Oftentimes, the Hawaiian-Shirted Tourist will appear as a fixture in pop culture to showcase that they're an awkward, unsophisticated, or otherwise generic tourist and are on vacation (regardless of if it's relevant to actually wear a Hawaiian shirt, i.e., in the middle of Paris).
Otherwise, a character will sport a Hawaiian shirt (also known as an Aloha shirt) to display that they're outside of the norm. This is usually as the Foil to the more straight-laced—and often more conservatively dressed—characters, which can include the Cloud Cuckoolander, the Plucky Comic Relief, or even one of the main characters (especially if they're a part of a duo or an ensemble cast). Red appears to be the most popular color and although women do sport the shirts, for some reason in media, it's almost always seen on men. Also expect that whenever they're not wearing the shirt, that their personality and/or the situation is markedly more serious.
Super-Trope of Fun T-Shirt and Consistent Clothing Style. Compare and contrast with Wardrobe Flaw of Characterization. See also Tacky Tuxedo, Goofy Print Underwear, Impossibly Tacky Clothes, Clothes Make the Legend, Iconic Item and Impossibly Cool Clothes.
Please don't confuse this with a bowling shirt; while this can be formal at times, bowler's clothing is almost always informal. Also, explain how the shirt wearer would qualify as this trope; hard as it is to believe, just because someone wears a Hawaiian shirt doesn't automatically make them quirky.
Examples:
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Advertising
- Punchy, the mascot for the Hawaiian Punch fruit punch drink, qualifies as a mostly joyful and quirky guy (except with the Oaf, who himself appears to be more of a Hawaiian-Shirted Tourist).
Anime and Manga
See Also
Television | Page 370 of 684The Peach Blonde Bomber PDF, Epub DownloadDarth Vader All-Red Entry - TV TropesStar Wars THE BAD BATCH Is Coming to Disney Plus – Here Is What You Need To Know- Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury: Naji Geor Hija, the leader of the Dawn of Fold terrorists and/or freedom fighters wears a purple shirt with large flower prints on each shoulder. Despite his position, he's very laid-back and friendly, and is the Parental Substitute to the idealistic Nika Nanaura. His casual outfit choice puts him in sharp contrast to his much more serious second-in-command Olcott, who dresses in sensible paramilitary clothing.
- Exaggerated with Principal Kuno in Ranma ½, maybe the biggest nut in a Cast Full of Crazy; his Hawaiian shirt is just the tip of a pathological obsession with Hawaii in general, and the absolutely bonkers rules he constantly tries to enforce on Furinkan High.
Films — Animated
- The LEGO Movie: The male character from the in-universe sitcom "Where Are My Pants?" wears a blue Hawaiian shirt and is portrayed as a silly character (who, as the title suggests, has trouble finding his pants) compared to his wife.
Films — Live-Action
- Ace Ventura: Pet Detective and its sequel has the titular character, played by the incomparable Jim Carrey, as the eccentric but effective detective who has a strong love for animals (even co*ckroaches), justice, Hawaiian shirts, and having perfectly styled hair.
- Back to the Future: Eccentric scientist Dr. Emmett Brown dons Hawaiian shirts a couple of times. The first time, during Part II, he wears one with a pattern of steam trains being pursued by cowboys (foreshadowing him and Marty hijacking a train in the next film). In Part III, as Marty prepares to head back to 1885, the younger Doc — appropriately — wears one with a pattern of lassos and cacti.
- Played with in Out of Time. Whereas Chief Matthias Whitlock wears them and is serious and methodical, his best friend, Medical Examiner Chae, also wears them and is the quirky comic relief and Butt-Monkey.
- UHF: The film's protagonist, George Newman, is an imaginative and eccentric man, and he's frequently depicted as wearing brightly-colored Hawaiian shirts. Fittingly, he's also played by "Weird Al" Yankovic.
- Daniel Radcliffe portrays a send-up of "Weird Al" Yankovic in Weird: The Al Yankovic Story. A promo shot
has him being quirky by wearing his platinum albums as medallions but also that his wardrobe is all Hawaiian shirts.
Literature
- Percy Jackson and the Olympians: Poseidon, when he appears as a human to Percy, usually wears a Tommy Bahama shirt with coconuts and parrots on them. Double Subverted - this appearance obscures the fact that Poseidon is in fact a powerful sea god but highlights that he is more laid back than most of the other Olympian gods. This makes his older, more grim appearance in The Last Olympian so startling, reflecting his dark mood after his kingdom was destroyed.
Live-Action TV
- Sam Axe of Burn Notice is always in a colorful Hawaiian shirt, befitting of the show's Miami setting and Sam's aggressive Life of the Party persona. It's easy to mistake him for a Hawaiian-Shirted Tourist but that's precisely the Obfuscating Stupidity Sam is aiming for.
- Farscape: Invoked; Harvey, the Scorpius neural clone haunting Crichton throughout the series, is first encountered wearing a very loud button-up shirt over his coolant suit that, at first sight, appears to be Hawaiian in origin. However, despite the claims of observers from outside the show, the shirt is not Hawaiian at all, but Mambo. In spite of this, as Harvey becomes more distinct from Scorpius and becomes a character in his own right, he will occasionally appear wearing the Mambo shirt and a straw hat, especially after he severs ties with the real Scorpius; in this case, the wildly colorful shirts are used to indicate that Harvey has become more of an individual than was originally intended.
- Magnum, P.I. has Thomas Magnum as the quintessential beach bum private eye who lives in Hawaii and, as expected, sports these.
- In the earlier seasons of M*A*S*H, Hawkeye and Trapper often wore Hawaiian shirts as part of them showing their contempt for all things military.
- Miami Vice has Det. Larry Zito, one half of the series' comic relief (alongside his partner Stan Switek), who primarily wears Hawaiian shirts. Additionally, he has a goldfish he talks to like a dog, a large collection of snow globes, and is noticeably more quirky than the rest of the cast, including Switek.
Theatre
- The Lightning Thief: Discussed. After the minotaur battle, Percy has a vision of "a strange man in a Hawaiian shirt" giving him a seashell. Percy remarks on this in his addled state and finds it weird, making him write it off as just part of a dream, until late in the show, when he realizes it was Poseidon giving him a gift.
Video Games
- Grand Theft Auto: Vice City: Inverted with the gruff criminal Tommy Vercetti, who starts the game wearing a loud shirt (much like Tony Montana) and only starts changing it after neurotic lawyer Ken Rosenberg gives him an invitation to a South American druglord's party and accompanying fashion advice.
Ken: Hey, I like 1978 too, but y'know this isn't gonna be a beer and strippers do. I mean, no offence but I think you might turn heads on the runway for the wrong reasons.
Tommy: What's wrong with the way I'm dressed?
- In The Feeble Files, at one point you run into an eccentric tourist visiting a local zoo. He speaks in a very stereotypical accent, wants you to take a photograph of him, and wears a hawaiian shirt. In a game where everyone is an alien living in a sci-fi society.
- Mafia II: Starting with Chapter 7 Joe Barbaro starts wearing Hawaiian shirts alongside leather jackets showing his goofball nature.
- Mafia III: Bounty Hounter and former CIA Agent Robert Marshall is a rather eccentric, but competent Friendly Sniper who happens to wear a Hawaiian shirt as his getup in New Bordeaux. He ends up becoming a contact and associate of Lincoln Clay should Lincoln accomplish his bounty hunting side missions, and even gifts Lincoln his own Hawaiian shirt dubbed the "Party Animal".
Webcomics
- Vast Error: Murrit Turkin wears a purple and blue Hawaiian shirt in their old design. They have a complex personality and tend to mess with people, and their speaking style is full of incomprehensible slang, references, memes, and nicknames.
Web Video
- Critical Role: In the "Liam's Quest: Full Circle" one-shot, preteen Matthew Mercer wears a Hawaiian/bowling shirt with a dragon on it, showing what a huge nerd he was at that age. This was based on a real photo of the actor.
Western Animation
- Dale of Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers is a good example. Whereas Chip is the serious and mature leader of their group and wears a leather jacket and hat (inspired by Indiana Jones), he on the other hand is the more laid-back and silly and sports a red Hawaiian shirt (which itself was inspired by Magnum P.I.).
- Daria: In "Murder, She Snored" (a murder-mystery episode with several shout-outs to detective dramas), Daria at one point sports a red Hawaiian shirt as the Magnum P.I. theme song plays in the background.
- In Darkwing Duck, Drake Mallard's neighbor Herb Muddlefoot wears a Hawaiian shirt adorned with fruit to show that he's unsophisticated compared to the "normal" Mallard family and their associates.
- Family Guy has one of Peter's best friends, the airline pilot and Lovable Sex Maniac Glenn Quagmire who (pre-Flanderization) was shown to be an upbeat horny guy with an endless parade of ladies at his side and is almost always seen in a red Hawaiian shirt.
- Chuckles from G.I. Joe wears a blue short-sleeved, open-collar Hawaiian shirt with pink flowers and green leaves along with green pants with beige belt, brown holster, and black boots. He has a gregarious personality that makes him the life of the party, quick-witted, and possesses a natural likeability. His gregarious nature also helps him to earn the trust of his marks, so that they have no idea that he's actually spying on them.
- My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic: Rarity's cheerful if slightly absent father Hondo Flanks wears a straw hat and flower-patterned blue shirt. It both establishes his carefree personality and that he's the polar opposite of his daughter, who's a designer and fashionista.
- Discussed in The Simpsons episode "Homer's Phobia". According to Homer's logic, the only guys who wear Hawaiian shirts are "gays or big, fat party animals".
Other
- Defied in the one Despair, Inc. Demotivator "Break The Rules" poster, which features a red Hawaiian shirt in a closet next to several black blazers: "...on your own time. Here, you get paid to conform."
Real Life
- "Weird Al" Yankovic is a popular and critically acclaimed comedy musician and in addition to his quirky and eccentric persona, is also well-known for his collection of Hawaiian shirts.
- Although wearing a Hawaiian shirt is usually frowned upon in many businesses, the idea of "casual Friday" that a job may have is often an acceptable time for an employee to wear one.
- Polish traveler Wojciech Cejrowski, known from putting eccentric and controversial statements in his programs is known from wearing hawaian shirt in his programs (and walking barefoot).
- Somewhat invoked by the Boogaloo Movement whose adherents can be identified wearing Hawaiian-style shirts under their militia gear. While the inspiration for both the name and the fashion comes from Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo (and Oddly Named Sequel by proxy), adherents do seem to appreciate the juxtaposition of their quirky fashions with their rather violent goals.
