Basic Trope: An episode that focuses on a character's birthday.
- Straight: Alice's birthday takes up most of the episode.
- Exaggerated: All the characters were coincidentally born on the same date, so it's everyone's birthday for an episode.
- Downplayed: Alice's birthday is only a subplot or only takes up one scene.
- Justified: Well, everyone has a birthday.
- Inverted:
- The characters are celebrating the fact that it's not Alice's birthday.
- Alice is The Undead and they're celebrating the anniversary of the day she died.
- Alice was evil and the characters are celebrating the anniversary of the day her birth was prevented via Time Travel.
- In a series mostly composed of birthday-centric episodes, there is one where it isn't somebody's birthday.
- Subverted:
- A celebration is taking place that looks like a birthday party but it turns out to be some sort of Fictional Holiday.
- Alice seems to be having her birthday, but it's All Just a Dream.
- Bob wishes Alice a happy birthday, but it turns out that he got the date wrong.
- Double Subverted:
- But the holiday is dedicated to some historical figure's birth or coincidentally falls on a birthday.
- But when she wakes up, it really is her birthday, or it's someone else's.
- Bob was mixing Alice up with Carol. It's Carol's birthday.
- Parodied:
- Alice was created in a lab, so the other characters are unsure if she has a birthday or not.
- The episode is all about Alice's friends planning an elaborate birthday for Alice. At the end, she shows up naked.
- Zig-Zagged: Alice appears to be celebrating her birthday, but it's just a dream, but when she wakes up and gets dressed, Bob wishes her a happy birthday, but he got the date wrong, then some people appear to be celebrating Carol's birthday, but it's actually a fictional event...dedicated to the birth of a historical figure.
- Averted:
- There are no birthday episodes.
- The work does not have an episodic structure.
- Enforced: Someone wrote to the writers asking how old Alice was, and they decided that that person could figure it out by counting the candles on Alice's cake.
- Lampshaded: "Happy birthday, Alice!"
- Invoked: Alice uses Time Travel to go to her birthday.
- Exploited: Alice tries to use the fact that it's her birthday to get her way.
- Defied: Alice hates birthdays, and explicitly tells everyone not to throw her a birthday party.
- Discussed: "So when's Alice's birthday?"
- Conversed: "I hear Alice's birthday is coming up a few episodes from now."
- Implied: Alice is seen blowing out candles on a cake.
- Deconstructed: Alice's birthday won't keep Emperor Evulz from putting his plan into action. By the end of the episode, the world is a dystopia.
- Reconstructed: The Team defeats Evulz, and then celebrates Alice's birthday
- Played for Laughs: Bob tries to throw Alice a surprise birthday party but is hilariously incompetent.
- Played for Drama: Something bad happens during Alice's birthday.
- Played for Horror: Alice is stalked and killed by a masked slasher on her birthday.
Back to Birthday Episode, and if it's your birthday, then happy birthday.
