Basic Trope: A heroic character is unexpectedly bowed to.
- Straight:
- Queen Alice, having assumed the identity of a beggar to walk the streets, is bowed to by her subjects.
- Queen Alice and all subjects in the room bow (or curtsy) before Bob, a commoner who has helped save an orphanage.
- Exaggerated:
- Alice finds out she is a queen because people are bowing to her.
- Everyone in the kingdom (starting with Queen Alice) bows to Bob for saving them from the evil warlord.
- Downplayed:
- Queen Alice, having passed the throne to her successor, is still occasionally bowed to by her most loyal retainers.
- Viscount Charlie bows before Bob because Bob performed an important personal favour for him.
- Justified:
- The commoners aren't fooled.
- It's traditional in the setting to bow before citizens to respect extraordinary achievements, but Bob has recently immigrated and is not aware of this.
- Inverted:
- Subverted: It turns out they were actually bowing to Evulz's army.
- Double Subverted: They claimed to be doing this to catch Evulz off-guard so they could help Alice fight him.
- Parodied: Bob puts on a toy paper crown from Burger King and everybody suddenly bows to him.
- Zig Zagged: People kneel when Alice and Evulz are around, but it's not clear who they were bowing to.
- Averted: No one kneels before the heroes.
- Enforced: Bob has suffered a lot throughout the story, and the writers want to show that he's earned his happy ending.
- Lampshaded: "Suddenly I feel quite important."
- Invoked:
- The commoners whisper to eachother to bow to Alice to surprise her.
- Alice orders everyone present to kneel before Bob.
- Exploited: Dave the assassin sees everyone bowing to Queen Alice and realizes that he's found his target.
- Defied:
- Alice, realising she's been discovered, orders the commoners to stand back up.
- Bob has made it clear that he doesn't want the publicity, and his wish is respected.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
- Deconstructed: The display goes to Bob's head, and he ends up turning into an egomaniac Glory Seeker.
- Reconstructed: Bob is such a Humble Hero that he is just baffled by the kneeling and it doesn't go to his head.
Back to Kneel Before Frodo.
