Splash / YMMV - TV Tropes

Best Known for the Fanservice: To some, the movie is best remembered for Madison the Mermaid's nudity.
Ensemble Dark Horse: Dr. Kornbluth, the Large Ham Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain, easily steals every scene he's in.
Hilarious in Hindsight:
- The Line-of-Sight Name joke, where the mermaid chooses the very unusual name of Madison, now doesn't work due to the film's own popularity. It inspired Madison to become one of the most common female names in the United States.
- A scientist trying to prove supernatural creatures exists. Sound familiar?^note
- The boat Tom Hanks is riding in randomly loses power halfway between the mainland and an island. The pilot generously attributes the problem to him intentionally rocking the boat, but that's because this was decades before the world learned never to travel with Tom Hanks.
- In the film, Tom Hanks sings the Disney song “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah” to indicate how elated he is after getting so much nookie from Madison. Five years after the film’s release, the Disneyland log flume “Zip-a-Dee River Run” was renamed Splash Mountain, after then-Disney CEO Michael Eisner suggested that the attraction be used to help market the film Splash ^note.

Jerkass Woobie: Stan the Tour Guide, in a way. After what happened with Madison, how does he tell future tour groups that it was a one-time fluke and that they shouldn't expect to see that happen again?
Memetic Mutation: A Tumblr GIF of Tom Hanks saying to Madison at the pier of the East River “I love you! Let’s get married!”, only to then have Madison reject his marriage proposal by diving back into the water.
Moral Event Horizon: Dr. Kornbluth calls out the other scientists, particularly the leader Dr. Ross, for planning to dissect Madison. But they merely insult him for "not being a real scientist," expressing how Kornbluth would always be a disgrace in his eyes and the eyes of the scientific community no matter if he is considered crazy or not, thus making all his efforts to earn his respect amongst fellow scientists for naught. This helps lead to his Heel–Face Turn afterwards, and also makes Ross look like an idiot and a more deplorable Mad Scientist then Kornbluth since he could have gotten into the history books as the one who established contact with a new race if he wasn't such a cold-hearted "sadistic pig".

MST3K Mantra: Don't try to figure out how Madison is able to read a map despite having had no previous contact with the English language.
One-Scene Wonder: Kornbluth's mentor
Signature Scene: Madison at the Statue of Liberty.
Values Dissonance: The scene in the prologue where ten-year-old Freddie drops coins on the ground in order to look up women’s skirts is played for laughs. It gets worse when you see Freddie doing the same thing, this time as an adult. In fact, when Allen lifts Freddie up and tells him how embarrassing it was back when he was ten, Freddie justifies his behavior by saying “Hey, if something works with me, I stick with it”.
- Freddie announcing to everyone at work that “Penthouse” Magazine printed his letter titled “A Lesbian No More” would not fly today, given how lesbophobic the title of the letter sounds.
- Allen telling Madison that they need to take a blood test before they get married. Although certainly not a common practice anymore, back then, it was meant to insure that the couple wasn’t carrying any sexually transmitted diseases or genetic disorders.

YMMV / Splash