Favourite narrative tropes:
- “That was ONE time!”
- “Due to an administrative error”, or any major plot point which is caused almost entirely by bureaucratic fuckups
- “Contrary to popular belief” appended to something that’s either really obvious or completely subjective
- A character makes an assertion, then cut to the narrator contradicting it (‘“Everything’s fine!” Everything was not fine.’)
- First-person narrators who call a specific character by a series of increasingly convoluted nicknames
- Unusual narrative euphemisms. I still hold that describing around a curse word is almost always funnier than just using the word.
- Establishing character moments which subvert your expectations right from the get-go. The best example is in the Brooklyn Nine Nine pilot, where Jake’s fooling around at the crime scene before revealing that he’s already solved the case.
- Montages. Just montages of any kind, for any reason, anytime. I actually think they work better in text form because you can do so many creative things with them.
- Side characters with a level of fourth-wall awareness / quasi-supernatural ability which is never quite certain, like the janitor in Scrubs.
- Double meanings in narration that take a while to make themselves clear.
- Really, really specific similes.
Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.