Amusing Alien

If there are any tropes that run the risk of causing Unfortunate Implications, this is among their ranks.

The Amusing Alien is exactly as the tin describes it. A character that fits this trope is a supernatural, otherworldly or otherwise uncommon creature designed specifically to amuse the audience in some fashion. Of course the term 'alien' need not be literal, in the sense that they are, in fact, from another world/planet. They are only required to be a creature that isn't common to the universe - if it is, they become Funny Foreigner instead.

You need to be careful when portraying an alien creature as the source of comedy, whether among the 'high' or 'low-brow' comedy. All that matters in satisfying the first half of the moniker is that the intention; they don't actually have to succeed, so long as the audience knows they were meant to be funny. As such, they can certainly be the source of unwanted aggravation, crossing the line into Scrappy territory if all goes wrong. It's a reminder that comedy is fickle and while the audience might know what you're attempting, they may hate you for it.

This is true whether or not the Amusing Alien is even a sensitive portrayal. A common distinction between the Amusing Alien and the Funny Foreigner is that we usually see the latter when we write stories using Earth as the setting. This is far from the only situation, as elves can be Funny Foreigners if the setting uses them plentifully, but nevertheless, it isn't unwarranted to make that distinction at times. In either case, Funny Foreigners occasionally overlap with stereotypes, causing them to be nearly (if not outright) prejudicial Scrappies if handled with intense disregard. Amusing Aliens aren't exempt from this practice, as many criticisms of Jar Jar Binks may attest.

As such, please proceed with caution when using the Amusing Alien in any setting, whether it be sci-fi or fantasy (as they tend to be). An Alien's failure and descent into Scrappy-hood need not be due to any insensitive portrayal, of course; horribly written comedy is enough on its own. Either case, you don't want value dissonance or mishandled comedy, even unintended, to ruin a work. Amusing Aliens do provide the benefit of working around most Unfortunate Implications revolving around Earth customs and expectations, but as mentioned, that is by no means true for everything.