Twinkle Smile

My shiny teeth that sparkle just like the stars in space

My shiny teeth that twinkle add beauty to my face!
—Chip Skylark, "My Shiny Teeth and Me"

When a (usually) heroic character does something awesome, it usually merits a celebration. For certain characters it involves a clenched fist of determination and a smile, showing teeth so white and spotless that they twinkle, sporting the combination of a tiny Lens Flare and an Audible Gleam. This is supposed to signify their impeccable moral values and spotless physical splendor.

Of course, it's usually done ironically.

Note that this is different from when teeth sparkle menacingly to show how sharp they are and how bad the impending bite is going to hurt. For those cases, see Audible Sharpness. In slightly more realistic circumstances, someone's smile might also sparkle because of a Gold Tooth.

Examples of Twinkle Smile include:

Advertising

  • In the Delta Airlines safety video that plays before takeoff, a flight attendant does this while demonstrating how to use a seat cushion as a flotation device.
  • Toothpaste commercials. For obvious reasons.

Anime and Manga

  • Fukuyama from Girls Bravo has been known to do this on occasion.
  • Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni Kai: Keiichi in episode 3 while talking to a baseball player.
  • Tatewaki Kuno of Ranma ½ does this incessantly. Whether he's ever done anything awesome in his life is open to interpretation.
  • Rock Lee and Might Guy from Naruto do this constantly. They call it their "Nice Guy Pose". Might Guy also provides the picture for this trope.
  • Shun Mitaka from Maison Ikkoku has this trait. In fact, "Shun" means "twinkle", and the trait runs in the family, with his parents beaming sparkling smiles and later his children.
    • When Godai first meets Mitaka, they engage in twinkle-to-twinkle combat.
    • Don't forget his dog
    • Godai's grandmother will occasionally use one of these across the entire length of her Cheshire Cat Grin. Much shining was had when she met Mitaka for the first time.
  • The tennis duelist in Yu-Gi-Oh! GX.
  • Gasket does this as he completes his transformation in Transformers Galaxy Force . (More recently, Starscream does the same in Animated.)
  • In the Axis Powers Hetalia anime, America does this.
  • Negi Springfield of Mahou Sensei Negima does this while magically aged-up, often combined with Bishie Sparkle.
  • Yatterman 1 & 2 do this a lot, their smiles and eyes are often gleaming. Their enemies get so fed up with this, that they spoof this tendency by getting random blinks all over their bodies! It is also referenced in the Tatsunoko vs Capcom beat'em-ups, see the Videogame section below.
  • Zoids: Chaotic Century parodies this in the episode "Moonbay's Waltz". McMahon does this often, each time causing Fiona to wonder if that's normal.
  • In Manga, the character ニ ("ni") is used as a sound effect when someone smiles.

Film

Prosecutor: Lincoln Sternn - you stand here accused of twelve counts of murder in the first degree, fourteen counts of armed theft of Federation property, twenty-two counts of piracy, thirty-seven counts of rape, and one moving violation. How do you plead?
Sternn: (smile) Not guilty!

  • Used in the live-action Rocky and Bullwinkle movie, every time the handsome, kind, not-very-bright security guard smiles.
  • The original Home Alone movie has Joe Pesci's Harry's gold tooth gleam to Kevin... which serves as an indicator that he's the cop who would "protect" the house while they were on vacation.
  • Ron Ely as Doc Savage in the 1975 film Doc Savage: Man of Bronze.
  • Austin Powers at the end of his first film - showing he's embraced dental hygiene.
  • Aladdin, where Aladdin is first revealed as "Prince Ali" (in the musical number).

Live Action TV

  • Lyle Waggoner's trademark, especially in The Carol Burnett Show and Wonder Woman.
  • Of all people, the Master from Doctor Who does this in the new series when at the height of his power.
    • Something of a lampshading in "Voyage of the Damned" - When the Doctor meets Max Capricorn in person, Max smiles complete with the twinkle and Audible Gleam, to which the Doctor asks "It really does that?"
  • Often parodied in Benny Hill. Eyes are subjects to it too.
  • In Blast Lab, Hammond does this in the opening sequence; it's a reference to how Jeremy Clarkson often mocks him for probably having got his teeth whitened.
  • Done in Scrubs with an extremely likeable patient, to indicate the moment when other characters (including Cox and Kelso) realised they liked him.
  • Captain Terrific, the guest of the day on one Imagination Movers episode, listed this as one of his super powers, along with Super Strength, Super Speed, and Flight.
  • Taken to truly ridiculous lengths in the Even Stevens episode "The Big Splash", where Ren is competing for the title of "Best Smile". She gets into a "smile war" with another girl, and wins it with a smile so dazzling the entire school is blinded by it.
  • For one of the appearances of Sabrina the Teenage Witch's father, he had the magical natural ability to do this everytime he smiled. When he felt down and depressed he lost it but by the end of the episode the shine has come back. The gag was never carried over to other later appearances due to a mix of neither needing the visual cue of being happy or sad nor having as attractive and dashing looking an actor for the part later on.
  • Used almost seemingly as parody in at least two eps of The Amazing Race.
  • Ace Rimmer. What a guy!
  • In an episode of NCIS where McGee fell asleep and overbleached his teeth, the end-of-episode shot (where the still goes monochrome) adds a twinkle to his teeth, complete with the appropriate sound effect.

Literature

  • In an edition of Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets, Miss Mary Grandpre gave a nice little sparkle to Gilderoy's teeth in the chapter illustration for 'At Flourish and Blott's'
  • Referenced in Moving Pictures of the Discworld series, where the main character has been in films for so long that it really does so this.
    • It doesn't go "ting" though, they never got sound working.
    • Also in Guards! Guards! when Vimes is thinking about heroes.

And then they smile, and the light catches their teeth, Ting!. Bastards.

  • Parodied in The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul, where a character makes sure to stand in exactly the right spot for a beam of sun to hit his teeth at exactly the right moment.

Music

  • In the video for Weird Al's song, Headline News, Nancy Kerrigan's initial appearance is completed with a twinkle smile, showing how much better she is.

Theatre

Video Games

  • Kim Kaphwan in The King of Fighters has this as one of his winning poses. Considering the lengths to which he goes to purge evil from the world, there's a bit of irony in there as well.
  • Box art of Air Traffic Chaos is an example to this.
  • Dan Hibiki's "Legendary Taunt" ultra move in Street Fighter 4 ends with him giving a thumbs up and a twinkling smile right through the Fourth Wall.
  • Redd White from Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney has a flashy smile (among lots of other flashy things).
  • Disco Kid from the Wii version of Punch-Out!!!! does this periodically when he's about to wallop you, but it always gives Mac an opportunity to earn a Star Punch.
  • The Scout of Team Fortress 2 gets one in the Meet The Medic video, after the Medic heals him and replaces a knocked-out tooth.
  • Prince Peasley in Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga has a smile so bright, it regularly whites out the entire screen.
    • That's actually him tossing his hair back.
  • Sonic gets one in Sonic Unleashed when fighting the final boss.
  • Yatterman-1 does it for one of his Victory Poses in Tatsunoko vs. Capcom.
  • In World of Warcraft during Hallow's End (the annual in-game Halloween event), there's a chance each time you trick-or-treat that you'll get 10 toothpicks. When you use one of these toothpicks, you gain the "impeccable smile" buff for the next 60 seconds, during which a visible gleam animation shows up on your mouth every few seconds.

Western Animation

"He got strength, and speed, and shiny teeth/And as the Huntsman was reborn!"

  • Fanboy and Chum Chum used this on The Bully, Boog.
  • Brain once tried to use one that made people adore him for no particular reason to Take Over the World.
  • In My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic, Pinkie Pie does a variation of this after demonstrating she's able to dispel illusionary "monsters" by laughing at them. She smiles a white, toothy smile, but it's her eye that gleams. (The sound effect also seems to be a part of the magic being undone rather than Audible Gleam, but otherwise you'd have two in a row.)
  • Exaggerated in Fairly Oddparents with pop star Chip Skylark, who has teeth that are shiny enough to literally blind people. He even has a song dedicated to his beloved teeth.

Real Life

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