History Main / HerCodenameWasMarySue

A form of StylisticSuck. Whenever an in-universe author or creator not established as being a (passable) writer [[ShowWithinAShow creates a story]], the main character will be a blatant AuthorAvatar MarySue. Whatever they want, their character gets. Often, all the other primary characters will [[WriteWhoYouKnow have their actual fictional counterparts of their own as well]], usually with [[CharacterExaggeration one or two traits exaggerated greatly]] and generally portrayed in the light that the character sees them. This may include [[AuthorTract the villain of the story being based on a character the writer doesn't like]]. Most of the time, these stories will be treated as being pretty bad by the other characters (whether or not they express it depends on how nice they're feeling), and the work will often raise [[UnfortunateImplications implications]] about their friend's desires and feelings about the people around him [[MuseAbuse that will raise eyebrows]]. This is all usually PlayedForLaughs, however, the trope could also be used to tell the audience what the character writing the story wants and what he thinks of other characters, etc.

* ''Film/Shazam2019'''s CreativeClosingCredits are an animation of Billy's notebook doodles. In the story therein, Shazam faces [[UpToEleven exaggerated]] versions of his challenges in the movies [[spoiler:with his foster family]], easily outshines ComicBook/{{Superman}}, ComicBook/{{Batman}} and ComicBook/TheFlash [[spoiler:(It's actually Darla who outruns the Flash, but she has the same power set as Shazam)]] and takes ComicBook/WonderWoman to the prom.

* In ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'':
** Sarah is creating a comic titled "The Wizard Sarah". Hmmm... She's [[IJustWantToBeSpecial jealous that the other characters have magic]], so it's understandable.
** In the NP storyline "Original", Ashley tries ''not'' to do this with her transformation stories, but now she knows people who can actually ''do'' this stuff, it's more difficult. Given the nature of her stories, she realises she needs to create original characters so she can look at her friends without blushing. She ends up creating a totally original scientist who is Elliot in glasses, a totally original assistant who is Susan with glasses and lighter hair, and a totally original test subject who is herself with a different hairstyle. She is completely convinced these are original characters, even though she keeps slipping and imagining them normally. Then she comes up with the idea of a test subject who doesn't get embarassed about this stuff, which makes everyone else ''more'' embarassed, and...
--->'''Ashley''': No, Ashley, that's ''just Grace''.\\
'''Ashley''': That's ''still'' just Grace!\\
'''Ashley''': ''That's just Grace in a hat!''

** In the NP storyline "Original", Ashley tries ''not'' to do this with her transformation stories, but now she knows people who can actually ''do'' this stuff, it's more difficult. Given the nature of her stories, she realises she needs to create original characters so she can look at her friends without blushing. She ends up creating a totally original scientist who is Elliot in glasses, a totally origial assistant who is Susan with glasses and lighter hair, and a totally original test subject who is her with a different hairstyle. She is completely convinced these are original characters, even though her imagination keeps slipping and imagining them normally. Then she comes up with the idea of a test subject who doesn't get embarassed about this stuff, which makes everyone else ''more'' embarassed, and...

* In ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'', Sarah is creating a comic titled "The Wizard Sarah". Hmmm...
** She's [[IJustWantToBeSpecial jealous that the other characters have magic]], so it's understandable.

** In "The Thespian Catalyst", in order to practice his performance skills, Sheldon makes a play out of a story he wrote as a child, "Where No Sheldon Has Gone Before". In it, Spock from ''Star Trek'' takes 10-year-old Sheldon into the future so his genius can bring peace to "a vast and troubled galaxy", while his mother calls herself "a religious nut" and is happy to see him go save the future. Penny suggesting that his mother should have a more emotional reaction to her son leaving causes Sheldon to get too in-character and suffer an emotional breakdown, necessitating a call with his real mother.

** Leonard starts working on a novel about a crime-solving physicist with a "bigger-than-average" penis. His friends are reduced to villains and stereotypes. He ''claims'' the abrasive love interest is based on Penny, but she thinks the character acts more like Bernadette. In the end, Leonard realizes she's ''actually'' based on [[FreudWasRight his mom]], and decides to stop working on the book.

* The Creator/AdamSandler film ''Film/BedtimeStories'' has the main character of Skeeter tell his nephew and niece WishFulfillment fantasies with him in the starring role. They include such memorable moments as "Skeeticus" in Roman times creating an improvised set of ramps and jumping over a dozen elephants Evel Knievel-style on a horse carriage. Although this trope is subverted in the first story.

** Leonard starts working on a novel about a crime-solving physicist with a [[BiggusDickus "bigger-than-average" penis]]. His friends are reduced to villains and stereotypes. He ''claims'' the abrasive love interest is based on Penny, but she thinks the character acts more like Bernadette. In the end, Leonard realizes she's ''actually'' based on [[FreudWasRight his mom]], and decides to stop working on the book.

* The ''VideoGame/{{Arknights}}'' event ''Ancient Forge'' follows the plot of a movie co-written by and starring Lava and Nian. Lava, in reality a rookie Caster still learning how to properly harness her [[FunctionalMagic Originium Arts]], is depicted as one of Rhodes Island's strongest operators, a master of fire Arts, the only one smart enough to figure out how to save the day, and has her wearing [[ImpossiblyCoolClothes a cool new outfit]]. Nian, meanwhile, portrays herself as an InvincibleVillain and gives herself new powers based on whatever she thinks would be cool at the time, such as summoning an army of immortal terracotta soldiers or cleaving through a fortified city wall with a single swing of her sword, [[spoiler: but unlike Lava it's implied she's not embellishing her abilities; she's one of several PiecesOfGod and could probably do all of that and more if she wanted to]].

* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy'' where the Eds recount a story of [[NoodleIncident how they got stuck in Johnny's wall]] ended up with each Ed telling part of the story. In his story, Eddy is wealthy and everyone worships the ground he walks on. In Double D's story, he's more assertive than he is in real life and his friends are easily cowed by his scoldings. In Ed's story, he has superpowers and is the only one who can save the day. The story's only consistent elements were that it involved a jawbreaker bank and the Kanker Sisters.

* ''VideoGame/IMMeen'': The titular villain writes stories about himself to boost his already huge ego. You find excerpts from four of his completed ones- "Meen, Dinosaur Hunter", "Hooray For Meen", "Meen Goes To Mars", and "The Temple Of Meen"- on cell doors. Unfortunately, he doesn't use proper grammar, which has lead to many people disliking his work.

* ''VideoGame/IMMeen'': The titular villain writes fanfics about himself to boost his already huge ego. You find excerpts from four of his completed ones- "Meen, Dinosaur Hunter", "Hooray For Meen", "Meen Goes To Mars", and "The Temple Of Meen"- on cell doors. Unfortunately, he doesn't use proper grammar, which has lead to many people disliking his work.

* An InUniverse version in ''Kev: ComicBook/TheAuthority'': Kev and his SAS friends go to a book signing by one of their friends, reading his autobiographical book along the way. The more they read, the more inconsistencies, Hollywoodesque exaggeration and outright lies they find ("What'd he do, pass selection when he was ''12''?!"), but when they meet, the author confirms it's all executive-mandated BS. As he points to the adoring crowd behind him, he contemptuously says "This lot? All they want is fucking {{Film/Rambo}}".

* ''Series/TheSopranos'': Christopher Moltesanti produces a horror film, ''Film/{{Cleaver}}'', where undead mobster Michael comes back for revenge on his boss Salvatore and his cheating fiancé. It's quite obvious that Michael is a stand-in for Christopher, Salvatore for Tony, and Michael's fiancée for Adriana.

** Harris starts HypotheticalCasting for a film version, and picks Charles Nelson Reilly as Dietrich because he's "mad at him".

** The [=SBEmail=] "[[Recap/StrongBadEmailE176Hygiene hygiene]] has Strong Bad make a cruddy personal hygiene movie about John (played by [[SitcomArchNemesis Homestar]]), a fifth grader with terrible hygiene and no friends, and Gene (played by Strong Bad himself), "a beacon of light shining through the stink cloud generated by John." The movie goes on to explain why John sucks and Gene is awesome. [[spoiler:{{Subverted|Trope}} at the end, where John goes to an out-of-state college to reinvent himself, while Gene spends the rest of the fifth grade, and possibly his life, struggling to keep up his reputation.]]

* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy'' where the Eds recount a story of [[NoodleIncident how they got stuck in Johnny's wall]] ended up with each Ed telling part of the story. Needless to say, each member of the group sue-ifies himself to one extent or another. The story's only consistent elements were that it involved a jawbreaker bank and the Kanker Sisters.

* VideoGame/WarioWare has Wario Man's microgames, which are, at least in Touched starring Wario as the main character in every single one of them. Or barring that, they'll star some random character with Wario's face on them. Or just things like a dog with Wario's moustache.

* In VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft, the newest expansion, Cataclysm, is about how [[BigBad Deathwing]] ravages Azeroth. There are a series of quests where three drunken [=NPCs=] tell you how they 'dealt' with him while he was passing by in the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1bP-m_BwX0 most hilarious]] way possible.

* A web short made to advertise ''VideoGame/PuyoPuyo20thAnniversary'' features Klug writing a novel and then reading it to Sig. The main character of Klug's book is very obviously meant to be Klug himself, with a different name that's clearly still just "Klug", with the other characters being his friends and enemies. Klug writes his hero Lemres into the story as his ally, while Raffina and Feli, his rivals, are the villains. Klug himself messes up his speech a couple times and nearly says the people's actual names instead of the altered ones he made up for the book.

* A web short made to advertise ''VideoGame/PuyoPuyo20thAnniversary'' features Klug writing a novel and then reading it to Sig. The main character of Klug's book is very obviously meant to be Klug himself, with a different name that's clearly still just "Klug", with the other characters being his friends and enemies. Klug writes his hero Lemres into the story as his ally, while Raffina and Feli, his rivals, are the villains. Klug himself messes up his speech and nearly says the people's actual names instead of the altered ones he made up for the book.

* A one-time character named Nobuko from the first season of ''Anime/OjamajoDoremi'' writes a story starring a boy detective named "Tatekawa Nobuo", his scientist friend Professor Hadzuki, his friend/rival detective from Osaka Aiko Senoo, and Doremi the... friendly dog. Bonus points for the characters being double [[{{Expy}} expies]] of not only Doremi and her friends, but also various characters from ''Manga/DetectiveConan''-- in that order, [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld Conan Edogawa]], [[GadgeteerGenius Dr. Agasa]] and [[TheIdiotFromOsaka Heiji Hattori]].

* In ''Gardenscapes 2,'' Austin the butler is sometimes seen working on the manuscript for a thriller novel. The main character is an "intrepid butler" named Caustin.

* In ''VideoGame/SamAndMaxTheDevilsPlayhouse, Episode 5'', the [[FantasticVoyagePlot living room in Max's brain]] has a rack of 'ideas for novels in audiobook vinyl form', which can be listened to. One of them is a "FanFiction" about Flint Paper, which ends when Flint says that to solve the mystery, he needs to rely on "his best friend - [[SelfInsertFic Max!]]". The other stories are a Creator/DanBrown TakeThat starring a Mary Sue, with the AncientConspiracy involving Eli Whitney and two completely insane but violent works starring obvious {{AuthorAvatar}}s.