History Literature / Riverworld

* MetalPoorPlanet: The Riverworld was designed this way to help the human race concentrate on spiritual things. [[spoiler: Until a meteorite hits.]]

* EvilBrit: Burton is made the villain of the 2010 movie, even though he's the ''hero'' of the novels!
* FemmeFatale: (2010) Allegra. And proud of it.

* NakedOnRevival: Averted in 2010 where everyone crawls out of the river in the clothes they died in, but not in the first adaptation.

There was also a short novella called "Riverworld" included in the short story collection ''Riverworld and Other Stories'' (1979), featuring cowboy movie star Tom Mix [[spoiler: and Jesus] ]]as protagonists.

* AllCavemenWereNeanderthals: Played straight with Kaz, but averted with Joe.

* AndIMustScream: How Star Spoon punishes her rapists.

* AxeCrazy: Star Spoon, but she has a hell of a FreudianExcuse.
* BambooTechnology: Due to the lack of metals on the planets, most of the construction material based on the planet's fast growing bamboo.
* BangsianFantasy

* GodGuise: [[spoiler:Deliberately set up by the Ethicals.]]
* HeelFaceTurn: Former Nazi Hermann Goerring repents and attempts to atone for his crimes on Earth. In ''The Magic Labyrinth'', he sacrifices his life in an attempt to repair the failing machinery of the Ethicals. [[spoiler:it doesn't work]]

* HumansAreSpecial: Why Riverworld was created.

* KnightTemplar: [[spoiler:Loga.]]

* TheMasquerade: Ethical agents.
* MassResurrection: The entire human race is brought back in the titular world after a cataclysm.

* MushroomSamba: Dreamgum.

* SaintlyChurch: The Church of the Second Chance.
* SeaMonster: Riverdragons.
* SignificantMonogram: Peter Jairus Frigate.
* SufficientlyAdvancedAliens: The Ethicals.

* TheChessmaster
-->'''Ellman:''' Is this another one of their chess games?
-->'''Male Ethereal:''' ''(appearing)'' Chess. One of my favourites.
-->'''Female Ethereal:''' ''(appearing)'' Mine too.
-->'''Male Ethereal:''' Your move.
-->'''Female Ethereal:''' No. ''(indicates Ellman)'' His.
* ColonyDrop: What causes TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt in 2003.

* NietzscheWannabe: Burton.
-->"If you had seen what I'd seen, your eyes would be dead too."
* SceneryPorn

* DeathIsCheap: The same advanced alien technology which resurrected everyone on Earth who had ever died remains active. Anyone who dies on the Riverworld is brought back to life the next day somewhere else. A few characters use this "Suicide Express" to deliberately, though randomly, explore the Riverworld. By ''The Dark Design'', the machinery breaks down and resurrections are halted. [[spoiler:This is corrected by ''Gods of Riverworld''.

* CoolBoat: Averted in 2010; obviously it would be impractical to construct a huge paddlesteamer/aircraft carrier with SteamPunk machine-guns, but would it kill them to mock up some armor and gatling turrets, as opposed to a small black powder cannon and sandbags?

* MechanicalHorse: Pizarro rides a horse, an animal which didn't exist in Riverworld in the novels. But when the horse is 'killed' they see it's flesh has been cut open to reveal robot parts.

* WellIntentionedExtremist: Burton (perhaps unintentionally) comes across as this, since he's basically right about the [[CrapsackWorld Riverworld]] being a [[GladiatorGames giant game]] for someone else's amusement and no-one ever presents a valid counterargument to the question of why they ''should'' save it?

''Riverworld'' is a novel series by Creator/PhilipJoseFarmer detailing the adventures of humanity in a world reshaped into one long river-valley. All humans that have ever been born are mysteriously restored to life with a body in its prime, and left to live in this world. There are no ores to make tools more advanced than Paleolithic, so humans are incapable of getting to the other side of the mountains that block the sides of the river. Humans that are killed awaken the next day somewhere else on the river. The novels are told from the perspective of different characters; the first is centered around Sir Richard Francis Burton and the second on [[Creator/MarkTwain Samuel Langhorn Clemens]].

* ''To Your Scattered Bodies Go'' (1971)

There was also a short novella, included in a short story collection, with cowboy movie star Tom Mix as the protagonist:
* ''Riverworld and Other Stories'' (1979) (The Novella was titled "Riverworld").

These were followed by a pair of anthologies, featuring short stories by Farmer and a variety of other authors.

* CoversAlwaysLie: Covers of the various editions often depict the heroes as they appeared on Earth, not on Riverworld.

* DeathIsCheap: The same advanced alien technology which resurrected everyone on Earth who had ever died remains active. Anyone who dies on the Riverworld is brought back to life the next day somewhere else. A few characters use this "Suicide Express" to deliberately, though randomly, explore the Riverworld. Later on, the machinery breaks down.

* OurSoulsAreDifferent: The soul is an ''artificial construct'' implanted by AppliedPhlebotinum, recording one's life, memories, and existence to allow people to reincarnate on the eponymous Riverworld, eons later, and work their way to some kind of Redemption/Ascension/Nirvana. One striking scene shows a vat holding thousands of souls: this is metaphysics meeting mass manufacture. Imagine: machinery handling souls like a billion ghostly Coke bottles on a production line. In a supreme irony there is no ''proof'' of the final afterlife: the spirit engineers infer that, since some ''wathans'' can't be observed, they have passed on. [[spoiler:In "Gods of Riverworld" is revealed that this is a lie and that wathans never "pass on"; the apparent evidence of this in Loga's computer was planted by him, to give them some goal while they were in the Tower. The real opportunity granted to the survivors of the test is to migrate to a new world of their choice, plant wathan generators and start over there.]]

* ResurrectionTeleportation: The story "The Suicide Express" revolves around this. When someone dies on the Riverworld, they are resurrected at some point along the river. Characters who want to reach the origin point of the river will repeatedly kill themselves, knowing that they will eventually be resurrected near enough to the origin to walk to it.

* TechnologyLevels

* ArtisticLicenseHistory: Nero in the 2003 film is portrayed as happily greeting a Praetorian Guard who he sees there in Riverworld, along with other Romans. The real man would probably have been far more wary, since the Praetorian Guards had defected from him to a governor who rebelled against Nero, and he'd also be unaware of whether the rest would follow him (his usurper had been popular). Here, he's portrayed as undisputed Emperor whom they immediately hail as their ruler. Also, he orders a {{human sacrifice}}, which Romans by his time viewed as anathema. They even claim Nero's misrule brought down Rome itself-it actually endured over three more centuries, so this is ''ridiculously'' off.

* BigBad: [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nero Emperor Nero]] in the first adaptation, and [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francisco_Pizarro Francisco Pizarro]] in the second. Given that King John is just a walk-on role in ''RobinHood'' to most Americans this isn't surprising.

* BodyBackupDrive: When someone dies in Riverworld, their ''wathan'' (soul) is collected, a new body is created for them and the ''wathan'' s released and re-attached to it.

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: Both fictional and historical.

* OurSoulsAreDifferent: The soul is an ''artificial construct'' implanted by AppliedPhlebotinum, recording one's life, memories, and existence to allow people to reincarnate on the eponymous Riverworld, eons later, and work their way to some kind of Redemption/Ascension/Nirvana. One striking scene shows a vat holding thousands of souls: this is metaphysics meeting mass manufacture. Imagine: machinery handling souls like a billion ghostly Coke bottles on a production line. In a supreme irony there is no ''proof'' of the final afterlife: the spirit engineers infer that, since some ''wathans'' can't be observed, they have passed on.

* AuthorAvatar: Recurring character ''Peter Jairus Frigate'' (note the initials), who is, of course, a writer of science fiction who was defrauded by a publisher no less. Rather than being idealised, Peter is scared of fighting and a bit of a weenie compared to the rock-ribbed Burton.

There was also a short novella, included in a short story collection:

* CoolShip: The ''Not For Hire'', a 19th century style steamboat modified with a mix of modern technology and [[Steampunk]].

* OurSoulsAreDifferent: The soul is an ''artificial construct'' implanted by AppliedPhlebotinum, recording one's life, memories, and existence to allow people to reincarnate on the eponymous Riverworld, eons later, and work their way to some kind of Redemption/Ascension/Crystal Dragon Nirvana. One striking scene shows a vat holding thousands of souls: this is metaphysics meeting mass manufacture. Imagine: machinery handling souls like a billion ghostly Coke bottles on a production line. In a supreme irony there is no ''proof'' of the final afterlife: the spirit engineers infer that, since some ''wathans'' can't be observed, they have passed on.

* AlienSky

* AuthorAvatar: Recurring character ''Peter Jairus Frigate'' (note the initials), who is, of course, a writer of science fiction who was defrauded by a publisher no less. Rather than being idealised, Peter is scared of fighting; a bit of a weenie compared to the rock-ribbed Burton.

* BambooTechnology

* BodyBackupDrive: When someone died in Riverworld, their ''wathan'' (soul) was collected, a new body was created for them and the ''wathan'' was released and re-attached to it.

* CoolShip: The ''Not For Hire''. Both of them. Aircraft, steam-powered machine guns, etc.

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters

* NonHumanSidekick: [[TheBigGuy Joe Miller]] is of an undiscovered hominid species called Titanthrops.

* OurSoulsAreDifferent: The soul is an ''artificial construct'' implanted by AppliedPhlebotinum, recording one's life, memories, and existence to allow people to reincarnate on the eponymous Riverworld, eons later, and work their way to some kind of Redemption/Ascension/Crystal Dragon Nirvana. One striking scene shows a vat holding thousands of souls: this is metaphysics meeting mass manufacture. Imagine: machinery handling souls like a billion ghostly coke bottles on a production line. In a supreme irony there is no ''proof'' for the final afterlife: the spirit engineers are profoundly religious.

* RagtagBunchOfMisfits

* GivingUpOnLogic: This is presumably why in both versions no one's particularly [[UnusuallyUninterestingSight fazed for very long]] upon discovering they're back from the dead, young again in some cases, or that the world was destroyed by aliens. Also, they have a lot to deal with before too long. giving them little time for much thought about it.

* HistoricalVillainUpgrade: Burton is made the villain of the 2010 movie, even though he's the ''hero'' of the novels!

* ArtisticLicenseHistory: Nero in the 2003 film is portrayed as happily greeting a Praetorian Guard who he sees there in Riverworld, along with other Romans. The real man would probably have been far more wary, since the Praetorian Guards had defected from him to a governor who rebelled against Nero, and he'd also be unaware of whether the rest would follow him (his usurper had been popular). Here, he's portrayed as undisputed Emperor whom they immediately hail as their ruler. Also, he orders a {{human sacrifice}}, which Romans by his time viewed as anathema.

* ArtisticLicenseHistory: Nero in the 2003 film is portrayed as happily greeting a Praetorian Guard who he sees there in Riverworld, along with other Romans. The real man would probably have been far more wary, since the Praetorian Guards had defected from him to a governor who rebelled against Nero, and he'd also be unaware of whether the rest would follow him (his usurper had been popular). Here, he's portrayed as undisputed Emperor whom they immediately hail as their ruler.

* OurSoulsAreDifferent: The soul is an ''artificial construct'' implanted by AppliedPhlebotinum, recording one's life, memories, and existence to allow people to reincarnate on the eponymous Riverworld, eons later, and work their way to some kind of Redemption/Ascension/Crystal Dragon Nirvana. One striking scene shows a a holding vat holding thousands of souls: this is metaphysics meeting mass manufacture. Imagine: machinery handling souls like a billion ghostly coke bottles on a production line. In a supreme irony there is no ''proof'' for the final afterlife: the spirit engineers are profoundly religious.

* GivingUpOnLogic: Presumably why in both versions, no-one's particularly [[UnusuallyUninterestingSight fazed for very long]] upon discovering they're back from the dead, young again in some cases, or that the world was destroyed by aliens.

''Riverworld'' is a novel series by Creator/PhilipJoseFarmer detailing the adventures of humanity in a world reshaped into one long river-valley. All humans that have ever been born are mysteriously restored to life with a body in its prime, and left to live in this world. There are no ores to make tools more advanced than Paleolithic, so humans are incapable of getting to the other side of the mountains that block the sides of the river. Humans that are killed awaken the next day somewhere else on the river. The novels are told from the perspective of different characters; the first is centered around Sir Richard Francis Burton and the second, [[Creator/MarkTwain Samuel Langhorn Clemens]].

* BodyBackupDrive: When someone died in Riverworld, their wathan (soul) was collected, a new body was created for them and the wathan was released and re-attached to it.

''Riverworld'' is a novel series by Creator/PhilipJoseFarmer detailing the adventures of humanity in a world reshaped into one long river-valley. All humans that have ever been born are mysteriously restored to life with a body in its prime, and left to live in this world. There are no ores to make tools more advanced than Paleolithic, so humans are incapable of getting to the other side of the mountains that block the sides of the river. Humans that are killed awaken the next day somewhere else on the river.
The novels are told from the perspective of different characters, the first is centered around Sir Richard Francis Burton and the second; [[Creator/MarkTwain Samuel Langhorn Clemens]].

* AndIMustScream: How Star Spoon punishes her rapists

* TheAtoner: Goering

* AxeCrazy: Star Spoon, but she has a hell of a FreudianExcuse

* GodGuise: [[spoiler:Deliberately set up by the Ethicals]]

* KnightTemplar: [[spoiler:Loga]]
* LadyOfWar: Tomoe Gozen, eventually [[Literature/AliceInWonderland Alice Pleasance Liddell]] (!) in the books

* TheMasquerade: Ethical agents

* MushroomSamba: Dreamgum

* SecretTestOfCharacter: [[spoiler:Riverworld's true purpose was to give all of humanity a second chance since the best of humanity proves them worthy of joining a long line of alien creators, yet the worst of humanity proves them unworthy of such an honor]].
* SaintlyChurch: The Church of the Second Chance
* SeaMonster: Riverdragons

* SufficientlyAdvancedAliens
* TakeThat! - when Frigate settles his score with the publisher who cheated him. Farmer's snipe at the publishing industry.

* HistoricalDomainCharacter: Richard Burton and MarkTwain are just the tip of the iceberg.