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First introduced in the Johan and Peewit story "La flûte à six trous", literally meaning "The Flute with Six Holes", published in 1958, les Schtroumpfs... er, the Smurfs weren't officially seen right away. The artisans of the six-holed flute wouldn't be announced until more than midway through the story.

Their creator Pierre "Peyo" Culliford wanted these humanoid little blue elves be mysterious by having them shadow Johan and Pirlouit... that is, Peewit throughout the tale's beginning by showing their shrouded eyes in some panels or a five-fingered blue hand reaching out from behind some leaves in another. It wasn't until wizard Homnibus sends both knight and his squire to the Cursed Land where the Smurfs live via "hypnokinesis" are we introduced to said creatures.

Just as introducing the troublesome Peewit proved to be an excellent contrast to the somber and serious Johan before them, the Smurfs were a huge success delivered in a small package where popular demands had them appearing in the next Johan and Peewit adventure titled "La Guerre des sept fontaines", "War of the Seven Springs" in English, published in 1959.

Recently made Editor-in-Chief Yvan Delporte recognized the diminutive stature of the Smurfs made them perfect stars to fit in the mini-récits (short stories) that gave readers fully contained forty-eight page story in a postcard sized comic in the pages of Spirou. After Spirou publisher Charles Dupuis approached Peyo with the idea, Peyo agreed and, on the condition Delporte helped him write the comic, the Smurfs' first comic "Les Schtroumpfs noirs" was introduced the same year, the story helping establish the basic setting and some of the original characters that would become the staples of the series.note 

By 1963, The Smurfs graduated from supplementary mini-comics to the prestigious pages of Spirou. Starting with "Le Schtroumpf Volant", which is "The Smurfnapper" in English, the Smurfs' adventures expanded from postcard-sized mini-récits to the more traditional A4 single-fold-sized comics roughly 8.5×11 inches found in the page of Spirou magazines. Meaning since the size of the pages increased, more panels could fit on a page, reducing the page count for each individual story, so more stories were required to fill each individual book, eventually the pages expanded to forty. As with Johan and Peewit, the adventures became serialized over a string of weekly issues. Having the longer format meant character development along with emergence of numerous Smurfs from what had been relative anonymity in the blue masses of identical Smurfs.

Not only did the first book "Les Schtroumpfs noirs" feature three tales, but the story "Le Voleur des Schtroumpfs" introduces the villainous Gargamel and his cat Azrael, making them the Smurfs' main and only adversary. It wasn't until 1966 that another character was introduced: la Schtroumpfette, though she wouldn't officially become a main character until later on. Despite Bigmouth's only sole appearance in "La Soupe aux Schtroumpfs" ("Smurf Soup" in English), other new characters wouldn't be introduced until "Le Bébé Schtroumpf", in which Baby Smurf becomes an official main comic book character in 1984. Four years later sees the introduction of the Smurflings (Nat, Snappy, Slouchy and Sassette) in "Les P'tits Schtroumpfs".

"Le Schtroumpf Financier", "The Finance Smurf" in English, was the last album published on the first of January by the Smurfs' creator, as Pierre "Peyo" Culliford died of cardiac arrest on Christmas Eve 1992. Despite the loss of the Smurfs' true Papa Smurf, the Smurfs continued to live on thanks in large part to the Culliford family's efforts. While International Merchandizing, Promotion & Services — a company founded in 1984 by Peyo's daughter Véronique Culliford — continues to license the property throughout the world, Peyo's son Thierry Culliford continues his father's work by continuing having the Smurfs appear in new comics produced by Cartoon Creations, formally called Peyo Studios and distributed by Le Lombard with other artists drawing the characters.

Now has a shout out page.


Frequent tropes:

  • 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".
  • Adaptation Amalgamation: The comic book adaptation of "The Smurflings" combines the plot of both the original cartoon version of the episode and its companion episode "Sassette" into one story.
  • Aesop Amnesia: The Smurfs are not getting along again and fight. They should have learned. Papa Smurf decides to use magic again by creating an enemy for them to unite against. It ends up creating a menace worse than expected. He should have learned!!
  • Agitated Item Stomping: Smurfette in "The Reporter Smurf" stomps her blue dress to death when Reporter catches wind of the dress she planned to surprise her fellow Smurfs with from outside Tailor's shop and leaks the information to the press.
  • A.I. Is a Crapshoot: In the album "You Don't Smurf Progress!", the Smurfs create robots that do their chores, but these eventually rebel. Though in this case only one robot becomes sentient and it then reprogrammed every other one to obey him.
  • Alas, Poor Villain: King Smurf doesn't die, but when all the blame on the disaster that befallen the village falls on him, he just bows his head in shame and sets out to repair all the damage he did. The others join in and the village starts to recover from the civil war.
  • All That Glitters: The comic book story "The Little Tree" has Timber and an elf named Vini search for a legendary golden tree that produces golden pinecones in order to help pay off Gargamel's debt before sundown or else he would threaten to burn the elf's sister, who was turned into a tree. Upon reaching the island where the tree is located, though, Timber and Vini discover that the pinecones are just ordinary ones reflecting sunlight and the tree that produced them is an ordinary tree. With some quick thinking, Timber gets Painter to bring a can of gold paint, then they dip the pinecones into them to make them appear golden, and later hand them off to Gargamel, who after bringing them to the bailiff to pay off the debt finds out that they are just painted pinecones.
  • And Then What?: In "The Egg And The Smurfs", the Smurfs found an egg which gave them as many wishes as they liked. One Smurf wishes for riches and gets a lot of jewels. At first he's happy, but then another Smurf asks what he's gonna do with them. He has no answer.
  • Animal Stampede: "The Wild Smurf" begins with one through the Smurf Village, which is a prelude to the fact that the Smurf Forest is on fire.
  • Anthropomorphic Food: "Salad Smurfs" is a comic book story about the Smurfs turning into anthropomorphic vegetables.
  • Arrowgram: The Gray Smurfs sent arrowgrams to the Smurfs prior to attacking them, hoping that they would surrender, in the comic book story "The Smurf Menace". Unfortunately, Papa Smurf's response leads to a war with the Gray Smurfs.
  • 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.
    • In the first Smurf books, the Smurfs were very often depicted with Black Bead Eyes. Now, they very nearly always have their full black-on-white eyes.
    • Their head shapes also changed. In the early era, their heads were quite wide compared to the rest of their bodies; the later books have their heads narrowed down.
    • Gargamel and Azrael also looked different when they debuted in the 60s until their redesign in the 80s.
  • Ascended Meme: A common meme among Smurf haters is to present Papa Smurf as a fascist or communist dictator. In the story "The Reporter Smurf", Reporter accuses Papa Smurf of being a dictator through his newspaper when Papa Smurf warns him to stop going after Smurfette with his "exclusives".
  • Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Gargamel attempts this near the end of "The Smurfnapper" when he drinks a potion that he thinks will grow him into a giant. However, because the Smurfs switch the contents of the potions in the bottles, Gargamel instead shrinks until he is no more than Smurf-size.
  • Attractive Bent-Gender: Completely averted when Jokey Smurf tries to impersonate Smurfette and asks for a date with another male Smurf. He gets severely beaten up and acts surprised because he thought his disguise was perfect.
  • Autocannibalism: In the comic book story "The Hungry Smurfs", one of the Smurfs wishes that he was still a sausage so that he could eat parts of himself during a village famine in winter.
  • Balcony Wooing Scene: The cover of the Random House-published book "Romeo And Smurfette" features a Smurf wooing Smurfette while she stands on a low balcony of her house.
  • Banana Peel: Used in a comic book story about Baby Smurf's paper dolls, who play that trick on a hapless Greedy Smurf carrying a dessert with him.
  • Bankruptcy Barrel: Brainy Smurf in "The Gambler Smurfs".
    • Also used in the title illustration of "The Finance Smurf", although it never happens in the story itself.
  • Bait-and-Switch Suicide: One strip has the Smurfette refuse a Smurf's advances. The Smurf then goes out of the village pulling a rope behind him, finds a tree, and throws the rope over a branch... The horrified Smurfette appears desperately running towards the Smurf, who... turns out to have made a rope swing, and tells the Smurfette that she can go make her own since she didn't want to play with him.
  • Battle Discretion Shot: In the comic book story "The Smurf Menace", Hefty gets into a fight with three Gray Smurfs who have stolen food from the Smurfs, and while only the two Smurfs following Hefty get to see the fight that we don't, we do get to see Hefty shaking his fist at the badly-wounded Gray Smurfs running back to their village.
    • "Salad Smurfs" teases us with this, as in one panel Papa Smurf sees a cloudy skull wearing a Smurf-style chef's hat, indicating that the Smurfs were ganging up on and beating Chef Smurf to a pulp, protesting Chef's recent spell of bad cooking, but when Papa Smurf enters the kitchen, Chef Smurf looks like the only thing that was harmed was his pride.
  • Beach Episode: "The Smurfs' Vacation" and "Bathing Smurfs" are two examples of this.
  • Bears Are Bad News: Gargamel deals with a bear chasing him through the forest in "Bathing Smurfs", which leads to his accidentally finding the Smurf Village. He later encounters the same bear who eats up his Trail of Bread Crumbs (cherries that he left so he could find his way back to the Smurf Village) and gets into a fight with it, getting bruised in the process.
  • Beastly Bloodsports: Parodied in a one-page gag, where the Smurfs gather around a coliseum to see Lazy Smurf engage in a bullfight, only to reveal that the "wild beast" he was taming was actually a snail.
  • 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 he is sleeping in Papa Smurf's bed.
  • Bedsheet Ladder: In the comic book story "The Smurf Menace", Papa Smurf, Hefty, and Jokey escape their imprisonment inside the Gray Smurf prison camp by making a ladder using torn pieces of Smurf pants...leaving the hapless victims with a Censor Shadow.
  • The Bet: In the comic book story "The Gambler Smurfs", the Smurfs have Gargamel make a bet with the earl of Aubenas that he would best the earl's knights in a contest of skill so that the earl would not cut down the forest that Gargamel and the Smurfs live in, with Gargamel offering to be a jester to the earl for three years if he lost the bet.
  • Big Eater: Greedy Smurf, of course. In "The Jewel Smurfer", a human cook looks in dismay as he keeps on eating piles of food, and wonders where he finds the room to put all this.
  • 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.
  • Big "SHUT UP!":
    • The Duke of Abelagot in "The Jewel Smurfer" interrupts the play the Smurfs put on by suddenly pounding on the table and saying "ENOUGH!" when he realizes that the story of the play is revealing something too close to home.
    • Papa Smurf yells the same thing in the comic book adaptation of "The Smurflings" when the music that the Smurfs are practicing in the orchestra is too loud.
  • Blank Book: The Book That Tells Everything in the comic book story "The Smurfs And The Book That Tells Everything" is initially blank except for the page numbers. However, when the reader of the book asks it a question, the book will cause the answer to the question to appear only on that selected page.
  • Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: New Smurfette (Blonde), original Smurfette (Brunette) and Sassette (Redhead). Alternately, Smurfette (Blonde), Gray Smurfette (Brunette), and Sassette (Redhead).
  • Book Burning: The Gray Smurfs in the comic book story "The Smurf Menace" burn all of Papa Smurf's spell books in order to keep him from finding the spell to make the Gray Smurfs vanish.
  • Bottomless Bladder: The comic book story "Bathing Smurfs" has Handy build an outhouse near his house by the lake, in case anyone was wondering about a Smurf's personal physical habits.
  • Bowel-Breaking Bricks: It's simply the main function of the waste disposal robot in the comic book story "You Don't Smurf Progress": he eats garbage and he turns them into bricks which he ejects from his rear hatch. Surprisingly, he doesn't poop bricks when he sees that the queen companion Handy Smurf made for him when he became King Trash fell apart and a swarm of termites came out of her.
  • Brown Bag Mask: Vanity Smurf uses a shopping bag mask in "The Smurfs and The Book That Tells Everything" when the face cream he created and used from the titular book ended up giving him spots on his face.
  • Buffy Speak:
    • Papa tries to solve the language issue that caused the conflict in "Smurf Vs. Smurf" by declaring that nobody can use any more compound words. This becomes the result.
    • This dialogue between Papa Smurf and a nameless watchtower Smurf in "The Smurf Menace".
    Watchtower Smurf: They're everywhere. The village is surrounded. They're armed to the smurfs. They even have things...you know, machines.
    Papa Smurf: Machines?
    Watchtower Smurf: Why, yes, you know... to smurf stones.
    Papa Smurf: To smurf stones? (Rock comes flying and strikes the base of the watchtower.) Catapults!
    Watchtower Smurf: (finger raised up from the wreckage.) That's it! Catapults!
  • The Bus Came Back: Fafnir, the dragon from Johan and Peewit makes a surprise return and need the Smurfs' help.
  • But Now I Must Go: At the end of "The Smurfette", she decides to leave the village after seeing how her presence keeps making everyone else fight.
  • Cannot Keep a Secret: In "The Astro Smurf", the title character tells one inquisitive Smurf about the spaceship he's intending to build and warns him to keep it a secret. However, that Smurf ends up telling another Smurf, and soon enough the whole village knows about it!
  • Cannot Tell a Joke: In her first appearance, the Smurfette completely botches the joke she's telling. That does not prevent all the Smurfs to find it hilarious, since she's a blonde bombshell by that point.
  • Captain Ersatz: Jeanty of "A Child Among The Smurfs" might have become this for Scruple from the cartoon show, in being a bratty child that becomes Gargamel's apprentice, but he ended up having a change of heart by the end of the story.
  • Carrying a Cake: A one-page gag has Jokey stumbling to keep a pie intact as he carries it over to his recipient so that he could splatter his face with it.
  • Censor Shadow: Used in the comic book story "The Smurf Menace" depicting the Smurfs who gave up their...uh, pants to create a Bedsheet Ladder for Papa Smurf, Jokey, and Hefty to escape the Gray Smurfs prison camp.
  • Cheaters Never Prosper: In "The Easter Smurfs", Brainy finds an egg and plans to give it to Papa... but when he sees that Baker's making a sugar egg, assumes that Papa will like that better and switches them. Long story short, he would've been better sticking with his original gift.
  • Chew-Out Fake-Out: In "The Smurf Menace", Papa Smurf chews out Hefty for picking a fight with the Gray Smurfs after specifically telling his little Smurfs not to use violence against them in any of their dealings. Afterward, though, Papa Smurf smiles, as Hefty's willingness to go against Papa Smurf's orders for the sake of sticking up for his fellow Smurfs has produced the result of the Smurfs being united together again.
  • Child Hater: Grouchy Smurf is made out to be this in the story "The Smurflings"...not that Snappy Smurfling was any help by preemptively commenting "I hate grownup Smurfs" before Grouchy could even say anything.
    • And yet he was the opposite of this in "The Baby Smurf", where he kidnaps Baby Smurf because he has grown attached to him and doesn't want him to be taken away again by the stork.
  • Chimney Entry: In a one-page gag story, as the Smurfs are all getting excited over the presents they received from Santa, Chilly Smurf ponders why he received a pair of Santa pants with a hole burned in the seat while standing next to a roaring fireplace.
  • Compelling Voice: Attempted and failed in "The Smurfs' Apprentice" when a gag formula that Alchemist Smurf mixed up makes him believe he can compel his fellow Smurfs to do his bidding simply by command. He found that out the hard way when he tried this on Papa Smurf.
  • Continuity Nod: Several.
    • "The Fake Smurf" references "The Smurfnapper" as Gargamel's motivation for revenge against the Smurfs.
    • "The Egg And The Smurfs" references "The Black Smurfs" as how Grouchy became what he is.
    • In "The Olympic Smurfs", the Smurfs try to decide on the reward for the winner of the games. When they think of a medal, they answer "King Smurf has already given us one!"
    • "The Finance Smurf" is referenced in a few later works by Studio Peyo.
    • "Salad Smurfs" has the Aerosmurf from the story of the same name, plus a few other items from previous stories that were stored away.
      • And "The Aerosmurf" has the Howlibird appearing in it as a cameo.
    • The phony disease that the Smurfs tricked Gargamel with in "The Reporter Smurfs" is mentioned by Gargamel in "The Gambler Smurfs".
  • Cool Old Guy: Papa Smurf is often the one who has to leap into action when some danger is involved, usually because the other smurfs are too afraid to; like dealing by with the howlibird all by himself.
  • Costume-Test Montage: In the comic book story "The Reporter Smurf", Reporter goes through panels trying on different costumes created by Tailor Smurf in order to find something appropriate to wear so he can stand out as a reporter Smurf.
  • Cross Counter: In the comic book version of "The Hundredth Smurf", Vanity and his Mirror Self duplicate both throw their fists at each other...and end up hurting each other's fists when they connect since they were in mirror sync with each other.
  • 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.
  • Democracy Is Flawed: When Papa Smurf is away, the Smurfs argue who should be the new leader. In the first round of voting, everyone votes for himself. The second round ends with a Smurf elected (by making empty promises) who installs a monarchy with himself as the king.
  • Den of Iniquity: A very family-friendly version of this appears in "The Gambler Smurfs", as Papa Smurf discovers that the Smurfs have set up a private gambling room in the village.
  • 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.
  • Didn't Think This Through: Gargamel turned himself into a Smurf so he can infiltrate them. Except, Azrael comes in the room and think he's breakfast. After escaping Azrael, Gargamel forgot that he doesn't know where the Smurf village is.
  • Dirty Cop: Brainy and Hefty in "The Smurfs Of Order".
  • Distaff Counterpart: The Smurf Girls, whom the Smurfs meet in the comic book story based on the film Smurfs: The Lost Village.
  • Distracted by the Sexy: Smurfette elicits this kind of response from her fellow Smurfs, as seen on the cover of the children's book Meet Smurfette.
  • Doppelganger Link: In "The Hundredth Smurf", Vanity Smurf had a mirror duplicate with whom he had synchronized movements.
  • Dragged Off to Hell: Gargamel gets dragged off to hell by Beelzebub to fulfill his end of the Deal with the Devil in "Sagratamabarb".
  • Driven to Suicide: Papa briefly fears that the reason "The Smurfette" hasn't been answering her door is that this has happened. While it hasn't, when he breaks in and finds her, she cries that she wants to die, and this is after she's been subject to a lot of You Are Fat jokes.
  • Early Installment Character-Design Difference: When the Smurfs originally appeared, they had very pointy hats that were only slightly curved at the top, making them look like classical fairy tale gnomes. Quickly, their hats curved until they became the shape we know today.
  • Empty Swimming Pool Dive: Hefty in the comic book story "The Smurf Menace" makes a masterful dive into an empty river bed. A few Smurfs also make empty swimming pool dives in "The Smurf Garden" when Gargamel designs it to drain all the water from the pool and trap the Smurfs in it.
  • Enemy Mine: Gargamel reluctantly works together with the Smurfs to save their forest in "The Gambler Smurfs".
  • Enfant Terrible: The so-non-aptly-named Jeantil (which sounds like "gentil", meaning "considerate").
  • Epic Flail: When the rebels led an assault against King Smurf, one Smurf was carrying a flail, although the metal ball had no spikes. No one was seen getting hit by it.
  • Everyone Loves Blondes: Smurfette originally had black hair, and was regarded as unattractive. Papa Smurf's Magic Plastic Surgery turned her a blonde, and every Smurf instantly fell in love with her.
  • Evil Twin: The Smurfs deal with evil duplicates of themselves in "The Smurf Menace" that were created by Papa Smurf to get the Smurfs to stop fighting with each other.
    • Inverted in one story where the Smurfs meet Gargamel's good twin brother Gourmelin.
  • Eyes Always Shut: The nameless Thief of Abelagot from "The Jewel Smurfer".
  • The Faceless: The stork has wrongly delivered a Baby Smurf to the Smurf village. To whom was Baby originally meant to, then? Other Smurfs? Who are they?
  • Face Palm: Papa Smurf does this a few times in "Bathing Smurfs".
  • Fainting: Smurfette faints from overworking in "Doctor Smurf".
  • False Friend: In "The Jewel Smurfer", Ganelon is revealed to be this to the duke of Abelagot, having kidnapped the duke's son and held him hostage to extort a ransom from the duke. The Smurfs know about this and put on a Show Within a Show to expose Ganelon as a traitor.
  • Feminine Women Can Cook: "The Smurfette" shows that she's a good cook even before her makeover. Unfortunately, she gets distracted while talking to Vanity and lets the soup burn before most of the Smurfs get to taste it.
  • Fictional Holiday: The Imitate Festival in a one-page gag, where each Smurf must imitate another Smurf for a full day. However, Papa Smurf isn't pleased that Jokey would choose to imitate him.
  • Fishing for Sole: In the comic book story "You Don't Smurf Progress", a Smurf who is using one of Handy's robot servants to go fishing ends up catching an old sock and other bits of junk from the river.
  • Floating in a Bubble: One of Flying Smurf's methods for attempting flight in the story "The Flying Smurf" involved being blown up inside a bubble which floated in the air until a passing bird popped it and sent him falling down, crashing through the roof of a Smurf house.
  • Floorboard Failure: In "The Smurfs' Vacation", Papa Smurf notices that the floorboard in one of the changing huts he and his little Smurfs were trapped inside was weak, and so he and another Smurf dig a hole through the floor to get outside the hut.
  • Flower from the Mountaintop: In the comic book version of "The Astro Smurf", one of Astro's challenges to become a Swoof is to get an edelweiss flower from the top of a mountain before sundown, and given that this task takes place around sundown, this gives Astro very little time to accomplish it. After being unable to climb up the mountain, Astro sees a stork and uses it to complete the challenge in record time.
  • Flower-Pot Drop: In the comic book story "The Reporter Smurf", a Smurf reading the village newspaper wonders if he's a Taurus when the horoscope of the day for Taurus reads "beware of falling objects", and soon enough he gets bonked in the head by a flower pot, with his fellow Smurf confirming that he's a Taurus.
  • Force Feeding: In the comic book version of "The Astro Smurf", Papa Smurf force-feeds the title character with the sleeping potion to keep him asleep.
  • For Halloween, I Am Going as Myself: In a one-page gag, all the Smurfs attend a costume party dressed as Papa Smurf, except for one Smurf, who seems to be dressed as himself. The catch? The ordinary Smurf is actually Papa Smurf wearing a costume.
  • Fork Fencing: In the comic book adaptation of "The Clockwork Smurf", both Clockworks fight each other with silverware — the fake Clockwork with a fork and knife, and the real Clockwork with a spoon.
  • Freudian Slip: Brainy referring to Papa Smurf as "Papa Pea" (at least that's how it's translated) after he got transformed into a pea in "Salad Smurfs".
  • Friend-or-Idol Decision: Near the end of "The Smurfs And The Book That Tells Everything", Brainy is trapped on a rock in the middle of a flooded river with Baby Smurf and the titular book and he is forced to choose either to save Baby or the book in order to swim across to safety. The book tells Brainy since that it's more important, he should sacrifice Baby. Brainy thinks that the book is a monster and so throws the book into the water and swims to safety with Baby.
  • Frothy Mugs of Water: Averted. Gargamel and Azrael were bottle partners, and the Smurfs themselves were fond of drinking alcohol:
    • The Smurfs tried to find water using a dowsing stick. It led them to a liquid in the ground that made them drunk; it was because they unintentionally dug inside Papa Smurf's underground barrel of alcoholic raspberry juice.
    • A Smurf found a strange bottle at Papa Smurf's lab that contained alcoholic raspberry juice, so Papa Smurf has to invent a wacky story of an evil genie trapped inside a bottle to prevent him from opening it.
    • In "Bathing Smurfs", a Smurf appears to be getting drunk on berry juice.
  • Gag Series: One album, "Smurf Stories", was an anthology of one-page humor stories. The concept was then reused in a spinoff series called "Schtroumpferies" (Smurferies), all short comedy stories.
  • Garbage Hideout: In "The Reporter Smurf", the titular character hides himself in a garbage barrel while spying on Smurfette in order to get the story on who her "secret lover" is. Of course, he didn't know that the barrel he was hiding in was used for garbage until another Smurf dumped some trash into it while he was still inside!
  • Garden Garment: Wild Smurf in the titular story of the same name starts off wearing a Smurf hat made of leaves and a bush covering his male parts. Near the end of the story, Gargamel disguises himself by dressing himself with a hollow tree stump that covers his male parts.
  • Giant Food: The comic book story "Salad Smurfs" had Farmer Smurf grow really big vegetables from his garden when Chef Smurf forced him (due to threats from other Smurfs) to use more of Papa Smurf's fungicide and fertilizer than was necessary. Unfortunately, it had the side effect of turning the Smurfs who ate the vegetables into Anthropomorphic Food.
  • Giving Someone the Pointer Finger: Hefty Smurf jabs his pointer finger into the chest of the character of King Smurf in protest of the latter character's demand for respect at all times in the comic book version of "King Smurf".
  • Going Commando: Mostly with the male Smurfs, as they are shown to not have any underwear when putting on or taking off their pants.
  • Gold-Colored Superiority: To make himself stand out as the Smurf above all others, King Smurf from the story of the same name (and its Animated Adaptation) wore a Smurf suit made entirely of gold.
  • The Golden Rule: Quoted by Brainy near the end of the story "King Smurf" when he and his fellow Smurfs decide to help King Smurf clean and fix up the village.
  • Gold Makes Everything Shiny: The title character of "King Smurf" shows off his shiny new gold outfit, which everybody else sees as yellow.
  • Gone Horribly Right:
    • After "The Smurfette" is tricked by the other Smurfs into believing she's become hideously fat and ugly, Papa gives her Magic Plastic Surgery to help her regain her confidence. Unfortunately, this works too well, as all the Smurfs fall in love with her new look and start falling over each other trying to impress her.
    • In order to unite the warring village in "Smurf Vs. Smurf", Papa uses a spell to switch forms with Gargamel and pretends to be the sorcerer. However, after he's been captured, nobody believes that he's actually Papa.
    • In "The Smurf Menace", Papa Smurf had to create a group of evil duplicates of himself and his little Smurfs so that they could see in the duplicates what they were becoming with all their fighting among themselves. It succeeds all too well in bringing the Smurfs together when the duplicates become such a threat that they nearly destroy the village and take the original Smurfs captives. Near the end of the story, Papa Smurf spends it working on a way to make the duplicates disappear.
  • Gossip Evolution: In "The Reporter Smurf", Fisher Smurf's story about simply losing his catch of the day evolves into a story about him fighting a monster in the lake when the story gets passed around from one Smurf to another.
  • Got Volunteered:
    • Often, when Papa asks for volunteers to help with a problem, the Smurfs hem and haw until he points at some of them and tells them they're his volunteers.
    • In "King Smurf", King Smurf announces that he's looking for volunteers to build a wooden wall around the village... and those who don't volunteer will be sent to prison.
  • Graffiti of the Resistance: The comic book version of "King Smurf" has the rebel Smurfs paint graffiti all over Smurf houses that defame and denounce King Smurf, which irritates the title character to no end. It even goes so far as someone somehow putting a "Down with King Smurf" note on the back of his cape.
  • Great Big Book of Everything: The Book That Tells Everything from the comic book story "The Smurfs And The Book That Tells Everything". It's capable of answering every question and solving every problem, except that it never warns the consulter of the book the consequences of using its solutions.
  • Great Escape: In "The Smurf Menace", one of the Smurfs in the Gray Smurf prison camp makes his escape by digging a tunnel from the camp to freedom. He reaches the Smurf Village by the time the story ends and the Gray Smurfs have disappeared.
  • A Handful for an Eye: Smurfette in the story "The Great Smurfette" used pepper hidden inside her compact to blind Gargamel.
  • Holding Back the Phlebotinum: There is a magic well around the village that has the power to grant any wish. However, the Smurfs barely use it. One Smurf couldn't find a wish to make, because he thinks that they have all they need. In Smurfette's answer to a fanletter in the short-lived "Schtroumpf!" magazine, she specifies that the magic well cannot change people's personalities, so they cannot wish Gargamel into becoming nice.
  • 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.
  • How We Got Here:
    • Much of "Smurf Versus Smurf" is Papa Smurf recalling what went on the village that required him to seek out Gargamel's help.
    • Also a good part of "Salad Smurfs" is the four Smurfs telling Papa Smurf how they got to the point where the village was nearly abandoned when he returned home.
  • Human Chess: A non-villainous version appears as a one-page gag in the comic book story "Smurfery". The Smurfs used as pieces are actually happy when they are taken, as waiting on the giant chessboard between moves is incredibly boring.
  • Hoist by His Own Petard: In "Salad Smurfs", Farmer Smurf and Chef Smurf ended up being affected by the mixture of fungicide and fertilizer, and turning into vegetables. Papa Smurf decided to keep them like that for a while to "teach [them] a lesson".
  • Hypocritical Humor: During a play, Dimwitty Smurf laughs at one of the actors, calling him stupid because he forgot his lines. Brainy Smurf reminds him that it's normal, because the actor is playing Dimwitty Smurf's role.
  • Impact Silhouette: Flying Smurf after his bubble popped, through the roof of a Smurf house in "The Flying Smurf".
  • Impersonating the Evil Twin: Papa Smurf in the story "The Smurf Menace" attempts to impersonate his Evil Twin self the Great Leader after he, Jokey, and Hefty escape being imprisoned in the Gray Smurfs' prison camp in order to find the laboratory in the Gray Smurf Village and make the antidote that will cause the Gray Smurfs to disappear. The Gray Smurfs encountering Papa Smurf almost buy into the impersonation until Jokey accidentally lets slip a joke that gives them away.
  • Inopportune Impersonation Failure: In the comic "The Fake Smurf", Gargamel makes a potion to transform him into a smurf, so he'll be able to infiltrate in the Smurfs' village to kill them. His impersonation is perfect except for the absence of a tail, so he sculpts a round piece of wood, paints it blue and sticks it to his rear with glue. He deceives everyone until he falls into the river and is saved by the real Smurfs. That doesn't change his plans, but his soaked tail drops off, being found by a Smurf who shows it to Papa Smurf. With his cover blown, Gargamel locks himself into Papa Smurf's lab and concocts a potion that makes him turn back to normal... except that he is still Smurf-sized, allowing him to be easily captured.
  • I Need a Freaking Drink: Or in the case of Gargamel in "The Smurfnapper", "I need a few grains of hellebore".
    • In "The Clockwork Smurf", Gargamel heads straight for the bottle after coming in from the cold.
  • Is That Cute Kid Yours?: In the story "The Baby Smurf", the Smurfs are all wondering whose child that Baby Smurf is, and Brainy has the audacity to suggest that the child could be Smurfette's, which she rewards with throwing objects at Brainy.
  • Karma Houdini:
    • Strangely, when a Smurf violently hits Brainy Smurf over the head - often with a hammer, no less - and he says he is telling Papa Smurf, you never see the continued consequences of such a violent act.
    • Whoever threatened Chef Smurf to force Farmer Smurf to use all the fungicide and fertilizer in "Salad Smurfs" was not mentioned or accused at all.
  • "Kick Me" Prank: King Smurf in the comic book story of the same name gets "Down with King Smurf" placed on the back of his royal cape after he sees the graffiti marking up Smurf houses saying the same thing.
  • Landslide Election: In the comic book story "King Smurf", the nameless Smurf wins the election by an overwhelming majority, with his opponent Brainy Smurf only getting two votes (one of them from himself) to prove how unpopular he was with his constant nagging and moralizing.
  • Less Embarrassing Term: King Smurf's costume is not yellow but gold. Though to be fair, the suit does sparkle when he first shows it off, so it may simply be factual.
  • Lingerie Scene: Smurfette was seen in lingerie when she was abducted along with her fellow Smurfs in their nightclothes by the robot servants reprogrammed by the now-sentient waste disposal robot in the comic book story "You Don't Smurf Progress". Cue drooling male Smurfs.
  • Literal Ass-Kicking: In "The Handy Smurf", 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. With himself being ass-kicked.
  • Literary Allusion Title: "Romeos And Smurfette" (Romeo and Juliet)
  • Literal Metaphor: In a four-page comic book story about Smurfette's visit to the Smurf Village, when Smurfette tells her fellow Smurfs that she wants them to "bring her the moon," the Smurfs take to fulfilling this request rather literally — one Smurf tries to pole-vault up to the sky and grab the moon, another Smurf tries to scoop up the moon's reflection in the water with a net, a third Smurf tries with an arrow and gets another Smurf Shot in the Ass, a fourth Smurf tries to build a rocket, a fifth Smurf makes a cutout of a moon shape, and so on.
  • Live Mink Coat: In a one-page gag from "Romeo And Smurfette", one of the Smurfs tries to give what Smurfette thinks is a fur stole, only that it turns out to be a caterpillar.
  • Loincloth: Tailor Smurf made one to Wild Smurf to wear. Before that, Wild Smurf was covered with leaves.
  • Lonely at the Top: The title character of "The Finance Smurf" becomes the richest Smurf in the world near the end of the story when all the Smurfs leave behind the village along with all their money...but now with nobody to share his good fortune with, he instantly becomes sad and lonely.
  • 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 that other time where, 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.
  • The Man in the Mirror Talks Back: In a one-page gag, Brainy is so annoying with his moralizing that even his mirror's reflection knocks him over the head with a hammer to get him to stop talking.
  • Meaningless Villain Victory: While not technically a villain, the Finance Smurf from the comic book story of the same name gains the entire village after all his fellow Smurfs, including Papa Smurf, have left it behind along with all their money...only for himself to be left without anybody to share his new-found good fortune with, making him very sad and lonely. This makes Finance Smurf come to his senses and go out to find the Smurfs to tell them he's giving them back everything and abolishing the money system.
  • MockGuffin: In "The Little Tree", the golden tree that Lumberjack and Vini the elf set off to find for its legendary golden pinecones actually only produced regular pinecones. Lumberjack has Painter dip the pinecones in gold paint in order to trick Gargamel into thinking they were actually the gold pinecones they found so he would not threaten Vini's sister (an elf turned into the titular tree) with burning her to death.
  • Mocking Sing-Song: In the comic book story "Smurf Soup", Gargamel sees that Bigmouth the ogre has turned ugly because he ate the Smurf soup. The Smurfs get a little sing-songy just to taunt Gargamel into having Bigmouth physically abuse him.
    Bigmouth: You're the one who told me to eat Smurf soup!
    Gargamel: But I didn't know it would have that effect!
    Smurfs: ♪♫ Yes, he did know! Yes, he did know! ♪♫
    Bigmouth: Ha ha! I've got you! And now you're going to do that thing...that trick, like Papa Smurf says, that afterwards makes you like before!
    Gargamel: The antidote? But I don't know it!
    Smurfs: ♪♫ Yes, he does know! Yes, he does know! ♪♫
  • Modesty Towel: One Smurf got stuck wearing a towel throughout most of the comic book story "The Smurfs And The Howlibird", and when Papa Smurf has to do a bullfight with a Howlibird stripped of its feathers to wear it down, he takes that Smurf's towel to do it!
  • Monster Is a Mommy: In "The Great Smurfette", a wild boar terrorizes the village, and Smurfette, who was assigned the village leader role by Papa Smurf for a time, bravely investigates what is causing the boar to do that. She soon finds out that the boar has a piglet that has gotten into the Smurfs' storehouse, and she soon reunites the boar piglet to its mother, and they both leave happily.
  • Motor Mouth: "The Smurfette" has a problem with this in her debut; she tends to keep talking right over others without giving them any chance to get a word in.
  • Mutagenic Food: The comic book story "Salad Smurfs" had the Smurfs turning into Anthropomorphic Food from eating magically-treated giant vegetables.
  • Never Bareheaded: Although the Smurfs were sometimes shown hatless in the animated adaptation and revealed as bald, this is much more ambiguous in the comic. The bare head of a Smurf is never shown, except for Papa Smurf in "The Black Smurfs", who despite Ash Face looks bald, although that could just be because he's old.
    • In "The Jewel Smurfer", when Jokey Smurf is suggested by the humans to remove his hat for better stealth, he gets very defensive and agressively refuses.
  • Never My Fault: The title character of "The Smurfette" struggles with this concept in her debut story, blaming others for the chaos she unintentionally creates.
  • Never Trust a Hair Tonic: Gargamel's hair formula that he gave to a bald person, as mentioned by one of his inspectors from the Order Of The Sorcerers in "The Great Smurfette", gave him a full head of hair... and also a chronic case of hiccups.
  • Nobody Poops: An outhouse is hinted at in the comic book story "Bathing Smurfs", where Handy shows Painter and Poet the house he has built by a lake in the mountains.
  • Not Me This Time: When Smurfette's cake mold was punctured with holes, everyone assumed it was a prank from Jokey Smurf who denied any involvement. The one responsible was actually Handy Smurf, who wanted to impress Smurfette with his new power driller.
  • Oh Wait, This Is My Grocery List: In the comic book version of "The Astro Smurf", Harmony (or Drummer) makes an announcement that Astro Smurf's invention is ready to be unveiled, but the first thing he reads off is a recipe Greedy Smurf had given him.
  • Open Sesame: In the story "The Smurfs And The Book That Tells Everything", Brainy uses a spell given to him by the book that only allows it to be used when it hears only Brainy announcing his name.
  • 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.
    • Played straight however, when Gargamel dressed up as a fairy and managed to completely fool Harmony Smurf by giving him a cursed magical instrument.
  • The Peeping Tom: Greedy Smurf plays this role in the comic book story "You Don't Smurf Progress" when Smurfette takes a shower out in the forest and Greedy tries to get a peek, but is stopped by one of the robot servants.
  • Playing Sick: The Smurfs in "The Reporter Smurf" when Gargamel receives a bogus news article about a disease that the Smurfs are carrying that turns any human that comes into contact with them into a toad.
  • Please Put Some Clothes On: In "The Smurflings", the three boy Smurflings try to avert their eyes as much as possible after Sassette comes to life while handing her a Smurf hat and a pair of pink overalls to wear.
  • POW Camp: The Gray Smurfs set up one for the captured Smurfs in the story "The Smurf Menace".
  • Prank Date: In "Romeo And Smurfette", a Smurf is given a date invitation by who he thinks is Smurfette, so he gets all washed up, perfumed, and carrying a big bouquet of flowers out into the forest where the invitation said she would be. It turned out to be a prank played on him by Jokey who dressed himself up as Smurfette. And that Smurf was none too happy about it!
  • Prequel: The limited-edition 50th anniversary story "The Flute Smurfers" is a prequel to the Johan and Peewit story "The Smurfs And The Magic Flute", telling what the magic flute was originally made for. It should be noted, however, that the Smurf Forest in the prequel resembles the flourishing Sugar Bowl forest of the Smurf comic book series more than it does the sparse rock-filled forest of the Johan And Peewit story that chronologically follows it.
  • Product Placement: A 15-page spinoff story arc was an advertisement for the Benco breakfast chocolate powder brand.
    • It was then redrawn to replace the anthropomorphic Benco jars with the Clockwork Smurf. Yes, that is how this story first came to be. See Remix Comic.
  • Pyrrhic Victory: Gargamel's victory against his cousin in "Sagratamabarb" ends up having him live up to his end of his Deal with the Devil (quite literally).
  • Quicksand Sucks: In "The Great Smurfette", Smurfette leads the two sorcerers from The Order Of Sorcerers into a marsh to find a fictional rogue witch named Pustula, only for the sorcerers to be sunk into hidden marsh waters that act like quicksand, giving Smurfette time to escape.
  • Reasonable Authority Figure: Papa Smurf. Most of the time.
  • Red Armband of Leadership: In the story "The Smurfs Of Order", Hefty and Brainy wear blue armbands as police officers.
  • Red Eyes, Take Warning: The later books have the Smurfs having their eye pupils become red when they are very scared, angry or shocked.
    • The case with all the Gray Smurfs.
  • Remix Comic: The comic book version of "The Clockwork Smurf" was an official remixed version of a multi-part story ad that originally featured a Product Placement character.
  • Reverse Psychology: In "King Smurf", when the King and his soldiers are looking for the rebel camp, they encounter a series of signs, saying "The camp is not in this way" "Smurf back before it's too late", "No. You're on the wrong smurf" and "Beware — do not look up!" Naturally, they go that way and look up, and they end up falling into a lake.
  • Ribbon-Cutting Ceremony: Smurfette in "Bathing Smurfs" does this at the opening of the new Smurf Village getaway resort.
  • 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.
  • Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: In "The Smurf Menace", Papa Smurf orders his little Smurfs not to respond to the Gray Smurfs with violence when the Gray Smurfs ward them away from the dam with weapons during their protest of the Gray Smurfs hoarding all the water. Later on, when the Smurfs see that the Gray Smurfs were harassing them and robbing them of food that they were harvesting from the forest, Hefty decides to pick a fight with the Gray Smurfs and send them back to their village with nothing but bruises. The Smurfs applaud Hefty for his heroic act, but Papa Smurf still scolds Hefty for going against his orders... which immediately afterward he smiles, realizing that Hefty's decision to do so has resulted in his little Smurfs being united together again.
  • See You in Hell:
    • In "The Egg And The Smurfs", a Smurf gets so fed up with another Smurf being so indecisive about what to wish for with the magic egg that he tells the other Smurf "to the devil with you" while accidentally striking the egg... and that Smurf ends up meeting the devil. By the end of the story, however, when Papa Smurf wishes everything to return to normal, that Smurf returns with a pitchfork in hand. "If you knew where I came back from!"
    • In "Sagratamabarb", Gargamel tries to get rid of his titular cousin by saying, "see if the devil has any room for you." A moment later, Gargamel's cousin returns with a couple of demons as witness that the devil doesn't have any room for him.
    • In another comic book story, a Smurf makes a wish with a magic bird that he wants Gargamel to go to hell, and POOF! that's where he went.
  • 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 Smurf" where a Smurf makes a wish to become rich and ends with jewels and money as a result (though he can't actually do anything with them) 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.
    • The Smurfs are generally assumed to be vegetarians. However, one Peyo-written gag story has a Smurf intending to feed a turkey with the obvious intent to eat it.
  • Shoo Out the Clowns: After their introduction into the comic book universe, the Smurflings are hardly heard from again, mostly appearing as guest stars and cameos, while the stories mainly focus on the adult Smurfs. They do get an occasional Day in the Limelight; Sassette especially.
  • Shot in the Ass: In the comic book story "The Smurf Menace", Farmer receives an Arrowgram for Papa Smurf from the Gray Smurfs right in the behind.
  • Shower Scene: The comic book story "You Don't Smurf Progress" has Smurfette in a Shower Scene, though mostly blocked by the robot servants holding up a sheet for modesty. This doesn't stop Greedy from playing The Peeping Tom, hoping to see Smurfette naked, though the robot servants foil that attempt.
  • Show Within a Show: The Smurfs use a play in "The Jewel Smurfer" to frame not only a thief who's after the Duke of Abelagot's treasure, but also the duke's supposed friend who kidnapped his son.
    • In "Smurf Vs. Smurf", the Smurfs put on "Little Red Riding Smurf" (or "Little Red Smurfing Hood"), a play that gets beset with dialogue problems stemming from the North Smurfs and the South Smurfs all arguing over the use of the word "smurf" in compounded words and phrases (or however the language division is portrayed in non-English versions).
  • 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 a noun (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.
  • Smells Sexy: In the comic book story "The Wild Smurf", Wild briefly smells Smurfette and then suddenly has the hots for her.
  • Soap Punishment: Papa Smurf has a foul-mouthed Smurf brush his mouth with soap, but the resulting bubbles are effectively Pictorial Speech Bubbles, which contain the same Symbol Swearing he was using before.
  • Species Title: About a village of tiny blue creatures called Smurfs.
  • Spit Take: Ganelon in "The Jewel Smurfer" when he watches a play put on by the Smurfs and sees one of the Smurfs impersonating him, possibly revealing him to be a traitor to the duke of Abelagot.
  • Status Quo Is God: The Smurfs always learn that they shouldn't force in human concepts such as money, alternative medicine or even police. Many of these issues end up as being answered as "just ask Papa Smurf to sort it out".
  • Stealth Pun Insult: Brainy being turned into a pea in "Salad Smurfs". A "pea brain".
  • 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.
  • Subbing for Santa: Inverted in the story "Little Peter's Christmas", as Gargamel puts Santa Claus to sleep and dresses up as him so that he could infiltrate the Smurf Village. Some Smurfs get the real Santa awake and back on his feet to stop Gargamel as the fake Santa.
    • Another story has Gargamel begging Santa to give him presents, as he has always been denied some because he was too mean. Santa finally agrees, but only if Gargamel himself distributes the Smurfs's presents in their village, without stealing or harming any of them. Oh, and also under threat of being turned into a worm. The temptation is great for Gargamel to smurfnap, but he resists and gets his own presents by the end.
  • Suddenly Shouting: In "The Gambler Smurfs", after Gargamel agrees to team up with the Smurfs to prevent destruction of a nearby forest:
    Papa Smurf: Oh, and just one more thing... (jumps up) STOP CALLING ME "BEARDY OLD MAN"!!!
  • 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.
  • A Taste of the Lash: In "The Smurf Menace", after Papa Smurf and a few of his Smurfs were caught outside the Gray Smurf prison camp, the two Smurfs were chained up with the Great Leader threatening to give them ten lashes each. When Papa Smurf tells his little Smurfs not to worry because the Gray Smurfs aren't real and they will soon be gone, one of the Gray Smurfs gives one of the chained Smurfs a whip lash.
  • Tempting Fate: At the end of "Water Smurfs", Smurfette, who wanted to have her hair dry, finally finds a suitable place to take a nap... which turns out to be near the dam, the gates of which are about to be opened for water to flow through.
  • Termite Trouble: The termites that saved the Smurf Village from King Trash and the mechanical robot servants turned against the Smurfs in "You Don't Smurf Progress" become the new problem in the village by the book's end.
  • That Cloud Looks Like...: In a one-page gag, the characters look at the various cloud formations in the sky and are able to recognize what each of them resemble...except for the last, which takes on the form of continental Europe.
  • This Cannot Be!: Gargamel's reaction near the end of "The Smurfnapper" when he drinks what he thinks is the giant-making formula, only to instead become small because the Smurfs had switched the potions in the bottles without him knowing about it.
  • This Is No Time for Knitting: In "The Weather-Smurfing Machine", Papa Smurf, facing a Weather Control Machine gone amok, hastily makes a kite. The onlooking Smurfs comment that the old man is probably trying to cheer himself up in the dire situation, and proceed to hesitantly engage in some games themselves. Papa Smurf, meanwhile, uses the kite to bring down lightning and destroy the machine.
  • Throw the Book at Them: Brainy in "The Smurfs And The Book That Tells Everything" whacks a few Smurfs in the head with the titular book in order to get them away from him.
  • Throw the Dog a Bone: Brainy Smurf gets particularly lucky with Smurfette at the end of "The Olympic Smurfs"... though at the cost of Weakling Smurf's victory smooch from Smurfette being denied!
  • Too Dumb to Fool: King Smurf tries to fool Dopey Smurf into voting for him, but because Dopey always does the wrong thing when asked for, King Smurf insistantly asks him to vote for Brainy Smurf. Dopey Smurf repeats to himself constantly to vote for Brainy Smurf and when election day comes, Dopey actually votes for Brainy Smurf, being the only one who voted for him apart from Brainy.
  • Trail of Bread Crumbs: In the comic book story "Bathing Smurfs", the Smurfs trick Gargamel into leaving his camping area near the Smurf Village by saying that his house is on fire, and then set up a bonfire behind the house to make it look like the house was on fire. Gargamel tries to one-up on the Smurfs by leaving a trail of cherries behind him so that he can find his way back to the camping spot, but on his return, he sees that a bear is scooping up the cherries and eating them.
  • Trash the Set: The Smurf Village getaway resort is completely trashed by beavers at the end of "Bathing Smurfs".
  • Trojan Horse: Of a sort in "You Don't Smurf Progress", when Handy builds a female robot companion for King Trash, but fills it with termites which end up eating their way out of her and proceed to destroy the other robot servants under King Trash's control.
  • Turned Against Their Masters: The robot servants in "You Don't Smurf Progress".
  • Uncanny Family Resemblance: Gargamel's cousin Barbapapa. Lampshaded when Brainy sees him for the first time and panics, thinking it's the evil sorcerer. Also done with Gargamel's other cousin Sagratamabarb. And also three nephews of his who look like tiny clones of him, balding included!
  • Vetinari Job Security: In "Bathing Smurfs", the Smurfs that are left behind in the Smurf Village try to take care of important village tasks while several Smurfs are away at the vacation resort, only for Potter to fail at Baker's job of baking bread and another Smurf to fail at Farmer's job of delivering fresh vegetables to Chef Smurf.
  • Watching Troy Burn: In "The Smurf Menace", the original Smurfs watched helplessly while being carried off in chains as the Gray Smurfs burned the Smurf Village to the ground.
  • We Are Not Going Through That Again: Played with: in the comic book story "The Astro Smurf", one of the Smurfs dreams of travelling to outer space in a spaceship he builds. Not wanting to disappoint him, Papa Smurf concocts a convoluted plan to drug him and make him thinks he's travelled to another planet populated by Smurflike humanoids called Swoofs. So convoluted, in fact, that when Astrosmurf "returns" (after drinking a similarly drugged beverage given to him by the Swoofs), a different Smurf contemplates making his own spaceship to go into space, only to be overridden by other Smurfs, who practically yell the trope name at him.
  • 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.
  • Weight Woe: "The Smurfette" suffers from this after Jokey leads the others in a vicious series of pranks tricking her into thinking she's gained lots of weight.
  • Who's Your Daddy?: The issue of paternity shows up in the story "The Baby Smurf", despite the fact that the child came by Delivery Stork.
  • Wind-Up Key: Flying Smurf's Aerosmurf from the story of the same name requires a wind-up key to keep its motor functioning. As he and Smurfette are being chased by Gargamel, the motor of the Aerosmurf gives out, and Flying has to use the key to get the motor running again before he and Smurfette crash-land.
  • Word, Schmord!: In the original English translation of the comic book story "King Smurf", Papa Smurf returns and sees his little Smurfs in the final battle with King Smurf ready to let him have it and stops the fight, asking what's going on. They turn and innocently ask if he's got the euphorbium that he left the village for, and he replies "euphorbium smurfphorbium".
    • In the Papercutz translation of "A Smurfing Party", a Smurf accompanying Brainy into the forest replies with "Smurf schmurf" and "Gargamel schmargamel".
  • 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. The gold coins ends up being melted and reforged into musical instruments at the story's end.
  • You Are Fat: Although she's about the same size physically as her fellow Smurfs, Smurfette prior to her extreme makeover in the comic book version of "The Smurfette" was the target of some fat jokes, including having a fun-house mirror installed that made her think that she turned fat. This eventually led to her perceived Driven to Suicide moment and the makeover that Papa Smurf gave her in the story.
  • You Didn't Ask: The Smurfs aren't aware that "The Smurfette" was created by Gargamel until she casually mentions it.
  • Your Size May Vary: The artists sometimes forget that the Smurfs are NOT human-sized; they would draw plants and animals small enough to be in proportion with the Smurfs. This is quite egregious in cases like the Smurf Fire Brigade episode, where a warthog is depicted as smaller than a Smurf.
  • Your Tomcat Is Pregnant: Gender inverted in "The Egg And The Smurfs", when a Smurf raises up a chick that hatches from the magic egg, thinking that it will grow up to be a hen that will lay magic eggs. To his sad surprise, it grows up to be a rooster.
  • Zombie Apocalypse: The first comic book, "The Black Smurfs", has the Smurfs contaminated by a disease that turns them black (purple in subsequent adaptations), perpetually angry and hoping around saying "GNAP" while attempting to bite healthy Smurfs, which transmits the disease. They even shuffle around purposelessly once the last healthy Smurf has been contaminated. It does not stick, of course.

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