Basic Trope: "Either (correct, reasonable suggestion), or it's (absurd suggestion)."
- Straight: Charlie sees that Alice and Bob's living room is a mess, and suggests "Either you haven't cleaned around here in a while, or aliens came and ransacked your living room!"
- Exaggerated:
- The absurd suggestion doesn't even make any sense at all: "Either you haven't cleaned around here in a while, or I like bananas. Frogs."
- Charlie comes up with a whole list of ridiculous alternative suggestions: "So, I take it that you haven't cleaned around here in a while, or aliens came and ransacked your living room, or the furniture came to life and got in a fight, or a unicorn had a temper tantrum in here, or..."
- Downplayed: Neither suggestion is necessarily absurd, but one still makes a lot more sense than the other: "Either you haven't cleaned around here in a while, or you got in a fight in the living room yesterday."
- Justified:
- Charlie wanted to be clever.
- Alternatively, Alice and Bob really did have their living room ransacked by aliens once.
- While absurd, the second suggestion is the only other possibility left.
- Inverted: ???
- Subverted: Charlie sees the room and says. "Either you haven't cleaned around here in a while, or a unicorn had a temper tantrum in here." Later on in the same day he mentions mentions that a unicorn wrecked his apartment a month ago meaning he was actually referencing said bizarre incident unironically.
- Double Subverted: While the incident was likely to happen to Charlie, it's still impossible for it to happen to Alice and Bob for whatever reason.
- Parodied: "Either you haven't cleaned around here in a while, or aliens came and ransacked your living room." A Cutaway Gag reveals that aliens actually did come and mess up Alice and Bob's living room!
- Zig-Zagged: ???
- Averted: Both suggestions make complete sense and are equally likely to have happened.
- Enforced: To add some humor to the scene.
- Lampshaded: ???
- Invoked: ???
- Exploited: ???
- Defied: ???
- Discussed: "Well, of course we just haven't cleaned in a while. Do you really think aliens messed up the living room?"
- Conversed: ???
Back to Lopsided Dichotomy
