Not Thriving (Alt Names crowner 1/7/16): TGIO Chili Bees

Casual Dining Gimmick?

edited 3rd May '15 7:57:01 PM by crazysamaritan

As I mentioned upthread, "Stuff/shit on the walls restaurant" is an existing term for this kind of restaurant, so Stuff On The Walls Restaurant may be viable.

But from the description, and the current decor at some of the current trope namers, this genre of restaurant isn't just the ones with "stuff on the walls." It also encompasses places like The Cheesecake Factory and Olive Garden.

Yeah its more Themed Restaurant.

The best example I can think of is How I Met Your Mother S2 ep6 where Lily is working at a Hawaiian Restaurant and is really humiliated for wearing a stereotypical Hawaiian outfit, goes by a fake Hawaiian name, has a whole required intro, has to sing a unique birthday song and so on. [1]◊

The rest of the cast has to come visit her and tease her for working at the place.

Kitschy Themed Restaurant?

I recognize all the names in the title, and I can glean the trope from it, but what I hate about those type of titles is that even I would have to look it up before linking it, as exactly how it's broken down is tough to remember.

Those are two different types of restaurants though. A TGI Friday's or Applebee's type is stereotyped by having random mashup appetizers like wonton tacos, and stuff on the walls. Those don't really have a "theme" per se. Then there are the "vague theme" restaurants like Outback, which is "just any other steakhouse except they use 'blokes' and 'sheilas' on the bathrooms".

... how's that not kitschy?

Well 'Kitschy' would make it a YMMV trope as that is pretty much this but with 'poor taste'.

I still think, though, that the current description also supports places like The Cheesecake Factory and maybe even Sizzler, places with no overly weird decor or overt theme.

TGI Ripoffs? It's a simpler reference to TGI Friday's

Ripoff has really bad connotations in addition to I don't think TGI was the first themed restaurant, they probably were copying off someone else

How does Kitschy make it YMMV?

It's not a value judgement if the work presents it as such. If the work doesn't present it as such, it's obviously not this trope, it's just "a restaurant that happens to be a chain."

'Kitsch is a low-brow style of mass-produced art or design using popular or cultural icons. Kitsch generally includes unsubstantial or gaudy works or decoration.'

To say something is Kitsch is very much in the eye of the beholder. In addition to people are saying its broader than that.

edited 6th May '15 1:01:57 PM by Memers

Broadening it makes it hopelessly broad. Then it because "the cast eats at a restaurant."

It's 'Themed' in some way, sometimes actually being Kitsch in its presentation especially if it is made to look like what popular culture thinks that is what X culture looks like, or could be an authentic look and such.

It could be any kind of theme really, from foreign culture to Planet Hollywood or anything, Heck How I Met Your Mother had a Canada bar and cafe and a Minnesota one in New York made for people from those locations. It's across the pacific counterpart is Cosplay Café.

A Denny's, Hooters or IHOP clone would never be this.

From what I see in the trope page and this discussion there are a few different types of American restaurants here.

One is a place that focuses more on a particular culture or region's food (though an Americanized version) except also with the "stuff on the walls" and/or kitsch. Places I can think of like this on the West Coast are The Old Spaghetti Factory (Italian but with San Francisco trolleys), Buca di Beppo (Italian and probably the Most Triumphant Example of "stuff on the walls"), Red Lobster (seafood/nautical), Azteca (Mexican), Bahama Breeze.

The other, but related, idea is just kind of a generic "American" place that features food like burgers, pizza or steaks but also tends to have an exhaustively long menu and "fusion" dishes like Mexican eggrolls or whatever. They can also have a gimmick or overriding "theme parky" feel. Examples I can think of here include Applebee's, Rainforest Cafe, California Pizza Kitchen, Red Robin, Cheesecake Factory, Claim Jumpers, The Ram, Chili's, and TGIF.

Then there are corporate owned places like Olive Garden or P. F. Chang's which I wouldn't describe as kitschy... just very "standardized".

The uniting theme seems to be that there is a corporate script to all of this (often literally, "Hi, I'm Bob and I'll be your server tonight!"), and they are chains especially prevalent in Suburbia. Just being kitschy is not enough (I know plenty of indie/hipster places here that also have kitsch all over the walls, and if anything the corporate places seem to be imitating that).

So I would suggest Corporate Chain Restaurant or something similar (maybe Corporate Casual Dining to distinguish it from fast food or Denny's-type places)

edited 14th Jun '15 11:50:39 AM by sunlitgarden

I'm thinking that the uniting factor in all of the variants is "The Theme Park Version in a resteaunt."

I'm also thinking that Cosplay Café could technically be considered a Sub-Trope to that premise; the only thing preventing it from being so is the Western influence.

Perhaps we actually have a Supertrope on our hands...

The two restaurants have different expected customers and are presented in fiction with different wait staff. Rarely will you see the Western version happy, instead of a Stepford Smiler or Butt-Monkey attitude.

I'm not super familiar with Cosplay Café but just from looking at it, it seems like that's a fairly niche interest... where the restaurants in T.G.I.O'ChiliBee's are more mainstream (and are so universal that things like the corporate scripts are Played for Laughs).

I made a few edits to the trope description that will hopefully clarify things a bit. I think it could still use a little work, though.

edited 14th Jun '15 4:26:48 PM by sunlitgarden

I guess the essence of the Trope is "The Theme Park Version in a restaraunt staffed by Burger Fools".

Maybe it is the treatment that distinguishes this from Cosplay Café. The latter seems to be for reasons of Fanservice whereas the fromer is yet another example of This Loser Is You.

Again, I can imagine how a Cosplay Café can be like a TGIO...whatever, and vice versa, but these would be exceptions to the respective rules.

But, yeah, needs a rename. I'm also going to link this page and Burger Fool to show that the latter also work here and at Suck E. Cheese's.

They arn't staffed by Burger Fools though, these are far more upper/middle class than those. Many of which have a sports bar in it, try to look nice presentation wise and tend to pay rather decently.

These are not for kids as well, which is completely different than a Generic Suck E Cheese clone.

edited 14th Jun '15 6:20:58 PM by Memers

I got the sense that, but for the trappings, the staff between here, Burger Fool, and Suck E. Cheese's would be interchangable due to the reference on this page that Happiness Is Mandatory for the staff.

Kind of the equivalent of the "Specialty Store" (e.g. Home Depot, Game Stop, Old Navy, etc.) versus the Soul-Sucking Retail Job at Sprawl-Mart or the Box Grocer. It's not (normally) as harried, but the intrinsic faults are still there.

edited 14th Jun '15 6:35:48 PM by DonaldthePotholer

At the casual-dining places I've more seen college-age and up people working there than the teenagers commonly associated with Burger Fool, but the overall feel is similar, I think.

I'm sure the degree of Happiness Is Mandatory varies, but I've known people who have worked at these places and I know they have rules that define nearly everything they do and say. At the very least these places hire wait staff that can project a bubbly personality, but it often comes off as Stepford Smiler, especially when there's an undertone of fear behind the cheerful script. California Pizza Kitchen is the worst offender in my experience. I used to work at a retail store in the mall and they opened a CPK there; I ate there a couple of times. The food was pretty good, though (IMO) overpriced. But what really creeped me out was this policy they have where about once an hour, the (presumably) manager on duty would go around and personally check in with every table and ask if everything was going okay. But there was a very suspicious tone to their questions, like they didn't trust their wait staff to report if there was a problem. This happened with at least two different managers, but both had a similar attitude. The wait staff fear the managers, but what they ALL fear, from what I've seen, is Corporate. The customers can get away with just about anything in most of these places because the managers fear punishments from corporate if they complain. In fiction this can either be Played for Laughs or seriously.

For wherever it was, I do think some trope hierarchy needs to be established.

The first thing that came to mind with respect to Applebee's/TGIFriday's/etc. in fiction was Office Space. Is that a recognizable enough cultural touchstone that some riff on something like Casual Dining... With Flair! would get people thinking in the right direction? "Flair" being the pins Jennifer Aniston's character was supposed to wear on her waitress suspenders◊ to go along with the corporate-mandated chain personality. Casual Dining, Corporate Flair? Even if you don't pick up on the reference, "flair" can be read as a subtler attempt at personality than something like "theme," which definitely puts me more in mind of a theme park and by extension places like Chuck E Cheese.