Basic Trope: A nerd gets an attractive, non-geek girlfriend.
- Straight: Seamus O'Taku is in love with Alice, a cheerleader. But she's dating Jacque Strapp, the captain of the football team. But when Seamus proves himself to her, Alice dumps Jacque for him.
- Exaggerated:
- Seamus ends up dating the entire cheerleading squad.
- As an adult, Seamus gets Happily Married to a supermodel.
- Downplayed: Seamus dates a girl who's attractive, but not extraordinarily so.
- Justified: Seamus actually cares about Alice for who she is, not just what she looks like. And not only does Alice apparently have some kind of Geeky Turn-On, but she likes Seamus for who he is.
- Inverted: Alice despises Seamus because he's a geek.
- Gender Inverted: Jacque Strapp, the captain of the football team, dates a Geek girl named Betty.
- Subverted:
- Alice only likes Seamus as a friend.
- Seamus is dating Betty.
- Double Subverted:
- But she starts dating him when Jacque gets caught cheating on her with one of the girls from the nearby Catholic school.
- Who, although still geeky, is more attractive and has better social skills than Seamus does.
- She gets an Unnecessary Makeover over summer vacation and comes back supermodel-hot.
- Parodied: The geek is a Tin-Can Robot. Alice comes to find his instant mathematical calculation skills and awkward chatbot-like speech patterns Endearingly Dorky.
- Zig Zagged: ???
- Averted:
- Seamus doesn't date "out of his league," and neither does Alice.
- Seamus doesn't date.
- There are no geeks.
- Enforced: "The producers told us to cut our 'nerdy loser guy' a break because the audience is starting to complain about Seamus's numerous failings."
- Lampshaded: "Oh, of course, the girl goes for the nerd. It's like this is an 80s teen comedy."
- Invoked: After a bad breakup, Alice's friend Cathy suggests she pursue a nerd next.
- Exploited: It's part of a ploy by the jocks and cheerleaders to humiliate Seamus and his friends.
- Defied: Alice turns Seamus down.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
- Implied: ???
- Deconstructed: Alice only dates Seamus because she feels she has to, and Seamus really only liked Alice for her looks. After going out for a while, they realize they have nothing in common but both are afraid they will be seen as shallow if they break up.
- Reconstructed: Alice and Seamus decide to break up. Alice ends up becoming interested in Seamus' equally nerdy friend Bob, while Seamus meets nerdy Betty. Unlike their previous relationship, Alice and Seamus have genuine chemistry with their new partners.
- Played For Laughs: Seamus is the story's resident archetypical nerd who would be luckier to find a copy of Action Comics #1 than he would be to score a date with a woman... but the epilogue shows that, thanks to striking rich thanks to whatever goofy gadget he was working on earlier in the film, he got everything he wanted, including having Alice as a wife.
- Played For Drama:
- The relationship of Alice and Seamus is constantly on the verge of collapse, with everybody thinking that Alice is nothing more than a (future) Trophy Wife for Seamus.
- Seamus is the story's resident Butt-Monkey who has endured an unending barrage of humiliation and abuse throughout the whole plot and quite frankly looks by the middle of the story like he's on the verge of jumping off the nearest bridge. Getting Alice as a date is the universe's way of telling him that they are burying the hatchet.
- Played For Horror: Seamus is an extremely needy Yandere and Alice just committed a huge mistake by getting too close to him.
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