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Domestic and Romantic Comedy series by British author Helen Fielding.

Bridget Jones's Diary began as a newspaper column in The Independent in 1995, and ran on-and-off until 2006. Its earlier years were eventually collected / rewritten into two novels, one self-titled and the other subtitled The Edge of Reason. Both were eventually made into films starring Renée Zellweger in the title role. They focus primarily on Bridget's existence as a single, unwed thirty-something who is somewhat prone to exaggeration. She perceives herself as an overweight, over-aged, dependent on self-help books, alcohol and cigarettes, and generally hopeless, the type who must fight "fears of dying alone and being found three weeks later half-eaten by an Alsatian." Nonetheless, she attempts to persevere as a self-assured, satisfied "Singleton" despite being increasingly surrounded by "Smug Marrieds" who seem to have turned This Loser Is You into an artform.

Naturally, this is all Played for Laughs, but the character's unexpected popularity made it clear that a lot of people could relate.

Both novels are based loosely on Jane Austen works: the first on Pride and Prejudice, and the second on Persuasion. The former's influence is very direct, with Bridget as Elizabeth, publisher Daniel Cleaver as Wickham and barrister Mark Darcy as, get this, Mr. Darcy. Mark is particularly influenced by Colin Firth's portrayal of the role in the BBC's '95 film adaptation, particularly his Sexy Soaked Shirt scene which Bridget, Shazzer and Jude frequently replay on tape. This created all-new levels of fangirl-swooning when Firth agreed to reprise(?) his role as Darcy for the Bridget Jones films. (It also created all-new levels of Celebrity Paradox for the second book, in which Bridget, the character, conducts a newspaper interview with Colin Firth, the actor.) Meanwhile, an actor friend of Fielding's, Hugh Grant, was cast as Cleaver.

A third novel, subtitled Mad About the Boy, was published in October 2013. A third film, Bridget Jones's Baby, was released in 2016, with Patrick Dempsey co-starring.


Tropes used in the various Bridget Jones media:

  • Adaptation Dye-Job:
    • In the movies, Bridget's portrayed by blonde Renee Zellweger, although in the first book she commented about men preferring blondes in a way that indicates she is not blonde in book canon.
    • Pamela Jones, Bridget's mom. The first book mentions Pam being identified with red hair and the third book mentions that Woney had dark hair when she was younger; the films have them played by blonde actresses Gemma Jones and Dolly Wells.
    • There was even some illustrated editions of the 1st two books (after the movies) where there was a brunette Bridget and Shazzer (compare to blonde film portrayals) and light haired Magda and Jude (redhead and brunette in film respectively)
  • Adaptation Name Change: Mark's mother was named Elaine in the books, the films changed it to Geraldine.
  • Adaptation Personality Change: A huge example with Rebecca Gillies. The books portrayed her as a jealous thirty-something Rich Bitch that went out of her way to press Bridget's buttons and she genuinely tried to seduce Mark. Come the film adaptations and she is merely the good-natured and brainy daughter of a wealthy man who has a close professional relationship with Mark with no carnal interest in him.
  • Adaptational Angst Upgrade: Happens to a few characters when the books were adapted to film.
  • Adaptational Curves: Inverted with Bridget in the third film, showing her far thinner than she's been in the films or books. Whereas Renée Zellweger previously put on weight for the first two movies so she'd look rounder like a regular person, in Bridget Jones' Baby Bridget is as slim as Zellweger during her Chicago days, with only an offhand comment explaining that she finally made it to her ideal weight.
  • Adaptational Sexuality: This happens to Rebecca Gillies.
    • The movies have removed any trace of Uncle Geoffrey being a closeted gay man.
  • Adapted Out: Bridget and Mark in the films don't appear to have any siblings, whereas the novels had Bridget's older brother Jamie and a mention of Mark's brother Peter getting married.
  • Added Alliterative Appeal: "Jaundiced Julian", and "Tangerine-tinted buffoon."
  • Aerith and Bob:
    • Lampshaded in the third book when Bridget wonders why her children, Mabel and Billy, go to school with classmates who are all called Cosmata, Thelonius, Atticus, etc.
    • The Sloane Rangers Bridget and her friend Magda run into fall under this trope, the men have normal names like "Jeremy" and "Michael" whereas the women sometimes have silly, babyish names like "Pufti", "Mufti", and "Woney" (for Fiona).
  • An Aesop: The series in its own way drops several.
    • The first novel/film: "You have to believe in yourself and not try to focus on being some paragon of perfection, concentrate on being human" along with "You have to know know what you want and not enter a relationship for the sake of being in a relationship." Props also given out that even if you don't match the "ideal" body and aren't posh, you can still find happiness.
    • The second novel/film: "It's imperative that you be yourself and let the people you love know how much you love them" and Poor Communication Kills.
    • The third novel: "Just because you reached a certain age/are widowed/have kids doesn't mean that life stops, you have to still live for yourself and step outside your comfort zone."
  • Aesop Amnesia: Invoked in the second film, Edge of Reason, where Bridget lets herself be charmed by Daniel Cleaver again, only to finally learn her lesson when she finds out he ordered a hooker on the same evening they spend together.
    • Something for Bridget and Mark who have 1. Personality clashes, mostly caused by his closed off nature. 2. Break up over said clashes. 3. Have to push themselves to reveal their feelings for one another. 4. Get back together and be romantic.
  • Age-Gap Algebra: Lampshaded and joked about in the 1st film where Bridget and Mark talked about the paddling pool incident at Mark's 8th birthday party and Bridget was wondering if it really happened. Mark confirmed it did and said he was 8 and she was 4. Bridget remarks that "it's quite pervy" only for him to smile in agreement.
    • The 3rd book reveals a 6 year age gap between Mark (born in 1956) and Bridget (born in 1962).
  • Agony of the Feet: When Bridget pursues Mark in the snow, at first she runs out barefoot, to the sound of crunching snow. She quickly returns shouting "bollocks", and puts running shoes on her bare feet.
  • Alone Among the Couples:
    • The only thing worse than a smug married couple is... lots of smug married couples: Hugo and Jane, Cosmo and pregnant Woney, Alistair and Henrietta, Julia and Michael, Joanne and Paul, and Natasha Glenville dating Mark Darcy.
    • Even when Bridget is a widow, her friends and acquaintances still act this way towards her, and ask when she's going to get married again.
  • Alpha Bitch:
    • A mid-thirties version in Rebecca in the second book.
    • Natasha in the first film. She's a good-looking lawyer and quite condescending towards Bridget, and always picks on her when she has a chance.
    • Rebecca's character was re-tooled and replaced with Janey Osbourne in the second film.
  • Always Someone Better: In the second film, Bridget feels very insecure next to Mark's brainy, leggy, comely assistant Rebecca; it gets worse when Rebecca answers the final question of a trivia game correctly after Bridget was acing it.
  • Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: A major subplot of the first book is Bridget's mum going on a midlife crisis, which only exacerbates her already-outrageous personality. Not to mention her introducing Bridget to Mark in the first film - "You used to play naked in his paddling pool".
  • And Now You Must Marry Me: An odd example for a romantic and situation comedy. At the Ruby Wedding, Natasha implies she begged her Mark's father not to mention the possible engagement and move to New York (Mark looked surprised that he was "engaged" to her), something Mark would feel bound by obligation to stick by. Thankfully Bridget voices her opinion.
  • Anguished Declaration of Love: Mark in the second movie. And later a hurried and embarrassed Bridget when she heads to a meeting he's in and confesses how much she always loved him in front of his colleagues.
    I said "I love you" for God Sakes!
  • As Himself:
    • Several renowned writers in the first film appear on the launch of a Pemberley book.
      Bridget: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the launch of Kafka's Motorbike, The Greatest Book of Our Time! [beat] Obviously except for your books, Mr. Rushdie, which are also very good. And Lord Archer, yours aren't bad either."
    • In the second book, Bridget interviews Colin Firth. Fielding actually interviewed Firth, and put his answers into the book.
  • Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: "...and I think you should rethink the length of your sideburns."
  • Ass Kicks You: Bridget inadvertently invokes this trope by taking out the cameraman with her bottom as she slides inelegantly down the fireman's pole!
  • Ass Shove: In the first film, offscreen and consensual.
    Bridget: [in bed with Daniel, post-sex] Daniel, what you just did is actually illegal in several countries.
    Daniel: That is one of the reasons that I'm so thrilled to be living in Britain today.
  • Award-Bait Song: Ellie Goulding's "Still Falling for You", from Bridget Jones' Baby. It even has its own Video Full of Film Clips to go with it!
  • Awful Wedded Life: Bridget's parents, the Dad is too lazy to do much and the Mom is self-centered and impulsive; the Alconburys are nosy, bourgeois, and crass where the books have Geoffrey be a lecherous closeted gay or bisexual (the films just have him as a lech that gets away with feeling up Bridget's ass); the crass Smug Marrieds are implied to have sexless marriages with Woney being beaten down by Cosmo's leering at other women; Mark Darcy and his first wife only married for convenience and she cheated on him; Bridget's married friend Magda deals with her philandering husband in the first two books. All of them, excluding Bridget's Dad and the Darcy's, bug Bridget about getting married soon.
  • Babies Ever After: Bridget at the end of the third movie with Mark, the father, now her husband.
  • Baby Talk: Bridget's daughter Mabel speaks this way despite being five years old.
  • Be Yourself: Mark likes Bridget "just as she is".
  • Best Friends-in-Law: Bridget's and Mark's parents are long-time friends and have the interest of setting their kids together. They eventually succeed.
  • Betty and Veronica:
    • Gender-flipped; Bridget is the Archie to Mark Darcy's Betty and Daniel Cleaver's Veronica. Although thanks to Cleaver's lies, she thinks it's the other way round at first.
    • Bridget and Natasha/Rebecca Gillies (book version), respectively.
  • Beware the Nice Ones: Bridget is a very kind and amusing woman, yet as her diary and inner thoughts can attest to, she is capable of making scathing comebacks to people that offend her and a Deadpan Snarker.
    • The movies show her not hesitating to tell Daniel off.
    • The 3rd book has Magda snark to Bridget about the state Cosmo and Woney are in: Cosmo is retiring, (not mentioned) they've let themselves go, their son went off to college, Woney is dissatisfied with Cosmo's leering at other women, and they have nothing to do except stare at one another at their designer, retro dinner table when they're not bugging Bridget about being single.
  • Big-Breast Pride: The films has Bridget flaunting this area of her body, and they are certainly the opposite of small.
  • The Big Damn Kiss: Bridget and Mark make this trope in the two movies.
  • Big "NO!": Bridget in the movie, when Bridget learns that Mark Darcy is moving to New York.
  • Birth-Death Juxtaposition: It's mentioned in Mad About the Boy that Bridget's father, while dying from lung cancer, lived just long enough to hold her newborn baby for the first time.
  • Blonde Republican Sex Kitten: Bridget is hired as the British equivalent of this when she leaves to work for Sit Up Britain. Though in 1997 at least she's actually a Labour voter. Mainly because in 1997, nearly all floating voters ended up voting Labour.
  • Brainy Brunette: In the movies, Investment Banker Jude and Law Assistant Rebecca Gillies are played respectively by the dark-haired Shirley Henderson and Jacinda Barrett.
    • Also in film canon, the conniving and bitchy Lara and Natasha (played by Embeth Davidtz), are a nastier version of this trope.
    • Cunning Daniel, Top Notch Barrister and Type A Mark, and Witty Tom (all played by the dark-haired Hugh Grant, Colin Firth, and James Callis) are male versions of this trope.
  • Break the Cutie: Bridget after her break up with Daniel gets very down in the dumps, but soon gets better when she decides to choose vodka, Chaka Khan, and finding a job in journalism; again when she and Mark break up (temporarily) and after Mark died (according to the 3rd book).
    • In the middle of the third film, Bridget goes from having two suitors to zero, gets fired, has her card eaten by a cashpoint machine, loses her bags, and gets locked out of her apartment in the rain. Fortunately both Mark and Jack are there to get her to the hospital when her water breaks.
  • Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Patchouli. She's works a secretarial job where Bridget works (doesn't apply to the films). She's something of a Valley Girl, yet she's shown to be very competent and keeps Bridget on any important info that Richard Finch might've fudged up in imparting. She also holds Bridget in high regard.
  • Bus Crash: In the third film, Daniel Cleaver is missing, presumed dead in a plane crash, as Hugh Grant turned down appearing in the film. Subverted in the one-year later epilogue when a newspaper article reveals that Daniel survived and was found alive.
  • Butt-Monkey: Poor Bridget. Nothing ever goes right for her.
  • The Cameo: Ed Sheeran has a rather gratuitous cameo in the third film.
  • Camera Abuse: Courtesy of Bridget's bottom. Never work with fireman's poles.
  • Canon Discontinuity:
    • In the interim between the second and third books, Helen Fielding wrote a new version of the newspaper column; in which Bridget sleeps with both Daniel and Mark at the same time, gets pregnant, and gives birth to a son who turns out to be Daniel's. Mark offers to marry her and adopt the baby, but by the end of the story it appears she's content to be a single mother with support from Daniel. This is at odds with the third book, where Bridget married Mark and they had two children before he was killed in a landmine accident abroad. Her first-born is a son named Billy so technically, the events of the column could still have happened, but everything in the book suggests Billy was Mark's legitimate child.
    • The third film ignores the third book and instead follows the Mama's Baby, Papa's Maybe storyline from the columns, with newcomer Jack replacing Daniel as the other possible father (as Hugh Grant turned down a role in the film) and keeps both Mark and Bridget's father alive instead of keeping both of their deaths from the books. Bridget also marries Mark in the film and confirms his paternity to her child instead of choosing to be a single mother and moving in with Daniel (her child's father) as in the columns.
    • In the third book, the movie canon seems to be woven into the book universe, with references to the the kissing scene between Bridget and Mark at the end of the 1st film and Bridget's old show being referred to as Sit Up Britain instead of the book canon Good Afternoon!.
  • The Casanova: Daniel Cleaver.
  • Casting Gag: Mark Darcy is of course meant to be Mr Darcy from Pride and Prejudice, who was memorably played in the BBC adaptation by Colin Firth. There's also a bit in the book where Bridget has a crush on Colin Firth, and an extra scene for the second film had Bridget interviewing him for work, as per a memorable part of the second book that couldn't be used in the film because of the obvious Celebrity Paradox implications. What's more, the third film reveals that Mark's middle name is Fitzwilliam.
  • Celebrity Crush: Bridget, Jude and Shazzer all have a crush on Colin Firth in the books.
  • Celebrity Paradox: as mentioned, Bridget interviews Colin Firth in the second book. This was completely left out of the second movie for obvious reasons, though there is an improvised version available as an outtake on the DVD.
  • Character Development: In the films, Mark Darcy getting over his stuck-up and often embarrassed attitude over Bridget. In the third film, when Bridget has made a fool of herself on television again, Mark enters the scene and instead of acting embarrassed like he used to, simply looks at her with a loving smile.
  • Character Title: Fill "Bridget Jones" in the blank; _____'s Diary, _______: The Edge of Reason, and __________: Mad About The Boy.
  • Christmas Carolers: Appear near the end of the film version. Bridget is single and spending Christmas Eve with her father. They are completely out of the mood and she just yells at them to bugger off.
  • Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: In the first novel, Bridget has an older brother, Jamie, who she speaks to on the phone occasionally and who usually attends family gatherings. He is never mentioned in the subsequent novels or either of the movies, though her mother does mention something about having raised "children" in the scene where she tells Bridget that she's left her father so it's possible that Bridget isn't her only child.
  • Cigarette of Anxiety: While Bridget smokes cigarettes recreationally, she does have them when she's stressed out and her father comments in the 2nd film that he finds a good cig to be relieving.
  • Cluster F-Bomb: Shazzer.
    • Catchphrase: Lampshaded by Bridget as her narration introduces her "Shazza - likes to say 'fuck'".
  • Cool Aunt: In the books and the third movie, Bridget is made godmother to most of her friends' children and is referred to as "Auntie Bridget" and even joins them in dancing to "Gangnam Style".
  • Composite Character: Bridget Jones' Mother takes on not only the role of Mrs. Bennet, but also... Elizabeth's sister Lydia. Meanwhile, this is inverted by dividing Wickham into two characters, one who romances Bridget and the other who absconds with Pam.
  • Condescending Compassion: Bridget and her friends remark on the attitudes towards Singletons held by mostly upper-middle class married peers of theirs who have earned the endearing moniker of "Smug Marrieds". Shazzer retorts that at least they aren't in unhappy marriages just for the sake of being married and that the single life is just another way of living.
  • Cosmetic Catastrophe: Happens to Bridget in the 2nd novel and film with a bad haircut and hastily prepared makeup in a dark car.
  • Creepy Uncle: Geoffrey (the Honorary Uncle). He always touches Bridget's butt etc.
  • Cute Clumsy Girl: Bridget
  • Daddy DNA Test:
    • A lot of the third movie hinges on the outcome of a DNA test that will determine whether Jack Qwant or Mark is the father of Bridget's baby. It's Mark.
    • In the newspaper columns, a similar scenario happened involving Mark and Daniel. The baby was Daniel's but adopted by Mark.
  • Daddy's Girl: Bridget is this to Colin, which causes some angst for her mother who talks about their "grown-up club of two" and how they always talk about "silly mummy".
  • Dangerous Key Fumble: Played with in the first film of Bridget Jones' Diary. When Bridget's friends take her away to Paris so she can forget about Mark Darcy, she struggles with the keys when locking her front door... giving Mark Darcy time to appear, and Bridget has to decide whether to go with him, or with her friends.
  • Dare to Be Badass: Part of Bridget's Character Development, not so much badass as just taking a chance for a more fulfilling career and for love.
  • Daydream Surprise: Mostly with Bridget dreaming up a scathing speech to someone who's a thorn in her side. At one point in the 1st film, Bridget is talking to Mark at the book launch party when her supervisor Perpetua demands to be introduced. Bridget introduces them to each other with thoughtful details: "Mark's a prematurely middle-aged prick with a cruel raced ex-wife. Perpetua is a fat-arse old bag who spends her time bossing me around." Then the voiceover says, "Maybe not," and we cut back to reality, where Bridget gives a much more ordinary introduction.
    • There are a few more in the original script where Bridget dreams of mouthing off to the nosy Smug Married Woney that she'd rather be single and/or kill herself than be pregnant and married to a dull man like Cosmo like her. And another where Bridget dreams of telling Mark that marrying Natasha out of obligation and to avoid loneliness is a big mistake.
  • Deadpan Snarker: Oh so many characters: Bridget, Daniel, Mark, Colin Jones, Shazzer, Jude, and Tom; Natasha attempts to fulfill this trope.
  • Defeat Means Friendship: A third book occurrence.
    • Woney note  gets her own mid-life makeover due to Bridget's own speech about how middle-age is not the end of the world for women anymore and at Bridget's younger boyfriend, along with Talitha's advice about fashion and botox.
    • Daniel, prior to Mark's death and the birth of Billy and Mabels' births, reconciled with Mark and Bridget and became a good friend and Godfather to the kids.
    • Nicolette, after a breakdown after being called out for her Education Mama tendencies, is offered some companionship by Bridget and seems to be less prickly.
    • Bridget's "perfect" babysitter, Chloe, after being dumped by a boyfriend for being "too perfect" receives a lot of counseling from Bridget and Daniel where they remind her she's too good for that guy.
  • Demoted to Extra: Bridget's friends play a large role in both the books and the films. In the third film, they only appear in a couple of scenes and are more or less replaced by Miranda, Briget's younger thirtysomething coworker.
  • Dirty Old Man:
  • Disposable Fiancé: Mark has a disposable wife in the third movie who we don't get to know at all, and who is quickly brushed aside as wanting to divorce Mark so that Mark and Bridget can get back together.
  • Disturbing Statistic: When Bridget is surrounded by lots of "smug married" couples mocking her singledom, she says "is it one in four marriages which ends in divorce now, or one in three?".
  • Double Standard: Dealt with frequently.
  • Downer Beginning: The third film opens with Bridget lamenting her being an old spinster, with the reveal that she and Mark broke up off-screen years ago between films due to their character differences. Not to mention that Daniel is dead or so we think.
  • Downtime Downgrade: Despite having apparently worked out their differences in the second film, the third film opens with the reveal that Bridget and Mark not only broke up between movies, but he also married another woman in the interim.
  • Dramatic TV Shut-Off: A deleted scene shows Daniel obsessively watching sport on TV, until Bridget switches it off to get his attention. He then reveals how he has booked them to go on a mini-break: when she reacts with delight, he quickly switches the set back on.
  • Drowning My Sorrows: From the movie: "I will not be defeated by a bad man and an American stick insect. Instead, I choose vodka."
  • Dumb Blonde: Film Universe. Avoided with the honey blonde and witty journalist Shazzer. Bridget gets this treatment in a scene from the second film and while she isn't a Rhodes Scholar, she does possess normal intelligence along with wit and an appreciation for literature and pop culture.
  • Dying Alone: What Bridget fears, the 3rd book adds she's afraid of dying mateless with two defenseless children.
  • Dynamic Entry: Julio.
  • Dysfunctional Family: The Jones Family. Father Colin seems to only tolerate his flighty and selfish wife's antics, daughter Bridget seems to only grudgingly visit for her father's sake and to be nice, son Jamie seems very distant and avoids most get-togethers', and mother Pam has enough drama to pass around.
  • Education Mama: A prominent example in the third book. One of Bridget's fellow school mothers, Nicolette, is very concerned and gung-ho about her sons being ready for the business world to the point that the boys are nervous and insecure whenever they fail/not perfectly succeed at their school work or their extracurricular activities, thankfully she learns to relax a little with the help of Bridget's friendship.
  • Empty Fridge, Empty Life: After the breakup with Daniel, there is only iced-up cheese in Bridget's fridge.
  • Everyone Loves Blondes: Bridget's rivals for Mark's affections are always classy and slender brunettes, but Mark truly loves the curvy, blond Bridget. Daniel puts this up to eleven in the third film, where his funeral reveals that he has countless old paramours, all of whom are young and blond.
  • Executive Meddling: In-Universe. Bridget writes an adaptation of Hedda Gabler set in modern London. The film company that options the rights decides to set it aboard a yacht in 1970s Hawaii and have Hedda survive at the end.
  • Fanservice:
    • The boys fighting in the fountain. Sexy Soaked Shirt scene that appeals to ladies.
    • Bridget in a Bunny suit.
    • The part where Bridget's butt is revealed in the fire-pole scene, as there was no mention of her bottom showing on tv in the novel.
  • Feedback Rule: When Mr Titspervert - sorry, Fitzherbert switches on a microphone, feedback is heard.
  • Feminine Women Can Cook: Not this lady, that's for sure. After dyeing the soup blue, reducing the caperberry gravy to toxic waste, and managing to lose the fresh tuna, Bridget is obliged to step aside and let Darcy save the dinner.
  • Flamboyant Gay: Bridget's friend Tom who used to record a hit song and manages to get laid on his fifteen minutes of fame.
  • Flanderization: In the first movie, Cleaver's a womaniser who shows some remorse for his ways and seems to genuinely love Bridget in spite of his promiscuous nature. In the sequel he just comes across as a narcissistic Jerkass who only wants to get into Bridget's pants and literally could not care less about anyone but himself.
  • Friend to All Children: Wallacker in the 3rd book mentioned that he chose his current job, at the elementary school Bridget's kids attend, due to the fact he loves kids and wants to make some sort of difference.
  • Fun with Foreign Languages: In the second movie, where Bridget's in a drugstore and tries to explain through a combination of mime and faltering German that she needs a pregnancy test. She's unable to understand the reactions of those around her, who at first think she's saying she is pregnant, and then (as her "explanation" gets stranger) that there's something psychologically wrong with her.
  • Geek Physiques: Lampshaded. Daniel, in the novel, states to Bridget that Mark was a really skinny awkward teen nerd with terrible fashion sense; In the 2nd book, Bridget recalls herself as being very thin at 15 (her dieting started a year later) yet with glasses and braces, which scare off a mugger at the time. Between the both of them, they don't resemble their teen selves.
  • Girls Behind Bars: In The Edge Of Reason, Bridget ends up in a Thai womens' prison when caught unwittingly smuggling drugs.
  • Glamorous Single Mother: Played with in the 3rd book, with Bridget attempting to put together a look that resembles the "red carpet girls" but the difficulty of pulling off the trope is demonstrated and her feelings about Mark make the dating part of the trope very difficult.
  • Global Ignorance: In the 2nd film, Daniel and Bridget's demeaning boss Richard Finch make fun of Bridget for thinking Iran is the wife of David Bowie and not naming which country is below Germany.
  • Good Girls Avoid Abortion: Only slightly alluded to in the 3rd movie when Bridget finds herself pregnant, when she is asked by a friend what she'll do now, she says that it could be the last chance she has to be a Mother. So the topic of abortion is turned down because she isn't a girl anymore.
  • Good Parents: The 3rd book shows Bridget as a clumsy, yet loving and fun Mom.
  • Grew a Spine: What Bridget does throughout the 1st film also called back, in one of the original scripts where towards the Ruby Wedding she chooses to wear a stylish black dress instead of the pre-Thatcher era outfit her mother picked out for her; this happens to Mark on a lesser extent in the film, pretty much he learns to act on his own wants.
  • Hair-Contrast Duo: The films have a Blonde Bridget with the dark haired Mark and Daniel. She tends to be more light-hearted than her moodier boyfriend/fiancee and is more monogamous than her ex Daniel.
  • Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: Bridget is sweet and kind-hearted along with being played by blonde film Ingenue Renée Zellweger in the films.
  • Happily Married: The 3rd book reveals that Bridget and Mark were this trope before he died. Later she gets together with Wallacker and raises their kids together under one roof in the epilogue and she speaks very contentedly of it.
  • Happy Ending Override: Though Mark and Bridget are happily together at the end of the second film, the third film opens not only with Bridget wallowing in singledom, but Mark married to another woman, with their breakup off-screen and in the past due to what Bridget describes as emotional deficiencies on Mark's part. Presumably this is so the paternity question can occur without Bridget cheating on Mark, and the narrative quickly shoos out Mark's wife regardless.
  • Hello, Attorney!: Mark Darcy is a famous defense attorney who represents political refugees, and regarded as incredibly desirable by most women.
  • Henpecked Husband: Bridget's father, to a certain extent.
    • The third movie seems to paint Jude's husband as this when she yells at him for picking Mark as the godfather to their youngest child...when Bridget was already the Godmother.
  • Holiday in Cambodia: To Thailand, in the second book/film, complete with the drug charges. Played for drama, allowing Bridget to Take A Level In Badass as she works to get herself free.
  • Hollywood Beauty Standards:
    • Bridget is already an attractive woman with a sex appeal that turns on Daniel, and when she joins "Sit Up Britain", both the reporting job and her looks land her in this trope.
    • Daniel becomes one in the 2nd film when he becomes the "Smooth Guide" host.
  • Hollywood Pudgy: Bridget, according to the other characters. Invoked directly by Daniel:
    "I keep telling you nobody wants legs like a stick insect. They want a bottom they can park a bike in and balance a pint of beer on."
    • On that note, Perpetua considers Bridget to be Hollywood Thin, referring to her as having a "bony arse" which surprises Bridget.
    • Then when she lost weight and got pregnant, Una remarks that she thought Bridget "got fat again".
  • Hollywood Tone-Deaf: Bridget, at least in the movies. She sings off key at a Christmas office party.
  • Homemade Sweater from Hell: Part of Mark's poor first impression. The novel also mentions bumblebee socks.
  • Honor Before Reason: Mark and Bridget. This can perhaps be a trait they have in common with one another.
    • Bridget
      • Reasonable: Being able to say "No" to some of her Mother's outrageous requests and telling people that she doesn't like it when they bother her about her marital status.
      • Honorable: Just going along with her Mother's demands and grinning and bearing it when people needle her about her love life to avoid hurting their feelings.
    • Mark
      • Reasonable: Telling your girlfriend that you aren't cheating on her with your assistant/colleague and that said colleague isn't into you.
      • Honorable: This conversation.
        Bridget: Are you or are you not sleeping with Rebecca Gillies?
        Mark: I won't dignify that with an answer.
  • Hopeless Suitor: Jack in the third film. He clearly adores Bridget and wants the baby, but Bridget and Mark have just too much history and chemistry. Doesn't stop him from amicably becoming a groom at the wedding of Bridget and Mark and adoring Bridget's son, though.
  • Hypocritical Humor: Cleaver's brand of humor, particularly when discussing his latest book deal, the "Worst Book Ever Written" (while standing in front of one his ads proclaiming it "The Greatest Book Of Our Time")
  • I Need a Freaking Drink: When Bridget screws up her cooking, she takes a swig from a bottle of some alcohol. She tends to do it quite often, and sometimes she needs more alcohol than just one shot.
  • I Want Grandkids: Bridget's mother in the third film feels this way and constantly reminds Bridget of her advancing age and lack of children.
  • I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Played two ways. One of the reasons why Rebecca in the second film confesses how much she is infatuated with Bridget, who was convinced Rebecca and Mark were "still together" and wished them all the best.
  • I Was Quite a Looker: Invoked for Bridget's 2012 diary entries, where Bridget had fell into this trope between the death of Mark and her current life as a Mrs. Robinson type; she also lampshades the trope when describing the appearance of Woney as letting her "lovely dark hair go gray" and being struck with a bad case of middle-age spread, she like Bridget gets her appearance back in shape further on.
    • It was even lampshaded after Bridget got back to the weight she complained about in the last two books, with Daniel marveling at how he was afraid she wouldn't look like that again back when she was heavier.
  • Ice Queen: Bridget attempts this frequently, with mixed success, due to her warm personality.
    • A deleted scene from the film has Bridget's friends advising her on maintaining a cool demeanor to reel Daniel in, since it worked for one of them.
  • Iconic Item: Bridget's control top panties for one, there is also her the ever-present miniskirts and (especially in the book) her floaty dresses but the films have her wearing a silver heart necklace especially in scenes involving her and Mark.
  • Incompatible Orientation: The second film has the straight Giles with a small crush on Rebecca, has been adapted into a lesbian, who has a crush on the heterosexual Bridget.
  • Informed Flaw: Many reviewers of the films have slapped Bridget with the Hollywood Pudgy stick and referred to her as "plump", "frumpy", "dowdy", and possessing chubby hands. Bridget isn't a total fashionista, yet dresses like an ordinary person and is merely curvy with non-chubby hands.
  • Innocent Blue Eyes: Bridget, as played by Renée Zellweger in the films. She has very blue eyes to match her sweet nature and she's the protagonist.
  • Insecure Love Interest: Bridget
    Bridget: I read that you should never go out with someone if you can think of three reasons why you shouldn't.
    Mark: And can you think of three?
    Bridget: Yes.
    Mark: Which are?
    Bridget: First off, I embarrass you. I can't ski, I can't ride, I can't speak Latin , my legs only come up to here and yes I will always be just a little bit fat.
  • Ironic Echo: Mark Darcy is (taps nose significantly) still available!
    Bridget: He's also (taps nose) still deranged!
  • It's a Costume Party, I Swear!: The "Tarts and Vicars" party. The hosts decided to call the scheme off, but forget to tell several people, Bridget (who's dressed as a Playboy Bunny) and her father among them.
  • Jerk with a Heart of Gold: What Mark eventually is more or less revealed as, Daniel has his moments, but really Bridget's demanding supervisor Perpetua (who stands up for her when she tells Daniel she's quit).
  • Jerkass: Both Richards, Jude's boyfriend later ex-husband and Bridget's boss; Daniel's temporary fiancee Lara and Mark's partner Natasha.
  • Jerkass Has a Point: As unpleasant as Bridget's boss frm the third film was, it's hard to dispute - even In-Universe - that she had perfectly valid grounds for firing Bridget.
  • Karaoke Bonding Scene: In the film, Bridget's drunken karaoke performance at the office Christmas party gets the attention of her suave boss Daniel.
  • Ladykiller in Love: Subverted with Daniel. He does love Bridget, but that doesn't sway his wandering eye (and pants) and he is more of a Romantic False Lead for her.
  • Leg Focus: Two film examples.
    • Rebecca Gillies in the second film is noted for having "legs up to here" *armpit area*, not that she shows them off a lot but it's fairly obvious with her tall and thin frame.
    • Bridget wears miniskirts and dresses that show off her "climber's legs", with the 1st film having a close up on her slim ankles and calves on her shapely frame after stepping off the scale.
  • Lethal Chef: The highlight of Bridget's cooking is blue soup "made of" melted plastic string.
  • Light Girl, Dark Boy: The movies have a blonde Bridget with the darker haired Mark and Daniel.
  • Likes Older Women:
    • Bridget got this in her 30s, when Mark's teenage cousin attempts to flirt and dance with her, with a Raging Stiffie involved.
    • Roxster, Bridget's boyfriend in the third book. He says he likes they have a voice of their own and more to say.
  • Lipstick-and-Load Montage:
    • In the montage where Bridget prepares to impress her boss Daniel at the upcoming book launch, she does the following: brushes up on conversational skills, studies up on current events, shave and wax, uses a body brush, rolls up her hair, picks out a sleek black dress and weighs the options between a control-top panty and a thong before deciding on the former.
    • The second film has a montage that includes more Fashion Hurts and the inclusions of such tropes as Of Corset Hurts in addition of a haircut that has to be ravaged by the damage done by a deluded hairdresser.
  • Lipstick Lesbian: In the second film it's the very feminine Rebecca Gillies who harbours a crush on Bridget.
  • Loser Gets the Girl: Subverted after the Cockfight, Bridget rushes to Daniel's side and scolds Mark for being just as bad as the "fuckwits" she has to deal with only to dash any idea Daniel may have of getting back together with her.
  • Mama's Baby, Papa's Maybe: The plot of the third film, based on a series of columns by Fielding, revolves around this: Bridget sleeps with two men, one of them Mark Darcy (the other being Daniel in the column and Jack in the film) in a short span of time, becomes pregnant, and is unsure who the father of her baby is. In the column, the baby turns out to be Daniel's, but Mark offers to take care of the baby anyway. In the film, the child is Mark's.
  • Mama's Boy: Many viewers and a critic have seen Mark Darcy as this, though his mother serves more as a background player and isn't manipulative or anyway unpleasant.
    Cara Ann Lane: He is the epitome of a sensitive new age man, handsomely packaged in a nice suit. However, the catch to this characterization is his tendency to be manipulated and controlled by the women in his life. While exhibiting his sensitivity and awareness of the needs of others, he is hesitant to stand up for his own desires. His mother and his law partner/girlfriend both make most of the decisions in his life. The film suggests his ex-wife, who had an affair with Daniel (one of the factors leading to this fight), exercised similar control over Darcy.
  • Mean Boss: A few examples.
    • The 1st film and book have Perpetua, who is said to be some arrogant woman that is in a more "slightly senior" position than Bridget and is said to be a thorn in her side; she did tell Daniel off for his treatment of Bridget.
    • Richard Finch is a straight example, sometimes behaving lewdly around Bridget when he isn't belittling her.
    • The third film has Alice Peabody, a young woman in charge of reinvigorating the studio, and who is rumored to fire anyone older than her. Bridget wonders who isn't older than her. She belittles Bridget and is overly aggressive in her pursuit of more interesting news, though she's shown in the end to be not so rough around the edges.
  • Meet Cute: Jack and Bridget in the third film, when Jack rescues her from a pile of mud and puts her shoe back on her foot like she's Cinderella.
  • Mid-Battle Tea Break: After crashing a birthday party, Darcy and Cleaver politely stop fighting for a moment to sing along with "Happy Birthday."
  • Monochrome Casting: It can be safe to say that it's easier to find a needle in a haystack than it is to find a main or secondary character that isn't of Anglo-Saxon descent, the 1st book's British Edition mentioned an Aunt of Mark looking a lot like Shakira Caine (changed to Faye Dunaway in the American edition), but aside from Pam's boyfriends and Bridget's cellmates, that's about it.
  • Mrs. Robinson: In the third book, Bridget has a relationship with a man twenty years her junior, causing them both to think of her along these lines. She's particularly torn when she finds out that his thirtieth birthday is the same day as her friend's sixtieth.
  • My Beloved Smother: Pam Jones, can get very critical of her daughter (who guiltily tries to avoid telling her things), to the point that her husband onetime asked her leave Bridget alone when it comes to the colors she wears, the guys she dates, and her life in general.
    • The 3rd book has Nicollette, who is a poised yet cold Foil to Bridget, is very demanding of her young (and insecure) sons putting 200% into their school and sports; she thankfully loosens up but not before a digital breakdown sometime after being called out for her parental skills.
  • My Biological Clock Is Ticking: Downplayed with Bridget in the third film, who frequently comments on her own spinsterhood, looks longingly at children, and notes that all of her friends were married with children before her. Her turning down an abortion when she does get pregnant is due to the realization that she may never get the chance again.
  • Mythology Gag: Colin Firth's famous lake scene is parodied in the first film. A drunk and boorish Cleaver falls face-first into the drink, then whoops it up with Bridget as an envious Darcy looks on (clearly wishing he could join in).
  • Neutral Female: The first Cock Fight between Mark and Daniel puts Bridget in this role, justified since she and her friends were very puzzled with the situation and didn't know exactly who to root for.
  • Never Found the Body: The beginning of the third film deals with Daniel's funeral in a bush plane accident, though his body was never found. Naturally, he's found alive later, as shown in a newspaper article.
  • New Year's Resolution: Bridget Jones's Diary starts with Bridget listing her resolutions. At the end, she makes an assessment of her year, and notes that she kept one of her resolutions (which she rates as a very good result).
  • Nice Girl: Bridget is a very kind, loving, friendly person who cares about her family and friends; even comforting the babysitter she previously viewed as the paragon of perfection after said girl gets dumped.
  • No Celebrities Were Harmed: In the third movie, Mark defends a blatant Expy of Pussy Riot from extradition to their home country. This backfires when the band members stage a protest in central London - blocking all the roads just as Bridget is going into labour.
  • No Periods, Period: Brought up time to time, especially in the second movie when Bridget gets a pregnancy scare after noting she and Mark had 8 uninterrupted weeks having coitus together.
  • Non-Idle Rich: There are many wealthy characters in the books, yet plenty of them do work. Most notably Mark, who works as a Human Rights lawyer; Wallacker learns this about Bridget in the 3rd book when she reveals she writes and doesn't spend a lot of her time at the beauty salon despite what he thinks.
    • The 2nd film has Rebecca Gillies, a personal assistant, whose father owns "half of Australia".
  • Noodle Incident: Albeit an imaginary one:
    Daniel: Why don't you tell me in detail the story of your school netball tour, with particular reference to the unsavoury incident in the communal showers?
  • Not Like Other Girls: Mark says something of the sort to Bridget when he's asking her not for dinner in the novel.
    Mark: Last Christmas, I thought if my mother said the words 'Bridget Jones' just once more I would go to the Sunday People and accuse her of abusing me as a child with a bicycle pump. Then when I met you… and I was wearing that ridiculous diamond-patterned jumper that Una had bought me for Christmas…. Bridget, all the other girls I know are so lacquered over. I don't know anyone else who would fasten a bunny tail to their pants or…
    Bridget: But you're going out with somebody.
    Mark: I'm not anymore, actually. Just dinner? Sometime?
    Bridget: Okay.
  • "Not Wearing Pants" Dream: Bridget has a recurring nightmare where she has to take A-level French while wearing nothing but her Domestic Science apron.
  • Of Corsets Funny: Bridget's Iconic Item is her panty girdle that only serves to embarrass her, to the point where such garments are often referred to as "Bridget Jones Knickers" in the UK.
  • Old-Fashioned Rowboat Date: Two couples at the same time in the first movie. Mark and Natasha are dignified and discuss their case as they are both lawyers. Bridget and Daniel have more fun. She recites John Keats' poem "To the Autumn" (Daniel specifically forbade Keats and it's a misquote), and he tries to outshout her with a dirty limerick. He then parodies the iconic "I-am-King-of-the-World" scene from Titanic (1997), and unsurprisingly falls into water. He doesn't want to be the only one wet and tries to swing the boat with Bridget as well. Prim and proper Natasha is horrified ("How childish!"), but Mark looks as if he envied them.
  • Old Maid: What Bridget perceives herself to be.
  • The One Guy: Tom, in Bridget's group of friends.
  • One Head Taller: Film versions certainly applies to Bridget (Renée Zellweger is 5'4") with Daniel (Hugh Grant at 5'11") and Mark (a 6'2" Colin Firth), but especially with the latter.
  • One-Hit Wonder: In-Universe example. James Callis plays one here. Tom retired in the mid-eighties upon discovering that one hit song was quite enough to get laid for all time.
  • One-Steve Limit: Averted with anyone named Peter (Bridget's ex boyfriend, Mark's brother in Hong Kong, or a doctor Bridget dates it a few columns) and again with two Rebeccas in the books (Bridget's bitchy acquaintance and her Bourgeois Bohemian neighbor), it's even lampshaded with the latter Rebecca being called "Rebecca the Neighbor."
  • Only Sane Woman: Bridget. She may get scatter-brained and frustrated, but one can chalk it up to all the behavior of Smug Marrieds, her co-worker's behavior, Daniel, her Mom, Una and Geoffrey, her pals (sometimes they get a turn), Richard Finch, the School Run Moms, sometimes other pals of her parents, fuckwit guys, Rebecca (in the book), and the countless dramas caused by them.
    • Mark Darcy can may well figure into this trope. These two are match made in heaven.
  • Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping: Averted by Renée Zellweger, who manages a very convincing English accent.
  • Oven Logic: Bridget burns a meal for friends this way, leading Mark to have to help fix it.
  • Pair the Spares: Giles and Rebecca (loosely, since Giles and Bridget were never interested in each other romantically).
  • Parental Hypocrisy: A rare parent to adult child example. In this deleted scene available on DVD in Europe, Pam (who had been briefly separated from her husband and was sleeping with another man the previous year) scolds Bridget about having pre-marital sex with Mark.
  • Perverse Sexual Lust: Bridget harbors this for the Colin-Firth version of Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy (as does Jude) (and Shazzer). Notably, she frequently refers to the actor as "Mr. Darcy" instead of by his real name.
  • Pragmatic Adaptation: The third film is the only one not adapted from a book (wisely stepping around Mark Darcy's death in the final novel), instead adapted from a series of columns, but does so easily, though not without some pragmatism (Notably, in the end Bridget's baby is indeed Mark's, whereas it was another man's in the columns, with Mark offering to take care of it regardless, though she turns him down and instead moves in with Daniel as more of a single mother. Presumably this would not be received well with all viewers, and the filmmakers decided on a neater ending.)
  • Previously Overlooked Paramour: Bridget meets Mark Darcy, and they initially don't get along. When Bridget's romance with her boss, Daniel Cleaver sours, Bridget discovers that Mark really is her type, a considerate, romantic individual. For his part, Mark eventually realizes that he fancies Bridget as well.
  • Proper Tights with a Skirt: Bridget frequently wears tights with her short skirts.
  • Put on a Bus: In the third book, Shazzer has moved to California and is replaced by Bridget's glamorous new friend Talitha.
  • Race for Your Love: Three times over the course of both movies; subverted twice, played straight once.
  • Racist Grandma: The first books (and film) have Pam with the racist part pat down with her views of the Japanese as a "cruel race" at least when regarding Mark's first wife, considers homosexuality to be laziness, and she nicknames an African Tribal man "Wellington" since she can't pronounce his real name. The 3rd book already has her as a Grandmother.
    • Subverted in the third movie, where Pam runs for a position in the local council on a racist and homophobic "family values" platform. When threatened with losing Bridget over this (since Pam was also demonising single mothers), Pam changes her campaign to become much more inclusive and open-minded and wins.
  • Real Men Cook: Mark Darcy saves Bridget in the kitchen when she ruins dinner she has been cooking for her friends.
  • Real Women Have Curves: Bridget the feminine, curvy, warm, and blonde Girl Next Door, is contrasted with the thinner, angular, and comparatively masculine Alpha Bitch Natasha in the first film.
  • "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Subverted and Deconstructed in both Mark and Bridget's declaration of love, they each admit the other's faults but noted that despite all that, they're great the way they are.
    • Alice gives a short one to Bridget in the third film as to why she deserves to be fired. Bridget assumes that it's because she's pregnant and older than Alice, while Alice fires back that Bridget humiliated the station on a number of occasions.
  • Red Pill, Blue Pill: Played with in that for Mark, the Betty Bridget is serves as the red pill who is more honest, passionate, loving, and without pretense compared to the safe option of Natasha (the Veronica) who cares more about nabbing him as an ideal Trophy husband and for social climbing.
  • Refuge in Audacity: An out-of-universe example. While preparing for the first film, Renee Zellweger worked undercover at a publishing house. She wasn't recognised, despite keeping a framed photo of fiancee Jim Carey on her desk. None of her co-workers questioned this, worried about offending her.
  • Remember the New Guy?: In the 3rd book, Bridget notes new character Talitha as a colleague of hers back when she was a presenter on the news, whether she was around during the events of the 2nd book or met Bridget in between books is not known.
  • Rich Bitch: Plenty to go around and all as Bridget's Foil.
    • The 1st book and film with Natasha, a successful lawyer who sneers at Bridget (who serves as a Romantic threat)
    • The 2nd book has Rebecca, who is very wealthy along with persuasive and self-centered. She picks at Bridget's self-image whenever she can.
    • The 3rd book has Nicollette Martinez, one of the posh Education Mamas Bridget runs into at the school-run, she thankfully learns to loosen up.
  • Rich in Dollars, Poor in Sense: Many of the Sloane Rangers and perhaps the older upper-middle class adults in Bridget and Marks' parents' peer group. For example, they ask inappropriate questions about dating status and do many questionable things that reflect poorly on their judgement.
  • Romantic False Lead:
    • Julio, Bridget's mum's lover.
    • In the second book, Rebecca.
    • Daniel counts as this (except in the columns) in the tradition of Pride and Prejudice, Natasha merely sets herself up as the lead in the film/novel she appears in, alas for her she fails.
    • Jack in the third film, as a Romantic Runner-Up, as few seriously believed that Bridget would end up with him instead of Mark.
  • Romantic Rain: Spoofed in the second movie. Bridget runs after Mark, her big love, to tell him to she loves him and that she wants to get back together. She dresses up and looks really pretty, but gets massively splashed by water from puddles that cars drive into when she gets out of a taxi.
  • Rule of Three: It takes Bridget and Mark three movies to finally get together for good.
  • Savvy Guy, Energetic Girl: Mark and Bridget, when they start going out.
  • Selective Obliviousness: Bridget Jones's mother. Having just got out of rehab for addiction to excitement:
    "Well, I was supposed to say, 'I will not allow overconfidence to blind me to reality' and, 'Today I will recognize my faults as well as my assets.' I mean, it was completely ridiculous, darling."
  • Setting Update: Jane Austen Recycled In Space!!
  • Sexy Soaked Shirt:
    • The first movie had a scene where Daniel was fooling around while he and Bridget were rowing their individual boats in a pond, he ends up falling into the water and the camera soon focuses on Daniel and the soaked shirt clinging to his body.
    • The second movie has a variant with a dress, where Bridget arrives at Mark's workplace to get back together with him and two passing buses splash water on her, which end up highlighting her very round and ample assets.
  • Shadow Archetype: Perpetua and Bridget. Bridget loathes Perpetua, resenting her for being bossy because she is slightly senior to Bridget at work and is also envious of Perpetua's own self-assurance that she is desirable and competent. One example is the launch party where Bridget tries to glam up and appear to be poised, but doesn't feel like she belongs and lacks the confidence to ease into conversations with the literati, while Perpetua strides in, back straight, demanding that someone introduce her to someone in a conversation. Perpetua is also naturally more assertive than Bridget and has a special disdain for Daniel Cleaver and she is liked more by posh snobs like Mark and Natasha.
  • Shared Universe: Apparently with Sue Townsend's Adrian Mole novels: in Adrian Mole: The Cappucino Years, Bridget (in a Lawyer-Friendly Cameo) is seen having dinner in the restaurant where Adrian works.
  • She Is All Grown Up: Bridget grew up from a little girl who played in her underwear in Mark's paddling pool at his birthday party into an adorable, shapely woman chasing after him in a sweater, blouse, and her panties. Mark once used to be that little boy who was bemused/annoyed at that little girl and became...Colin Firth.
  • Shout-Out: The Edge of Reason opens with Bridget skydiving, and her parachute unfurling to reveal the emblem of her TV show 'Sit Up Britain', all to the accompaniment of "Nobody Does It Better".
  • Shut Up, Hannibal!: Subverted, as Bridget never delivers this sort of speech to Woney (who is bugging her on why Bridget is still single with mock concern) for the sake of not hurting the other woman's feelings.
    Bridget: Because if I had to cook Cosmo’s dinner then get into the same bed as him just once, let alone every night, I’d tear off my own head and eat it.
  • Single Woman Seeks Good Man: One of Bridget's resolutions is to find "a nice, sensible boyfriend" and not to date any dysfunctional men, this doesn't stop her from dating Daniel yet she ends up with Mark (the Good Man in question).
  • Sleeping with the Boss: This is a significant driver for the drama (that and the Belligerent Sexual Tension with the other love interest).
  • Sleep Mask: In the second film, Bridget and Daniel unexpectedly end up with seats next to each other on a long flight to Thailand. Overnight, they wear sleep masks, but keep lifting them to peep at each other.
  • Small Name, Big Ego: Cosmo, one of the Smug Marrieds, Bridget comments in the 3rd book that he (albeit of a bland appearance and a boorish manner) believes that anyone would be lucky to be with him.
  • Snake Oil Salesman: In the role of Wickham, Julio, who sleeps with Bridget's mom. He works in TV commercials.
  • Snow Means Love:
    • At the end of the first film, half-dressed Bridget runs after Mark who seemingly left her when it's freezing. They're reunited, he hugs her and they kiss, it starts snowing and he covers her with his coat.
    • In the second movie, there's a brief Call-Back when Bridget mentions the above when she wants to get together again. She says that a moment they share might be romantic even without snowing.
  • Soapbox Sadie: This is basically Shazzer, sans the teenage part and with a double helping of "strident feminism."
  • Sophisticated as Hell: What did the usually proper and eloquent barrister Mark Darcy say to Bridget when she gasped that "nice boys don't kiss like that"? He replies: "Oh yes they fucking do" and kisses her again.
  • Spared by the Adaptation: Mark is still alive in the third film unlike the third book.
  • The Stinger: The third film opens with Daniel's apparent death, but the final shot is of a newspaper article declaring that he was found alive after all.
  • Stylistic Suck: The Leaves in His Hair, Bridget's effort to rewrite Hedda Gabler as the story of a woman in modern-day London. Could have been good, actually, but executive meddling ruins it all and instead of gloomy London, it's set on a yacht.
  • Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Bridget and Miranda, in the third film, sabotage a live interview to get information on a potential baby father. Not only is it All for Nothing when the interview is rescheduled at the last minute, she ends up fired for it (though not immediately, as it initially seems as if everyone forgot... until a new CEO is installed shortly afterwards.) She promptly chews out her boss then and there... and the camera focuses on her, as she only realizes she essentially napalmed any chance of working there again when she reached her home fridge and realized it was completely empty.
  • Take a Third Option: Bridget has two options. She can accept a permanent state of spinsterhood and... eventually be eaten by Alsatians, or NOT. Bridget chooses vodka. And Chaka Khan.
  • Tall, Dark, and Handsome: Mark and Daniel, as played by Hugh Grant and Colin Firth.
  • That's an Order!: As Bridget's boss, Daniel orders Bridget to tell him about girls teaching her French kissing, whether it is true or not.
    Daniel: Tell me about the girls teaching you French kissing.
    Bridget: It wasn't French kissing.
    Daniel: I don't care, make it up. That's a order, Jones.
  • Themed Party: Bridget's parents' friends host a "Tarts and Vicars" party. Women are supposed to stylize themselves as prostitutes while men dress up as clergymen. Too bad they call the theme off at the last minute and some people show up in costumes, which is extremely awkward.
  • Thing-O-Meter: In The Edge of Reason, an acquaintance of Bridget has a habit of making stinging remarks. This is shown as a "jellyfish counter" on the screen, which increases with each remark. It decreases when Bridget manages to insert stinging remarks of her own, but eventually goes off the scale and explodes.
  • Title Drop: one of the chapters in The Edge Of Reason is entitled "Persuasion."
  • Titled After the Song: The 3rd book's title references the song "Mad About The Boy" (Dinah Washington cover), which Bridget even dances to in one scene.
  • To the Batpole!: The scene where Bridget is filmed from underneath when coming down a fireman's pole. Whilst wearing a skirt.
  • Took a Level in Badass: Mark, during the climax of the third movie where he comes in time to see Bridget, punches a glass window of a door to let her in her apartment and then carries her to the hospital.
  • Took a Level in Kindness: Richard Finch in the third movie. Once Bridget's crude and sexist boss who makes fun of her and has a crush on her, is a lot nicer and more supportive of Bridget in the third movie; he even defends her to their new boss and cheers when her son is born.
  • Trademark Favorite Food: Bridget loves having chocolate croissants with coffee or tea and loves it when she and her friends watch movies over the Cadbury Milk Trays.
  • True Blue Femininity: In the films, Bridget wears a lot of blue clothing, especially tops, and is a gentle hearted woman. Here,there, aqui, another,and more blue shown in all of the films.
  • True Love Is Boring: Bridget gets together with One True Love Mark Darcy at the end of the first installment of the series, only to spend the sequel trying to keep their relationship working as conflict after conflict appears and her own friends are encouraging them to break up. The third film deals with an Downtime Downgrade Offscreen Breakup leaving Bridget single and alone while Mark marries another woman in the interim, though they do divorce as Bridget rekindles her relationship with Mark — only for it to be her turn to have a third party thrown in the mix. Which is still a better fate than Mark faces in the third book, where he was killed off before the events of the novel and Bridget alternates between reliving her grief over his death and learning to date again.
  • Tsundere:
    • Mark Darcy, funnily enough. Though Bridget defrosts him over the story's course.
    • Richard Finch: Finds Bridget an idiot? Yes. Makes fun of and humiliates Bridget? Yes. Has a crush on Bridget? Why yes again.
  • Two-Timing with the Bestie: Daniel Cleaver tells Bridget that his friend Mark Darcy slept with his fiancé, causing the present distance between them. It turns out to be the opposite: Daniel was the one who cheated, with Darcy's wife. Bridget's perspective on Darcy completely changes once she discovers this.
  • Uncomfortable Elevator Moment: Slighty in the film with Daniel, Bridget appears calm and collected at first but then feels Daniel's hand on her butt, when they get off they flirt a little.
  • Uncool Undies: Bridget has to decide whether to wear skimpy panties which will look good when she undresses or control-type undies which are more likely to get her undressed. When she chooses the latter, her date makes fun of her for wearing "mum's underpants".
  • Uptight Loves Wild: Bridget isn't so much wild as she's clumsy and goofy, but the "gherkin up his arse" Mark falls in love with her and her messier ways, it goes to show that Mark ends up dropping all plans he set up or have been made for him (like an engagement that just sprang upon him in public) just to be able to start things afresh for Bridget.
  • Valley Girl: Patchouli, the assistant in the first two books. She is in her early twenties and behaves in a ditzy and frivolous manner. The trope is subverted because she is more competent and nicer than her and Bridget's boss, Richard Finch.
  • The Vicar: Rumoured (but never proven) to be gay, due to his flamboyant taste in surplices.
  • Wanting Is Better Than Having: Bridget. When she reaches her goal weight in the 1st book, she's elated until she realizes her bust is smaller and her friends openly ask if she's sick, she then muses on how she's spent about 15 years getting down to said weight along with wearing clothes that disguise the size of her backside and walking backwards after sex so her partner doesn't see her backside and it's all for naught. This doesn't cure her Weight Woe.
  • Wedding Bells... for Someone Else: At the end of the second movie, Bridget asks Mark to take her back. Mark does, he proposes and she happily accepts. One of the final shots of the movie has them standing in front of the altar... Except the wedding ceremony is for Bridget's parents who are renewing their vows.
  • Weight Woe:
    • Bridget constantly worries about her weight. And unless she's well below average height for a white Brit, the weights she writes down are within or only slightly over the 'healthy' range. In the second novel, she strives to go down to her ideal weight, and does so... only for her friends to observe with worry that she looks unhealthy and not like herself.
    • The third book has a subplot where Bridget has put on a substantial amount of weight (through a combination of "middle-aged spread" and having had two children in the last few years) and is treated at an obesity clinic but even then, if she is average height, her weight would put her as slightly short of the medical benchmark for obesity. This was even lampshaded when the nurse that recommended the clinic to her told her that it had nothing to do with Bridget being obese, but it's an effective way for her to meet her healthy weight of nine stone six to ten stones. note .
    • By the third film, it was unlikely to expect Renee Zellweger to gain weight again for the role, so she keeps her Hollywood slenderness with the Hand Wave that she is finally at her ideal weight.
  • Well, Excuse Me, Princess!: Like their Pride and Prejudice counterparts, Mark was at first critical of Bridget and she even moreso of him, yet start realizing they really...like like each other.
  • Who Names Their Kid "Dude"?: As with Aerith and Bob many members of the Upper and Upper-Middle classes Bridget meets either have odd names or name their children do. The 1st book has the example of a friend of Perpetua named "Piggy".
    • The assistant Patchouli where Bridget works.
  • Whole-Plot Reference:
    • To Pride and Prejudice in the first book and the movie. Most characters do not correspond one-on-one; there is no Bingley and Bridget has no sisters, only an older brother who is already settled. The main thrust is the Love Triangle and the different appeals that Bridget's two suitors have on her.
    • Persuasion is a little closer to The Edge Of Reason, with Bridget as Anne, Mark as Captain Wentworth, Rebecca as Louisa, Giles Benwick as Captain Benwick, and the Mr. Elliot subplot essentially done away with.
  • Widow's Weeds: Of a sort, Bridget wears loose-fitting and unfashionable black clothing after Mark died and has so for a few years before her weight loss and new lease on life has moved her to more stylish, flattering, colorful clothing.
  • Wimp Fight: Daniel and Mark are not very skilled at fighting, so their fights are always of the comic relief kind.
  • Writers Cannot Do Math: In the 2004 sequel, Bridget has an Imagine Spot where she sees her grave inscribed as "Bridget Jones: Spinster. 1972-2050"; later Bridget notes that she is 34 years old, which would put her birth date around 1970 rather than 1972 (then 32 years old).
  • Wrong Guy First: In the manner of Pride and Prejudice with Lizzie/Wickham/Darcy. Bridget dates Daniel, whom she is convinced is the one despite the fact he embodies traits that she told herself to maintain a safe distance from; then later ends up with Mark, who she thought was the wrong guy at first.
  • You Know What You Did: Bridget to Mark at the summer party they attended due to Daniel convincing Bridget that Mark has sex with his fiancee and she heard Mark badmouthing him.
  • Your Television Hates You: Some seriously depressive TV shows are on the night when Bridget finds out that Daniel is cheating on her. At first a woman tells a man that it's her last chance to have a child, a brutal murder scene from Fatal Attraction, and finally, there is a documentary about wild lions and their mating rituals. Poor Bridget!
    "The male penetrates the female and leaves. Coitus is brief and perfunctory."

Alternative Title(s): Bridget Jones Diary, Bridget Jones The Edge Of Reason, Bridget Jones Baby

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Smug married couples

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Main / AloneAmongTheCouples

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