Cutting the Electronic Leash/Playing With

Basic Trope: A character throws away their cell phone rather than be bothered by their boss any more.

• Straight: As Alice and Bob is driving down the highway, Bob calls her cell phone. She picks it up and pitches it out the window.
• Exaggerated: ...and off the side of a cliff.
  • ... and into an industrial-grade metal shredder.
• Downplayed: Alice left the phone at home before she got on the road. It rings in the empty room.
• Justified: Alice had already retired, and Bob had been begging her to do "just one last thing before you leave" over and over.
• Inverted: Alice buys a cell phone to make sure that Bob can get in touch with her.
• Subverted: Alice rolls down the window to throw the phone out, but decides against it.
• Double Subverted: However, when she takes the call and hears Bob's demands, she pitches it out after all.
• Parodied: Alice cuts the string on a Tin Can Telephone.
• Zig Zagged: Alice throws away the phone her employers gave her, but keeps her personal cellphone - until her boss calls her on that.
• Averted: Alice just lets the call go to the answering machine, instead.
• Enforced: ???
• Lampshaded: "You know that phone cost $150, Alice."
• Invoked: ???
• Exploited: ???
• Defied: Carol, in the passenger seat, catches Alice's arm before she can throw the phone out the window.
• Discussed: ???
• Conversed: "I wonder if it ever occurred to the writers that throwing your phone away like that counts as littering."

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