"Hey, I'm the friendly stranger in the black sedan
Oh won't you hop inside my car...
I'm your vehicle, baby
I'll take you anywhere you wanna go..."
Oh won't you hop inside my car...
I'm your vehicle, baby
I'll take you anywhere you wanna go..."
— The Ides of March, "Vehicle"
Tropes all about vehicles and transportation.
See also Chase Scene, Flying Tropes, Race You to the Index, and Travel Cool, as well as Junkyard of Tropes for vehicles past their prime.
If you're looking for "vehicles" in the entertainment industry sense
— a movie made specifically for one actor's career— see Non-Actor Vehicle.
Tropes:
Sub-categories:
- Accidental Astronaut: Involves a character accidentally launching the spacecraft with them in it.
- Ace Pilot
- Anti-Cavalry
- Anti-Vehicle
- Are You Sure You Can Drive This Thing?
- Armored Coffins
- Artistic License – Cars
- Asian Drivers
- Automobiles Are Alien
- Backseat Driver
- Badass Driver
- Bad Humor Truck: An ice cream truck is driven by a bad person.
- Balloonacy
- Belly-Scraping Flight
- Beware of Hitchhiking Ghosts: A good-intentioned driver picks a traveler in need of help only to discover it's a ghost.
- Blindfolded Trip
- Burning Rubber
- Cable-Car Action Sequence
- Captain Crash: The driver tends to crash whatever vehicle they are driving.
- Car Cushion
- Car Fu
- Carload of Cool Kids
- Casual Car Giveaway
- Chaotic Car Ride
- Chariot Pulled by Cats: Cart-carrying cats are cool cavalry.
- Chariot Race
- Chopper on Standby
- Circular Drive
- Combat Chariot
- Coming in Hot
- Construction Vehicle Rampage
- Conveniently Empty Roads
- Cool Garage
- Crew of One
- Cruise Episode
- Damage-Proof Vehicle
- Dangerously Loaded Cargo
- Dangerous Senior Driver
- Danger Takes a Backseat: A character is unaware an intruder is present in their vehicle until it's too late.
- Dead Foot Leadfoot
- Defenseless Transports
- Derelict Graveyard
- Description Porn: Describing a vehicle in great detail.
- Dinky Drivers
- The Dinnermobile
- Directionless Driver
- Dodge by Braking
- Does Not Drive
- Don't Come A-Knockin': Coitus in a vehicle.
- The Dreaded Dreadnought
- Dread Zeppelin
- Drill Tank
- The Driver
- Driver Faces Passenger
- Drives Like Crazy
- Driving a Desk
- Driving Up a Wall
- Drunk Driver
- Dude, Where's Our Car?
- Eject... Eject... Eject...
- Ejection Seat
- Enormous Engine
- Epic Launch Sequence
- Epic Tank-on-Tank Action
- External Combustion
- Faking Engine Trouble
- Falling into the Cockpit
- Fantastic Ship Prefix
- Fantasy Helmet Enforcement
- Fell Asleep Driving
- Fighter-Launching Sequence
- Flashed-Badge Hijack
- Flying Dutchman
- Follow That Car
- Forklift Fu
- Franken-vehicle
- Free Wheel
- Game of Chicken
- Gangland Drive-By
- Getaway Driver: A driver who takes a criminal away from a crime scene before the police can catch up.
- Ghost Ship
- Global Airship
- Grand Theft Prototype
- The Great Repair
- Hack the Traffic Lights
- Handcar Pursuit
- Hard Truckin'
- Hero Stole My Bike
- High-Speed Hijack
- Hollywood Police Driving Academy
- Horseback Heroism
- Hostile Hitchhiker
- Hover Bike
- Hover Skates
- If It Swims, It Flies
- Implausible Boarding Skills
- Instant Convertible
- Itasha
- It's Going Down
- Jammed Seatbelts
- The Jaywalking Dead
- Just Keep Driving
- Kiddie Vehicle Supercharge
- Lady Vessel
- Living Ship
- Look Both Ways: A common measure of street safety.
- Ludicrous Speed
- Machine Empathy
- Mailbox Baseball
- Mega-Maw Maneuver
- Midair Collision
- Missed the Bus
- Molotov Truck
- Motile Vehicular Components
- Mounted Combat
- Mounted Mook
- Murder by Remote Control Vehicle
- My Horse Is a Motorbike
- No Bikes in the Apocalypse
- Nose Art
- Not My Driver
- One-Wheeled Wonder
- Only I Can Make It Go
- On-Ride/On-Foot Combat
- Open Air Driver
- Outside Ride
- Overdrive
- Pardo Push
- Pedal-to-the-Metal Shot
- Pop the Tires
- Ramp Jump
- Ramp-rovisation
- Real Vehicle Reveal
- Removable Steering Wheel
- Rental Car Abuse: Someone rents a car and acts as if the car being a rental means that it's not their problem if the car gets damaged.
- Roadside Wave
- Road Trip Across the Street
- Rock Star Parking
- Running Over the Plot: When a story begins or resumes with a character being run over.
- Sapient Steed
- Sentient Vehicle: A vehicle that is sentient.
- Sexist Used Car Salesman: Some car salesmen assume women don’t understand cars as well as men.
- Sci-Fi Flyby
- Shoot the Fuel Tank
- Shopping Cart Antics
- Sinister Car
- Skeleton Crew
- Sky Surfing
- Sniping the Cockpit
- Spiked Wheels
- Standard Sci-Fi Army
- Standard Sci-Fi Fleet
- Submersible Spaceship
- Sunroof Shenanigans: Someone uses a sunroof (typically in a limo) to misbehave
- Surprise Vehicle
- Take the Wheel
- Tandem Parasite
- Targeting the Exhaust System
- Thememobile
- Toasted Buns
- Tripod Terror
- Troubled Takeoff
- Underside Ride
- Universal Driver's License
- Unnecessarily Large Vessel
- Unusual Weapon Mounting
- Vanity License Plate
- Vapor Trail
- Vehicle Title
- Vehicle Vanish
- Vehicular Assault
- Vehicle-Based Characterization
- Vehicular Sabotage
- Vehicular Theme Naming
- Vehicular Turnabout
- Wacky Racing
- Watch the Paint Job
- We Don't Need Roads
- Who Is Driving?
- Wiper Start
- Women Drivers: The stereotype that women cannot drive well.
- Wrong Lane Hijinks
Genres:
- Driving Game
- Gearhead Show: Show about the (re)construction or customization of vehicles.
- Mecha Show
- Real Robot Genre
- Simulation Game (various subgenres)
- Sub Story
- Super Robot Genre
- Vehicular Combat
- Wooden Ships and Iron Men
Vehicles:
- Airborne Aircraft Carrier
- Airships
- The Alleged Car
- Animal Mecha: A driveable robot that resembles an animal.
- Animal-Vehicle Hybrid
- Automated Automobiles
- Awesome Personnel Carrier
- Base on Wheels
- The Battlestar
- Bell-Bottom-Limbed Bots: Robots have trumpet limbs.
- Big Badass Rig
- Black Helicopter
- Chicken Walker: A giant long-legged mecha.
- Clown Car: Tiny on the outside, seemingly huge on the inside.
- Combining Mecha: Two or more robots that can combine to form an even larger robot.
- Cool Airship
- Cool Bike
- Cool Boat
- Cool Car
- Cool Horse
- Cool Plane
- Cool Sidecar
- Cool Ship
- Cool Starship
- Cool Train
- Drill Tank
- Drop Pod
- Drop Ship
- Flying Broomstick: The common transportation of witches.
- Flying Car
- Hippie Van
- Hopping Machine
- Horse Jump
- Hover Board: A floating skateboard-like device.
- Hover Mecha
- Hover Tank
- Humongous Mecha: A gigantic robot that someone controls from within.
- Improbably Cool Car
- Magic Bus
- Magic Carpet: A carpet that flies.
- Mecha: Someone rides in a robot.
- Mercurial Base
- Meta Mecha
- Mid-Life Crisis Car
- Military Mashup Machine
- Mini-Mecha
- Mobile Factory
- Mobile Kiosk
- Monowheel Mayhem
- Mook Mobile
- Motion-Capture Mecha
- Moving Roadways: Instead of vehicles moving on a roadway, the roadway moves itself (and its passengers).
- Official Presidential Transport
- Orient Express
- Pimped-Out Car
- Power Harness
- Prison Ship
- Reliable Rustbucket
- Rice Burner
- Ridiculously Inappropriate Vehicle
- Rocket Ride
- Rollerblade Good
- Ship Out of Water
- Shopping Cart of Homelessness
- Signature Team Transport
- Sled Dogs Through the Snow
- Space Plane
- Spider Tank
- Spy Ship
- Super Wheelchair
- Tank Goodness
- Tanks, but No Tanks
- Tank-Tread Mecha
- The Taxi
- Technically a Transport
- Those Magnificent Flying Machines
- Transforming Mecha
- Transforming Vehicle
- Tree Vessel
- Van in Black
- Vehicle-Roof Body Disposal
- Vulnerable Convoy
- Walking Tank
- Weaponized Car
- White Stallion
- The Workhorse
- Zeppelins from Another World
