Basic Trope: This character never arrives on time when they should.
- Straight: Magnolia, an office worker, overwhelmingly arrives at least five minutes late to meetings.
- Exaggerated: Magnolia arrives at her meetings shortly before they end.
- Downplayed: Magnolia tends to arrive on the minute the hour strikes, but only just.
- Justified:
- Magnolia has poor time management skills.
- Magnolia has the world's worst luck with traffic, and when she leaves the house early to compensate, the traffic is bad enough to completely invalidate her early start so she's late again.
- Magnolia doesn't own a car and, since she lives too far away from work to walk, she is forced to use public transport, which is notoriously slow in her area.
- Inverted: Magnolia shows up early to every commitment. More often than not, she's often there at least a good hour earlier than everyone else.
- Subverted: Magnolia always has a tendency to be late to show up to class. But one day, she arrives to school with a few minutes to spare.
- Double Subverted: But she accidentally goes to the wrong classroom, and by the time she finds the right one, it's started ten minutes ago.
- Parodied: Magnolia is so late for work that it's night by the time she arrives. She ends up unknowingly doing a shift with the night shift employees before being asked who she is.
- Zig-Zagged: Magnolia tends to be late, but on very rare occasions, she'll show up on time or even early.
- Averted: Magnolia does not have a particular pattern or arriving late or early.
- Lampshaded: "I know Magnolia's coming over, but we still have a bit of time to prepare. She never gets here at the time we planned."
- Defied:
- Magnolia makes an effort to leave early and account for any setbacks she might face such as traffic and diversions, so she can reach her commitments on time.
- People who know Magnolia well will tell her to leave earlier than the event is actually scheduled for, so she can make it on time.
- Discussed: "Do you think Magnolia ever shows up on time for anything?"
- Conversed: "I wonder if the writers are ever gonna let Magnolia be on time for once."
- Played for Laughs: Magnolia is a superpowered crime fighter, but by the time she reaches any crime scenes, the criminals have already gotten away.
- Played for Horror: Magnolia is an Eldritch Abomination, and you can never be sure when she'll show up, adding to the suspense.
Back to Always Late. And hurry up, it's already started!
