Basic Trope: A character's parents treat them badly.
- Straight: Carl's parents, Alice and Bob, "forget" to feed him and yell at him for everything.
- Exaggerated:
- Alice and Bob's ancestors and gods were horrible people.
- Alice and Bob take turns beating Carl and they enjoy it.
- Alice and Bob lock Carl in a basement, starve him for several days, and try to frame him up for crimes he never did.
- Alice and Bob kill Carl.
- Alice and Bob lock Carl in the basement and take away the stairs... because he is grounded!
- Alice and Bob partake in Parental Incest with Carl.
- Alice and Bob are the main antagonists.
- Alice and Bob put Carl in Saw-like traps every day just for their evil amusement.
- Alice and Bob have healing powers, and exploit them so they can repeatedly beat Carl to death and then revive him with no traces of injury on his body.
- Downplayed:
- Alice and Bob are only abusive to Carl on certain occasions, but they are nice to him most of the time.
- Alice and Bob constantly neglect Carl, but they are always nice to him when they're around.
- Alice and Bob love Carl but are very strict and don't know how to discipline a child appropriately.
- Justified:
- Social Services Does Not Exist in this world.
- Alice and Bob suffer from a mental disorder that hinders them from treating Carl normally and being patient and nice with him.
- Carl has a mental disorder that twists the way he sees Alice and Bob. To him, even innocent remarks can feel like crushing criticism.
- Alice and Bob were abused by their parents when they were children so they take all their anger out on Carl.
- Alice and Bob are Child Haters. They gave birth to Carl for the sole purpose of making him miserable.
- Alice and Bob are abusive to everyone, why should they leave Carl out?
- Alice and Bob are under the influence of alcohol 24/7.
- Alice and Bob had to put their careers on hold to have Carl, and they hate every second of raising him.
- Inverted:
- Subverted:
- Alice and Bob are abusive towards Carl... till it turns out that these are random thugs who bought him from the streets and not his actual parents.
- Alice and Bob are abusive towards Carl... till it turns out that he's just a young servant and not their own son.
- Carl is an Unreliable Narrator who lied about Alice and Bobs mistreating him for attention.
- Alice and Bob angrily tell him to go to his room. They close the door and only Carl's screams can be heard from behind it. The door opens and it's revealed that they were just tickling him.
- Double Subverted:
- Then it's revealed that Alice and Bob are Carl's true parents.
- After doing a DNA test, it turns out that Carl is Alice and Bob's son after all.
- While Carl's claims of physical abuse are false, psychological abuse and neglect are plentiful.
- It looks like Alice and Bob are tickling Carl at first glance, but a closer look reveals they are using hidden blades in their fingernails to painfully scratch Carl's skin until it comes off.
- Parodied: Alice and Bob use really complicated and expensive methods, like setting Bear Traps on his way, using the The Ludovico Technique, and hiring a Torture Technician to torment him instead of just... hitting him or something because they think spanking and slapping are boring and outdated.
- Zig-Zagged:
- Alice and Bob are only nice to Carl's when they are in good moods, though they have no problems repeatedly beating him when their mood turns sour.
- Alice and Bob are sometimes abusive and sometimes kind, depending on Carl's manners; if he behaves well, they don't harm him and even praise him, but if he misbehaves, then they punch him.
- Averted:
- Enforced:
- The creators are trying to give Carl a Freudian Excuse for his murders so the audience would sympathize with him.
- The creator is trying to vent about his own abusive parents through his characters.
- Lampshaded: "Your parents are really awful, Carl, haven't you considered running away once?" "I did, many times before, and I tried but it didn't work."
- Invoked: Carl demands Alice and Bob to hit him.
- Exploited: Carl is a masochist. He does his best to make Alice and Bob mad so that they can hurt him as much as possible.
- Defied:
- Carl runs away from home immediately the moment Alice and Bob start behaving strangely.
- Carl calls child protective services before Alice and Bob do anything to him.
- Carl murders Alice and Bob so he could stop being abused.
- Alice and Bob had abusive parents of their own, and refusing to give Carl the same kind of life they had, they decide to raise him well instead.
- Discussed: "Carl must have been abused as a child. Look at those nasty scars and bruises!"
- Conversed: "What is with all this stuff? If Alice and Bob did that to Carl in Real Life, they'd be locked up!"
- Implied: Carl noticeably doesn't talk about Alice and Bob and avoids going home as much as possible. He's also prone to getting bruises and gets really uncomfortable when someone asks how he got them.
- Deconstructed:
- The constant abuse from Alice and Bob leads Carl to believe that life is meaningless and he is Driven to Suicide.
- Carl gets sick of his constant abuse, snaps, get Revenge and finally kill Alice and Bob.
- Because Carl only knows abuse from Alice and Bob, he ends up becoming just as abusive to his own children when he has a family of his own, and starts a cycle of abuse that will result in his children abusing their families as payback for his actions and this cycle will continue for future generations.
- Reconstructed:
- Carl's teachers notice how scrawny and sickly he became, so they take it upon themselves to investigate his home situation to find the cause and help him get away from this abusive household when they learn it's Alice and Bob's doing.
- Carl redeems himself, grows up to try to be different from Alice and Bob and becomes a loving and caring father, raising his son to become the next hero.
- Carl runs away and goes to live with his distant relatives or his friend's house. He then moves on with his life and refuses to use his terrible parents as an excuse for anything. He remains kind and hardworking, he also goes to therapy.
- Played for Laughs: Alice and Bob constantly abuses Carl, which leads to Amusing Injuries hat instantly heal.
- Played for Drama:
- Alice and Bob were abused as children themselves, spurring them to abuse Carl in turn.
- Carl's Panicky Expectant Father antics take a turn for the dramatic when he voices concerns about hurting his children like Alice and Bob hurt him.
- Carl does end up being as bad a father as his parents.
- Carl ends up killing his parents when their abuse of him goes too far.
- Plot Foundation:
- Carl breaks under the abuse, and brutally murders Alice and Bob. He's acquitted, on the grounds of being an orphan who watched his parents get brutally murdered by a stark-raving madman.
- Someone calls child protective services, and, while Alice and Bob are serving time, they see other parents treating their children right. After a while, Alice and Bob see the error of their ways, and do what they can to patch things up with their child, tearfully apologizing for what they've done and explaining why they did it.
No! Please don't hit me and send be back to Abusive Parents! I don't want to be locked up in that dark room! Please... if there is a God... help me.
