History Film / TuckerAndDaleVsEvil

* RealityEnsues: Much of the comedy of the movie results from showing the realistic outcome of standard horror tropes.
** After multiple teens have accidentally killed themselves on Tucker and Dale's property, Dale voices the idea of just explaining their situation to the authorities. Tucker accurately points out that the circumstances no longer matter, what matters now is how the authorities are going to interpret the accidents.
** When [[spoiler:Chad]] decides to fight Tucker and Dale, the other teens are unnerved by this behavior and only participate in the attack because they're afraid they will be attacked instead.
** Mike's death accurately shows the unfortunate results of making a diving tackle without checking out the area beforehand.

* NotSoDifferent: Allison's willingness to think the better of Tucker and Dale stems partly from the fact that she grew up on a farm in circumstances not a million miles removed from them.

Meet Tucker (Creator/AlanTudyk) and Dale (Tyler Labine). They are two best buds who have taken a little vacation to fix a cabin in the woods which Tucker has bought. On their way there, they ran into the aforementioned college kids at the gas station. They inadvertently give the wrong first impression and the kids are convinced that they are typical creepy backwood hicks like the ones in movies. Later on, our two heroes meet the kids again when they are fishing. They accidentally scare the female lead of this film, Allison (Creator/KatrinaBowden), when she's about to go for a swim and she almost drowns. They save her and take her home with them to recover, but again they give the wrong impression about themselves and the college kids think they have actually ''kidnapped her''. Several accidents and [[PoorCommunicationKills more misunderstandings]] later, the planned vacation goes south big time for our duo as they have to give it their all against…'''EVIL'''.

-->'''Dale''': You guys uh...goin' camping? (''[[NotWhatItLooksLike Giggles nervously while holding the scythe]]'')

-->'''Tucker''': ''You'' are a good-lookin' man...more or less. You got a damn good heart. That's two things right there.

Sounds pretty standard, right? However, in this case, the kids are ''not'' the oppressed protagonists...it's the ''hillbillies''.

Meet Tucker (Creator/AlanTudyk) and Dale (Tyler Labine). They are two best buds who have taken a little vacation to fix a cabin in the woods which Tucker has bought. On their way there, they ran into the aforementioned college kids at the gas station. They inadvertently give the wrong first impression and the kids are convinced that they are typical creepy backwood hicks like the ones in movies. Later on, our two heroes meet the kids again when they are fishing. They accidentally scare the female lead of this film, Allison (Creator/KatrinaBowden), when she's about to go for a swim and she almost drowns. They save her and take her home with them to recover, but again they give the wrong impression about themselves and the college kids think they have actually ''kidnapped her''. Several accidents and [[PoorCommunicationKills more misunderstandings]] later, the planned vacation goes south big time for our duo as they have to give it their all against...'''EVIL'''.

->''"... It doesn't matter what happened, what matters is what'' looks ''like what happened, and what looks like what happened...is pretty nasty."''

* InTheBlood: Invoked by Chad early on to say that all hillbillies are evil. Later, [[spoiler:it turns out that Chad, with his murderous rage and rapist overtures towards Allison, is the son of a murderous hillbilly and was conceived via rape.]]

* BeeAfraid: While sawing a tree, Tucker accidentally strikes a hornets' nest. HilarityEnsues. [[spoiler: And one fatality that was entirely the kid's fault for not looking where he was going.]]

Meet Tucker (Creator/AlanTudyk) and Dale (Tyler Labine). They are two best buds who have taken a little vacation to fix a cabin in the woods which Tucker has bought. On their way there, they ran into the aforementioned college kids at the gas station. They inadvertently give the wrong first impression and the kids are convinced that they are typical creepy backwood hicks like the ones in movies. Later on, our two heroes meet the kids again when they are fishing. They accidentally scare the female lead of this film, Allison (Creator/KatrinaBowden), when she's about to go for a swim and she almost drowns. They save her and take her home with them to recover, but again they give the wrong impression about themselves and the college kids think they have actually ''kidnapped her''. Several accidents and [[PoorCommunicationKills more misunderstandings]] later, the planned vacation goes south big time for our duo as they have to put their best against...'''EVIL'''.

* BaitAndSwitch: In terms of perspective -- the movie starts off following Allison's group of friends, but switches to the Tucker and Dale after the two groups meet at the country store.

* BeeAfraid: While sawing a tree, Tucker accidentally strikes a hornets' nest. HilarityEnsues. [[spoiler: And one fatality (that was entirely the kid's fault for not looking where he was going.)]]

* DumbassHasAPoint: Everyone except Chad basically. Tucker and Dale themselves are not traditionally smart (see DumbIsGood below) but appreciate how bad things are and how bad they'll look. The rest of the college kids all have at least one moment where they question Chad's interpretation of the events, but aren't capable of avoiding the lethal consequences. Inverted with Allison, who's portrayed as the smartest one of the main cast but makes some pretty poor decisions through the couse of the film. She [[LampshadeHanging hangs a Lampshade]] on it in the finale [[spoiler:when Tucker and Dale's cabin burns down.]]

* DumbIsGood: Tucker and Dale are both rather oblivious to the rather obvious signs of what's going on around them, Dale in particular. When they first enter their new cabin, Tucker sees what appears to be human ribs dangling from an improvised wind chime. His response? Some kind of archeologist must have lived there. And when Dale sees all the newspaper clippings from the [[HorrorDoesntSettleForSimpleTuesday Memorial Day Massacre]], both of their attention is drawn to the 'Buy 3 get 2 free' coupon for a local chili dog shop that doesn't have an expiration date. It's almost enviable how the two can move into what's clearly a decrepit cabin in the woods formerly owned by a psychopath and yet be overjoyed at finally having a vacation home that just needs some fixing-up.

* MurderByCremation: Happens to one of the college kids during the Memorial Day Massacre.

** Mitch, the first of the students to accidentally off himself, was also the first to question the notion that Tucker and Dale were up to no good.

Sounds pretty standard, right? However, in this case, the kids are ''not'' the oppressed protagonists...t's the ''hillbillies''.

Sounds pretty standard, right? However... in this case, the kids are ''not'' the oppressed protagonists. It's the ''hillbillies''.

Meet Tucker (Creator/AlanTudyk) and Dale (Tyler Labine). They are two best buds who have taken a little vacation to fix a cabin in the woods which Tucker has bought. On their way there, they ran into the aforementioned college kids at the gas station. They inadvertently give the wrong first impression and the kids are convinced that they are typical creepy backwood hicks like the ones in movies. Later on, our two heroes meet the kids again when they are fishing. They accidentally scare the female lead of this film, Allison (Creator/KatrinaBowden), when she's about to go for a swim and she almost drowns. They save her and take her home with them to recover, but again they give the wrong impression about themselves and the college kids think they have actually ''kidnapped her''. Several accidents and [[PoorCommunicationKills more misunderstandings]] later, the planned vacation goes south big time for our duo as they have to put their best against... '''EVIL'''.

While [[{{Deconstruction}} deconstructing]] the [[HillbillyHorrors killer hillbillies sub-genre]], this 2010 horror comedy film also works as an {{Aesop}} for proper communication and the dangers of profiling.

* AbuseMistake: The college kids [[spoiler:and the police]] simply assume that Dale is doing terrible things to Allison. It doesn't help that some of the college kids overhear an out-of-context conversation where Dale boasts of having "beat the crap out of" her and mentions wanting to go back to the cabin to "finish her off" (he was actually talking about how he was beating her at a board game.)

-->'''Dale''': You guys uh... goin' camping? (''[[NotWhatItLooksLike Giggles nervously while holding the scythe]]'')
* AggressiveCategorism: With his paranoia and prejudice against "hillbillies," Chad makes an example of the scary and not at all amusing kind.

* BigDamnHeroes: Attempted several times throughout the course of the movie. However, except for [[spoiler: Dale rescuing Allison,]] this only succeeds in escalating a nonexistent situation to a deadly one.

** Chloe receives a faceful of blood after Mike dives into the woodchipper. After cleaning up she later receives another faceful when Naomi gets hit with the weed whacker.
* BothSidesHaveAPoint: Subverted. Allison is really trying for this one, in her attempts to mediate. It doesn't work.

** The poorly fixed column in the cabin.

** When Dale brings breakfast to Allison, she screams in fear at the ragged looking hillbilly approaching her. Dale's takeaway is that she doesn't like pancakes for breakfast and immediately retreats to make her something else.

-->'''Tucker''': ''You'' are a good-lookin' man... more or less. You got a damn good heart. That's two things right there.

* DeconstructedCharacterArchetype: Chad dissects the "alpha male" hero of a horror movie. His "bravery" and desire to take on "the bad guys" is in reality horrible arrogance and paranoia, and causes a somewhat troubling situation to become catastrophically bad for both the hillbillies and his friends. [[spoiler: His refusal to disobey his instincts eventually make him into the evil horror movie villain he claimed to oppose]]. Tucker and Dale are heroic simply because they are humble and polite enough to consider their actions, barring the occasional moment of thoughtlessness.

->''"... It doesn't matter what happened, what matters is what'' looks ''like what happened, and what looks like what happened... is pretty nasty."''

* PoorCommunicationKills: The Movie! [[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] by Allison, who explains that she's studying psychology because she feels so many of the world's problems are the result of this. She even tries to sit the main characters down to talk their way through the conflict. To her credit, it ''does'' seem to work - until her other two friends who were LockedOutOfTheLoop decide to intervene to save them from the hillbillies.

* PoorCommunicationKills: The Movie! [[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] by Allison, who explains that she's studying psychology because she feels so many of the world's problems are the result of this. She even tries to sit the main characters down to talk their way through the conflict. As expected, it doesn't work.

* EpicFail: Jason and Chloe's attempt at "rescuing" the rest of their friends goes ''spectacularly'' wrong. First, [[spoiler:Jason tries to attack Dale with a weed whacker, only to hit Naomi instead. Then, Chad tries to throw a lantern at the hillbillies, hitting Jason instead. Then, when Chloe tries to save Jason by dousing him with the nearest liquid she could find, she just makes the fire even worse, culminating in Jason burning to death, she and Naomi both dying in an explosion, and Chad becoming horribly disfigured.]]

Meet Tucker (Creator/AlanTudyk) and Dale (Tyler Labine). They are two best buds who have taken a little vacation to fix a cabin in the woods which Tucker has bought. On their way there, they ran into the aforementioned college kids at the gas station. They inadvertently give the wrong first impression and the kids are convinced that they are typical creepy backwood hicks like the ones in movies. Later on, our two heroes meet the kids again when they are fishing. They accidentally scare the female lead of this film, Allison (Katrina Bowden), when she's about to go for a swim and she almost drowns. They save her and take her home with them to recover, but again they give the wrong impression about themselves and the college kids think they have actually ''kidnapped her''. Several accidents and [[PoorCommunicationKills more misunderstandings]] later, the planned vacation goes south big time for our duo as they have to put their best against... '''EVIL'''.

* StockholmSyndrome: When Allison tries to explain to Chad and Naomi what happened, [[TheVictimMustBeConfused Naomi erroneously deduces that she is going through this]]. Even worse is that Naomi clearly has [[HollywoodPsych only the most basic idea of what Stockholm Syndrome even]] ''[[HollywoodPsych is,]]''much less how to diagnose it.

* DumbassHasAPoint: Everyone except Chad basically. Tucker and Dale themselves are not traditionally smart (see DumbIsGood below) but appreciate how bad things are and how bad they'll look. The rest of the college kids all have at least one moment where they question Chad's interpretation of the events, but aren't capable of avoiding the lethal consequences. Inverted with Allison, who's portrayed as the smartest one of the main cast but makes some pretty poor decisions through the couse of the film. She [[LampshadeHanging: hangs a Lampshade]] on it in the finale [[spoiler:when Tucker and Dale's cabin burns down.]]

* DumbassHasAPoint: Everyone except Chad basically. Tucker and Dale themselves are not traditionally smart (see DumbIsGood below) but appreciate how bad things are and how bad they'll look. The rest of the college kids all have at least one moment where they question Chad's interpretation of the events, but aren't capable of avoiding the lethal consequences. Inverted with Allison, who's portrayed as the smartest one of the main cast but makes some pretty poor decisions through the couse of the film. She hangs a Lampshade on it in the finale [[spoiler:when Tucker and Dale's cabin burns down.]]

* DumbassHasAPoint: Everyone except Chad basically. Tucker and Dale themselves are not traditionally smart (see DumbIsGood below) but appreciate how bad things are and how bad they'll look. The rest of the college kids all have at least one moment where they question Chad's interpretation of the events, but aren't capable of avoiding the lethal consequences. Inverted with Allison, who's portrayed as the smartest one of the main cast but makes some pretty poor decisions through the couse of the film. She hangs a [[Lampshade]] on it in the finale [[spoiler:when Tucker and Dale's cabin burns down.]]

* DumbassHasAPoint: Everyone except Chad basically. Tucker and Dale themselves are not traditionally smart (see DumbIsGood below, but appreciate how bad things are and how bad they'll look. The rest of the college kids all have at least one moment where they question Chad's interpretation of the events, but aren't capable of avoiding the lethal consequences. Inverted with Allison, who's portrayed as the smartest one of the main cast but makes some pretty poor decisions through the couse of the film. She Lampshade's it in the finale [[spoiler:when Tucker and Dale's cabin burns down.]]