Eccentric Townsfolk

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    These are the inhabitants of Quirky Town, a selection of several Stock Characters. They're goofy, quirky, friendly, and ultimately harmless. There will be one or two "sane" people (protagonists included) and at least one sourpuss and a Tall, Dark and Snarky townsperson to complain about this idyllic place. And it is idyllic. It would take a town of Stepford Smiler clones to approach the non-existent level of crime and unemployment these towns have.

    If they are related, they are a Quirky Household.

    Examples of Eccentric Townsfolk include:

    Anime & Manga

    • The residents of Kinkan/Gold Crown Town in Princess Tutu, who are all unaware characters in a fairytale and are comprised of quirky people and anthropomorphic animals.


    Film

    • The lemurs of Madagascar, lead by King Julien XIII, self-proclaimed king of the lemurs, blah, blah, blah, hooray everybody!
    • The residents of the village Sandford in Hot Fuzz. But it's a dark form of this however; many of the townsfolk do have their stereotypes, or at least roles, but it turns out that they're actually murdering anyone who threatens the town's rural image, including other Eccentric Townsfolk.
      • But...it's for the greater good!
        • The greater good!
    • In many of the Laurel and Hardy pictures, townsfolk tend to exhibit some unusual behaviour.

    Laurel: Which way is the basement?
    Receptionist: Down the stairs.

    The inhabitants of the town in the movie The King Of Hearts are escaped patients from the local mental institution and qualify as this trope.


    Literature

    • In Nora Roberts' Nothern Lights the town Lunacy, high up in Alaska is inhabited with independent eccentric characters.


    Live Action TV

    • The Andy Griffith Show's Mayberry inhabitants.
    • Corner Gas has the Canadian version.
    • Everyone in Ed's hometown of Stuckyville.
    • There are a few quirky townspeople in Eureka, including the cloned set of twins. (Or would that make then quatruplets?)
    • The Gilmore Girls crew in Stars Hollow.
    • On Newhart, pretty much everyone in Stratford, Vermont apart from Dick Loudon qualifies.
    • The residents of Hooterville, in Petticoat Junction and (especially) Green Acres.
    • Northern Exposure, with Rob Morrow playing the straight man to everybody else.
    • Scrubs has an Eccentric Hospital Staff version.
    • Pretty much the entire cast of Twin Peaks qualifies.
    • Subverted in The League of Gentlemen, where the people of Royston Vasey are certainly eccentric, but very, very far from harmless.
    • The inhabitants of Dibley, with the possible exception of the Vicar and David Horton.
    • Pretty much everyone in Father Ted, up to the main characters. Only visitors from the mainland and (maybe) Ted don't count.
    • The inhabitants of Elmo, Alaska in Men In Trees. Alaska is evidently a popular locale for this type of setting.
      • This trope seems to gravitate toward Alaska, since we also have the denizens of Cicely in Northern Exposure.
    • The people of St. Olaf, Minnesota. We never actually see the town ourselves, but plenty of locals drop by Miami, and what they all manage to prove is that Rose seems to be the most clear-headed and intelligent person who ever lived there.
    • Increasingly, and delightfully, kook-filled Pawnee, Indiana.
    • The people of Port Niranda in Round the Twist. The Gribble family are a nasty piece of work, though.
    • Many of the people who wander into the store on Oddities are, um, oddities.


    Music


    Radio

    • The entire cast of the radio drama Adventures in Odyssey fit this trope to a T, and were probably influenced at least somewhat by shows like Andy Griffith.
    • The population of Lake Wobegon, Minnesota, in A Prairie Home Companion.
    • Karl Pilkington of the Ricky Gervais Show et al told a series of stories about the people who lived around where he grew up that consistently amazed or bewildered Ricky and Steve. They included:
      • Karl's own family: his mother, who made him stay home from school when it was very windy and used to shave the family cat so it would be easier to keep clean; his dad, a cheapskate and grocery thief who once removed a mentally challenged young man ("a Forrest Gump") from his taxi and left him in a wheelie bin; his brother, who impregnated many girls and was discharged from the army after driving a tank to the store to buy cigarettes; and two aunts: Auntie Nora, who once farted for five straight minutes and wanted her back yard astroturfed so she wouldn't have to take care of it, and "Uncle" Hazel, a lesbian with a haunted house.
      • "Uncle Alf," a friend of Karl's dad who slept in an inflatable lifeboat and had two televisions, one of which had no sound and the other no picture, so he would tune them both to the same channel to watch something.
      • Guys with nicknames like Jimmy the Hat and Tattoo Stan.
      • A family that kept a horse in their living room.
      • A family who used to babysit Karl and had "a cat that was dead violent." When they wanted to control Karl, they would get him to take a nap on the sofa and put the cat on his chest, and when he woke up he would be afraid to move.
      • A woman who rode a three-wheeled bike with her husband in the basket. She was mean to him, so Karl's dad impersonated a policeman to scare her into leaving him alone.
      • Two boys at school who both had abnormally big heads and webbed hands. (Karl explains that he grew up near a chemical plant.) They weren't related and didn't hang out together because that would be "too obvious."
      • The mother of a friend of Karl's who was obsessed with cleanliness. When Karl would come over to play video games, rather than let him in, she would send him around to his friend's bedroom window and he would stand outside and look in.
    • The Navy Lark has the UK armed forces as being populated solely by Eccentric Forces Personnel.


    Video Games

    • The animal townspeople in Animal Crossing.
    • All of the inhabitants of St. Mystere in Professor Layton and the Curious Village. Not only do they have "unusual" personality quirks, they have an unhealthy obession with riddles. This is because they're all robots designed as part of a test to see who's worthy of getting the treasure and Flora.
    • Found all over the place in EarthBound. In Mother 3, you get to know them all by name.
    • The entire supporting cast of Psychonauts qualifies. The campers were crazily developed considering how much screen time they got.
    • Several towns in the Pokémon franchise, but the quirkiest are probably the denizens of Vientown in Pokémon Ranger: Shadows of Almia.


    Webcomics

    • In The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob, Bob's girlfriend Jean has commented in frustration (and more or less accurately) that she appears to be the only sane person in town—casually lumping Bob himself in with the Eccentric Townsfolk.


    Web Original


    Western Animation

    Child Monsters: Tender lumplings everywhere, life's no fun without a good scare
    Parent Monsters: That's our job, but we're not mean, in our town of Halloween

    Twilight Sparkle: "All the ponies in this town are crazy!"

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