsense Islands", each of which is a classic Island of Hats where everyone is an athlete, a bureaucrat, etc.
  • Sometimes used in the Disney Mouse and Duck Comics:
    • In one Mickey Mouse detective story, Mickey and Goofy are employed by aliens from a planet where everyone is a thief — its perfectly legal to steal, people are suspicious of someone who doesn't, and their leader got his position because he is such a great crook. (No, not by cheating. People voted for him because he was such a dishonest man.) They need an outsider because they are temporarily hosting an artifact shared with other, friendly planets, and they don't trust anyone on their own planet — with good reason.
    • The "Reginella" subseries has various examples:
      • Reginella's homeworld of Pacificus is inhabited by a Perfect Pacifist People-and for a good reason, as their Psychic Powers can be devastating under the right conditions (when coordinated by their queen Reginella a group of them has summoned lightning, and Reginella, as the queen, is incredibly powerful), so it's more about protecting the rest of the universe from themselves.
      • Bingo's people seem to all be bullies and proud of it. It's unclear if this is valid for their entire species or just Bingo's group, as they're the only ones seen.
      • The Vampirionians are all thieves, who robs anyone unlucky enough to get close to their Planet Spaceship and can't retaliate.
    • Paperinik New Adventures has its own examples:
      • All Evronians are tyrannical and evil Emotion Eaters (to the point a warrant officer commanding a cut-off group of Evronians hoped to find a superior officer to be properly mistreated), with the Imperial Council, the Emperor's subspecies, and rogue members of the high caste being outright Galactic Conquerors and their nicest members being at most Noble Demons and Pragmatic Villains. Justified in that current Evronians are all clones with some modifications depending on their post and job-to the point that Porphioolon, the first known Evronian to be an actual good person, is the result of a low caste technicians messing up the process to artificially grow a high-caste one.
      • All Xerbians are scientists and hold a doctorate, to the point that when asking if there's a doctor they have to specify they mean a medic.
      • The entire population of Armadha is in the Private Military Contractors business, either by leading an army of combat robots or manufacturing and selling said robots and anything they need to fight. Justified in that Armadha is extremely poor in resources (even air is scarce), so the only thing they have to export and get what they need to live on their Death World is themselves-and as they're tough enough to live on Armadha and too stubborn to just move somewhere else, becoming mercenary soldiers was the logical choice.
      • The Coronan women are shown to be all rather cold and calculating and extremely concerned about their Psychic Powers, and the males (whose powers are rarer and usually weaker, to the point some guards had to call out a warning about having to face one who could fight the most powerful women) seem to be OK with it if not fully supporting. Justified in that this was a willing cultural shift following the overthrow of Moldrock: after he and his warriors were sealed away, the women with psychic powers and the scientists that took down Moldrock found themselves as the strongest in a warrior society, and to protect the rest of the universe from themselves they forced a cultural shift.
      • The Coronans under Moldrock were a rather violent warrior society devoted to scour the galaxy to find a good challenge and honor (to the point Moldrock felt dirty when he had to use subterfuge for the good of his followers), as shown when Moldrock and some of his followers manage to escape their seal. Even the one scientist of that era that is shown, Everett Ducklair, has rather violent tendencies fixated with violence and spent much time after Moldrock's defeat creating weapons by accident, as he was so used doing it that the moment he got distracted while inventing something he'd make it as lethal as he could.
  • In Invincible, all of the male Viltrumites have to grow moustaches.
  • In the Justice League of America story "Heaven's Ladder" has a race of aliens infiltrating various planets to discover how each one views the afterlife and their religious beliefs. For most races the alien sleeper-agents are things like priests or religious leaders, as all of the universe's alien races only have one religion apiece. On Earth, their human representative is a professor of comparative theologies.
    The Atom: A theologian's the only option that makes sense from a comprehensive point of view. Earth isn't one of those Star Trek planets with one global culture.
  • In IDW's Transformers comics, their homeworld of Cybertron has thirteen long-lost colony worlds, some of which have recently been reunited. Each one is uniquely quirky: Caminus is spiritual and resource-poor, everybody on Velocitron is a speed freak, everybody on Devisiun is half-sized twins, Eukaris is populated solely by animal-formers, and Carcer is a stratocracy that abhors lies. Two others have also been named: Prion, where everybody is tiny (relative to the average sixty-foot Cybertronian), and Tempo, which was full of philosophers.
  • Ultimate Vision: One of the planets the Vision visited was composed entirely of engineers, all of them focused on stopping the threat of Gah Lak Tus. They covered their whole planet in armor, and bobby trapped their solar system. Alas, it was not enough.
  • Sillage: A species developed as clone soldiers with minimal intelligence. Even when freed, the one intelligent member of their race says they don't know what to do with themselves.
  • In Marooned, there is very brilliant species that consists of brains in robot bodies. They couldn't manage to land their highly advanced ships. When one ship was saved, two of those died by accident while exiting the ship. Out of all the crew in ship, only one survived.
  • Astro City:
    • The gorillas of Gorilla Mountain (a hidden tropical zone in Antarctica) are all trained to be warriors and protectors. Somewhat justified as Gorilla Mountain is on top of an interdimensional rift and frequently gets invaded as a result.
    • In "Sorrowsday", the Quiqui-a are a race of farmers devoted to raising and preparing the Jhef, the grain of their world.
    • The Zirrs are a race of insectoid aliens whose entire social structure is geared towards worshipping their warlord leader and serving the Zirr Empire.

    Comic Strips 
  • Brewster Rockit: Space Guy! has had several. Possibly justified in the case of the Zombie Planet.
  • Prince Valiant occasionally features Islands of Hats. When Val is on a sea voyage, it's somewhat common for his ship to get waylaid by supernatural means. One of two things then happens: either Val is put to some bizarre test, or he comes to an island where all the inhabitants share a single characteristic.

    Fan Works 
  • 5 Years Later features the Dragons. In Ben 10: Alien Force we meet an alien Dragon who was a map maker, and he is the only member of the species we meet due to changes in plans. When the expanded universe of Five Years features them again in the And Beyond series, the entire species has a overall goal of mapping the universe instead of just having a single member of the species making a map. This is in contrast to many of the other species featured in greater focus, who don't all lean on a single trait from a single member of the species seen in series.
  • In Ashes of the Past all Squirtles, Wartortles, and Blastoise are massive Otakus. It gets to he point where many of them have fighting styles that emulate their fandom.
  • Intelligence Factor:
    • Scrafty's hat is rebellion. They rebel against the idea of being categorised as sapient due to the misunderstanding that the Federation are imposing it on them.
    • Malamar have a tendency to be megalomaniacs, or at least a desire for power. Julian wonders if the non-megalomaniacal ones never leave their cities... or if they purge ones who have different ideals.
    • Cinderace treat everything in life like a competition.
  • Mass Effect: Altered Humanity: Enforced by game mechanics. Each faction gets a number of "Aspects" when they are created that represent the cultural norms of the group. Each provides a number of stat modifiers reflecting how this attitude has shaped the faction. These are considered more stereotypes and generalizations than absolute rules, however.
  • Reimagined Enterprise: Usually there are some attempts to avert or reduce this trope compared to the canon show. To be fair, the prose format makes it somewhat easier to avoid reducing races to a stereotype compared to TV.
  • Top of the Line (Editor-Bug):
    • The planet that the SIR Tourney is held on, Arenia, is an uninhabited barren rock with nothing on it but a dilapidated colosseum used for the tournament.
    • Aggrage 9 is an entirely mechanized planet that serves as a giant mechanics shop for spaceships, with the entire population employed for this purpose.
  • Deconstructed in The War of the Masters, in that what appears to be a monoculture is more commonly the result of one particular group on a Multicultural Alien Planet becoming dominant over the others, which becomes a stereotype In-Universe. This ranges from the "violent brute" stereotype of Klingons (the protagonist Klingons such as B'Sanos and K'Ragh tend to be more inclined to prioritize batlh, or "internal honor", over quv, "external honor") to the cultural conflict between atheist quasi-communist United Earth and its more religious and agrarian rim colonies such as the worlds of the Moab Confederacy. The idea is even referenced by name In-Universe, and derided as the notion that your species dictates your politics.

    Films — Animation 
  • The Yolkians in Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius are all basically egg-shaped gobs of slime with eyes contained in a metallic, robotic "skin", featuring a glass upper half for sight and a bottom half fully electronic with a hovering mechanism and arms.
  • The Transformers: The Movie has the planet Junk, where a race of robots made of scrap live; their entire culture is based on TV and radio transmissions from Earth, with the result that they say things like "Stop, thief! No welcome wagon 'hello stranger' with that new coffee flavor for you!" This was homaged in the Live-Action Adaptation where Optimus Prime claimed the Autobots learned to speak English "from your Internet".
  • The Point is a fable which Harry Nilsson used to make an entire soundtrack. It was later adapted into an animated film and screenplay using the soundtrack. The entire fable revolved around a planet on which everything had a point on it, with the sole exception of the main character. He is shunned as a result. Ironically at the end, the entire world becomes devoid of points with the exception of the main character, who grows a point.
  • Russian animated film "The Mystery of the Third Planet" when protagonists check database about planet Shelezyaka, it says: "Planet Shelezyaka: no plants, no water, no minerals. Inhabited by robots". When they visit planet, they see, how exact this entry. This is justified, however, at least in the novel. A ship crash-landed there, only the robots survived, and they built a civilization that consumed all of the planet's resources to build more robots and is now stagnating.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • In Mom and Dad Save the World, the title characters get kidnapped by (and save the world from) an Evil Overlord from a planet where the hat is... mind-boggling amounts of stupidity. As an example, one of the deadliest weapons on this world is called the light grenade, which instantly disintegrates whoever picks it up. And how does this decimate an entire army? It says "Pick Me Up".
  • The American Astronaut has the Venusians which are all Southern Belles and the people from Jupiter who are all miners; the latter is justified since it's implied they are hired from all over the galaxy.
  • Cloud Atlas: Sonmi's time period. The hat in question? Capitalism.
  • Predator: Less pronounced in the originals, since only a single member was present, but the more the franchise progressed, the more the Yautja were shaped up to be all about hunting.

    Literature 
  • Emperor Mollusk versus The Sinister Brain:
    • Neptunons are known for two things; they are wicked-intelligent scientists, and they're very paranoid. Most of their technological achievement is done so that they could protect their planet and themselves from any potential invaders. Ironically, all their technological achievement is why their planet is so desired by other interplanetary superpowers in the first place.
    • Venusians are a Proud Warrior Race of Lizard Folk known for their strong moral framework, which usually involves a strict chain of command. The fact that their Gods are real and inflict Divine Punishment if they don't adhere to their moral values no doubt has something to do with it.
    • Saturnites are a race of rock people who invaded the Earth for its resources. Much like the Venusians, they are a Proud Warrior Race, though they embody the "Soldier" side of the Soldier vs. Warrior dichotomy; most Saturnites do it not for honor, but because it's just a job.
    • Atlanteans are known for being highly-opportunistic hyper-capitalists. Their loyalties are easily bought, one can't get to anybody important without bribing their entire staff, and they are perfectly willing to sue people over anything. When Mollusk's Blob Monster destroys part of the city, the town's entire economy goes into overdrive; not for construction and repairs, but Frivolous Lawsuits by individual citizens over their physical well-being, mental well-being, whether their warning system caused them too much (or not enough) distress, investigations over who's to blame for all of it, etc.
  • Nations characterized by a single trait have been a staple of travelogue-style fiction for centuries. The academics-obsessed people of Laputa in Gulliver's Travels are a good example.
  • Older Than Feudalism: This happens in the ancient Greek tales of Hyperborea, Atlantis, and other allegorically intended foreign lands.
  • The Idirans of Iain M. Banks's Culture books are a Proud Warrior Race of Scary Dogmatic Aliens. Culture Orbitals tend to acquire hats due to the nature of the Culture as a society of absolute leisure with high population mobility. Masaq orbital is full of extreme sports (and is so dedicated to risk it's deliberately orbiting an unstable star), whilst Chiark is the destination of choice for games of skill and chance. There's also The Affront, a race of Laughably Evil sadists and the Gzilt, whose Hat is being Mildly Military with everyone being (nominally) a soldier.
  • The Wheel of Time: The world is comprised of hat-wearing nations and peoples. Two Rivers folk are all brave and stubborn, Cairhienin are all short and concerned with political intrigue, Arad Domani women are all seductresses, women in the various Ajahs of the Aes Sedai almost always act alike, etc. Few cultures in the series are shown to have individuals who behave contrary to their cultural stereotypes. Arguably justified with regards to the Aes Sedai; they are guided towards their appropriate Ajahs while they are still Accepted.
  • The Stormlight Archive is a world where each nation has a hat. The Thaylen are merchants, the Azish are bureaucrats, the Alethi are warriors, etc. Historically the nations were united, as humanity was united in a series of apocalyptic wars (called Desolations) against the Voidbringers. The nations (referred to as Silver Kingdoms in modern times) divided duties in preparing for and fighting these wars. Alethela trained warriors, Thalath managed supply lines and trade, etc. In the four thousand years since the last Desolation, borders have shifted and the Kingdoms have grown or split in various ways, but their ancient purposes have played a major role in defining their modern cultures.
  • Janet Kagan's Hellspark is a multiple-culture universe where each of the cultures has a single quirk — one considers feet obscene, one duels at the drop of a hat, one considers telling the truth (speaking accurately) a basic requirement, etc. It's downplayed; each character is influenced by their culture's hat, but not defined by it. There's a scene where Om im, who comes from a society with a "knife user" hat, says as much, and points out that if he were nothing but the hat most of his colleagues would have knife holes in them by now.
  • Larry Niven's Known Space deals with this trope.
    • Pierson's Puppeteers are cowards to the point that only insane specimens are willing to deal with other species (but as their name implies, their real hat is Manipulative Bastardry.note ) Kzinti are all Samurai-esque Proud Warrior Race Guys, and humans may or may not have a trait for genetic luck. Humans are also apparently obsessed with sex; in Ringworld, the puppeteer Nessus says to Louis and Teela, "No known species copulates as often as you do"note , and The Ringworld Engineers.
    • The series features many species with the same ancestry as humans whose politics revolves around ritual inter-species sex. Further, at various points in the series, Niven will go into the details of how these hats are worn, via the various mechanism that produced the human traits, and the evolutionary imperatives that effect the ongoing makeup of the various species. At one point in Ringworld, a kzin sets a human off on a logical analysis of the instability of Kzinti aggression in the context of an enemy race that they can't easily beat. Whether this is a Lampshade Hanging or a justification is left as an exercise for the reader.
    • There are plenty of exceptions of course. The Kzinti have the least, but that's justified with them genetically engineering themselves into a 'heroic' race. They were at best bronze age technologically when taken by another species to use as troops. They rebelled and overthrew their masters, using their technology with most of them not truly understanding it. They tinkered a hell of a lot with their own genome, with one of the offshoots making their women non-sentient and playing with their sex drives and aggression. The Puppeteers don't even have sex as we understand it, reproducing with a female of a separate species that actually gestates the young until the child eats its way out...
    • The Outsiders are a race of intrepid proud merchants and Knowledge Brokers, and the Kdatlyno are a race of badass artists.
  • Justified in The Little Prince since every planet is inhabited by exactly one person.
  • Animorphs:
    • The series has the Iskoort, whose Hat is guilds — there was (in order of introduction) a Trader Guild, a Criminal Guild, a Warmaker Guild (though it quickly becomes clear the Iskoort were not cut out for combat), a Servant Guild, a Worker Guild, a Superstition and Magic Guild, a Shopper Guild, and even a "News, Gossip, and Speculation Guild." And all the Traders were the most annoying salesmen imaginable. (The others were annoying, too, but they ran into Traders the most.)
    • The Hork Bajir were designed by the species that created them (to be gardeners of a sort) to be peaceful and not terribly bright. Occasionally one is born with human-level intelligence though.
  • From The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the Vogons are a race of Obstructive Bureaucrats. Their correspondingly shallow personalities and total lack of creativity make them the third worst poets in the universe.
  • This trope dates back to at least The Skylark of Space, the very first Space Opera. It was taken to such an extreme that the heroes would cheerfully commit genocide on species they disapproved of, rather than try to change them.
  • In the comedy science fiction Hoka series by Poul Anderson and Gordon R. Dickson, the Hokas' "hat" is that they are entranced by fiction. Give them a story and they will start to live it out, believing (or at least acting) as if they are in it. They have whole cities based on various periods of human history, with Ancient Rome, Victorian England, American Wild West and other places. One of them believes he is Napoleon and has an entire city of Hokas willing to follow him as leader of "France". Actually, a better way of saying it is that their hat is following tropes, as they tend to act out the trope more than reality. Luckily, they are non-violent, so they tend to just fake the wars and other violent parts.
  • The trope also occurs in Gordon R. Dickson's Childe Cycle, better known as the Dorsai series. Humanity has separated in various splinter cultures who specialize in one attribute. The Dorsai focus on courage and honor. Newton, Cassdia, and Venus are hard science cultures. Ste. Marie is a colony of Catholic farmers. Freiland is known for its bureaucracy. Coby are known for its miners. The Exotics focus on philosophy. The Friendlies focus on religion. The trope is justified in the larger frame of the Cycle.
  • The alternate worlds or "planes" in Changing Planes by Ursula K. Le Guin are often like this; each one features a more-or-less humanoid alien race with a special ability, psychological/biological quirk, or universal tradition — such as sharing dreams, seasonal migrations, near-constant anger, becoming silent at adulthood, and extreme devotion to apparently meaningless architectural projects.
  • The Belgariad series of novels by David Eddings:
    • Each of the nations of the West has its own hat - unusually, each is explicitly engineered by destiny. To a first approximation, based on the characters encountered: All Sendars are farmers, all Drasnians are spies, all Tolnedrans are merchants, all Chereks are Viking warriors, and all Nyissans are drug-addicted poisoners (with the exception of Issus, who is at least sober).
    • Most of the 'hats' are actually fantasy archetypes based on Earth cultures — the Chereks are Vikings, the Algars are the steppe horsemen (Magyars/Poles/Scythians with a side of Mongol) likewise, the Drasnians appear to be a Renaissance Italy stereotype transplanted into a different geographical setting, the Tolnedrans are based on the Roman and Byzantine Empires (hence both their mercantile aspect, preference for operating through clever treaties and their obsessive road-building and disciplined legions), the Arends are medieval high chivalry myths taken to the point of self-parody, etc. The unflappable demeanour, their courtesy, and the general obsession with propriety of the Sendars seem to be more English than anything.
      • This is somewhat justified, as each group were hand-picked by a Physical God, who shaped them specifically to align to their ideals, and possibly more than just in terms of commandments - the various disciples of Aldur, with the exception of Beldin, and particularly Belgarath, are all noted to look a lot like their Master. It is quite possible that something similar seeped into the national character of the chosen peoples. The exception are the Sendars, who were "created" by an immortal sorceress, and are a mixture of the various peoples around them. It is perhaps telling that they are by far the most stable of the nations of the West.
    • The Angarak nations on the Western continent started out as pretty hatty - Nadraks are more amoral counterparts of the Drasnians, the Thulls are the bulky and not overly bright workers who might as well have a sign saying 'kick me' painted on their backs, while the Murgos are the warrior aristocracy with the attendant ego. But then, they were under the control of an insane god for millennia. Certainly, it's notable that the Malloreans, who managed to get out from under the Grolim Church and do their own thing, culturally merging with the Melcenes in the process, became equivalent to the Sendars in their ethnic mixing and social stability, and the Tolnedrans in their secularism.
      • Moreover, the tribes of Angarak originally were the CASTES of Angarak, and Torak mistook their differences for tribal rather than professional distinctions after being away doing god-stuff/whinging in self-pity for a couple thousand years.
    • Eddings recycles revisits recycles those themes in the Elenium and Tamuli novels: All Styrics are self-pitying magicians, all Atans are warriors, All Tamuli are polite to a fault, etc.
  • In the novel Design for Great-Day by Alan Dean Foster and Eric Frank Russel, a spiderlike species is mentioned whose hat is... hats.
  • In The Edge Chronicles, all of the Slaughterers are hunters and butchers, all of the shrykes are slave-trading warriors, and all of the trolls are lumberjacks. This even extends to occupations: the Leaguesmen are corrupt, the Sky-Scholars are evil, and the Earth-Scholars and Sky Pirates are good. However, oakelves, goblins, waifs, and (of course) fourthlings can be anything, and quarter-masters are either traitorous or fiercely loyal (sort-of hat).
  • In L. Ron Hubbard's Battlefield Earth, the Selachee, a race of sharks who have feet, can "live anywhere, breathe any atmosphere and eat anything," and while they did have Selachee who are engineers and other professions, their planet's exclusive profession is banking.
  • Several races in The Chronicles of Narnia, such as the Dufflepuds, who play Captain Obvious with such astute observations as water is powerfully wetnote , and the Marsh-wiggles, an entire race of Eeyores.
  • In Alan Dean Foster's series The Damned Trilogy, all of humanity wears the Blood Knight hat once an interstellar war lands in our laps. And it's a good thing, too, because every other species in these novels either wear the Programmed For Pacifism hat or the Reluctant Clumsy Warrior hat, and being good at killing things is our only hope to survive in the face of technological superiority. Well... that and being immune to telepathy. Humans are the only species that doesn't have a single, unified culture, because we're the only ones who're such bastards that we can't even get along with members of our own species.
  • Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga books are made of this trope. The Beta Colony wears the "uber tolerant libertine" hat. The Jackson's Whole wears the "Wretched Hive" hat. Cetaganda wears The Empire hat. And the titular Barrayar wears the Proud Warrior Race Guy Ruritania hat. Justified in that all planets mentioned (except Earth, which is now the only world that doesn't have one overarching government) are colonies settled by groups from Earth, probably often special-interest groups like the European religious minorities who colonised America (for example, Athos was colonised by a religious group who believe women to be the root of all evil), and some were shaped by historical forces (for example, Barrayar was cut off from communication with the rest of the universe for many centuries, and had to revert to more primitive behaviour to survive). Also, some locations are comfortable only for minority groups (for example, the Quaddies, who were created to be slave labourers working in zero-gravity conditions, narrowly escaped being massacred when the invention of artificial gravity made them redundant, and so had to found their own colony - naturally, on a zero-gravity space station rather than on a planet, although modern Quaddies generously provide some gravity-installed areas for the comfort of visitors).
  • Tanya Huff's Confederation of Valor series has the Taykans and the Krai whose hats are sex and food respectively.
  • John Varley's short story "The Barbie Murders" features a cult of humans nicknamed "The Barbies" who are obsessed with conformity. They have each been modified to look and sound identical, down to the last tiny detail. They have no names or personal identities, and each takes responsibility for the actions of all the rest. This makes finding a murderer in their midst rather trying.
  • The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant:
    • The Haruchai are a race of stoic proud warriors. The Insequent are a race who Walk the Earth in search of knowledge. The Elohim wear an Omniscient Morality License hat. All the Ramen (people from the Plains of Ra, not noodles) care about are their horses. The Stonedownors are obsessed with stone while their cousins the Woodhelvins are obsessed with trees.
    • And on the evil side of things, the Cavewights are all Ax-Crazy mooks, the ur-viles are enigmatic sorcerers, and the Croyel are parasites who offer faustian bargains. Ravers could also be said to have the hat of nature-hating omnicidal jerkasses, but this is justified by there being only three of them, and the fact that they work directly for the God of Evil.
  • Ender's Game has planets that were colonized by a single religion or country, to encourage diversity of humans among the stars.
  • Saga of the Exiles similarly mentions worlds being assigned to individual peoples for colonisation; there is even a reference to races with more "vigour" being given more planets.
  • Jerry Pournelle's CoDominium is similar for a justified reason; colonies are expensive, and require sponsors who obviously choose who populate them. America and Russia have filled the galaxy with clones of themselves, and every industrial power has at least one colony; all are meant to be examples of the superiority of their given culture. Religious and political nutcases with sufficient funds have attempted to do the same, but are often subject to the titular Amerusski Pact dumping violent criminals on them, meaning that almost every planet that isn't populated by Hats is a Crapsack World.
  • Walter Moers applies the principle to several cities in his Zamonia novels, most notably Bookholm (everything revolves around books) and Sledwaya (everything revolves around illness)
  • This is a common theme in Robert Asprin's MYTH series, with the characteristic of residents often being puns on the name of their "dimension." For example, residents of Deva (Deveels) are all aggressive merchants, while male residents of Trollia are trolls and female residents, trollops.
  • In the To the Stars trilogy by Harry Harrison, EarthGov has not only terraformed Single Biome Planets, they've also created a unique culture for each in order to maximise their control. For instance the agricultural planet the protagonist has been exiled to in Wheelworld is populated entirely by peasants and mechanics, ruled by a group of autocratic Familys.
  • In old science-fiction novel ''Star Surgeon'' by Alan E. Nourse, Humans have the hat of being doctors, to the point that Earth is called "Hospital Earth". Apparently nobody else ever really got into the whole "cut people open to make them better" thing. (At the time it was written, open heart surgery was a new, exciting thing.)
  • In Pandora's Legions, the Alien Invaders are dull and gullible enough compared to humans that once we start going out and proselytizing they become more convinced than the proselytizers. A whole planet briefly bans everything artificial. Mention is made of a low-gravity world colonized expressly for the purpose of horse racing.
  • E.T.: The Book of the Green Planet, the sequel novel to E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, implies that all the members of E.T.'s unnamed species are botanists, since they can all communicate telepathically with plants.
  • In Stephen Baxter's Manifold: Space, humans are the only species able to devote themselves entirely to an idea (i.e have faith), which becomes important at the end of the book when a coalition of aliens are trying to construct a gigantic solar sail to prevent a future galaxy sterilization event (and not the next one, either).
  • While many planets in Honor Harrington are interesting, multi-cultural places, others are outright Planet of Hats type places:
    • Montana, on which everyone acts like stereotypical cowboys, which is lampshaded by one of the Montanans when he explains that his ancestors fell in love with an ideal, regardless of whether that ideal ever actually existed. In short, their planet's Hat is a Stetson.
    • Grayson is a planet of stubborn traditionalists, even those who want to reform the society want to do so to make it more like Grayson and when new ideas or technology are introduced from off-world they almost inevitably improve it first to make it a Grayson advancement. Furthermore much of their mindset is infectious so even offworlders start acting Grayson in time. This is perhaps exemplified by their name for God; while most modern versions of Christianity call God things like a healer, protector, or provider, Graysons call God "The Tester", and believe that everyone faces their own personal Test.
  • Each of the different realms in the Shadowleague books has its own hat: Callisoria, for example, is the land where everyone blindly follows the Corrupt Church, and Ghariad is the land full of humanoid monsters who drink human blood.
  • Lonely Werewolf Girl has Fashion being the hat of a race of Fire-Demons.
  • In The Demon Princes, there's Sarkovy, the Planet of Poisoners; and Methel, the Planet of Snobs. This is partly explained by the fact that Methel is actually owned by socially elite caste, who take steps to keep others out, not least the Darsh from neighbouring Dar Sai, the Planet of Boors.
  • In The Witches of Karres by James H. Schmitz, Karres is the Planet of Witches; Uldune is a world-sized City of Spies.
  • Another example of this is in Stephenie Meyer's book The Host (2008) which features a horde of peace loving aliens which invade earth and take over the body of almost everyone who lives there. This is used (apparently) deliberately as an excuse for the aliens, who hate violence, to bodysnatch the human race, as because all of them are so similar in their views and personality, they do not understand the diversity in human morality, and assume all of us are evil.
  • Garth Nix's Old Kingdom series isn't too bad about this, for a fantasy story—Ancelstierre's hat is being early 20th century England, and the Old Kingdom's hat is being a fantasy country with a distinctive magic system and a serious zombie problem. Considerable variation within. And then in Abhorsen we get the Southerlings, refugees from a war in the South whose real purpose is to be killed by the Big Bad and turned into its zombie slaves. They barely say a word. They are identified by their blue hats (and scarves). Repeatedly.
    • Presumably Nix wanted a cultural trait to identify the doomed-people-and-zombies with, since a physical one, such as skin color, would be like marking out whatever real race(s) resembling that as Cannon Fodder and/or things to run away from. And since particular hats have frequently been the intentional markers of communities throughout history (most of Eurasia has for extended periods viewed the lack of a hat as indecent) blue headwear was a solid call.
  • The different colonist habitats in Slow Train To Arcturus each function as a planet of hats. Justified in that each of the habitats was purchased by a group which wished to leave Earth and selected other colonists with similar interests. The particular hats are:
  • A Song of Ice and Fire features several peoples that take one particular thing, usually an important resource or terrain feature, and make it the absolute center of their culture, shoehorning it into their language's figures of speech wherever possible:
    • The Dothraki: horses
    • The Lhazarene: sheep
    • The Iron Islands: iron and seafaring
    • Targaryens: Dragons & fire
  • Parodied in Death and Diplomacy, in which three warring empires have been carefully manipulated to be Planet of the Sex-Obsessed Savages, Planet of the Uptight Military, and Planet of the Devious Assassins. It's specifically mentioned that none of these societies would actually work if someone wasn't pulling the strings.
  • In Year Zero by Rob Reid, Earth wears the hat of "being really good at making music." (Which is to say that, by our standards, everyone else in the universe is really bad at making music.)
  • In Robert J. Sawyer's Starplex, the Waldahud are mostly rude and mean, though not necessarily bad, as such. The Ibs are all rational and polite, and very serious about not wasting each other's time. The alien races themselves are annoyed by humanity's tendency to... overuse acronyms, these being entirely unknown to any other intelligent race.
  • In Paul Preuss and Arthur C. Clarke's Venus Prime series, the various outposts all have different cultures. Port Hesperus (a space station in orbit around Venus) is basically a mix of Tokyo and Dubai, for instance, while the Martian colony and its orbiting station are both severely Russian.
  • Very much subverted for the alien species of Star City, the Ba'ren. They are very much a multi-planet, multicultural species.
    • Invoked by humans who are ignorant and/or hate the Ba'ren.
    • Lampshaded in reverse by the Ba'ren. Their researchers complain that it's hard to translate Earth media because the humans do not have a common, culture-neutral language, instead comprising of many different languages and cultures.
  • While Vatta's War generally averted this tropes two examples were found. One world Cascadia is a world of tree loving Dogged Nice Guys, while Gretna is a world white supremacists who are also seriously against humods. Otherwise the most planets only hat is whether they are for or against implants and other modifications
  • Played interestingly in the New Jedi Order series with the Yuuzhan Vong who basically wear the hat of "fanatical devotion", but there's a great deal of variety in how this manifestsnote . It mostly breaks down along caste lines (warrior caste hat: war, priest caste hat: religion, shaper caste hat: Mad Scientist, and intendant caste hat: bureaucracy), though two of the main Vong characters (Nom Anor and Nen Yim) are both rebellious spirits who break their society's mold in different ways, while neither buying in to the brutal religion that shapes most of their culturenote . Still, it's practically unheard of to see an apathetic Vong; they're almost all intensely devoted to something.
  • The Hunger Games: Each of the districts has a different primary industry, which serves as its theme. This is an Invoked Trope in the Hunger Games, since the tributes are each trope are traditionally dressed in ways that reference their theme.
  • Shadows of the Apt: Every race in that world is a member of a hat (though to some degree this is justified, as their totem insect affects each race on a biological level). The Mantis-kinden are all lightning-fast and skilled in battle, the Flies are all cunning, extremely small and agile, Scorpions are big, bald, strong and bad-tempered, Beetles are Made of Iron and stocky, Moths are delicate and mystical, Ants are superstrong and devoid of personality and Spiders are all beautiful seducers/seductresses with an innate taste for intrigue. This gets further generalized as the races get categorized as Apt or Inapt. If a character is Apt, then they'll be technologically adept and kinda unattractive, whereas the Apt are incapable of understanding technology more advanced than a lever, are good-looking and are magically capable.
  • The Discworld novels contain a number of societies that result when you take the expected stereotypes and turn them up until the knob breaks off. Notably:
    • Dwarves, for whom gender diversity is something that happens to other people because both sexes have long, lush beards and dress in so many layers of clothing that they default to an androgynous barrel shape, and every individual has a bone-deep instinct for mining, smithing, and trading (mechanical work and gadgetry, while often associated with dwarves in other works, is specifically noted not to be a common trait of Disc dwarves, the dwarf that the narrative is focusing on just happens to be good at it). Notably, traditional dwarves consider even identifying as female to be shameful and obscene, though this seems to be easing off in more progressive areas. In later books the more extremist dwarves acquire a new hat where they basically become the Taliban.
    • Lancre, where narrativium seems to be a bit stronger than elsewhere, and thus stories tend to be a law of physics. People there tend to break out in fairy tales.
    • Uberwald, a country of Gothic Horror where every vampire myth is true, but no two vampire families necessarily have the same combination of traits and weaknesses, and pretty much every classic horror trope (werewolves, mad science, decrepit castles on every mountaintop...) can be found if you just walk far enough.
    • Igors. Whether they are a family, a social group of like-minded individuals, or a species in their own right is unclear, but they all have a crazy talent at mad science and surgery of all kinds, and all serve as an assistant of some sort to a Marthter. The men tend to be hunchbacked and artfully ugly, while the females (Igoras and Igorinas) tend to be drop-dead gorgeous, to fit with the expected stereotypes of, respectively, The Igor and the Mad Scientist's Beautiful Daughter. It is also demonstrated in Monstrous Regiment that they can be quite gender-fluid within these parameters.
  • In The Divine Comedy, the seven planets medievals thought orbited the Earth, which include the Moon and the Sun, are fully inhabited by saints of similar natures. The trope is justified, as Beatrice goes out of her way to make it clear that the saints are on the same planet because they are similar, and not vice versa.
    • The Moon is the planet of The Oathbreakers who didn't absolutely will to break their oaths.
    • Mercury is the planet of were too driven by fame and honor on Earth.
    • Venus is the planet of those too focused on romantic pursuits.
    • The Sun is the planet of wise men.
    • Mars is the planet of the holy warriors.
    • Jupiter is the planet of The Good Kings.
    • Saturn is the planet of the contemplatives.
  • In the Venus and Mars series of self-help books, Men are described as Martians, who value direct communication, facts, practicality, and status. Women, meanwhile, are described as Venusians, who value art and culture, nuanced communication, relationships, feelings, and talking. Mars is described as a very utilitarian, almost military-like setting; there are no art museums, parks, gardens, magazines, or anything else viewed as "not practical or useful," (with the one exception of the giant telescope they use almost expressly for gawking at the Venusians) and everyone has a rank and wears a hat or uniform to show what his status/rank/function is. Venus, meanwhile, is a much more esoteric place, with art museums, gardens, newsstands full of magazines, beautiful homes, and no one ever seems to do any work, just sits around chit-chatting and daydreaming.
  • The Jan in Alien in a Small Town are all compulsively honest. They evolved from hive-dwelling prey animals, and cooperation was essential to their survival. This doesn't cripple them in dealing with other races, for several reasons: they know that others may lie to them; their hearing is so acute that they can hear your heartbeat, making them living lie detectors; they can keep secrets, as long as they don't have to actively lie to keep them; and they have a vast network of allies because everyone trusts them.
  • In Good Omens, Angels and Demons are respectably Always Lawful Good and Always Chaotic Evil, while humanity is capable of both. Such tropes are all deconstructed, as since humanity has the free will to be either/or good and bad, they are capable of greater virtues and viler atrocities that any angel or demon could come up with to the point where Crowley considers telling everyone in Hell that they should not even bother. Since Aziraphale and Crowley themselves have lived among humans since Adam and Eve left the garden, they have essentially gone native, Crowley begrudgingly doing nice things and Aziraphale doing bad things throughout the story as a sign that humanity had rubbed off on them.
  • Isaac Asimov's "Mother Earth": Earth's Pacific Project Invokes the idea that each colony planet will diverge from the baseline human characteristics. A combination of eugenics, alien chemical life, and a lack of baseline infusions means that each of the Outer Worlds will mutate in a way unique to each world. The Pacific Project expects them to outgrow their racism and xenophobia, and embrace the spectrum of humanity.
  • Happens to humanity in Star Surgeon by Alan Nourse. The human race are trying to join a Galactic Confederation but need a useful skill to qualify. Fortunately we're the only species with the experience in life science and inclination to practise medicine, so Earth has now become Hospital Earth. The plot involves an alien trying to become a doctor himself, against human prejudice and those fearful that humanity will no longer be useful if they don't keep this monopoly on medical care.
  • In InCryptid, several of the humanoid cryptid species have a hat that is often the only thing separating them from humans:
  • In Nine Princes in Amber, Corwin forms an army by recruiting entire species of creatures that are brutish, but a little slow. They also happen to have a predilection toward hero worship. This is all justified by the fact that as a Prince of Amber, Corwin can walk through Shadows until he finds one with an ideal species to recruit.
  • In Craig Shaw Gardner's Cineverse Cycle every world in the Cineverse is based on a particular type of B-movie, from film noir to beach-party musicals and everything in between.

    Live-Action TV 
  • Babylon 5:
    • The Narn start off as the Proud Warrior Race, the Minbari as Elves, the Vorlons as Mysterious Elders, and the Centauri as the declining Roman Empire. The Narn become Warrior Poets, the Minbari lose all hats due to a civil war, and the Vorlons gain (or rather, reveal) a Law hat. The Shadows also happen to gain the Chaos hat, while the Drazi steal the Proud Warrior Race. The uniformity of the alien cultures compared to humanity is lampshaded in the episode "The Parliament of Dreams," where each of the major races puts on a display of their global religion, while Sinclair arranges dozens upon dozens of people to represent humanity's multitudes of religions (even including a nonreligious atheist). Ultimately humanity's "hat" is explicitly defined (by Delenn) as community-building — humans automatically and unthinkingly weave together disparate groups into communities. The Narns also have more than one religion, but weren't seen to put on a demonstration in "The Parliament of Dreams".
    • The hats come off slightly as the series goes on. Londo points out that, to be a success in Centauri society, you have to be a schemer; there are plenty who don't, it's just that their families dwindle to insignificance. Delenn points out that both the religious and warrior castes have been ignoring the worker caste since Valen founded the Grey Council, and since they are fairly isolationist, we usually only get to see those who are on government business, who tend to be religious caste (possibly this is just because Delenn is religious), the military (and hence the warrior caste, although Londo does tell Earth Gov that this is not quite the same thing), or the Rangers, who are an elite undercover military force, with the obvious hats.
    • The Minbari hat is tradition, whichever caste it comes from. This certainly applies to both Delenn and Lennier, though sometimes we get to see Beneath the Mask.
    • The Abbai's hat is a focus on "community", the Brakiri's hat is business (more corporate culture as an ideal, rather than a Star Trek Ferengi-style "profit", though of course that is their ultimate goal). The Drazi's hat is pretty much "violence" — more specifically, the idea that a brawl pretty much solves any problem. The Llort's hat is basically kleptomania. The Shadows and Vorlons of course proudly promote their hats of "chaos" and "order and obedience" respectively, and try their hardest to make the younger races wear them too.
  • The Twelve Colonies of Battlestar Galactica occasionally fall into this, in function if not in populace. Aerilon was the breadbasket of the colonies, and everyone from it is perceived to be some sort of hick (which is why Baltar adopted a more upper class accent-apparently they sound like Yorkshiremen). The Gemenese believe in the literal truth of scripture. Sagittarons are downtrodden, and mad about it. Taurons are stoic and traditional, and have a mafia equivalent (depending on your perspective, they're either Space Mexicans or Space People of the Mediterranean). Capricans have it made - their planet is the center of art, culture, science, and politics. There is, however, no physical look specific to the people of any planet. Hopefully, this means that Single-Biome Planet is avoided.
  • Caprica indicates that the title planet may have been a planet of actual hats, as well, at least 58 years before the Cylon genocide.
  • Doctor Who:
    • The Time Lords might be described as a planet of very silly hats indeed (look up images some time and try not to giggle). They tend to be portrayed as very Lawful Neutral (with frequent forays into Lawful Stupid) philosophers and scholars who one alien describes as a race of "ancient dusty senators" who were "peaceful to the point of indolence". The Doctor is very much an exception, being more of a Chaotic Good rebel and nonconformist, whom his people barely tolerate (though they sometimes need his help). There is some debate, however, on whether or not "Time Lord" is the same as "person from Gallifrey", and if this applies to the general populace of the planet or just the ruling class.
    • Justified in the case of both the Daleks and Cybermen, who are created races rather than natural ones. The Daleks are genetically engineered to feel no emotions but hatred and xenophobia, explaining their desire to destroy all non-Dalek life in the universe. The Cybermen have also had their emotions removed, and seek to survive by assimilating other races Borg-style. Their origins vary, however, as the classic series had them as a humanoid race that slowly lost their individuality as they replaced more and more of their bodies with technology, while the new series introduced an Alternate Universe version as the creation of one man, who intentionally removed their emotions so they could cope with the trauma of being "upgraded": they freak out and die if they remember who they are.
    • The Sonatarans are a Proud Warrior Race of clones made to be the best at fighting and conquering any planet that looks at them funny. They are so into the whole warrior thing that their form of punishment is forcing the perpetrator into a job as a nurse.
    • In "The Doctor Dances", regarding Captain Jack Harkness, the Doctor explains to Rose that in the future, humanity's Hat becomes being more or less everywhere and having sex with more or less anything.
    • The Ood appear to be a race of slaves, who want to be given orders. It turns out this is due to humans taking over their Hive Mind. The Ood, once freed, turn out to still be a peaceful race.
    • "Partners in Crime" has a literal reference when Donna is revealing how much she was banking on the Doctor being at Adipose Industries so she could take up that companion offer of his that she'd turned down:
      Donna: I packed ages ago, just in case. 'Cause I thought, hot weather, cold weather, no weather... it goes anywhere, I've gotta be prepared.
      The Doctor: You've got a... hatbox?!
      Donna: Planet of the Hats, I'm ready!
    • On at least two occasions, the Eleventh Doctor has, shortly after meeting some alien being, announced its species' hat, for expository purposes, apparently without caring about tact. note 
    • "The God Complex" features Gibbis, who is apparently a member of a rather pathetic alien race whose hat is being a Dirty Coward. He mentions being abducted while planting trees along a road... so a conquering army can march in the shade.
      Gibbis: All I want is to go home and be conquered and oppressed, is that too much to ask?!
      • This is ultimately revealed to be a planned survival strategy – by being completely non-threatening, indeed actively welcoming to any would-be conquerors, the Tivolians avoid reprisal and annihilation. They're one of the oldest civilizations in the galaxy for a reason.
    • The Sarah Jane Adventures introduced the Shansheeth in "Death of the Doctor". They resemble vultures, and their hat is that they're the undertakers of the universe. Sarah Jane didn't buy it at first.
      • The Big Finish Doctor Who story "The Best-Laid Plans" features their cousins the Shanroth, who are all lawyers.
    • The Ogrons are explicitly Too Dumb to Fool.
  • Farscape had an episode on the planet Litigara where 90% of the inhabitants were lawyers and the remaining 10% servants who ran the various non law-related services.
    • It could be called a planet of balaclavas, since that's what the lawyers always seemed to wear. Also, the Judge wore a hat that was a mix between a sombrero and a dinner plate, and (like the uniform) the colour looked like Dolores Umbridge picked it out.
    • It's also made clear in the episode that their civilization is actively collapsing because of this setup. The events of the episode quite likely pushed it over the edge; the crew doesn't stick around to find out.
    • The Nebari are presently attempting to make their home planet a Planet of Hats through brutal enforcement of the law- to the point that dissenters are often simply brainwashed into perfect citizens. As a result, the only Nebari encountered in the show are either cold-hearted police officers or rebellious criminals like Chiana.
    • The Kanvians have a planet of mafia lords. Their government is based in the ruling of a criminal family over the others.
    • Other races also seem to be very monocultural or extremely specialized; the Diagnosans are a species of medics, and of course the Peacekeepers are a species of soldiers. The Peacekeepers later turn out to be just one culture amongst many; a breakaway cluster of planets are a regional power, and many unaffiliated worlds of the same race exist.
  • Lidsville takes the concept to its furthest extreme — a world entirely populated by actual anthropomorphic talking hats. Amusingly, despite being a planet of literal hats, it was not a planet of figurative hats.
  • The Neighborhood of Make-Believe segment of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood deconstructed this trope, in a child-appropriate way, with alien visitors from the Planet Purple. Everyone from this planet has purple skin and hair, they dress in identical purple clothes and speak in a monotone voice, and all the boys are named Paul and all the girls are named Pauline. They were used to illustrate how boring the world would be if everyone was the same.
  • In Power Rangers, planet Onyx. Its hat is The Wild West, existing largely as a place for the Evil Monster Saloon to be located.
    • An unusual example is Inquiris. Little is known about the planet, save that the natives, for whatever reason, cannot make declarative or exclamatory statements. Yes, a planet who's hat is literally a specific type of sentence.
  • Red Dwarf had Rimmerworld, a planet populated by Rimmer clones. The population idealized the core aspects of Rimmer... which happened to be cowardice, backstabbing, snottiness, arrogance, and hunger for power. Those that deviated were hunted down and executed.
    Rimmerworld emperor: Are there no signs of normalcy in these wretches? No cowardice or pomposity, no snideness or smarm, not even basic honest-to-goodness double-dealing two-facedness?
    Rimmerworld guard: Sire, these creatures did not even attempt to sell each other out for their own freedom... they lack even the most basic natural drives.
  • The very basis of Sliders, where our protagonists would slide into a parallel Earth defined by a key difference with "real" Earth. Although some episodes are more imaginative and seems to be inspired by classic horror and sci-fi movies, some of the Earths truly play this trope straight. There’s an Earth of lawyers where 90% of the population study law and even the minimal action like buying fast food would require tons of disclaiming paperwork and documentation or accidentally hitting someone slightly may result in a life-destroying suit. There was also a hippie world, a hare Krishna world and an Egyptian world (mainly based on the most basic stereotypes associated with Egypt like their alleged obsession with death, although this idea has been already discarded by modern scholars).
  • Used a lot in the Stargate-verse:
    • Stargate SG-1:
      • Particularly in the earlier episodes, nearly every planet the SG-1 team visits is based on a particular human culture. It's a justified or at least handwaved by saying that the people were transplanted to that planet from Earth, and their culture has just been stagnating since. There are the Middle Ages, the Norse, the Greeks, and, of course, the ancient Egyptians, among others. Justified in that most of these planets were supposedly populated by people of earth who had been taken to that planet by one of the more highly-developed species - the Goa'uld and the Asgard being the typical abductors.
      • The Goa'uld deliberately stagnate the culture of any people they transplant. They like to keep them primitive, because 1) primitives are more easily coerced into worship by their awesome-but-impractical weapons, and 2) primitives are absolutely no threat to them. (The Goa'uld really hate it when people become advanced enough to see they aren't gods.) Earth only developed to the point of being a threat because the Goa'uld lost access to the Earth Stargate and then *forgot where the planet was*. The Asgard also (somewhat) stagnated the Norse people they transplanted because a treaty they had with the Goa'uld didn't allow any protected planet (the planets the Goa'uld agreed not to touch) to develop to a point where they would be a threat to them. The Asgard were not in a position to fight the Goa'uld due to the war with the Replicators, so the transplanted humans were kept relatively primitive (though not so much as the Goa'uld transplanted ones) for their protection.
      • In "2001", the Aschen are described as: "They don't get excited in general, General. It's like an entire planet of accountants." Their more significant hat is planetary genocide.
      • The Nox, had preachy pacifism as their hat as well as literal funny hats.
      • The Goa'uld hat appears to be arrogance and sense of superiority, something that is present even in the Tok'ra, non-malevolent Goa'uld.
      • The Jaffa are a Proud Warrior Race as a result of their entire species being enslaved to serve as the Goa'uld military.
      • The Asgard hat is clearly science and scholarship as we never meet an Asgard who does any kind of physical labor. This is also justified as thousands of years of cloning have weakened their bodies to the point that an excited hug can hurt them.
      • Earth also has its own hat: Genre Savvy. SG-1 is the most Genre Savvy of them all, but most other minor characters show at least some signs of this trait. We Tau'ri have a technological hat, too — instead of basing more advanced tech off more exotic principles, we use fundamentally basic equipment in increasingly refined ways. This is particularly noted in our really spectacular projectile weapons.
    • In Stargate Atlantis, the Wraith are a race consisting solely of warriors who live to eat. In the last season, Todd the Wraith mentions that feeding on humans is the driving force in their society with little beyond that. We did finally get a small glimpse of Wraith society in Season 5's "The Queen". Judging from that episode, the entire society is divided into Queens, who seem to spend their time intimidating one another, their male Advisors/Viziers, who seem to specialize in Magnificent Bastardry, and the possibly asexual Drones, whose duties apparently involve patrolling ships and standing guard (not unlike actual Soldier Drones in Bee colonies). All of them are in thrall to a prime Queen (called The Primary in this particular segment shown, but this may not be the case with every Wraith alliance). Exactly where the various Male Wraiths who serve as scientists and field commanders (who are also uniformly errhm, uniformed in leather) fit into this mix is never really shown.
  • Today's Special: Fred the space mouse comes from the planet Squeakonia, populated by mice whose hat is eating cheese, talking in rhyme, and generally acting just like Muffy.

    Podcasts 
  • Lerts in Mission to Zyxx are an entire species of mid-level office workers.

    Radio 
  • An episode of X Minus One featured a reptilian alien coming to a mining planet for one of their workers (basically a milder version of a Furian). The reptile alien's hat is that they Cannot Tell a Lie (although they don't have to say the whole truth either) while the "Furian's" hat is being Hot-Blooded. Lampshaded by the "Furian": "You know how they say we're all good at bar fights?"

    Tabletop Games 
  • Dungeons & Dragons:
    • In the earliest edition of D&D, Elves and Dwarves were classes. Which means that all Elves and all Dwarves had the same level progression, learned the same kills and abilities.
    • 4th Edition D&D splits the old traits of the elf race into two new races called "elves" and "eladrin". Because, you know, you can't have a single species wearing the intellectual hat and the close-to-nature hat at the same time.
    • Humanity's hat in 4th edition is being driven, ambitious, The Determinator, and being able to learn things faster than other races because of their shorter lifespans.
    • It's also heavily implied that humans are the only species in the setting other than dragons that can mate with any other species and produce viable offspring. Our hat is that we Really Get Around.
    • The Drow or Dark Elf hat is treachery, with the exception of Drizzt and all his imitators along with Church of Eilistraee.
    • Beholders are almost all narcissistic xenophobes.
    • Neogi are completely obsessed with slavery.
    • Giff (not to be confused with Gith) are an entire species of militaristic mercenaries, with a British flavor.
    • Grells are completely obsessed with eating
  • The Stellar Nations of Star*Drive all have their own hats.
  • GURPS:
    • In GURPS Fantasy 2: The Madlands, there is the region of Savringia. Thousands of years previously, two godlike entities decides to have a contest to see which one could create the most unlikely society. So they reduced themselves to energy and used that to create City-states of Hats. Currently there are about 30 but this is subject to change. There are the more ordinary Cities of Merchants, Tradesmen, and Priests, but there are also esoteric ones like Cities of Judges, Spiders, Grays, Silence, and the Fickle.
    • From the same publisher comes GURPS Aliens and GURPS Fantasy Folk, which also fall under this trope.
  • Since the expansion of Magic: The Gathering's focus to outside of Dominaria, most planes seem to follow this sort of pattern. For instance, Kamigawa resembles Feudal Japan in culture and aesthetics, Mirrodin is made almost entirely from metal, Innistrad is an darker version of Überwald, and Zendikar is an adventurer's paradise with constantly-shifting landscapes and an endless number of unexplored ruins.
  • While the planet Cray in Cardfight!! Vanguard is diverse as a whole, its nations and clans tend to have hats.
    • Nations:
      • Magallanica is the sea nation.
      • Zoo is the animals-plants-insects/nature nation.
      • Star Gate is the space-themed nation.
      • Dark Zone is the dark-themed nation.
      • Dragon Empire is what it sounds like.
      • Averted with United Sanctuary, which has 3 kinds of knights, 2 corporations and a nursing organisation.
    • Clans:
      • Royal Paladins and Gold Paladins are heroic knights.
      • Shadow Paladins are dark knights and later antiheroes.
      • Angel Feather consists of angels in nurse outfits.
      • Kagero are fire dragons.
      • Narukami are thunder dragons.
      • Tachikaze are prehistoric-themed.
      • Nubatama and Murakum are ninjas.
      • Nova Grapplers are prizefighters.
      • Dimension Police are mecha and superheroes.
      • Link Joker are alien invaders.
      • Great Nature is an uplifted animal university.
      • Megacolony is the insect mafia.
      • Neo Nectar are plant/farming-themed.
      • Aqua Force are a well-intentioned extremist navy.
      • Bemuda Triangle is composed of mermaid pop stars.
      • Granblue is composed of zombie pirates.
      • Spike Brothers is a violent American Football team.
      • Pale Moon is a circus as a front for assassins.
      • Dark Irregulars are movie-monster-themed.
  • Warhammer 40,000: Many worlds are characterised by this — everyone from Cadia is a soldier, everyone from Krieg (German for "war") is an exceptionally grim and dour soldier in a longcoat, everyone from Catachan is Rambo. To be fair, they come from a planet sitting at the gates to a Negative Space Wedgie from hell, a (self-made) radioactive wasteland, and a Jungle Death World full of carnivorous plants and even worse animals respectively. The hats are likely survival mechanisms. For Imperial hats, the Imperium is a basically a portmanteau of the Roman Empire, the Catholic Church, the Third Reich and the U.S.S.R, so everyone being the same is not so incredible.
    • Eldar:
    • Space Marines:
    • Chaos Space Marines:
      • Every World Eater is an incarnation of Ax-Crazy, and/or a Blood Knight.
      • Every Emperor's Child is horror with a killer guitar (apart from Fabius Bile, who is a Mad Scientist).
      • Every Death Guard is an implacable bag of walking filth.
      • Every sentient Thousand Son is a mad wizard in power armor. The others are all ghosts trapped in Space Marine armor.
      • Every Iron Warrior is a master siege engineer.
      • Every Night Lord is a psychotic serial killer akin to a Chaotic Evil Batman.
      • Every Alpha Legionnaire is an Ambiguously Evil Magnificent Bastard. They are also all Alpharius.
      • Every Word Bearer is an insane and unrelenting dark priest.
      • Every Black Legionnaire is out for revenge for the death of Horus.
    • For Space Marines and Chaos Space Marines, this is largely justified due to the fact that they all share genetic material with the primarch of their chapter - essentially, they have all been deliberately modified to be the same. Plus, most Space Marine chapters are only just north of 1000 members (10 companies of 100, plus command) who are taught similar fighting styles and recruit from one planet (or a handful of similar ones). Anyone who was not, in fact, wearing their hat would probably be questioned as a traitor. Chaos Marines tend to be much more individualistic, but come from the same parentage-of-the-legion situation, as well as many worshipping the Chaos God that closest matches with their... idiom. All berserker warriors who favor close combat and are trained and given access to chain-axes would seem similar enough, but make them more likely to all enjoy martial prowess and chopping off heads? That may as well be a hat breeding program...
    • Orks:
      • Every Bad Moon is decked out with flash. And their teef fall out and grow fast.
      • Every Blood Axe is a sneaky git who likes mimicking the Imperial Guard.
      • Every Death Skull is a looter.
      • Every Evil Sun is a speed-freak.
      • Every Goff is grim and dour and thinks melee combat is Serious Business.
      • Every Snakebite is a tribal who is Made of Iron.
    • Tau (technically not a hat for the whole culture, but every caste has a specific purpose, and you're born into your caste, with crossbreeding between castes illegal. To be fair, the ethereals are breeding the perfect warriors, builders, diplomats etc... and even though they've only had a few thousands years, they may even technically be different species by now.)
      • Every Ethereal is a ruler of some sort.
      • Every member of the Fire caste is a warrior.
      • Every member of the Earth caste is a builder/scientist/engineer.
      • Every member of the Water caste is a bureaucrat/diplomat/politician.
      • Every member of the Air caste is a pilot/navigator/starship crewmember.
      • Some of the Tau sept-worlds have specific headgear, too. Everyone from N'dras is brooding, everyone from Ke'l'shan refuses to give up, everyone from Fal'shia is a problem solver and the list goes on and on. This one is actually justified, as the Tau's non-warp "skip drives", while relatively safe, are also expensive and slow. This means Septs share ideas slowly and tend to develop their own cultures after a while. For the most part this is accepted, even planned for, as long as septs continue to follow the Greater Good, but independent breakways are starting to appear, such as the Ethereal-hostile Farsight Enclaves.
    • The Imperial Guard:
      • Everyone from Cadia is immensely proud and are vaguely like the Canadian army or the Mobile Infantry.
      • Everyone from Krieg is a Death Seeking World War I-era stormtrooper with a Badass Longcoat.
      • Everyone from Praetoria is a British redcoat, or more specifically, a Zulu extra.
      • Everyone from Catachan is a tough-as-nails jungle survivalist, and looks an awful lot like Rambo.
      • Everyone from Valhalla is a Soviet conscript (except those in the 597th, who are closer to modern soldiers).
      • Everyone from Tallarn is a pious desert warrior who specializes in guerilla warfare. Bedouins, not, well...
      • Everyone from Atilla is a Space Hun, complete with love of horses (sometimes mechanical).
      • Everyone from Elysia is an American-ish paratrooper.
      • Everyone from Mordia is a Napoleonic-era Prussian soldier with Nerves of Steel.
      • Everyone from Vostroya is a Ukrainian Cossack.
      • Everyone from Salvar is a Kleptomaniac who dresses like a Mad Max mook.
  • Warhammer: Within most of the major factions, there are multiple subdivisions and groups with clear-cut regional and factional identities.
    • The Empire:
      • All Marienbugers are foppish, arrogant but irritatingly skilled dandies.
      • Everyone from Nuln is an engineer reeking of blackpowder.
      • All Reiklanders are skilled marksmen and consummate professional soldiers.
      • All Middenlanders are hairy barbarians with a liking for blunt weapons.
      • Hochlanders are accomplished hunters and crack shots with hunting rifles and longbows.
    • The Skaven are divided between multiple clans, each with a very specific gimmick. Among the four Great Clans, Clan Skryre are crazy techo-magical inventors; Clan Moulder are insane fleshcrafting breeders of monsters; Clan Eshin are cloaked spies and assassins; and Clan Pestilens are fanatical worshipers of plague and decay. Among the numerous minor clans, Clan Mors are regimented militarists with ambitions to Great Clan status, Clan Skab are soldiers with a lot of Stormvermin, Clan Skaar are warpstone miners, Clan Sleekit are underground navigators and sailors, Clan Volkn are a bunch of pyromaniacs, Clan Skurvy are mutinous pirates, Clan Carrion are thieves and scavengers, Clan Ektrik are all obsessed with lightning, Clan Treeeherik are Social Darwinist backstabbers even by the standards of the Skaven, and Clan Vrrrtkin are obsessed with weaponizing poison gas.
    • Vampire Counts: Before their rework in the 6th-7th edition, each Vampire Count was from one of several bloodlines: Von Carstein (classic Dracula-style vampires, although recently have been modeled to be a lot more bestial), Lahmians (pseudo-Egyptian female vampires. With cats), Blood Dragons (honour-bound martial powerhouses who exist only for combat and proving themselves), Strigoi (horribly deformed ghouls with no link to their humanity at all) and Necrarchs (Nosferatu-like intellectuals who are wizened but terrifyingly powerful when it comes to magic). There were abilities and artifacts that kept these ideas pure for old players and the bloodlines are still mentioned in lore, but the terms were put to rest for gameplay purposes.
    • Bretonnians are a curious juxtaposition of the lofty ideals of Arthurian Legend (Knight in Shining Armor, questing for the Grail, fighting monsters) and The Dung Ages (peasants are downtrodden and considered as a sentient animal at best and are used in battles as cannon fodder, the knights themselves tend to be painfully sheltered and their survival in an age of gunpowder is largely due to the protection of the Wood Elves manipulating them as a buffer and a huge mountain range between Bretonnia and the Empire). Oh, and they're also French, with all that implies.
    • The High Elves are split into ten kingdoms that all embody some aspect of the Tolkien-esque elf stereotype. Eataine, the oldest and richest kingdom of Ulthuan and home to the only city on the continent non-elves can visit, represents the Proud Merchant Race and cosmopolitanism. Avelorn is the ancient homeland of the elves where poets, mages and artists live in an Enchanted Forest realm, represents a hybrid of high elf and wood elf stereotypes. Ellyrion is a wide-open steppe kingdom where intelligent horses with the lifespans of elves thunder across plains, and is known for producing elite heavy cavalry and mounted archers. Caledor is a mountainous realm where mighty dragons slumber under the peaks, represents elves as Dragon Knights. Saphery is an enchanted realm where magic flows through the land and through the blood of the locals, producing some of the greatest wizards in the realm. Yvresse, once a rich and prosperous kingdom, was ravaged by Daemonic invasions and the WAAAGH of Grom the Paunch and most of its people were slain; handsome white mansions and gleaming amphitheatres now lie vacant and eroding, representing the elves as a race in decline. Cothique, a cold coastal realm battered by storms and Norscan and Druchii invasion fleets, has produced generations of hardy and brave elves who are Born Under the Sail. Chrace, a wild kingdom infested with Chaos monsters and bearing the brunt of Norscan and Druchii raids, has bred a generation of toughened and warlike elves who fortify every city and defend them with grim determination. Tiranoc, a kingdom devastated by the Sundering beyond recovery, produces disciplined and proud yet wild elves addicted to the thrill of battle and equally adept at fighting on land or at sea in traditional chariots or Skycutters. And the Shadowlands, formerly Nagarythe the homeland of Malekith and the Dark Elves, is a shattered wasteland kingdom devastated by war and sparsely populated except by bitter Ulthuani loyalists who ruthlessly hunt down Dark Elves using stealth, assassination and brutal terror and guerrilla tactics straight out of the Druchii playbook.
  • Shadowrun 3rd edition features a section with members of each of the Standard Fantasy Races giving you a brief introduction to their race. Most of them start by acknowledging their race's hat, then going on to tear it apart as racist bullcrap. Except the dwarf, since their hat is being short.
    • Dwarves also have a hat of being technical wizkids. The dwarf explaining this has trouble working out how to fix a toaster.
      • Shadowrun does a good job of deconstructing the hats/stereotypes for each race. For instance, the dwarf states that a lot of dwarves live underground because basement apartments are cheaper and they don't mind the low ceilings. Amusingly enough, the human points out how he's different from the other races by mentioning the other races' hats and stating how Humans don't have any of those.
  • Traveller is a little more complex about this. Humans overall are as complex as, well, humans, though individual worlds often have a hat. The Aslan's hat is Proud Warrior Race Guy, though arguably that quality is detailed well enough to take the hattiness away. The K'kree are Vegetarian Jihadists (yes, really). The Zhodani's hat is Psionics.
  • Nearly every race and culture in Talislanta wears a hat to some degree or another: Sarista are Lovable Rogues, Danuvians are Action Girls and Non Action Guys, Muses are Cloudcuckoolanders, Yassan are Gadgeteer Geniuses, Jaka are hunters, and so on. The Gao are a notable exception...but that's because Gao-Din is less a culture proper than a mixed bag.
  • A vast majority of the various D-Bees in Rifts fall neatly into this trope. The Simvan are all nomadic warriors with a psychic connection to animals, the Larmac are all lazy, the Naruni are all shrewd businessmen, etc. Occasionally exceptions to this trope will be made in the case of individual NPCs, but the description almost always includes the statement "Unlike most members of X's race..."
  • Space Munchkin The RPG had the Bumpy Foreheaded Alien race, which is actually a category for all races of this type in scifi. You chose (or randomly rolled) your one distinguishing racial feature, the concept that your culture is entirely devoted to and the concept from human culture your culture cannot understand ("We have no word for this thing you call 'modesty'")
  • Each Splat in the Old World of Darkness represents a Hat.
    • Vampire: The Masquerade as an example, most players choose their clan/Hat from the Brujah (rebellion), Gangrel (wilderness), Malkavian (insanity), Nosferatu (secrecy), Toreador (art), Tremere (magic), or Ventrue (wealth). Being Hatless here brands you a Caitiff, giving you the outcast Hat. For all that the Clans are stated to be diverse (and some atypical examples are given as character templates in the splatbooks) canon characters are almost always at most slight variations on a Hat.
    • Mage: the Ascension had its splats organized around their primary sphere, influencing their worldview: Celestial Chorus (clergy and worshippers), Dreamspeakers (shaman-types), Akashic Brotherhood (Eastern monks and martial artists), Cult of Ecstasy (musicians, hedonists, and hippies), Sons of Ether (inventors), Verbena (witches, wiccans, and naturalists), Order of Hermes (alchemists and western-medieval mages), Virtual Adepts (netrunners, hackers, and script kiddies), and Euthanatoi (nihilists, assassins, and brooders)
    • Werewolves had their tribes: Black Furies (greek man-haters), Bone Gnawers (homeless crazies living under bridges), Children of Gaia (eco-warriors), Fianna (Irish hero wannabes), Get of Fenris (Viking savages), Glass Walkers (modern, tech-lovers), Red Talons (human hating feral wolves), Shadow Lords (sneaky ninja types), Silent Striders (mystics), Silver Fangs (nobility-loving plotters and schemers), Uktena (dark magic lovers), Wendigo (traditionalists), and Black Spiral Dancers (corrupted bad guys... or maybe heroes playing a deep cover long game?).
  • Exalted: Every group wears a hat. every group has five subgroups, which each wear a hat.
    • Solar Exalts wear the hat of the superheroes. Dawncaste = warriors, Zenith Caste = Priests and performers, Twilight Caste = inventors and scholars, Night Caste = ninja assassins, and Eclipse Caste = diplomats
    • Lunar Exalts wear the hat of the Protectors and of the feral monsters. Two of their types were destroyed, meaning they are one of the few types that does not have five subgroups. They have Full Moon (warriors), No Moon (mystics), and Changing Moon (rogues) castes.
    • Abyssals Exalted and Infernal Exalted, both corrupted Solars, wear the hat of the Rebels and destroyers. Their castes are reflections of the Solar castes — for instance, a Daybreak (corrupted twilight) might be a necrosurgeon or demon-summoner, whereas their Infernal versions, Defilers, are all about seeking how to tear down the existing reality and create their own, better version.
    • Sidereal Exalted wear the hat of the master manipulators. Their types are based on their patron planet/Maiden, and are pretty clear based on what that god is a patron of: Voyages (travelers, loners, and explorers), Serenity (lovers, hedonists, and pleasure-seekers), War (duh), Secrets (spies and info-gatherers), and Endings (assassins)
    • Dragon-Blooded Exalts wear the hat of the Samurai-style nobility. The Earth, Fire, Air, Water, and Wood castes are fairly standard elemental interpretations. The Noble Houses that are led by an elemental individual also tend to take on stereotypical traits.
    • Amongst everyone else, you can expect a Dragon-King to be either kung-fu master seeking to rebuild his or her near-extinct race, or a mindless brute who kill anyone who gets into their territory. And a Jadeborn is either a Worker, Warrior, or an Artisan, as Autochthon willed them.
  • Stars Without Number: alien races usually have Lenses, essentially a way of randomly rolling for Hats. You might have a culture with, say, Curiosity and Wrath, or Collectivism and Fear, or Sagacity and Pride, as the defining cultural traits.
  • Generally in Rocket Age all Venusians are warrior poets, all Ganymedians are noble savages and all Europans (aside from the Emissary Corps) are arrogant and superior. However, this becomes subverted the more is learnt about every planet and it's peoples.
  • The Mutants & Masterminds book Worlds of Freedom says: "Most worlds have one philosophy, racial makeup, language, and extraordinary ability common to all planetary natives, but Earth is rich in contrasting cultural traditions."
  • Played for laughs in the Toon supplement Tooniversal Tour Guide. The "Star Toon" setting features the Bozonians, a race of pigeon-people who are so stupid they can perform seemingly-impossible feats of science and engineering.

    Video Games 
  • In Azur Lane, the various shipgirls are all based around national themes:
  • The various alien races from Star Control come from different varieties of Planet of Hats. The Spathi are cowardly to the point of paranoia, the Pkunk are hippy-dippy psychics, the Umgah are psychotic practical jokers, the Druuge are slavers, and there are multiple species of Scary Dogmatic Aliens (Ilwrath, Mycon, Ur-Quan Kzer-Za and Kohr-Ah) and Proud Warrior Race Guys (the Thraddash, the Shofixti, and the Yehat).
    • Subverted in a couple of cases with examples of My Species Doth Protest Too Much; the Vux all find humans utterly disgusting, but Admiral Zex really really likes them, to an uncomfortable degree. We are also told of a group of Spathi who are completely fearless and travel the galaxy performing daring acts. And the Zoq Fot Pik are actually three different races, whose combined hats appear to be bickering, not remembering which of them is which, and Frungy.
    • The Fan Discontinuity sequel Star Control 3 takes this to strange extremes, with many aliens having unbelievably specific Hats. The Owa, for instance, practice chivalry and know about antimatter science, and you never learn anything else about them.
  • The world in Pokémon seems to be a Planet of Hats as well — much of culture and society revolves around Pokémon, from the economy (shops and huge department stores which sell only Pokémon-related goods) to the government. And since every town is surrounded by tall grass, it's technically impossible to even leave town without a Pokémon of your own.
    • In the games, all Pokémon have serving humans as a hat. It's possible to have a disobedient Pokémon, but there is always a way to overcome this problem and get them to submit to you. Truly untrainable Pokémon only appear in the anime and tend to be legendaries. Individual species have additional hats, such as Gardevoir's loyalty, and Slaking's laziness (the latter even became a game mechanic). The anime established early on all Pokémon are Always Good and only do evil if they have an evil trainer, but this was eventually retconed away many years later with Pokémon serving as antagonists.
  • Mass Effect is known for playing with this trope. Everyone's got a hat of some kind (often with some biological basis), but many individuals do take off their racial hats.
    • Humanity's in-universe hat is being impatient, rude, and demanding things done their way. A Paragon Shepard will actually surprise some alien characters by being gentle and considerate, while a Renegade Shepard will embody the stereotype.
    • The Asari's hat is being Blue-Skinned Alien Space Elves with three life phases: Maiden (Stripper/mercenary), Matron (boring), and Matriarch (politician). The Asari character Liara is a Maiden-phase Asari who works as an archaeologist, Matriarch Aethyta works as a bartender (after being ignored when she suggested the Asari make more of an effort to ditch their hat), and Peebee is very much a reckless, live-in-the-moment person (Asari are long-lived and thus tend to take longer views of things).
    • The Krogan have Proud Warrior Race Guy and Blood Knight as their hats, but Okeer is a Krogan scientist, Charr is a Krogan romantic, and Kesh is a Krogan engineer.
    • The Salarians' hat is that of the Proud Scholar Race, being a race of scientists and other academics. Some of those smarts go into spycraft and black ops as demonstrated with the Special Tasks Group, the Salarians' military organization that leverages subterfuge and sabotage to compensate for their physical frailty.
    • Quarians have the hat of sickly, environmental suit-bound Grease Monkeys who are experts in computer programming and ship engineering, although there are also Quarians who know how to fight and can throw down with the best of them, such as Quarian marine Kal'Reegar.
  • Sten, from Dragon Age: Origins has this to say, which can actually sum up what BioWare thinks of this trope.
    Warden: Tell me about the qunari.
    Sten: No.
    Warden: Well, that wasn't what I expected to hear.
    Sten: Get used to disappointment. People are not simple. They cannot be defined for easy reference in the manner of: 'the elves are a lithe, pointy-eared people who excel at poverty.'
    • Iron Bull from Dragon Age: Inquisition is a lot more forthcoming about his culture, but still takes a shot at this trope:
    Iron Bull: ""Tell me about the Qun," is like saying "Tell me about economics." Most Qunari know just enough to get by. It's like blind dwarves trying to figure out a dragon by touch. Only the priests really have the whole picture, and they spend their whole lives figuring that crap out."
  • Meteos, despite being a puzzle game, has a good number of these. There's a planet for robots, insomniacs, stubborn miners, shapeshifters, timid jumpers, gangsters, telepaths, bees, ninjas, and ascended psychics each.
  • The computer game Spaceward Ho! gets honorable mention. It's a light turn-based strategy affair and doesn't have culture, but planet ownership is indicated by hats. A variety of cowboy hats worn by the actual planets. (Santa hats if the game is played on December 25th.)
  • In Spore, when your race reaches the Space phase, they are assigned a hat based on their actions up until that point, which usually falls into the standard sci-fi racial norms. There's Shaman, Trader, Warrior, Diplomat, Zealot, Scientist, Ecologist, Bard, Knight and Wanderernote .
  • Earth has become this in Mega Man Star Force, with the hat being The Power of Friendship. People even get significant discounts and increased political rights as they become popular.
  • In Startopia, the alien races are each suited to one specific task — OK, two related tasks for the blue-collar Salthogs. Karmarama are purple four-armed hippies, that plant seeds. Turraken are two-headed nerds, that are all scientists. Sirens are sexy winged humanoids, and the only aliens in the game with obvious gender dimorphism, and they "love" others. And so on. The most specialised are the Grekka Targ, who are solely employed to run your communications gear.
    • The Greys are all experts in xenobiology after experimenting on all known races, so they run the sickbays. The Kasvagorians are all Proud Warrior Race Guys, making them useful only as security guards. The Zedem Monks are, well, a race of monks, whose hands have evolved to naturally be in the prayer gesture. The Polvakian Gem Slugs are all hedonistic aristocrats and an obvious parody of the Hutts.
  • In Chronomaster, you play a retired designer of Planets of Hats. The mini-universes you end up visiting include a hypermilitant world, a space casino, and a Cloudcuckooland. To top it off, one world that you never even see is implied to be pop Jung-themed, and solving an optional puzzle requires you to warn somebody who's going there of the inevitable Evil Twin threat.
  • The Henry Stickmin Series has the Toppat clan. An international crime syndicate in which members may be identified by the top hats they all wear. Apparently they aren't allowed to trade.
  • The world of Loom is divided into xenophobic guilds, each with a specific craft, e.g. Weavers, Glassmakers, etc. Each guild's citizens seem to all bear the characteristics of their guild. For instance, the glassmakers value traits such as clarity and beauty, and have names like Luscent Bottleblower. Somewhat justified in that the thing that defines them is what their community was formed on in the first place.
  • Gilneas in World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, even before worgen curse, seems to be a literal Nation of Hats. As far as you can see, everyone in the starting zone wears some kind of hat.
    • Warcraft 2 had several examples of this trope among the human nations and orcish clans. Dalaran was all mages, Kul'Tiras was all sailors, Stromgarde was all warriors, Alterac was all snobs. The Twilight's Hammer was all end of the world cultists, the Stormreavers were all warlocks, Laughing Skull were all backstabbing traitors, Warsong could all do earsplitting battlecries, Bonechewers were all cannibals. In World of Warcraft, dwarves continue to fit this loosely. Ironforge dwarves are mostly smiths and disciplined warriors, Wildhammers are nature loving barbarians, and Dark Irons are all sneaky spies, thieves, assassins, and pyromaniacs.
    • Cataclysm has provided many races a chance to get new hats. Night elves can now be magi, something that was long forbidden in their culture. Dwarves can now be shamans, providing stark contrast to their otherwise industrial nature (at least of the Bronzebeard variety). Orcs are seriously divided over whether or not Garrosh Hellscream is a good leader—even though the should fully embrace a blood-and-thunder warrior. There is still a tremendous amount of hat wearing though, and while not all races have true hats, they have collective niches, which both the Horde and the Alliance forming parts of Six Race gang.
  • This was a major complaint in Ross's Game Dungeon's review of Deus Ex: Human Revolution: Humanity's hat in 2032 is cybernetic augmentation. There is very little casual dialogue or worldbuilding not devoted to augmentations, the impact of which was supposedly able to revive Detroit and construct a Chinese Layered Metropolis from scratch within... a couple decades from now. This is in contrast to the original Deus Ex, which explored a multitude of themes from terrorism to transhumanism, and was also much more grounded in reality compared to Human Revolution despite taking place twenty years later (i.e. cities still look pretty much the same as they do in the present, while Human Revolution is getting close to Crystal Spires and Togas territory).
  • In Bangai-O, the heroes hail from Dan Star, a planet populated with hot-blooded men. Since the game focuses entirely on shoot-em up action (and little elaboration on the setting), one can only imagine what it must be like there.
  • Despite what their name might suggest, the Space Pirates of Metroid aren't simply a gang of outlaws in space and are actually a distinct alien species that has piracy and galactic domination as its hats. There's also the Krikens of Metroid Prime: Hunters, who exist to raze other worlds to the ground.
  • In the Halo:
    • Human colonies tend to take after one or two particular cultures; Harvest had a mix of American Midwest and Scandinavian, Reach's original Hungarian settlers still had a major impact on on the planet's culture, the Rubble's population seems to be largely Hispanic, etc.
    • Done on purpose by the Covenant. The Prophets set up their society so that none of the various races could get by on their own (Elites are warriors, Grunts are laborers, etc.). One Elite spends the whole of Halo: Glasslands searching ancient texts to rediscover things like agriculture, to keep the Elite homeworld from total collapse.
  • The X-Universe is really bad about this, due in large part to the games' near lack of plot and characterization (though that's not necessarily bad). Every faction has a hat that fits every character of that race. The Terrans are high-tech xenophobes, the Split are a Proud Warrior Race, the Teladi are Proud Merchant Lizard Folk, the Boron are peace-loving Squid People, etc.
  • This was the objective of the Smithy Gang in Super Mario RPG: To turn the Mushroom Kingdom into a world filled with... WEAPONS!
    • You also visit a couple Towns of Hats. Moleville is full of anthropomorphic moles who are all miners, Yo'ster Island has its entire populace (of Yoshis) obsessed with racing, Monstro Town is populated almost exclusively by monsters who have gone straight. But the weirdest has to be Marrymore, a town that is all about weddings. The only places of note in the entire town are a wedding chapel, and a fancy hotel for the honeymoon.
  • Several of the alien races in Ratchet & Clank come with their own hats. The most notable of these are the Lombaxes, a race of badass gearheads who can barely sit next to a piece of machinery or weaponry for five minutes without trying to modify it in some way.
  • Justified with the Amarcians in Tales of Graces. All of them seem to be scientists or engineers of some kind. We later find out that the Amarcians aren't actually a race, the word is just what the Fodrans called engineers. They're basically what happens when everyone from one job sector gets stranded on another planet so long they form their own culture. Most present-day Amarcians aren't aware of this though.
  • The United Powers League of StarCraft took some very drastic measures to turn Earth into one in order to remove all the differences that lead to wars and other conflicts. They made English the official language of the world, banned all the old religions in favor of a philosophy of the "divinity of mankind", and made cybernetics and genetic engineering illegal, among other things. Those who did not conform to these new standards were forcibly rounded up and executed, leading to a death toll of 400,000,000. Doran Routhe had 40,000 of these dissidents selected to be put into cryogenic sleep and sent off to colonize other worlds, leading the Terrans to populate the Koprulu Sector that serves as the main setting of the games.
  • In FTL: Faster Than Light, the races are all defined by certain traits. The Engi have Machine Empathy, but are awkward in combat, instead relying on attack and defense drones. The Mantis are the opposite, being a Proud Warrior Race, but also are often violent and vicious. Rockmen are stoic and have a bit of The Fundamentalist in them, as well as being extremely wary of other races. Zoltan are Lawful Neutral (sometimes Lawful Stupid) Energy Beings. Slugs are greedy merchants with psychic powers that allow them to see through the thick nebulae where they live. And Humans...well, Humans Are Average.
  • Some planets in Doki-Doki Universe are defined by a single characteristic. For example, there is a planet where everyone likes gross things and a planet where animals keep humans as pets, among others.
  • League of Legends yordles. One of the most distinctive characteristics of this species is that they're relatively kind-hearted and friendly towards everyone. Although this is a justified trope, since social isolation has caused many yordles to go insane or even become evil (as evident with Veigar).
  • Starbound: Each race as at least two components to their hats; Florans have the savage and plant-life hat, Humans currently are a race without a home planet, Glitch are stuck in the past due to an issue with programming (hence their name), Apex are ape-men who seem to follow the government strongly, Hylotl are fish people who are the most peaceful of the races, to the point of getting mockery from time to time, Avians are a strongly religious race with a heavy May Inca Tec aesthetic, and Novakids are Space Westerners with bodies composed of energy.
  • ToeJam & Earl come from Funkotron, a planet whose hat, shockingly enough, is funk and rap culture.
  • The early alternate-universe missions in City of Heroes cross this with Underground Monkeys through the re-use of enemy models. You've got the alternate Earth of werewolves, the one where the Corrupt Corporate Executive's project went horribly right, producing a Hive Mind that took over, the one where the psychic-powered clockwork robots took over, etc. They're generally referred to in-game as "enemy group Earth".
  • The fal'Cie of Final Fantasy XIII. There are over a million of them on Cocoon alone, and they are all Jerkass Gods who consider humanity to be essentially livestock. 100% of the fal'Cie are in on the plan to force the Creator to return by killing all of Cocoon's humans, which they figure will get his attention. Even the one whose job is to open the pod bay doors.
  • In Gems of War, each kingdom has a particular theme, and some involve a "hat" — piety, invention, etc. However, the quest character for each kingdom is sometimes in opposition to that theme rather than an exemplar of it; for example, the kingdom of temples and paladins (Whitehelm) has you receive your quests from a vampire (Sapphira) who is being attacked by the pious folk.
  • Played With to Hell and back in Stellaris. All species have Traits, biological instincts which are ingrained into them to make them, say, better sociologists, more inclined to disagree with each other, or happier when they have access to enslaved subjects, and Ethos which are ideological in nature and determine which government the species has; they may, for instance, make a species more egalitarian or more authoritarian, more spiritual or more materialistic, or more warlike or peaceful. Traits can only be changed to a very limited degree via genetic manipulation, while ethos changes very often depending on factors such as how far the colony's population is from the homeworld or how much free thought is encouraged or suppressed by government policy. Populations with different ethos may even form divergent factions which may push for independence from your empire, peacefully or not.
  • Downplayed in The Elder Scrolls series, as many of the nations and peoples of Tamriel have leanings towards certain professions and characteristics but there are a lot of exceptions to the rule - generally, individuals who grew up in their homeland play the hats straight, while individuals who were raised in other lands tend to be exceptions. Some of the "hats" in question include: Nords are mead-loving magic-hating viking-esque Boisterous Bruisers; Bretons are Deadpan Snarker French Jerk Magic Knights; Redguards are Scary Black Men badass Master Swordsman and adventurous sailors; Altmer (High Elves) are snobby, supremacist Squishy Wizards, Bosmer (Wood Elves) are Noble Savage Forest Rangers who are amazed by basic carpentry because of an ancient code which prevents them from ever harming plantlife in their Lost Woods homeland and who that same code requires to consume fallen enemies, etc. etc. For additional information, please see the series' "Races" sub-pages.
  • In Scrapland, on the planet's capital city of Chimera, every robot has a specific function. In fact, D-Tritus is refused entry into Chimera until he's assigned a job.
  • Super Mario Odyssey has a good chunk of areas with its residents in a theme that plays to the architecture, and the purple coin stores will sell clothes that match (which can help you get a few Moons). For a more literal example, Bonneton (also known as the Cap Kingdom), is literally inhabited by sentient hats and have hats as a recurring theme around the level.
  • The "offscreen" regions of Dark Souls tend to fall into this. People from Catarina are jovial, noble, but often somewhat bumbling knights; Forossa was a land of Blood Knights; Thorolund and Lindelt are defined by devout religiosity; Mirrah was home to knights and murderers; the Great Swamp provides you with pyromancy tutors; Vinheim is the home of sorcery; Volgen is mercantile and mercenary; Astora is predominantly home to focused and honourable knights, plus one blacksmith; and Londor is the home of shadowy, deceptive Hollows and will be "made whole" by the Unkindled One usurping the First Flame in Dark Souls III. Carim is an interesting one; it started out with an unsavoury reputation, then underwent a cultural Heel–Faith Turn and absorbed most of the now-absent Thorolund's religiosity in III.
  • Played with in the Galactic Civilizations games. Most species have one hat: Altarians are spiritual Human Aliens, the Drengin are warlike conquerors, and so on. Humanity's hat is diplomacy, being the ones to share hyperdrive tech with other races unconditionally in the hopes of fostering cooperations... but they also don't flinch at employing violence if a situation degrades to that point. The fact humanity doesn't see anything strange about this dichotomy freaks the other races out a bit, with some of them considering it downright duplicitous. Meanwhile, humanity finds it strange that every alien they meet is so culturally homogenous.
  • The Sankta race, which are essentially angels, from Arknights have a hat of being obsessed with guns. To further emphasize this obsession, unlike other races, the Sankta race hails universally from the nation of Laterano. This is explained away by being the only nation/race to invent firearms and subsequently formed their entire culture and religion around them. Most playable Sankta characters exhibit are classed as Sniper Operators and/or use guns. The three remaining Sankta Operators who don't use guns in gameplay still have a connection to firearms in their lore. The full extent of their gun quirk is revealed in the nation's spotlight event as bullet shells are legal tender in their economy. Bullet and gun iconography is littered everywhere in signage and interior decoration. Hospital patients regularly play with guns for fun during downtime. The darker side to this are all the gun laws that Sankta must adhere to or suffer the material consequences, non-Sankta who own guns do not have to obey these laws.

    Web Animation 
  • For a deeper analysis of the trope, you may want to watch the Overly Sarcastic Productions video, found here.
  • Parodied in the Flash-animation series Burnt Face Man. In the conclusion of episode 7, Bastard Man (yes, that's his name) steals all the world's air with a vacuum cleaner (yes, he did that) and tries to sell it to a "planet of shifty characters". Everyone on the planet is wearing a large overcoat and hat or they are hidden in the shadows, the main shifty guy telling Bastard Man that they might not pay him for the air because they're all "a bit shifty".
  • Several of these are visited in the fifth season of Bonus Stage, including a convention planet, a fist planet, and McWorld. As Joel says, "Isn't it great how every planet is named after its purpose?"
  • In the Season 2 finale of BIGTOP BURGER, titled UP, it's revealed that Steve hailed from a faraway planet populated by an ancient Clown Species who based their culture around ritualised performances of Cats.

    Webcomics 
  • Melonpool's planet Melotia is a planet of couch potatoes. There's a Bizarre Alien Biology explanation, with their antennae resonating to Earth television broadcast frequencies.
  • In Sluggy Freelance the residents of the Dimension of Lame are all incredibly sweet, nice, rice cake-loving pacifists. The most deranged psychopath among them suffers an incredible bout of guilt after slightly bruising the toe of a murderous demon. Even the rules of the universe conform to this Hat: the sewers smell like flowers, fermentation doesn't exist, and all swear words are automatically replaced with a "bleep" noise.
  • Goats's Multiverse has entire Dimensions of Hats, such as Topeka Prime, the farm dimension, complete with cow computers. Each dimension, however, has a pub.
  • Curvy invokes this; every Earth explicitly has a gimmick, and ours is apparently "Boring World".
  • Parodied in this episode of Mountain Time, as the astronauts are all too eager to attach a gimmicky label to a newfound planet.
  • Some of the aliens seen in Buck Godot seem to fit this trope, with all individuals seen having similar behaviour or jobs. However, just as many are as varied as humans both in behaviour and appearance.
  • Subverted in Quentyn Quinn, Space Ranger! Groonch the Gnorch, a parody of Worf from Star Trek, says that despite being raised with the ideals of another alien race, he strives to be the kind of noble warrior honored by "the Gnorch peoples." Quentyn asks, "Which peoples?" Groonch then learns, to his complete surprise, that the Gnorch species is rather culturally diverse and only a handful of ancient tribes were as warlike as he thought. His own outfit is an odd cultural mishmash.
  • Referenced, perhaps, in this Cwen's Quest strip. Haaaaaaaats!
  • Used for some aliens in Spacetrawler. The Eebs are all Gadgeteer Genius telepaths with almost zero willpower. The Tornites are infamous for their bad fashion sense.
  • While not a planet, per se, the Jägers of Girl Genius have two hats. The first, is that they love fighting. The second is that... they love hats. No, really, they REALLY like hats. One Jäger had an entire short story about him going to get a new hat. There's even rules on how the hat must be acquired- you can't just go into a store and buy one.
    • The fighting is justified in that Jägers were once humans who chose to transform themselves because they loved fighting.
    • This obsession is not limited to just the Jaegers. In particular, Franz has been seen to follow the same rules of acquisition as the Jaegers, unsurprising as the dragon has likely fought alongside them for centuries, and Bang DuPree shares their fascination with magnificent headgear along with many other personality traits. Even the Wulfenbach entourage gets in on the trend eventually.
  • Star Power is chock-full of these.
  • Planet of Hats is named for the trope, and naturally contains examples as it's a parody recap of Star Trek: The Original Series.
  • Sam Starfall of Freefall is from a species of kleptomaniacs, because his race evolved from scavengers. Sqids who pull off incredible acts of stealing are heroes. In Sqid mythology, the gods have never actually given anything to mortals, and everything mortals have that came from them was stolen. Humans have seriously considered wiping out the Sqids because their values are so different than humans that conflict would seem inevitable should they ever gain space travel.

    Web Original 
  • Limyaael's Fantasy Rants discusses this in her "Avoiding Gimmick-Worlds" rant here.
  • Associated Space has Sarmatia, the planet of Space Amish nomadic horse warriors, and New Tau Ceti, the planet of religious fanatic sheep-men.
  • This is #3 of Cracked's 6 Sci-Fi Movie Conventions (That Need to Die).
  • In Beyond the Impossible, everyone on planet Myridia is born with the power to create thousands of duplicates of themselves.
  • Enforced by the Compact in The Last Angel. Tribunes are honorable warriors. Thinkers are wise. Broken (Humans) are meant to be inept and stupid, but occasionally earnest. Brutes (Verrish) are meant to be unloving, brutal creatures prone to criminal behavior. A few millennia of indoctrination of a species can do a lot.
  • Played for Drama in ''this 4chan post.
  • The short story How the Emperor of All Space and Every World Awoke to the True Nature of Reality and Why it Didn’t Matter by P.H. Lee, featured on the Escape Pod podcast, parodies this trope, with the titular Emperor hiring entertainers from "the best of the seven Dancer Planets" and the idea of a planet without a hat being perceived as absurd and embarrassing.
    "Our world is called the Earth," explained Weizi. “And it is a world of nothing-in-particular.”
    The entirety of the court, except for the Emperor, laughed out loud. "A world of nothing-in-particular!" they exclaimed, "how could such a world exist?" While they laughed and joked, Weizi waited in silence, their face flushed, ashamed at their humble origins.
    “Silence!” said the Emperor, who did not see the humor in it. “Tell me, my advisors, can there really be such a thing as a world of nothing-in-particular?”
  • A regular target on SF Debris. In his review of "The Magnificent Ferengi," he says that if Raiders of the Lost Ark had been a Trek two-parter, Germany would've been painted as Mordor for the rest of the series.

    Western Animation 
  • South Park:
    • The reverse of this is used in the episode "Cancelled": apparently every planet except Earth has only one species, with "a planet of deer, a planet of Asians," etc. Earth was started billions of years ago with creatures from all over the universe on one planet—-as part of an intergalactic Reality Show.
    • A previous Marklar introduced the Marklar of Marklar. The Marklar used the Marklar "Marklar" for all Marklar. The Marklar spoke otherwise perfect Marklar.
    • The Jakovasaurs (which were an obvious parody of Jar-Jar Binks) are a race of morons.
  • Futurama would often use ridiculous examples, i.e. the Neutral planet, the cannibal planet, planet of human-hating robots. In "Love and Rocket", Dr. Zoidberg (himself from a planet of Crustacean Space Jews) talks about the planets destroyed by love radiation why not, "including two gangster planets and a cowboy world."
    • The opening of a certain episode sees the Planet Express crew return pantless and low on supplies from "the planet of the moochers."
    • Fry goes to live on the Amish Homeworld for a while.
    • Also the planet of gigantic man-hating tribeswomen in "Amazon Women in the Mood".
    • The episode "The Duh-Vinci Code" introduces a planet of Insufferable Geniuses. How smart were they? Leonardo da Vinci left because he was the dumbest person there.
    • There's also a literal Universe of Hats. Namely, when visiting the edge of our universe in "I Dated a Robot", the crew sees on the other side their identical alt-selves, only they're all wearing cowboy hats.
    • "The Farnsworth Parabox" has them visit a series of alternate-universes-in-boxes; most of these universes are one-shot-gag Hat Universes, such as the hippy universe and the eyeless universe.
    • Not to mention the Harlem Globetrotters, with their own planet, university, and algebra.
    • Subverted in one episode: There is not, in fact, a radiator planet inhabited by radiator people. Or at least, the radiator that Fry made out with wasn't one.
  • Transformers: Cybertron is very guilty of this. There are three planets where a great deal of the action takes place: Gigantion, the giant planet, is populated by massive Transformers obsessed with construction, aided by the tiny Mini-Cons. On Velocitron, the speed planet, the fastest rule and those who don't measure up are left in the dust. And on the unnamed Jungle Planet, might doesn't make right so much as it is right. As if Cybertron, a planet populated by giant transforming robots, wasn't enough of a hat planet in its own right. (Admittedly, "giant transforming robot" is a pretty cool hat.)
    • Pretty much every non-Transformer alien planet in Transformers: Generation 1 was made of hat. Including earth (our hat is a construction worker's hardhat, everybody wore them).
    • Likewise, Transformers: ★Headmasters had a planet of humans innately in touch with nature, and a pirate planet.
  • One episode of VeggieTales had two feuding Towns of Hats used for their Good Samaritan retelling. One town wore shoes and boots on their heads, and the other wore pots. The purpose was to show how people are divided by trivial differences, a rare acknowledgment of the silliness of Planets of Hats.
  • A three-part Pinky and the Brain episode involves the protagonists being taken to a city of hats. There, everyone is ... a hat.
  • Invader Zim:
    • Parodied; the Irken Empire includes such ridiculous territories as "Conventia, the Convention Hall Planet" and "Foodcourtia," a planet of nothing but restaurants. Justified because these planets don't seem to actually start out this way: one episode shows the Tallests after the conquest of the planet Blorch, deciding to make it a "parking garage planet" literally on the spot. The Irkens themselves are a culture based on height. Dib points out how stupid this is.
    • Another example might be the Planet Jackers, whose culture seems to revolve around collecting new planets to throw into their sun.
    • The two Abductors seen completely fail at their job, having all of one specimen in their "collection," and that's only because he's a blob creature with no legs. They mistake both Zim and a gopher for humans and Dib, an actual human, with a weasel; they also run "experiments" on their test subjects by fusing them together...with tape. Oh, and despite being capable of space travel, their method of cloaking their ship turns it into a floating whale and a giant floating baby.
  • In Megas XLR, Jamie mentions to Kiva to take them to the "planet of the Space Amazons", to which Kiva replies "I'm from the future, not a comic book!". Though the post credits sequence seems to suggest such a planet exists...
  • The titular anthropomorphic ducks of Mighty Ducks: The Animated Series come from a planet whose entire culture revolves around hockey. Yes, seriously.
  • Most episodes of The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! featured Mario, Luigi, Toad, and Princess Peach travelling to a different world built around a particular theme (e.g., karate, rock-n-roll, cowboys, rap). Also, Bowser and his minions always seemed to conform to the "hat" of the world, appearing as a different stock villain in each episode.
  • Earthworm Jim frequently parodied this, like with the aptly-named Planet of Easily Frightened People from "Sword of Righteousness". Asking them to guard the Orb of Quite Remarkable Power was probably not the best idea.
    Easily Frightened People: AAARGH! Something green! AAARGH! Something not green!
    PsyCrow: I love this planet.
  • Darkwing Duck had some fun with this trope in one episode, where our hero visits the planet Mertz, where every single person is a superhero (complete with everyone having a totally unnecessary secret identity.) There is only one person on the planet without super powers, whose name is actually Ordinary Guy. Everyone else spends their entire lives trying to rescue him from peril (which in practice means gigantic, city-smashing brawls over who gets to help him cross the street.) Needless to say, Ordinary Guy's life sucks. Eventually, he snaps and becomes the planet's first and only supervillain. This gives him an outlet for his rage, and gives the heroes some actual evil to fight, making everyone much happier.
    • An absolutely literal version of this trope is used as well: Two episodes featured aliens from a planet where all aliens actually are hats, who hop onto other beings' heads to control them.
  • Kaput & Zosky is a cartoon series based entirely on Planets of Hats. The titular characters wander from planet to planet, hoping to find one where the population's hats make them easy to conquer and pleasant to rule.
  • The Eggs follows the colourful adventures of the four anthropomorphic egg college graduates as they continue their mission through the Loonyverse to search out valuable new sounds for their music-loving home planet of Kazoo. Not only is Kazoo a Planet of the Hats (the hat being music), but every world they visit seems to have its own specific hat.
  • R.O.B. the Robot. Dammit, that show has a planet for practically every theme.
  • On Buzz Lightyear of Star Command, we had Rhizome, a planet of peace-loving vegetarians, and mention is made of a "planet of widows and orphans".
  • In Titan Maximum, Eris is inhabited solely by rednecks and Mercury by old people. Neptune is a gigantic winter resort, with a lone steam-in-a-can production facility.
  • In The Fairly OddParents!, sometimes a character going to Fairy World will end up in other places first, such as Dairy World and Scary World (Exactly What It Says on the Tin).
  • An episode of American Dad! had Roger claim that his Bizarre Alien Biology made it so that everyone in his species has to be a Jerkass or else they'll die.
  • The different kingdoms of Adventure Time could count as respective kingdoms of hats. The most often visited one is the Candy Kingdom, but there's also an Ice Kingdom, a Fire Kingdom, a Crime Kingdom, a Breakfast Kingdom, a Cats in Cardboard Boxes Kingdom...
  • In Wander over Yonder, most of the planets are this, like a planet of hillbillies, a planet of Viking sheep-men, a planet of Sickeningly Sweet happy-go-lucky aliens, and so on and so forth.
  • Every planet featured in The Brothers Flub that Retrograde makes deliveries to are hat planets. i.e. a planet of wrestlers, or a planet that's a giant pinball machine.
  • SpongeBob SquarePants:
    • Tentacle Acres in the episode "Squidville": a town where everyone is a squid who looks like Squidward. They they all seem to enjoy biking and interpretive dancing.
    • Some species are indeed a species of hats. All squids look the same, sound similar and are (or strive to be) insufferable geniuses with strong artistic inclinations, while all starfishes look identical and act, well... not very bright.
    • The crabs all appear to be greedy, long-nosed businessmen.
  • In Biker Mice from Mars, the main antagonist is Lawrence Limburger, who is a member of a race of fish-like aliens called Plutarkians. All Plutarkians shown on the series are greedy and power-hungry jerks.
  • Subverted with the inhabitants of Planets Wait-Your-Turn, Tell-a-Lie, and Gut in 3-2-1 Penguins!, as their hats were put on by outside forces. I.E. a cutting-in-line bug caused the Wait-Your-Turners' hat to be impatience, the king pressing the button that caused Tell-a-Lie's moon to fall and him telling the Tell-a-Liars to constantly lie caused the Tell-a-Liars' hat to be dishonesty, and cereal caused the one-eyed pigs' hat to be gluttony.
    • Averted with the penguins themselves, one of the only things they have in common is that they're on one ship.
  • The Tarulians in The Hair Bear Bunch episode "No Space Like Home" have an unorthodox custom. They select a new leader each day and lock the previous leader in a glass cage. Guess what happens when Peevly, Botch and the bears land on it.
  • On Creative Galaxy, the Creative Galaxy that Arty and his friends travel throughout is full of these and this is basically a point of the show. In each installment, Arty visits a different one to help him make art. These include Paperia the paper planet, Fabrictopia the fabric planet and Paintoria the painting planet.
  • Winx Club has several, although not as many as one would think, partially due to the lack of information about most of the Winx's planets of origin.
    • Musa's planet Melody's only shown feature is whales who sing, and the only other people from her planet are her parents (who played instruments and sang) and Princess Galatea, who appears to be the fairy of classical music.
    • Tecna's planet, Zenith (or Titanium in the comics) is also full of people very similar to her: logical and rational and extremely technologically advanced.
    • All that appears to be of Linphea, Flora's planet, is forests, magical trees, and giant ladybugs that give rides. The only other inhabitants shown are Miele, Flora's little sister, and Princess Krystal, who also has healing, nature-type powers.
    • Averted by Eraklyon, Dominio, and Solaria, which act more like regular, non-homogeneous regions with no one sharing all the same character traits.
  • On My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, nearly almost every single sentient species that isn't a pony has a rather one-note culture. All dragons minus Spike are greedy, aggressive and prideful monsters which act with disdain toward weaker creatures (they do have a nobler side, however), all gryphons are money-obsessed, callous and unfriendly jerks who don't get along even among themselves, and all yaks are short-tempered, obnoxious brutes with a rather poor grasp on English, to name some examples.
  • In The Simpsons, while trying to get to Branson, Missouri the family ends up in Bronson, Missouri, a town where everyone, including women and children, look and talk like Charles Bronson.
  • The Ogres in Adventures of the Gummi Bears are all pretty dumb, bordering on Minion with an F in Evil. The one smart Ogre, Toadwort, is about as tall as a human five-year-old and is routinely abused by his brother Ogres and his boss, The Man Behind the Monsters, Duke Igthorn.
  • In one episode of the Mr. Bean animated series, it's revealed that Mr. Bean is actually from a planet where everyone looks and acts exactly like him.

    Real Life 
  • Some scientists argue that through alien eyes, Earth could be seen as a planet of hats — aliens would first notice all common traits of humans and ignore all the differences.
  • Many exoplanets have a designation that starts with HAT.
  • Humans tend to stereotype based on region, no matter how diverse a particular region may actually be. The "South" in the United States, for example, or any major metropolitan area.
  • An Earth-bound version of this trope is Older Than Feudalism. Aristotle is alleged to have said that the difference between the Greeks and "barbarians" is that all Greeks are different and all barbarians are the same. To the Greeks, then, all foreign tribes they came across were tribes of hats.
  • Many attempts to solve the Fermi Paradox (that there are no physical reasons why intelligent life should not be everywhere in the Universe, and yet we cannot see it) have invoked the Planet of Hats fallacy; assuming that "aliens" would never travel into interstellar space or be under some form of edict of non-interference, as if any and all aliens (or even every inhabitant of a single alien planet) would all behave exactly the same way.

 
Feedback

Video Example(s):

Alternative Title(s): Culture Of Hats, Species Of Hats, Race Of Hats, Monocultural Planet, Monocultural Race, Planets Of Hats, Planet Of Dunce Caps

Top

Hysperia

Invoked by Hysperians, who are described by Rutherford as "Ren Faire" types who colonized a planet with a population of dragons. Naturally, they emulate a theme park version of medieval culture, complete with a monarchy and eating mutton while referring to all their futuristic technology with fantasy terms.

How well does it match the trope?

5 (7 votes)

Example of:

Main / PlanetOfHats

Media sources:

Report