Basic Trope: A baby crying on a plane.
- Straight: Bob is on a plane, and has to endure baby Alice's crying.
- Exaggerated: Bob is on an ultra-long-haul flight - with half the plane being just screaming babies.
- Downplayed: Baby Alice starts crying as the plane takes off, but settles down as soon as the flight levels off.
- Justified:
- The flight is to a destination popular with families.
- Baby Alice is scared by the plane taking off, or doesn't know how to equalize the air pressure in her ears and it's starting to hurt, or the dry atmosphere is making her uncomfortable, or perhaps just finds the very idea of flying scary.
- Inverted: Baby Bob has to deal with an adult Alice (possibly under the influence) screaming and generally being unruly.
- Subverted: Bob is on a plane, and is pleasantly surprised to find that there are no babies at all.
- Double Subverted: Until a Mad Scientist on the flight turns everyone except himself and Bob into babies, who promptly cry.
- Parodied:
- Bob gets on the wrong plane. Turns out it was a charter flight for the Organization for Parents of Screaming Babies. The inevitable ensues.
- Bob's flight is operated by "Screaming Baby Airlines".
- Zig-Zagged: Some flights have screaming babies, others don't (whether there well-behaved babies or they're just not there).
- Averted: The flight bans children. Extra points for it specifically catering for those who hate crying babies that much.
- Enforced: Bob is The Chew Toy, so his flight should naturally be packed with screaming babies.
- Lampshaded: "For Christ sakes! This kind o' racket again?"
- Invoked: ???
- Exploited: Big Bad Charles arranges for there to be screaming babies on hero Bob's flight so that Bob will be tired and not at his best when he arrives at the destination.
- Defied:
- Bob uses a private jet.
- Bob uses another form of transportation like car or train.
- Baby Alice is a Brainy Baby and understands that many people don't like it when she cries loudly, so she tries her best not to bother others.
- Discussed: "Why is it that whenever I go on a plane, there's always some cryin' baby?"
- Conversed: “I knew it. It’s an airplane in a comedy, there’s always gonna be a crying baby to annoy poor old Bob.”
- Implied: Bob is shown walking into a plane. Babies can be seen dotted around the cabin. Once he gets off the plane after a Gilligan Cut, he is shown to be very tired.
- Played for Laughs: This trope usually is.
- Played for Drama: The sound of a crying baby triggers PTSD in Bob as a result of previous tragedies. He can't go on most planes without an inevitable Flashback.
- Played for Horror:
- The babies on a plane are possessed to produce a Brown Note. There are no survivors.
- Completely fed up with the baby (or from a horrific PTSD attack), Bob proceeds to pull out an M16 and unload an entire mag the baby.
Back to Screaming Plane Baby
