Basic Trope: A character's outfit, or part of it, is considered as important as any other well-known aspect of that character.
- Straight: Princess Alice is one of the most popular characters in her show, thanks to her sassy, no-nonsense attitude. This is visually represented by her wearing a short white ermine cape draped over one shoulder. Fans complain more if the writers have her not wear the ermine more than if they change her dress.
- Exaggerated: Fans will complain if even the embroidered lining on Alice's ermine cape is inconsistent. (Yes, this can happen in real life; exaggerated doesn't mean impossible.)
- Downplayed: Alice spends a few episodes in a Spy Catsuit, and at most fans send mildly irritated emails.
- Justified: Being a Merchandise-Driven show, the sales show that Alice's outfit sells best when it maintains the base form.
- Inverted: Fans complain if her outfit is the same in the next episode, even if it's a two-parter taking place on the same day.
- Subverted: Fans look like they are about to complain about Alice getting her hair dyed from blonde to red, but the fans say they don't care about that.
- Double Subverted: Instead they care that Alice's famous long, wavy hair is getting cut.
- Parodied: Alice's actress says that she's tired of wearing that ermine cape, and suddenly riots break out.
- Zig-Zagged:
- Some fans complain when the creators change Alice's outfit, while others don't.
- The fans complain when the creators change Alice's outfit ... and when they change it back. Then the creators change it to something else, which doesn't touch off a round of complaining. Then they change it back to what it was before.
- Averted:
- The creators don't change Alice's outfit.
- The creators change Alice's outfit, but the fans don't complain.
- Enforced: Fans throw hissy fits about costume changes in a Show Within a Show, but not because a producer wants to mock fans for complaining about changed, but because he believes they have poor fashion sense for liking such tacky outfits.
- Lampshaded: ???
- Invoked: Alice leaks that her costume is going to change, so the fan backlash will put extra pressure on producers when her contract renewal comes up.
- Exploited: The local furrier makes a deal with the producers to keep supplying new ermine capes when the old one wears out, which gives the company a lot of publicity.
- Defied: Fan complaints be damned. Alice needs a new outfit, since the toy sales are stagnating.
- Discussed: Bob, another character on the show, says, "I want to see Alice in her white cape, not a yellow silk dress."
- Conversed: ???
Back to Clothes Make the Legend (We were going to add a full stop to the end of that, but it's too iconic without one.)
