Basic Trope: One character attacks another character who is talking too much to them.
- Straight: When Dennis talks to Bob so much it annoys him, Bob punches him out.
- Exaggerated:
- Bob uppercuts Dennis, sending him flying “to the moon, Dennis!”
- Bob kills Dennis because he's been endlessly talking.
- Downplayed:
- Bob throws a punch at Dennis, but Dennis is an angel who only Bob can see or hear, and thus the punch goes through his head without harming it.
- Bob gives a Dope Slap to Dennis because he said a sentence that’s a bit longer than the usual length of one.
- Justified:
- Dennis made the mistake of believing that Talking Is a Free Action in the middle of a fistfight.
- The only thing Dennis has to say is a Pre-Mortem One-Liner, and Bob has one chance to strike first.
- Inverted:
- Bob punches out Dennis, who then verbally expresses outrage to Bob at length.
- Bob's giving Dennis a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown, but stops when Dennis manages to get out an Armor-Piercing Question
- Subverted:
- As Bob throws his punch, Dennis shows his own reflexes by grabbing Bob’s wrist in mid-punch. Bonus points if Bob stares at Dennis disbelievingly, whilst he disparagingly remarks, "Boy, how rude!" before continuing on his tangent as if nothing happened.
- Bob punches Dennis in the face, and Dennis showcases he's Made of Iron by being completely unfazed by the punch, even continuing to talk like nothing had happened (or deciding to start his speech again from the beginning).
- Double Subverted:
- Dennis also uses his other hand to restrain Bob’s fist, but then Bob’s other hand punches him out. Dennis then sheepishly remarks, “I should’ve seen that coming.”
- Bob escalates Dennis' insistence on continuing his speech by smashing a brick over his head; That he can't shrug off.
- Parodied: Bob and Dennis mock the Three Stooges, with “Moe” (Bob) punching out “Curly” (Dennis); as a result, both of them can't go two syllables without punching each other: that's just how they plan their weekends.
- Zig Zagged:
- Bob throws his punch but misses Dennis and falls flat on his own stomach instead; however, he lands on a loose floorboard which teeters upward and sends a brick flying towards Dennis’ head. Dennis ducks out of the way, but the brick hits the bottom of a ladder leaning against the wall, which then topples over and bonks Dennis in the head, knocking him unconscious.
- Bob clenches his fist while Dennis is talking and is ready to strike him, but calms down and decides to listen instead. Once he looks closer at Dennis, he sees that he is drawing a gun and tries to punch him. Unfortunately Bob is too late, and Dennis is able to shot Bob. Dennis then continues to monologue over Bob as he bleeds out, until Bob shuts him up with a kick to the nuts.
- Averted:
- Instead of punching Dennis, Bob makes the much better choice of walking away.
- Dennis and Bob never have a conversation.
- Enforced: The writer has a bit of a beef with the Hannibal Lecture trope and wants to make clear that if he was in the same room with Hannibal Lecter, he would tear his Hannibal throat with his (insert censored expletive of choice) teeth.
- Lampshaded: *WHAM* "If you're gonna kill someone, kill em' already. Don't start monologuing before you do it."
- Invoked: Dennis has a counter ability to Bob's attacks, so he talks endlessly in order to make Bob hit him, only to shutter his hopes when it does nothing.
- Exploited: ???
- Defied:
- Dennis to Bob:
Dennis: “I wouldn’t do that. I can sue you, y’know.”- Dennis blows away Bob's limbs and breaks his jaw before starting his Breaking Lecture, leaving Bob completely unable to do anything to stop him from talking.
- Discussed: "I mean, I'd be talking more, but considering you're one to speak in the language of fists, I'll shut up before I waste more money on my dentistry."
- Conversed: "Jeez, Bob REALLY doesn't like long speeches, doesn't he? That's the ninth time he decked Dennis due to his idiotic speeches!"
- Implied: Dennis talks to Bob at annoying length in one scene and is shown with a big bump on his forehead in the next.
- Deconstructed:
- Bob punches Dennis out, giving the latter amnesia; the former then tries to restore his memory and, when it returns, apologizes for ever visiting any harm upon his friend.
- If the crux of Dennis' Breaking Speech is how much Bob depends on violence to get whatever he wants, then Bob trying to smash Dennis' nose in results in Not Helping Your Case.
- Dennis tries to tell Bob something important when Bob punches him and knocks him out. As a result, Bob never learns what Dennis was trying to tell him.
- Bob gets arrested for assault and battery.
- Dennis giving Bob a dumb smack-talk speech was him following Contractual Genre Blindness, being a good sport, working on holding back his aggression. Then Bob punches him in the face mistaking his desire to talk for weakness. Dennis decides that if Bob won't show him the slightest modicum of respect, he can just die screaming.
- Reconstructed:
- Dennis also remembers that he was talking to Bob at annoying length and picks up where he left off, prompting Bob to punch him out again.
- Bob is quick to point out that against people like Dennis, any dialogue or speeches will just end up with him quickly brushing them off. And then Bob delivers another punch that sends him flying.
- Dennis was threatening Bob and his family, his words were violence in and of themselves.
- Played for Laughs:
- Dennis' reaction to Bob punching his teeth out and busting his nose open is a wacky little "Ow! That hurt, man!”
- Bob punches out Dennis for telling him for the ninth time to please wash the dishes.
- Bob uppercuts Dennis, who gets knocked out in the manner of Punch-Out!!, complete with a referee in a red hat counting up to 10.
- Played for Drama: Bob has seen all of his life demolished little by little by every single twisted truth Dennis has said, and he's pretty much had it.
- Played for Horror:
- Bob is in a heated verbal spat with Dennis and punches him in the face, and Dennis falls, hits his head on the ground, and dies.
- Bob doesn't stop at one punch. At all. And he considers smacking whoever is screaming, "He's dead already! You killed him!! Stop!!!" with the same amount of brutality.
- After a whole film of enduring tremendous amounts of misery, Bob showcases he has developed a murderously bad case of misanthropy and sociopathy by killing Dennis mid-speech with the same bored and annoyed face he would show when wiping dog crap from his shoe.
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