Basic Trope: A character represents himself/herself in court.
- Straight: Bob is charged with Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking. He can't afford an attorney, but refuses the one the court appointed for him, and represents himself.
- Exaggerated: Bob not only wins the case, but decides to go to law school afterwards.
- Downplayed:
- Alice and Bob are getting a divorce, but it's a pretty amicable one, so they decide to negotiate the terms of their divorce without hiring an attorney or going through court.
- Bob has attorneys, but counts himself as part of his legal team, and actively participates in the trial.
- Justified:
- The country Bob faces charges in has no provision for a court-appointed attorney if the defendant can't afford to hire one. This applies to Bob.
- Bob doesn't like the attorney the court picked out, or doesn't trust one he didn't even choose.
- Bob is a lawyer who has legal expertise relevant to the case at hand.
- Bob doesn't trust any lawyers.
- It's a civil case, and Bob is settling out of court.
- Alice and Bob are going through an amicable divorce, and they are able to divide up their assets, debts, children, and pets fairly without having a Divorce Assets Conflict or hiring attorneys.
- Bob is overconfident and stupid.
- Bob files a Frivolous Lawsuit. It's so ridiculous that no lawyer wants to touch it.
- Bob lives in a People's Republic of Tyranny. As he's been deemed an enemy of the state, the Kangaroo Court won't even let him have an attorney.
- Inverted:
- Bob hires a lawyer to give a speech that Bob himself was supposed to give.
- Due to the vastly differing social norms, hiring a lawyer to represent yourself in court unless not legally competent in the first place is considered incredibly dumb.
- Bob prosecutes himself.
- Bob sues himself.
- Subverted: Bob is sitting alone at the defense table, when an attorney walks in and apologizes for being late.
- Double Subverted: The Judge then admonishes the attorney for stepping into the wrong courtroom.
- Parodied:
- Bob ends up running a law firm out of his garage, despite never having actually been to law school.
- Bob acts as the jury and judge, too. Bizarrely enough, he still gets convicted.
- Zig Zagged:
- Bob just can't decide whether he wants to represent himself on court or have his lawyer do it during the trial.
- After Bob sues Alice, he goes through multiple attorneys during the pre-trial phrase, sometimes writing legal motions all by himself.
- Averted:
- Bob hires an actual attorney (not related to or friends with him in any way) to represent him in court.
- No trials or other legal proceedings take place in the work.
- Enforced: Hollywood Law
- Lampshaded:Bob: I'd like to represent myself, Your Honor.
Judge: Are you sure about that? - Invoked: Bob doesn't like the lawyer the court chose because he feels that she's too sexy to be taken seriously.
- Exploited: Bob is hoping the jury and/or judge will go easier on him, being that he's doing this all himself and knows nothing about law.
- Defied:
- Bob accepts the court-appointed lawyer.
- The court denies Bob's request to represent himself, forcing him to either hire an attorney or accept the court-appointed lawyer.
- Discussed: "I hope you're not thinking about representing yourself, Bob."
- Conversed: "Representing yourself: yes, you can, but no you shouldn't."
- Implied: The trial isn't shown, as the camera cuts to other events right before it begins, but Bob is shown alone at the defense table, so it can be surmised that he will represent himself.
- Deconstructed:
- Bob's incompetence loses him the case.
- Bob argues his case reasonably well, but is not taken seriously because he is not a legal professional.
- Bob fails to defend himself in court, because the legal system is such a bureaucratic nightmare that only a professional who spent decades studying it can possibly understand and navigate any of it.
- Reconstructed:
- Bob only lost because he was guilty. The innocent Alice tries this and wins her case.
- The judge proves to be a Reasonable Authority Figure who ensures that Bob is taken seriously whenever he makes valid points, and advises him within reason of being impartial so he understands what resources and limitations he has for arguing his case.
- Played For Laughs: Bob acts like a pastiche of courtroom antics to the exasperation of everyone. Despite getting held for contempt several times he is acquitted - when even a first year law student could have had it dismissed by pointing out the statue of limitations expired.
- Played For Drama:
- Bob's representation of himself just shows how his growing martyr complex is getting out of control and will end only in suffering.
- The court-appointed attorney Bob is given is blatantly on the real killer's payroll and intends to throw the case. Bob representing himself is treated as a move of absolute desperation, signifying how screwed he is.
- Both parties in a lawsuit represent themselves because It's Personal. The case is the culmination of a series of quarrels between both sides, and their choice to personally face off in court instead of hiring attorneys shows just how much they hate each other's guts.
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