On-the-Nose Dialogue

Dialogue that states exactly what a character feels or means — subtext with the cover off.

'I'm angry because you never supported my dreams' is on the nose: the emotional content delivered as a statement of itself. Real speech works slantwise — people protect themselves, negotiate, and lie, and the truth leaks through behavior.

The revision move is to bury the want: keep the emotion, take away the character's permission to announce it, and let the scene's actions carry the payload.