Basic Trope: A group of people stands on each other so they can climb.
- Straight: The team all stand on each others' shoulders (in order from top to bottom; Miki, Alice, Bob, Dirk) so that they can reach the MacGuffin.
- Exaggerated: The team all stand on each others' shoulders (in order from top to bottom; Dirk, Bob, Alice, Miki) so that they can look through a window and oversee Emperor Evulz discussing his plan, which he takes his sweet time doing. Thankfully, they are very used to doing this, especially Miki.
- Bob convinces an entire village to stand on each others' shoulders so that he can climb to the top and reach the MacGuffin.
- Downplayed: Dirk lets Alice sit on his shoulders so that she can reach an apple from a tree. But the apple is just out of reach.
- Justified: The team is performing a cheerleading stunt known as a human pyramid.
- Subverted: Dirk is against the idea, saying it's too dangerous.
- Before they make the human ladder, they find an actual ladder hidden away that they can use.
- Double Subverted: Bob: "What other options do we have?"
- But the ladder ends up breaking in half as soon as Dirk takes one step on it.
- Parodied: At the beach, they made 3 human ladders of exclusively hundreds of bodybuilders standing on each others' shoulders, with the exception of 3-year-old Miki, who was on the bottom supporting all 3 of those human ladders on her shoulders and head by herself, for no reason other than to show off her super strength. They stayed like this for weeks before Miki got bored and just casually threw them all off of her.
- Defied: Dirk: "No way that we do this. I know how this goes. Everything will seem fine, but then someone will sneeze and we will all come painfully crashing down!"
- Discussed: Alice: "The only way we could reach that is to make a human ladder."
- Exploited: Emperor Evulz and all of his Mooks can fly, and there are a lot of high ledges in his dungeon. If no one in your group can fly, your best option is to make a human ladder to reach those ledges.
- Played for Drama: The group is seemingly trapped. Emperor Evulz's mooks are about to catch up to them, and the only way out is over a ledge that is too high up. Miki gets the idea to create a human ladder, letting everyone stand on her shoulders so that they can escape while she dies holding off the mooks. Dirk and Alice are heavily against this, but she reassures them that if any of them have to die, she would rather it be her because she is the youngest and least capable in combat. They all stand on each others' shoulders (in order from top to bottom; Dirk, Bob, Alice, Miki), letting Bob, Dirk, and Alice climb up and pull each other over the ledge, making their escape and leaving Miki to die as she asked for. She ends up holding them off and taking down a few mooks with her, but in the end, her demise is inevitable. The rest of the group can hear her screams right before she dies, but still keep running despite their grief.
- Played for Laughs: Bob, his friends, and his 3-year-old sister Miki often make human ladders in his backyard just for fun. Miki is on the bottom everytime despite being the youngest and the only girl, because she likes it that way. They often collapse and get bruised up, but they always laugh it off and try again.
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