To-do list:
- Redirect Nerd to Indexed and Nerdy.
-
Split off a new Stereotypical Nerd trope.Done.
I noticed some vague examples for the trope while wick cleaning for Hollywood Nerd and discussed it here which led me to doing a wick check.
Total Wicks Checked = 100
Issue 1 is big in scope but I think is a fairly straightforward fix and that's the fairly extensive ZCE issue. Nearly half of all wicks are ZCE, not including random potholes in sentences which makes up another 12% of wicks. Substantial uses of the trope make up only 40% of examples.
- I think the name is causing some of this since, as a one word title for a fairly common word, people are just plopping it in and calling it a day. If we make the name slightly less "plop down-able" it could curb some of this behavior. Something like Nerd Archetype or Stereotypical Nerd. To make sure the ZC Es are fixed, we'd probably just need to follow up with some wick cleaning.
Issue 2, and the bigger problem I think, is the misuse. From what I understand, the Nerd is an Archetypal Character with the following traits:
- stereotypical bad fashion, with the classic representation being plaid button down shirt or a polo, high waisted belted pants, suspenders, and a pocket protector (but other not trendy fashion can fit)
- not physically attractive due to Geek Physique and a lack of care about outer appearance, often times this includes acne, thick Nerd Glasses, braces, and unstylish hair
- socially awkward in some way (shy and clams up when talking to people, talks too much and can't read the room, etc)
- unpopular. This can be as little as them not occupying a high spot in the Popularity Food Chain, but still having a friend/a small circle of friends or can mean they are a complete loner amongst their peers
- victim of bullying or teasing, especially by the most popular students
- interests in "nerdy" hobbies that are typically non-mainstream and niche subcultures based on things you need a deep knowledge (be it technical or lore based) to enjoy, e.g. tech, sci-fi works, fantasy works, anime, collecting things, etc.
There are some other traits that can show up to give the nerd a different "flavor" (being genuinely intelligent, pedantic about their topic of interest, turning typically mundane or casual things into Serious Business, etc), but the core seems to be what's listed above and that's more or less discussed in the current trope description. Much like other archetypes like the Messianic Archetype and Satanic Archetype, not every box needs to be checked but the majority do need to be to qualify.
However, people are treating the trope less like a defined stereotype and more like a personality trait. For example, several tropers give a character who just says the read comic books this trope, despite that not being enough to fulfill the stereotype. Of the remaining 40 wicks, 45% of them are correct (or 18% of the total 100 wicks). The remaining wicks fall into 2 categories: a person who shows interest in niche or otherwise considered "geeky" interests like Tabletop games, video games, tech and computers, and the hard sciences; a person who is smart or has an in-depth knowledge on a particular topic (often one that is also considered "geeky").
- Other than the name change and clean up of wicks, I'm not sure how to fix this. Perhaps tweaking the description a bit so it more straightforwardly lists the traits (like how Messianic Archetype and Satanic Archetype do) and explicitly states characters need to meet some min number of the characteristics to qualify might help.
- I've also been mulling over whether we can conform to the misuse somewhat by directing all of the "has geeky interests" examples to Geek, which is currently definition only, or Otaku, Fanboy, Fangirl (though these last 3 are both more specific and more nebulous and may need to be looked at themselves, so maybe not). The "just is smart" examples can probably be cut entirely or redirected to The Smart Guy if the character is part of a team/group.
Edited by MacronNotes on Oct 5th 2022 at 6:47:27 AM
Characters A-B done. 714 left.
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465 wicks left
Main/ is done.
Archiving the wick check so I can cut it:
Wicks checked: 100
- Correct: 18 (18%)
- Just smart/knowledgeable: 7 (7%)
- Just has "nerdy interests": 15 (15%)
- ZCE/PCE: 48 (48%)
- Potholes: 12 (12%)
Ignoring pothole wicks: 88
- Correct: 20%
- Just smart/knowledgeable: 8%
- Just has "nerdy interests": 17%
- ZCE/PCE: 55%
Ignoring Potholes + ZCE/PCE: 40
- Correct: 45%
- Just smart/knowledgeable: 18%
- Just has "nerdy interests": 37%
- Nerd & Jock: The aforementioned Nerd is a nerd, being a very intelligent and adorable-looking kid who is also an Otaku who collects action figures and watches anime. He's also quite scrawny and physically weak, something he occasionally mulls over, which is why he took up weight-lifting. Fortunately, Jock has his back.
- Between Two Worlds: R2 functions on Star Wars, Internet and all the things electronic, is a professional programmer and wears Nerd Glasses. Marcus and Juhani like their ShoutOuts a lot, too.
- Ryan ToysReview: Pack the Penguin is portrayed as a stereotypical glasses-and-bow one. This is played straight explicitly in this Combo Panda video:
Pack: We're going to read so many books. Do you have an encyclopedias, please? I love-Combo: PECK, NO! You're going to come over to my house. We are NOT going to be reading books, we're playing video games, okay?!
- Psionics: The Next Stage in Human Evolution: Ian, Tim, and Chance were unpopular, uncool, and frequently bullied before being awakened. They still are, to varying degrees. Tim is definitely the most straight example of the three. Everything about him, from his clothing to his haircut to his taste in music to the way he carries himself, is painfully awkward and uncool. He even has coke bottle glasses.
- The Juggernaut and Wizard archetypes are both described as this. The Wizard is even depicted levitating a set of dice. It’s worth mentioning that Ian is the esper in the Juggernaut’s picture.
- Dexters Laboratory S 1 EP 8: Without his axe, Valhallen gradually transforms into a stereotypical one, complete with nasal voice and glasses.
- Cloak & Dagger (1984): The proprietor of the Game Keeper is an overweight, bearded man with Nerd Glasses who spends most of his time playing video games and requesting Twinkies.
- Napoleon Dynamite: In an odd case, Napoleon isn't even particularly smart or hard-working, but has all the cornerstones of a stereotypical nerd - poor social skills, awkward posture, mouth breathing, eccentric habits, thick, ugly glasses, crappy fashion sense...
- Kunskapens Korridorer: "Hjärnan" is clearly the smartest student in the class of 8C, to the point that his nick-name simply means "The Brain". And he also looks like a stereotypical nerd, with glasses and a more conservative dressing style.
- Yamada-kun and the Seven Witches: Second Witch War Others: He wears opaque glasses, looks scrawny, is interested in nothing but American military bases, and doesn't seem to have much social success given that he had no friends to team up with for the Guam trip and has never seen a girl's room before.
- Sticky Dilly Buns: Ruby is a slightly unusual female nerd. She's not actually unattractive, her social ineptitude takes the form of abrasiveness rather than bumbling, she doesn't seem very interested in science or computers (her degree is in Business Administration), and we have no evidence about her physical fitness beyond her claim that she can swim quite well. However, the glasses, the opinionated attitude, and the privileging of intellect over social relationships, make her classic nerd. She also has a nerdish tendency to use the Internet to fill in the gaps in her knowledge of the world, through her smartphone; she seems to be a big fan of Google. She just starts out as the sort of nerd who geeks despise. And in her case, nerds are definitely virgins, at least until the end of the comic’s run.
- Squirrel Boy: While he hasn't been shown in school, he does have some nerdy traits such as wearing glasses, his awkwardness in social situations, his small friend circle, and falling victim to bullying and teasing, which is a plot point of "Andy Had a Little Squirrel".
- Anya's Ghost: It gets him in a lot of trouble with his peers. He studies hard, is intelligent, spindly, gets turns of phrase wrong because of his Russian background, and he has no friends because of it all.
- Bob's Burgers - Wagstaff School: A textbook example; a complete dork in nerdy, boring clothes who's obsessed with dinosaurs and his fighting robot graphic novel. Is also incredibly intelligent and observant and is not afraid to use it to his advantage.
- Command & Conquer: Red Alert Series - Units: The Allied Engineers, starting from Red Alert 2. They speak in a stereotypically nasally nerd voice and even yell "Excelsior", in Red Alert 3, a clear reference to the late famed comic book author Stan Lee, who was known for saying this word.
- Degrassi The Next Generation Grade 11 Class: He's into computers and gaming, and he's completely socially awkward and introverted. He's the nerd that uses gaming as a way to escape reality so he doesn't have to deal with his depression and anger issues.
- Gravity Falls – Dipper Pines: Mostly a Lovable Nerd with just a pinch of Insufferable Genius. He's a self-proclaimed Smart Guy who's very nice yet socially awkward, with on-screen hobbies that include learning about and investigating paranormal phenomena, reading mystery novels, solving intelligence puzzles, and playing both video and role-playing board games. In Gravity Falls: Dipper and Mabel's Guide to Mystery and Nonstop Fun!, he describes his "ultimate hideout" as consisting of maps of the world, a telescope, a seismograph, a Geiger counter, and a Tiger Fist arcade game.
- King of the Hill - Other Characters: He fits the stereotype, being a pale, twiggy, bespectacled bookworm.
- Liv and Maddie: Classic case: Joey is socially awkward, quirky, really bad at flirting and being athletic, video game and comic-book obsessed, academically intelligent and has a weird taste in fashion (look at his cat shirts). Of course he wears a pair of Nerd Glasses.
- The Inbetweeners: Will is widely assumed to be a nerd, due to his appearance, his private school background and the fact he seems be more level-headed than his peers. But he isn't shown to be academically gifted, and he struggles with exams.
- Gilmore Girls S 07 E 09: While averting much of this trope, Rory has accidentally memorized what the symbols for the wedding anniversaries are.
- The Archmage's Last Bow: In addition to Nova and Twilight, Bright Gleam is quite the geek when it comes to all things magic. Later on, she sounds thrilled to be talking about Marevel comics as well.
- The Order of the Stick: The Empire of Blood: He likes things to be organized, is clever, doesn't get from behind the desk much, is short and wears Nerd Glasses.
- Dead Poets Society: He's an intelligent young man who wears large glasses with chunky black frames, and excels in every subject he studies.
- Enter The Arena As Your Avatar Neutral And Independent Characters: Downplayed. She doesn't have the look, but she's still a loner, is more at home reading a book than in a social situation, and for your own sake, don't ask her anything about magical theory, you'll be there all night.
- Jeeves and Wooster: Obsessed with newts.
- This Country: Kurtan has an obsessive streak a mile wide. He develops a new obsession every week, from tracking down old classmate Robert Robinson, to winning the village's annual scarecrow contest, to keeping a blog detailing all the production errors in Emmerdale. He also enjoys playing Warhammer and is mocked by Kerry as "King of the Nerds" in the episode of the same name. Specifically, Kurtan is an Extraverted Nerd who is pretty confident even when asking out his new neighbour.
- Summer of My German Soldier: Patty reads dictionaries for fun, and is so excited when her grandparents present her with a collegiate dictionary!
- World Trigger A Class Agents: As evidenced by her habit of collecting video game consoles.
- Watch_Dogs 2: Aside from their obvious obsession with tech, they constantly sling pop-culture references at each other, and their main hackerspace is located in the basement of a tabletop gaming store.
- The Dresden Files – Ordinary People and Badass Normals: So much of a gamer that he gives Butters confidential patient information in exchange for a rare RPG item, namely World of Warcraft's Blue Murloc Egg note .
- Tales of the Skull King: Known to play table top games.
- Surviving High School: Until he becomes popular. He's still enthusiastic about science and grades though.
- CDT Characters A–J: When delirious, she can think only of video games and memes.
- Choice of Robots: In a more traditional way than the protagonist; Josh makes robots because they're cool, not because he wants to change the world.
- Craig of the Creek – Kids of the Creek: They're a reclusive bunch who spend their time playing board games dressed as fantasy characters.
- Earth Twenty Seven The Bat Family: On the surface, Luke's muscular frame and bad boy persona might seem to make him unapproachable, but he's really a closet geek. Babrbara knows he's the biggest Star Wars fan and has at least two go-to cosplay costumes in his closet for attending comic book conventions.
- Family Guy Adam West High School: Is a total Star Trek fanboy.
- Freaks' Squeele: she is even part of the tabletop role playing game club!
- Futurama Planet Express Crew Relatives: Dwight enjoys reading books about Mathematics, playing role-playing games or cosplay.
- Homestar Runner Main Characters: He tends to be a fan of obscure subjects.
- Eastern Mind: The Lost Souls of Tong-Nou: Tou is based off of one, as he wears big glasses and works on strange computers.
- Friday the 13th: The Game – Counselors: She wears conservative attire and Nerd Glasses while boasting the highest Repair stat in the game.
- Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog:
- Billy (and Dr. Horrible, too, although that changes halfway through, when he gets his mad on.) He's also a tech geek, to judge by his apartment.
- In this world, anyone displaying stereotypically nerdy attributes getting persecuted as a potential supervillain.
- Gridiron Heights: Colts' kicker Rodrigo Blankenship is characterized as this, with his first appearance having him compare the Gridiron Height volcano to Mustafar.
- Back to the Eighties: Corey Jnr. and co, and Feargal and co. Corey is a more relatable and realistic example; Feargal plays the stereotype to the hilt.
- I Love New York: Mr. Boston and Cheesy. Mr. Boston actually manages to transcend this a bit. Cheesy...not so much.
- Brotherly Love: The episode "Downtown Girl" has two examples of this in Lydia, Matt's lab partner, and Phoebe, Geek turned popular musician.
- The Simpsons S4 E4 "Lisa the Beauty Queen": A bunch of these chase a football team out after Lisa rats on the players for extortion.
- Psych S 02 E 07 If Youre So Smart Then Why Are You Dead: Shockley and Goddard are younger versions, but they fill most of the classic tropes nicely. Nerd tropes in general abound in this episode.
- Macdonald Hall: Elmer Drimsdale and Mr. Wizzle.
- A Dance to the Music of Time: Widmerpool.
- X-Men: First Class: Hank McCoy, who is like an introverted version of Charles. All the brilliance, all the attractiveness, but none of his telepathic gift with people.
- Vampire: The Masquerade - Camarilla: Due to their status as outcasts and pariahs, the Nosferatu clan tends to embrace people disconnected from mortal society; however, they also tend to embrace those with skills that can benefit the clan as a whole — leading several nerdy characters to end up getting inducted into the Nosferatu, from the Tunnel Crawler concept to Mitnick from Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines.
- Desu Nyan Fucking Shit: His inability to fend for himself in battle and his literally pasty white appearance invoke this trope
- Danny Phantom: Villains: A really stereotypical one, aside from being a ghost.
- Day of the Tentacle: So much. Half of the image used to illustrate the trope, in fact, looks exactly like him.
- Crash Fever: Oneiros fits like a glove. And accordingly, he's a Squishy Wizard-White Mage mixture.
- The Smelly Mystery: Jerry Bombanat. If he is the Smell Switcher, he'll claim the reason he did it was for a scientific experiment.
- The Witcher - Other Characters: About every single mention of him screams this trope, even if it generally doesn't appear in Medieval European Fantasy.
- The Simpsons: Tapped Out
- Supernatural: Hunters: Her defining character trait.
- Super Filete: Is and looks like a textbook example.
- La que se avecina: Leo, naturally.
- Mission Hill: Kevin and his friends.
- James and Jessica's Plotless Escapades: AJ to an extent.
- Acquisitions Bureau: a rare Victorian example.
- All Dogs Go to Heaven
- Atop The Fourth Wall Main Characters: He even admits it.
- Bratz: Dexter and the rest of the "Nerd" clique in The Movie.
- Batman: Poison Ivy: Okay... she may be evil, but let's take a moment to really think about her.
- Battleborn LLC: Positively blustered by her ironic adversary, Oscar Mike.
- Being Human (UK)
- The Princess Diaries
- Boyfriend of the Dead: Just as nerdy as N, although he doesn't show this side many times.
- CatDog
- Cel Damage: No shit, Sherlock.
- Code Lyoko - Lyoko Warriors: A completely textbook example.
- Danganronpa Abridged Thing: But of course.
- The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob: Alexandre, the groom.
- Revenge of the Nerds: Present and accounted for, in mass quantities.
- Nobody Sleeps in the Woods Tonight: Julek
- Assassination of a High School President: Bobby
- Motor Home Massacre: Benji, who actually wears a tie and sweater vest on a camping trip.
- We Are All Pokemon Trainers Main 2: He has his moments.
- Less Than Perfect: Owen
- El Cafe du Watchog
- Warbears: Kla.
- Fire Emblem On Forums Bay 12 Roleplays
- Sym-Bionic Titan: Further, when they get into the local high school, they all end up as a different stereotype — Lance is a bad boy, Ilana is a flower girl, and Octus is a nerd.
- Brandy & Mr. Whiskers: The season 1 episode "Lack of Brains vs. Brawn" plays with this trope when Mr. Whiskers has to deal with The Bully Lester. While Mr. Whiskers is portrayed as being Nerd-ish relative to Lester, Mr. Whiskers is a Cloud Cuckoolander and often The Ditz of the show. However, as Characterization Marches On, in later episodes he becomes more of a Genius Ditz.
- StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty: Ohhh, boy: a nerd, a Mr. Fixit, a mercenary contractor, an idealist, renegades...we can continue all night long. Lampshaded by both Raynor and Matt, after the mission "Media Blitz":
Raynor: You know, Matt? Someday, you're going to lead this bunch of misfits.
Matt: Oh, no... that's what I keep you around for... sir.
(Cue some laughs) - The Last Breakfast Club: In Brian's essay, which he leaves for Vernon at the end of the musical, he writes, "We found out that each of us is more than just a brain, an athlete, a basket case, a princess, a janitor, or a criminal. We're a family. And you know what? We owe it all to you."
- Takin' Over the Asylum: There's a few characters; Two that really come to mind is the silly◊ Yosemite Sam-esque motivational speaker at Eddie's workplace and those two fellow Patients◊, a lumpy grump and his geeky-looking sidekick named Hector.
- Harlem Beat: Sakurai lined in a wrong queue, entered a streetball game and boom, he was hooked.
- The Ace: Sakurai, Takagi from Kanakita.
- DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story: Directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber, the 2004 comedy DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story revolves around amiable underachiever Peter LaFleur (Vince Vaughn), who owns a rundown gym called "Average Joe's" with a less-than-average clientèle, including a self-styled pirate (Alan Tudyk), an ultra-obscure sports aficionado (Stephen Root), and a pining high-school Nerd (Justin Long).
- Venom: Flash Thompson: Flash and Peter rib each other over their past relationship as a Jerk Jock and Nerd, though they're Headbutting Heroes as Venom and Spider-Man.
- The Powerpuff Girls / The Heroes: Revealed to have been this in his childhood, much to the surprise of Mojo, in "Get Back Jojo." He was even bordering on The Bully toward the other kids, particularly Matthew.
- Strange Academy: Although identical twins, Alvi is a Nerd and Iric is a Jerk Jock.
- Chuck: Team Bartowski - Beauty, Brains, and Brawn: A example without all female Characters. Femme Fatale Spy Sarah is the Beauty, Nerd Chuck the Brain and The Big Guy Casey the Brawn.
under 100 now
Down to 70
Edit: Below 50, not including perm-locked pages
Edited by randomtroper89 on Oct 19th 2022 at 3:54:33 AM
finished the remaining wicks! this thread can close
Nice! Closing.
Macron's notes
Crown Description:
Nerd has been misused for any character with nerdy interests are characteristics even though they don't fit the stereotype.
Thanks amathieu. I'll see what I can do.
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