Troopers is an online series of short videos created by CollegeHumor. The series is a parody of the Star Wars franchise and centers around a pair of Dread Troopers.
In 2019, a new series called Troopers Rise Of The Budget was announced for the Dropout.TV service, and the original pair got an Animated Adaptation that can be found here
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This series contains examples of:
Original & Animated Series
- Bad "Bad Acting": Lord Sinister orders Rich and Larry to act and pretend to have lost all their love ones when their moon exploded. The result is a cringed-inducing performance.
- Bad Boss: Dread Lord Sinister will kill his minions for the slightest reason, reasons vary from mistaking a mash potato manikin for a prisoner, to him simply not liking anyone's suggestions... or someone just not giving a suggestion.
- Exaggerated in "Death By Space", where he tricks multiple people into killing themselves since he thinks it to be more expedient than to just deal with them normally. First he sends his surviving wounded(and, keep in mind, victorious) elite troopers to the infirmary, only for it to lead to space. Then he sends the sceptical and questioning General of the troops to the Impartial Investigation Committee, only for it to lead to space. Then he tries to send the builder of these 71 mismarked doors to Accounts Payable, though since he built them the builder knows that is a mismarked door to space. So he gives him his payment in gift tokens and sends him to the Gift Shop... which is a room that turns people inside-out and was built by the builder's brother. Then he sends the brother to Accounts Payable, who falls for it since he doesn't know about the doors, only for it to lead to space. Then one trooper raises concern about the rumours of Dread Lord Sinister doing this, so to calm him down he sends that trooper to the Spa... which is an actual spa. Then, while relaxing, the trooper goes to the private bathroom of the Spa and that sends him to space. Though it turns out that the Spa trap was unintentional, as the builder refused to finish it until Dread Lord told him what happened to his brothers.
- Bizarre Alien Biology: In the animated version, Rich's fiance is shown to be a Hive Mind who splits into "any number of omni-conscious bodies at the exact age of 37".
- The Chew Toy: Chase is a Kenny-style Chew Toy, having already died just about every time he appears.
- Duct Tape for Everything: Larry has strapped duct tape at his gun and himself to make sure the princess wouldn't steal it. Next thing you know, the princess has inexplicably stolen the gun without Larry noticing while he was conversing with her.
- Establishing Character Moment: "Coffee Run" is the debut of Dread Lord Sinister. The first scene alone tells us what we can expect from him.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Lord Sinister is definitely not a good guy, but even he felt the princess' casual willingness to let billions of her own people die was cold.
- Expy: Dread Lord Sinister is quite obviously based on Darth Vader. He wears all black, a cape, a face-concealing helm and surrounded by white-clad Dread Troopers.
- Force-Field Door: The episode Force Field Door.
- The Guards Must Be Crazy: Rich and Larry:
- The princess escapes in almost every episode she appears in when Rich and Larry are tasked with guarding her.
- Rich removes the handcuffs of an alien lizardman (who's been imprisoned for rape) thinking he's friendly. It goes as well as you imagine.
- A prisoner escaped under Larry's watch and placed a dummy in his place. It took three months before Lord Sinister got wind of this.
- Rich opens the door for Insurgency troops to storm-in thinking it was the pizza delivery guy knocking.
- Hopeless Suitor: Larry tries to hit on the princess several times, but without any success.
- Juggling Loaded Guns: "Gun Privileges" is full of this.
- Laser Blade: Lord Sinister is all excited because he received his brand new laser sword... Except it doesn't come with a fusion core, so it has to be plugged to an electric outlet with a power cord. On the upside, it can change the blade's color on the fly, the blade's length can be adjusted if needed, has various blade shapes and can inflict various effect (such as cancer or kill ghosts).
- Lima Syndrome: Larry is one of the princess’s captors, but he has an obvious crush on her. His affections for her often cause her problems as well as interfere with his job as a Dread Trooper.
- Mile-Long Ship: Spoofed in "Coffee Run", where Dread Lord Sinister keeps constantly sending one of his Dread Troopers back and forth for coffee from a coffee shop on the other end of the Dread Cruiser, forgetting that the Dread Cruiser is the size of a small planet. Each coffee run takes three days. By the time Dread Lord Sinister finally gets his coffee, he's either forgotten that he asked for it in the first place, it has become cold/not fresh, or he's got a craving for something else from the same place.
- Exaggerated in Troopes vs. Teleporter, where the Dread Crusier's size is mentioned as being so large it takes weeks to get there and back.
- Exaggerated in Troopes vs. Teleporter
- Once per Episode: Every time the princess makes an appearance, she has a different hairstyle.
- Potty Emergency: It becomes the plot of Bathroom Run when Larry really need to go and can't find a free bathroom in the whole Dread Cruiser.
- Refuge in Audacity: The only reason Larry lived through peeing on Dread Lord Sinister is that Sinister was so enraged that he felt numb, and needed to go process what just happened.
- The Resistance: The Insurgency which the princess is part of.
- Riddle for the Ages: The princess repeatedly tried reveal the secret weakness of the Dread Cruiser to the Insurgency, but is interrupted every time by Larry. Viewers never got to know what the weakness was.
- Single-Biome Planet: Satirized in "The Swamp Planet"."50 years ago Dread Trooper scouts landed in a swamp on our planet and for some reason didn't bother exploring anywhere else! If they'd gone one mile to the left, they would have found some beautiful beach front condos. But they didn't. And now we're the "swamp planet". How do you think that makes me feel?"
- Skewed Priorities: Lord Sinister is amazed by his brand new holopad and doesn't seem too concerned by an escaped prisoner going on a rampage.
- Superficial Suggestion Box: In Suggestion Box, Dread Lord Sinister installs a suggestion box. Those troopers who are interested in maintaining good health (or just living) might wish to decline placing suggestions in the box.
- They Killed Kenny Again: Chase is routinely killed, only to reappear the next time for his next trip to oblivion.
- Those Two Guys: Rich and Larry.
- Too Dumb to Live: Again, Rich and Larry, but especially Larry, given one skit had him on the chopping block for a major failure, and is so inept at trying to not give himself away that Rich flat-out asks "How are you still alive?!"
- Tractor Beam: Rich and Larry are assigned to bring ships into the Dread Cruiser by using tractor beam, with disastrous results.
- The Unreveal: Lord Sinister orders Rich, Larry and Chase to remove their helms. We don't see any of their faces.
- The Voice: Mr. Kankerschmidt, the only prisoner Rich and Larry are capable of keeping contained.
Rise of the Budget
- Commander Contrarian: Almost literally with Dreadlord, who disagrees with the commander aboard at every opportunity.Admiral: (To a trooper) Run an internet-diagnostics check!
Dread Lord Sinister: Cancel that check!
Admiral: Eyes forward!
Dread Lord Sinister: Eyes backward!
Admiral: March!
Dread Lord Sinister: September!
Admiral: Okay, Dread Lord, enough!
Dread Lord Sinister: More! - Macguffin: The Orb in Rise of the Budget. Lampshaded, of course. Everyone takes great pains to avoid mentioning what it actually does since, as everyone already knows what it is, they don't need to explain it.I kinda feel like the Orb is this vaguely defined macguffin.
