Tv Tropes What Does He Do Again Job

"A homo who doesn't know how to do anything goes to work equally a guard. A woman who doesn't know how to do anything goes to piece of work every bit a prostitute. Both jobs are basically the aforementioned thing; sleeping for money."

A Narrative Device particularly common in film and TV, though not express to them.

This is the job where a once-famous or admired character is "reduced to this!" More dire than a 24-hour interval job, this is a stereotypical last-resort job to which has-beens, people who got fired or laid off from their regular jobs, Impoverished Patricians, or Fallen Heroes have resorted, just to pay the bills. The Fallen on Hard Times Job is ofttimes the starting point for a protagonist'southward Redemption Quest, or try to chase later their Lifelong Dream (with accompanying Gonna Wing Now Montage). It can also serve as a recruiting station for a Ragtag Ring of Misfits or Putting the Band Back Together. Such jobs include:

• Party organisers for actors (Political party Downwards)
• Hotel lounges for musicians (The Dejection Brothers)
• Dinner theater or background work for actors (Team America: Globe Police, Soapdish, Auto Focus)
• Personal-injury piece of work for lawyers (Erin Brockovich, Legal Diplomacy)
• Cheesy ice shows for effigy skaters (Blades of Glory)
• Sideshows for characters with unusual abilities or attributes (X-Men Origins: Wolverine)
• Enforcer or Dumb Muscle for boxers (On the Waterfront, Dare Devil, Rocky)
• Youth charabanc for athletes (The Bad News Bears)
• Rent-a-cop or mall security for police force agents (National Security)
• Entertaining kids at altogether parties (Ghostbusters II)
• Really whatsoever blue neckband stuff (taxi driver, cook, retail, fast food, etc) for diverse commando/spec ops military officers and immigrants whose merits (university degrees, positions, nobility) in their country are worthless in this land.
• Ghost-writing or producing Extruded Book Product for authors.
• Hosting depression-finish talk shows
• Scullery Maid for runaway Fairy Tale Princesses
• Governess for Real Life Fallen Princess
• Stripper, phone-sex operator, prostitute, or other sexual practice worker for a poor unmarried mother.
• Japandering
• Actualization on D-Listing Reality TV shows and/or porn for a washed-upwardly glory or Quondam Child Star.
• Working at Burger Fool, a Soul-Sucking Retail Chore, or some other menial position for people who have A Degree in Useless, or Tragic Dropouts.
• Primary care, or becoming a Back-Alley Physician or "wellness practitioner" for doctors.
• More or less everything for the Impoverished Patrician

Compare Former Regime Personnel, when a lot of secret policemen, commandos, spies, and similar people end up fallen on hard times at once. The most common Fallen-on-Difficult-Times Chore for them is mafia soldier or security mook. Too compare Worthless Foreign Degree, in which highly educated immigrants end upwardly in menial jobs. Contrast Waiting for a Pause which is nearly aspiring actors and moving picture writers doing a 24-hour interval job whilst attempting to arrive large. Can lead to a Scrap Heap Hero if the person is called back to duty. Meet too Loser Protagonist, Acceptable Hard Luck Targets.

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Examples:

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• An former Discover Card commercial depicts a fictional Hair Metal band chosen Danger Kitty (whose members are played by hair metal parody grouping Steel Panther) rising to great fame and fortune in the early 1980s before falling into obscurity. At the end of the commercial ane of the members of Danger Kitty is seen working at a hot dog stand.

    Anime & Manga

• One Ghost in the Shell: Stand up Alone Complex episode revolves around a onetime boxer who'due south at present an teacher (and who's also making some extra cash through espionage).
• In Oestrus Guy J, Kia is a struggling musician, and to make ends meet, he usually waits tables or works other odd jobs. Also, Shogun used to exist a big-fourth dimension mob boss, merely he had a Heel–Face Turn and by and large retired from that life, and he at present sells pottery and not-perishable foods (such as rice). While it is just something to support himself plus Daisuke and Shun in their youth, he does genuinely enjoy it and it gives him a sense of purpose. He also moonlights every bit the leader of an underground vigilante grouping.
• Maou from The Devil Is a Part-Timer! used to exist the king of demons until he was defeated by Emilia the Hero. Now he works part-time at MgRonalds and plans on working his way back up to the summit of the food chain through the wage slave ladder. He as well genuinely enjoys and is passionate almost his work.
• The Hentai, Muzzle revolves around a young woman who resorts to prostitution subsequently her fellow ran off after having maxed out her credit cards, and emptied her bank account. When she accepts the proposition of a guy to help her financial situation, he responds by pimping her out to random johns.
• In Even If It Was But One time, I Regret It, Chiyo Kozuka, who quit her job at a game company later on getting reassigned to general diplomacy, ends upward taking a function-time job at a cafeteria where she worked in high schoolhouse. It'due south played with in that while this is not the job Chiyo wants, she's regained enough of her free energy and confidence to work again, so the fact that she can practice so is a sign of her recovery, rather than of desperation.
• In The Manner Of The Business firm Husband, a few quondam members of the Yakuza are forced to work in simple honest jobs afterwards their crime groups were disbanded.
  • Torajiro, The Rival to Tatsu, was in prison when Tatsu wiped out his gang. He now works in a food truck selling crepes and bubble tea when he saw anybody was gone.
  • Hibari Torii, former co-leader of the Torii Family, now works in a supermarket with iii of her old subordinates.
  • Tatsu is the exception, every bit he willingly left the Yakuza life backside to become a House Husband and he'south happy with his lot in life.
• Zombie Land Saga: At the outset of Revenge, Franchouchou has had to selection up part-time jobs to pay for a massive amount of debt from their EFS concert.
  • Sakura and Tae tend to a dairy farm.
  • Saki works night shifts as a construction worker.
  • Ai works in a product line at a dried squid manufactory.
  • Junko paints ceramic dolls at a cultural heart.
  • Yugiri works a nighttime shift every bit a bartender.
  • Lily does the just job available to an 11-year-old-looking zombie and works as a milk deliverer.

    Ballads

• In the Child Ballad The Lord of Lorn and the False Steward, the title lord, being oathbound not to reveal who he is, is reduced to working every bit a shepherd, and later on as a stable male child.
• In the Kid Ballad The Famous Blossom of Serving Men, the heroine pulls a Sweet Polly Oliver and works for the king, rising to the position of his chamberlain. (That is the servant in charge of his bedroom. Nonetheless a very high condition for a servant.)

    Comic Books

• When the Soulsearchers and Company temporarily split up, Peterson earns money past exhibiting Stanley as a talking prairie dog and selling tickets.

    Fairy Tales

• Scullery Maid, in "Cap o' Rushes", "Catskin", "Maid Maleen", "King Thrushbeard", Asbjørnsen and Moe's "Katie Woodencloak", Joseph Jacobs' "Rushen Coatie", The Brothers Grimm's "All-Kinds-of-Fur", "The King Who Wished Marry To His Daughter", and many, many, many more.
  • Also in Joseph Jacobs' "The Fish And The Ring", where information technology is a hazard to fulfill a prophecy every bit it turns out, not a place to go to the ball from.
• In "The Goose Girl", the goose girl is actually the true princess.
• In "Catherine and Her Fate", Catherine goes through an unabridged series of jobs earlier she finds one abject enough that her Fate doesn't ruin information technology for her.
• In "Iron Hans", the prince works first in the kitchen and then gets demoted to gardener.
• In the Italian fairy tale "The Devil'southward Breeches" -a "Bearskin" variant-, the impoverished hero tries to support himself working as a valet, but either the married woman or sister of each master falls in dear with him for his beauty, and he has to quit to avert complications.
• In "The Brownish Conduct of the Light-green Glen", John works for the smith.
• In "Fair Brow", the titular character was kicked out of his dwelling house by his male parent, and his wife paints to back up them.
• In Franz Xaver Von Schonwerth's "King Goldenlocks", the runaway prince finds a chore as a gardener afterwards fleeing his country.

    Fan Works

• In The AFR Universe, Ryuji ends up a Tragic Dropout after a year in collage. He'd spend the side by side five years working in arduous part-fourth dimension jobs just to help his mom become by in their flat. What kills him the nearly about information technology, as he explains to Haru, is that he feels similar he can't suggest to Hifumi like he wants until he knows he can support them. Things do ameliorate for him as Haru uses her connections and cognition of college society to introduce Ryjui to, and getting an interview for, Private Security.
• The two-part Daredevil (2015) fanfic Marci Stahl Is Amend Than You lot is based on this trope. Written before season 2 was released ^note Early in season ii of Daredevil, we larn that Marci has gotten a job at Hogarth Chao & Benowitz, the premise of the work is that afterward turning against her Landman & Zack colleagues who were aiding and abetting Wilson Fisk, Marci Stahl ends upwardly having to accept a task every bit a contract attorney with Nelson & Murdock as her past association with L&Z makes other Manhattan law firms unwilling to rent her.
• Marinette spends several years working equally a waitress in The Seven Misfortunes of Lady Fortune. Luckily for her, Madame Zhou is too kind to force her into her main business.
• In Marinette Dupain-Cheng's Spite Playlist, Gabrielle feels this mode about her job at a minor café. This is mainly because her family has paraded around their status equally 'former money' for generations, merely has effectively gone bankrupt, and is struggling to go on upwardly appearances.
• In Vengeance of Dawn, when we first see Breaking Dawn in the present, she'due south getting fired from her job at a article of clothing store. Nigh ponies probably wouldn't detect this then bad, but Dawn, as a one-time pupil of Princess Celestia and ex-candidate for alicorn princesshood and the Element of Magic, considers information technology beneath her. Manifestly she had to work several of these jobs afterward getting kicked out of the School for Gifted Unicorns, but couldn't concur on to any of them because of her pride.

    Films — Blithe

• Batman and Harley Quinn: Nightwing discovers the recently paroled Harley Quinn working equally a waitress at a eating house called Superbabes—basically Hooters, but with the servers dressed in skimpy superheroine/villainess costumes. Despite Harley's psychiatric background, no i would allow her back in the field and no ane else was interested in employing a former supervillain. Aside from offers to practice porn, Superbabes was her only option.
• In Leap! Odette reveals that years before the picture'south story takes place, she was a talented dancer with a shot at beingness prima ballerina. Even so, an blow resulted in a broken leg, and after recovering she walked with a bad limp, and past the fourth dimension of the motion-picture show'southward events, she'due south working as the cleaning lady for the Paris Opera House.
• Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island: Even though Fred and Daphne managed to find a decent job later Mystery Inc. split upward (Working every bit a news show hosts), Shaggy and Scooby are both working every bit airport security where they get fired after eating contraband they were supposed to guard while Velma is working at a minor book store that'south shut to going out of business.
• In Sing, the dilapidated Moon Theater collapses post-obit years of neglect, as a effect of its owner, Buster Moon, mounting a series of flops, the property is repossessed by the bank, and Moon has to resort to washing cars.

    Films — Live-Action

• In American Mary, medical student Mary is reduced to applying for a chore equally a masseuse at a sleazy strip club to pay off her debts. However, during her 'interview', a medical emergency arises that opens upward a whole new career path for her.
• Ant-Man's titular hero finds himself working at a Baskin-Robbins afterwards getting released from prison - and even they fire him once they observe he'due south an ex-con (Baskin-Robbins always finds out). Then he ends upwardly working as a thief for eccentric billionaire Hank Pym, thus starting his superhero career.
• In Beerfest, the ragtag beer-drinking squad recruits from their erstwhile higher buddies: 1's now a carny, and another's a street hustler.
• Blades of Glory: Afterward champion skaters Chazz Michael Michaels and Jimmy MacElroy are banned from Men'due south Singles skating for fighting on the winner'due south stand up, they stop up respectively as A) a drunk lurching his way through a children's skating show and B) a stockboy at a sporting-goods store.
• The Dejection Brothers: Jake and Elwood reassemble their onetime band from members who are currently making their ends meet as lounge musicians and brusk-gild cooks. Averted in the case of Mr. Fabled, who had institute a high-paying task equally maître d′ at a fancy eating place and was obviously very happy there. The rest of the band Jumped at the Phone call, but getting Mr. Fabulous dorsum took a fair bit of work (and some judiciously applied blackmail).
• Blue Streak: A criminal version appears when Miles is shocked to find out that Tulley, an experienced getaway driver, has been reduced to sticking upwards convenience stores.
• Catch Me If You Can: Frank Abagnale Sr. was plain quite a successful entrepreneur at i bespeak, but by the start of the picture show he's existence scrutinized by the IRS for sketchy accounting, likely tax evasion. First he's forced to sell the quondam family home and downsize his store. The concluding time his son sees him, his business has apparently gone under, equally he'southward now a deliveryman for the US postal service.
• In Chalet Girl Kim was a skateboarding champion, but she had to quit her career to help her dad at dwelling house and works equally a Burger Fool at the get-go of the movie.
• Cop: The sleazy main graphic symbol hooks up with a modest Hollywood actress whose roles have dried up and has had to resort to dealing drugs and prostituting herself to make ends meet.
• In The Country Girl, Bernie is shocked to find out that Frank Elgin, once a highly successful big ring vocalizer, has been reduced to recording commercial jingles.
• In Dead Again, Robin Williams plays a former therapist who lost his license due to sleeping with patients, and now works in a grocery store.
• Korben Dallas in The Fifth Element starts out this way, being a former decorated soldier working a lousy chore as a taxi driver.
• The start of Ghostbusters Two shows two members using their ghost-fighting gear to (unsuccessfully) entertain children at a birthday political party. Some other member is hosting a hack-psychic show.
• In The Goodbye Girl, later Elliot'southward Richard 3 prove closes subsequently 1 disastrous performance, Elliot takes a job as a sidewalk barker outside a strip order.
• The Paw: After losing his hand, and being dropped by his agent, cartoonist Jon Lansdale takes a job teaching cartooning at remote community college, to a form of students who seem largely uninterested in the bailiwick.
• The Hobbit shows Thorin Oakenshield, Durin'due south heir, working as a blacksmith in the time betwixt the razing of the kingdom and his quest to restore information technology.
• In Kill Beak, former international assassinator Bud is working as a bouncer slash handyman at a perpetually deserted Texas strip society with the frustrated owner firing him when he points this out.
• In Peter Jackson's Rex Kong, entertainer Ann Darrow faces the prospect of becoming a burlesque chorus girl—in that 24-hour interval, pretty much one step higher up stripping.
• Kolya: Louka'southward offhand smartass remark to a bureaucrat got him fired from the orchestra. Now he cadges piece of work playing at funerals and moonlights as a restorer of gravestones, and is in debt, which is why he agrees to the marriage scheme. Lampshaded when the Bad Cop interrogating Kolya threatens to get him fired from the orchestra and get out him playing funerals, and the Good Cop passes him a note saying "HE DOES FUNERALS ALREADY."
• In The Last Command, Sergius went from a Russian Grand Knuckles and regular army general to working as a Hollywood extra for $7.50 a day, thanks to Red October.
• The Magnificent Seven. Charles Bronson's grapheme was once a highly-paid Bounty Hunter, just now works chopping wood so he's willing to accept the measly pay the villagers are offer. "Right now, that'southward a fortune."
• Subverted in Man on the Moon. After achieving national fame on Taxi, Andy Kaufman (Jim Carrey) is seen bussing tables at a deli, while the show is even so on the air. When people recognize him, he just tells them "I get that all the fourth dimension." That was based on existent life. Andy refused to quit his busboy job, in part because he never liked the testify or his character and didn't want to be dependent on information technology.
• In The Muppets, Fozzie is stuck playing in a Muppets cover band.
• Before getting his large intermission, the failed boxer Rocky works as a debt collector for a local loan shark.
• In National Security, Hank becomes a security guard afterwards being fired from the constabulary force.
• In Body of water's Xi, at the kickoff of the movie, Rusty has resorted to teaching young actors how to play poker and Saul is attempting to retire and take up dog-racing but both are clearly bored out of their minds.
• In Raging Bull (too every bit Real Life), boxer Jake LaMotta ends up a seedy bar possessor and stand up-up comic.
• In Rehearsal for Murder, Frank Heller mentions having waited tables, worked in construction, and driven cabs betwixt acting gigs.
• Roger & Me has many examples of unemployed people doing odd jobs.
  • Most famously, Rhonda Britton who earns just enough coin for groceries past selling rabbits for meat.
  • Some people are able to literally profit from Flint'due south decline, similar U-Haul helping people movement out.
  • Janet, who decides to get an Amway saleswoman and tries to help unemployed women practise the aforementioned. Moore decides to help Janet out of a crisis past letting her do his colors.
  • Some autoworkers become jobs at Taco Bell, hoping to use their assembly line skills in the making of Tacos.
  • Some autoworkers are retrained past the UAW as prison guards. Notably, many of the prisoners are their onetime co-workers.
• The protagonist of Rounders drives a delivery truck for a living whenever he busts out and loses all his money playing poker.
• In Shaolin Soccer, the team'southward coach had suffered from a Career-Ending Injury in the start and is now working equally an errand male child for his teammate now chairman who caused his injury. Also, the quondam Shaolin monks except i are working for a meager living.
• Slightly meta instance: in Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Betty Boop is seen working as a nightclub cigarette girl following the arrival of color cartoons.
• In Soapdish, Jeffrey Anderson (Kevin Kline) has sunk from a prominent daytime television receiver role to performing equally Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman in a rundown Florida dinner theatre for an audience of uninterested senior citizens. Half of his audience is likewise difficult of hearing to know what he'south saying, the other half are too distracted to care.
• Spider-Human being iii: Subsequently she is fired from Broadway, Mary Jane struggles to detect a job every bit an actress, and eventually resigns herself to go a waitress.
• Sunshine Cleaning deconstructs this. Rose drags her sister into starting an impromptu business cleaning up offense scenes - because she needs the money to become her son into a private school. Although disgusted by the piece of work at first, she shortly finds enjoyment in it and comes to love it - peculiarly when she realises that what she does benefits people.
• In The Whole Ten Yards, Bruce Willis' retired hit-human being character is spending his time as the world'due south most trying househusband.
• When Mickey Rourke'south character in The Wrestler is forced to leave the band—fifty-fifty at the low-level promotion he had been with since falling from national stardom—he resorts to working the cafeteria counter at a grocery store. The movie plays with this as Randy actually seems to enjoy working with the customers - though he's mortified when someone recognises him equally a wrestler.

    Literature

• When Cut-Me-Own-Throat Dibbler from Discworld is institute selling sausages, it'southward a sure sign that yet another become-rich-quick scheme has diddled up in his face. Strangely, disarming people to buy and eat his guaranteed-some-kind-of-meat sausages is something he's very, very skillful at.
• The Han Solo Adventures: In the last volume, Han is shaken to observe out that his mentor "Trooper" Badure, a war veteran and piloting instructor turned charlatan, has been reduced to contract labor at a mining camp.
• In The Kite Runner virtually of the Afghans who fabricated it to America were from well-off or even noble families (escaping a war-torn zone and getting a visa has its cost). Since their degrees or merits have no value in the U.S. most of them work in blueish-collar jobs. Amir's father goes from tycoon to gas station worker (just eventually becomes the managing director), his male parent-in-law is also proud to work and lives on land help coin and what he earns from the flea market place.
• In 1000. Yard. Chesterton's The Tales of the Long Bow, Elizabeth Seymour, Impoverished Patrician, has taken a job with better grace than most.

  I suppose most people would call me a failure and all my people failures now; except those who would say we never failed, because nosotros never had to try. Anyhow, we're all poor plenty now; I don't know whether you know that I've been didactics music. I dare say we deserved to go. I dare say we were useless. Some of us tried to be harmless.

• In P. G. Wodehouse's Jill The Reckless, subsequently her money was lost, Jill escapes nasty relatives and ends up resorting to working every bit a chorus girl.
• In the Chivalric Romance Sir Isumbras, Isumbras is reduced to menial work as The Blacksmith.
• In The Spine of the World, the barbarian adventurer Wulfgar's postal service-traumatic stress disorder afterwards spending a few years every bit a demon lord's prisoner causes him to lose his heart for adventuring. He becomes an alcoholic and takes a task as a bouncer at a seedy tavern in order to support his drinking addiction.
• In a crossover with Real Life, showing what times were actually like for the disabled around the year 1918, Mary Grant Bruce's volume Back To Billabong has the Linton family see a disabled youth offer for sale toy gas-filled balloons too every bit matches in a London street. Since the Lintons are reasonably well off, they buy his whole stock of balloons to help him out without insulting him (and so give the balloons to a random youngster before long afterward).
• In The Devil You Know by Mike Carey, professional exorcist Felix Castor works as a sorcerer at a child's birthday political party. This may be a Shout-Out to Ghostbusters II above.
• In Lois McMaster Bujold's Shards of Honor, Aral Vorkosigan (Admiral, Hero of the Barraran Empire, Confidant of the Emperor, Butcher of Komarr, etc, etc) notes that he'd be unlikely to even get a job as a judo instructor (the just non-military job he could call back of that he'd be qualified for) on Beta Colony.
• In The Death of Kings (second volume of Conn Iggulden'due south Emperor serial), ii former soldiers of the destroyed Primigenia legion are establish working as guards in a (high-class) brothel.
• In A Pearl for My Mistress, which is set in 1934, Lady Lucy's family regards her journalistic occupation to exist this. Lucy herself actually enjoys both the job itself and the contained income it allows her.
• In Straight Outta Fangton, Peter Stone works equally a convenience store clerk. This is despite the fact he's a one-time Iraqi veteran, security baby-sit specialist, and oh yeah, a vampire. Played with as it'due south discovered a lot of vampires accept graveyard shift jobs equally people don't rent them and merely a few Vampires Are Rich.
• Kris Pulaski, the protagonist of We Sold Our Souls, is working at a truly fleabag motel when the book starts.

    Live-Action Television

• 30 Stone: Tracey Hashemite kingdom of jordan starts out every bit a one time-popular A-lister whose continual eccentricities and other conflicts take branded him hard to piece of work with and he's reduced to starring in the eponymous show, which in-universe is generally considered hacky and non that not bad. Later he has a brief career renaissance which is cut short in one case other A-listers realize he'southward a "Goggle box Role player". Includes a meta-commentary on this by Jack Donaghy, played past Alec Baldwin, a former A-lister now better known for his TV work.
• Arrow:
  • Later his loaded father cuts him off, Tommy Merlyn, who previously didn't need to do annihilation to alive by, seeks employment at Oliver'southward bar.
  • Felicity is a MIT graduate, and isn't happy when Oliver promotes her as his assistant, as information technology ends upwards reducing her to become a Daughter Friday (or "Girl Midweek"). In flavour 7, after Oliver is arrested, she ends up having to become undercover by working at a coffeeshop.
• On Thank you, Carla'south married man got cutting from the Boston Bruins and concluded upwards wearing a penguin arrange in the Ice Capades. (Eventually, a rogue Zamboni automobile killed him.)
• Hack features a disgraced constabulary detective reduced to working equally a cab commuter. He still considers it preferable to serving equally muscle for a local gangster.
• Later their wrongful imprisonment, the paroled deputies of Reno 911!! have to brand ends come across in diverse capacities, including security guard, realtor, carnie, bed & breakfast owner (in a passenger vehicle), groupie, and American Idol hopeful.
• Veronica Mars: Afterwards Veronica's mom walks off with her $50,000 bounty, Veronica makes some spending money equally a barista.
• In Breaking Bad, Walter White afterwards exiting a technological firm where he did research on chemistry had to have a task as a high schoolhouse chemistry teacher. He made only $45,000 a twelvemonth so he also had to take a 2nd job at a car launder. The day he found out he had to wash a car for one of his own students from chemistry, he snaps and turns to a life of cooking and distributing meth.
• In Meliorate Call Saul, the main grapheme Jimmy McGill afterwards his involvement with Walter White'southward criminal empire back in Breaking Bad were exposed and he is wanted for money laundering and conspiracy with a kingpin, is forced to go into legal hiding bold the identity Gene. No longer the criminal lawyer comfortably living on high 6 to 7 figures per year when he was Saul Goodman, Gene is a Cinnabon manager who mops floors and empties the trash.
  • During the chief timeline of Better Call Saul, Jimmy struggled to make income with just his independent police force exercise making only $700 per defence (and he scarcely earned whatsoever clients), so he tried supplementing that with taping and airing commercials for modest stores throughout Albuquerque, NM. Merely he lost money as a result of taking this task.
  • Later on beingness temporarily disbarred, Jimmy winds up working in a cell phone store for a total twelvemonth.
• In Rome, professional soldiers Vorenus and Pullo become thug enforcers after they are demobilized and without income. Eventually, they are required to actually kill people. Vorenus however draws the line at murder and quits.
• Wealthy socialite Caroline becoming a waitress 2 Broke Girls. Played with in that the series begins with her taking that chore after her father's abort cost her her access to the family unit fortune.
• The premise of Hung. The recession has hitting Ray hard and he is unable to brand ends come across with his job as a substitute instructor. Prostitution ensues.
• In season ii of My Name Is Earl, Earl had worked hard plenty to have a decent job every bit an apparatus salesman, an apartment, and a girlfriend. Then he took the rap for a crime his ex-wife committed, out of pity for her new husband and her two children. So he spent virtually of season 3 in Prison. When he finally gets out, no 1 will hire him since he at present has a criminal tape, and he has since lost the cushy chore, the apartment, and the girlfriend. So he takes on a chore equally a take-out delivery man for a Chinese/Mexican eatery and loses his faith in Karma.
• This is part of the primary premise of The Steve Harvey Show. Steve Hightower is a former disco vocaliser who is now a high school music teacher.
• In Gilmore Girls, Emily Gilmore sees Lorelai running away from her privileged life every bit a teenager and working as a maid like this.
• Cady, midway through Season 2 of Longmire, loses her job at the law firm, and ends upwardly working at Henry'southward bar (much to Walt'due south disapproval).
• In the Doctor Who story "The Brain of Morbius", Sarah Jane contemplates such a fate after beingness temporarily blinded. She hits upon selling flowers on the streets of London, briefly affecting a sickeningly-sweet Cockney accent: "Luv'ly violets, guv'nor!"
• In the StargateSG1 episode "Mobius", a trip to the past by the main cast creates a timeline where the Stargate was never discovered. Alt!Daniel is reduced to instruction "English language as a Second Language" courses while Alt!Carter is working in a civilian enquiry visitor every bit a glorified proofreader for other people's work while having her own enquiry plagiarized by her boss.
• In Supernatural Sam Winchester, a onetime Stanford educatee studying law, is seen clearing tables at a bar later on he and Dean part ways in season 4. In later seasons the boys are separated again and Dean works construction, merely that might exist less of an example since he'south a high schoolhouse dropout who likes working with his easily. Still, you'd think a lifetime of monster hunting at the elite level would accept some more transferable skills.
• A variation in Charmed's Season vi. Paige decides to find herself, so she goes to loads of temp jobs. These terminate up existence annoying jobs such as domestic dog walking, fruit packing in a manufacturing plant, secretary to a sleazy businessman, etc. She ordinarily finds a magical purpose in them, even so.
• When Lisa in Saved by the Bell spends too much money on her father'due south credit card, she gets a job as a waitress to pay the money dorsum. Bear in heed that Lisa is a rich, prissy Daddy'southward Girl. Her father finds this Actually Pretty Funny when he finds out - and his punishment is for Lisa to keep working the chore until she's paid the debts (at her own insistence).
• Luke Cage (2016): Luke Cage used to exist a cop in Savannah, Georgia, and earlier that, he was a soldier in the Marines. After existence framed up by Diamondback and sent to Seagate Prison, and receiving powers in a botched experiment, he escapes with Reva to New York City, where he initially works as a Hell's Kitchen bartender up until near the stop of Jessica Jones (2015). Later getting shot by Jessica to break Kilgrave's control over him, Luke starts his own bear witness living in Harlem, getting paid under the table by working every bit a floor sweeper at Pop's Barbershop and a dishwasher at Harlem'south Paradise.
• Daredevil (2015):
  • Narrowly avoided by Marci Stahl, every bit after blowing the whistle on Landman & Zack'southward dealings with Wilson Fisk, she manages to secure a task at Hogarth Chao & Benowitz.
  • We learn in "Penny and Dime" that Frank Castle was shot in the head, and "suits" conspired to take him declared deceased. Unfortunately for them, Frank woke up (after flatlining for a minute) and fabricated the nurse assigned to him have him home. The guy lost his job, and after, when Karen tracks him down, he's working equally an office edifice janitor.
• The Wire: In season five, upkeep cutbacks in the police section lead to decreased morale among the rank-and-file, though Burrell is able to lift it when he convinces Carcetti to elevator the cap on secondary employment. Crutchfield, for example, makes upwardly his lost overtime by securing part-time work as a security guard at a jewelry store.
• Ghosted: Leroy Wright was the LAPD's best missing persons detective, now he'southward forced to work as a mall cop. Dr. Max Jenifer was a professor at Stanford and the leading theoretical physicist, who is forced to work as a sales clerk in a bookstore. They both initially agreed to work for the Agency Underground considering Captain Lafrey'due south offers to get them their old jobs back.
• Whose Line Is It Anyway?: One skit had Drew Carey playing the new employee at an water ice foam parlor. Ryan Stiles, playing the employee grooming him, comments something like "I used to watch both your shows. Y'all should have saved some money."
• On Shakespeare & Hathaway - Private Investigators, Sebastian is a RADA-trained player who is working as Frank's receptionist and secretary while keeping his interim dreams alive past appearing equally a spear-carrier in plays and doing bit parts in commercials.
• On Schitt's Creek Johnny Rose is a formerly wealthy business concern mogul who now owns function of a roadside motel. He throws himself into the managing of the identify and gradually improves information technology, and he rarely if ever complains near the difficult piece of work.
• On BrainDead (2016), the show opens with Laurel being talked into taking a job every bit elective casework for her brother because funding for a documentary film she's been working on has fallen through.
• Oftentimes comes upwards on Heroes with characters whose involvement with superhuman abilities unknown to regular science and that sort of thing ruins their careers. Niki formerly had a better job at a casino but becomes a Single Mom Stripper afterwards her husband goes to jail on felony charges under mysterious circumstances. Mohinder was a professor in Bharat, but drives a taxi subsequently coming to u.s.a. to investigate his father's bizarre murder. And when his telepathy does more harm than good in his law-enforcement career (and then much for the Super Cop), Matt ends up being a bodyguard or security guard.
• Life with Boys: In "Bathroom Battles with Boys", Jack takes on an embarrassing, and physically punishing, 2nd job as a party clown to heighten the actress money and then Tess can have her own bathroom (and not have to share with her brothers). Tess feels incredibly guilty when she finds out.
• Frasier: Bulldog Briscoe gets fired from KACL at the cease of season six after the ratings on his show drop too low. By his next appearance in the post-obit season he's living at the YMCA and delivering pizzas to make ends meet. He gladly accepts Roz's offer to take over every bit her new bodyguard. Later seasons encounter him dorsum at KACL but working in the storage areas hauling boxes.

    Music

• "King of Espana" by Moxy Früvous. The titular king actually seems to accept iii such jobs: he works at Pizza Pizza, vacuums astroturf, and drives a Zamboni.
• "Weird Al" Yankovic:
  • "The Rye or the Kaiser" is a parody of Middle of the Tiger where the boxer lost the big fight and wound up retiring to run a small deli.
  • "Skipper Dan" features an aspiring role player who languishes in his hard-times job at Disneyland, remembering his educatee dreams of distinction just feeling as well worn downwards to shoot for them now.

    Pro Wrestling

• After losing his job when the WCW/ECW Alliance lost against the WWF at Survivor Series 2001, Lance Storm was shown working every bit a busboy in the WWF New York restaurant.
• In the mid-1990s, WWF did a storyline where Nikolai Volkoff savage on difficult times and became an underling for "The Million Dollar Human being" Ted DiBiase. Nikolai wore trunks with cent signs on the sides (a play on the $ signs DiBiase had on his) and "Belongings Of The Million Dollar Man" on the dorsum.
• A like angle was worked years later when Shawn Michaels fell on hard times and wound up working for JBL.
• During the last yr of WCW in 2000, Norman Smiley lost a match that cost him and Ralphus their jobs in WCW. In ane segment, they were shown working as popcorn vendors at the loonshit.
• Lisa Marie Varon when she was wrestling as Tara in TNA, lost a Title vs Career friction match and disappeared for months, before returning as the sidekick of Madison Rayne. Madison alluded to Tara existence reduced to working at "the lipstick counter" before she got her rehired.

    Religion & Mythology

• The Parable of the Prodigal Son from The Book of Luke has the wayward younger son becoming a swineherd after squandering his father'due south wealth. This is particularly abhorrent, as the Jews consider swines unclean, and the fact that the young man was willing to lower himself to such a devastating extent for a bit of nutrient and cash demonstrates how destitute he'south become.

    Video Games

• The Nighttime Brotherhood in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is a shadow of its one-time glory. Without a Listener to speak to the Dark Mother and receive word of Black Sacraments, they're forced to rely on rumor and word of rima oris to observe contracts, and whatever work they can. The histrion graphic symbol gets their attention by talking to a child who'd performed a Sacrament and been ignored, taking the chore in their place.
• Knights of the Former Republic: Canderous Ordo was in one case a respected commander among the Mandalorian Neo-Crusaders. Subsequently his people lost the state of war, and Revan's forces strip the Mandos of all their armor and weaponry, he ends up dandy heads for the crime lord Davik on the backwater globe of Taris. In the 2nd game, he discusses this past pointing out to Kreia that he and his followers are clawing their way out of menial work and rebuilding the Mandalorian people. Kreia dismisses information technology, but the Expanded Universe shows Canderous every bit having the terminal express mirth.
• In Mana Khemia: Alchemists of Al-Revis, Roxis Rosencrantz, a descendant of a long line of famous alchemists, mentions in i scene that his father earned the money they lived on by playing cards, as despite their fame and history, his family hasn't produced a decent alchemist in more than than a century.
• After endmost the rifts at the cease of Orcs Must Die! the State of war Mage inadvertently put himself out of work. Without invading Orcs to fight and his actions causing all the magic to become away and getting people mad at him, he's go a miner by the start of the sequel.
• In Dead Ascension ii Chuck Green was in one case a star and a champion in the motor-cross excursion, but has been reduced to slaughtering zombies on the controversial "Terror is Reality" in order to afford Zombrex, his girl's expensive multi-dose anti-zombification medicine.
  • In ''DR2: Off the Tape'' Frank West became a glory by selling his story of survival during the Willamette outbreak, and happily coasted on the fame, and money, it brought him. Several years after, he was lone, and the coin disappeared leaving him in debt. To brand ends run into, and go on buying the expensive Zombrex medication he needs, he participates on the controversial "Terror is Reality", being billed as the hero of Willamette.

    Visual Novels

• Daughter for Dessert:
  • Saul cooking in the diner after getting fired from the liquidation visitor. However, instead of beingness bitter, he is grateful for the employment in the time when he is trying to discover another task in police.
  • Perhaps the case for Heidi (who sells her bar to pause the wheel of long days every day just to barely get past) and Veronica (who founded a startup that eventually failed).
• Subverted with the protagonist'south tutoring job in Melody. The protagonist isn't corking on the job when it's get-go offered to him, and takes it mainly to get away from Bethany, but he makes enough coin to become by, and enjoys the town where the job is, and the people in it.

    Web Comics

• In Onetime, Maid Maleen, All-Furs, and the prince in "Iron Hans".
• Ménage à iii pulls a nice comedy variant with Zii, the determinedly cool "punk rock chick" who, lacking a band or whatsoever other source of income, takes a job as "counter candy" in a comics store, being "ogled by geeks" as she herself afterwards puts it. This even comes with its own version of the traditional humiliating uniform, every bit seen here.
• Stand Notwithstanding, Stay Silent: Torbjörn and Siv Västerström are from a family that underwent a Riches to Rags episode some years ago. After this, Torbjörn got a job copying old books and got the idea for the expedition when he found out simply how valuable the original texts were. Siv was working in an institute researching the Rash before joining him in his initiative, simply it is unclear whether she got the job earlier or after the family's financial difficulties showed up.

    Western Animation

• In Fantastic 4: World'due south Greatest Heroes episode "Strings", a major PR problem forces the Four to get bodily jobs. Technically, merely Susan's (children's entertainer) and Ben'due south (garbage man) might count. Two women cattily lampshade this, commenting on "how far she'due south fallen."
• The Simpsons: In "The Seemingly Never-Catastrophe Story", when Mr. Burns lost his fortune in an Absurdly Loftier-Stakes Game to Rich Texan, he decided to start from zip. However, he felt he needed to work at Moe'southward in order to get upwards to zero.
• Batman Across episode "King's Ransom" has both Melanie and the Royal Flush Gang she left working this mode. Melanie has a traditional hard times job working food prep in a restaurant, while her family laments that they have to steal for hire instead of for themselves.
• Batman: The Brave and the Assuming: When Batman tracks down the members of the Doom Patrol in "The Last Patrol!", he finds Negative Human being working as a sideshow freak in a seedy carnival.
• King of the Colina:
  • In "Propane Boom", Hank Hill ended up working at Mega Lo Mart when he got laid off from Strickland when the same store briefly sold propane.
  • Subverted in "My Ain Private Rodeo". Hank, Neb, and Boomhauer think this happened to Dale'south estranged begetter Problems, finding him performing in a gay rodeo (though they originally didn't realize they were even at ane) and when they do, they effigy out that he'south there considering he'due south gay himself.
• Magica De Spell in DuckTales (2017). You know you hit stone bottom when your current job is a party magician for kids, while your previous occupation was an all-powerful sorceress.

    Miscellaneous, Real Life

• In Japanese media, paper-blossom vendors are stereotypical emblems of hard times, indicating that someone is one footstep away from beggary.
• In 19th- and early on 20th-century Europe, the lucifer seller was a stock "hard up" graphic symbol. It was an particularly popular depiction of impoverished WWI veterans, peculiarly the wounded and disabled. Famous examples are The Footling Match Girl and Otto Dix's painting The Match Seller.
• During the American Great Low, hawking pencils or apples was an equally common stock job in media.
• Nowadays the Traveling Salesman job is seen as this. George Orwell wrote descriptions of such people in his essays of the 1930s and Spike Milligan portrays an encyclopaedia salesman in Puckoon.
• Slowly becoming this in the U.s., cheers to the Great Recession, is people being snatched off the street and paid to wave customers into businesses that can't afford other forms of advert. "WE BUY GOLD" places practise this all the time, and the poor guy or girl usually has to article of clothing a Goofy Adjust.
• Up to WWI, female teacher or lady's companion were synonyms of an impoverished woman of skilful social standing.
• Actress Nikki Blonsky started working at a salon later movie roles dried up.
  • Similarly, Gary Coleman worked as a security guard when his career fizzled out. In fact, it's not all that uncommon for actors to take a 2nd job if they don't have a long-term contract or can't notice regular brusque-time roles.
  • Following photos of him working at a Trader Joe's going viral in 2018, role player Geoffrey Owens (Elvin on The Cosby Show) began getting roles afterward being "job shamed".
• Louise Brooks was at starting time a Hollywood star in the '20s and '30s but faded into obscurity in B-movies before quitting acting birthday. At one point among other jobs, she worked equally a call girl. She would later enjoy Career Resurrection equally a novelist.
• One specific to recent college grads who can't observe piece of work in their caste field is working in coffeeshops. At least, information technology'south seen every bit this by more than "marketable" graduates and by some of the coffee store workers themselves. Ironically, despite the stereotype that "what the English major says to the business major is 'exercise you want fries with that'", coffee shops are somewhat more likely to rent graduates than fast-food bondage, who consider them overqualified.
• Colonel Thomas E. Lawrence resigned from the British Ground forces subsequently WWI, but subsequently found civilian life uninspiring. So he joined the Royal Air Force as an ordinary Airman under a pseudonym to get back into the military, even if as an ordinary rating.
• Jon Gosselin (Jon & Kate Plus 8) now works as a waiter in Pennsylvania.
• This photo of a Syrian ceremonious war victim selling pens ◊ while hauling his girl made the rounds across the world.
• From the 16th to the 19th century, working on a slave ship was this for contemporary sailors. While their conditions were practically enviable by the captives on the cargo concord, most of the crewmen had to slumber on the exposed top deck, since there was no space below deck. The raw sewage and deceased bodies meant disease was rampant. If the cargo decided they did not want to be cargo anymore, the crew could literally observe themselves fighting for their lives. To pinnacle it off, employers offered comparatively low pay for dangerous piece of work, or oftentimes stiffed their employees. In one case the slaves were sold off to their new masters, almost of the crew were told their services were no longer needed and had to sail back their home countries from the Americas.
• Sadly many wrestlers employed past TNA also had to get second jobs because the company didn't pay them enough or paid them late.
  • Taylor Wilde was working a minimum wage job at Sunglass Hut while was reigning Knockouts Champion because of how underpaid she was. After a fan recognized her, she resigned immediately.
  • ODB had a second job as a bartender because TNA's low pay made it hard for her to make ends encounter. She was a multiple-time Knockouts Champion and a Knockouts Tag Team Champion too.
  • Jesse Sorenson had to work backstage at TNA to pay off medical bills that TNA refused to pay for later on he suffered a broken cervix.
  • Gail Kim had to outright get out TNA in 2008 despite being a star and proven ratings depict - because she literally couldn't afford to be there. She signed a three-year contract with WWE solely for financial reasons - and spent those three years miserable and being misused, quitting four months before her contract expired.
• In the '50s and '60s, television roles were considered this for actors, as interim on Television was the kiss of death every bit far every bit Hollywood pic casting went at the fourth dimension.

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Source: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FallenOnHardTimesJob

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