What Is This Index?

Is this an index for tropes about questions? Does it include tropes that are posed as questions?

Sub-index of Dialogue. See also Information Desk, Mystery Tropes, and Perp Sweating. Does not include the comic book character.

Tropes:

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Tropes about questions

Armor-Piercing Question: Posing a question that forces a character to consider their motives.
Ask a Stupid Question...: set yourself up for a snarky answer.
Child Naming Request: Asking that a child be given a certain name.
Confused Question Mark: Question marks in a Speech Bubble to signify confusion.
Constantly Curious: Someone, usually a child, who is constantly asking questions.
Don't Ask: Pre-emptively cutting off any questions about an apparently bad experience.
Don't Ask, Just Run: The bad situation is approaching, so no time for questions!
Driving Question: The motivating question of the work
Excuse Question: A contest that consists of a very easy question, but is really a masquerade for a business advertisement.
Iconic Song Request: A song everyone always asks to hear.
Innocent Awkward Question: A child asks a question about a subject that an adult thinks is too mature for them.
Last Request: Allowed to ask for one thing before being executed.
Life-or-Death Question: A character's life depends on answering a question or set of questions correctly.
Ludicrous Gift Request: Asking for something ridiculous.
Many Questions Fallacy: A question is framed as only having a yes-or-no answer but is itself based on a false premise.
My Name Is ???: Question marks in place of No Name Given.
"No Peeking!" Request: Asking someone not to look at what you are doing.
No Questions Asked: Stock Phrase used when recruiting someone or seeking help without providing further details.
Not Actually the Ultimate Question: A question is answered philosophically when meant literally.
Owls Ask "Who?": An owl's noise sounds like a question.
Questioning Title?: A title that's a question.
Reasonable Request Rejected: The answer is "no" no matter what you ask.
Rhetorical Question Blunder: A rhetorical question receives an answer.
Rhetorical Request Blunder: A request strictly made in anger is taken seriously by those who hear it to the person's great regret.
Riddle Me This: Gaining entry or completing a task requires answering a riddle.
Schrödinger's Question: Answering a question determines the answer to the question.
Stupid Question Bait: A group asks questions of a speaker that have nothing to do with the topic at hand.
That Wasn't a Request: Mistaking a command for a request.
These Questions Three...: Riddle Me This in the form of three questions.
Torture First, Ask Questions Later
Trial Balloon Question: Asking a hypothetical question that is actually about yourself.
Viewer Gender Confusion: Audience questions a character's gender.
Viewer Name Confusion: Audience questions a character's name.
Viewer Species Confusion: Audience questions a character's species.
You Answered Your Own Question: A question that contains the answer.
You Didn't Ask: A common excuse given for failing to disclose information.

Tropes posed as questions

Indexes posed as questions:

Am I Just a Toy to You?: Asking someone if they're just using you for their own end.
Am I Right?: Stock Phrase used at the end of a (supposedly) funny observation.
And Then What?: Characters wonder what happens after victory.
Angst? What Angst?: A character shrugs off something that should be traumatizing.
Any Last Words?: Asking someone if they have final words before killing them.
Anyone Remember Pogs?: A forgotten fad is referenced to mock it.
Are We Getting This?: A reporter or film director asks whether their cameraman is recording an unexpected, extraordinary event.
Are We There Yet?: A character, usually a child, on a trip pesters the driver with questions like "Are we there?" or "How much longer?"
Are You Pondering What I'm Pondering?: One character wrongly but humorously guesses what another character is thinking.
Are You Sure You Can Drive This Thing?: Asking someone if they can drive a complex or unfamiliar vehicle.
Are You Sure You Want to Do That?
Aren't You Forgetting Someone?: Thanking almost everyone.
Aren't You Going to Ravish Me?: A Damsel in Distress is offended that the villain has not sexually assaulted her.
Big "WHAT?!": A character yells, "WHAT?!" to convey a combination of shock and confusion.
Big "WHY?!": A character yells, "WHY!?" to express despair.
Can't You Read the Sign?: Ignoring the instructions on a sign.
Defensive "What?": A character says something and then wonders why everyone is looking at the character.
Did Anastasia Survive?: Works in which the Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova may have survived the Russian Revolution.
Did I Just Say That Out Loud?: Speaking aloud when you don't mean to.
Did I Mention It's Christmas?: It's Christmas but barely anyone is acting like it.
Did the Earth Move for You, Too?: A stock joke made when characters kiss or have sex during a disaster.
Did They or Didn't They?: It's left ambiguous whether two characters had sex.
Did You Actually Believe...?: A villain is incredulous over the hero's naivete.
Did You Die?: Asking the person telling a harrowing tale whether they survived.
Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: A mortal character defeats an Eldritch Abomination.
- Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?: A mortal character mock an Eldritch Abomination.
- Did We Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?: A mortal character dines with an Eldritch Abomination.
- Did You Just Romance Cthulhu?: A mortal character dates an Eldritch Abomination.
- Did You Just Scam Cthulhu?: A mortal character tricks an Eldritch Abomination.
Did You Think I Can't Feel?: The Stoic reveals they're Not So Stoic.
Didn't We Use This Joke Already?: Breaking the Fourth Wall about an overused joke.
Do I Really Sound Like That?: Dismay at hearing what your voice sounds like.
Do You Trust Me?: Asking someone to take a Leap of Faith (often literally, but sometimes metaphorically).
Do You Want to Copulate?: Someone with No Social Skills propositions someone.
Do You Want to Haggle?: Buyer and seller compete over the selling price of a good.
Does He Have a Brother?: If you're attracted to someone who's taken, find out if they have a similar relative.
Does That Sound Like Fun to You?: A Naïve Newcomer gets set straight.
Does This Make Me Look Fat?: No. No, it does not.
Does This Remind You of Anything?: A humorous or censor-friendly stand-in for a more controversial action.
Dude, Where's My Respect?: A hero feels disrespected by those he has protected.
Dude, Where's My Reward?: The reward for a hard task is practically worthless.
The End... Or Is It?: Happily Ever After turns into a Sequel Hook.
Et Tu, Brute?: Shock at being betrayed by your closest friend.
Flat "What": Deadpan response of disbelief.
Have I Mentioned I Am a Dwarf Today?: Nonhuman characters frequently mention their species.
Have I Mentioned I Am Gay?: A character wants you to know they're gay.
Have I Mentioned I Am Heterosexual Today?: A character wants you to know they're not gay.
Have I Mentioned I Am Sexually Active Today?: A character wants you to know they have lots of sex.
Have We Met?: Two characters ostensibly having their first meeting wondering whether they have met before, for various reasons.
Have We Met Yet?: A time traveler meets an old acquaintance/enemy, but for that person it's the first time.
Have You Come to Gloat?: An imprisoned villain accuses any visitors of coming just to mock him.
Have You Seen My God?: God is absent.
Have You Told Anyone Else?: Asking someone if they are only one who knows a confidential piece of information, usually right before killing them or trying to.
Have You Tried Not Being a Monster?: A parent expresses Fantastic Racism towards their child.
Have You Tried Rebooting?: Resolving computer issues by turning it off and then on again.
Haven't You Seen X Before?: Responding to someone else's look of surprise.
Heads or Tails?: Flipping a coin to decide an outcome.
How Can Santa Deliver All Those Toys?: A work examines or raises the question of how Santa Claus works.
How Did That Get in There?: Implausibly denying you have something you’re not supposed to have.
How Did You Get It?: A character lies about how they got a valuable or contraband item.
How Did You Know? I Didn't
How Do I Shot Web?: A newly superpowered hero has issues fully accessing their new powers.
How Do You Say: Stock Phrase used by non-English-speaking characters when trying to think of English terms or phrases.
How Is That Even Possible?: Questioning how the supposedly impossible occurred.
How Many Fingers?: Holding up a number of fingers and asking someone to count them to check the person's brain function.
How Much Did You Hear?: Asking someone if they overheard confidential information.
How Much More Can He Take?: Questioning someone's endurance after having suffered an incredible amount.
How Would You Like to Die?: A murderer gives their soon-to-be victim a choice.
I Am Who?: A character learns about their own Secret Identity.
I Ate WHAT?!: Disbelief over what you've unknowingly just eaten.
Is It Always Like This?
Is It Something You Eat?: Mistaking a new word for a kind of food.
Is Nothing Sacred?
Is That a Threat?: A common response after being threatened.
Is That Cute Kid Yours?: Wrongly assuming someone is the parent of a nearby cute child.
Is That the Best You Can Do?: Tempting Fate by belittling your adversary's efforts thus far.
Is That What He Told You?
Is the Answer to This Question "Yes"?: Posing a rhetorical question in place of simply answering "yes".
Is There a Doctor in the House?: Someone has fainted or been hurt.
Is This a Joke?
Is This What Anger Feels Like?: Feeling anger for the first time.
Isn't It Ironic?: Enjoying the upbeat sound of lyrics while ignoring its actual message.
I've Heard of That — What Is It?: Pretending to understand something, only to immediately ask about it.
May I Borrow a Cup of Sugar?: Asking a neighbor to share a common item.
My God, What Have I Done?: A character expresses horror at their own deeds.
Need a Hand, or a Handjob?: A sexual solicitation is mistaken for a legitimate offer of aid.
No Plot? No Problem!: Rule of Fun wins!
Not Listening to Me, Are You?: A character realizes they're being ignored.
Now How Much Would You Pay: A rhetorical question in an ad about how much the customers would pay.
Now What?: The premise is resolved without a satisfying conclusion.
Now, Where Was I Going Again?: Playing a game after a really long time of absence can make you forget your destination or goal.
Or Are You Just Happy to See Me?: Asking someone what's in their pocket.
Or Was It a Dream?: A dream may not actually be a dream.
Shall I Repeat That?: A character asks the player if they want the character to repeat the information they just gave the player.
Shouldn't We Be in School Right Now?: Child characters aren't in school during school hours, and they're neither sick, homeschooled, nor explicitly stated to be playing hooky.
Shouldn't You Stop Stealing?: A character's reason for doing something unethical no longer applies.
So What Do We Do Now?: The hero feels a bit sad once the adventure is over.
So You Were Saying...?: Interrupting a confession with contrary news, causing the confessor to change their mind.
Was It All a Lie?: Asking The Mole whether anything about your relationship was genuine.
Was It Really Worth It?: A character questions whether the prize was worth all it took to get it.
Wasn't That Fun?: Only for that character.
What's an X Like You Doing in a Y Like This?: Someone is called out for making an Unfortunate Name choice.
What Are You in For?: Characters in prison discuss their reasons for being there.
What Could Possibly Go Wrong?: Innocently and optimistically Tempting Fate.
What Did I Do Last Night?: Question posed after going on a bender the previous evening.
What Did You Expect When You Named It ____?:
What Do You Mean, It's for Kids?: A children's story has adult-seeming content.
What Do You Mean, It's Not Didactic?: Insisting a work has a deeper meaning than its author intended.
What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: Mistaking a work for being for kids when it's not.
What Do You Mean, It's Not for Little Girls?: Mistaking a work for being for little girls when it's not.
What Do You Mean, It's Not Political?: Insisting a work has a political meaning that its author did not intend.
What Do You Mean, It's Phlebotinum?: A normal substance on Earth proves to be quite special for aliens.
What Does She See in Him?: A character's attraction to another is baffling to everyone else.
What Does This Button Do?: Press it and find out!
What, Exactly, Is His Job?: A member of the True Companions doesn't seem to have a (logical) role among the True Companions.
What Happened to the Mouse?: A minor actor or storyline disappears without being addressed or resolved.
What Have I Become?: A character expresses shock at their own moral or physical transformation.
What Have You Done for Me Lately?: Expressing ingratitude despite in the past having received a lot from someone.
What If?: Imagining what happens if a small detail is changed.
What Is Evil?: The concept of good and evil is meaningless to the villain.
What Is Going On?: A late-arriving character demands an explanation.
What Is This Feeling?: A character experiences an unfamiliar emotion.
What Is This Thing You Call "Love"?: A non-human is confused but intrigued by the concept of love.
What Is This, X?: A character says that this isn't that thing/place.
What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: Having a superpower that sounds nice but has little to no practical value.
What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Wondering whether other sentient creatures have the same moral value as humans.
- Do Androids Dream?: Wondering whether robots and computers have the same moral value as humans.
- What Measure Is a Humanoid?: Judging the value of an Interspecies Romance involving a human by how closely the alien species is to human.
- What Measure Is a Mook?: Questioning the righteousness of killing a mook.
- What Measure Is a Non-Cute?: Only cute or pretty animals are the good guys, while uglier or more boring-looking animals are villains.
"What Now?" Ending: A Time Skip occurs between seasons in which the characters are recovering the effects of the previous season's Cliffhanger.
What Song Was This Again?: A song is dubbed in a way that completely changes it.
What the Fu Are You Doing?: Making up a martial art as you go along.
What the Hell Are You?
WTH, Costuming Department?: A work makes a highly questionable costuming call.
What the Hell, Hero?: Expressing shock that the hero is acting like a villain.
What the Hell Is That Accent?: And where is it from?
What the Hell, Player?: The game calls you out for doing something cruel or idiotic.
What Were They Selling Again?: A commercial that fails to communicate what it's advertising.
What Were You Thinking?: A character is dumbfounded by another's actions.
What's a Henway?: Tricking someone into asking what a nonsense word is, leading to a pun.
What's He Got That I Ain't Got?!: Comparing yourself to someone you are jealous of.
What's In It For Me?
What Would X Do?
When Is Purple?: Going beyond "comparing apples to oranges" by thinking of the color orange as an apple.
When You Coming Home, Dad?: A child longs for their father's attention.
"Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: An epilogue provides information about the main characters' future.
Where da White Women At?: Tension created by a romantic relationship between a black man and white woman.
Where Did We Go Wrong?: Parents express sorrow and confusion about their child's life choices.
Where Do You Think You Are?
Where Does He Get All Those Wonderful Toys?: Someone questions how the hero is so well-supplied.
Where Is Your X Now?: Mocking someone for having been failed by their hero, god, or value system (or so it seems).
Where the Hell Is Springfield?: A work's location is kept ambiguous.
Where Were You Last Night?: Getting in trouble for not coming home the night before.
"Where? Where?"
Where's the Fun in That?: Stock Phrase used to validate doing something risky and foolhardy.
Where's the Kaboom?: An explosion doesn't explode.
Which Me?: Confusion over which Alternate Self is being referred to.
"Which Restroom?" Dilemma
Who Are You?
Who Dares?: An ominous character is shocked that someone would approach or confront them.
Who Is Driving?: A character questions who's driving (whether missing or abnormal character).
Who Murdered the Asshole?: So many motives and so many suspects for killing the Asshole Victim.
Who Names Their Kid "Dude"?: Remarking on a strange name.
Who Shot JFK?: Anyone but Lee Harvey Oswald.
Who's Laughing Now?: Getting revenge on someone who previously mocked/attacked/killed you.
Who's on First?: Making a joke out a name that sounds like a question word.
Who Wants to Live Forever?: Immortality sucks.
Who Watches the Watchmen?: Who will enforce the law onto those who enforce law?
Who Will Bell the Cat?: Someone needs to volunteer for a tough challenge that will benefit everyone.
Who Would Be Stupid Enough?: Rhetorical question posed about a stupid action before a Gilligan Cut to someone doing it.
Who Would Want to Watch Us?: Self-Deprecation via Leaning on the Fourth Wall
Who Writes This Crap!?: Commenting on bad writing (including their own).
Who You Gonna Call?: Paranormal experts, that's who!
Why Am I Ticking?: Because there's a bomb attached to you!
Why Are We Whispering?: Characters whisper even though no one else is around.
Why Are You Not My Son?: A parent develops a stronger connection to their child's friend than they have with their own child.
Why Can't I Hate You?: A character expresses frustration that they care for someone despite how much that person has hurt them.
Why Couldn't You Be Different?: A parent wants their child to be different from they are.
Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: A hero's particular phobia appears during their quest.
Why Did You Make Me Hit You?: Someone blames their victim for having to hit them.
Why Didn't I Think of That?: A character expresses surprise that they didn't think of an obvious solution that someone else thought of.
Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: Someone, typically a mook, asks why the villain doesn't simply kill the hero when they have the chance.
Why Don't You Marry It?: Someone mockingly says that someone else loves something, and that they should marry it.
Why Isn't It Attacking?: An enemy or threatening creature holds back when the hero expects them to attack.
Why Won't You Die?: A villain expresses frustration that the hero keeps surviving deadly attacks.
Why Would Anyone Take Him Back?: Audience's negative reaction to a character being easily forgiven.
Would You Like to Hear How They Died?: A villain describes how they killed a hero's loved ones with every gory little detail about it.
You and What Army?: The villain doubts the hero can take them on alone. Cue The Cavalry.
You Can See Me?: An invisible character is shocked someone can see them.
You Can See That, Right?: Someone sees something shocking and asks if others can see it too.
You Can Talk?: A supposedly mute animal or object can talk.
You Know I'm Black, Right?: Responding to a bigoted comment by reminding the person that you are a part of that group.
You Know Who Said That?: A profound statement is said by a surprising person.
You Talkin' to Me?: Talking to yourself while doing a Robert Deniro impression from Taxi Driver.

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