Happily Ever After: Fairy Tales for Every Child

An animated series that originally aired on HBO and ran for three seasons. The episodes take different Fairy Tales and set them in a variety of cultures from all around the world (and occasionally with female leads instead of the original male characters). The most common practice was casting the European fairy tales with African-Americans, and placing the fairy tales in China or the surrounding Asian countries. Each episode is narrated by Robert Guillaume, with a recurring cast of guest stars including Sinbad, Rosie Perez, and B.D. Wong. And yes, every story ends with the characters living Happily Ever After. Not to be confused with the Filmation movie Happily Ever After.

Tropes:

• Adipose Rex: The Emperor in "The Emperor's New Clothes"
• Adult Fear: Seeing as this is a fairy tale based show this is a given really. Just the whole idea of having childern in danger of being kidnapped or worse runs through out several episodes of the show.
• All-Star Cast
• All Women Love Shoes: One of the princesses in "The Princess and the Pea" was heard talking about how she wished she brought her better shoes.
• Amazon Brigade: Robinita Hood and her Merry Chicas.
• And the Adventure Continues...: "Robinita Hood" ends with the Merry Chicas and Mario escaping from a trap, with the narrator stating that they continue to fight against the Sheriff until eventually stopping him for good, and everyone of course live Happily Ever After.
• Big Bad Wolves: The Three Little Pigs episode has an educational film about avoiding these.
• Break the Haughty: Happens to many times to count.
• Dating What Daddy Hates: Or in the case of "The Princess and the Pea", Dating What Mommy Hates. The Queen doesn't like that her son is falling for Princess Yu-long, since she arrived late and claims to have lost her invitation. The Queen even faints when Yu-long turned out to be the truly blue princess.
• Disneyfication
• Earn Your Happy Ending
• Fainting: In "The Process and the Pea", the Queen fainted upon learning that Yu-long can feel the snow-pea through the sheets of quilt, confirming her a true blue princess. She fainted again after her son and Yu-long got married.
• Fairy Tale Motifs and Fairy Tale Tropes in general.
• Fractured Fairy Tale: Most notable in the Aesop's Fables episode.
• Gender Flip: "Three Little Pigs", "The Prince and the Pauper", "Robin Hood", "The Nightingale", "The Steadfast Tin Soldier", and "The Bremen Town Musicians" get this treatment, not to mention a few of the characters from Aesop's Fables in the last episode.
  • Which is somewhat unneeded considering most of the fairy tales the show adapted already had female protagonists to begin with...
• Handicapped Badass: Goldie from "The Steadfast Tin Soldier".
• Hey, It's That Voice!: In addition to the All-Star Cast, you may be able to recognize Raven Simone as both the princess and her peasant look-alike.
• I Just Want My Beloved to Be Happy: The fisherman's final wish in "The Fisherman and his Wife".
• Ink Suit Actor: Not as common as you'd think, but why else would the Rooster from The Bremen Town Musicians (voiced by George Clinton) have his comb tied up like that?◦ Also very prevalent in the "Henny Penny" episode.
  • Mother Goose, played by Whoopi Goldberg does look a lot like her character.
• Interactive Narrator: Usually averted, but a few of the more tongue-in-cheek stories have the narrator getting in on the act, such as becoming a golf announcer in "The Frog Princess," and having Henny Penny treat him like the reporter back at the studio.
  • "Rip Van Winkle" features a female co-narrator near the end, emphasizing the theme of gender equality.
• Love Redeems: Happens in "Beauty and the Beast" and to the king in "Rumpelstiltskin".
• My Beloved Smother:
  • The Queen in "The Princess and the Pea". She's sliding between this along with being a Doting Parent and a Jewish Mother. She wants what's best for her son, no doubt, however, she oversteps. She'd have kept doing that until the Prince threatened to climb up to the roof and not come down "until Christmas" if she doesn't allow Princess Yu-long to stay.
  • Madame Zenobia is a very dark example.
• The Runt At the End: In "The Princess and the Pea", the King noticed one of the princesses is really short.
• Setting Update: Or sometimes setback - "The Shoemaker's Elves" takes place in Aztec Mexico.
• Snake Oil Salesman: The tailors in "The Emperor's New Clothes"
• Terrible Interviewees Montage: In "The Princess and the Pea", each invited princesses has to perform in a talent show, but they're either awful or screwed it up.
• The Fair Folk: Rumpelstiltskin fits this trope to a T.
• The Power of Love: Is often used to save the day.
• The Trickster: Rumpelstiltskin, Puss in Boots, The Pied Piper, and the beggar in "The Golden Goose" just to name a few.
• Twice-Told Tale
• Unsettling Gender Reveal: In "The Princess and the Pea", while looking at the arriving suitors for her son, the Queen can tell one of them is really a man. This caught the King's attention. But this wasn't brought up again afterwards.