Basic Trope: A character realizes they're in a story, but guesses wrong as to the genre, or their role in the story.
- Straight:
- Bob thinks he's a Dogged Nice Guy in a Romantic Comedy, but he's actually a Stalker with a Crush in a Police Procedural, and his antics get him arrested.
- Veronica thinks she's the heroic paranormal-obsessed kid/minor trying to save Earth from an Alien Invasion, but the aliens she's hunting actually have no malicious intentions, and Veronica is an Ax-Crazy Sadist who always ends up causing more chaos than she thinks she's stopping.
- Bob thinks he's in a Duke Nukem-esque action adventure, when in actuality he's in an Alien-esque horror movie.
- Bob thinks he's in a buddy-cop movie, but he's actually The Commissioner Gordon to a superhero.
- Bob thinks he's the Decoy Protagonist in a Slasher Movie, when he's really the main human character in a Kaiju movie.
- Bob thinks he's in a Sex Comedy, when he's actually in a Hack/Slash-esque Serial-Killer Killer story.
- Bob thinks he's the main protagonist of a story set After the End, when he's actually an Improperly Paranoid Crazy Survivalist in a modern-day setting and the disaster that is happening in the background is not as dire as Bob thinks.
- Bob thinks he's in a War Movie, when he's actually in a Zombie Movie.
- Exaggerated:
- Bob thinks he's a Dogged Nice Guy in a Romantic Comedy, but he's actually about to suffer Sex Signals Death in a Horror film.
- Bob thinks he's The Hero or at least a member of a Five-Man Band in a Fighting Shonen Anime, but he's actually a Noble Demon that is member of a Quirky Miniboss Squad, an evil Five-Man Band (An evil Five-Man Band wasn't unheard of, it used to be called "Five Bad Band" before the idea was scrapped) or even a Big Bad Duumvirate.
- Downplayed:
- Wrong Assumption
- Bob is right on the money about the setting being a Romantic Comedy, but he's entirely wrong about his role in it, as he turns out to be the Dogged Nice Guy's best friend being used to show the nice guy in a better light.
- Bob is right that he's in a superhero movie, but he's wrong about how dark the movie is.
- Justified:
- Bob spends too much time watching movies about relationships and not enough time having real relationships.
- Veronica watches TV a lot, and she watches too many shows involving Alien Invaders, so she acts like the heroic paranormal-obsessed kid/minor because she thinks she's saving the world from an Alien Invasion (that's not actually gonna happen because the aliens she's hunting are Innocent Aliens).
- Bob plays too many Duke Nukem games, so of course he's gonna expect the aliens to act like Duke Nukem villains.
- Bob's police partner Joe keeps his superhero identity a secret, so of course Bob would not be able to realize that he's actually in a superhero story.
- Bob has watched so many Slasher Movies that he fears a Serial Killer might be after him when it's just some random coincidences.
- The Female Serial Killer-Killer initially acts like the "good girl" in a Sex Comedy, so of course Bob mistakes her as that archetype.
- Bob is a doomsday cultist or a crazy conspiracy theorist, so of course he's quick to assume that the local disaster in the background is apocalyptic.
- Sgt. Bob McKyles initially thinks that the zombies are a PTSD-induced hallucination caused by the war, until one violently grabs at his hair to reach for his brains, the pain being very real, and he shoots it off.
- Inverted:
- Regular Genre Savvy, Functional Genre Savvy, or Genre Blindness.
- Everyone in a police procedural is acting out of place except for Bob.
- Bob is able to force reality to run on the rules of any genre he wants.
- Death by Genre Savviness: Bob is right that he's in a Romantic Comedy, but it still doesn't saves him from getting a gut full of buckshot by his girlfriend's Knight Templar Parent, leaving his friend Charlie, the horn-dog Slime Ball that hoped to nab the girl once Bob failed, to run the friggin' hell away soiling his trousers in libido-shattering terror.
- Subverted:
- Bob thinks he's a Dogged Nice Guy in a Romantic Comedy, but the audience knows this is a horror movie, so they're surprised when he manages to hook up with a nice woman, they have sex, and nothing bad happens.
- Bob realizes that he's not in a Sex Comedy, but later in the story, the main female character (who is a Serial-Killer Killer) eventually gets to know him and find him attractive in the end.
- Bob is foreshadowing a Genre Shift after which he's perfectly Genre Savvy.
- Double Subverted: Until half an hour later, when the monster's plotline suddenly crosses over into Bob's life and he and the woman both suffer Sex Signals Death after all.
- Parodied: Bob continues to act as though he's in a romantic comedy even as the bodies pile up, the city is put under martial law and a Zombie Apocalypse rages in the streets.
- Zig Zagged: While Bob is wrong about being in a romantic comedy, some but not all of his actions based on that premise actually work out well for him in bizarre ways.
- Averted: Even though Bob is a big fan of romantic comedies, he doesn't try to apply their tropes to his current situation.
- Enforced:
- Writer X hated the "vampire romance" novel she read recently, so she's using Bob as a Take That! at the subgenre.
- Writer X wanted to make a villainous parody of Dib Membrane from Invader Zim, as she thinks he'd be a cool villain in a story about Innocent Aliens, so she made Veronica, who only THINKS she's saving the world, when she's really just an Ax-Crazy Sadist causing chaos and tormenting Innocent Aliens.
- Writer X is not really a big fan of Agent Fox Mulder and decided that a Halloween Episode in which a Mulder wanna-be is chasing after the protagonists because he saw too many "X-Files" episodes and assumed they were aliens would be good comedy fodder.
- Lampshaded:
- "Now, I know this sort of thing doesn't normally happen in romantic comedies, but I'm sure it's just a temporary setback."
- Female Serial-Killer Killer: For fuck's sake, Bob, this is not American Pie! Besides, I already have a boyfriend!"
- "I think you're reading the wrong script, buddy."
- Well-Meaning Alien: "Oh my gosh, Veronica, this isn't Invader Zim! I'm NOT trying to invade Earth! You're just insane!
- Sgt. Bob McKyles: "I thought we were in a Blackhawk Down fight, not a fucking Dawn of the Dead zombie outbreak!!"
- Invoked: The vampire planning to snack on Bob feeds him lines similar to a romantic comedy's dialogue, hoping to fool him about her intentions.
- Played For Laughs: Veronica tries desperately to act like the heroic paranormal-obsessed kid/minor in a movie/TV show, and thinks she's saving the world from an Alien Invasion (that's not gonna happen because the aliens she's hunting down are Innocent Aliens), but she just causes hilarious chaos and one of the aliens she's hunting down gets hilariously pissed off at her.
- Played For Drama: Veronica's attempts to act like the paranormal-obsessed kid/minor trying to save the Earth from an Alien Invasion and her wrong assumptions about the aliens on Earth being Alien Invaders (rather than the Innocent Aliens they are) cause the aliens to be in danger and almost get killed by her.
- Exploited: The female Serial-Killer Killer actually does have sexual intercourse with Bob, partially out of pity, but also partially to motivate him to help her hunt down the killer she is targeting.
- Defied: "Something doesn't feel right here. I'm probably not in a romantic comedy after all, so I need to rethink my assumptions."
- Discussed:
- "Bob, get it through your head! This can't be a romantic comedy, there are ninjas!"
- "Wait, before I invite you in... are you a vampire who can't hurt me without an invitation across the threshold, or an angel in disguise who'll judge me for my bad hospitality if I don't help you?"
- Female Serial-Killer Killer: "Bob, get your fucking hands off me! This is not National Lampoon!"
- Well-Meaning Alien: "Veronica!! Stop that! I'm NOT trying to conquer Earth! This is not one of those alien invader movies/TV shows! All you're doing is harming my innocent family! You're Insane!!
- Conversed:
- "Bob thinking he was in a romcom was hilarious, up until he got eaten."
- "Veronica thinking she is in an alien invader show is hilarious, because the aliens she's chasing are actually Innocent Aliens, and it's funny how much chaos Veronica causes. Her sadism is scary though."
- Deconstructed: Bob's belief that he's in a romantic comedy is caused by his obsession with the genre and his own inability to separate reality from fantasy... or, for that matter, the fantasy that's coming true around him from the one he wants.
- Reconstructed: The tropes Bob lives by are Truth in Television, but only in his own culture; he then finds himself in a culture where the Dogged Nice Guy is more likely to get arrested for stalking than get the girl.
Back to Wrong Genre Savvy, unless of course this is actually the scene where you're found dead at your computer, with a few last keystrokes giving a clue to the murderer (it's probably TV Tropes that did you in).
