Basic Trope: Someone gets food poisoning or a foodborne illness.
- Straight:
- Alice eats some week-old leftovers and is later seen in the bathroom vomiting.
- Alice gets E. coli after eating food contaminated with the pathogen.
- Exaggerated:
- Everyone gets food poisoning after eating contaminated food, and it results in a massive Vomit Chain Reaction and/or everyone experiencing Potty Failure all at once.
- Alice was infected with all types of foodborne illnesses at once. Don't even ask how she survived.
- The entire world suffers a food poisoning pandemic.
- Downplayed:
- Alice feels a little sick after eating some food that came in contact with germs, but gets over it quickly.
- Alice gets a mild case of the runs after eating out-of-date food.
- Justified: Truth in Television; people can get sick from ingesting contaminated/improperly-prepared food/drink.
- Inverted: Alice is healed after eating food with germ-destroying properties.
- Subverted:
- Alice eats rotten food and Bob thinks she'll get food poisoning, but she shows no signs of being ill later on.
- Alice only thinks she has food poisoning.
- Double Subverted:
- That’s because the food poisoning had already passed, and Bob learns this the hard way by coming into the bathroom and finding a whole…erm…mess.
- She later ingests something contaminated and gets it for real.
- Parodied:
- Alice eats poisonous food and suffers bizarre symptoms, such as purple polka-dots forming on her face.
- Alice gets food poisoning from eating some old chocolate from underneath the couch.
- Zig-Zagged: Alice eats at a restaurant and throws up afterwards, but it’s only because she ate too much. She then gets diarrhea, but it turns out it was because she ate something that triggered her IBS. At the end of the day, she gets food poisoning for real.
- Averted: Nobody has food poisoning.
- Enforced:
- An Aesop on food safety.
- Can be a grossout gag in some cases.
- This was one of the Non-Patient Of The Week Patients to show that there is more to the hospital than ward 3.
- Lampshaded:
- “So we’re starting out this episode eating at a crappy restaurant? You guys are just asking for food poisoning, huh?”
- Alice has a Growling Gut after eating week-old food and Bob remarks “That doesn’t sound good”.
- Invoked: Alice wants to get out of work, so she eats rotten food to give herself food poisoning.
- Exploited: Alice is a Prom Wrecker who gets food poisoning on the night of the prom. She decides to show up and cause a Vomit Chain Reaction.
- Defied: Alice strictly obeys the "When in doubt, throw it out" rule.
- Discussed:Bob: That doesn’t sound good.Alice: How so?Bob: You ate from that crappy restaurant and now your stomach is upset. I think this is a warning sign that I should find you a bathroom.
- Conversed: ???
- Implied:
- Alice mentions the time she got food poisoning, but doesn't elaborate.
- Alice feels sick after eating something, and starts running off-camera, presumably to go to the bathroom and/or throw up.
- Deconstructed: Alice's food poisoning weakens her digestive system and causes health problems later on in her life.
- Reconstructed:
- The whole ordeal prompts her to eat out much less and educate herself on food safety. She ends up improving her cooking skills to where she’s now a Supreme Chef.
- Her weakened digestive system forces her to curb her Big Eater habits and eat healthier. She ends up losing weight and becoming more fit, and thus happier.
- Played for Laughs: Alice eats at a dodgy restaurant and in complete Toilet Humor manner, starts projectile vomiting and defecating into inopportune locations.
- Played For Drama: Alice's food poisoning causes life-threatening dehydration, resulting in her having to be rushed to the ER.
Back to The Food Poisoning Incident
