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Red Riding Hood Replica

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Who's afraid of the big bad Grimm? Not her, that's for sure.

"I am the reflection of who prevails
I'm what inspired the fairy tale"
RWBY, "Guide My Way (Red Like Roses - Part III)"

Little Red Riding Hood is an iconic fairy tale about a young girl travelling in the woods who wears a red cloak on her way to deliver baked goods to her grandmother. Along the way, she encounters a seemingly friendly wolf, in actuality The Big Bad Wolf, who intends to eat her.

The wolf asks Red where she is headed, Red tells the wolf about her delivery, and the wolf goes to the grandmother's house clandestinely to replace her and eat Red.

There are many versions of the tale. Either the wolf eats and kills Red, or Red is rescued by a woodsman/hunter, with the grandmother's survival optional.

The Red Riding Hood Replica is any character which adopts traits of Red Riding Hood, including her cloak, her colours, her plotline, or all of the aforementioned elements.

The presentation of the Red Riding Hood Replica varies, from the innocent victim to the capable survivalist, and anything in between. Occasionally, she may be presented as less innocent than she looks.

There isn't always a literal wolf. Sometimes, the antagonist is a killer, a sexual predator, or any otherwise unsavory individual.

This is a Super-Trope to Little Dead Riding Hood, when red clothing is worn by an innocent character to mark her for death; and to Little Red Fighting Hood, when the Red Riding Hood analogue is nobody to be trifled with.

Compare Fractured Fairy Tale and Fairy Tale Motifs. See also Too Smart for Strangers, where a story about an innocent child encountering a conniving trickster is often used for An Aesop.


Why granny, what big examples you have!

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    Anime & Manga 
  • The titular Cute Witch from Akazukin Cha Cha has her default attire (including a red hooded cloak) being based directly on Little Red Riding Hood. One of her companions, Riiya, is even a little werewolf boy who can turn into a white wolf pup at times. The third opening of the anime even directly references this trope by having the main trio take part in a stage play based off the fairy tale, with Chacha and Riiya mostly having the roles they should in the story, and Shiine, Chacha’s other companion, taking the Grandmother's role.
  • At one point in The Kindaichi Case Files, Reika tells Kindaichi of a dream she used to have as a child, in which she was Little Red Riding Hood being dragged away by a wild wolf and expecting the wolf to kill her, only for the wolf to stare at her until she noticed the wolf had an injured leg and tended to it, causing the wolf to be a Predator Turned Protector.

    Comic Books 
  • Scarlet, from Crimson, starts out as a werewolf hunter in a red hood.
  • In the DC Comics graphic novel Kingdom Come set in a dystopian future, Lian Harper followed in her father, Red Arrow's footsteps and became an archer. She took his color scheme and based her superhero identity and costume on Little Red Riding Hood, calling herself Red Hood.
  • Over the Garden Wall makes the Woodsman's daughter, Anna, into a subtle one. She dons a red cloak before heading into the woods, and her father is an ax-wielding outdoorsman who spends years trying to save her from a "Beast" who, in a sense, consumed her. Of course, fans of the show know that the Beast was lying about that, as Anna actually escaped back home.
  • Through the Woods, a series of horror comics by Emily Carroll, (best known for His Face All Red) has a short epilogue based on the Red Riding Hood story. Carroll's version of Red arrives at her grandmother's without incident, however even while safe in her grandmother's house, the wolf has a way to truly frighten her.
    Red Riding Hood: What a fine night! What a good walk! I knew the wolf wouldn't find me!
    The Wolf: [Peering in through the window, looking absolutely gigantic] Oh, but you must travel through these woods again and again, and you must be lucky to avoid the wolf every time. But the wolf... the wolf only needs enough luck to find you once.

    Fan Works 
  • Chloe Cerise from Infinity Train: Blossoming Trail is associated with the tale, first having a dream of her in a red cloak meeting up with Lexi in a dark forest and then later gets a red cloak modeled after Marchosias — a wolf demon from the Ars Goetia — by Olmec.

    Films — Live-Action 

    Literature 
  • In Blood Red the first chapter (and the original short story that inspired it) is a retelling of this. The rest of the book is the main character all grown up and kicking monster ass.
  • The kids' book Little Red Reading Hood and the Misunderstood Wolf involves a little girl in a red cloak and a wolf who are both Bookworms. In this version, the wolf isn't perfect since he wants to steal the books, but he's pretty much harmless and as the title suggests, he's mistaken for being worse than he is.
  • Little Red Rhyming Hood is about a little girl who wears a red cloak like Little Red Riding Hood but always speaks in rhyme.
  • The children's book Little Red Ruthie features a girl who is like Little Red Riding Hood, but Jewish.
  • Lucy and the Big Bad Wolf begins with Lucy on her way to visit her grandparents, wearing a red anorak, when she's accosted by a Wrong Genre Savvy wolf who assumes that he's the Big Bad Wolf in a Red Riding Hood story.
  • Scarlet from The Lunar Chronicles is based off of Red Riding Hood, with red hair and a red jacket, lives with her grandmother and falls in love with a man whose genes were spliced with those of a wolf nicknamed "Wolf".
  • The Princess Series: In Red Hood's Revenge, Roudette has become an assassin known as the Lady of the Red Hood, after her family were killed by the Wild Hunt, a group of monstrous spirits who kill anyone in their path; the wolf in her story was actually her grandmother wearing an enchanted wolf-skin when she was killed by the Hunt for her long vendetta against them. After her grandmother's death, Roudette took the skin and combined it with her pre-existing red cloak; initially enchanted to block magic, Roudette had the runes changed so that they deflect fairy magic, the combination of the two cloaks making Roudette immune to magic cast on her directly and able to transform into a wolf.
  • Quite Contrary: The protagonist, a twelve year old girl named Mary, walks home from a halloween party wearing a red riding hood costume- on the way home, she finds herself lost in the woods, and stalked by the fairy tale wolf himself. Mary has somehow stumbled into the world of fairytales- and not the kid-friendly Disney version. Trying to get home, Mary must make her way through various fairy tales whilst being pursued by the big bad wolf, who is intent on eating and/or raping her.
  • Tales of the Five Hundred Kingdoms: Beauty and the Werewolf, the sixth main story of a Fractured Fairy Tale series, which is a twist on Little Red Riding Hood, mixed with Beauty and the Beast, and as implied by the cover art of a woman in a red cloak, and the blurb on the book's back:
    The eldest daughter is often doomed in fairy tales. But Bella — Isabella Beauchamps, daughter of a wealthy merchant — vows to escape the usual pitfalls.
    Anxious to avoid the traditional path, Bella dons a red cloak and ventures into the forbidden forest to consult with "Granny," the local wisewoman. But on the way home she's attacked by a wolf—who turns out to be a cursed nobleman. Secluded in his castle, Bella is torn between her family and this strange man who creates marvelous inventions and makes her laugh—when he isn't howling at the moon.
  • In the Discworld novel Witches Abroad, the witches find a young girl in a red hood taking a basket of goodies to her grandmother. After spending some time with the Bratty Half-Pint, Magrat starts to understand why her mother lets her walk alone through a forest known to contain wolves. Due to the book's theme of "rural myth", Nanny Ogg says the same thing happened near Skund and they never even found the granny. It's also mentioned that when Nanny herself was younger, she also wore a red hood while taking baskets of goodies to her grandmother, who lived next door. The "wolf" in this case being "old Sumpkins the lodger".
  • In the second book of The Wolf Chronicles, a situation is inspired by Little Red Riding Hood. The girl TaLi frequently visits and brings food to her grandmother, who lives alone in the woods, and they have a connection to wolves due to being the shamans of their people. TaLi's wannabe love interest, DavRian, is a hunter who represents the huntsman of the tale. He ends up murdering both the grandmother and the wolf protecting her.

    Live-Action TV 
  • Once Upon a Time uses Red Riding Hood as one of many fairy tale characters inhabiting a shared universe. Her name in the real-world town of Storybrooke under the Dark Curse is Ruby.
  • In the Supernatural episode "Bedtime Stories," a little girl in a red jacket loses her grandmother and is abducted by a man with a Wile E. Coyote tattoo as a result of a ghost forcing a town's inhabitants re-enact fairy tales. She survives due to the intervention of Dean Winchester, a career monster hunter who takes on the role of the huntsman who saves Red Riding Hood in the fairy tale.
  • The pilot of Grimm opens with a jogger in a bright red hoodie being killed by a Blutbad. The little girl he abducts is also wearing a red hoodie, and he turns out to have a collection of them. Munroe tells Nick that the colour is a kind of trigger for Blutbaden.

    Music 
  • The 1960 song "Li'l Red Riding Hood" by Sam The Sham & The Pharaohs is a monologue from the wolf's perspective, revealing that he has lecherous intentions but plans to act like A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing until the girl trusts him enough to let her guard down. Metaphorically, of course, this plays up the double meaning of "wolf" as both the animal and the slang term for the other kind of predator.

    Theatre 
  • Into the Woods takes several well-known fairy tales, including this one, and weaves them into one story.

    Toys 
  • Several Lalaloopsy dolls are based on fairy tales, and Red Hiding Hood is no different. Say hello to Scarlet Riding Hood and little sister Cape.
  • One of the 2022 Chaos and Pretty girls from Megami Device is a Little Red, who has a wolf head and claws as part of her weapons.

    Video Games 
  • In Adventures with Anxiety by Nicky Case, the main characters are Hong, an androgynous young person in a red hoodie, and Beebee, a bright-red anthropomorphic wolf that represents the embodiment of their anxiety.
  • In Arknights, the character Projekt Red is a specialist operator who is, ironically, of the Lupo race (which is based on wolves), and wears a red, hooded jacket. Because, story-wise, her involvement usually indicates a mission with high potential for casualties and losses, she's infamously known as the "Reaper in a Red Riding Hood" amongst some of her colleagues. While her tendency to stare at her fellow Lupo operators tends to spook them, she really just wants to play with their tails, Provence in particular being a common target of her desires - this habit of hers led to a small fluff-ball being added to her Module, to serve as a comforting surrogate whenever she lacks someone else's fluffy tail to play with.
  • In Castle Cats, Hood is a cat who wears a red hooded cape. Like the girl in the fairytale, she comments about how she wants to visit her grandma, and one of her lines advises against trusting strangers, which is a reference to Little Red Riding Hood's encounter with the wolf.
  • Dark Parables: The Red Riding Hood Sisters
  • Doraemon 2: SOS! Otogi no Kuni, in which Doraemon and friends get to enter the world of fairytales thanks to the Picture Book Entry Shoes. Shizuka's level is based on Little Red Riding Hood, where she gets to dress up in a red hood, launch projectiles from her food basket, and battle The Big Bad Wolf who serves as her level's boss.
  • The Shy Girls from Erinye are this, going around everywhere in red hoods and masks. They're actually based on an intentionally altered version of the Red Riding Hood story that was read to them by their caretaker at the orphanage who, wanting to teach the girls to be strong, turned Red into a badass Action Girl who slayed the Big Bad Wolf using her awesome knife skills.
  • Velouria in Fire Emblem Fates has inspiration of Little Red Riding Hood, as shown in her red hood, the "carrying a basket" aspect being referenced by her personal skill, Goody Basket, and being a collector like her father. Ironically, she's a Wolkskin so she's the Big Bad Wolf as well.
  • While King's Quest II uses the actual Little Red Riding Hood, the Fan Remake replaces her with a girl named Possum. She still wears a red cloak and still has to deliver soup to her grandmother, only now the grandmother is dying and they both get turned into vampires.
  • Little Red Riding Hood's Zombie BBQ
  • Lobotomy Corporation and Library of Ruina includes the abnormality known as Little Red Riding Hooded Mercenary is a twisted version of the classic fairytale, being, as her name suggests, a Mercenary. In addition to the hood, she wears a bandana-like mask over her mouth resembling sharp teeth to hide her face, which is horrifically scarred with no teeth. The one responsible was Big and Will be Bad Wolf, and she will do everything in her power to hunt it down. She can however be hired to fight on your behalf, for a price.
  • Moshi Monsters had a whole species called Little Red Riding Wolves, the most prominent one being one named Randall. Little Red Riding Wolves were sort of werewolves in reverse; they were usually wolves but turned into humans on the full moon. Their human forms are always female and wear red cloaks.
  • The Path: The game is very based on Little Red Riding Hood, having six sisters in red clothes with red Colourful Theme Naming delivering food to their grandmother with the possibility of encountering a wolf-figure.
  • Soul Sacrifice has Similia, known by her epithet Red Hood. She is a member of Grim and comes from a line of sorcerers known and feared for the hood, being the third. The original Red Hood became an archfiend, tricking a man in wolf armor to eat her. She took over his body and they became the monster known as Little Red Riding Hood.
  • In The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, Geralt can take a quest to protect a village from a bandit leader named Little Red, who wears a hood and transforms into a werewolf if Geralt chooses to fight her.
  • Woolfe - The Red Hood Diaries has Red as an Action Girl with an axe, pursuing Corrupt Corporate Executive B. B. Woolfe.

    Web Animation 
  • While Ruby Rose of RWBY is not in and of herself an instance of this trope, being a Little Red Fighting Hood instead, one sketch from the Lighter and Softer Super-Deformed spinoff series, RWBY Chibi, fittingly called "Little Red Riding Hood", has Team RWBY put on a play recreating the tale proper, written by Ruby herself who's playing the obvious role, alongside a reluctant Blake as the wolf, a very hammy Yang as the grandma, Weiss as the woodsman, and Zwei as the stagehand. Needless to say, the play goes Off the Rails very quickly, and Yang ultimately gets fed up with Ruby's controlling attitude and calls her out on writing the whole thing just to make herself look good.
    Ruby: I like to think that art is open to interpretation.

    Webcomics 

    Western Animation 
  • This was a staple of Hanna-Barbera cartoons in the late 1950s and 1960s, such as The Huckleberry Hound Show ("Little Red Riding Huck"), Yogi Bear ("Hoodwinked Bear") and Wacky Races ("Idaho à Go Go").
  • Tex Avery:
    • "Red Hot Riding Hood" is a Hotter and Sexier parody of the Red Riding Hood myth, invoked by the original characters of the fairy tale complaining about how stale the original fairy tale is. Red is an adult nightclub singer in a skimpy red dress, while the wolf is an overenthusiastic audience member who lustfully pursues her, though she loudly rejects him with a Big "NO!". Granny shows up as a brothel owner who pursues the wolf in turn, much to his displeasure.
    • "Little Rural Riding Hood" takes a The City vs. the Country approach to the Red Riding Hood story, with a "Country Red" whose quest to give her grandma some moonshine is intercepted by a romantic tryst with Country Wolf. Country Wolf soon departs to the city when his cousin invites him to see the sexy nightclub dancer Red from "Red Hot Riding Hood."

 
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Red Hot Riding Hood

Tex Avery's different take on the classic fairy tale "Little Red Riding Hood"; now with more night clubs, sexy singers and wolf whistles.

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5 (17 votes)

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