History Literature / GeraldsGame

* AGlassInTheHand: A young Jessie does this when the sight of her father affectionately touching her mother's hand [[spoiler:triggers a traumatic memory of her father sexually abusing her in the past]].

[[JustForFun/IReadThatAs Definitely not to be confused with]] ''WesternAnimation/GerisGame''. (Though ironically, they both involve heart attacks and mind games.)

* CreepilyLongArms: One of the more noticable traits of The Space Cowboy.

* {{Fingore}}: Jessie must give herself a degloving injury to escape the cuffs. For the love of god, do ''not'' Google "degloving."

* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Gerald in the book is described as nearing fifty, overweight and losing his hair. Movie!Gerald is played by Bruce Greenwood, who, despite being more than a decade older than Book!Gerald, is a very attractive man.

* FanDisservice: Carla Gugino spends much of the film in a skimpy outfit and Bruce Greenwood, who is [[SilverFox very handsome and fit for a man in his sixties]], spends a good portion of it shirtless and with his six pack abs clearly visible at various points but the tone and story make the effect very off putting.

* YourCheatingHeart: While never confirmed, Jessie became suspicious of Gerald's late night hours, mysterious phone calls and weekened trips, especially with their failing marriage. However she never confronted him about it.

* KarmaHoudini: [[spoiler:Jessie's father is presumably never faced comeuppance for his crime.]]

** After molesting her Jessie's father says that it happened because "a man has certain needs" and his wife wasn't fulfilling them. However, he does admit that this is a shitty excuse.

* PetTheDog: In the movie, Hallucination!Gerald is genuinely horrified that [[spoiler:Jessie was sexually molested by her father and gives her a proud farewell when she escapes her bondage.]]
** After what happened during the eclipse is revealed, Hallucination!Gerald realizes exactly why it didn't work out between them, looking troubled learning about the many secrets Jessie kept from him during their marriage. He looks especially concerned and questions how [[spoiler: Jessie knows all the reasons why so many people choose to commit suicide by slitting their wrists]].

* YourCheatingHeart: While never confirmed, Jessie became suspicious of Gerald's late hours, mystery phone calls and weekened trips, especially witn their failing marriage. However she never confronted him about.

** After what happened during the eclipse is revealed, Hallucination!Gerald realizes exactly why it didn't work out between them and looking troubled about how many secrets Jessie had kept from him during their marriage, believing even the most painful ones could be shared.

* YourCheatingHeart: While never confirmed, Jessie became suspicious of Gerald's late hours, mystery phone calls and weekened trips, especially since she knew their marriage was crumbling. However she never confronted him about.

[/folder]]

[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tropes in the 1992 novel only]]
* AmplifiedAnimalAptitude: Prince's intuition is described by King in a way that doesn't feel that farfetched.
* AssholeVictim: Gerald, who was about to rape Jessie. It's further implied that he wasn't a great person (or husband) even before that moment. Jessie admits to herself she's not sorry he's dead.
* AutoErotica: Jessie had sex with her prom date on the back seat of his father's Oldsmobile.
* BetterThanSex: [[spoiler: When Jessie finally gets rid of the handcuffs, she feels ecstatic, and thinks that if sex was even half this good, people would be doing it on every street corner.]]
* CoolOldLady: Meggie Landis, the housekeeper Jessie hires to take care of her after her ordeal in the book. [[AdaptedOut She doesn't show up in the movie.]]
* {{Crossover}}: With King's ''Literature/DoloresClaiborne''. Both characters are caught in the path of the eclipse, which allows them a moment of physic connection. It's very brief, and if you haven't read both books, it might seem like [[BigLippedAlligatorMoment a stray, random moment of weirdness]] that's never followed up.
* DaddysGirl: Jessie was one of these as a child, and her father took advantage of their relationship.
* DeadpanSnarker: Ruth Neary, the voice in Jessie's head that belongs to her old college roommate.
* {{Fingore}}: Jessie must give herself a degloving injury to escape the cuffs. For the love of god, do ''not'' Google "degloving."
* HopeSpot: In the book, Jessie remembers the jar of Nivea cream on the shelf above the bed, and attempts to open it, hoping to use the cream as lubricant to free herself. [[spoiler: As she's concentrating intensely on opening the jar one-handed, however, Prince the dog chooses the worst possible moment to run into the room, startling Jessie and causing her to drop the jar.]]
* ImAManICantHelpIt:
** How Goody Burlingame, the more submissive voice in Jessie's head, tries to rationalise Gerald's attempt at rape.
** After molesting her Jessie's father says that it happened because "a man has certain needs" and his wife wasn't fulfilling them. However, he does admit that this is a shitty excuse.
* MayDecemberRomance: {{Implied|Trope}}. Their ages are not specified, but Gerald is described to be older than Jessie.
* NothingIsScarier: Jessie's already made herself sufficiently paranoid by ''imagining'' what might be making those strange sounds in the dark before anything really ''does'' come after her.
* PsychopathicManchild: Once he's captured, Joubert turns out to be a childlike but thoroughly insane man who talks about his "mummy-daddy" in a high-pitched cheerful voice and is excited to get to ride in a police car.
* RepressedMemories: Trapped on the bed, Jessie's mind has nothing to do but drift back to a past memory she has forgotten, a memory that not only gives her a plan to escape, but helps her to survive the psychological trauma that comes afterwards.
* SignatureStyle: Stream-of-consciousness writing? Italicized, parenthetical snatches of phrases representing the main character's little brainfarts? Multiple contexts for the same phrase, all of them disturbing? Must be a Creator/StephenKing book.
* SlutShaming: Subverted. Jessie has a vision of "Punkin" (an imaginary version of her younger self) being thrown in the stocks "for sexual enticement." Jessie violently rejects the idea that a child so young can be guilty of such a crime.
* SpitefulSpit: [[spoiler:After confirming Joubert was the Space Cowboy, Jessie spits in his face, symbolically moving past her instinctive defense of her father and declaring she'll never be used by a man again.]]
* StrawFeminist: Maybe her real-life counterpart is less so, but the version of Ruth that lives in Jessie's head is utterly scornful of men and considers them the cause of most of the world's problems.
* StockPunishment: Both "Goody" and "Punkin" are imagined in Puritan garb, and Jessie sees visions of both of them placed in stocks for their obscure crimes.
* TotalEclipseOfThePlot: Jessie flashes back to a solar eclipse when she was a child.
* TrophyWife: Jessie bitterly admits that she was one of these for Gerald, having given up her bold and independent spirit for financial security.
* VomitingCop: Sheriff Norris Ridgewick throws up, when he finds what is in the truck of Raymond Andrew Joubert, a [[spoiler: necrophiliac cannibal (for example, a sandwich with a human tongue)]] but manages to get out of the truck just in time. A character says that "the State Police would have torn him a new asshole if he'd puked on the evidence. On the other hand, I'd have wanted him removed from his job for psychological reasons if he hadn't thrown up."
* {{Xenofiction}}: Some parts of the book are told from the perspective of Prince, the stray dog.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tropes in the 2017 film only]]
* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Gerald in the book is described as nearing fifty, overweight and losing his hair. Movie!Gerald is played by Bruce Greenwood, who, despite being more than a decade older than Book!Gerald, is a very attractive man.
* AdaptationalNiceGuy: A ''very'' small example, but along with the PetTheDog example below, in the film [[spoiler: Gerald is a LITTLE less aggressive and backs off, angry but also disappointed, when Jessie struggles against him via biting his lip, before he has his heart attack. In the book Gerald refuses to back down at all, forcing Jessie to kick him repeatedly, which is suggested to have been the last bit of stress that triggers said heart attack. Whether Movie!Gerald would have uncuffed Jessie then had he not suffered said heart attack, or reverted to his book behavior is left up in the air.]]
* AdaptationNameChange: {{Downplayed|Trope}}. It doesn't apply to a character's birth name, but ''nick''name. In the book, Jessie's father nicknamed her "Punkin", in the movie, it's "Mouse".
** In the book, Jessie refers to the mysterious stranger in the room as "the Space Cowboy". In the film, he's dubbed "the Moonlight Man".
* AdaptationalModesty: In the book, Jessie is topless and wears nothing but a pair of underwear throughout her ordeal. In the film, she wears a full slip.
* AdaptedOut: Ruth Neary, Nora Callahan, Meggie Landis, Brandon Milheron... basically, if the character wasn't physically in the house or a family member of Jessie's in the book, they don't show up in the 2017 film.
* AscendedExtra: In the book, Gerald lies dead on the floor and only briefly appears in Jessie's hallucinations. In the 2017 movie, he serves as a major hallucination that tries to talk her down and manipulate her.
* CanonWelding: In the 2017 movie, when Jessie is coming to terms with the likelihood that she's going to die when the Moonlight Man returns, Gerald tells her "All things serve the Beam." This could be either a ShoutOut to ''Franchise/TheDarkTower'', or have considerably deeper implications.
** Another case comes in the form of a cameo from [[Film/{{Hush}} a copy of "The Midnight Mass" by Maddie Young]].
* MythologyGag: Gerald calls the dog Literature/{{Cujo}}.
* PetTheDog: In the movie, Hallucination!Gerald is genuinely horrified that [[spoiler:Jessie was sexually molested by her father and gives her a proud farewell when she escapes her bondage.]]
* SettingUpdate: The 2017 film moves the setting to TheNewTens, rather than 1992, when the book was written. By extension the day of the eclipse moves forward from 1963 to somewhere around 1989.
* SparedByTheAdaptation: In the book, Prince (Jessie's canine visitor) is shot by police. The film version doesn't tell us the dog's ultimate fate.
* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: In the book, Prince (the dog that feasts on Gerald) is shot by the police. In the 2017 film, we don't learn his fate.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tropes that appear in both]]

* YourCheatingHeart: {{Implied|Trope}} in the film. Hallucination!Jessie implies that Gerald would have "late work nights" and "trips" to cheat on Jessie.

* AdaptedOut: Ruth Neary, Nora Callahan, Meggie Landis, Brandon Milheron... basically, if the character wasn't physically in the house with Jessie in the book, they don't show up in the 2017 film.

* HearingVoices: In the book, Jessie hears four voices in her head: Ruth Neary (her old college roommate), Nora Callahan (a psychiatrist she stopped seeing), "Goodwife Burlingame" (a version of herself that is a devoted wife), and her 12-year-old self from the day the eclipse happened. In the 2017 movie, these are condesned into two characters: Gerald and herself as she is now.

[[JustForFun/IReadThatAs Definitely not to be confused with]] ''WesternAnimation/GerisGame''. (Though ironically, the both involve heart attacks and mind games.)

* AutoErotica: Jessie had sex with his prom date on the back seat of his father's Oldsmobile.

** After molesting her Jessie's father says that it happened because "a man has certain needs" and his wife wasn't fulfilling them.

* ImAManICantHelpIt: How Goody Burlingame, the more submissive voice in Jessie's head, tries to rationalise Gerald's attempt at rape.

* AscendedExtra: In the book, Gerald lies dead on the floor and never shows up in Jessie's head at all. In the 2017 movie, he serves as a major hallucination that tries to talk her down and manipulate her.