History Main / TheChrisCarterEffect

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[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]

* ''WebAnimation/HelluvaBoss'': The show has a bad habit of adding more spinning plates into the mix rather than resolving any of them, such as the [[FallenAngel Cherubs]], [[ProfessionalKiller Striker]], [[TheMafia Crimson]], [[WillTheyOrWontThey Blitzo's relationship with Stolas]], etc. Since the series comes out periodically one episode at a time, fans started to become restless about this in the middle of Season 2, as it was continuing this trend while also having a few filler episodes that didn't advance any plots at all. Around that point, only ''one'' plot thread from the previous season was followed up on (Striker returning to kidnap Stolas on Stella's orders) The unrest grew to even greater volume when the long-awaited season 1 finale finally arrived after having been delayed significantly due to being ScrewedByTheLawyers. Fans had been hoping to see some kind of CharacterDevelopment or emotional reconciliation between Blitzo and Loona, only for that plot to be [[SpotlightStealingSquad completely sidelined in favor of a new character]] who [[CelebrityVoiceActor happened to be voiced]] by Music/{{Kesha}}(whom Creator/VivienneMedrano is [[AuthorAppeal notoriously a gigantic fan of]]) and given a song that takes up almost a third of the already shorter-than-usual episode's runtime.

* According to [[http://blog.immelmann.net/2010/10/08/the-end-of-concession/ the author]], this is why ''Webcomic/{{Concession}}'' is ending.

* ''Literature/TheNeverendingStory'' intentionally invokes this trope by starting many more story arcs than it intends to finish. One by one, they are dropped off with "that is another story, and shall be told, another time". [[spoiler:This is also the last line at the end of the book itself]]. Of course, given [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin the name]]...
** Also used as a plot device [[spoiler:as Bastian is told by the Water of Life that AURYN will not permit him to leave Fantastica until he's finished all the stories that he started. Atreyu and Falcor agree to do this in his stead.]]

* Played with in ''[[http://negamaki.thecomicseries.com Negamaki]]''. The plot points are introduced and wildly discarded, except it's acknowledged and played for laughs by the characters. Characters have, more than once, decided to "wait out" a current turn of events or attempt to ignore a twist with the knowledge it will just go away when the author gets bored.
** A WordOfGod post in the comments section declared that each page's plot is basically made up as it's being assembled.

* Parodied in one of ''WebAnimation/HomestarRunner'''s Strong Bad Emails, where a fan asks Strong Bad to "resolve all the cliffhangers". As there ''were'' no cliffhangers in the series, he obligingly created three just so they could be resolved seconds later. [[LiteralGenie Can't nobody say Strong Bad never did nothing for the peoples.]]

* Defied with ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'': Creator/AlexHirsch explicitly stated in interviews that, despite it being on the way to becoming the network's CashCowFranchise, he ended it after two seasons in order to avoid this trope.

->''"ABC announced this week that it has renewed Series/{{Lost}} for a fourth season. Said the show's writers, [[OhCrap 'Oh, crap.']]"''

* After 300 chapters of ''Manga/RentAGirlfriend'', the relationship between Kazuya and Chizuru hasn't progressed much since when the story started, and every major step they get in the relationship would be quickly met with StatusQuoIsGod, with a lot of the CharacterDevelopment either of the two would get usually being gone once the following arc starts -- Chapter 218 in particular being an infamous example of this. As such many fans have given up on the manga, feeling the UnresolvedSexualTension is never going anywhere.

It isn't solely overly-complicated plots that can do this, either. It can also be caused by a {{Cliffhanger}} followed up by [[CliffhangerWall one too many installments that neglect to resolve it]], or a series running on UnresolvedSexualTension and WillTheyOrWontThey that drags it on just a little too long.

->''"ABC announced this week that it has renewed Series/{{Lost}} for a fourth season. Said the show's writers, 'Oh, crap.'"''

* ''VideoGame/HelloNeighbor'' got hit with this even worse than FNAF did. As the game went through alphas, it became clearer that the developers were making it up as they went and were relying on the alleged "mystery" to get exposure (to point that many of the developers' Twitter posts consisted of begging for people to make theory videos) which wasn't helped by the game itself become increasingly overcomplicated and unpolished. The game's hype sunk like a stone upon the final release, where the longtime "mystery" of the neighbor's basement was answered in the ''first act'' , making the rest of the story vague and confusing, with the last chapter ending on a pathetic AllJustADream twist. The sequel would later fall into the exact same trap.

** Many of the plot elements related to the Spider-Totem introduced by Creator/JMichaelStraczynski during his run on ''ComicBook/SpiderMan'' from 2001 to 2007 gave readers a lot of doubletalk and mystical mumbo-jumbo, but very little in the way of concrete resolution, like exactly why Peter had to "evolve", why one cosmic entity wanted to bring him back from the dead while another thought he should stay deceased, the mysterious entities that resurrected Mysterio and Miss Arrow and what they wanted with Peter, etc. None of this was ever really explained. A degree of resolution was achieved in the ''ComicBook/SpiderVerse'' storyline, which explained the origins of the Inheritors and had Spider-Man and his allies defeat them.
** ''ComicBook/TheCloneSaga''. Originally, the story was supposed to wrap up after a few months, after an already complicated narrative. However, due to the [[ExecutiveMeddling efforts]] of Marvel executives, the story was extended for another year, with plot twists being reversed constantly, and supposedly dead characters appearing, reappearing and then dying anticlimactically. The story finally limped to its conclusion with another plot twist that had almost nothing to do with most of the events that preceded it ([[spoiler:ComicBook/NormanOsborn was back]]). It should be noted that, when the saga started, it was Marvel's highest-selling group of books. The act of stretching it to the limit for so long caused sales to slump, and fans turned away in droves.
** Most of the plots in the book during "Spider-Man's" ''ComicBook/BrandNewDay'' storyline essentially went nowhere. Mysteries such as who was Jackpot, what Mr. Negative was going to do with Peter's blood, what happened to erase Peter's memories, why Harry was alive, and more were given an anti-climactic resolution, dragged out for several years, or worse, both. The explanation for Harry Osborn's return was that the goblin serum revived him, which made no sense since it was the thing that killed him in the first place (the run by Creator/NickSpencer a decade later would eventually reveal he was just another clone and killed him off). Jackpot was a character that the readers never met before and was killed off during the same story. Mysteries such as the secret to how Peter's identity was made a secret again were resolved in a manner that most of the audience figured out already, leading many to question why it was kept a secret for three years. After a while, it became clear that the writers had no real major arc planned for the character and his mythos, and were just making it up as they went along.

* After 300 chapters of ''Manga/RentAGirlfriend'' the relationship between Kazuya and Chizuru hasn't progressed much since when the story started and every major step they get in the relationship would be quickly met with StatusQuoIsGod with a lot of the CharacterDevelopment either of the two would get usually being gone once the following arc starts. As such many fans have gived up on the manga feeling is not going anywhere.

* ''Manga/HunterXHunter'' suffers from extreme Schedule Slip, and hasn't come close to resolving many plots as a result, such as the Phantom Troupe and the Dark Continent arc. The series began to inch forward in stunted segments due to constant {{Hiatus}}, making little gains until 2016 finally saw the ball rolling with several [[WhamEpisode bang-up chapters]] before another long drought. In 2017, despite another hiatus, the story finally gets down to business, because this is the first time in a ''long'' time that Yoshihiro Togashi has taken a hiatus and promised to '''come back''' at a set return date and has found a nervous rhythm that is giving the story momentum.

* ''Franchise/PiratesOfTheCaribbean'' started as an inversion with [[Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanTheCurseOfTheBlackPearl the very first movie]] concluding the storyline and giving all the characters a [[EarnYourHappyEnding happy ending]] which is understandable giving it was [[TwoPartTrilogy meant to be a stand-alone movie]], but once the original movie became a huge SleeperHit and the start of a franchise, the writers decided to go against their original conclusion by pulling HappyEndingOverride after HappyEndingOverride over the three following sequels without really trying to bring the characters to a positive conclusion and commonly ending in a worse place they already were per movie. By the time of ''[[Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanOnStrangerTides On Stranger Tides]]'' most of the sympathetic characters were dead, PutOnABusToHell, disappeared with an UncertainDoom implication and the one character that seemed to be gaining a happy conclusion was [[spoiler: Barbossa, the villain of the original movie]] while Jack Sparrow seemed to get further from his objective of winning back the Black Pearl as the movies keep going and the newly introduced characters got not much resolution in favour of pulling more [[{{Cliffhanger}} Cliffhangers]]. This lead to a lot of fans to start to lose interest in the franchise feeling the writers were not intending to give the characters a happy ending as long as the movies keep being popular. ''[[Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanDeadMenTellNoTales Dead Men Tell No Tales]]'' tried to fix this by [[spoiler: giving Jack, Will and Elizabeth a happy ending]] only for TheStinger to have [[spoiler: Davy Jones coming back from the dead which to many fans make a lot of the struggles of the last four movies completely pointless]], meaning the franchise still hasn't left this trope yet.

* ''Franchise/PiratesOfTheCaribbean'' started as an inversion with [[Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanTheCurseOfTheBlackPearl the very first movie]] concluding the storyline and giving all the characters a [[EarnYourHappyEnding happy ending]] which is understandable giving it was [[TwoPartTrilogy meant to be a stand-alone movie]], but once the original movie became a huge SleeperHit and the start of a franchise, the writers decided to go against their original conclusion by pulling HappyEndingOverride after HappyEndingOverride over the three following sequels without really trying to bring the characters to a positive conclusion and commonly ending in a worse place they already were per movie. By the time of ''[[Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanOnStrangerTides On Stranger Tides]]'' most of the sympathetic characters were dead, PutOnABusToHell, disappeared with an UncertainDoom implication and the one character that seemed to be gaining a happy conclusion was [[spoiler: Barbossa, the villain of the original movie]] while Jack Sparrow seemed to get further from his objective of winning back the Black Pearl as the movies keep going and the newly introduced characters got not much resolution in favour of pulling more [[{{Cliffhanger}} Cliffhangers]]. This lead to lot of fans to start to lose interest in the franchise feeling the writers were not intending to give the characters a happy ending as long as the movies keep being popular. ''[[Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanDeadMenTellNoTales Dead Men Tell No Tales]]'' tried to fix this by [[spoiler: giving Jack, Will and Elizabeth a happy ending]] only for TheStinger to have [[spoiler: Davy Jones coming back from the dead which to many fans make a lot of the struggles of the last four movies completely pointless]], meaning the franchise still hasn't left this trope yet.

* ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'': A big complaint within the fandom was that Tite Kubo seemed to have so many hanging plot threads that he didn't seem to be paying any attention to. The final arc began the process of tying up all dangling plot threads, character issues, and backstories, even covering events the fandom had been convinced Tite Kubo had forgotten all about and addressing issues that the fandom had completely missed the original significance of. Unfortunately, due to the declining health of the author and Shonen Jump insisting on a quick end, the manga was CutShort and it is likely that the unanswered questions the author didn't get to will never be resolved.

* ''WebAnimation/HelluvaBoss'': The show has a bad habit of adding more spinning plates into the mix rather than resolving any of them, such as the [[FallenAngel Cherubs]], [[ProfessionalKiller Striker]], [[TheMafia Crimson Knowlastname]], [[WillTheyOrWontThey Blitzo's relationship with Stolas]], etc. Since the series comes out periodically one episode at a time, fans started to become restless about this in the middle of Season 2, as it was continuing this trend while also having a few filler episodes that didn't advance any plots at all. Around that point, only ''one'' plot thread from the previous season was followed up on(Striker returned to kidnap Stolas [[spoiler:[[BackForTheDead only to be killed off in the same episode, and even then Stolas wound up hospitalized as a result]]]]). The unrest grew to even greater volume when the long-awaited season 1 finale finally arrived after having been delayed significantly due to being ScrewedByTheLawyers. Fans had been hoping to see some kind of CharacterDevelopment or emotional reconciliation between Blitzo and Loona, only for that plot to be [[SpotlightStealingSquad completely sidelined in favor of a new character]] who [[CelebrityVoiceActor happened to be voiced]] by Music/{{Kesha}}(whom Creator/VivienneMedrano is [[AuthorAppeal notoriously a gigantic fan of]]) and given a song that takes up almost a third of the already shorter-than-usual episode's runtime.

* ''VideoGame/HelloNeighbor'' got hit with this even worse than FNAF did. As the game went through alphas, it became clearer that the developers were making it up as they went and were relying on the alleged "mystery" to get exposure (to point that many of the developers' Twitter posts consisted of begging for people to make theory videos) which wasn't helped by the game itself become increasingly overcomplicated and unpolished. The game's hype sunk like a stone upon the final release, which had a story that was just as vague as the alphas and ended on a pathetic AllJustADream GainaxEnding. The sequel would later fall into the exact same trap.

* ''WebAnimation/HelluvaBoss'': The show has a bad habit of adding more spinning plates into the mix rather than resolving any of them, such as the [[FallenAngel Cherubs]], [[ProfessionalKiller Striker]], [[TheMafia Crimson Knowlastname]], [[WillTheyOrWontThey Blitzo's relationship with Stolas]], etc. Since the series comes out periodically one episode at a time, fans started to become restless about this in the middle of Season 2, as it was continuing this trend while also having a few filler episodes that didn't advance any plots at all. Around that point, only ''one'' plot thread from the previous season was followed up on(Striker returned to kidnap Stolas [[spoiler:[[BackForTheDead only to be killed off in the same episode, and even then Stolas wound up hospitalized as a result]]]]). The unrest grew to even greater volume when the long-awaited season 1 finale finally arrived after having been delayed significantly due to being ScrewedByTheNetwork. Fans has been hoping to see some kind of CharacterDevelopment or emotional reconciliation between Blitzo and Loona, only for that plot to be [[SpotlightStealingSquad completely sidelined in favor of a new character]] who [[CelebrityVoiceActor happened to be voiced]] by Music/{{Kesha}}(whom Creator/VivienneMedrano is [[AuthorAppeal notoriously a gigantic fan of]]) and given a song that takes up almost a third of the already shorter-than-usual episode's runtime.

* ''VideoGame/HelloNeighbor'' got hit with this even worse than FNAF did. As the game went through alphas, it became clearer that the developers were making it up as they went and were relying on the alleged "mystery" to get exposure (to point that many of the developers' Twitter posts consisted begging for people to make theory videos) which wasn't helped by the game itself become increasingly overcomplicated and unpolished. The game's hype sunk like a stone upon the final release, which had a story that was just as vague as the alphas and ended on a pathetic AllJustADream GainaxEnding. The sequel would later fall into the exact same trap.

* ''VideoGame/HelloNeighbor'' got hit with this even worse than FNAF did. As the game went through alphas, it became clearer that the developers were making it up as they went and were relying on the alleged "mystery" to get exposure (to point that many of the developers' Twitter posts begging for people to make theory videos) which wasn't helped by the game itself become increasingly overcomplicated and unpolished. The game's hype sunk like a stone upon the final release, which had a story that was just as vague as the alphas and ended on a pathetic AllJustADream GainaxEnding.

[[TropeNamer Named for]] Creator/ChrisCarter, creator of ''Series/TheXFiles'',[[note]](not the baseball player(s) or the electronic music pioneer)[[/note]] which some believe to be the godfather of this trope.

It has nothing to do with the former Minnesota Vikings wide receiver, Cris Carter. Note the missing "H" in his name. It also has nothing to do with Beatles DJ and former Dramarama member Chris Carter.