War and Peace/YMMV

• Ensemble Darkhorse: While actually a minor character, Dolokhov seems to fit an unusual number of tropes, and makes enough of an impact on main characters' lives to merit distinction.
• Hollywood Homely: Princess Marya howers somewhat close to this. From the very beginning she is depicted as butt-ugly, but then, during her romance with Nikolai Rostov she becomes quite attractive. Go figure.
  • She was never depicted as ugly, but rather just plain. A sort of "diamond in the rough"
    • Are we talking about the Russian original or some English translation? As a matter of fact, Tolstoy does mention her "ugly, unhealthy face" and "ugly, weak body" ("некрасивое, болезненное лицо", "некрасивое, слабое тело") very early in the novel. The first impression is so strong that the Russian high school students either tend to overlook her abovementioned metamorphose after the encounter with Nikolai Rostov (her plot line is a secondary one, after all), or it comes to them as a shock.
• Ho Yay: It gets hilarious (and slightly worrying) whenever Rostov sees the tsar.
• Hype Backlash: You want some hype? This book is considered one of the greatest novels ever written, a masterpiece of world literature. It's been considered that for over a century now.
• Mainstream Obscurity: Usually remembered for how long it is.
• Memetic Mutation: tl;dr
• Padding
• Values Dissonance: It's the early 1800s in czarist Russia: men and women aren't exactly on equal standing. The women are fully-realized characters with understandable motivations, and their parts of the story are equally long and important as those concerning men. However, it's not unfair to say War belongs to the men and Peace belongs to the women.
  • The fate of Natasha, as shown and explained in the epilogue, is especially outrageous in this respect.