Playing With / Tragic Keepsake

• Basic: A character keeps something that belonged to a dead loved one.

• Straight: Cassie's brother Charlie is dead, and Cassie carries his skateboard everywhere with her.
• Exaggerated:
  • Cassie keeps 5 of Charlie's things with her at all times.
  • Cassie's kept everything that ever belonged to Charlie.
  • Cassie doesn't own anything that wasn't Charlie's.
• Downplayed:
  • Cassie owns the skateboard, but she keeps it in her closet and rarely looks at it.
  • Charlie isn't dead, but he is far away and unable to contact Cassie for whatever reason.
• Justified
  • Cassie knows how to skateboard, and it's a useful and portable method of transportation.
  • The skateboard is essential in stopping the villains.
  • As long as someone keeps an item of Charlie's, he won't fade away into The Afterafterlife. Cassie has taken that upon herself.
• Averted: Cassie doesn't keep anything of Charlie's.
• Inverted:
  • It's All Junk.
  • Cassie makes a point of throwing all Charlie's stuff in the garbage.
  • Charlie actually keeps something of Cassie's with him in the afterlife.
  • After killing Evulz, Cassie steals one of his rings and wears it.
• Subverted:
  • Cassie tells everyone, including the main character, that she's so attached to the skateboard because it was Charlie's...turns out, it's secretly the amulet that can destroy the world in disguise and she doesn't want anything to happen to it.
  • Charlie isn't actually dead- he's alive but on a mission, and the skateboard is actually a portal they use to communicate.
• Double Subverted
  • Turns out, it lost power as an amulet a while ago, and now it's just a keepsake from the time Charlie tried destroying the world, and while Cassie loved him no matter what, she herself is not plotting to destroy anything.
  • Then Charlie dies, and the skateboard becomes a Tragic Keepsake.
• Parodied: Cassie is always loudly reminding everyone, "THIS SKATEBOARD IS MY BROTHER'S! HE'S DEAD!"
• Enforced: The audience is complaining about how unsympathetic Cassie is, so the producers give her a tragic keepsake to make her more, well, tragic.
• Implied: Charlie is seen onstage before he died riding a skateboard that looks exactly like the one Cassie carries around now. While it's never stated that the skateboard Cassie has was Charlie's, the audience can guess.
• Lampshaded: "I carry Charlie's skateboard around because it reminds me of him, you know?"
• Discussed: "Is it weird that I don't own anything of Charlie's? Because I see all these people on TV with their tragic keepsakes and stuff, and I don't even have any photos!"
• Played For Laughs: Cassie is a very tough, very stoic Action Girl. She carries around a stuffed bear that was Charlie's when he was little, and gets very touchy when someone points it out. Its name is Snuggles McFluffypants.
• Played For Drama: A Jerkass breaks the skateboard. Cassie flies into a rage, murders the Jerkass and has to hide the body.
• Played For Horror: Cassie is a serial killer on a quest to kill anyone who wronged Charlie during his lifetime. Before she kills someone (possibly with the skateboard), she'll caress the skateboard and whisper, "Charlie, I did this for you." or something along those lines.

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