Basic Trope: A child character who is introduced mid-series.
- Straight: In season 5 of Long Runner, Billy becomes the Sixth Ranger.
- Exaggerated: Billy becomes a one-kid Spotlight-Stealing Squad
- Downplayed: Billy is introduced, but is mostly a background character.
- Justified:
- Alice was Put on a Bus when she had a baby, but The Bus Came Back, and she now has a little boy with her.
- Billy is actually relevant to the plot.
- Inverted:
- Billy was part of the cast from the beginning.
- Alternatively, a Cool Old Guy (or other adult character) is added to the roster, in a series (such as a Kid Com or a Teen Drama) where most of the characters are children or teenagers.
- From his point of view, Billy feels he's pretty normal. It's his own cousin and the main cast he views as the Cousin Oliver.
- Subverted:
- Billy makes his first appearance and has A Day in the Limelight, but is then promptly Put on a Bus or Demoted to Extra.
- Billy is an Ascended Extra.
- Billy is an adult.
- Billy is not the only child in the cast.
- Double Subverted:
- Billy ends up Commuting on a Bus.
- The extra screen time, and/or the fact that Billy becomes the Creator's Pet, causes the audience to dislike him.
- Billy is a Manchild, One of the Kids, The Ditz, and/or The Millstone.
- But, he makes his appearance after the other child characters grow up and "stop being cute" (or their actors move onto bigger and better things).
- Parodied: ???
- Zig Zagged: ???
- Averted:
- No child characters are introduced.
- No new characters are introduced, period.
- Enforced:
- "We need to keep our characters "fresh" and possibly open up new plot possibilities".
- The executives thought it'd be a good idea to add a Token Mini-Moe.
- Lampshaded: "Nothing has been the same since that meddling kid joined our team!"
- Invoked: Alice and Bob, the two protagonists, have a baby.
- Exploited: ???
- Defied: "No no! You tell Aunt Alice I am not babysitting my cousin Billy. In fact, I'll buy them both a bus ticket back to their home town!"
- "But Mom! I don't wanna tag along with these stuffy grown-ups."
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
- Deconstructed: Billy upsets the character dynamic, especially if he's the only child character, and especially if he's something of a Mouthy Kid or other annoyingly bratty type of kid.
- Reconstructed: Billy meets another local kid in the neighborhood who's relevant to the story, someone his age whose personality can bounce off his, someone who can make him relevant to the story as well.
- Played For Drama: Billy is a Living Macguffin.
Back to Cousin Oliver
