Not always that much.
"In Mexico, we grew up watching Speedy Gonzales. He was like a superhero to us, or maybe more like a revolutionario like Simon Bolivar or Pancho Villa. He watched out for the little people but with a lot of bravado, and a weakness for the ladies. I'm really excited to be bringing this character to the big screen."
When a character is created that is a culmination of a number of stereotypes with regard to different culture, nationality or other demographic, there will likely be some backlash within the culture of origin because of those stereotypes (especially an Ethnic Scrappy). But with some surprise the target culture ended up embracing that caricature concocted by someone else.
It might be a case of Insult Backfire, though it happens most often when the caricature in question is at worst tone-deaf rather than intentionally offensive. It's usually because of an unexpected Values Resonance as they embrace the spirit in which it was intended, or a case of Actually Pretty Funny when they recognize themselves in the caricature.
It may help if:
- The allegedly offensive character has a good side — Speedy as the Trope Namer may be stereotypical, but he is an adored hero of the people with Super-Speed while also shrewd, energetic, determined and always wins.
- The other characters aren't portrayed as any better, utilizing an All-Stereotype Cast where nobody is an especially subtle character type.
- The stereotype is carried so far as to be clear parody even to a casual viewer, even intended to be offensive In-Universe.
- The stereotype is so unintentionally ridiculous that members of the targeted demographic can't help but think, "It's hilarious that this is what they think about us."
- The stereotype is based on an outdated Forgotten Trope that no longer has as much weight, or is so clueless about the minority that it isn't even identifiable as offensive any more except on an intellectual level. Something that fell out of favor 100 years ago doesn't press as many buttons as a recent stereotype.
- The stereotypical aspects are exceedingly Fair for Its Day. The character's traits are not treated as inherently negative, or they are shrewd enough to play into how others perceive them, or they simply don't care how others perceive them. For example, a Camp Gay character who's a source of cheap gay jokes, but is also unafraid to be himself and speak his mind.
- The demographic rarely appears at all in the media, so they embrace any representation they can get.
- The stereotype, for whatever reason, doesn't translate over or read as negative. Thick accents may be rendered as natural and eloquent when dubbed for foreign distribution. This also happens a lot in cases of whitewashing, which tend to get a pretty cold reception in diaspora communities but barely raise an eyebrow in their home countries.
- The stereotype is made by someone from the targeted culture itself and acknowledges the group's own flaws. There's enough truth to it to be funny, but enough affection that it doesn't offend. Conversely, the creator may not exactly be a member of the community but are close enough to be "adopted" as part of the group, as they demonstrate both familiarity with the culture and appreciation for the people.
- The stereotype doesn't carry as much of a negative connotation due to lack of a negative history — for example, Bollywood stereotypes of America tend to read as downright cute to Americans, since it isn't invoking the same ugly legacy as, say, stereotypes of black Americans.
- The country/group that created the work sees the stereotype as negative because it rubs against their values, but the targeted group sees it as positive because it aligns with their own values. For example, when certain countries stereotype Americans as Hot-Blooded, Large Ham Blood Knights, they consider this to be mockery, while some Americans find it entertaining or even complimentary.
- The backlash comes primarily from Malcolm Xerox types whose extreme views don't always represent average members of the group. In the worst case scenario, the complainers might not even be part of the group at all but are speaking for them anyway without understanding the cultural nuances that make the character so popular.
- The character and the franchise it comes from are both nostalgic for many individuals, and by the time the audience is old enough to notice the stereotypical elements, they already have many good memories of the character and can’t bring themselves to dislike them.
Compare Approval of God, when a fan adaptation or a parody of a work is well-received by the original author. Also compare Cross-Cultural Kerfluffle, Affectionate Parody, and This Loser Is You. Possibly a Guilty Pleasure.
Note that this trope specifically involves, as the top of the page says, a stereotypical and sometimes unflattering caricature. If a group of people is portrayed positively and non-stereotypically in foreign media, and said group reacts positively to it, that's Watched It for the Representation or Germans Love David Hasselhoff. If said group dislikes their depiction to a greater extent than other audiences, it's Americans Hate Tingle. Do note that this trope and the characters described here can easily become base-breaking. One person's "Speedy Gonzales" is another's Uncle Tomfoolery.
See also and compare Opinion Override. The inverse trope is Offending the Creator's Own, where a work or character is condemned as offensive to a particular group despite the creator being a member of that group.
Examples:
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Advertising
- The Frito Bandito, a character Frito-Lay used from 1967 to 1971 to advertise their potato chips. Being a creation from a U.S. ad agency of the 1960s, he was just as stereotypical as Gonzales, down to sharing the same voice actor. Reactions from Mexican-Americans were mixed: while anti-defamation groups successfully lobbied for the retirement of Bandito, surveys in four cities in California and Texas conducted by the ad agency that created Bandito claimed that 85% of Mexican-Americans liked him. Frito-Lay reportedly received a letter from a Los Angeles junior high school with a predominantly Mexican student body, saying, "If you take away the Bandito, we'll stop buying Fritos." In Mexico itself, the character was very popular.
- Mars Inc. had a few commercials
for their Starburst candies which featured "Scotch-Koreans" (Korean people who speak with thick Scottish accents and play up classic Scottish stereotypes like playing bagpipes by foggy lakes), which wound up being pretty well-received by actual Scots of Korean descent. They know the commercials aren't taking the last bit serious and are happy to see Scottish-Korean anything in the mainstream.
- Jaguar's "It's Good to Be Bad" campaign, embracing the Evil Brit, Stiff Upper Lip stereotypes, used in its home market just as heavily as abroad, with no complaints from the British because Evil Is Cool.
- As stereotypical as the mascot is, many Latinos are fond of the Chiquita Banana campaign.
- An entire series of Propaganda Piece posters such as this by Red China is really well received by Americans for making them look badass. Some other examples include this metal album cover looking one, and this Big Red Devil NATO (which was made into an army morale patch). But by far the most impactful was this Glowing Eyes of Doom poster of Joe Biden on an Iron Throne of guns, which was a major contributor to the Dark Brandon mega-meme and subreddit. The propaganda is meant to play up America as a powerful adversary and the Chinese as an underdog struggling against a vast power but Americans, used to the far more cutting satire they produce themselves, find such portrayals endearing by comparison.
- Reportedly, Bostonians love the "Your Cousin from Boston" ad campaign from Samuel Adams. These ads feature a Boston city slicker with an exaggerated accent and attitude.
- Native Jamaicans and Jamaican-Americans overall rather like CinnaMon from the 2000s Apple Jacks commercials. Though they admit that he's not a very accurate representation of them, they like CinnaMon for his smooth voice, friendly personality, and tendency to always win his races against Bad Apple. In general, Jamaicans tend to be fond of representation that doesn't paint them as just a joke.
Anime & Manga
- The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, REALLY Love You: Naddy’s shtick is completely ludicrous and arguably cultural appropriation, but Americans tend to like her quite a bit, since she is totally earnest in her ideals and she genuinely believes in Flavor 1 Eagleland, and as such is very nice instead of obnoxious. It also helps that her obsession is clearly The Theme Park Version of American culture instead of the real thing, so it isn’t like the writers are saying that all Americans are like that in real life.
- Despite being blatant American stereotypes, Androids 13, 14, and 15 from the Dragon Ball movie Super Android 13 are all well-loved by the American fanbase.note
- While not specifically stated to be American, Ein from Fist of the North Star is a stereotypical "American" tough guy character. He wears a stars-and-stripes jacket, has a larger-than-life attitude and fights with Good Old Fisticuffs instead of the do-anything Kung Fu other characters in the series use. He is easily the most popular character in the second part of the manga for Americans, being seen as a better, more honest companion to Kenshiro and Bat than Falco. The fact he's a Papa Wolf of epic proportions and died in a Heroic Sacrifice also helps to endear him to American fans.
- Envy of Fullmetal Alchemist is loved by many trans and non-binary fans, despite being one of the nastiest villains, as well as an Artificial Human with two very inhuman, No Biological Sex true forms in the manga/''Brotherhood'' and a shapeshifter, which many Ambiguous Gender characters tend to be designated as. Part of this is nostalgia; for many young anime fans in the 2000s, Envy was one of the first gender-ambiguous characters they were introduced to (though in the 2003 anime version, Envy is confirmed male.) It also helps that Envy is considered by many viewers to be attractive (without being a fetish object) and very entertaining, and they're never ridiculed in-universe for their gender identity or expression.
- In Getter Robo, Texas Mack has too much high popularity, man! To explain, the Cowboy Robot and its pilots from the original TV anime were seen as offensive stereotypes even in Japan while it was airing. Years later, the Shin Getter Robo vs Neo Getter Robo OVA included a portrayal that was less offensive and more endearingly goofy, which won the Texas Mack the affection of Western fandom.
- In Girls und Panzer every schoolnote that partakes in the shows sport of 'Sensha-Do' is based in Japan but styles itself after a different nation that took part in WWII and all of them have been well received by fans. Special mentions go to the St. Gloriana'snote who are constantly sipping tea while operating their tanks and Pravdanote who are led by a short wanna be autocrat and kill time during matches by cossack dancing. The characters that inhabit these schools tend to adored by those whose culture they're parodying. It even got to the point where the Government of Finland paid the studio to add a Finnish team to the castnote and Girls und Panzer fandom returned the love by donating enough to the Finnish tank museum to save the last BT-42 tank from being scrapped.
- American fans of Gravitation seem to quite enjoy K-san, the crazy American manager of Bad Luck who has a habit of carrying guns everywhere and threatening people with them in situations where a stern talking to would probably get the job done.
- In the Gundam franchise there are several "American" characters who stand out:
- Chibodee Crockett of G Gundam is ridiculous in many way, but he's also just as awesome at the same time. His Gundam, Gundam Maxter, is a has armor shaped like American football uniforms, has boxing gloves and a six-shooter pistol as its weapons, and a shield shaped like a surfboard. Chibodee himself is very patriotic and loves his nation, and in fact represents the ideal of the "American dream" (a poor child with no money to his name that found success through talent and hard work).
- In fact, nearly every character in G Gundam is some kind of broad ethnic stereotype, and also greatly loved by fans in their country of origin, even Chico Rodriguez and his Tequila Gundam.
- Duo Maxwell of Gundam Wing is the sharpest character in the show, combining boisterous joking with some extremely badass tendencies. His Gundam, the Deathscythe, is one of the more beloved Gundams in the show and is affectionately known in some circles as the Bat-Gundam due to its wings and general color scheme.
- The first 16 or so episodes of After War Gundam X take place on the North American Continent with the majority of the characters being North Americans and actually not being Eaglelanders. Characters are enjoyed for their diversity and the series has built up something of a positive reputation in North America despite Bandai's reluctance in bringing the series to North America. (Which they eventually did.)
- Before the second season, Graham Aker of Mobile Suit Gundam 00 was also incredibly popular in the U.S. for a myriad of reasons. First, he was a Type 1 Eaglelander (rare enough in anime) with Boisterous Bruiser, A Father to His Men, and Noble Demon traits. Second, he was one of two characters (the other being Ali al-Saachez) who could take the Gundams straight on with non-GN powered mobile suits (and the only one to actually damage one), thus cementing his badass credentials. Third, in a franchise that usually focuses on morally gray characters, Graham is one of the few antagonists that cannot be described as amoral in some way, nor did he fight for a thoroughly evil nation/factionnote ; he was more or less the archetypical American soldier (and fighter pilot to boot) fighting for his country against invaders (and even then he didn't necessarily hate his opponents, at least until the Thrones showed up). All that stated, it should be obvious why more than one American Gundam fan cheered whenever Graham showed the Meisters how real pros used mobile suits. Additionally, in The Movie he comes to the aid of the heroes more than once.
- While Nils Nielsen does get criticism from some American fans, others love him for being an over-the-top weeaboo who uses a samurai-styled mobile suit who has some kickass moments. It doesn't hurt that over the series, he becomes less of a weeb and instead plays the straight man to the rest of the cast, and isn't exempt from some of the wackier things that happen in the series.
- And finally, an example of a Gundam character who isn't "American", protagonist Kamille Bidan from Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam claims to be autistic at one point. Despite hitting many of the stereotypes listed on Hollywood Autism (although this can be excused by autism not being well-researched when the anime first aired in the 1980s), he's still beloved by actual neurodivergent people.
- Chibodee Crockett of G Gundam is ridiculous in many way, but he's also just as awesome at the same time. His Gundam, Gundam Maxter, is a has armor shaped like American football uniforms, has boxing gloves and a six-shooter pistol as its weapons, and a shield shaped like a surfboard. Chibodee himself is very patriotic and loves his nation, and in fact represents the ideal of the "American dream" (a poor child with no money to his name that found success through talent and hard work).
- Hellsing Ultimate is quite popular among both American Catholic and Protestant audiences... even though the series does not portray Catholics in a positive light, and Christianity is more of a backdrop for the vampire gore. The former audience especially loves Alexander Anderson, and more than one has actually claimed him to be an ideal priest. Enrico Maxwell is (rather surprisingly) popular as well, though it helps that he was actually a great character before he went Jumping Off the Slippery Slope.
- Hetalia: Axis Powers, for example, being made of exaggeratedly stereotyped anthropomorphic personifications of countries, has plenty of fans all over the world. A lot of the characters are well-loved in the countries they represent, probably because they can see those stereotypes and know how to laugh at themselves. There are some exceptions, though; the series is hated in South Korea due to the many, many, problems between that country and Japan, though it still does have South Korean fans.
- Finland in Hetalia Axis Powers, a moe boy with a close relationship with the big and scary Sweden, is actually quite indistinguishable to Finnish audience, save for maybe the fact he's said to be surprisingly strong in the cold, a Shout-Out to Winter War (of which Finns cannot seem to get enough). They still like him. The trope is also defied, in that the personality of the character himself has a polarizing effect in certain Finnish circles, who find him to have little to do with how Finns typically are.
- The usual Russian reaction to Ivan Braginsky is "Fuck, yeah! Two please."
- Indonesian fans clamored for over a decade for their country to be personified, and when he finally debuted in Hetalia World Stars manga, they're all overtaken with extreme joy.
- Funny Valentine, the main villain of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Steel Ball Run, happens to be the President of the United States. He has sympathetic ideals (but he goes on a rather extremist way of making them happen), genuinely cares for his country, and has a quirky personality, which has caused him to become popular among Americans.
- In regards to the series itself, next to Japan, Italy has had a JoJo fandom longer than any other country in the world, even before the 2012 anime. Based on this Reddit thread, Italian viewers love Araki's dedication to Italian culture, and even when the characters' naming conventions in Golden Wind amounted to Spaghetti and Gondolas, while Italian fans thought strangely of it, they ultimately wrote it off as funny, seeing it as an extension to the series' Narm Charm.
- In regards to the series itself, next to Japan, Italy has had a JoJo fandom longer than any other country in the world, even before the 2012 anime. Based on this Reddit thread
- The vaguely non-binary or genderfluid Osana Najimi from Komi Can't Communicate is a ditzy cloudcuckoolander who seems to flip-flop between male and female to take advantage of the current situation and is somewhat of a Compulsive Liar who tries to cheat at the school festival awards. Plenty of trans, genderfluid and non-binary fans love them nonetheless due to their fun yet flawed personality that isn't exclusively dominated by their gender identity, and despite all their scheming/enterprising, they are genuinely good friends towards Komi and Tadano. Never mind the substantial amount of non-binary people who envy their cute, androgynous appearance.
- Mr. Kouhei, American stereotype edition from Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi. Stars-and-stripes-attired Elvis impersonator selling giant hotdogs and constantly saying "fuck", cheerleaders with American flag bikinis... it's all just too ridiculous to be insulting.
- My Hero Academia:
- All Might, an Affectionate Parody of Superman-type superheroes, certainly isn't a negative stereotype, but a ridiculously muscular perpetually-grinning superhero who shouts the names of U.S. states or cities when he attacks would probably be seen as corny (at best, and excessively patriotic at worst) if he came from an American creator. But, since it's a foreign franchise — and because despite his Eagleland style, he's actually Japanese — Americans see All Might as more of a love letter to the positive aspects of their culture, making him very popular, and possibly the biggest draw for newcomers. It helps that he falls under the "Boisterous American" stereotype that frequently leads to this trope due to Americans seeing themselves that way, is a lovingly made Expy of Captain America, and is also a 100% legitimate Ideal Hero beloved by many in-universe and a deeply well-written character in his own right.
- Given the small number of Black characters in anime that don't turn out to be Ambiguously Brown, Rock Lock is also enjoyed by black anime fans, who are relieved to see a character like them who isn't based on or resembles any anti-black stereotypes.
- Tomoko Kuroki from No Matter How I Look at It, It's You Guys' Fault I'm Not Popular! is a Loser Protagonist otaku with No Social Skills. International anime fans love her due to her relatability and sympathize with her. Japanese anime fans, however, thought she was just offensive and too close for comfort. Poetically, the anime did very poorly in Japan but is popular in several other countries.
- One Piece
- As one of the only asexual or aromantic heroes out there, Monkey D. Luffy is beloved by the asexual and aromantic communities, even if he is a bit dim and fits the "asexual who just cares about food" stereotype.
- Bon Clay is generally agreed to be a product of his time, but queer fans adore him anyway due to his Token Good Teammate status among Baroque Works, his hamminess, his friendship with Luffy and the Straw Hats causing to make increasingly badass choices throught the story, and because he doesn't actually follow that many negative stereotypes of queer people despite his colorful design.
- Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt was much better received in the U.S. than it was in Japan, despite (or perhaps because of) being also a homage to/parody of U.S. animation, presented as a bunch of dick-and-fart jokes, repulsive moments and lots of sex.
- Garterbelt himself is a fairly rare (for the medium) example of a black Badass Preacher who's clearly a good guy by normal standards, let alone those of the show's setting. While it takes a while to see it as they seem fairly nominal as heroes at first, the Anarchy sisters are presented to play up their status as Chaotic Good angels with the defense of freedom as a dominant virtue, which feeds into the Americanized look. It also helps the show's not afraid to poke fun at its source; an episode done in a "Little Tokyo" ghetto with a distinctly changed art style manages to show Panty and Stocking, when they finally show up looking and acting no different than usual, appearing like actual angels simply due to contrast.
- In spite of Garterbelt being a Black caricature, there are many Black people who still like him and the show in general, judging by the huge amount of Black PASWG cosplays and fanart on social media.
- Pokémon the Series:
- Lt. Surge is a favorite among American fans.
- In the English dub for Pokémon: The First Movie, there's a scene where Team Rocket show up disguised as Vikings, to which Brock comments "I didn't know Vikings still existed." and Ash responds "They mostly live in Minnesota." a nod to the Minnesota Vikings team in the NFL. Minnesotans and Vikings fans alike get a kick out of this.
- Stop Hibari Kun features a lot of Values Dissonance due to being a 1980s manga, but a lot of trans women like Hibari despite all the jokes about her from other characters.
- Tokyo Godfathers: Hana is a pretty stereotypical trans woman character, with as much flamboyance and cheap jokes about her being physically masculine as you'd expect. However, she's liked by trans fans of the film for being the most kind-hearted member of the cast, for having a sympathetic storyline and some badass moments, and for getting a happy ending, not the usual death. It helps that her GKIDS voice actress, Shakina Nayfack, is trans like her.
- Yu-Gi-Oh!:
- Bandit Keith, or at least his Abridged Series incarnation, is popular... in America! Although he's actually Canadian.note
- There was never any doubt that Pegasus was fully American; he was the first Big Bad of the series, and was depicted as a Camp Straight Psychopathic Manchild... and American audiences couldn't get enough of him.
- The original series, with its Egyptian themes, is also pretty popular in Egypt. It helps that Kazuki Takahashi's research into ancient Egyptian mythology and culture is easily leagues above most anything else in pop culture.
- Yuri!!! on Ice. The characters are pretty popular with the countries that they're supposed to come from. The Russian skaters are particularly beloved by Russian anime fans, probably because they're not the typical Hollywood Russian villains.
Asian Animation
- A North Korean children's show, Squirrel and Hedgehog, depicts the unfortunate peninsula as a land where Funny Animals wage war on each other. In contrast to the cute chipmunks and ducks that dwell in Furry North Korea, the Evil Americans are represented as deep-voiced bipedal wolves with glowing blue eyes wearing greatcoats while flying rocket-powered robo-falcons and tossing around Jeeps. There is also a Furry Fandom version of The Baroness: Lieutenant Vixen, a badass with curvy, sashaying hips, wearing a military uniform and glasses. Americans' response to this has generally been "Were you trying to insult us? It's not working." This is a huge case of Values Dissonance; North Korean philosophy teaches that Koreans are a gentle, innocent people beset on all sides by vicious, bloodthirsty killers that would annihilate the Koreans were it not for North Korea's "great leaders". Thus the North Koreans really do see it as an insult to portray Americans as wolves no matter how cool it seems to the Americans themselves. Even putting aside said Values Dissonance, another reason it fell flat was that Flower Hill's actions paint them way off from their supposed portrayal of the moral underdog, while for the Americans it could be a case of At Least I Admit It.
- Chinese propaganda series "Year Hare Affair" is popular with Americans on reddit, probably because the US military looks so powerful. Chinese soldiers are portrayed as rabbits and Americans as bald eagles.
Comedy
- Comedian Paul Rodriguez says he likes Speedy's friend, Slowpoke Rodriguez, even more than Speedy, despite being a caricature of lazy Mexicans.
- Stand-up comic Carlos Mencia was once asked to perform in front of a crowd of hospital patients with mental and physical disabilities. The crowd asks Mencia to do jokes about "retarded people", but he was hesitant to until one of them asked an Armor-Piercing Question of "why won't you do those jokes in front of us?" So Mencia did, even exaggerated the stereotypes, and the crowd was beside themselves with laughter.
- According to Arab-American comic Ahmed Ahmed, Jeff Dunham's infamous puppet Achmed the Dead Terrorist is actually a big hit in the Middle East.
- Similarly, Jeff Dunham was concerned that "Sweet Daddy Dee!", a caricature of African-American pimp culture would be seen as offensive, particularly in areas like New York and Los Angeles with a far higher concentration of African-Americans. He quickly found that Sweet Daddy Dee performs much better in those areas since the stereotype he's poking fun at is better-known.
- Gabriel Iglesias tells a story that backs up the claim about Dunham's. He was once told by a cab driver in Saudi Arabia that he was the #2 most popular comedian in all of the Middle East. He was very flattered, then he asked who was #1. The driver's answer? Jeff Dunham.
Gabriel: You mean you guys don't find him at all offensive?
Driver: [gasps, offended] No! "I KEEL YOU!" - Also, while in Riyadh, Iglesias talked about how "I didn't know I would be performing for Assassin's Creed." The crowd loved it.
- Gabriel Iglesias in Stadium Fluffy tells the story about how he invoked the trope in real life because he had heard that Speedy Gonzales was left out of Space Jam: A New Legacy for his racist implications so he started a trend on Twitter. The filmmakers actually contacted him and he offered to do the voice. When they heard him do the voice they were so blown away by his accuracy that they offered him the role immediately but they also asked don't Latin Americans, especially Mexicans find him offensive. Gabriel replied that this trope is Truth in Television since there wasn't much representation of Hispanics or Latin Americans during his childhood.
- Lisa Lampanelli, known for making fun of all kinds of racial stereotypes, said that she started making jokes about the disabled after a guy in a wheelchair asked her to do it.
- The Blue Collar Comedy troupe (Jeff Foxworthy, Bill Engvall, and Larry the Cable Guy) are known primarily for making exaggerated humor pertaining to stereotypes of the Southern United States... where most of their fanbase hails from.
- Much of Les Dawson's act consisted of mother-in-law jokes. His own mother-in-law thought they were hilarious.
- Jim Davidson's act featured the notorious black stereotype character Chalky White. He claimed that black audiences loved the bit.
- Don Rickles and pretty much anyone of any ethnicity, religion, nationality, or race. When he lampooned you, you knew it was all a gag and you laughed with him rather than taking offense. That and he was completely egalitarian in his insult comedy, so it was clear that your (fill in the blank) wasn't being singled out.
Comic Books
- Asterix:
- René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo went so far as to post an apology at the beginning of the English translation of Asterix in Britain. However, it's consistently the best-selling Asterix album in the UK — probably because the stereotypes it promotes (Stiff Upper Lip, Brits Love Tea) are ones the British are happy to promote themselves, while in general the Britons are portrayed as being not that different from the Gauls. Goscinny noted that normally he would get a torrent of hate mail from whatever country he was spoofing in albums set in foreign countries, but did not receive a single one for Asterix in Britain.
- The best-selling album in Corsica is Asterix in Corsica, which portrays the Corsicans as surly, terrifying, outrageously misogynistic gangsters who eat cheeses so unspeakably foul-smelling that they are explosive, and Corsica itself to be beautiful but a Reassigned to Antarctica hell for legionaries, to which being thrown to the lions in the circus is preferable.
- Italians tend to self-identify as the descendants of the Ancient Romans that the series depicts as villains, and often buffoonish ones at that. The series is wildly popular in Italy, to the point the Italian translations added their own humor to make them even more ridiculous: Obelix' catchphrase "These Romans are crazy" was translated as "Sono Pazzi Questi Romani" to match Rome's motto "SPQR"note ; and in the movies' dubs, the Romans talk in Rome's dialect or accent.
- Chick Tracts are popular among certain skeptics and liberal Christians (some of Jack Chick's favorite targets of criticism), who enjoy the tracts for their unintentionally hilarious nature. "Dark Dungeons" is also popular among tabletop gamers for the same reason.
- Doctor Doom is hugely beloved by Romani comic fans, despite being a villain and his origin having a lot of stereotypical aspects. A large part of this is that Doom has been written as a sympathetic character for decades (with his origin explicitly showing anti-Roma persecution as an injustice), and his role as a highly dominant archvillain and national leader with a sense of honor contrasts with the more common stereotype of Romani as a bunch of good-for-nothing thieves. It helps that a number of comics have depicted a willingness to stick up for his people as one of his redeeming qualities. The tendency for adaptations to cast non-Romani actors to play him (with his two major film appearances being Australian and English) has proven something of a sticking point.
- Tintin: The album Tintin in the Congo, published in 1930, is widely considered to be Hergé's biggest Old Shame for its caricatural and paternalistically racist depiction of Congolese people, and several countries perpetually banned it from reprints. Oddly enough, it is quite popular in francophone Africa, and in modern Congo itself in particular. Interviews of locals show that people don't mind the caricatures therenote , considering them as hilarious (seeing how Europeans could be so unbelievably ignorant about Africans), and that Hergé actually made the country's name world-famous and inspired its comic book artists to the point of making it Africa's number one provider of comic book authors. And there's the boost it gave to local tourism.
Comic Strips
- Dilbert:
- Many white-collar professionals love the comic, despite (or because of) the mockery of the corporate cubicle culture.
- Tina is revered among technical writers, as this profession is rarely mentioned in popular media.
- The Far Side:
- Non-ethnic example: Gary Larson once drew a cartoon in which a scolding chimpanzee wife finds a blonde hair on the fur of her chimp husband and snarls: "Conducting a little more 'research' with that Jane Goodall tramp?" The (then-)Director of the Jane Goodall Foundation sent an angry letter to Larson threatening him with a lawsuit for defamation. But then word came in from the Gambia that Goodall herself loved the cartoon, and was unaware that anyone had been offended by it. (For the record, Larson has said that he respects Goodall a great deal and did not intend to hurt her anyway.) Eventually, they met in person, and Goodall ended up writing an introduction to one of the Far Side collections, signing a contract to guarantee she would never sue him for the cartoon, and subsequently selling the design on souvenirs from the Institute. Goodall even invited Larson to her chimpanzee sanctuary, whereupon one of the larger chimps roughed him up a bit.
- In another non-ethnic example, after the "Al Tilly the Bum" comic, a random guy named Albert Tilly wrote to say how honored he was to have his own Far Side cartoon.
- A comic with a salesman looking apprehensively at a "Beware of Doug" sign, with Doug watching intently from behind a tree, supposedly went over quite well — with guys named Doug.
- Comics of fat scientists behaving like children or engaged in the pettiest of behaviour are extremely popular on campuses and in labs.
- Hägar the Horrible, an American cartoon about a Horny Viking, is popular in Scandinavia, having been syndicated in major newspapers.
- Tumbleweeds was popular among Native American readers, who sent T.K. Ryan fan mail about how hilarious the Poohawk tribe was. Some Poohawk-centric strips were even reprinted in Native newsletters!
Fan Works
- An 2016 Voltron: Legendary Defender Klance fanfic Dirty Laundry was heavily bashed for what they deem as racist and stereotypical portrayal of Lance's Mexican American family and their culture. The bullying the author Gibslythe receive was so intense that it led to its deletion from Archive of Our Own. Despite this, it got huge amount of Mexican American fanbase who express on how much they relate deeply to Lance's family and feel represented by its depiction of Mexican American culture.
- Early on in the story's publication history, the writer of Origin Story came under fire from a handful of readers for his supposed "mocking" of trans-people. Thing is, it wasn't actual trans people who were doing the criticizing. Turns out the story has a large following among trans readers of fan fiction who came to the writer's defense and applauded the relatively sensitive way the story dealt with the issue of dysphoria and the feeling of not belonging in your own body.
Films — Animation
- Don Bluth's Anastasia was well-received in Russia and a box office hit, since its distributors took care to market it as not history but a historical fairy tale, letting the audience watch it with a fair dose of MST3K Mantra.
- Coonskin, despite its usage of blackface stereotypes and frequent saying of the N-word, was very popular among African-American audiences and even the NAACP. It helps that much of the film was meant to be a mocking satire towards the racist portrayals of African-Americans in America, and that director Ralph Bakshi really put effort into making sure the film was as accurate as possible. The film was so popular among black audiences, in fact, that many couldn't believe that Bakshi was white. It is even apparently a favorite among Spike Lee and the Wu-Tang Clan.
- Disney Animated Canon:
- A strange example is the character Sunflower from Fantasia. She's a female centaur who is drawn like a black caricature (wide lips and a body like a donkey) and acts as a servant to the white-featured centaurs. She has been removed from the movie since the 60s, but she has her share of fans. There is rather a lot of fan art depicting her as a little more realistically drawn and unsubmissive.
- The crows from Dumbo are divisive for being stereotypical caricatures of African-Americans, but they did have some black fans. They are based on real black entertainers of the time, and most of them are voiced by actual African-American singers; these details are often lost on modern audiences. Floyd Norman, one of Disney's first black animators, defended them due to their basis in reality, and Whoopi Goldberg once expressed a desire to see them in more Disney merchandise. It helps that they're likable and supportive characters.
- José Carioca from Saludos Amigos, The Three Caballeros and Melody Time is heavily popular in Brazil, even rivaling with Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck in popularity among the Brazilian fans. He has been featured prominently in the local Disney comics since the 1950s, and has his own comic book since 1961, with stories entirely made by Brazilian Disney artists. Interestingly, as the years passed, some of the Brazilian authors actually made him a little less stereotypical by giving him new outfits, more consistent with the weather and contemporary fashion in Brazilnote and introducing new characters, such as his many friends from the neighborhood and his cousins from different parts of Brazil, thus giving him a wider range of possibilities for the stories and better opportunities to exploit lesser-known aspects of the Brazilian culture.
- Though not as popular in his representative country as José is to Brazilians, Panchito Pistoles from The Three Caballeros is still well-liked by many of Mexican descent. Although his outfit and a lot of his mannerisms are very stereotypical for the time like his gun-toting, he's shown to be highly proud and respectful of his culture, dropping his Large Ham attitude to educate Donald Duck about various aspects of Mexican history like Los Posadas and the meaning of the nation's flag. Panchito also has a recurring comic strip that is still printed in many countries along with other Disney comics.
- Disney's version of Tiger Lily from Peter Pan is a popular character, even amongst Native Americans who otherwise dislike their portrayal in the film, thanks to her go-getter personality and her less stylized, more traditionally appealing design. It also helps that she doesn't speak, and therefore lacks the Tonto Talk that other Native Americans have.
- Lady and the Tramp is full of National Stereotypes from Irish cops to Mexican chihuahuas, yet all kinds of people enjoy watching it. Being one of Disney's first ventures into real diversity, it's pretty Fair for Its Day. Si and Am are an obvious parody of Asian stereotypes, but there are Asians who enjoy them and their Villain Song. Tony is a stereotypical Italian, but quite a few Italians like him for his lovable personality and having the most memorable song in the film. Jock, a tartan-wearing Scottish terrier with a Scottish accent, doesn't seem to bother Scottish viewers, especially since he and Trusty end up being the real heroes of the film.
- Ursula, the Big Bad of The Little Mermaid, is fat, and the fact that she thinks of herself as attractive (and laments that she's actually "wasted away" from her former weight) is Played for Laughs. However, this actually made her popular with many Fat and Proud Disney fans, to the point that there was an outcry when the official Disney Villains merchandise gave her a slimmer physique.
- In some Middle Eastern countries, such as Egypt, Aladdin is seemingly popular. Despite being a mishmash of various Middle Eastern cultures, many people of Arabic descent have praised the film for a positive portrayal of Middle Eastern people — as opposed to depicting them as terrorists or savages.
- While Pocahontas is often criticised for its liberties with facts, Irene Bedard (who voiced Pocahontas) has said that young girls of Native American descent have thanked her for portraying a Disney heroine who looked like them. Irene herself views the character as an important figure in Native American representation.
- The Hunchback of Notre Dame was a huge hit in France. The filmmakers were especially worried about offending the French people by taking an iconic symbol of French literature and culture and giving it the so-called "Disney Treatment" (and perhaps they had reason to be, given the notoriously controversial opening of Disneyland Paris earlier that decade). This is possibly why Disney was shocked later when Hercules was met with revulsion in Greece for its extreme liberties taken with the country's mythology.
- In contrast to the various criticisms levied at Hercules by native Greeks, Greek-Americans have much kinder things to say about the film, acknowledging that it's not intended to be an accurate retelling of Classical Mythology, and finding the Lighter and Softer take on their mythos to be an enjoyable experience on its own merits.
- Atlantis: The Lost Empire: Vinny Santorini is as much of a beloved Ensemble Dark Horse among Italian fans as he is generally among other viewers worldwide. The Superlative Dubbing by Pasquale Anselmo, who gave Vinny a southern accent to make him stick out more in the Italian dub and be accurate to him being from Palermo, definitely upped the character's charm.
- Dreamworks:
- Kung Fu Panda was so popular in China that it started a national debate on why Chinese filmmakers couldn't make a movie so good.
- How to Train Your Dragon is incredibly popular in the Scandinavian countries. Despite promoting the Horny Vikings stereotype and using Scottish accents rather than Scandinavian, many Scandinavians feel that it portrays parts of the Norse culture correctly, something unusual for Hollywood.
- Pixar:
- Many viewers with disabilities love Finding Nemo and Finding Dory. Sure, the franchise uses things like the word "gimpy", and there's been some criticism about using animals as a stand-in for representation. But it's also one of the few major mainstream film series to have many characters with disabilities (who vary in both condition and characterization), and for the most part, it's handled well. Dory's short-term memory loss may often be played for laughs, but since the movies are comedies, so is everything else, and both films balance it out by giving Dory a Cerebus Retcon.
- Scotland loves Brave despite having stereotypical jokes like Going Commando under kilts and Haggis Is Horrible. It helps that the cast was mostly genuine Scots, and they were encouraged to tweak the dialogue as much as they saw fit, so it certainly sounds authentic.
- Although there was some heavy criticism at first, eventually Coco did Win Back the Crowd in Mexico, big-time. It became the biggest ticket seller when it premiered and it's loved because of just how loyally it depicts Mexican culture, specially of Day of the Dead, which is one of their most important holidays.
- Ever since it's been revealed that Luca used the towns of Cinque Terre in the Italian region of Liguria as the reference for Portorosso, the movie has gained a lot of interest from Italians despite the "Italians love pasta" joke and the thick accents, especially those from Liguria who instantly loved it for its accurate portrayal of the region and its lifestyle. In Monterosso (one of the towns of Cinque Terre), they've even placed two statues of Luca and Alberto on the seabed off their main beach a few days after the movie debut.
- While Turning Red has been criticized by some for presenting a stereotypical view of Chinese culture (despite the film being directed by a Chinese-Canadian woman), the film has become praised by many Chinese-Americans/Canadians due to how much Mei's experiences resonate with their own experiences and has been praised amongst native Chinese audiences as well, with the film getting an 8.2/10 on Douban (a Chinese film rating site).
- Brazilians (especially casual consumers) seriously love Rio (and its sequel). Blue Sky Studios clearly pushed the right buttons when they made it — the movie's portrayal of the country is mostly accurate without being (particularly) offensive. Its director, Carlos Saldanha, is from Rio himself, so even if he does portray his hometown with its common stereotypes, you can see the good intentions are there.
- While Peni's depiction in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse received plenty of love from the many members of the Western fandom (yes, even the Otakus love her), her popularity in Japan exploded to the point that she gets more fan art than the other five Spider-People combined, for obvious reasons because Japanese entertainment love to include Moe-ish Girls.
- In-Universe in The Super Mario Bros. Movie, after Mario and Luigi view their plumbing business commercial on a local pizzeria’s TV, Mario questions if the fake Italian accents they used as a reflection of their Italian heritage were “too much”. The Italian-born Giuseppe (voiced by Charles Martinet and who has a very thick accent himself) overhears and reassures the brothers that the accents were perfect.
Films — Live-Action
- Many (not all, but many enough) Poles think fondly of the Russian film Sixteen Twelve, which tells the story of heroic Russians expelling Polish occupiers out of their country. This is mostly because, for a change, it's the Poles who are the evil badasses who kick everyone's backsides until the film's heroes finally get their stuff together.
- Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy is very popular with people who work at TV stations.
- The Chinese big budget anti-American propaganda film about the Korean War The Battle At Lake Changjin, portrays American troops as overwhelmingly powerful, over the top macho badasses, and pretty much anywhere footage of the American forces in the film pops up, is filled with comments of Americans enjoying such, like these reactions to its portrayal of Douglas MacArthur.
- Despite some seriously unflattering portrayals of local life in Hawaii, Beyond Paradise seems to be popular among Hawaiians who have seen it.
- Borat is quite popular in Kazakhstan, despite the title character being a deliberately absurd Funny Foreigner who acts nothing like a real Kazakh, and the general portrayal of Kazakhstan as a dirt-poor backwards country inhabited by ignorant racist buffoons. Kazakhs were mostly smart enough to realize that the film has nothing to do with the real Kazakhstan and is actually lampooning Americans' ignorance of foreign cultures. It also helped reintroduce Kazakhstan to the public eye after the fall of the Soviet Union left it without a real national identity. The president tried to ban it, but his daughter convinced him to lighten up and enjoy the joke. In 2020, the Kazakhstan Board of Tourism even released an advertisement incorporating Borat's catchphrase, "Very Nice!"
- The latter half of The Bourne Legacy features scenes from Manila right down to the slum areas and the heavy traffic. There's also Aaron Cross (played by Jeremy Renner) beating up Filipino security guards and policemen. Filipino viewers don't mind that the movie showed the downside of Manila or Cross beating their cops since Cross is a super agent like Jason Bourne and the cops are just doing their jobs and are obviously no match to a guy whose physical abilities are genetically enhanced. It also helps that at the end, a fisherman helped Cross and Dr. Shearing escape from the guys who are trying to kill them in the first place. The film production staff got permission and support from the Filipino government to shoot the scenes.
- Boys Don't Cry depicts a cisgender actress (Hilary Swank) portraying a transgender man. Despite this controversial casting, the film is seen as a positive example of transgender representation — and Hilary Swank confesses to getting hundreds of letters from LGBTQ fans thanking her for helping tell the story.
- Sacha Baron Cohen's other film, Brüno (2009) was more divisive in Austria. Older, more conservative generations thought Brüno was an obscene and disgusting pervert who had no place in their country. Others understood Cohen's satirical intent and even noted that Brüno was likely based on a popular and flamboyant TV show host — Alfons Haider — who was famous for wearing tight vests in public.
- Despite its historical inaccuracies, Frank Abagnale Jr. is an avid fan of Catch Me If You Can, claiming it fulfilled his fantasy of meeting his father again.
- Many Asian-American critics dislike the Charlie Chan franchise because of its Ice Cream Koans, Yellowface, misrepresentation of Chinese culture, broken English, and the title character's alleged subservience to whites. However, he's also a brilliant, law-abiding detective in a time where most Chinese characters were villains and some of his Ice Cream Koans are funny. Plus, Chan is the hero of the series, always defeating the villain. While Chan is a stereotype, his children are shown as being all-American kids (Number One Son, Lee, even wins a Gold Medal in the 1936 Olympics!) and were played by actual Asian actors. This has earned the franchise a few Asian-American defenders, including actor Keye Luke (who would voice his animated equivalent). The enormous popularity in East Asia could also be due to Values Dissonance. The use of color-face (blackface, whiteface, yellowface) isn't seen as offensive as in the U.S., especially if it's not used spitefully. A commercial by Nippon Airline had an actor dressing up in whiteface for a gag, and most Japanese didn't see the problem, and an English competition in China featured middle school students dressed as "foreigners". It's worth noting that the books are better-received, as many aspects that Asian-Americans disliked about the films are downplayed or even completely absent in the books.
- The Craft:
- Despite the most gothic girl turning out to be the villain, the movie has a huge fanbase of goth and punk girls. Nancy is particular is regarded as one of the most memorable parts of the film; it helps that she's depicted as a more complex Anti-Villain with sympathetic traits.
- Although the Token Black Friend Rochelle is considered a Flat Character whose entire arc revolves around her race, Rachel True has spoken about getting thanked by many Pagan girls of colour who were happy that someone who looked like them was one of the leads in a mainstream film (the film was released in 1996). In fact, fans merely wish more had been done with Rochelle as a character. It's also worth noting that Rochelle's character lacks some of the most common stereotypes of black characters, such as being a Sassy Black Woman or from the ghetto.
- The movie is also popular among Wiccans despite showing magic as something dangerous and promoting what many Wiccans would consider being common misconceptions about "magic". It helps that they had a consultant on board to write many of the spells, and Fairuza Balk did plenty of research to enhance her performance; including buying an occult shop.
- Singaporeans are aware that Crazy Rich Asians would not give an accurate representation of their city and its population due to criticism for not casting Malays and Indians who are the second and third ethnic groups in the city. They also accepted that the movie is meant for the Asian-Americans who have been underrepresented and stereotyped in Western media for years. For Singaporeans, the movie is just a typical romantic comedy which is set in their city. It helps that the Singaporean Tourism Board helped out during the film production, which would also boost the city's tourism.
- Australians love their portrayal by foreigners, particularly in America. The best part is that, for a long time, most American portrayals of Australians have been based on "Crocodile" Dundee, in which the character of Mick Dundee actually played up most of the "outback survivalist" aspects to trick American tourists. America didn't get it, which makes most American portrayals of Australians hilarious.
- In addition, Belarusian audiences were generally okay with the American-produced film adaptation of Defiance: The Bielski Partisans, despite the historical liberties and film's constant harping on antagonism between the Soviet military and Jewish partisans (when the book demonstrated Belarus was one of the rare places where nationalist and Jewish partisans cooperated in great concert). It may have had something to do with being an American film set in a country Americans are not necessarily aware of and James Bond fighting Nazis.
- South Africans are extremely enthused about the popularity of District 9 even though non-African viewers seemed to get the takeaway message that 'South Africans are terrible people'. Afrikaaners are just that damn thrilled to have a major film with a mostly S.A. cast and crew.
- Galaxy Quest:
- The film's most fervent fans are Star Trek fans, to the point that many consider it the unofficial tenth movie (which has the side effect of making the Star Trek Movie Curse still work). It helps that, though the movie mocks all the oddities of Trek and its fandom, its overall impression of the franchise is a pretty positive one.
- The cast of both the original series and The Next Generation also found the movie incredibly funny. Patrick Stewart said he initially was going to give the film a pass since he assumed it would be a mean-spirited parody. When he was finally convinced to see it, "nobody was laughing longer or harder than I!" Though George Takei also described the early scenes with the actors being washed up, bitter, and coasting on previous glory to be a "chillingly accurate documentary".
- Ghostbusters (1984): Egon is implied to be Jewish and Nerdy but is popular among Jewish viewers anyway, since the nerdy stereotype is one that most Jewish people don't find so bad, and he's played by a Jewish actor rather than being a caricature.
- Japanese audiences didn't seem to mind Ghost in the Shell (2017). In America, the film was slammed for casting the white Scarlett Johansson as the Major (who was Japanese in the original anime). But in Japan a lot of people praised the casting, including the director of the original, since Scarlett Johansson really does look like the Major as depicted in the original anime. Ironically the film also changes the location (though it's only implied) from Japan to Hong Kong. In this case the American media may have been the more relevant part; the setting of the franchise does a lot of weird if not terribly overt things with national stereotypes (if Caucasian Americans show up, they'll usually behave stereotypically Japanese in a sinister way — but the Japanese stereotype of "sinister Japanese" rather than Yellow Peril, and a lot of the heroic characters are based on non-Japanese stock roles to start with). And it's a part of the Major's character in particular that she has the outward appearance of a generically pretty adult woman who doesn't even resemble in face or body the woman she might have naturally grown up as.
- The whole Spaghetti Western genre is an example of this. While these films were made by Italian studios, usually shot in Spain, titles such as The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and Once Upon a Time in the West are among the most successful Western films, even in the United States, which is notoriously resistant towards European films.
- The Great Dictator:
- Though no one ever recorded what Adolf Hitler thought of it, he did definitely watch the film twice.
- Chaplin stated that he couldn't have made the film if he had known about the true extent of the horrors of the Nazi concentration camps at the time. Most Jews would be glad that he didn't.
- The Green Inferno features members of an actual Peruvian tribe as the cannibal tribe. According to director Eli Roth, in order to teach the tribe what a movie was, he and the crew brought in a generator and a TV and showed them the infamous Cannibal Holocaust to give them an idea of what they were being asked to do. They all loved it, thinking it was a comedy, and instantly signed on to play cannibals. Roth chalked it up to a strong culture of storytelling among the indigenous peoples of the Amazon.
- Hackers: Despite being clueless about how computer hacking works, it's popular among real-life hackers and IT technicians for portraying them in a positive light and making their job look cool, as well as the general So Bad, It's Good-ness.
- Hocus Pocus, much like The Craft; despite the Sanderson Sisters being Wicked Witches, they're often beloved by real witches for how fun and powerful they are.
- The Korean film The Host (2006) did good business as a foreign-language import in the American market, despite the United States being villains in the film and responsible for creating the monster. The film does make an attempt to soften its portrayal by making an off-duty American soldier a Badass Bystander who tries to fight the monster off in the beginning.
- James Bond:
- During screenings of The Spy Who Loved Me for Egyptian censors, the producers worried that Bond's "Egyptian builders!" quip would be poorly received, but it got a huge laugh.
- Octopussy: Even though it includes many Mystical India tropes, the film is considered a series highlight in India, and is a factor in Roger Moore's own popularity in the country.
- Similar to Rocky Horror mentioned below, Jennifer's Body is popular among sapphic women even though the eponymous villain (played by Megan Fox) is a Literal Maneater with Homoerotic Subtext between her and her best friend Anita "Needy" Lesnicki (played by Amanda Seyfried). It helps that Jennifer is a Tragic Monster who starts out sympathetic (if something of a jerkass, but a sympathetic jerkass nonetheless) because she was demonically possessed in the first place after being captured and sacrificed by a devil-worshiping rock band who thought she was a virgin. It also helps that she seems to genuinely love Needy (albeit in an increasingly possessive and violent way) even after becoming a Fully-Embraced Fiend, that Needy herself is Ambiguously Bi too while being the heroine, and that Fox (herself bisexual) was the one who decided to play Jennifer as a deeply closeted lesbian.
- Joker depicts the famous Batman villain as a normal man with mental illness who undergoes a Face–Heel Turn after being mistreated by society. Plenty of people who do suffer from mental illness praised the film for a sympathetic depiction of it — especially as Arthur's condition is what humanizes him and it's society's indifference to his suffering that leads to his Start of Darkness.
- The Jurassic Park franchise is very popular in Costa Rica, despite the fact that it shows several misconceptions about the country itself (like the depiction of the capital or the idea that it has an army) because it is one of the very few instances in which the country is part of a world-famous movie franchise.
- The Tom Cruise movie The Last Samurai, despite taking many "liberties" with Japanese history, is beloved over in Japan because they think it's really cool. This also might have something to do with the fact that the movie used actual Japanese actors like Ken Watanabe instead of other East Asians. It's also a movie that basically praises the good old days, which is something that any nostalgia junkie would get behind. Both in spite, and because it wasn't as great as people would like it to be. This is particularly ironic as the Japanese troops trained in Western combat were world renowned after the Russo-Japanese War for how well they followed the rules of war and the honor with which they treated their captives. The people wanting to return to the old ways of bushido are responsible for the Japanese army becoming monstrous during WWII, but they are depicted as good guys fighting evil progress in this film.
- Both Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan's films are popular in Japan, despite (at first in Jackie Chan's case) many of them implying they kick lots of Japanese ass.
- The 1989 Kirk Cameron/Jami Gertz drama Listen to Me has a cult following among the competitive speech and debate community for its totally unrealistic and excessively melodramatic portrayal of college debate.
- Little Shop of Horrors: Most dentists don't mind Orin despite him being a Depraved Dentist, since they find him funny.
- Hollywood Montrose from the Mannequin movies is so stereotypically Camp Gay that he would become a bonfire if he were any more flaming, but queer audiences loved him for being unafraid to be himself. He is also the only character who appears in both films, and he gets at least one scene in each where his quick thinking saves the day. Rantasmo, a gay reviewer, admitted to loving Hollywood in spite of his extreme stereotyping.
Rantasmo: Hollywood Montrose is a cliché character based on a tired, thoughtless, offensive, insulting stereotype... and I love him. [...] And so Hollywood presents a kinda unique dilemma: can a stereotype be awesome?
- Martial Arts Movies are never any less popular among western audiences when an eastern martial artist is pitted against western villains who are portrayed as ruthless thugs or pompous weaklings. In fact, westerners seem to expect it. Such films made in the west often continue this dynamic.
- The films of the Marx Brothers — which feature the Jewish Chico Marx (real name: Leonard Marx) as a very broad stereotype of shifty Italian immigrants — were very popular with real Italian immigrants, because — much like Speedy Gonzales — he always outwits his WASPy, patrician foes.
- Miss Congeniality is very popular in the pageant world for several reasons: the producers had clearly done their research on all the hard work that goes into pageants, the handful of contestants given characterization are not just shallow bimbos but have nuanced personalities, and it reveals that pageants are not as anti-feminist as main character Gracie assumes.
- Moral Guardians aside, many Christians think Monty Python's Life of Brian is hilarious. It helps a lot that, while Brian is a bit of a buffoon, Jesus himself is always treated respectfully, and that the Pythons get a lot of obscure and specific details from the four Gospels right. In fact, it's so accurate at times that some priests and ministers have even shown clips from the film during sermons to illustrate one point or another.
- Greeks have enjoyed My Big Fat Greek Wedding — which makes sense since Nia Vardalos is Greek,note and many don't see the "stereotypes" in the film as that.
- Nacho Libre was made as an Affectionate Parody of lucha libre wrestling, and it's positively adored by many Mexican viewers and fans of lucha libre for its silly, yet earnest and loving depiction of the national pastime (the fact its star, Jack Black, isn't even of Mexican descent, only adds to the strange charm). It helps that the villain Ramses was played by Silver King, an actual luchador.
- Ocean's Thirteen is reportedly very popular with hotel staff worldwide. In particular is the treatment of the VUP (Very Unimportant Person) who is in actuality the reviewer of the coveted Five Diamond Award; many a hotel worker has claimed their (obviously impossible) wish to be able to treat annoying guests in that manner.
- The Party, which stars white British comedian Peter Sellers as an Indian actor named Hrundi Bakshi, is very popular in India. One of Bakshi's famous lines, "In India, we don't think who we are, we know who we are", is often quoted, and it had an influence on some legendary players in the Indian film industry, including the likes of Amitabh Bachchan and Satyajit Ray.
- The Princess Bride: Australian fans are in fact very pleased by the line ...and Australia, as everybody knows, is populated entirely by criminals and cinema screenings in the country are often interrupted by loud cheering after this line.
- The Quiet Man has several examples of Oireland stereotyping, but it's considered a classic in Ireland. Helping matters was that it was the first big-budget Hollywood film to be shot there, features mostly Irish actors (besides Victor McLaglen and Ward Bond) and has the Irish language spoken on-screen. It's frequently played on television around Christmas in Ireland.
- Rambo III is hugely popular in Afghanistan. Apparently, the Afghans appreciated being portrayed as an unbeatable Proud Warrior Race.
- Despite many critics accusing Rambo: Last Blood of being racist and xenophobic for portraying the Mexican border as a dangerous, crime-ridden wasteland, many viewers of Mexican descent who enjoyed the movie have come out on social media to defend the film, claiming its portrayal of how dangerous the border has become isn't too off the mark, were happy that it raised awareness about sex trafficking, and weren't offended by its depiction at all.
- Reefer Madness has actually become a popular Stoner Flick; despite condemning cannabis, the movie is so hilariously clueless and over-the-top that it's great to laugh at while high. Its ironic popularity eventually earned it an Affectionate Parody in the form of Reefer Madness: The Musical.
- Rising Sun had all the potential to become hated in Japan for its negative portrayal of the Japanese. Yet the local screenings had audiences roaring with laughter at what was supposed to be a thriller, as between stereotypes and mispronunciations of Japanese words, what could offend was instead deemed unintentionally funny.
- Ivan Drago, the stereotypical Red Scare Husky Russkie from Rocky IV is very popular in Russia, with many people noting that, despite being a character in an anti-Soviet movie, he was far cooler than heroes from actual Soviet propaganda. It helps too that the film had a surprisingly benign portrayal of Russia for the time (a real rarity during the Cold War).
- The Rocky Horror Picture Show still has a sizable LGBT Fanbase despite some of its choices in depicting such communities not holding up so well today. For its time it was notably progressive and opened up a lot of eyes. Modern backlash is largely due to generational differences: both because increased sensitivity toward queer people has made unambiguously positive depictions more widespread, and because Rocky Horror's creator—though nonbinary himself—has expressed invalidating views about trans women specifically.
- Many Russians enjoy inaccurate portraits of Russia and the USSR in Hollywood movies. They affectionately call it klyukva (cranberry). One of the more (in)famous examples is the old Arnold Schwarzenegger flick Red Heat, which enjoys a Cult Classic status and has launched a couple of internet memes.
- Several evangelical Christian youth groups leaders have found the movie Saved! to be a funny but important teaching tool, despite the fact the movie was intended to mock this very demographic.
- There're a lot of drug dealers who feel represented by the movie Scarface (1983) despite the fact that Tony dies at the end. It's common for police to seize guns or other items bearing the inscription The world is yours.
- School of Rock: Contrary to writer/star Mike White's negative opinion of the character having his Camp Gay stereotypes played up and efforts to humanize him more in the Broadway show, Billy "Fancy Pants" is very beloved by LGBTQ+ fans of the movie, who not only think he's hilarious but argue that he isn't even that much of an exaggeration of an effeminate preadolescent boy to be considered offensive.note It helps that his actor Brian Faltudo, not only came out as gay after the fact but went on to become a passionate activist for LGBTQ+ causes, including The Trevor Project.
- The character of Ben Jabituya from Short Circuit and its sequel is an Indian-American character played by a white actor, Fisher Stevens. In spite of the casting choice, Ben is liked by Indian and Indian-American viewers, helped by the fact he is portrayed in a positive light with little of his personality being stereotypically Indian (Stevens has said the role was originally written as white, and the decision to make Ben an Indian-American only happened after an attempt to cast Bronson Pinchot in the role fell through), plus in the sequel he undergoes more character development. During a 2015 discussion between Aziz Ansari and Stevens on the subject, Ansari noted that he did not view Stevens as a bad guy or someone who played Ben as a tired stereotype, and agreed with Stevens that the role would be played by an actor of Indian or South Asian descent had the movie been made in modern times.
- The Sister Act movies are well-known for playing fast and loose with Catholicism and playing nuns and sisters for comedy, but many real-life nuns and others in Catholic ministry love the movies. A lot of it is because the films are both feel-good and harmless; aside from lighthearted ribbing against some goofier antiquated practices, they never mock the practice of religion or theology as a whole, and they frame the nuns, priests, and monks in the movies as being in the right in finding strength from their faith.
- The producers of Star Trek Into Darkness found themselves facing unexpected criticism from the Sikh community that was really looking forward to the film's villain, Khan Noonien Singh, played by a Sikh actor. The producers wanted to avoid the Yellow Peril implications of a villain of color, but the Sikh community noted that the character is such a classic Magnificent Bastard and Tragic Villain who physically and mentally outclasses any white man that it was a disappointment he was played by a British actor. More importantly, Khan was a genetically engineered superhuman, and making him British has rather questionable implications.
- Ricardo Montalbán's portrayal of Khan in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan was praised. At the time, having a non-WASP play a non-white character billed as a "perfected" human was revolutionary enough than Montalbán being Latin American didn't really matter. Khan, as in all his portrayals, was charismatic, intelligent and reasonably sympathetic, which made him a prime Draco in Leather Pants. More importantly, the very idea that a genetically engineered "superior" human could even be non-white was a big deal. What most people didn't (and still don't) seem to know is that Montalbán himself was a white man: he was born in Mexico, but his parents were immigrants from Spain. What most people also don't seem to know is that this isn't the least bit unusual considering that more than a third of Latin Americans self-identify as white.
- Suicide Squad: El Diablo (Chato Santana) has gained some popularity among Latin American fans, because of his amazing powers, his tragic past (which has turned him into The Atoner) and his heroic sacrifice at the end.
- In spite of (or, more likely, because of) its relentless mockery of rednecks, NASCAR, and NASCAR-loving rednecks, Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby became a box office smash in middle America, beloved by the very demographics it was (lightheartedly) making fun of.
- Team America: World Police:
- A possibly apocryphal story says that the late Kim Jong-il found the film to be hilarious, despite himself being the movie's villain.
- On a different level, the late Gerry Anderson apparently thought that despite being an Affectionate Parody of Thunderbirds, Team America World Police stayed much more true to the spirit of its source material than the live-action Thunderbirds movie released around the same time.
- Matt Damon actually thought his portrayal was rather hilarious, and spoke very highly of Trey Parker and Matt Stone, even calling them "geniuses".
- Many rock fans and rock stars either really love or really dislike This Is Spın̈al Tap for being a close-to-the-bone Affectionate Parody of rock excess and culture, especially as the "Spinal Tap" analogy has become synonymous with such behavior and art. Some of that may have to do with how deeply involved with their own excesses they were at the time they viewed the movie; Steven Tyler of Aerosmith, fueled by drug-induced paranoia, allegedly thought the movie was specifically mirroring the Aerosmith story and hated the movie as a result. Ozzy Osbourne genuinely thought the film was a documentary since the various comedic mishaps were so true to life that he didn't understand they were actually jokes. For example, the idea of turning something Up to Eleven has become a staple of the rock attitude, even though the movie itself thoroughly lambasts the concept. The long sequence in which the band cannot find the stage and ends up wandering around the bowels of the venue until a janitor gives them directions is apparently Truth in Television for anyone who has been on the right-sized tour.
- Despite concerns that he would be perceived as offensive, Robert Downey Jr.'s character Kirk Lazarus from Tropic Thunder (a pretentious actor who spends most of the film in Black Face) was actually well-received by black audiences in initial test screenings. What made Kirk so well-received among African Americans was that the character was clearly white in-universe, meant as a satire of Method Acting and a criticism of Hollywood whitewashing as opposed to mocking actual black people. It helped that there was also an actual black character in the film, the rapper/actor Alpa Chino who calls Kirk out on what he's doing and turns out to be a closeted gay man hiding behind an over-the-top hardcore gangsta image.
- Umrika: During an In-Universe showing of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Indy is met with Produce Pelting. The Indian audience is rooting for the Indian villain, Mola Ram, despite him being a violent Hindu priest with various other 'thuggish brown people' stereotypes.
"Don't hurt Brother Amrish!"
- Oliver Stone said in an interview that he is surprised that stockbrokers loved Wall Street so much. Despite the fact that Gordon Gekko is ultimately the villain, he's portrayed throughout the film as a rich, intelligent, stylish, and well-spoken corporate badass who rather eloquently articulates his view that "greed is good", so it's not exactly a mystery why the film inspired a lot of wanna-be Gordon Gekkos.
- The Waterboy: Henry Winkler has said that many college football players have told him about their coaches playing the movie during bus rides to games.
- Many Puerto Ricans like West Side Story (1961), despite its rather unflattering portrayal of them, and one of the songs describing Puerto Rico as a backwards Banana Republic. This might have something to do with the fact that it was remarkably pro-immigrant for the time, which might have something to do with the fact that the director and songwriter were both the sons of immigrants. It helps that Puerto Rican actress Rita Moreno won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance as Anita, too.
- The World of Suzie Wong is often attacked for enforcing the Asian Hooker Stereotype and being one of the archetypal Mighty Whitey and Mellow Yellow stories. But it has just as many fans who love it for the on-location scenes in Hong Kong — making it a valuable time capsule of the city in the '60s. The film is also beloved for Nancy Kwan — who became one of the most prominent Asians in Hollywood thanks to playing Suzie. Journalist HY Nahm noted that a lot of the hate for the film came from people who had never seen it but had heard the negative things about it. When she sat down to watch the film, her reaction was...
"The revulsion never came...none of the vulgarity the mind conjures up at the mention of Suzie Wong...as awful as it sounds, I can't dislike the film. I come away with an appreciation for Kwan's beauty and talent."
- Many Israelis found You Don't Mess with the Zohan to be pretty funny, albeit exaggerated. The fact that Adam Sandler is Jewish probably helped him avoid negative reception there.
- Many members of the fashion industry loved Zoolander, claiming its portrayals of male models are only slightly exaggerated.
Jokes
- Despite concerning an Italian man who speaks in You No Take Candle grammar, and the humour coming from people not understanding his heavy accent (misunderstanding "piece" as "piss", "fork" as "fuck", and "sheet" as "shit"), many Italians found the "Italian Man who Went to Malta" joke funny anyway.
Literature
- Several actual librarians find the Alcatraz Series hilarious, with the comedic take on the titular villains preferable to the other common interpretation of librarians in fiction.
- Down to a Sunless Sea: The book is written by an Englishman, and the American people are portrayed as victims of And Man Grew Proud who destroyed themselves by using too much oil, have lost their cities to criminal hordes, struggle to scrounge up a single meal a day, and are desperate to emigrate to Britain, but it is nothing worse than various American novelists have done with their own post-apocalyptic novels and the engaging premise and various sympathetic individual American characters cause the novel to maintain a decent fanbase in the U.S.
- Most Scottish Discworld fans love the drinkin' and fightin' and stealin' Nac Mac Feegle. As Eleanor Morton put it on the Desert Island Discworld podcast, from most other writers it would be an offensive stereotype, but it's Terry Pratchett, and he's clearly done the research, so it's fine.
- Harry Potter:
- The fictional sport of "Quodpot" from Quidditch Through the Ages is a joke on Eagle Land and American rejection of association football. It's essentially basketball, played on flying broomsticks, and the ball blows up if you take too long to score. American fans of the series generally think that Quodpot sounds like a lot of fun, or at least like that their fictional counterparts are badass enough to play such a Blood Sport.
- Viktor Krum. While his As Long as It Sounds Foreign name and Misplaced Accent (for those who read the books in English) have attracted the ire of Bulgarian readers, he himself is very popular for being a decent, honorable guy and a star Quidditch player, and for their country being portrayed positively in such a famous work (instead of negatively or using a fictional Ruritania).
- The fictional sport of "Quodpot" from Quidditch Through the Ages is a joke on Eagle Land and American rejection of association football. It's essentially basketball, played on flying broomsticks, and the ball blows up if you take too long to score. American fans of the series generally think that Quodpot sounds like a lot of fun
- Spaced Out (2016): In-Universe example. Dash shows his alien friend Zan Parfonic a Star Wars movie when she becomes curious after he mentioned it. She starts laughing at the designs of the alien characters and states that she really enjoyed it.
- Warrior Cats:
- Atheist fans of Warrior Cats are fond of Mothwing, a non-religious medicine cat, despite Mothwing being a Flat-Earth Atheist who lost her belief in StarClan due to traumatic events.
- Cloudtail is also popular amongst atheists, to a lesser degree, despite being a "pompous atheist" stereotype.
Live-Action TV
- Archie Bunker in All in the Family is meant as a parody of working class conservative white men of the generation that came of age around the Second World War. Because Archie has many likable traits (such as being a hard worker, a devoted family man) despite his bigoted views, and because his son-in-law and liberal foil Meathead came across as preachy and self-righteous much of the time, many conservative, working class white guys loved the show and the Archie Bunker character, even among those who knew perfectly well that Archie was intended to be a parody and that the purpose of the show was to preach against his outlook.
- 'Allo 'Allo!, a show set during World War II, uses every national stereotype there is for the English, French, Germans, and Italians. Yet it's extremely popular all over Europe, probably because everybody is equally ridiculed.
- Many who identify as geeks claim to love The Big Bang Theory. However, just as many decry it as "nerdface".
- The majority of Hispanic characters in Breaking Bad (barring Gomey and Andrea, who are both relatively minor players) are antagonistic cartel members, many of whom aren't even played by Hispanic actors and thus have very awkward Spanish, and the show's "Mexico yellow filter" has become infamously memetic online. And yet, the show is very much well-loved in Latin America, to the point of getting a shot-for-shot remake in Colombia, with plenty of memes on the Spanish/Portuguese-speaking internet originating from the show. Much of this might be due to how much the show absorbs from its Southwest US setting, including its Hispanic influence, as well as Walter eventually becoming no less brutal than his Hispanic rivals.
- A lot of real-life witches love Charmed (1998) in spite of it only bearing a passing resemblance to real Wicca. Mostly because the witches are strong women who save the day repeatedly, as well as also being simply everyday people that happen to be witches (averting the Goth Girls Know Magic stereotype). A lot of people were inspired to seek out witchcraft from watching the show; many covens and groups recall getting emails and phone calls from people asking if they could be like the Halliwell sisters.
- Some conservatives are aware that Stephen Colbert is a parody of conservatives, yet really love The Colbert Report. This includes Bill O'Reilly, of whom Colbert's in-show persona is a specific parody.
- That said, many conservatives think the show hit massive Seasonal Rot in recent years, with the show becoming less funny and more preachy. By 2021, most conservatives stopped enjoying Colbert and tuned out.
- Abed from Community is regarded as one of the better depictions of autism in the media in spite of how it's only heavily implied and the presence of stereotypical traits, albeit it helps that the entire series has an All-Stereotype Cast which makes the Hollywood autism traits a bit more forgivable. Plus he was actually created by an autistic creator, in fact, he came to that realization while writing Abed's character.
- Derry Girls is a sitcom set in Northern Ireland during The Troubles, and has a lot of Black Comedy relating to it — women complaining about bomb scares making them miss nail appointments, girls joking about their classmates being in the IRA, faking kidnappings to get out of trouble. Yet it's beloved in Northern Ireland — with a mural of the main cast even being painted in Derry. It helps that the show's writer Lisa McGee is from Derry herself, and most of the humor comes from her own experiences growing up there.
- Russian late-night talk show Evening Urgant did a New Year special called Ciao, 2020!, an Affectionate Parody of Italian televised concerts of the '80s which spoofed a lot of things common for Italian television of the time (such as nonsensical conversations and obsession with buxom breasts) as well as featured Russian hit songs translated into Italian and remixed Italo Disco style. The special generated a lot of buzz in Italy for what was interpreted as loving mockery. Indeed, the YouTube upload of the special had a lot of comments from Italy, and a number of Italian media, such as La Republica and Mediaset, spoke favorably of the special. Ivan Urgant was even eventually honored as a Knight of the Order of the Star of Italy.
- Evening Urgant crew produced another New Year special, Ciao, 2021!, even getting several Italian celebrities to appear as cameos (posing as Russians to keep the ruse afloat). It was similarly positively received by Italians, and quite a few expressed the wish to see Ivan Urgant on Sanremo festival.
- You'd think that Catholic priests would hate Father Ted. You'd be absolutely wrong.
- Many Brits love Geoffrey from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air because of how much of a Deadpan Snarker he is and how frequently he seems to be the Only Sane Man in a given situation. In fact, he's depicted as more intelligent and educated than he might be in a typical British sitcom.
- Welsh people (especially people living in South Wales) love Gavin & Stacey. Although the Welsh characters on the show are mostly eccentric, sometimes a bit dim and for the most part, rather sheltered from spending their whole lives in Barry Island, the same characters are also lovable, kind, and very funny, and Wales is very underrepresented in UK-wide media. The same applies to Doctor Who, which is filmed in Cardiff, despite the occasional Take That! made at Cardiff's expense.
- The comedy show Goodness Gracious Me, which was largely written and performed by British people from Indian backgrounds, did a sketch called "Having an English", which sent up the attitudes and behaviour of white Britons in Indian restaurants. It proved to be one of their most popular. The show's title also references a musical comedy bit by Peter Sellers as a very stereotypical Anglo-Indian doctor. They were originally going to be a lot harsher about Seller's broad use of Yellowface, but the character he played was actually a pretty decent, intelligent guy, so they decided on an Affectionate Parody instead.
- The Good Place makes constant digs at Florida and the football team the Jacksonville Jaguars. Most Floridians who watch the show find the jokes to be hilarious, and not always inaccurate. (In general, Floridians tend not to mind jokes about how weird Florida is — the Only in Florida trope is used a lot by writers who are actually from the area.) Similarly, a lot of Jaguars fans think the jokes about their team are funny.
- Similarly, Jason Mendoza is beloved by Asian-Americans, Filipinos in particular, specifically because he's a handsome doofus, the opposite of the usual smart-but-nerdy Asian-American stereotype.
- The Scousers, characters who appeared in Harry Enfield's Television Programme in the 1990s actually proved popular in Liverpool. They were even referenced in a Reebok magazine ad, with a whole section of the Enfield crowd in curly wigs and moustaches. Rumour has it that the crowd included the then-manager and several players, who were actually from the city.
- Hogan's Heroes:
- In spite of being yet another one of countless American works that tend to focus on the Nazi era when it comes to featuring Germany and/or Germans, the series did nevertheless become popular in Germany, due to massive Woolseyism in its treatment of the German characters, giving them different regional accents and adding various other cultural references which were played for comedy. For instance, more northern Germans thought Sergeant Schultz, a caricature of Bavarians, was funny, while likewise, more southern Germans were entertained by a similarly Prussian caricature embodied by Colonel Klink.
- Hogan's Heroes is also loved among the Jewish community, but not for the reasons you'd expect. If the portrayal of Nazis being incompetent, buffoonish warmongers that are constantly being outwitted by Hogan and his intrepid crew wasn't funny enough, then there's the fact that said Nazis are being portrayed by Jewish actors, many of whom were displaced following the rise of Nazi Germany (some of which, namely Robert Clary, John Banner, and Leon Askin, had lost relatives during). Indeed, Hogan's Heroes is often remarked as the Jews' "silent revenge" against the Nazis.
- House of Cards (US) has Villain Protagonist Frank Underwood as a ruthless amoral bisexual Southern Gentleman politician and later President Evil. Bisexual males have absolutely no problem with him, mainly because while he has used sex as a tool to manipulate, his actual relationship with his wife and ex-boyfriend in college has been portrayed rather sympathetically if a little shaky with the former.
- In Living Color!: While much of the humor from this 90's sketch comedy show would not be kosher today, its "Make fun of everyone" approach meant it had fans among the groups it mocked. "Men on Film", where two Camp Gay men gave film reviews (and later covered other topics), was loved by gay men at the time, especially black gay men, who couldn't deny that the characters were hilarious. And Handi-Man, a superhero both physically and mentally disabled, had his fans among people with disabilities because all jokes aside, he always came out on top and defeated the villains. At least in this case, his actor Damon Wayans had a club foot growing up, allowing a degree of N-Word Privileges.
- Mexican and Latino fans of Kamen Rider are appreciative of the utilization of the Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) for the Deadmans, the villains of Kamen Rider Revice.
- An Enforced Trope for Key & Peele: apparently, after the first series of the show aired, one (or both) of them were approached by a Latino gangster who asked them why they didn't make any jokes about Latino gangsters. Key and Peele obliged, so in the second season, we got the "Chairs are for pussies" sketch.
- You'd expect Kung Fu (1972) and Kung Fu: The Legend Continues to both be hated by both the Asian-American community and practitioners of martial arts. You'd be wrong. David Carradine visited the Shaolin Monastery in 2005 and the abbot, Shi Yǒngxìn, thanked him for helping to promote the Shaolin and kung fu culture, to which he replied "I am happy to serve."
- Jonathan Quayle Higgins III from Magnum, P.I., a stereotyptical Brit played by the Texan-born John Hillerman, is a beloved character among British viewers. Not only is he an effective foil toward Magnum, as well as T.C. and Rick, Higgins is also a worldly man that has served His/Her Majesty's interests on and off the battlefront since World War II (such that a running gag in the series is him going off on one of his adventure stories), and more or less plays an older, more sagely Smart Guy among the main group.
- Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers:
- The show is often mocked for the original Yellow Ranger being portrayed as an Asian-American woman (and the series never had an Asian Yellow Ranger again after this). However, her actress Thuy Trang spoke about being approached by many older Asian-American viewers who thanked her for portraying a positive role model for the community. And while Trini is academic and trained in Kung Fu, it helps that she's not the nerdiest member of the team (in fact translating for Billy when the others can't understand him) and Jason and Tommy are martial artists too — making this trait more incidental. In a fan poll in the 2000s, Trini was voted the most popular Yellow Ranger of all time. There have even been pieces written about what she meant to the generation of children who watched Power Rangers in the '90s.
"All I knew was that, for the first time in my life, I was watching a girl on-screen who looked like me, who might if I stretched my imagination have a childhood like mine, who might if I stretched my imagination even further might actually be me, and who was kicking massive amounts of butt...comic books were an oasis in the desert of all-White media; so starved were we for someone to relate to that we couldn't help but make an instant bond with those rare characters of colour we discovered. We connected with these faint and oftentimes racially insensitive characters (and caricatures) because they were, if nothing else, a validation that we, too, existed in this world."- Zach became popular among African-Americans for similar reasons to Trini. Despite the obvious cringe of the black guy being the Black Ranger, Zach was popular among Black viewers for being the cool one out of the five — as he was laid back, fashionable (by 90's standards), and had a distinct Dance Battler fighting style.
- The show is often mocked for the original Yellow Ranger being portrayed as an Asian-American woman (and the series never had an Asian Yellow Ranger again after this). However, her actress Thuy Trang spoke about being approached by many older Asian-American viewers who thanked her for portraying a positive role model for the community. And while Trini is academic and trained in Kung Fu, it helps that she's not the nerdiest member of the team (in fact translating for Billy when the others can't understand him) and Jason and Tommy are martial artists too — making this trait more incidental. In a fan poll in the 2000s, Trini was voted the most popular Yellow Ranger of all time. There have even been pieces written
- Mind Your Language is now generally viewed as a xenophobic, racist, and utterly cringeworthy piece of TV — yet at the time of airing, it was popular with many non-white viewers who found the exaggerated national stereotypes funny and appreciated that the show was providing greater visibility for actors of color.
- The Swedish Chef of The Muppets is a case of divisiveness in Sweden. Some people hate him for being an overtly ridiculous portrayal of Swedes, and others find him hilarious for exactly the same reason. According to Adam Hills, in Sweden, the Swedish Chef is known as The Norwegian Chef.
- Patrick Swayze enjoyed the Mystery Science Theater 3000 song "Let's Have a Patrick Swayze Christmas", which was inspired by his film Road House (1989).
- It's the same case for Niles in The Nanny, who more or less has the same role as Geoffrey (though Niles steps it up by being a Manipulative Bastard who plays everyone in the Sheffield house like a Stradivarius). Amusingly, Niles' actor, Daniel Davis, isn't actually British, but an Arkansan. Even more amusing is that his portrayal of Niles was so spot on that British fans reportedly wrote Sheffield's actor, Charles Shaughnessy (who IS a native Brit), imploring him to take voice lessons from Davis.
- Many people who work in white-collar corporate settings enjoy series like The Office (US). Software developers, in particular, have enjoyed The It Crowd.
- Outsourced, which is themed on the concept of outsourcing an American call center to India, has a growing fan following in India.
- Parks and Recreation's Ron Swanson is quite popular with libertarians, despite him being a Strawman Political. It probably helps that he's presented as a sincere and consistent proponent of the philosophy who practices what he preaches, making him practically unique in mainstream TV.
- Also, people who work in local government and/or public service, mainly due to being able to relate to Leslie's struggles as she tries to get something (anything!) done.
- Librarians rejoice in "punk-ass book jockey" T-shirts and mugs with that moniker abound, as do librarian blogs and social media handles.
- The series is also popular with people who grew up in Midwestern, flyover, conservative, under-educated towns that Pawnee satirizes. The general sentiment is, "They're not exaggerating as much as you'd think."
- Pistvakt is a Swedish series taking place in a fictional town in the darkest and coldest reaches of Norrland. The show also plays a lot of the stereotypes about people in Norrland for laughs, such as their dialect not being understandable to other Swedes (which is mainly shown by the creators making up vaguely Northern slang for the show), them drinking a lot of illegally homebrewed alcohol, regularly poaching and so on. Despite this, it remains popular in Norrland; for years after the show was over, the protagonist trio's actors would do tours across Norrland under the band name The Pjäx Pistols while in-character, consistently filling up the concert venues.
- German series Der Popolski Show involves a none-too-bright, heavily drinking, simplistically religious Polish family with a persecution complex. For some reason, it's apparently liked by Poles living in Germany. The Popolskis are a novelty band that specializes in humorous, polka-style cover versions. Their popularity with Poles living in Germany may be due to them being portrayed sympathetically and as tellers of incredible stories. Their main claim is that their grandfather Piotrek Popolski invented Pop Music (the "Pop" is actually short for "Popolski", you know) in 1908 and wrote 128,000 songs that reached the charts (all of which were stolen by a used-car salesman who sold them to other artists); he also landed on the Moon half an hour before Neil Armstrong in a homebuilt rocket launched from a field outside Zabrze.
- Portlandia is often beloved by Portland natives. Even the actual mayor of Portland plays a recurring bit part as the aide to the series' version of the Mayor. However, there are still Portland natives who feel that the series openly insults perfectly innocent subcultures.
- Raised by Wolves (2013), a British Black Comedy Sitcom featuring Rebekah Staton (herself from Stoke-on-Trent) was actually well-received by people in the Midlands despite being a harsh parody of the region and its culture.
- The Righteous Gemstones portrays it's titular megachurch family as hypocritical, foul-mouthed, decadent, and (with the exception of its patriarch) utter morons. Despite this, it's actually fairly popular with Christians because (1) a lot of Christians agree with its view on megachurches and prosperity gospel, and (2) it actually gets little details about American evangelicalism spot-on than most shows lampooning the religion miss.
- Saturday Night Live has lampooned virtually every group of people under the sun, so it's natural that a few would come to appreciate their teasing.
- The best-known example is probably "Bill Swerski's Superfans", or "DAAAAAAAA Bears!" The sketch portrays Chicago's male citizens as fat, lazy slobs who do nothing but eat massive portions of unhealthy food, have numerous heart attacks every day, and root without fail for Chicago sports teams, especially "daaaaaaaa Bears!" Despite the less-than-flattering portrayal, Chicagoans loved the characters and invited them to make guest appearances at virtually every major sporting event for the Bears, Bulls, and Cubs; similarly, Michael Jordan and Mike Ditka, both the biggest stars in Chicago at the time (Jordan as a player for the Bulls and Ditka as the Bears' coach), made appearances as themselves in sketches.
- In a more recent example, the 2020 episode hosted by Timothée Chalamet featured a sketch about hip-hop. Chalamet and Pete Davidson play obnoxious "rappers" who have made a single (terrible) song on Tik Tok that has somehow been viewed two billion times, know nothing about the history of hip-hop and its revolutionary roots (Chalamet's character was apparently inspired by the rapping hamsters in KIA car commercials), and speak endlessly in nonsensical slang. The idea was to mock Tik Tok stars in particular and Gen Z in general — but actual Tik Tok users thought the parody was hilarious and embraced it by sampling the fake song into their own short videos, while other Gen Zers flooded the sketch's YouTube post with praise and positive comments.
- SCTV had Bob and Doug McKenzie as a caricature of Canadians to protest Executive Meddling Canadian Content rules for the show. As it turns out, Canadians love them, as they're not only seen as funny, but also as a point of pride, reflecting Canada's national reputation of having an easygoing willingness to laugh at themselves. It's said that their "Coo-loo-koo-koo" call is one of the most popular ringtones ever sold in Canada.
- English comedian Russ Abbott's character of "See You Jimmy" is on the face of it a really insulting caricature of Scottish people in general and Glaswegians in particular. Sales of "See You Jimmy" hats and wigs in Scotland soar every time there is a national event, however, and the character was voted the third best Scottish person in a poll by the Glasgow Herald newspaper.
- Seinfeld has a Ukrainian man in Soviet clothing smashing a Risk board game after overhearing Kramer call his country "weak" (in the context of the game). In spite of his Soviet appearance, this character became a popular meme among Ukrainian online users and supporters, representing Ukraine's resistance against the Russian invasion of their country in 2022.
- Sesame Street:
- The show added an autistic character named Julia. Despite her displaying some stereotypical mannerisms of autistic people, she was universally praised by almost everyone, including autistic people. It helps that her performer is the mother of an autistic child.
- More so a case of Vindicated by History, but this applies to Roosevelt Franklin with the African-American community. He was initially seen as a stereotypical portrayal of black people with his rowdy nature and tendency of speaking in scat, resulting in his removal from the series. However, in more recent times, African-Americans have come to appreciate Roosevelt Franklin for how dedicated he was to clearing up misconceptions of their African heritage and, overall, just being a fun guy to hang around.
- Star Trek: The Original Series:
- Scotty has a big fanbase among Scottish Trekkies. Craig Ferguson has said that Scottish engineers may be stereotypical, but it was one of the few portrayals at the time that didn't follow another stereotype.
- Khan Singh is very popular with the Indian Sikh community. Even if he was played by a Mexican man, his charismatic villainy seemed to make it a moot point.
- Dr. Bashir from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is a big hit with the autistic community in spite of being the stereotypical Insufferable Genius and Innocent Bigot. It helps that he is still one of the most accurate portrayals of low-support autism ever, he's a hero and never portrayed as a burden despite sometimes being annoying, he has sexual agency (averting one of the most common and infantilizing Hollywood Autism tropes), and many autistic people have survived medical abuse as he did. (Though his condition isn't outright stated to be autism.)
- This article also considers it one of the best representations of a man of Arab origin on television.
- This article
- London Tipton of The Suite Life of Zack & Cody is the quintessential Asian Airhead, but is beloved by many Asian children who loved that someone who looked like them was a prominent character on a Disney Channel sitcom. It helps that the character is given plenty of Hidden Depths, bordering on Spoiled Sweet, and has a spectacular Unlimited Wardrobe. And Brenda Song's comic timing is greatly respected to this day.
- Super Sentai:
- Zyuden Sentai Kyoryuger features Ramirez, a Spirit Ranger with a big gut and silly mannerisms; he's exceptionally popular with Western Sentai fans, partly because he's the first non-Japanese Ranger ever (played by the emigrated Canadian actor Robert Baldwin), and partly because while he is used for Funny Foreigner jokes, he's still just as brave, noble, and competent as the other heroes. Needless to say, there are more than a few fans who have asked Saban to cast Baldwin as his own counterpart in Power Rangers Dino Charge (which is only aided by the fact that Baldwin himself has expressed interest as well).
- The same applies to Kinji Takigawa in Shuriken Sentai Ninninger a few seasons later. He's a Japanese-American who was raised in America and displays a bunch of American stereotypes like being a cowboy and liking to party with rock n' roll music, but he's just as heroic and skilled as the other Ninningers (and that skill is primarily self-taught) and Americans think that a rockstar cowboy ninja is awesome.
- Before both of them was Jiraiya/Ninja Black of Ninja Sentai Kakuranger, another Japanese-American character who spoke good English that his Japanese-American actor used to sneak in subtle jokes and snarkery. If Jiraiya is what Japan thinks Americans are like then they must think we're pretty awesome.
- Likely unintentional, but Uchu Sentai Kyuranger's Naga Ray/Hebitsukai Silver is shaping up to be this for the autistic/Asperger fanbase. Like Ramirez his "stereotypical traits" (lack of social skills and trouble recognizing emotional expressions in this case) are played for laughs, but it never comes off as mean-spirited or offensive and he's an unambiguously competent member of the team, showing skill as both a thief and fighter (with a scythe no less!), as well as some engineering talent.
- Superstore, despite being a parody of Walmart, was enjoyed by actual Walmart employees for being hilarious and portraying the employees like a family.
- The Tudors and The Borgias did well with Catholic viewers. It also helps that in The Borgias the Catholics are sympathetically portrayed as well as The Tudors to a lesser extent.
- Versailles did well in both the United Kingdom and the Netherlands despite the negative portrayal of king William of Orange.
- Despite having the most blatant examples of gay stereotyping that would never be allowed on a television sitcom today, most of the LGBT community appears to love Will & Grace, and not just because of the significant impact the show made towards marriage equality and the like. An NBC revival debuted in 2018.
- Czech comedy TV series Kosmo, telling a story of a Czech-Slovak-Polish race to the Moon, has become a viral sensation in Poland. This is not so much in spite as because it depicts the Poles as four nobleman types and a dog in a rocket topped with a cross and emblazoned with an image of Pope John Paul II riding a tiger and wielding a flaming sword, who only answer to a call for help if it's from another Pole.
Music
- The song "Yankee Doodle", so the legend goes, was invented by the British as a means to demean American troops during the French and Indian War.note
- Al Jolson, despite performing in Black Face, was well respected by African-Americans, since he himself fought for more racial equality in the music business and his admiration for black musical tradition seems to have been pretty genuine. Part of this is Values Dissonance though since Black Face wasn't generally seen as offensive in the 1920s and '30s as it is today.
- The Finnish novelty rock band Leningrad Cowboys, best known for their over-the-top hair and comedic antics, are fairly popular in Russia and throughout the CIS nations, despite originally being intended as a joke at Finland's Soviet neighbor for their film, Leningrad Cowboys Go to America.
- The Russians seem pretty okay with "Back in the USSR". Ironically, in the actual USSR practically no records of The Beatles were released for being a corrupting Western influence, even as American reactionaries accused the band of being pro-Soviet.
- The Burt Bacharach-Hal David song "Me Japanese Boy I Love You", first recorded by Bobby Goldsboro in 1964, only got to #74 on the Billboard chart but was a big hit in Hawaii, which has a large Japanese community. Later it was covered and translated into Japanese by Pizzicato Five. It helps that the song is more sappy than offensive.
- The British band Japan were massive stars in the country Japan. Their early material and dress sense inspired the genre of Visual Kei, and it took until Life in Tokyo for the band to really break big in their home country. The band embraced East Asian influences in their music and worked with Japanese musicians such as Ryuichi Sakamoto and Masami Tsuchiya. The band recorded exclusive material for their Japanese fan club and kept older singles in print. Lead singer David Sylvian continued to work with Japanese musicians in his solo career (working with Ryuichi Sakamoto on several occasions, most notably "Forbidden Colours") and broke many musical boundaries, and is regarded by many there as an honorary Japanese. Whilst it's not uncommon for Japanese people to appreciate Westerners enjoying their culture, Sylvian is one of the few to have made an effort to ingratiate himself with the people and surroundings, and is respected for that reason.
- Nobody is more enthusiastic about hearing Voltaire's song "Bomb New Jersey" (and his take thats towards the state in general) than his fans that live in said state. To be fair, Voltaire did grow up there and the song contains a lot of in-jokes that only make sense to people from New Jersey.
- Harry Belafonte is often criticized for playing an easy listening form of calypso designed for white audiences. However, many Caribbeans have to admit that his '50s popularity sparked an unprecedented level of creativity amongst 'genuine' calypso musicians from Trinidad and elsewhere. Many of these got their songs recorded and released on labels thanks to the music being in public demand at the time, with everyone wanting to capitalize on Belafonte's popularity and the genuine musicians finally getting their big break. It was thanks to Belafonte that the RCA Trinidad label formed, with superior production quality and better distribution. Lord Melody, in particular, realized by the '60s that if he wrote songs for Belafonte he'd make more money than if he recorded them himself.
- Much like the Jane Goodall example under Newspaper Comics, according to legend, Michael Jackson once performed a concert in England. When he heard that Princess Diana was going to attend, he decided to omit his song "Dirty Diana", afraid the title and "obsessed groupie" nature of the song might be offensive. This was only reversed after speaking to Diana herself, who asked he put it back as it was one of her personal favorites.
- One would think the song "Fujiyama Mama" by rockabilly legend Wanda Jackson would be hated by the Japanese, what with its opening line being "I've been to Nagasaki, Hiroshima too! The things I did to them baby, I can do to you!". However, oddly enough, it was a number-one hit in Japan! It was such a hit, in fact, that Wanda did a tour in Japan because of it. This is might have something to do with the Japanese love of rockabilly.
- Pluma Pluma Gay, a parody of the song Dragostea Din Tei, performed by the Spanish humorous duo Los Morancos, has a video clip where muscular and half-naked men and all possible gay stereotypes abound. Some people find that the song is offensive and homophobic, but many gays love it because it is a song that calls to be brave, to not care what the rest of the world thinks and to leave the closet assuming you as gay.
- "Weird Al" Yankovic:
- "Pretty Fly for a Rabbi" is beloved by Jewish people. It helps that he consulted with his Jewish drummer, Jay "Bermuda" Schwartz, and the lyrics show that Al did his research.
- Reportedly, there are several people in the Amish community who have a good sense of humor about "Amish Paradise."
- British-born Italo Disco singer Eddy Huntington's song "USSR" — which revels in Russian-themed kitsch (including mentions of vodka, Gorky Park and balalaikas) — is a beloved song among Russians. Huntington has performed the song multiple times in Russia, including at the Discoteka 80 concerts held by AvtoRadio.
- Despite some accusations of racism and stereotyping from westerners (even though the tropes in that music video are quite common in Japan), Avril Lavigne's "Hello Kitty" is very popular among Japanese fans (though the song didn't chart too well in Japan itself). Reportedly, Lavigne's general popularity among the Japanese is why she made the song at all.
- Portugal had embraced "Vira-Vira", a slightly pornographic spoof of their traditional rhythm, the vira, by Brazilian comedy group Mamonas Assassinas. The band would even tour the country had they not crashed their plane.
- Boney M.'s hit single "Rasputin" is meant to be a deliberately ill-informed Take That! at the titular Rasputin, created at a time where tensions with the Soviet Union were high. Understandably, the USSR government did its hardest to ban the song from the country's radio waves, but in an amazing form of Misaimed Fandom, USSR citizens actually loved the song, treating it as an ode to Rasputin and reviving interest in him.
- The song "Everything Stops for Tea" was written by an American composer for a musical adaptation of an American novel about a British aristocrat, and satirises the British fondness for tea. Since the only thing Brits love more than tea is Self-Deprecation, it became hugely popular in the UK and was actually used by the Ministry of Food during the 1940 Great Exhibition. It is still regularly heard on BBC radio, in fact.
- Merle Haggard's "Okie from Muskogee" was ostensibly a celebration of small-town American values and a condemnation of the counterculture of The '60s (criticizing things like anti-war protests, drug use, and sexual promiscuity). But hippies and protesters embraced the song ironically, as seen in covers by the likes of The Grateful Dead, Phil Ochs, and The Beach Boys (who also used it as Self-Deprecation of their own clean-cut image).
- Eminem has become something of a mascot for white trash America despite the fact that his kayfabe portrays white trash culture as a race of promiscuous, pill-addicted bigots from broken homes, stuck in dead-end jobs, forever on the verge of Going Postal or becoming Serial Killers. Eminem positions himself as an Escapist Character for the poor and dispossessed, and he's written multiple songs granting his alter-ego Slim Shady to his listeners as a name for the cathartic feelings of rage and pain they can release by listening to his music. Eminem's outspoken anti-racist views and inspiring, Friend to All Children persona in his songs outside of kayfabe also make him rather a positive figure as well and help keep his audience aware that they're in on a self-deprecating joke.
- The comment section of Your Favorite Martian's "Transphobic Techno" (whose lyrics consist almost entirely of the phrase "bitch got a penis" looped ad nauseum) is full of transgender people saying they love the song. It helps that the song is intended to make fun of EDM producers rather than trans people, and that the video portrays the character's Unsettling Gender-Reveal reaction as majorly exaggerated and not justified (especially since the ending reveals that the bitches didn't actually have a penis).
- Despite its harsh criticism of The South, Neil Young's "Southern Man" still sees regular radio play on many Southern US radio stations.
- "Prisencolinensinainciusol", an Italian rock song designed to sound like an Italian person's idea of what an American rock song sounds like, with all the lyrics being English-sounding gibberish. It's a longstanding "meme song" in the English-speaking internet because of how affectionately on-the-nose it is, and it helps that it's genuinely catchy.
- While it has garnered some controversy for usage of a derogatory word in the title, there is a large number of trans people who enjoy Harley Poe's "Transvestites Can Be Cannibals Too", which primarily helps as the lyrics portray the transphobes being eaten as Asshole Victims.
- Swedish Europop group Rednex are built on the Half-Witted Hillbilly stereotypes of Americans, but many people from the Deep South find their music fun.
- There are a number of cases of songs critical of a music genre becoming a hit with fans of the genre criticized:
- A Henry Rollins rant about techno only being enjoyable under the influence of drugs, along with a sample of a music interviewer mocking dubstep, was turned into a popular dubstep track.
- Eminem's "Without Me" has a techno remix, in which the line "nobody listens to techno" is looped multiple times.
- Liam Lynch's "United States of Whatever" was meant as a parody of punk, and has become a punk anthem in its own right.
- Norman Greenbaum's "Spirit in the Sky" was written to illustrate how simple and easy it is to make a Christian revival song, and contains many inaccuracies of Christianity (Greenbaum was Jewish), yet it is an immensely popular song among Christians and will often even be heard at evangelical services and other Christian group events, even getting covers from Christian artists such as dc Talk (who changed some of the lyrics to be more accurate).
- "I Dig Rock and Roll Music" by Peter, Paul and Mary was meant as a Take That! to rock music and its fans — Paul Stookey wrote it as a satire on how he felt rock music was all style over substance, and that the genre's fans liked it because it was popular; not because it was good music. Ironically, the song became one of their biggest hits, charting at number 9 on the Billboard Hot 100, and has been since included on many of "The Best of '60s Rock!" or "The Best of Hippie Rock" compilation albums. It also didn't help that one of the bands they ridiculed, The Mamas & the Papas (of which the first verse is a pastiche of their style), ended up covering the song.
- A Henry Rollins rant about techno only being enjoyable under the influence of drugs, along with a sample of a music interviewer mocking dubstep, was turned into a popular dubstep track
- The Standells' "Dirty Water", a song mocking the state of Boston in the 1960s (especially the polluted nature of Boston Harbor and the Charles River), is celebrated as an anthem by the city, with its sports teams often playing it following home victories. The Boston Red Sox even got the Standells to perform the song live at Fenway Park from atop the Green Monster on a few occasions.
Professional Wrestling
- This happens with all the foreign wrestling heels, who become heroes in their home countries despite all of WWE's attempts to depict them as despicable and/or pathetic. Examples include Sylvain in Quebec (French Canada), The Great Khali in India, and The Iron Sheik among the Iranian diaspora.
- The likes of William Regal and Wade Barrett were stereotypical Evil Brit characters. Yet both are very popular in their native UK. The gimmick is so over partly because Regal himself came up with it in the early 90s WCW and relishes playing it. He knows it's more over with fans than other ones could be. It helps that Regal's British fans know that his posh character is nothing like his working-class Northern roots (and is in its own way, a send-up of how Americans stereotype Brits as all being from London in movies). When WWF tried to rebrand him as the lumberjack 'Real Man's Man' he had no enthusiasm for their gimmick and it showed (he was also on a lot of drugs at the time). When he came back, he did so on the condition that he could resume his Evil Brit gimmick (albeit changing his name from Steven Regal to William Regal) and that WWF would play it up for all it's worth.
- The WCW stable "West Texas Rednecks" were unflattering southern U.S. stereotypes who ended up becoming a sort of collective Ensemble Dark Horse among WCW's primarily Southern audience. It helped that their main rivals, a supposed face stable called the No Limit Soldiers, acted like heels and mostly consisted of inexperienced newcomers.
- Eddie Guerrero's "I lie, I cheat, I steal" gimmick may have been somewhat unflattering toward Mexicans, and he put on a heavy Mexican accent while on camera which, judging by more serious interviews, wasn't his real accent at all. But he was still beloved by Latino wrestling fans, and wrestling fans in general. They seemed to more appreciate the fact that WWE was acknowledging Latino wrestling fans exist. Rey Mysterio has noted in his book that Eddie was so instrumental in bridging the gap between Mexican and American wrestling that he was regarded as a legend and huge face on both sides.
- Before he was Sami Zayn, Rami Sebei — a Canadian of Syrian Arab descent — wrestled on the indies as El Generico, a stereotypical Mexican Masked Luchador whose catchphrase was "Olé!" This did not stop him from getting massively over with Mexican-American audiences on the indies, particularly in Los Angeles.
- Rebecca Knox described her gimmick as a "stereotypical jigging Irish leprechaun" when she wrestled overseas. However, she's still beloved by Irish fans for her wrestling — especially since getting signed to WWE as Becky Lynch. But showing how this trope can change, when she debuted in WWE doing her Oireland gimmick, the backlash was massive and it was quickly phased out.
- Cryme Tyme were a pair of two African American thugs who talked slang and stole. Despite the massive stereotypes they ended up being one of the most popular tag teams during their time together, including with black audiences. JTG and the late Shad Gaspard were Robin Hood-like face characters during almost their entire WWE run, and always got the better of their (somehow always deserving) heel victims.
- Carmella received significant pops whenever she competed in Brooklyn for NXT. Her character is a trashy "Princess of Staten Island". But they loved her for her Plucky Girl nature and the fact that she was very much Jerk with a Heart of Gold. What's more, she's not really from New York — she was born and raised in Boston.
- Jinder Mahal is immensely popular in India. Despite the fact that he fits the "foreign heel" trope to a T, he is very charismatic, a skilled and entertaining wrestler, and has held down a number of championships. WWE tried to bank on his success by putting the world title on him at one point, but several factors made their plan fall apart (including failing to build up his push, having him shoot racist promos, and causing nearly all of his wins to be via cheating).
- Bullet Club in NJPW is considered to be a heel stable consist of gaijins but they are massively over to non-Japanese people because of how cool they look to the point where NJPW is really the only place they can continue playing the heel role straight.
Radio
- Fans of any given AFL club tend to like any given caller from The Coodabeen Champions' talkback segment, regardless of how stereotypical they are. For example, Collingwood fans love Digger, a cantankerous old Collingwood fan who constantly complains about how the umpires "crucified" the Magpies, while Melbourne supporters like Ivan from Ivanhoe, a pompous rich guy who knows more about finances than football, and usually goes skiing instead of attending games.
Tabletop Games
- In Warhammer, the civilisation of Kislev is based on stereotypes of Russia, from bear cavalry to mighty men in a frozen land. However, Russians like this faction because it heroically stands against murderous, monstrous hordes from an abominable realm far in the north. It is also because, in the game, the stereotypes have been made to look more badass and over-the-top.
Theater
- Despite the extremely irreverent portrayal of Mormonism in the musical The Book of Mormon, lots of real-life Mormons are fans. The LDS Church itself resisted the Streisand Effect and has been known to place advertising in the show's playbills, usually saying stuff like "Now that you've seen the show, come read the book it's based on!"
- Hamilton depicts King George III as a Camp Straight Yandere Manchild with a Britpop-inspired Villain Song. When it opened in London, the British loved him and found him one of the funniest things in the play. It helps that making fun of the royal family is practically a British tradition and that his Villain Song is extremely catchy and awesome, filled with the type of Black Comedy that Brits adore.
- Enid from Legally Blonde is a bit of a Straw Feminist, as well as a rather stereotypical Butch Lesbian. Despite this, a lot of feminist and lesbian audiences have taken a liking to her, since the portrayal of her sexuality isn't at all mean-spirited or demeaning, and Enid's shown to have plenty of admirable qualities along with her aggressiveness. It probably also helps that the show overall is extremely pro-feminist, and Vivienne and Elle's characters are both significantly more nuanced portrayals of feminism, so that balances things out.
- The Mikado, despite being a very broad caricature of Meiji-era Japanese society (actually a satire of Victorian mores in the guise of Meiji ones, which by coincidence, were based on Victorian mores), has always been very popular with the actual Japanese people. During The Edwardian Era, at the height of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, a member of the Imperial Family, Prince Fushimi Sadanaru, visited London, hoping to see the play for himself, only to find that every production had been closed for fear of offending him! Eventually, a command performance was set up, and he and his entourage were "deeply and pleasingly disappointed" to find "bright music and much fun" instead of "real insults" to Japan. Today, the play remains very popular in Japan, where the town of Chichibu (at Saitama near Tokyo) claimed that the setting was inspired by a peasant revolt in 1884 — a group of actors from the town later staged their own production, which was also staged by the same performers at the 2006 International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival in England.
Video Games
- Based on the words of people such as Prij and MangaKamen, the Ace Attorney series is popular with actual defense attorneys and prosecutors, who recognize the games as being satirical and not meant to be an accurate depiction of law, as well as providing genuinely good insight into corruption found within the legal system.
- Bad Dudes is a Japanese game about bad American dudes with giant muscles saving the President from ninjas and going out for burgers. Americans love the over-the-top parody of American ham and hot blood.
- In-universe example in the Borderlands 2 DLC "Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep", where Tina makes all of the dwarves in her Bunkers & Badasses campaign look like the resident short guy Salvador. Lilith thinks this is offensive, but Salvador thinks it's awesome.
- Broforce is an Affectionate Parody of American action films that were made by a dev team based in South Africa. It also has a rating of Overwhelmingly Positive on Steam, and many Americans practically fell in love with it. (The music video of the band Strident playing the credits theme tune, is popular even among those who haven't played the game for the sheer amount of fun the members seem to have being as over-the-top patriotic for a different country as possible.)
- The Latina title character of the Carmen Sandiego franchise is not really designed to be stereotypical or offensive; however, she is the antagonist and a world-class thief. However, the Hispanic and Latino American community, especially young Latin American girls, love her and view her as a role model, because she's smart, successful, and never loses (note that even when the kids won the game show and captured her, she was right back doing it again by the next episode).
- The Civilization series tends to find fans who enjoy the portrayal of their home country. It helps that the games tend to focus on generally popular leaders and periods of historical importance and generally plays the civs based on better times in their history. Depending on the Civ, it may also combine with grateful for any portrayal at all, let alone a well-researched one that plays on positive stereotypes. Special mention should be made of Polish players of Civ V and VI, which includes a Poland Civilization. The Civ was included because the game has a huge player base in Poland and the Polish players love that they were acknowledged and given a very competitively viable Civ to boot. Germans tend to enjoy that the game refuses to portray them as Those Wacky Nazis while still playing them as a military and industrial powerhouse. Overall, Civ VI is especially well received as the leaders selected are almost all better known for their diplomacy than their military prowess.
- The Command & Conquer: Red Alert Series is rather popular with Russians thanks to its ludicrous stereotyping, Ham and Cheese acting, and general awesomeness. When it comes to hilarious portrayals of the USSR, you can't beat a mind-controlling Lenin lookalike and Kirov airships of RA2... except with battle-bears and Premier Tim Curry of RA3. It probably helps that all the stereotypes are played for laughs, as well as that the Soviets get some really awesome units like the aforementioned airships, battle-bears, trained battle squids, and huge Apocalypse Tanks. It also doesn't hurt that the other factions are just as stereotypical.
- The GLA in Command & Conquer: Generals are favorites of many Middle Eastern & Southeast Asian gamers as despite of them being a run-of-the-mill War on Terror stereotype of Islamic militants, they are awesome enough to fight two superpowers at once with nothing but determination, guerilla skills, and outdated or improvised technology.
- The Crash Bandicoot franchise, originally created in America, has found itself a noticeable Australian fandom for its setting taking place in the outback and utilizing multiple seldom-seen species from Australia that the world is rather unaware of otherwise. In particular, the dingo-crocodile hybrid Dingodile, despite being a blatant bundle of practically every Australian stereotype known to man, is just as much of an Ensemble Dark Horse in the Aussie as he is everywhere else in the world for how deviously cool he is in terms of design and personality.
- Daikatana is heavily beloved in the Philippines despite its reputation as one of the worst FPS games of all time. Yet Filipinos still loved it even with all the hilariously stereotypical Asian Engrish accents and faux-Orientalist imagery.
- Captain Gordon, Defender of Earth! from Disgaea is a straight-up parody of American sci-fi B-movie characters. He is also much more popular in America than he is in Japan.
- The cast of Divekick is a parody of various figures from the Fighting Game Community, and the gameplay itself consists of doing nothing but the popular diving kick attack. Despite this, it was released to positive reception from those in the FGC. This is due to gameplay being stripped down to the bare essentials and embodying the main draw of Fighting game gameplay (positioning and finding the best opportunity to strike).
- Dragon Age: Inquisition: Inverted with Cassandra, the gruff, mannish Tomboy with a Girly Streak. The game establishes that she is 100% straight and can only be romanced by a male Inquisitor, likely to avoid making her come off as a stereotypical Butch Lesbian. However, Cassandra became very popular with queer female players, to the point that many were actually disappointed that they couldn't romance her as a woman. Sure enough, there are mods for the PC version to fix that.
- Dynasty Warriors could be construed as offensive with its very loose interpretation of Chinese history (and hilariously terrible dubs early on), but it is apparently quite popular in China. The fact that it takes place millenia before present day and blends in elements of Chinese mythology helps soften any comparisons to the modern CCP, and the Romance of the Three Kingdoms remains a very popular topic for media. It doesn't hurt that all of the characters are portrayed as larger-than-life heroes, almost all of whom show both virtues and flaws while also completely annihilating entire enemy armies on their own. Many modern Chinese still have the same surnames as these heroes (Liu, Zhang, Cao, Sun, Wang, etc.) and as such some also attest familial fondness for certain characters as a result.
- SNK's mascot character, Terry Bogard of Fatal Fury fame, is about as stereotypically Eaglelandian as an American character made in Japan can get, being Hot-Blooded and a Big Eater of burgers; speaking almost exclusively in Gratuitous English. Even with him checking off almost every stereotypical American box, American SNK fans love Terry to hell and back for being the living embodiment of awesomeness. It also helps that Terry avoids every boorish, negative American stereotype available and is always portrayed as an encouraging nice guy on top of being a powerful fighter, thus giving a very positive image for Americans.
- Fire Emblem Fates:
- Niles has been (with some caveats) completely embraced by the LGBT Fanbase despite being a Too Kinky to Torture bisexual male. It helps that some of his dialogues are genuinely funny, he's very useful in gameplay for being the only default bow user in Conquest, and he has quite the Hidden Depths in his supports, and he's extremely handsome.
- Similar to Niles, Arthur debuts in his game as a parody of over-the-top American superheroes cursed with a bad luck streak a mile wide, and he's far more popular in America than in Japan. Factors include the fact that he's a surprisingly high-potential unit when trained, has a ton of Hidden Depths as well as numerous well-written supports, and in spite of his status as a Cosmic Plaything, the story treats his earnest desire to do good and infallible optimism with the utmost respect, which elevates his parodic status to outright affectionate levels for many.
- Fallout:
- The Liberty Prime in Fallout 3 is a gigantic parody of American jingoism, but right-leaning Americans like to parrot his quotes unironically.
- Despite being turned into a major antagonist of Fallout 4, M.I.T students responded humorously to the Institute through their tradition of hacks.
- Fate/Grand Order has Quetzalcoatl appear in the game as a Spicy Latina luchadora, and while she is a lot more popular in the West than Japan in general, in Central American and South American servers her popularity is insane for for much of the same kinds of reasons that you'd expect, only cranked up to eleven due to finding her an excellent Latino representative. This becomes especially amusing because she is also the distillation of many problems with Mayincatec tropes, with the story repeatedly describing Mexico as part of South America and her Christmas alt seeing her utilizing a form of dance that's native to Brazil, but that hasn't stopped anyone in the region from widely considering her a fan favorite.
- When The Friends of Ringo Ishikawa was localized in Japan, a lot of Japanese gamers enjoyed the game that it made the top ten games sold there. This is despite the game being a harsh critique of common tropes about Japanese Delinquents to portray them as aimless and outdated.
- Grand Theft Auto:
- The franchise as a whole is made by a Scottish studio, and the series is meant to be America from foreign eyes (which seems to be a Wretched Hive of a Crapsack World, of this series is any indication). That said, a good majority of fans of the series are American.
- The trailer for Grand Theft Auto VI depicts the state of Leonida, the GTA universe's counterpart to Florida, in traditional GTA fashion, juxtaposing Scenery Porn with constant debauchery and depravity. Many Floridians loved it, and could easily tell how much Rockstar has Shown Their Work beyond just "Florida Man" memes. For example, Flanigan's, a restaurant chain that's restricted to South Florida, immediately had their Twitter account post a screencap depicting the game's in-universe counterpart of the restaurant getting robbed by the protagonists, with the comment "Wouldn’t be Miami without us."
- Goldlewis Dickinson from Guilty Gear -Strive- isn't exactly the most flattering depiction of an American.note His mighty girth, love for burgers, and horseshoes on his gloves makes him a clear example of how Everything Is Big in Texas. As if his name didn't sound ridiculous enough, he's a government official who fights using a coffin containing an alien from Area 51. Basically, he's a character whose concept is a little too crazy to have been thought up by an American and his image fits closer to your average American in an anime. That being said, his cool personality and voice, the fact he's a fat character in a fighting game who defies typical fat character stereotypes, and being a bit of a Memetic Badass won over a lot of American fans.
- HuniePop: Hot bod and cute face aside, Nikki isn't exactly the most flattering stereotype of a Gamer Chick — she's antisocial, misanthropic, dislikes children, and has little ambition in life beyond playing video games and eating junk food. However, among the player base, she is a firm fan favourite. Even famous streamers like TotalBiscuit have found her the most endearing heroine.
- There actually is no shortage of Japanese gamers who like World War II-themed shooters, especially ones involving Imperial Japan as the main antagonists.
- The 1942 series, made by Capcom, starring the iconic P-38 Lightning, has all but one game having the airplane cutting down swathes of Japanese fighters and navy.
- On X-Play, Adam Sessler was surprised when he saw an advert for one Medal of Honor while he was in Japan.
- Malaysian and Indonesian gamers really like Just Cause 2 despite Panau Island is mostly based on Malaysia, and besides the breathtaking scenery, its portrayal is anything but positive.
- The same can be applied to Far Cry 3 although the island in Far Cry 3 is obviously pretty far from known civilization.
- KanColle is liked by a variety of people worldwide in addition to military geeks. Surprisingly, many of these fans come from China and Southeast Asia, basically the regions where Japanese occupations during World War II were felt the harshest.
- Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance:
- George is usually considered as an Ethnic Scrappy, but he's a lot more popular with actual Guyanese since Guyana is highly unrepresented in media outside the country and they're happy to have a character who's a fairly accurate portrayal.
- Senator Armstrong has become such a Fountain of Memes that American fans love the character, even though (or precisely because) he is one of the most surreal and insane bosses ever presented in a Metal Gear game. Some even agree with his points and ideals (but not his methods).
- Many Americans are very offended about Metal Wolf Chaos. That is to say, they are offended about it not being released in the U.S. until the 2018 remaster. It was so popular as an import game, that discs were being sold for up to $200. It mercilessly lampoons Hot-Blooded Eaglelanders in such an over-the-top fashion that is hard not to love it for its BURNING AMERICAN FREEDOM!
- Monkey Island:
- Captain Dread from Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge is beloved by actual rastas (and reggae fans) as he embodies their typical traits of being helpful, laidback, and wise despite his failing business. The makers clearly had Shown Their Work as Dread comes across very similarly to how his inspiration Bob Marley actually was in interviews, as opposed to how he is usually depicted by the media.
- Haggis McMutton from The Curse of Monkey Island is as stereotypical as it gets, but he is beloved by Scots because of his no-nonsense attitude towards Guybrush, even after he's been recruited.
- Mother Russia Bleeds is an over-the-top beat'em up about walking around The Theme Park Version of USSR and smacking all kinds of Russian criminal stereotypes in the face, all while fueling yourself with a fictional krokodil-inspired drug. Both Russian critics and players fell in love with it, with a big chunk of positive reviews on Steam being written in the Russian language.
- Travis from No More Heroes is an extremely unflattering caricature of the violent, Machiavellian, ignorant, single-minded, and culturally clueless American. The game is much, much more popular in America than it is in Japan. It might help that he's intended as a spoof of otaku first, Americans second. Americans also appreciated how much Santa Destroy looked like southern California.
- Overwatch boasts a Troperiffic character cast of many different nationalities, often with a twist or two that keeps them from being stereotypes and cause them to become beloved in their home nation:
- D.va is based on the stereotype of Koreans loving video games, but breaks the mold in: 1. turning her gaming skills into Humongous Mecha piloting ones, and 2. being a woman talented at video games, when the South Korean pro gaming circuit is almost entirely dominated by men (and has had big problems with sexism.)
- Reinhardt is generally well-regarded among German fans, some noting that Overwatch is one of the few games to portray Germans as... well, not a bunch of militant fascists or mad scientists. He is actually portrayed as a neo-medieval knight — one longing for conquests and glory of old. He still retains a few stereotypes: for example, he loves David Hasselhoff, and cites "Precision German Engineering" as to what keeps him in one piece.
- Many players from the Middle East love Ana and Pharah and especially admire Blizzard's choice of voice actress for Ana — an actual Egyptian woman who speaks very accurate Arabic.
- Pharah was also quickly embraced by queer women, who read her as a Butch Lesbian. Granted, the game itself took much longer to acknowledge this, even lampshading it when Pharah's sexuality was confirmed in the "As You Are" short story.
- Torbjörn is more divisive — most Swedes think he doesn't sound the least bit Swedish, but at least appreciate Blizzard's English translation of Swedish idioms like "making a chicken out of a feather" in his voice lines.
- Australians tend to like Junkrat and Roadhog the best, even though Australia in the game is portrayed as a desolate, criminal-ridden wasteland and the two characters are outlaws because they're recognized as an homage to the Mad Max movies.
- Latin American fans really love both Reaper and Sombra despite both characters being Latin American criminals. Despite being antagonists, both of them have very sympathetic backstories and invoke Evil Is Cool and Laughably Evil respectively.
- Lúcio was well received by Brazilians — in no small part thanks to his very good Carioca accent in the Portuguese dub.
- While Symmetra is just fairly loved by Indians, it is the autistic fandom that overwhelmingly loves her, mostly because she's one of the few autistic characters in fiction that isn't portrayed as a complete freak, making her more relatable and avoiding common misconceptions of portraying autism in fiction. It also helps that while she currently stands as an antagonistic character, she's also portrayed as a very sympathetic Anti-Villain with a compelling backstory and motivation to the point where many fans don't even know she's an antagonist.
- Many Nigerian fans are pleasantly surprised that Doomfist has actual traces of Nigerian culture rather than simply being a stereotypical African warlord character with a mishmash of African representation. He is a descendant of the Yoruba people, an ethnic group who are from Nigeria; two martial arts practice he knows, Dambe and Gidigbo, can be traced from Nigeria with the latter even coming from the Yoruba people; and even two of his Legendary Skins, Avatar and Spirits, are based on the orishas, spirits that are a part of the Yoruba's religion with even each of the costumes color schemes has something to do with the orishas. These, along with the fact that he's intelligent, charismatic, and badass show that Blizzard took good care to research Nigerian culture in order to incorporate them into Doomfist, which many Nigerian fans can appreciate.
- Tracer has both the appearance and the personality associated with lesbian stereotypes but the LGBT Fanbase still love her for her heroic behavior and being the face for a media that underrepresent the LGBTQA community.
- Zarya gets a special treatment in Russia, despite her voice actress being Ukrainian (with "Bulgarian" accent). She got her appearance after a real Russian-American Blizzard employee, Tamara Bakhlycheva (although with exaggerated "stronk like bull" personality and muscles), and overall rather accurately represents a Russian strongwoman archetype, as opposed to slim, cold, emotionless Ekaterina Volskaya (sometimes referred to as "Joseph Stalin in the skirt").
- Mauga has a Samoan fanbase despite taking appearances from Wild Samoan stereotypes since while he a Blood Knight, he is also very friendly to people and he is clearly not stupid as he has done a lot of cunning things when he feels that it is best. The addition of him wielding two gigantic miniguns has helped as many Samoans will admit that's pretty cool on its own.
- D.va is based on the stereotype of Koreans loving video games, but breaks the mold in: 1. turning her gaming skills into Humongous Mecha piloting ones, and 2. being a woman talented at video games, when the South Korean pro gaming circuit is almost entirely dominated by men (and has had big problems with sexism
- Pokémon Red and Blue: Lt. Surge is designed to be a stereotypical American, being a Drill Sergeant Nasty who fought in a war, with his title of "The Lightning American" holding true in the Japanese version, and even gratuitously swearing in English in the Japanese script. Even with all that in mind, he's a fan-favorite Gym Leader amongst American players due to how much of a Boisterous Bruiser he is, on top of using Electric-types, which are practically the Pokémon franchise's signature type.
- In the Wii iteration of Punch-Out!!, every opponent is a blatant stereotype designed to be all the more satisfying to beat senseless. However, the characters are by far the most loved part of the game, in no short part due to the surprisingly good writing, the flawless foreign languages with its international opponents, and the fact that each stereotype is an Affectionate Parody of a national stereotype versus an ethnic one, which is all the more apparent with how Nintendo and Next Level Games takes the piss out of their own home nations with Piston Honda and Bear Hugger. Combine this with the surprising amount of research dedicated to affectionately lampooning each nation, and you got yourself a rare fusion of an All-Stereotype Cast and Cast of Snowflakes... and people love it! Respectively with the most popular instances:
- Glass Joe is a wimpy boxer from France who is the series' resident Butt-Monkey, having 100 losses to his record and only one win to his name, only won through a freak accident. Despite this, he is undeniably a fan favorite Ensemble Dark Horse of the series, with his popularity being outright celebratory in France due to his unbreakable optimism and subverting the Cheese Eating Surrender Monkey by being the defining Determinator of the series, as not even getting brain damage was enough to stop him from getting in the ring! Glass Joe is so loved by France for this reason that Super Punch-Out!!'s Suspiciously Similar Substitute, Gabby Jay, was an outright Replacement Scrappy simply because he wasn't Glass Joe.
- Von Kaiser hails from Germany, and is similarly adored by the fandom and especially German fans for being an affectionate take on another stereotype of Germans that thankfully wasn't Those Wacky Nazis, plus the downright imposing Ride of the Valkyries-esque remix of the Punch-Out!! theme. He also gained more love, additional Woobie points, and a Periphery Demographic among PTSD survivors for having an accurate portrayal of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder; even if the reason for his PTSD is humorous (getting beaten up by a bunch of kids at boxing school), seeing him genuinely look terrified after beating him and him still getting into the ring despite his trauma makes him even more adored.
- Many Canadians have found in Bear Hugger a very fun, endearing character; and a big part of it has to do with how he lampoons Canadian stereotypes in different ways (drinking maple syrup, saying "eh?" frequently, and working as a lumberjack when he isn't boxing). It's evident that Next Level Games had the time of their lives when bringing this character to the Wii game.
- Don Flamenco satirizes typical national stereotypes of Spaniards (Dashing Hispanic and Toros y Flamenco) in a very affectionate way alongside his hilariously arrogant confidence in himself, even bringing a rose into the ring! It genuinely helps that when you fight him again in Title Defense Mode, he's trying to reclaim his loss for his lover Carmen after being heavily implied to have been dumped by her for his loss in Contender Mode. This all comes together to make him Spain's favorite character by a long shot.
- Aran Ryan is a frothing lunatic Irishman who went from his home game as The Generic Guy into an Ax-Crazy Combat Pragmatist who breaks so many rules he brings a weapon into the ring in Title Defense! Despite this, and despite being reviled in-universe by the crowd, Aran is adored for being an Irish stereotype that isn't The Alcoholic or Lazy Bum, and the general Irish person's reaction to him is "Fuck yeah! Room for two, please!"
- Vodka Drunkenski/Soda Popinski was originally a joke on Russian drunkards from the original NES game, but truly breathed a life of his own as a Husky Russkie Boisterous Bruiser who drinks a metric fuckton of soda and somehow gets drunk on it. Ironically, this is a case where being Bowdlerised improved a character's popularity even moreso than it has before, as it let other traits than just a drunk Russian joke come to the surface. It helps that he has an awesome Russian Choir remix of the main theme, as well as the surprising detail that soda actually is that popular in Russia, and that their drink of choice – Pepsi – was so craved for that the Soviet Union gave part of its Navy to Pepsi when they couldn't pay. Because of all of this, Russia's response to Popinski is near-universally positive.
- Bald Bull is also loved for not only being one of the most memorable (and difficult) bosses in the game but also being a rare representation of a Turkish character in Western media, something Turks generally crave as much as they can get over.
- When it's West Coast America's turn, Super Macho Man is an elitist, condescending, rich, and very, very tanned Californian actor with a fair share of Fan Disservice to boot. Yet, he's one of the most popular characters in the United States, especially in the Wii sequel, because of how completely over-the-top he is (it also helps that he is also a regional stereotype of Hollywood celebrities), with his new Surfer Dude characterization achieving memetic status.
- Red Dead Redemption 2 has Sean McGuire, who is an Irish criminal that likes to have fun and talks a lot. Irish fans really enjoy him as a character, partly because for all his flaws, he doesn't have the typical negative Irish stereotypes like getting drunk all the time, and also for being a character who can bring genuine levity.
- Resident Evil 4 was broadly successful worldwide, but it gained a special following among Spanish-speaking fans. While it did depict rural Spain as a land of creepy, impoverished, near-medieval villages run by evil cultists with Everything Trying to Kill You, the traditional Toros y Flamenco stereotypes were nowhere to be seen, the game world instead feeling like Überwald transplanted west, while the supporting character Luis Sera was a heroic and charismatic Dashing Hispanic who's also Too Cool to Live. As for the use of grossly inaccurate Mexican Spanish, well, that only enhanced the game's campy action movie feel for those who spoke the language, such that quite a few of them were disappointed when the remake had the villagers and cultists speak in more accurate Castilian Spanish.
- Shin Megami Tensei depicts YHVH as a vain, megalomaniacal tyrant who leads Holier Than Thou, Knight Templar angels to remove The Evils of Free Will, and in most games Lucifer and The Legions of Hell are A Lighter Shade of Black. It might be surprising to find that the series has a very large number of Christian fans. This may be because the series averts Anime Catholicism and actually does its research, with many of the higher-ranked angels having nods in their designs that only hardcore Bible nerds would notice. There’s also Aleph, who is a rare genuine Biblical Messiah who fits the role and has humanity’s interests in mind rather than merely adopting the title, despite his opposition to YHVH, as well as the second appearance of Mastema considering YHVH’s plan is to have humans turn to Him by choice, mimicking Paradise Lost where God wished for humanity to be free of His influence.
- The Ugandan Knuckles meme presents Ugandans as a tribe of Knuckles with Ugandan accents repeating Who Killed Captain Alex? quotes. Though some claim the meme is being racist, Ugandan citizens, including the makers of Who Killed Captain Alex?, have responded positively to the meme.
- Street Fighter:
- According to the developers of Street Fighter II, Guile was based on the stereotypical image the Japanese people have of American soldiers stationed on military bases in Japan. As such he's a muscle-bundled former Special Forces with the U.S. flag tattooed on his arm, and it definitely helped that he is easily one of the most powerful player characters. Naturally, he became insanely popular in America, to the point that he became the main character in most of the Western adaptations.
- Most Brazilians love Blanka. Capcom producer Yoshinori Ono was even surprised once a local journalist told him so, given the country was reduced to the Amazon, and the character is a weird, mutant Feral Child with Psycho Electro powers. For some idea of how beloved Blanka is: a 2012 TV poll for the greatest Brazilian of all time had Blanka well in the lead, outclassing real-life Brazilian sports stars and politicians (yes, he was ahead of Pelé), and he was only disqualified on the basis that, at the time, he canonically wasn't born in Brazil.
- A similar love of Laura exists for Brazilian players, though this one is easier to understand since she's an Amazonian Beauty, Statuesque Stunner, a Hot-Blooded Spicy Latina of mixed race, and an Innocent Fanservice Girl. You couldn't get more positive Brazilian stereotypes in unless her power was throwing soccer balls. The other Brazilian character of the series, Laura's brother Sean, doesn't get much attention because, on top of being just another Shotoclone, the only game he appeared in was not as widely distributed in Brazil as the Alpha games, which makes him only known to the bigger fans of the franchise.
- Poison from Final Fight has a sizable fanbase among people who find her a badass woman who may or may not be transgender, despite the fact she's a criminal who runs with a major organised crime syndicate, was made trans because the developers thought Americans would be offended by beating up "real" women, and was, for one game, depicted as a Stalker with a Crush type on one of the heroes from the previous game. Her arrival in Street Fighter, where she went straight and started her own wrestling federation, was quite well received.
- Super Mario Bros.
- Birdo from Super Mario Bros. 2 is described in the manual as a guy who "thinks he is a girl". Despite this rather insensitive language and later games flip-flopping on whether or not she's transgender, Birdo is quite popular among actual trans people.
- When Super Mario Odyssey was announced, many players (particularly Americans) were up in arms over the appearance of Mario on the second world where he sports a poncho and a sombrero on top of Mario's signature bushy moustache while he runs around a town of colorful skeleton people and saw it all as an offensive stereotype of Mexicans. Mexican fans on the other hand (following the example of the Trope Namer) were ecstatic at seeing a character as beloved as Mario running around a fantasy version of Mexico, and most of their responses to people claiming it was offensive was to tell them to shut up and stop speaking for them, it also helps that Mario and his franchise is HUGE in Mexico. Mexican fans were also saddened after Nintendo, presumably due to the aforementioned American backlash, swapped a screencap of Mario wearing the sombrero with one of Mario swimming in the Lake Kingdom on the game's box art.
- All the characters of Team Fortress 2 are ethnic stereotypes (except the Pyro) with bloodthirsty natures, unhinged mentalities, and unrealistic accents. They're also utterly hilarious, and meant as affectionate parodies. What Russian doesn't want to be a huge Mighty Glacier Heavy who wields a ginormous minigun? What American doesn't want to pull off stunts like the Eaglelander Soldier, or trash-talk like the big-mouthed Scout, or build incredible devices like the Engineer? What Frenchman doesn't want to be like the suave, sophisticated, ladies-man Spy? Which Australian wouldn't want to live in a universe where their country is a World of Badass where everybody gets futuristic technology and mustaches? What Scotsman doesn't want to be a Drunken Master whose job is making sure that there's Stuff Blowing Up? What German wouldn't want to turn the tide of the battle by healing someone so hard that they turn into a glowing invincible juggernaut? Nobody, that's who.
- Clownpiece from Touhou Project was initially met with shock from American fans when she appeared in Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom. After all, she's a clown wearing an American flag, which seems to imply several unflattering things. This subsided after only an hour or so once other details came up. She's a fairynote clown from Hell that chucks literal moons at you and is powerful enough to be the penultimate boss of the game! She's based on a Lampad, making her one of the rare Touhou characters from Western myth! She kicked so much Lunarian ass that they were forced to evacuate the Lunar Capital! The quirky combination of hilarity, awesomeness, and unabashed American-ness quickly made her the most popular character introduced in the game, especially among American fans. It reached the point that even ZUN commented on it during an interview in the 2015 Tokyo Game Show, stating surprise at how quickly Americans had made impressive cosplays of Clownpiece after only one month. It probably helps that her main reason for wearing an American flag is indirectly celebrating an American achievement (essentially, she's taunting the Lunarians with the USA flag planted on the moon; they are still quite furious that humans actually got in their turf).
Web Animation
- Battle for Dream Island: Dora is a played with version of this trope, while she did start out as an offensive parody of Dora who only spoke Spanish and was loved by Mestizo audiences, she later developed to be far less offensive and more of her own character while still keeping her Mestizo fanbase.
- CollegeHumor's Furry Force videos are rather popular with the Furry Fandom, despite mocking said fandom (specifically its kinkier side). The show was even nominated for and won the "Best Anthropomorphic Dramatic Short Work or Series" category of the annual Ursa Major Awards. The creators' familiarity with the fandom through Pop Cultural Osmosis, as stated in an AMA hosted on the r/furry subreddit, definitely helps.
- Hazbin Hotel:
- Some detractors of the show (both LGBT and cishet) have accused Angel Dust of being a negative gay stereotype for being portrayed as sleazy, overtly sexual, exaggeratedly flouncing, egotistical, and rude. Other LGBT people love him, no doubt due to the aforementioned flaws giving him a memorable personality and his more nuanced Hidden Depths showcased in the pilot. It definitely helps that Charlie and Vaggie have much less stereotypical personalities to balance out Angel's character.
- It also helps that Angel is a "fallen soul" who is literally in hell, and thus is supposed to be a decided unpleasant person, with his career as a male porn star and prostitute being depicted as a bad thing. It's also fairly obvious from the pilot that there's a redemption arc planned for him.
- Vaggie's character (who is of Salvadoran descent) has been accused of being a racist stereotype of an "angry Latina", however she is very popular among Latinos, and there are Salvadoran people who frankly love her.
- Homestar Runner:
- Teen Girl Squad was well-liked by actual teenage girls. Moreover, it was mainly with the unpopular girls that related most to What's Her Face, the Butt-Monkey of the group. It helps that the series mocked the "high school hierarchy" that they were victims of.
- In spite of being a Shallow Parody, Stinkoman is very well-loved by anime fans. The Twitter announcement teasing the final level of the game received many responses with anime gifs.
- The Strong Bad Email episode "fan club" pokes fun at fanfic writers and fandom in general, but it's regarded by those same people as a hilarious and well-written episode.
- The Most Popular Girls in School: The high school girls that the show parodies are loved by real-life high school girls due to being quite relatable for them, according to this podcast interview with the creators. (Around the 23:30 mark.)
- Surprisingly enough, despite (or perhaps, because of) Armed Farces being one of the series' main sources of comedy (especially in the earlier seasons), Red vs. Blue is actually noticeably popular with American servicemen in the Middle East according to an interview with Geoff Ramsey. Many American veterans have praised the series for its depictions of the frustratingly inane and bureaucratic aspects of the military along with its satirization of the military-industrial complex. What certainly helps is that Ramsey, who has served as a consultant and aid on writing RvB episodes outside of being just a voice actor, previously served in the U.S. Army and so he knows how to mock with respect.
Web Original
- Betty "Batterwitch" Crocker's publicity department has tweeted that they read and enjoy Homestuck. This being a webcomic that portrays Betty Crocker as a maniacal alien dictator.
- Luke and Kevin of Hobo Bros have Chinese ancestry, but find the stereotypical East Asian voice hilarious, and often do it themselves, calling it the "Asian voice".
- Of the many silly voices Lucahjin does in her Let's Play videoes, one of the most frequently used — and one of the most apparently offensive — is a ridiculous, over-the-top Asian accent parody. Every time she uses it, she makes comments about losing subscribers over it. Naturally, she gets plenty of comments from her Asian fans on how much they love it.
- The Venezuelan satiric webseries Pero Tenemos Patria (But We Have Homeland) has the Ensemble Dark Horse "El Opositor Radical" (The Radical Opossitor), who is a satire of the Far-Right elements of the Venezuelan opposition to the Chavista regime. He is an old, loud, xenophobic, white man that hates everything related to socialism and communism. The Opossitor became popular among both left- and right-wing opossitors due to his charismatic actor and his sheer justified hatred towards the Chavista regime, which is sincere despite being not that different, calling to cut off the hands of everyone who shakes hands with a Chavista and showing it by severing his own hand after acknowledging having done it in the past.
- Scandinavia and the World:
- Finnish fans are quite fond of Brother and Sister Finland, although both are depicted as broody, Knife Crazy and practically unspeaking save for the frequent perkele. These are actually valid stereotypes and widely recognized within Finland. Also helps that this behavior is portrayed as undeniably badass.
- Similarly, Special Lion, a character born of a joke parodying the Scandinavian coats of arms, is popular enough to get on The Merch. One Finn even posted "go go retarded lion!" after Finland won the World Hockey Championships.
- Italy is shown as a Corrupt Bureaucrat whose every act ends up backfiring on him. The standard reaction to his appearances is a good laugh, with this one being lauded as extremely accurate.
- Everyone loves their respective nation-tans. Except for Estonians.
- "Upon Friar Review" is a YouTube series where two Catholic priests review portrayals or Catholicism and Christianity in media, and while they mention some parts are inaccurate, they generally seem to enjoy what they're watching.
- A number of personnel involved with 4Kids and their dubs have gone on record saying that they enjoy Yu-Gi-Oh! The Abridged Series, even though the series mocks them relentlessly.
- Most Clevelanders love the "Hastily-Made Cleveland Tourism Videos" despite their mercilessly-mocking tone. It helps that their creator, Mike Polk, is a local comedian.
- LegalEagle has proclaimed his love for two fictional lawyers, Lionel Hutz from The Simpsons and Saul Goodman from Better Call Saul, in spite of both characters being walking lawyer jokes. As he rightly points out, Goodman is a sleazebag but generally gives very solid legal advice, and Hutz is so bad his sheer Refuge in Audacity Crosses the Line Twice.
- A genre example with Youtube Poop; its heyday was in the Aughts and many creators went for shock humor, specifically sexual. This resulted in a lot of gay jokes. Despite this, the genre (including old videos that made heavy use of slurs) has a huge LGBT+ fanbase and some of the old creators have since come out as gay or trans.
- Popular Creepypasta character Ticci Toby is defined in the original story as suffering from Tourette's, resulting in their near constant twitching and erratic movements. Despite the common trope of disorders being played for horror being on full display, many people with the same condition in real life have commented on liking the character for this reason. Helping this is the fact that Toby ultimately takes revenge on the people in his life who have wronged and insulted him, and even co-opts their insulting nickname for him as his pseudonym. The fact that Toby doesn't display the stereotype of uncontrollable swearing may also be a contributing factor.
- The original Penis SMP post was meant for people who disliked MCYT, as it was making fun of those "annoying" MCYT fans... and instead it attracted MCYT fans, who turned the one-off post made at their expense into an expansive Fan Verse of Affectionate Parody for their own amusement.
- Moshi Monsters: Despite the fact that Sweet Tooth's Ambiguous Gender, as well as the fact that they beat up anyone who asks about their gender, is treated as the subject of a jokenote , many fans have considered them a non-binary icon.
Western Animation
- Avatar: The Last Airbender:
- The show actually has an individual In-Universe example when the True Companions watch a Show Within a Show based on their adventures. Most of them don't take kindly to their caricatured depictions in the play (not least because it's a Propaganda Piece by The Empire), but tomboyish Little Miss Badass Toph loves the theatrical version of her played by a huge muscleman.
- Beavis and Butt-Head is loved by many metalheads, despite the titular characters being complete idiots.
- BoJack Horseman: Raphael Bob-Waksberg admitted that part of the reason that led him to making Todd asexual was based on the stereotype that asexual people are too innocent or childlike for sex. However given he pulled a major Author's Saving Throw in the following seasons by giving Todd a serious arc involving his asexuality, the character became a icon among the community despite the stereotypes. Ironically, very few fans seem to care much about Yolanda, who's another asexual character that lacks those stereotypes.
- The Boondocks is generally considered to be racist and offensive by non-African Americans. African Americans, however, thought the show's social commentary and portrayal of obnoxious stereotypes were spot on. It's ironically popular amongst those who relate to the gangster stereotypes that Riley plays up, which the show is specifically putting down.
- Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs was once met with applause from black audience members, despite the short's extremely dated racial humor and the omnipresent BlackfaceStyleCaricatures. A lot of this could possibly be blamed on the short being Fair for Its Day, as it was one of the first cartoons to feature an all-black cast, especially so in an era where respectful Black representation in American cinema was very hard to come by, and the cartoon was made explicitly as a love letter to African-American jazz music, although the short's director Bob Clampett has admitted his views on race had changed since then and would have done it very differently had it been made later. Of course, the cartoon has been acclaimed for its musical timing, so there's probably a number of Black cartoon aficionados who appreciate that even if they dislike the rest of the cartoon.
- Drawn Together invokes Everyone Is Bi for shock value and Refuge in Audacity, plus the token gay character Xandir Wifflebottom is an extremely stereotypical effeminate twink who receives tons of homophobic jokes and gets sexually harassed by one of the main female characters. The show (and especially Xandir) still has quite the LGBT Fanbase though, because homosexuality/bisexuality gets so normalized and Xandir tends to be Only Sane Man while still being an entertaining character. As stated before, just about every group gets ripped to shreds as part of the shock humor which barely makes the homophobic jokes stand out.
- Family Guy:
- The episode "PTV" was entirely dedicated to bashing the FCC and its censoring practices. When it was shown to the actual FCC, they found the episode hilarious.
- The numerous jokes that Family Guy has made about Italy and Italian people are beloved among Italians and Italian-Americans. In particular, the "Babba da boopi?" joke from "McStroke" is legendary in Italy.
- Although Glitch Techs doesn't currently have a Japanese dub as of yet (and neither does The Loud House until 5 years later), there are a lot of Japanese fans who liked the homages to their media, like Leni as the 11 of Hearts (and by extension, Miko), etc. in both series.
- King of the Hill:
- The series began as a jab at Southern, Bible-thumping, redneck, middle-class Americans. However, the show soon became a smash hit with that exact demographic. After the first season, the show became less "look at this dumb white guy" and more "laugh along with this hard-working father and his loving family".
- The show also pulled this off in the opposite direction as well. In spite of the fact that the show would often skewer liberals and progressives, the show ended up becoming very popular with those very same demographics. Partially because of the show's explicit or implicit condemnations of some of the more negative aspects of American conservatism, and also because the views of many of the liberal and progressive characters that they show used to take potshots as those values were so over-the-top that all but the most extreme left-wing liberals thought that the characters were taking it too far. Additionally, Hank would find common ground with his liberal counterparts and learn to accept change as often as he reasserted his traditional values, with the series also depicting topics associated with the left, such as drag queens, in a respectful manner. It helps that the show actually had many left-wing writers on board, giving it a slight vibe of tongue-in-cheek Self-Deprecation.
- There's also Kahn Souphanousinphone, Hank's obnoxious Laotian neighbor and his family. He has a lot of Asian-American fans despite being a mostly-unlikable jerk (and being voiced by a white actor) because his focus episodes deal with issues that Asian-Americans deal with in Real Life, such as model minority stereotyping and the unreasonable expectations that go with it, plus being one of the few portrayals in American media that avoids Interchangeable Asian Cultures. There's also the fact that making him a jerk gives him a distinct personality that's ripe for comedy instead of just being everybody's best friend, a notorious pitfall with token minority characters in fiction.
- Looney Tunes:
- The Trope Namer is Speedy Gonzales. Despite being an obvious stereotype of Mexicans, he's still a particularly popular and beloved character in Mexico and throughout Latin America, where his cartoons still run to this day.
- The reason isn't really all that complicated: Speedy is actually a positive figure rather than an Ethnic Scrappy — he not only has a good heart and is more physically capable than his opponents, he more often than not defeats them through his own cleverness rather than just his speed. Even Slowpoke Rodriguez, Speedy's audaciously ridiculous Erudite Stoner cousin, is a gun-toting badass and "fast upstairs in the cabeza", and hypnotizes Sylvester in seconds. The most offensive aspect of Speedy, his broken English and terrible Spanish, is not present in actual Spanish dubs. The second most offensive thing, his womanizing habits ("Speedy Gonzalez goes steady with everybody's sister"), doesn't seem to have drawn all that much flak, presumably because having that one flaw (offensive as it may be) makes him a better-rounded character and serves as a weakness. It also helps that whenever Speedy's womanizing is mentioned, it almost always causes the mice to just laugh, and that Speedy is more often than not a gentleman around women.
- Another major reason why this trope is in effect is that Speedy Gonzales himself is not the offensive (or the most offensive) portion of his cartoons. Instead, what's potentially offensive is the fact that the cartoons go out of their way to paint all the OTHER Mexican mice as lazy and gullible as possible.
- As for the actual Mexico, in the 1950s when the cartoons were first made, Mexico was still in the shadow of both the Clutch Plague and a decade-long civil war that killed two million people in a country that had only 15 million at the time. Much of Mexico still resembled the poor villages depicted in the cartoons and the idea that Mexicans could be saved by a Mexican superhero really resonated with a lot of people.
- From 1999 to 2002, Speedy cartoons were banned in the USA by Cartoon Network, who had exclusive broadcasting rights, and discontinued by Warner Bros. but a massive fan campaign and lobbying by the League of United Latin American Citizens eventually led to this practice ending. The temporary discontinuation was referenced in Looney Tunes: Back in Action when Porky Pig meets Speedy at the Warner Bros. canteen and they talk about how political correctness ruined their careers, since Porky has a handicap (stuttering) and Speedy belongs to an ethnic minority, and both played these things up in their acts.
- When Cartoon Network first announced the production of The Looney Tunes Show, they started to build up hype by bringing the Looney Tunes back as a full-hour programming block during the weekdays, which had been absent from the network for about the better part of a decade. Speedy Gonzales cartoons were not shown. The Looney Tunes Show proved to be a success, and portrayed Speedy Gonzales in a positive light as the owner of a local pizzeria and an all-around entrepreneur who has business savvy, but wasn't overly focused on making money. The Looney Tunes still airs each day, but Speedy Gonzales cartoons are still decidedly absent.
- Speedy is popular enough with Mexicans that some Mexican restaurants in the USA actually offer a "Speedy Gonzales" dish on their menu. It usually consists of a taco, enchilada, and rice or beans. Also it's not uncommon to find stickers of him on the buses of every major city. There's even a song about him.
- Bugs Bunny's signature gag of crossdressing to fool his opponents was, at the time, seen as just a bog-standard joke with no real societal impact. However, current-day members of the LGBTQIA+ community, notably those who're transgender, non-binary, or genderfluid, like to consider Bugs a personal icon of theirs, given that despite those he fools being shocked by the fact that he's not a woman, Bugs himself never has any issue with having to crossdress, often times genuinely liking it (especially in The Looney Tunes Show, where he sees himself crossdressed as beautiful). Amplified by a number of Twitter messages citing an interview Chuck Jones gave, in which he essentially described Bugs as genderfluid.
- The Trope Namer is Speedy Gonzales. Despite being an obvious stereotype of Mexicans, he's still a particularly popular and beloved character in Mexico and throughout Latin America, where his cartoons still run to this day.
- The Loud House: The Moose and Maple Syrup depiction of Canada in "Schooled!" is divisive — some Canadians think it's cringeworthy, but others think it's fine since a lot of the show's writers are Canadian.
- Megas XLR is a show about a guy from New Jersey who uses a giant robot car and people from the Garden State are very proud of this fact. Even though the state gets trashed every episode and there are a couple of jokes at the state's expense, the fact that all the action takes place in Jersey as well as the jokes being more affectionate rather than mean spirited makes it being declared one of the best representations of New Jersey in all of media.
- At least a few Swedes have professed their love for Metalocalypse, despite the fact that their country is represented in the show by a vain, drug-and-alcohol-addicted nymphomaniac Jerkass with a Money Fetish who enjoys hitting on elderly women, and whose name isn't in actual Swedish. Said character, Skwisgaar Skwigelf, however, is probably the world's best guitarist in-universe, and Does It For The Art when it comes to death metal. (He also periodically will have a Pet the Dog moment, especially as the character development sets in) The show also definitely Shows Its Work when it comes to metal and the entertainment industry, and is generally loved by a lot of metal fans from all over.
- ¡Mucha Lucha! is very beloved among Hispanic audiences, as although the show likes to ham up Mexicans stereotypes and is created by an Australian and Asian couple, the creators are hardcore Latinophiles who have Shown Their Work regarding Mexican culture.
- My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
- Despite the character causing some minor controvery for being labelled as ableist, Derpy Hooves is a favorite among disabled fans. Most fanworks portray her eye problem and clumsiness in a sympathetic and relatable manner, and even the series itself picked up on this via meaningful background events.
- Zephyr Breeze is this for half of the fan base at least. Those who related to his crippling fear of failure saw his featured episode as a well-thought-out grown-up learning experience and many of those who dislike him do for his inappropriate behavior towards Rainbow Dash rather than the rest of his characterization.
- The PJs, a short-lived Stop Motion cartoon about life in public housing, was a huge hit with African Americans despite Moral Guardians claiming it was racist and demeaning. It helped that A) the show was produced by Eddie Murphy who grew up in such an environment, and B) it was actually funny and had some surprisingly subtle, relevant humor given the subject matter, rather than just being a parade of cliched stereotypes.
- The titular characters of Rick and Morty show signs of being on the autism spectrum, such as stuttering, difficulty understanding sarcasm, and in Rick's case, lack of empathy. In season 3, Rick outright admits he's autistic. Despite Rick being a Jerkass Comedic Sociopath with Blue-and-Orange Morality who endangers the people around him, autistic fans couldn't be happier about this revelation. Morty is also well-liked by autistic fans despite being the Butt-Monkey. It helps that one of the co-creators is autistic himself.
- Word of God has confirmed that Donatello in Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is meant to be on the autism spectrum. While this version of Donnie is something of an Insufferable Genius Mad Scientist, he's still popular among the autistic community and is considered a very good representation of autism in media.
- Rugrats:
- Many people saw Tommy Pickles' maternal grandparents, Boris and Minka Kropotkin, as offensive Jewish stereotypes, unaware that two of the show's creators were Jews who knew exactly what they were talking about. If anything, Ashkenazi Jews were honored to be portrayed so authentically. Tellingly, Nickelodeon's Jewish then-president Albie Hecht was baffled by the controversy, while his goy successor Herb Scannell completely agreed with it.
- The show's token African-American character Susie Carmichael also has an impressive African-American fanbase, despite sometimes being criticized as a Flawless Token (Word of God says she's supposed to be "the anti-Angelica", and since Angelica is a Know-Nothing Know-It-All Jerkass...). Cree Summer has said she's been thanked for years by people who were glad that a black character was part of their favorite cartoon. She also points out that at the time, it was often the case that white actors voiced characters of other races.
- Although she is described as an amoral scientist who ends up working for the villain Hordak, Entrapta from She-Ra and the Princesses of Power is extremely popular among autistic fans, as she presents multiple signs of being a character within the autism spectrum (and was later confirmed to be autistic by Word of God).
- The Simpsons:
- Ned Flanders is popular among conservative Christians despite being a caricature of them. Pre-Flanderization, he was easily the nicest guy on the show and always portrayed as being very reasonable compared to his stubborn, selfish, and idiotic neighbor Homer. Sadly, after Flanderization, Christians turned away from the character recognizing he had become more of a hateful stereotype of them by the writers, though they have tried to tone this down over time and have him go back to his earlier cheery self.
- Also from The Simpsons, Groundskeeper Willie is very popular in — yep, you guessed it — Scotland. Representatives of Aberdeen and Glasgow fought to have their respective cities recognised as his hometown and Glasgow City Council grudgingly removed him from their list of "Famous Glaswegians" when it was made official in-universe that he hailed from Kirkwall, Orkney. This is also thought to have given Orkney a tourism boost in the following years.
- Additionally, despite some episodes being Banned in China ("Goo Goo Gai Pan" in China, "Thirty Minutes over Tokyo" in Japan and "Blame It on Lisa" in Brazil), "The Italian Bob" averted No Export for You in Italy: not only did it not get banned at all, but it has aired often due to it being funny and even has the Italian-born Maria Grazia Cucinotta reprising her role as Sideshow Bob's Italian wife Francesca (she's the VA for the character in both versions).
- "Bart vs. Australia" is considered an excellent documentary in Australia, particularly for showcasing the game of Knifey-Spoony, and the Prime Minister drinking from a can of beer while lying naked on a lake in an old tire. One Australian is petitioning for the currency's name to be changed to dollarydoos. It's got over 60,000 signatures. Worth noting, however, that the episode was controversial when it first aired but became a cult classic over time. Prime Minister Andy in particular became a go-to reference during the reign of Tony Abbott, who — like many Australian PMs — had a great love of swimming and surfing, and was often coaxed by the press into giving statements on the beach while wearing only a Speedo. It's also common for Simpsons fan groups based in the country to use Tobias and Bruno (or at least their faces) in photoshopped memes involving Australian cultural references.
- "Blame It on Lisa" is a very loved episode in Brazil. While it had controversy (many people grew to hate the show thanks to it, and eventually the episode was banned in Brazil for a few years), there are many Simpsons fans in Brazil who love the episode despite its inaccuracies, and even more thanks to the stuff they got right. It helps that Brazilians have low self-esteem and love making jokes about their own country. Special mention goes to the "Our money sure is gay" joke, where Homer's kidnappers get a briefcase full of pink and purple money bills. Brazilians said how they needed the Simpsons to realize that, in Brazil, bills of 5 Reais and 10 Reais are indeed purple and pink.
- The situation around Apu is an especially complicated case.
- He has been criticized by Indian-Americans or rather South Asian Americans (since even Pakistanis and Bangladeshis who aren't Indians are confused for the stereotype and accent), but Apu is well-liked in India itself for the fact that Apu was one of the few Indian-origin characters in American TV, and that he was in the context of his time, non-stereotypical i.e. not defined entirely by religion, not overtly submissive, and generally shown with the same flaws and quirks as any Springfielder, compared to most Indian characters in Western media.
- He has also been positively received by first-generation Indian immigrants in the United States, due to him showing that a first-generation immigrant is capable of running a successful business and supporting a loving family in spite of his ethnicity and dialect, which is seen as quite significant form of representation by a group of people forced to keep track of multiple languages at once and redefine how they're viewed by the people around them.
- A documentary called "The Problem with Apu" intended to highlight the harmful cultural impact of the character, made by American born comedian Hari Kondabolu. It points out that The Simpsons being such a juggernaut of a franchise that many Indian kids in America will get an Apu joke thrown their way in their life, as well that Apu was voiced by the white Hank Azaria and there was growing backlash to the implications of a Race Lift in voice acting. Others have pointed out that the show uses a rather small group of voice actors to portray the majority of its' characters, and Apu's stereotypes are heavily relative to how every character is a figure of ridicule in some way. The show had actually not used Apu in several years (Azaria promised to never voice him again), and after a Leaning on the Fourth Wall comment in the show (that was criticized still) the showrunners said they had no more plans to use the character anymore.
- The episode "Blood Feud" has, at the end of the episode, Mr. Burns giving Bart an Olmec head. Though the writers made up most of the details regarding the giant stone head, a lot of archaeologists who specialize in studying the Olmec civilization wrote in to thank the show's staff for choosing Olmec rather than the usual Mayans and Aztec that had previously consumed nearly all mention of Mesoamerican pre-western history prior.
- Kelsey Grammer, an avowed Republican, has played Sideshow Bob, an avowed homicidal Republican who wants to "lower taxes, brutalize criminals, and rule you like a king", for over thirty years. Presumably, Bob's sophistication nullifies the 'Republicans operate out of a Dracula castle' schtick. (It doesn't hurt his closest friends, writers, and castmates are gay.)
- The character of Julio is very popular among both Cubans and Costa Ricans (his exact nationality is unclear) despite being gay and both countries been relatively conservative. Bumblebee Man is also very popular among Mexicans and Hispanics in general despite him being a bumbling doof, probably in part because he is also an Affectionate Parody of beloved comedian Chespirito who is an icon of both Mexico and Latin America at large.
- "The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson" is beloved by New Yorkers, because it shows the best parts of New York and the worst parts. New Yorkers were also pissed when the episode was pulled for years from rotation post-9/11 due to the jokes about the World Trade Center.
- The episode "Livin La Pura Vida" basically broke the Internet in Costa Rica, and it was even covered by many of the local newspapers and media as an important event. The Simpsons' popularity is a cultural phenomenon as in the rest of Latin America so to some, it was less this trope and more of a dream come true. The episode, to be fair, is pretty respectful and the country is more of a scenario than the subject of humor as in the Brazil and Australia episodes, however, should be remembered that there was already an antecedent with South Park's episode in which this trope was not fulfilled as even the government filed a complaint for the depiction of the country (and yes, the South Park episode does have some fans and defenders among the Costa Ricans but not so much as other examples of the trope, though most fans of the show just overlook the episode in question and enjoy the rest of the series).
- Lionel Hutz is beloved by YouTuber LegalEagle, an actual copyright attorney, who goes into some depth that the man is considered "the best worst lawyer ever" by many in his profession and that it's very common for lawyers to quote his "No, money down!" bit.
- In "D'Oh Canada", the Simpsons visit Niagara Falls, and during the drive through Upstate New York, Homer sings an unflattering musical number portraying the region as a Rust Belt wasteland. As the comments on the linked video suggest, the vast majority of Upstaters found the scene hilarious and were happy to see the show poke fun at their portion of the state and not just NYC. It also doesn't hurt that the scene included some surprisingly beautiful Scenery Porn despite its mocking tone.
- Many people in the LGBT community have a soft spot for Smithers, despite some of his more questionable misdeeds. It helps that he was an explicitly gay television character during a time when it was almost entirely unheard of, he's more of a Straight Gay rather than an outlandish stereotype, and in spite of his quirks, he's rather Adorkable and a relatively sympathetic character. In fact, a lot of people who unironically ship Burns/Smithers are LGBT in some way, with a lot of them being gay men who relate to Smithers and want him to succeed.
- South Park:
- Canadians seem to have taken the jibes at their accent and their country in the movie version of the series with good humor. Canadian fans tend to love anything involving Terrance and Phillip. It probably helps that the depiction of Canada isn't just based in Moose and Maple Syrup sort of stereotypes, but is a Cloudcuckooland that doesn't quite match up to any real-world culture.
- Quebecers generally found the South Park treatment of Quebec in "It's Christmas in Canada" pretty funny, and weren't offended by "zee out-RA-geous accents".
- Also, while the eighth season and beyond was not dubbed for them, South Park's sizable Japanese fanbase loves "Good Times With Weapons", which is an Affectionate Parody of anime. The song in said episode, "Let's Fighting Love", which is in real but nonsensical Japanese, has reached Memetic Mutation levels on Nico.
- "The Last of the Meheecans" was very well received in Mexico too, presumably because despite Butters dressing up in Brownface as a Mexican stereotype, it promotes patriotism and nostalgia towards Mexico and mocks the whole illegal immigrants panic in America.
- Trey Parker and Matt Stone have stated that the people who enjoyed "All About Mormons" were mostly Mormons themselves. It definitely helps that, although the episode heavily mocked the Mormon faith, the writers clearly Showed Their Work and, if irreverently, accurately talked about what they believe, and they ended the episode with an intended "The Reason You Suck" Speech from Gary that says nothing but nice things about them.
- Both Jimmy and Timmy are really popular with disabled people. While the show takes every available opportunity to poke fun at their shortcomings, it does the same to every other character with equal glee while simultaneously having the pair contribute to the story just as much as everyone else rather than talking down to fans in A Very Special Episode kind of way. Many people appreciate a show that embraces these two as regular characters who are included alongside the others as equals, and feel it's actually one of the most positive portrayals of disabled characters on television for it despite the Crossing the Line Twice humor.
- In-universe. In "Fat Butt and Pancake Head", a group of Latino community leaders actually award Cartman for his extremely stereotypical "Jennifer Lopez" hand puppet routine at a South Park cultural diversity event.
- Also in-universe, when the boys start their own wrestling federation and a large group of Mexicans are in the crowd wildly cheering for El Pollo Loco, Kenny's Masked Luchador persona.
- Tweek and Craig became a gay couple purely for the sake of a joke about the show's yaoi fanart, but a lot of LGBTQIA+ fans appreciated how they were portrayed as a Straight Gay couple who weren't defined entirely by their sexuality, and like Jimmy and Timmy, treated like normal kids who just happened to be gay. It helps that South Park's previous gay characters were either over-the-top Camp Gay stereotypes or antagonistic characters, making Tweek and Craig seem like even more of a breath of fresh air by comparison.
- "The Worldwide Privacy Tour", a plot-long Take That! to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, was well-received by British viewers, especially those who had grown tired of their antics.
- The song San Diego from the episode "Butterballs" is about the joys of "jackin' it" in San Diego... and it's very popular among San Diegans, with some local fans even (jokingly) wanting it to be the city's official song. It helps that the song does advertise many of the city's iconic locations, and that it mainly mocks an event only tangibly-related to the city.note
- SpongeBob SquarePants:
- Squidward was written to be the curmudgeonly, boring and overly-mature foil to SpongeBob and Patrick, living a joyless life, being annoyed by their constant shenanigans, failing to make it as an artist, and hating his Burger Fool job at the Krusty Krab (in contrast to SpongeBob absolutely loving the work). All these traits made him popular among the show's adult audience, who found him and his struggles to be surprisingly relatable.
- Likewise, Sandy Cheeks to Texans. She's a walking mish-mash of Texan stereotypes, speaking in a drawl, wielding a lasso, and singing guitar ballads about her home. She embodies a few negative stereotypes too, such as getting violently enraged when SpongeBob and Patrick begin making fun of Texas as she sees her home state as a Sacred Cow. Despite this, her vast intelligence, fighting skill, and big heart for everyone in her community make her popular enough that many areas in Texas have tried to "claim" her as Glasgow has in the past with Groundskeeper Willie.
- Evil Brit Mad Mod from Teen Titans has a good deal of fans from Britain, despite being an embodiment of every British stereotype you can think of i.e. he has wonky British Teeth, he's a fan of Monty Python and The Beatles and hates the "yanks" enough to try and cancel Independence Day!
- Thomas & Friends: A deleted scene from Big World! Big Adventures! showed Carlos, a Mexican engine joking about being a sun worshipper, then deploying the Aztec calendar around his face while "Jarabe Tapatío" plays in the background. It was deleted because it could be perceived as offensive, but Mexican fans expressed their approval of the scene and Carlos as a character.
- Total Drama:
- Any fan who was homeschooled seems to like Ezekiel. This includes Fandom VIP the Kobold Necromancer, whose fanfics played a huge part in rescuing him from the Scrappy Heap.
- People with Dissociative Identity Disorder often relate to Mike and his alters despite their less-than-accurate portrayal in the show, as they are a rare example of a system that is portrayed sympathetically. They often flesh out his symptoms and implied trauma in fan works to make him more realistic. It helps that he averts many negative stereotypes associated with DID and other mental health conditions, with it being made extremely clear that he is not crazy, not predisposed to violence, and a normal guy just like you and me.
- Sam is most beloved by the very gamers that he's a stereotype of. It definitely helps that he averts some of the more mean-spirited stereotypes associated with gamers (like perpetual singledomnote and desensitization to violence) and is continuously portrayed as one of the nicer characters on the show.
- Many fans from the Deep South or similarly "redneck" places find Sugar hilarious. Several of them can attest to having known someone like her growing up.
- Total Drama Presents: The Ridonculous Race: Crimson and Ennui are biting stereotypes of goth teenagers, being portrayed as Nightmare Fetishists who never outwardly show emotion, speak in Creepy Monotone, rarely socialize with other teams, are considered terrifying by most of the other contestants, and wear extremely heavy makeup and elaborate outfits (even when it wouldn't be practical). Despite this, they're extremely popular among actual goths, who find their character designs cool, their emotionless nature funny, and their relationship with each other and with their pet rabbit Loki extremely endearing.
- One of the commentaries for VeggieTales, the creators explain that when Canadians were shown the French Peas they thought they were offensive and they shouldn't be featured on the show. They then showed the episode with the peas to some people from France who thought it was hilarious.
Real Life
- Most historical records about Vikings heavily play up their brutality, being written by victims of their plunder and by Christian missionaries. In spite of that, Scandinavians today have embraced the stereotype of their ancestors as Horny Vikings, from Heavy Mithril bands like Amon Amarth all the way to Odinists. It helps that it gives their region a more intimidating, marketable image. Many descendants of Scandinavian immigrants who have settled in Upper Midwestern America are also fans of the Minnesota Vikings with its stereotypical Viking mascot.
- While on a trip to China in the eighties, Prince Philip (the late husband of Queen Elizabeth II) was overheard telling some British students studying there, "If you stay much longer, you'll get slitty-eyed." The media picked up on this and was understandably horrified, which only cooled down when it was revealed that many Chinese people actually found Philip's joke funny (and revealed that a lot of Chinese people, in turn, refer to Westerners as "round-eyed").
- The University of Notre Dame's "Fighting Irish" mascot is beloved by Irish Americans and in Ireland itself. The team has hosted 2 games there as of 2018, both of which sold out (albeit, a ton of American fans also travelled to the game). The planned third game (in 2020, which was eventually canceled because of COVID-19) had sold out within 24 hours.
- Orientalist artworks portraying typical stereotypes of the Middle East like nubile harem girls, "Arabian Nights" Days and stuff like that is actually very popular among collectors from that region, and they are willing to pay quite a lot.
- Since 1993, Arapahoe High School in the Denver suburb of Centennial, Colorado has had a working relationship with their namesake, the Arapaho Nation of Wind River, Wyoming. Notably, Wilbur Antelope, a Northern Arapaho artist, designed the school's original logo. In addition, the school's gymnasium was renamed for Anthony Sitting Eagle, an Arapaho Elder who was one of the primary tribal elders that principal Ronald Booth met with in establishing the school's relationship with the Arapaho Nation, and every year the school hosts "Arapahoe Day" in which members of the Arapaho Nation travel from the reservation to share in tribal customs with the students.
- Sexy outfits for female characters in video games, anime, etc., are frequently derided as being sexist, demeaning and objectifying to women. However if you spend any time on the Internet or in conventions you'll find no shortage of real life women happily cosplaying with said outfits, usually because they like the character as well as the outfit, or simply they also find said outfits sexy and want to feel that way too. It also doesn't hurt that these outfits are frequently quite easy and cheap to put together.