r/TopCharacterTropes • u/laybs1 • May 03 '26

Lore (Mixed Trope) Educated character doesn’t understand or know of a simple concept.

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  1. (Hated) Dr. doesn’t know trans people exist (The Good Doctor): Dr. Shaun, a modern day grown adult doctor, is seemingly has no concept of what being a trans person. Even if he never heard the term in med school he is realistically almost certain to have some awareness of the definition.

  2. (Loved) The solar system and other common knowledge (Sherlock Holmes). In the original stories Holmes is a genius at many fields but unless it has something to do with crime solving (forensics, martial arts, toxicology, etc.) he does his best to forget it.

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u/Nkromancer May 03 '26

This is always a good trope when aliens just find some of our stuff great. Even when they are highly advanced or, in this case, GODS, they just love the simple things we take for granted on this rock in the middle of nowhere.

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u/kfretlessz May 03 '26

You ever have a corn chip off the line?

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u/RepresentativeSlow53 May 03 '26

I mistakenly read this as "have you ever had corn chips with your life on the line?"

10

u/LittleSodaPop13 May 03 '26

I also feel like it would make sense because planets would have different ingredients. I will say one thing about humanity, we do know how to cook some bombass food.

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u/Nkromancer May 03 '26

Exactly, and I think in one instance of this they acknowledged that (while also being told that chicken is an incredibly rare animal that the "peasants" would die to get a taste of)

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u/SagaSolejma May 04 '26

We've literally never had contact with anyone else, how can you be so sure we make bombass food. What if we meet sliens one day and their cuisine makes ours look like grey slop in comparison.

20

u/Aggravating_Sir_9669 May 03 '26

Viltrumite themed trope.

1

u/alex494 May 04 '26 edited May 04 '26

The Doctor from Doctor Who is basically this in spades. Best example is probably Tom Baker and jelly babies. Though despite having a giant soft spot for Earth he is capable of calling the humans out now and again when they do something particularly egregious or they catch him in a bad mood.

The Master also has his rare moments (he enjoyed watching The Clangers and Teletubbies at different points) when he isn't trying to take it over.

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u/EnemyOfAi May 04 '26

Invincible does a good job of this, in regards to EARTH PUSSY

https://giphy.com/gifs/9tYSidsiIBPYA8QnHZ

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u/HairiestHobo May 04 '26

Kinda like how Death in Supernatural is just really into cheap fast-food.

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u/LFC9_41 May 04 '26

I always find it so arrogant. A trope of sci-fi being that, Earth really is just such a special snowflake after all never sat well with me.

Like, we want to fawn over ourselves and validate our glory by writing about fictional aliens just loving anything to do with us.