Basic Trope: Rural relatives.
- Straight: Alice has a cousin from an undisclosed location in the rural South.
- Exaggerated: Alice's entire family consists of hillbillies.
- Downplayed: Alice casually mentions an "Uncle Bubba," but it is not known what Uncle Bubba looks or acts like.
- Justified: Alice moved to the city, or at least to Suburbia when she reached adulthood, to pursue her dreams, but she still has a family back home.
- Inverted: Alice is a simple Country Mouse, but the rest of her family lives in or around a large, sophisticated metropolis.
- Subverted:
- Alice's cousin is from the Deep South, but he's a sophisticated, erudite man, not a redneck.
- It's not Alice's fault that Bob's selective hearing made him miss "Dakota" when she talked about Charlene.
- Double Subverted:
- He has a few stereotypical tendencies, such as driving a pickup truck, wearing flannel shirts, a tendency towards political-incorrectness, and a heavy accent.
- Alice's cousin is a Good Ol' Boy.
- Parodied: Alice's friends hear that her country cousin is coming for a visit and try to make him "feel at home" with over the top hillbilly stereotypes. Alice's cousin, who's actually from rural Minnesota, thinks they're loonies.
- Zig Zagged: Some of Alice's relatives are from the country, some are from the city, and some live in the suburbs. And they have varying levels and types of intelligence.
- Averted:
- Alice has no rural relatives.
- Alice has no family.
- Enforced:
- "Let's make The Smart Guy more ironic by having that character come from a family of uncivilized backcountry hicks!
- A country singer is guest-starring in the next season, which just happens to coincide with the planned reveal of Alice's family.
- Lampshaded: "Okay, who else has charming Southern cousins we need to meet?"
- Invoked: Alice was always the odd duck in her family; she liked reading and art and science, while her parents were Lower Class Louts who didn't believe in indoor plumbing. When she grew up, she swore she'd never be like them and moved away to get an education and pursue her dreams, but she still feels a connection to them and writes home often.
- Exploited: When one of Alice's friends needs to lay low, she sends them to live with her Southern family, knowing they live far out of the way.
- Defied: Alice ends up becoming just like her mother, and stays close to home.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
- Implied: Alice is embarrassed by her unseen family and briefly mocks them in a Southern accent.
Back to Country Cousin, to make sure the guest room is ready for Cousin Bubba
