Time for a Kick the X cleanup?

So, after I raised some concerns about creating a cleanup thread for the Kick the X tropes (i.e. Kick the Dog, Kick the Morality Pet, Kick The Son Of A Bitch, The Dog Bites Back, Pet the Dog) on ATT, themayorofsimpleton suggested that we might need to discuss it here.

For example, Kick the Dog is about meaningless acts of evil (such as when Killian offs Maya in front of Tony to pile more misery on him in Iron Man 3). The Dog Bites Back is when a villainous character decides to get back at their superiors for the dog-kicking (i.e. the hyenas against Scar in The Lion King). However, in some instances, it has been used in cases where the innocent victims and/or heroes finally had enough of the dog-kicking (i.e. Ange against Julio in Cross Ange, Lucy against Tomoo in Elfen Lied, Naofumi against Malty in The Rising of the Shield Hero).

If anyone finds bad or questionable "Kick the X" examples, please bring them here and discuss.

Edited by gjjones on Dec 29th 2020 at 4:02:15 AM

Does this trope have enough of a misuse issue to go into the Trope Repair Shop?

Which trope? Several were mentioned. All would need wick checks.

Indeed they would. I think we should start with the Kick the Dog trope and rule out any invalid examples.