Basic Trope: Angels appear as extraordinarily beautiful humanoids.
- Straight: Angela appears to Alice and Bob as a beautiful woman wearing white, with flowing curly hair, shiny eyes, and flawless skin, plus large birdlike wings and a Holy Halo.
- Exaggerated: Angela is so beautiful that Alice and Bob can't even look at her.
- Downplayed: Angela looks like an ordinary, albeit conventionally-attractive young woman.
- Justified: Angels take on humanoid forms so that humans will trust them more easily. And it helps to look good in a world where Beauty Equals Goodness.
- Angels are so full of Incorruptible Pure Pureness in this setting that their inner beauty is reflected in their outward appearance.
- Mortal standards of beauty were shaped by frequent contact with angels.
- Inverted: Angelic Abomination
- Angela is an ugly Fallen Angel, either because Evil Makes You Ugly or because she's been Punished with Ugly.
- Demona is Hot as Hell.
- Subverted:
- Angela’s humanoid silhouette appears, glowing brightly with holy light, and she looks like a beautiful woman. But when she stops glowing and her face becomes visible, she’s…not very attractive.
- Angela is not an angel, but rather an ordinary young woman.
- Angela isn't an angel, but an alien, or perhaps one of The Fair Folk.
- Angela is a fallen angel.
- Angela wears makeup and figure-enhancing undergarments, plus anti-aging creams.
- Double Subverted:
- Angela’s homely face is a disguise she wears, and when she removes the makeup and prosthetics, she’s inhumanly beautiful.
- She is described as being very angelic, and when she dies of Victorian Novel Disease, she turns into an angel.
- Aliens and/or fae in this setting are just like angels, and may even look like Western perceptions of angels. (For example, the "Nordic" aliens
.) - Except she's more like an Ascended Demon, and therefore gets the privilege of beauty.
- She doesn't really need those things, just uses them as part of The Masquerade.
- Alternatively, she is excellent at applying makeup and choosing flattering clothes to enhance her looks.
- Parodied: Angela is a Drag Queen.
- The angels are Starfish Aliens (or rather, Octopus Aliens with Combat Tentacles).
- Angela is a total Gonk and everyone in the setting still gushes over how beautiful she is.
- Zig Zagged: Some angels are beautiful, others are average-looking, and still others are total Gonks or Eldritch Abominations.
- Averted: Angels look like ordinary, average-looking people in this setting.
- Angels don't exist in this setting.
- Enforced: Beauty Equals Goodness
- Lampshaded: "Why are angels always so much more good-looking than humans in fiction?"
- Invoked: Angela makes herself more attractive because she knows that humans believe Beauty Equals Goodness.
- Exploited: Angela relies on her good looks and charisma to do God's work; it's much easier to interact with humans if they're willing to trust a beautiful woman.
- Defied: Angela refuses to take the form of an exceptionally attractive human, because she wants to ensure that the humans she convinces to perform good deeds aren’t simply doing them to win her love.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
