Basic Trope: A character can use their tail to do things.
- Straight: Alice can use her tail to grab objects.
- Exaggerated:
- Alice is able to use her tail like a third arm.
- Alice is a kitsune who can use all nine of her tails like arms.
- Downplayed: Alice can control her tail, but can't do tasks with it.
- Justified: Alice comes from a species with prehensile tails, such as a New World monkey, seahorse, chameleon, or possum.
- Inverted: Alice's tail is completely useless.
- Subverted: Alice's tail is shown moving around, but she isn't shown actually using it for tasks.
- Double Subverted: It turns out that Alice can use her tail to do tasks, but she doesn't use it much.
- Parodied: Alice's tail IS a third arm, having all the limitations of one and getting in the way.
- Zig-Zagged: Alice's tail doesn't actually do anything... except she actually uses it to do tasks, but only because of a Bioaugmentation in her tail, which turns out to be remote controlled.. by Alice, who uses her real, smaller tail to remote control it.
- Averted: Alice's tail functions like a normal tail, being able to move, but can't be used for tasks.
- Enforced: Alice is given a prehensile tail in order for her to have some cool abilities.
- Lampshaded: "You can use your tail like THAT?" "Yeah. It has no limitations, apparently."
- Invoked: Someone attempts to be turned into a monkey or some other creature with a tail.
- Exploited: Alice uses her tail to pickpocket discreetly, enabling her to steal precious items.
- Defied: Alice decides not to use her tail to do tasks.
- Discussed: "Man, I wish I had a tail like Alice's... I could do so many cool things!" "I know, right? I could be more helpful to our team!"
- Conversed: "Alice's tail can certainly do many things..." "Can such a thing even exist in real life? I know, monkeys and all, but still, that tail's bound to break my suspension of disbelief."
- Implied: Alice talks about how her tail can do cool things, but never shows them.
- Deconstructed:
- Alice struggles to concentrate on using her tail alongside her limbs. Cue enemies surrounding her from all angles to overwhelm her.
- Using your tail as an extra limb has several weaknesses, including a poor grip and being vulnerable to being attacked.
- Reconstructed:
- Alice practices concentration in order to be prepared for a situation like this, and manages to become a much greater fighter as a result.
- Cue the hero store selling tail armor and grips.
Back to Prehensile Tail.
