Basic Trope: Someone who is horrible at driving.
- Straight:
- Bob speeds, smashes into lamp-posts, and other cars.
- Alice will fail to read signs, and doesn't signal.
- Exaggerated:
- Bob drives off a cliff into a town, destroying everything in the process.
- Alice smashes through several buildings and even blows up a gas station when she drives.
- It takes Alice thirty miles to figure out she kept the stupid car in reverse.
- Bob somehow manages to crash his car on a satellite in outer space.
- Downplayed:
- Bob often fails to use signaling.
- Alice is a good driver, but has troubles with Parallel Parking.
- Bob is a genuinely skilled driver who forgets his passengers don't have Nerves of Steel and are terrified by the various near misses he gets into.
- Justified:
- Alice and/or Bob has never driven before, and doesn't have a license.
- Bob is trying to get away from the police, so abiding the rules is not at the top of the priority list at the moment.
- Alice is a stereotypical woman/Asian. What would you expect?
- Sir Bob Wellington Esquire has only recently hopped across the pond, he still finds right side driving to be a tad tedious.
- The car Bob took is too overpowered or clunky for his skill set and every attempt to compensate just gets out of his hands.
- Inverted:
- Bob is an excellent driver.
- Alice is the best driver in the world.
- Bob is not aggressive enough as a driver, going well below the speed limit and frequently coming to complete stops.
- Bob drives fine, but is an extremely aggressive pedestrian.
- Bob is an Axe-Crazy Cloud Cuckoo Lander, and yet he takes road safety very seriously, even becoming The Comically Serious whenever he gets in the driver's seat.
- Subverted:
- Bob nearly crashes into another car, but it's the fault of the other driver.
- Alice nearly drives through a red-light, but stops just in time.
- Bob is shown driving dangerously, but it's because he's actually a Badass Driver who can weave through the tightest spots to shake whomever's chasing him. His car comes out the other side with nary a scratch.
- Double Subverted:
- Bob then continues driving and smashes into another car.
- Alice decides to run the red-light after stopping.
- Unfortunately, Bob continues his dangerous driving habits even when he isn't being chased.
- Parodied:
- Whenever Bob starts his car, it cuts to sights of a wrecked town.
- Anything even remotely shaped like a wheel is a doomsday weapon in Alice's hands.
- Zig Zagged:
- Bob nearly runs a red light, but stops in time. They then fail to realize when the light has turned green.
- Alice's driving skills seem to depend on the vehicle being driven: she's a model driver in a family sedan but a rolling threat when in a pickup truck.
- Charlie treats traffic laws with complete disregard, but is able to avoid crashing into anything.
- Averted:
- Bob is an average driver.
- Bob is never given a chance to get behind the steering wheel.
- Enforced: The writer thinks the story needs someone who's terrible at driving, whether for Rule of Drama or — more often — for Rule of Funny.
- Lampshaded: "Why is Bob even allowed behind the wheel?"
- Invoked: Bob decided to be as terrible of a driver as possible.
- Exploited:
- Bob, who knows he's a terrible driver, gets behind a wheel to chase Emperor Evulz.
- Greg puts Alice behind the wheel to cause chaos.
- Defied:
- Bob takes a course from a professional rally racer to improve his driving skills.
- Bob never gets his driver's license and gets a lifetime ban from anything motor-related
- Discussed: "Where'd Bob get his license, a box of Cracker-jacks?"
- Conversed: "Having someone who drives like this should add some humor/drama to the show."
- Deconstructed: Bob has his license revoked and is not allowed to drive because he's such a bad driver. Or he is never given a license to begin with for being such a bad driver.
- Reconstructed:
- He still gets behind the wheel despite not having a license.
- The heroes eventually need someone really, really demented at the wheel for the distraction part of a plan Crazy Enough to Work. They all immediately turn to look at Bob. On his end, Bob not only succeeds at the "distraction" part, he also survives what the rest of the cast saw as a Suicide Mission because the enemy could not hit him at all.
- Played for Laughs:
- Bob's bad driving causes him to fly out the window of his car with his steering wheel around his neck.
- The show's about stereotypes, so Alice is naturally a terrible driver.
- There is a Running Gag about Bob constantly meeting one specific driving instructor/test official/traffic cop who becomes increasingly shell shocked from having to deal with the mayhem his driving causes repeatedly.
- Bob's history of bad driving is plagued with accidents that are too absurd to be true.
- Bob's insane driving is the cause of little Alice developing an Absurd Phobia for anything car-related.
- Played for Drama:
- Bob's bad driving kills people, which Bob has to hide from the police.
- Alice's bad driving gets her and her friends killed in a horrific car crash.
- Bob is getting shot at. Driving safely is just as lethal, if not more.
- Bob's insane driving gives little Alice a Trauma Button that her brother Jim spends a tremendous amount of effort trying to help her with and refuses to forgive Bob for creating, probably to the point of annihilating their previous friendship.
- Played For Horror:
- Bob is literally crazy, and not in the "funny" way either, and he either deliberately uses his car as a murder weapon or is too detached from reality to notice the X-rated carnage he leaves behind.
- The Zombie Apocalypse/invasion from The Legions of Hell/escape of the slasher villain Legion of Doom from the Bedlam House/death of the school bus full of innocents that leads to the Papa Wolf making a Deal with the Devil is a direct result of Bob having a car collision.
- Someone gets more than a little upset at being inconvenienced by Bob's bad driving, whether it is being delayed, getting a spike on their heart rate, or being in a fender bender. And we definitely mean more than a little.
- Bob's driving is portrayed as an intensely traumatizing experience that turn people into shell-shocked ghosts of who they were, more willing to jump in front of a car than get in one for as long as they live.
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