The Smurfs (comics)

Tropes appearing specifically in the comics:

 * Accidental Art: In an one-page story, Painter Smurf's canvas is taken away by the wind and it hits the ground several times, getting all kind of stains. Papa Smurf arrives and thinks his painting is brilliant, asking him how he did it. Painter Smurf replies it was "a little inspiration, a lot of perspiration".
 * AI Is a Crapshoot: In the album You Don't Smurf Progress!, the Smurfs create robots that do their chores, but these eventually rebel.
 * May be a subversion: the only sentient robot was the garbage-eating one (because he ate some of Papa Smurf's magic potions) who then reprogrammed every other one to obey him.
 * Art Evolution: The Smurfs, in their very first appearance in Johann and Peewit, had very pointy hats that only drooped a little at the end.
 * Bankruptcy Barrel: Brainy Smurf in The Gambler Smurfs.
 * Bedmate Reveal: In a one-page comic gag, a Smurf takes a walk outside when he can't get any sleep, only for the clouds to obscure the light of the moon so that he couldn't see his way, so he ended up going back to what he thinks is his own house and goes to sleep. In the morning, he wakes up and finds out.
 * Big "Never!": In the comic book story "You Don't Smurf Progress", the waste disposal robot, who became the tyrant of the Smurf Village, shouts this when he tries to escape from the front door of his castle, but finds himself surrounded by the Smurfs that were once his captives, demanding for his surrender. He tries to use a secret escape hatch, only to be turned into furniture when Handy cuts off his escape with his furniture-making machine.
 * Brown Bag Mask: Vanity Smurf uses a shopping bag mask in "The Smurfs and The Book That Tells Everything".
 * Continuity Nod: Several.
 * Deal with the Devil: Quite literally in Gargamel's case in the story "Sagratamabarb", where the evil wizard makes a deal with Beelzebub that if he helps to get rid of Gargamel's cousin, then he would belong to him forever. It didn't turn out well for Gargamel.
 * Did Not Get the Girl: For all the troubles Weakling Smurf went through in the story "The Olympic Smurfs", he winds up not getting Smurfette (or at least, not getting a kiss from Smurfette) by the story's end.
 * Enfant Terrible: The so-non-aptly-named Jeantil (which sounds like "gentil", meaning "considerate").
 * Evil Twin: The Smurfs deal with evil duplicates of themselves in The Smurf Threat that were created by Papa Smurf to get the Smurfs to stop fighting with each other.
 * Face Palm: Papa Smurf does this a few times in "Bathing Smurfs".
 * Frothy Mugs of Water: Averted. Gargamel and Azrael were bottle partners, and the Smurfs themselves were fond of drinking alcohol- at the point that Papa Smurf had to invent a wacky story of an evil genie trapped inside a bottle to prevent the Smurfs from opening it and drinking the special liquor he had on it.
 * Gag Series
 * Homage: Doctor Smurf is largely inspired by Jules Romains' well-known and beloved play Dr. Knock. It lampshades the play with a comical footnote and a retake in SMURFING of the play's most popular lines.
 * Lady in Red: Smurfette wore a red dress in the comic book story "The Great Smurfette", though it was more the feminine version of Papa Smurf's outfit, and it was mostly to show that she was in charge of the Smurf Village.
 * Literal Ass-Kicking: In a comic book story where Handy Smurf creates problems with a new handheld power driller by drilling through everything he can get his hands on, the Smurfs retaliate by turning his power drill into an ass-kicking machine.
 * Loin Cloth: Tailor Smurf made one to Wild Smurf to wear. Before that, Wild Smurf was covered with leaves.
 * Loves Me Not: Deconstructed. One smurf was doing the routine, and ends up with "Loves Me Not". Another smurf asks him about his luck and he replies, gesturing to the now barren flower field that "Yeah, I can't find one that has an odd number of petals!"
 * And there's other time that, as a joke, two Smurfs take petals from the flowers to ensure the one doing the routine always gets "Loves Me not".
 * Magic Plastic Surgery: Or make that "plastic smurfery", which is the explanation in the original English translation of the story "The Smurfette" for how the title character was changed from her original appearance into a real Smurf.
 * Off-Model: Comic example. In the original editions, there are several coloring errors, such as Papa Smurf's pants turning white in a panel, a Smurf's pants turning blue in another one...
 * Paper-Thin Disguise: This was subverted when Gargamel once put on a rabbit suit — with his face still visible — and the Smurfs had a lot of trouble to keep themselves from laughing (even Azrael laughed) as they decided to pretend his disguise fooled them, until they trapped him with a paralyzing potion.
 * Product Placement: A 15-page spinoff story arc was an advertisement for the Benco breakfast chocolate powder brand.
 * Screw the Money, I Have Rules: Papa Smurf in The Finance Smurf refuses to go along with the title character's suggestion of charging his little Smurfs for his services, even as impoverished as he is when he has to pay off his little Smurfs for their services during the time he was sick when the Smurf Village monetary system was in place. Eventually every Smurf decides to go Screw The Money to Finance Smurf when they realize that the old ways of cooperation and sharing were better.
 * Series Continuity Error: the story The Finance Smurf introduces the money system and the Smurfs are revealed as not knowing what money is at all. This contradicts earlier stories, such as The Egg and the Smurfs where a Smurf makes a wish to become "rich" - and ends with jewels and money as a result - and in Smurf Stories where Handy Smurf creates a machine that can turn hazelnuts into gold coins and Handy Smurf tells Papa Smurf he'll use the coins to buy more hazelnuts.
 * During the Smurflings origin story, three Smurfs are sent to Father Time's home to get a new sand clock for Papa Smurf. The place is full with all kinds of clocks, and there's a lot of coins scattered in the floor, because "Time is money". The Smurfs recognize them as money and even can tell their worth.
 * Silly Reason for War: In Smurf Versus Smurf, a civil war erupts in the Smurf village over whether the word "smurf" should be used as an adjective (south end) or a verb (north end). This gets funnier in languages that allow for many composite words (e.g. Dutch and German) because now the war is about whether the proper term is "corksmurf" or "smurfscrew".
 * As a whole, this was parodying the language divide issues in Belgium.
 * Stealth Pun: The waste disposal robot in the comic book story "You Don't Smurf Progress" would eat garbage and turn them into bricks that he would expel from his rear hatch. In essence, he was.
 * Sticky Situation: Gargamel creates a treat that ends up trapping a Smurf that touches it, but as Gargamel runs over to where he has set the trap, he also gets stuck in the trap, and so do birds, a cow, and several other things on his way home. Papa Smurf makes a potion that frees everything that got stuck in the trap -- everything, that is, except for Gargamel, whom Papa Smurf has no more potion for, but he does leave a recipe for the formula for Gargamel to make up.
 * Symbol Swearing: You might be surprised but it happened all the time in the original comics by Peyo. Yep, the comic overall was much less childlike than its Animated Adaptation.
 * Snappy Smurf cursed all the time.
 * It was even played with in one one-page gag story, where a random Smurf hits his foot with a hammer and begins Symbol Swearing up a storm until Papa Smurf tells him to wash his mouth out with soap. In the last panel, when the Smurf speaks again, his word balloon is completely clean, but now soap bubbles containing swear symbols are floating all around him.
 * Turned Against Their Masters: The robot servants in You Don't Smurf Progress.
 * Vapor Wear: Mostly with the male Smurfs, as they are shown to not have any underwear when putting on or taking off their pants.
 * We Want Our Jerk Back: In a comic book story, Papa Smurf plays a prank on Jokey Smurf in order to get him to stop playing his pranks on other Smurfs, only to find out that the other Smurfs are bored from the lack of his pranks, so he allows Jokey to play them once again.
 * Why Didn't You Just Say So?: Even the ever-respectable Papa Smurf does this in A Child among the Smurf.
 * Worthless Yellow Rocks: Miner Smurf dislikes gold, as he thinks it is a too soft metal to be of any use. Finance Smurf decides to take the gold to turn them into coins and create a money system..