The Libby - Television Tropes & Idioms

alt title(s): Alpha Bitch

I take it as a rule of nature that all American high schools are ruled by a pack of snobs, led by a supremely confident young woman who is blond, superficial, catty, and ripe for public humiliation. This character is followed by two friends who worship her, and are a little bit shorter. Those schools also contain a group of friends who are not as popular and do not think of themselves as pretty, although they are smarter, funnier and altogether more likeable than the catty-pack.
—Roger Ebert's review of Sleepover.

In the High School, our female heroine will always have to deal with The Libby.

Despite almost always being an unpleasant, bullying and mean-spirited snob who looks down on almost everyone she encounters except for an elite few she deems worthy of her good will (and she's still usually pretty snide even to them), The Libby is somehow the most popular girl in school. She will be the heroine's main rival — especially if the heroine is a Cool Loser — and will focus her bullying on the heroine with a combination of snide put-downs, backhanded compliments and mean-spirited pranks. The Heroine is rarely invited to the Libby's party (or if she is, it's usually the set-up to a mean joke played by the Libby by telling the heroine it is a costume party), and if the Cool Loser is having a party, the Libby will immediately schedule a much cooler, better party at the same time out of pure spite.

The Libby is also immensely spoilt and possesses a massive sense of entitlement, and if the heroine has anything that is in any way better than hers (clothes, possessions, boyfriend etc), she will instantly enter a war of oneupmanship or try to steal / sabotage the heroine's possession / relationship. Confrontations with her usually occur at the High School Dance. She is also usually voted the Homecoming / Prom Queen, despite the fact that she consistently treats the people whose votes she depends on to reach this position so poorly that their reasons for voting for her are a complete mystery. She frequently heads the cheerleading squad, meaning that despite her many deep-seated character flaws, she is automatically lusted-after by every single boy in school (which, in retrospect, might be how she can gets the votes to be homecoming or prom queen). The Libby's boyfriend will almost always be the Jerk Jock, though occasionally he will be the Big Man On Campus who ends up learning the error of his ways and dumps her for the Cool Loser heroine.

In contrast to the savvy, intelligent heroine, the Libby is almost always The Ditz or The Brainless Beauty (albeit a mean-spirited one) who coasts by on looks and charm. Popular Is Dumb, after all. She's evil, but she's frequently a Devil In Plain Sight whom all the teachers think is really helpful. Somehow, despite her stupidity, she's also a grandmaster (grandmistress?) Puppetmaster (puppetmistress?), shaping the whole social structure to her very whim. However, Karma almost always bites the Libby in the ass eventually; if ever we see how the Libby grows up, she almost always ends up a frumpy, frustrated housewife trapped in a miserable marriage (often to the now deadbeat and equal victim of bad karma former Jerk Jock, whose dreams of athletic stardom inevitably failed to come true) — and to rub salt in the wound, the girls (and guys) that she used to mercilessly bully and lord it over in high school will have all gone on to be much more successful (and attractive) than she turned out to be. Alternatively, if she grows up to be wealthy and pretty, her future life will still be shown to be ultimately hollow and unsatisfying, and the Libby will be doomed to become a Stepford Smiler projecting a superficial facade of happiness to cover up the empty misery that is her life.

Frequent subversions / Freudian Excuses are situations where the Libby is actually quite an intelligent, sensitive and deep down rather sympathetic soul who has merely been raised in a superficial environment where looks are perceived to be everything (often by a mother who was herself once a Libby and met the same fate raised above, and thus forces and influences her daughter to follow the same path in order to compensate for her own unsatisfying life once her reign as the Libby came to an end). In these cases the Libby is often bullied at home for similar reasons that she bullies people at school (by her mother or older sisters), and is deep down insecure about herself.

The Libby is usually a Rich Bitch, and she often has a Girl Posse that follows her around. She is who a female Spoiled Brat grows up to be. In a Betty And Veronica romantic triangle, she is nearly always the Veronica.

Named after the character from Sabrina The Teenage Witch.

There is a miniscule chance that she will become a secondary character version of the Fallen Princess. There is a near-100% chance the heroine will get a Broken Aesop about pitying/respecting/trying to befriend her because of the Freudian Excuse.

She is unlikely to be a Fille Fatale. She's too outwardly mean for that.

Examples

Anime

Nanami Kiryuu from Revolutionary Girl Utena is a particularly subtle and cruel anime example.
Soukou No Strain adds Isabella to the list of characters that it kills off, but her even worse successor, Mariette, has not bit the dust as of episode 11.
Subverted in Red Garden. One of the Student Council members constantly complained about how the protagonist was being treated with kid gloves for her constant absences and tardies and is seen several times spying, as if to blackmail the protagonist... then, in an emotional scene, she reveals that she's been worried about the protagonist for a long time, and wants to help her with whoever is hurting her.
Tamaki Reika from Ojamajo Doremi, though she has a bit of a Freudian Excuse. ( After she got serious burns as a baby thanks to her Bumbling Dad leaving a cup of hot coffee within her reach, he swore to never again make Reika cry... but ended up spoiling her rotten. )
Aki Honda from Narutaru, despite not being rich like most Libbies, is just about the cruelest and most horrible Libby ever created, graduating from criminal harassment to full on rape. She meets a very nasty end when her favorite victim, local Lonely Rich Kid Hiroko Kaizuka, gets her Shadow Dragon and brutally murders Aki and her Girl Posse in what proves to be her Start Of Darkness.
Sae from Peach Girl. She's Momo's main love rival, and is especially good at doing nasty things to Momo while making herself look innocent.
Shiho Huit fills this role in Mai-Otome, playing tricks on Arika and the other Corals and looking down on them because of their status.
- Tomoe Marguerite is a more traditional Libby, though, with a young hanger-on named Miya whom she verbally and physically abuses when no one else is looking. She's even tried to kill Arika and her friends on a few occasions.
Motoko Minagawa from Fruits Basket, complete with obsessive crush on Yuki Sohma and a Girl Posse that harrasses Tohru after she goes to live with Yuki and Shigure. In the manga, however, Motoko actually grows up and gives up on Yuki.
Mao, an anime-only character in Kekkaishi, was apparently created to serve as The Libby for leading girl Tokine in that she flaunts her wealth and makes catty comments about the latter. Subverted becuase Tokine isn't really affected by her snarky comments.
Kyoka (called "Antoinette" by the main character, after the infamous French queen who's extravagant spending on things such as mansions and the like while people were starving out on the fields was a prime example of the kind of thing that led to the French Revolution) is the antagonist of Aeka's route in Yume Miru Kusuri. Something that's kind of odd to this trope is that she had a crush on the lead from the beginning and tries to get with him several times, though the lead just finds her annoying. This doesn't stop her from targeting him along with Aeka once it becomes official that the two are going out, though. It gets pretty brutal. This goes for the backlash, as well, which sees Kouhei and Aeka turn the tables on and nearly kill Kyoka when she decides to have her friends pin down Kouhei so that he can watch Kyoka's boyfriend rape Aeka.
Aya Misaki from Oniisama E, in all her bitchy, slanderous "glory". Poor Nanako and Mariko.
Michiyo in Mahoraba acts like a Libby Ojou to Asami out of insecurity. She really wants to be friends with Asami.
Ami of Toradora, who usually hides her bitchiness behind a saccharine mask of sweetness until she feels she can get away with it. She does get Character Development though.

Comic Books

Spider Man Loves Mary Jane presents a subversion; through the series, it appears that Liz Allen is The Libby of the school, and certainly possesses the usual qualities — head of the cheer-leading squad, bitchy and snobby, dating the head football jock, obsessed with becoming Homecoming Queen, so on and such. However, come the night of the Homecoming Dance, it's revealed that Mary Jane — the nicer, sweeter, and more easy-going and modest protagonist, and Liz's best friend — is actually far more well-liked, and is voted Homecoming Queen (despite having not even run for it), much to both girl's surprise and, for different reasons, horror. After a big fight between them, Liz later admits that she's always been jealous of Mary Jane, more than aware that she's always been the more popular of the two, thus explaining Liz's desperate need to win the Homecoming Queen crown.
Stars and S.T.R.I.P.E. may be a bit of a subversion: Courtney is the blonde newcomer who ends up gaining popularity against a brunette Libby. Of course, said enemy is also a supervillain and the daughter of the series' Big Bad, and once that gets out, the cliques are bound to change.
Replace "High School" with "Super Hero Team" and Sistah Spooky from Empowered proves the platonic ideal of this trope down to the Freudian Excuse (she was a frumpy dark-skinned girl in a high school filled with hellishly gorgious blond libbies, and wound up selling her soul for looks).

Film

Regina in the movie Mean Girls. Her Meaningful Name is Latin for "queen".
Subverted in Clueless - Cher Horowitz is unquestionably one of the most popular girls in school, but she's also a genuinely nice person (if a bit spoiled, shallow and airheaded).
- Her rival Amber Mariens is a bit closer in spirit to The Libby, but is less popular than Cher and her sluttiness and airheadedness make her more like The Brainless Beauty (albeit a mean spirited one).
Mandy Moore's "Stupid Cupid"-singing cheerleader Lana Thomas in The Princess Diaries. Notable mainly for the fact that director Garry Marshall explicitly pointed out that Lana was this character on the DVD's supplemental material.
Christie Masters (played by Julia Campbell) in Romy and Michele's High School Reunion.
Also played by Mandy Moore, Hilary Faye in Saved!
Amber Von Tussle from Hairspray, played by Colleen Fitzpatrick in the 1988 version, and Brittany Snow in the 2007 version.
Heather Chandler (and later Heather Duke) in Heathers.
Subverted in Not Another Teen Movie with the character Priscilla.
Somewhat subverted in Napoleon Dynamite, in which the Libby turns out to be not so bad.
Sharpay Evans in High School Musical fits the part pretty well, but the movies' upbeat tone means that she's always redeemed by the end.

Literature

Nellie Oleson from Little House On The Prairie. Nellie first appeared in the 1937 book On the Banks of Plum Creek, making this Older Than Television.
Ethel Hallow from The Worst Witch.
Pansy Parkinson in the Harry Potter books seems to be one. We don't see much of her, but she acts snotty whenever she shows up and, of course, dotes on her boyfriend Draco Malfoy. Also, she is mentioned to have a Girl Posse and all the "good" female characters hate her with a passion.
- Romilda Vane, Harry's Stalker With A Crush from the sixth book, also had some Libby tendencies, possessing her own Girl Posse and telling Harry that he didn't have to hang out with kids as "uncool" as Neville and Luna.
Christine Hargensen, Carrie's nemesis in Stephen King's book and film Carrie.
Lara from Cherie Bennett's execrable Life in the Fat Lane is something of a failed subversion: She starts out much like Cher from Clueless—the rich, shallow and naïve, but basically sweet (and supposedly intelligent) homecoming queen. Then she (suddenly) gets fat and becomes a social outcast. (Of course, her immediate descent into Wangst upon gaining the first ten pounds had nothing to do with it...) Enter not one but at least two textbook incarnations of The Libby...and a few of their male counterparts.
There are several candidates for The Libby in the Whateley Universe stories, but the best is probably Solange (Tansy Walcutt, from one of the richest families in America). She's blonde, beautiful, shallow, cruel, followed by her equally blond sidekicks Flicker and Fade, and always looking for ways to mistreat the less fortunate. Since she has psychic powers, she has a LOT of ways to do just that. Before her powers kicked in, she was the fat, ugly, braces-wearing, pimply loser who was picked on, and now she gets to dish it out. After she literally absorbs one of the main characters for a week, the other main characters turn their attentions her way, and her life goes rapidly downhill. She doesn't learn a lesson from this.
Carmelita Spats in A Series Of Unfortunate Events is a self-entitled and spoiled young girl who looks down upon and bullies the protagonists simply because of her irrational dislike of orphans. Though this troper can't quite recall Carmelita being involved with any sort of posse, she was well liked by the school's conceited vice principal, Nero.
Massie Block, the main character of the Clique series of novels.
Lana is an even more cliched version of this in the books The Princess Diaries, as well as being a Devil In Plain Sight. Of course, Mia often retaliates.

Live Action TV

Libby from Sabrina The Teenage Witch (obviously).
Paige Michalchuk on Degrassi The Next Generation is, strangely, a Rich Bitch who isn't rich. She's the head cheerleader (who takes credit for other girls' work), and she's a horrendous snob toward anyone less popular than her. But when school is out, she has to work a minimum-wage job.
- Paige became a subversion of this trope. It was pulled off arguably well (as in more tastefully than this editor expected).
Cordelia Chase on Buffy The Vampire Slayer started out as this kind of character and rapidly became the Fallen Princess version.
- Her sidekick Harmony proceeded to take this position up until being killed and turned into a vampire; then she became the Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain.
Veronica DiAngelo on The Saddle Club.
Stephanie Kaye from the 1980s Degrassi Junior High is a rare case where The Libby is one of the protagonists. As a result, she has frequent Pet The Dog moments in between her bullying.
In Heroes, Jackie is a stereotypical example of this trope (although when her karmic retribution comes, it's a bit more severe than growing up to lead an unfulfilled life). The second season has Debbie, who is a copy of Jackie right down to being the blond head cheerleader.
Missy Meany in Neds Declassified School Survival Guide - The Libby with Theme Naming.
Summer Heights High features a parody of this trope, in the form of Ja'mie (played by a man doing a convincing impression), and to a much lesser extent, her "friends" (played by real girls).
Chelsea Breur in Naturally Sadie. Replaced in second season by Arden Alcot.
From Veronica Mars, three words: Madison Freaking Sinclair.
That's So Raven: The one-time character Nicki.
Wizards Of Waverly Place has Gigi. Inverted with Alex: We see her as the protagonist, but there's no denying that she has Libby qualities.
Amber in Hannah Montana. She's not a ditz, though her sidekick Ashley fills that purpose.
A one-shot character on The Secret World of Alex Mack who fit this type was actually named Libby, a year before Sabrina. The Freudian Excuse was somewhat subverted; Libby claimed that she has to worry about being popular, and that she really admires Alex, but she was manipulating Alex into feeling sympathy for her, and she wasn't really sensitive or sympathetic at all.
The killer in the Cold Case episode "Stand Up and Holler" was one of these. In the present day, she had two failed marriages (and was working on her third) and was desperately clinging to her glory days when she was the most popular girl in school.
Amanda Tanen in Ugly Betty

Music

The song Roses by Outkast is basically a long The Reason You Suck Speech directed at a Libby named Caroline. In the music video she doesn't really seem to mind.

Video Games

Etoile Rosenqueen from Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure, the first part of the Marl Kingdom games.

Web Comics

Semi-subverted by El Goonish Shive; Diane fits the stereotype perfectly, but shy, artistic lesbian Nanase keeps brushing off her attempts to get her into the Girl Posse.
- Further subverted in this comic in that Diane is shown to be caring, implying that her Libby-ness is a facade.
Subversion: In Penny And Aggie, Penny is a popular girl, and seems like a Libby at first (in contrast to the independent-minded Aggie). As the story progresses, however, Penny turns out to be a generally decent person, with most of the conflicts between her and Aggie being initiated by the latter.
- Subverted even more by the fact she's been shown to be observant and intelligent.
OTOH, Carrie of Loserz is the epitome of this trope, or at least trying to be. See here.
Sluggy Freelance briefly features Cindi. Somewhat subverted in that 1) she's not a recurring character, and 2) she wanders rather badly out of her league in this strip.
Sayuri Morita in Red String. Somewhat subverted in that her nastiness eventually comes back to bite her, and the main characters actually haven't gone and befriended her yet.
Kharisma in Something Positive. Oh Lawdy does she get her comeuppance. And then some.
Felicia Laine in Ozy And Millie fits most of the characteristics of a Libby, despite being in elementary school. In subversion of the trope, however, she's not stupid (as much as she acts the part), nor does she have any attraction to the strip's Jerk Jock Jeremy (actually, this editor isn't sure they've ever even met). Her infatuations are mostly directed at the members of boy band du jour.
You'd think that with cheerleaders as protagonists, Cheer! would be free of Libbies. You'd be wrong.
Sarah and Cass from Yu Me Dream, though Sarah and Fiona were childhood friends.

Web Original

Helena van Garrett (v1) and the Sisterhood (v2) from Survival Of The Fittest.
Ami from Sailor Nothing.

Western Animation

Bonnie Rockwaller on Kim Possible, except she tries (repeatedly and in vain) to usurp the role of captain from the cheerleading heroine. Bonnie did eventually become cheerleading captain in one episode, and much to Kim's initial dismay, proves to be exceptionally competent and dedicated to the job. (Though she doesn't become any less bitchy.) Kim eventually decides to not fight it, as she's sure Bonnie will get sick and tired of all the hard work involved with being squad captain. And she's right; the next episode showing the cheerleading, Kim's clearly back in charge.
Mandy from Totally Spies.
Paulina from Danny Phantom.
Gemini Stone from Sabrina The Animated Series.
Princess Morbucks from The Powerpuff Girls.
Sierra McCool in Disney's The Replacements.
The Oblongs has Debbie Klimer and her posse of identical Debbie clones.
Mindy from The Grim Adventures Of Billy And Mandy is a much younger Libby, as well as an incredibly obsessive one. For example, she loses her head cheerleader position to Mandy (who just shouts the game plans to the team) and after consulting the "patron saint of cheerleading" (a trophy she thinks is talking) decides the best solution is to incapacitate her in some way in the middle of the match, or, failing that, blowing her up.
Miranda Kilgallen in As Told By Ginger, however she is the second-in-command to Girl Posse leader and Brainless Beauty Courtney Gripling.
Elizabeth "Sissy" Delmas in Code Lyoko is a strange version of this. In the first season, this is played straight, with the exception of a few scenes in only a few episodes. However, her assistance to the heroes in later seasons, particularly the second and fourth, is often offered without second thought or a specific request for a reward, though this can happen quite a bit in a life or death situation. It seems that her personality alternates between seasons, from a straight Libby in seasons one and three to a Jerk With A Heart Of Gold in seasons two and four. The grand irony of the heroes' attitude toward her is that it is not based on her personality, but actually mistrust. She Missed The Call in the prequel when she was too afraid to enter the scanner on the first night, and lost the groups trust permanently when she did the right thing and told the secret of Lyoko to the adults to prevent further possible catastrophes. The group distrusts her to the point that she became particularly mean toward them, creating a kind of vicious circle of animosity between the Lyoko Warriors and herself. This is mainly persisted by Ulrich, whom Sissy has a crush on, and is rightfully rectified by him when he makes her part of the group in the last episode of the series (as of now still unaired stateside.)
On Winx Club, a girl from Bloom's old home town named Mitzi definitely fit the bill despite only appearing a few times. On the Halloween episode, she invited the Bloom and her friends to a party - which turned out to be an elaborate scheme to humiliate the girls. She bought and rigged a house, made up an elaborate legend, hired actors to pose as party guests (complete with scripts), and set up elaborate special effects around the house, just to pull a prank on someone she had barely seen in two years, along with four girls she had never met.
In The Spectacular Spider Man, Cheerleader Sally Avril is the most abusive girl in M³'s Six Student Clique, even mercilessly mocking fellow clique-member Flash Thompson when his hero Spider-Man appears to be commiting robberies.
- Slightly subverted when Peter's aunt has a heart attack as Flash mentions that even Sally feels sorry for him, although she is not as forthcoming with her sympathies as his friends are.
Sandi Griffin in Daria, who is outright emotionally abusive even to the other members of her own clique (Stacy Rowe in particular). It isn't until the series' final season that her position of control is finally first slowly undermined by both Quinn starting to distance herself from the group and Stacy gaining a sense of self-confidence, and then then finally lost when the other three members of the Fashion Club all agree to dissolve the group and she agrees last, as a face-saving measure.
Trixie Tang of The Fairly Odd Parents is rich and popular AND lusted after by everyone, including Timmy, the main character. However, in the episode The Boy Who Would Be Queen, a genderbended Timmy learns that there is another side to Trixie—a boyish side that likes comics and video games, which would shock all of the people who worship her. She says that all she wants for her birthday is a friend who understands this, but when Timmy arrives at her party and makes the offer, she saves face by rejecting him.
Penelope Miller in Atomic Betty, who coincidentally also looks Asian. Her two cohorts are a pair of syncopantic nerds. Is the increase in Asian Libbys some sort of Take That by Cho Chang haters?
Tricia from 6teen.
Heather the "Queen Bee" from Total Drama Island has pulled this off quite well in non highschool setting.

Real Life

Sadly, this is a case of Truth In Television: A lot of research has indicated that being popular is not always associated with being well-liked or particularly nice. Essentially they dominate social groups through exclusion, malicious gossiping and fear.
- Which brings us to Good is Dumb and the Puppetmaster, as you have to be really good at manipulation to pull this off. On the other hand, though, most high schools are way too large for Libby-level centralization of power.
- Huh? You either aren't female or don't remember your high school days at all. It doesn't take much to manipulate teenagers socially. It really doesn't.
- This Troper is female, went to an all-girls school, and the ONLY Libby she came across with was... mostly in her head. The stereotypical "Libby" was actually a nice girl whom the editor rather unfairly misjudged, based only on rumors. On the other hand, the punks and the goths she's met in her life were WAY more stuck-up and bitchy than any teen movie cheerleader would ever be.
  - This Troper believes that Libby's at an all-girl school would not work, the lack of a male football team really destroys the point.
  - Not when your all-girls school is just a few blocks away from an all-boys one. LOL
  - This Troper went to a small high school with about 400 students. There were several "Libbies" (four or five, perhaps more) that competed with each other and generally kept each other relatively weak through competition. I had always assumed that the situation was nature's way of keeping popular females from taking over school.
  - This Troper is currently in high school, and does not know anyone who would qualify as The Libby. However, I tend to stay away from the "popular" groups, and considering that I go to a rather large school, its perfectly possible that I've just never been around to see The Libby.