Basic Trope: That one teacher who loves to oppress and humiliate their own students.
- Straight: Mr. Stern regularly ridicules his students.
- Exaggerated:
- Mr. Stern outright tortures his own students.
- Evil Teacher
- Downplayed:
- Mr. Stern is mean, but he's only targeting one student, and for good reason: It's the local Barbaric Bully Flash Young.
- Mr. Stern is mean, but that's because some students grate on his nerves, albeit disproportionately.
- Mr. Stern is a Jerk with a Heart of Gold.
- Stern Teacher
- Justified:
- Mr. Stern has a Freudian Excuse (such as being bullied when he was a student) which the students he teaches touch on, prompting him to treat them poorly as "revenge" for his own mistreatment.
- Mr. Stern believes that making them feel miserable is what is molding them and shaping them up as better students. In some stories, he's correct, even if it's in a "we are going to ace our classes so we won't ever have to put up with you anymore" kind of way.
- Mr. Stern is a Child Hater.
- Inverted:
- Mr. Stern is actually a fairly good and kind teacher.
- All the students are horribly mean to their teacher.
- Cool Teacher
- Badass Teacher
- Subverted: Mr. Stern is strict and abrasive, but only has his students' best interests in mind.
- Double Subverted: It's a front.
- Parodied:
- Mr. Stern is a blatant rip-off of Jigsaw, who straps his students to intricate and overtly cruel torture devices which activate if they score a less than optimal grade in their assignments. And, OF COURSE, he does it under the pretense that it is to teach them a lesson and make them appreciate learning.
- Ms. Whippet, who teaches maths is a Dominatrix whose students fear wronging her, for the punishments she's said to inflict. Except for a few who love every minute of it.
- Mr. Stern is fired and dragged kicking and screaming from his classroom by the police on the first day of class.
- Zig Zagged: Mr. Stern's anger and hatred of his students varies between writers.
- Averted: Mr. Stern has no sadistic tendencies and is, at worst, a Stern Teacher.
- Enforced: The writer survived a Boarding School of Horrors and feels his High-School Hustler comedy requires a very justified Asshole Victim.
- Lampshaded: "Shouldn't this guy have been fired by now?"
- Invoked: Aside from choosing the best answer for each question, Mr. Stern's in-class assignments require his students to complete additional tasks, such as folding the assignment sheet perfectly down the middle of the paper, or expressing any number in the form of a roman numeral. Students fear any consequences that arise from not doing so.
- Implied: Everybody in the classroom, especially Flash Young, starts to shiver in fear when they hear Mr. Stern's voice approaching the door.
- Exploited: Dr. Sadistic, the evil Dean Bitterman that wants to turn Trope School into a Sucky School (for some reason), recommends Mr. Stern, hoping that the horror stories that will ensue will run the school's acceptance amongst the community (and the relevant department of education) into the ground.
- Defied:
- Mr. Stern has a lot of pent-up anger, but refuses to take it out on his students because he knows they don't deserve it.
- Mr. Stern is aware that he hates children and avoids becoming a teacher.
- Every school that Mr. Stern applies for is aware of his sadism and refuses to hire him.
- The PTA of this (and several surrounding) state have come up to Mr. Stern and kindly asked him to stop being an asshole. To wit, they tied him down to a chair and gave him a short session of torture that would make more sense in a Hostel sequel, with the promise to make it much worse if they get more complaints about his attitude.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
- Deconstructed:
- Mr. Stern's activities are discovered, and he's fired for it.
- Mr. Stern's students are too resentful of him to listen to what he says, especially since half or more of it is just flat-out abuse. Because they have a teacher more interested in emotional abuse than in actually educating, none of the students learns anything, and since Mr. Stern grades rather unforgivingly, most of his students fail the class. Since he's proven to be ineffectual as a teacher, he gets fired.
- Mr. Stern tortures his students until one of them strikes back—with fatal results.
- Played for Laughs:
- Mr. Stern is treated by the other teachers as an overgrown bully then a grownup, to the point he gets sent to detention not to oversee punishment but to be punished.
- The plot revolves around the Escalating War between Mr. Stern and Billy Sleek.
- Played for Drama: Billy Sleek is bullied so harshly that he is on the edge of going insane and because Mr. Stern is his teacher, "tell the school authorities" is a worthless option.
- Played for Horror: Mr. Stern doesn't just act this horrible to students: he is seen yelling at other teachers and sexually harasses at least one. And the question of "why the hell doesn't anybody calls the cops and fire him?" turns out to have the answer of "he will go on a killing spree if it happens."
- Plotted a Good Waste: Mr. Stern is much more ready to mete out punishments than Mrs. Willow, but overall his plot is that of the Bait-and-Switch Tyrant — he only appears to be sadistic because we see him through Little Bobby's eyes.
Back to Sadist Teacher.
