Totally Radical/Playing With
Basic Trope: The writer attempts to appeal to a younger demographic through an out-of-date or awkward interpretation of youth culture. This usually takes the form of outdated/awkward slang.
- Straight: X-treme Charlie is a superhero that wears a backwards baseball cap, rides a skateboard, and speaks in "hip" nineties slang.
- Exaggerated: Not a single word that comes from X-treme Charlie's mouth isn't some sort of slang.
- Justified: X-treme Charlie works at a restaurant or club with a nineties theme, so the slang becomes an odd form of jargon to him.
- X-treme Charlie, just likes old slange
- Inverted: X-treme Charlie, despite his name, speaks in Spock Speak or Little Professor Dialogue and enjoys sophisticated entertainment.
- Subverted: X-treme Charlie reveals that the whole slang-slinging sk8ter boy thing was an act put on just to mess with the grownups...
- X-treme Charlie turns out to be an English professor who only trys to look "cool" to appeal to teenagers.
- Double Subverted: ...while his real favorite thing is playing rad bitchin' video games.
- Parodied: X-treme Charlie's slang is treated as an entirely different language that requires translation, a la Airplane!. Bonus points if it translates to something intelligent.
- X-treme Charlie's slang includes overly ridiculous words like "cyber" and "Reaganomics".
- Deconstructed: The two generations can't understand each other, since the kids have built up their own incomprehensible-to-outsiders culture that they don't want adults being a part of, and the adults find their culture strange and disturbing.
- Reconstructed: ???
- Zig Zagged: ???
- Averted: X-treme Charlie is portrayed as an accurate interpretation of the modern-day teenager, or he simply doesn't attempt to be "hip".
- Enforced: "We have to find some way to relate to our demographic and we don't have time to extensively research their lifestyle. Hm... let's throw in some slang from the nineties and call it a day."
- Lampshaded: "'Totally radical?' Who uses 'totally radical' nowadays?"
- Invoked: X-treme Charlie deliberately uses his dated "coolness" to induce groans.
- Defied: X-treme Charlie researches present-day youth culture to avoid coming off as dated.
- Discussed: "Do you think we should maybe tell X-treme Charlie that the slang he uses hasn't been used since 1993?" "Nah -- it'd be funnier to see how long it takes for him to discover he's not cutting edge anymore for himself."
- Conversed: "Do these writers seriously think anyone talks like that these days, much less kids?"
Dude, you should like, totally return to Totally Radical! It's the bizee's knizees, n00b!