Basic Trope: A character who once had big dreams bitterly wonders what life would have been like.
- Straight: Bob played football in high school, but then a serious injury derailed his sporting career. He's now an insurance salesman, but he's fairly bitter over the fact that he never got to play professionally.
- Exaggerated:
- Bob was on the football team for only one game, and was only a benchwarmer. He's still bitter.
- Bob was the best quarterback on the team, and got injured so badly that he's not allowed to partake in even the lightest of exercises, lest he break a bone. He's now working as the CEO for a company, which earns him a 7 figure salary. He's still bitter.
- Downplayed:
- Bob sometimes wonders how things would have turned out if he had been able to keep playing, but it's not a constant source of Wangst.
- Bob is a professional football player, albeit an unremarkable one, and he wonders if he could have become a bona fide star had he done things a little differently.
- Justified:
- Bob was a skilled football player and could have, at the very least, made a professional roster for a couple of years. He knows this.
- Bob does not see the value of a "normal" life and thus feels like he has lost his only chance at happiness and success.
- (For Exaggerated and Parodied) No amount of money that Bob earns will ever amount to the thrills of being out playing football, professionally or not.
- Inverted:
- Bob is a sports star who wants nothing more than a nice, quiet life with an office job.
- Bob is a mediocre athlete who realizes that he would have far more potential in an office job.
- Subverted:
- Alice reminds Bob that he sucked at football before his injury.
- Rather than brood on what-ifs, Bob has come to terms with his injury and where his life is now.
- Double Subverted:
- She made that up to be funny.
- Alice also reminds Bob he was terrible at other sports.
- He hasn't come to terms; he's just learned to hide his disappointment.
- Parodied: Bob was the third-string punter on the worst team in the state, but grows up to become the president and CEO of a Fiction 500 company. He makes more per year than twenty of the world's highest-paid athletes put together, and he’s both incredibly popular and beloved. Despite this, he’s still incredibly bitter about the fact that he never got to play professionally.
- Zig-Zagged: Alice reminds Bob that he sucked at football, but she made that up to be funny. But we see flashbacks and Bob was a good player, but he was by no means a superstar.
- Averted: Bob holds no bitterness over his possible life as a potential superstar.
- Enforced: "We need some drama. Let's make the insurance salesman a former high-school football star!"
- Implied: Bob is an insurance salesman, and little is known about his past life. However, he keeps an old football and a old trophy on a bookshelf in his office. Next to a framed photo of his family is an old picture with a young Bob with his high school football team.
- Lampshaded: "I could've been a contender! Well, at least I got to say that. Nice line, ain't it?"
- Invoked: While watching a pro football game, Bob recognizes a couple of the players as former high-school teammates of his. This gets him thinking...
- Exploited: Evulz enlists Bob, promising he can fulfill his dreams.
- Defied: While Bob's injury sours his mood for the first couple of years afterwards, he decides he won't let it get him down and instead looks for alternatives.
- Discussed: "Bob was good at football back in the day. I wonder if he still thinks about it." "All the time."
- Conversed: "I don't like Jaded Washouts in these upbeat comedies." "Well, I think he makes the show a bit more realistic; it's not supposed to be a Sugar Bowl."
- Deconstructed:
- Bob's inability to get over his bitterness eventually takes its toll on his life, as no one wants to be around him anymore.
- Bob instead gets into a car crash that left him in a coma for 6 months. While he is still able to recover, he could only do his office work, and playing professionally is basically out of the question.
- Reconstructed:
- Bob eventually gets over the bitterness, accepting his life as an insurance salesman, while learning to appreciate the good things that he has earned because of that unexpected life-turn. He still wonders about how his life would be different, despite accepting what he has know.
- Bob is offered to play a football game professionally for old times' sake. He accepts.
- Bob channels his bitterness into helping his son Chris become a good football player.
- Played for Laughs: Bob was the worst player on the worst team in the state; however, he's still convinced that if he had gotten his chance, he would have been a superstar athlete.
- Played for Drama: Convinced that he could have been a real star, Bob would do anything to get another chance.
- Played for Horror: Bob not only sells his soul to the Devil for a second chance, the price also involves him being a Serial Killer on the side.
Don't you get it? I coulda had class! I Coulda Been a Contender!! I could have been somebody! Instead, I've got to edit this trope page for a living.
