Basic Trope: A character is always there when their friends need them.
- Straight: Whenever Alice, Charlie, or Daniel need something done, Bob is always happy to help them.
- Exaggerated: Whenever anyone, anywhere in the world needs some help, Bob is always there to help.
- Downplayed: Bob is happy to help a lot of the time, but there is a lot of time when he has to do his own thing.
- Justified:
- It's Bob's job to help those around him with whatever they need.
- Bob realizes that occasionally in an Ensemble Cast, there's one person who keeps everything running smoothly, and that in his group, he's that person, and merely acts accordingly.
- Inverted: Whenever Bob needs help with something, everyone tries to help him.
- Subverted: Bob helps Alice with the things she needs initially, but later doesn't want to help anymore.
- Double Subverted: ...Because he's busy helping someone else out.
- Parodied: Bob decides to take a vacation for a week. Since he's such a hardworking guy, the rest of his crew gladly let him. After a while, the crew notice that things aren't really getting done and phrases like "Hey, Bob, can you...oh, wait, he's not here. Dang." start to become more and more common.
- Zig Zagged: Bob is willing to help people on certain days, but on others, he doesn't help anyone out.
- Averted: Bob is no more likely to help anyone out than any other character.
- Enforced: ???
- Lampshaded: "Someone needs help? I expect Bob to appear any second now..."
- Invoked: Knowing that Bob will be willing to help out, Charlie sets out on a very ambitious project that he knows he can't do himself.
- Exploited: Alice asks for Bob's help on a project, because she knows he will help and she wants to spend time with him.
- Defied: Bob briefly considers that his mutation might give him the ability to heal at a superhuman rate... before dismissing it as ridiculous.
- Discussed: "The best kind of person is one that is always there to help out his friends... y'know, kind of like Bob."
- Conversed: "Bob is my favorite character. Why? Because he always looks out for all the other members of The Team."
- Implied: Bob is seen helping people more often than not.
- Deconstructed:
- In the process of helping everyone in town, Bob overextends himself to the point of exhaustion and starts doing more harm than good.
- Bob is reliable, yet is never given credit for dealing with the Boring, but Practical concerns. Worse, Bob finds himself on the receiving end of an All Take and No Give relationship.
- Reconstructed:
- ...so Bob takes a week or two off to rest, and takes care to leave a few hours to himself every week, so he won't wear down again.
- When the others see how overworked Bob is, they decide to follow his example, giving him a break and improving overall performance. The result is a team full of reliable ones.
Back to The Reliable One, who also got us this link. What a guy!
