Basic Trope: A Damsel in Distress or other non-action woman abruptly Takes a Level in Badass or even evolves into an Action Girl.
- Straight: Alice was normally a non-violent civilian who lets her teammates handle crises up until now. However, her previously-mentioned archery hobby suddenly comes in handy when the Mooks attack.
- Exaggerated:
- Alice, who was raised in a convent and whose most frequently used line up to this point was "Save me, Bob!" picks up a sword for the first time in her life, and engages in a duel to the death with The Dragon (which she wins) while Bob takes on the Big Bad... and dies. Alice then avenges him with ease.
- This happens to every female character on the show, one by one.
- Downplayed:
- Alice becomes slightly more competent.
- Alice has been a fighter from the start of this show, but the first version of Alice wasn't.
- Sometimes Alice can suddenly bust out ninja skills, sometimes she remains a Damsel in Distress, depending on the plot of the episode. People trying to stat Alice out for role-playing games get very frustrated.
- Justified: Not applicable. (The lack of an In-Universe reason is key to this trope. If there is one, it's just Character Development.)
- Inverted: Chickification.
- Gender-Inverted: Bob's male sidekick, Daniel, is The Load at first, but becomes just as competent as Bob.
- Subverted:
- The mook Alice just beat up? Paid to take a dive.
- Alice's fluke success in battle makes her overconfident and think she's ready to fight evil full-time. She isn't, and the next fight she's in gets Alice severely wounded.
- The fight ends with zooming out of Alice's head, seems she was just having a Power Fantasy.
- Double Subverted:
- But when she stiffs him on the bill, his attack is easily dealt with by her genuine hidden combat abilities.
- Alice's skills abruptly improve after she heals, with no straightforward explanation.
- Parodied: Princess Charlotte goes from damsel in distress to army-destroying warrior whenever she cracks her knuckles.
- Zig Zagged: In the first ten episodes, Alice is an Damsel in Distress; but in the next ten episodes, Alice is a Action Girl without any explanation. It turns out that this was actually Character Development, until after, she becomes a Damsel in Distress again without any explanation. It turns out that it was also Character Development, but it actually isn't. Rinse and repeat every time.
- Averted:
- No characters show suddenly improved fighting skills; any Action Girl types are well-established as such from the beginning.
- Alice is shown training hard for a number of scenes/episodes beforehand.
- Enforced:
- "Hey, I dropped a bunch of money on those fencing lessons. Any chance my character Princess Charlotte could, say, use a sword in this movie?" "Okay, Alice, but it will have to be pretty late in the story, we've already got the early scenes storyboarded."
- "Alice is turning into The Scrappy because people are sick of seeing her get captured every episode. So how about, next episode, she actually takes down the Monster of the Week on her own?"
- The new execs have decided that girls will need a role model and want to develop Alice as an Action Girl.
- Lampshaded: "Since when does Princess Charlotte know how to use a sword? They didn't teach that at the convent!"
- Invoked: Not applicable. (Since this trope requires there not to be an In-Universe explanation, it is beyond the control of the characters.)
- Exploited: After hearing of Alice's victory over Emperor Evulz, Ethan hires her to help him defeat a Big Bad in another country.
- Defied:
- Alice refuses to learn any combat skills on the grounds that it's not ladylike.
- Alice refuses to learn combat skills because she's an Actual Pacifist who prefers nonviolent solutions. Instead she becomes more competent in other, non action related ways.
- Discussed: "Hey, that dame can't suddenly toss me around like a sack of potatoes, can she? 'Cause I hate that."
- Conversed: "They hired Writer X on Generic Fantasy Show, I see. Five gets you ten Princess Charlotte gets a lot better at combat, because he loves that sort of thing."
- Deconstructed: Alice's sudden competence gets called into question with regards of her prior inaction or if something is amiss.
- Reconstructed: Alice lets Bob know of her new skills as soon as she acquires them.
- Played For Drama:
- Alice ends up in a Heroic BSoD because she has never killed before and unable to cope with the psychological consequences.
- Alice ends up becoming a ruthless Blood Knight, a far cry from her former self that might be even worse than the people she kills.
- Alice dies in battle, and The Bad Guy Wins.
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