History Recap / BigFinishDoctorWho035Ish

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ish_0.jpg]]

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

* AndIMustScream: [[spoiler: Cawdrey, a linguist, is left "without language... forever" by the end of the story. Given all the various things that the Doctor described as "language" earlier in the audio, this can be ''very harsh indeed''.]]

* ArtificialIntelligence: Book [[spoiler:and Warren.]]

* CreepyMonotone: [[spoiler: When the guests start saying "ish" at the end of episode two. Except the Sixth Doctor, as per usual, who seems to be in a [[NoIndoorVoice shouting match]] with one of the guests.]]
* DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment: Cawdrey apologizes. ''A Lot''.
* EldritchAbomination: The ''...ish'' is a living, sentient word which literally eats meaning and can reduce humans to babbling zombies just by being spoken in their vicinity. [[spoiler:In the end, though, it just wants to go home, which makes it one of the milder examples of this trope.]]

* FunnyBackgroundEvent: [[spoiler: When the Ish makes its presence known at the end of episode 2, The Doctor can be heard in the background emphatically arguing with someone while only saying "ish".]]

* SeparatedByACommonLanguage: The Doctor and Peri argue over Americanisms, which the Doctor considers a corruption of the English language. [[spoiler:[[ChekhovsGun Later,]] they use equivalent terms in American and British English to confuse the ''...ish'' and send it into retreat.]]

** The "Beginning" of the Dictionary being Aardvark could very well be one to ''Series/BlackAdder the Third''.

* TomatoInTheMirror: [[spoiler:Warren]].
* VerbThis: The Doctor himself. "Oh, circumlocute ''this!''", to [[spoiler: Warren.]]
* VirtualGhost: The Doctor brings Osefa back as one of these to investigate her alleged suicide. In a rare variation of the trope, [[spoiler: she continues to live, without drama.]]
* TheVirus: ...Ish.

* ItsPronouncedTroPAY

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: At one point during CensoredForComedy Peri utters "We're ***ed."

* MythologyGag: There are some amusing in-jokes amidst the wordplay in ...ish. One of Warren’s acts of sabotage apparently resulted in the creation of an impossibly thick encyclopedia volume starting with DAL, referring to Terry Nation’s apocryphal claim to have named his creations from the spine of an encyclopedia volume covering DAL to LEK. The Adjective of Noun is used to describe the structure of many classic episode titles (especially those of Season 14).

** The "Beginning" of the Dictionary being Aardvark could very well be one to Series/BlackAdder the third.

* BattleInTheCentreOfTheMind

* AddedAlliterativeAppeal: The Doctor throws a few in there in this adventure.

* EldritchAbomination: The ''...ish'' is a living, sentient word which literally eats meaning and can reduce humans to babbling zombies just by being spoken in their vicinity. [[spoiler:In the end, though, it just wants to go home, which makes it one of the milder examples of this trope.]]
* EternalEnglish: Played straight.
* FinishingEachOthersSentences: Warren and Peri hit it off so quickly that they do this.
* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: At one point during CensoredForComedy Peri utters "We're ***ed."
* GrammarNazi: The Doctor describes tenses and variants in gusto of how the English language SHOULD be spoken.
* GreatBigBookOfEverything: Book is trying to become one.

* ShoutOut: The AAH-AAH!! sound effect from FamilyFeud gets used.

** The "Beginning" of the Dictionary being Aardvark could very well be one to BlackAdder the third.

** "[[Literature/MobyDick Call me Ishmael..!]]"

* SoundEffectBleep: Used in-story as a means to keep Peri and Bob from hearing or saying ''...ish''. Also PlayedWith, when at one point Peri gets bleeped while very definitely saying [[GettingCrapPastTheRadar something other than]] "...ish".

The Doctor uses Osefa's BizarreAlienBiology to create a makeshift VirtualGhost out of her memories. It turns out that Osefa and Book recently visited an ancient tribal culture, whose people believed that all of language was created by a single word. Osefa turns out to have used grant money to investigate a very non-scientific field called transcendental linguistic (which greatly offends Cawdrey). She was convinced that the amount of possible meanings a word can have reflects its lexical status. For example, a word like "as" or "so" can have dozens of meanings, whereas longer words are less frequently used, therefore more rare, therefore the longest word in the universe -- the Omniverbum -- will only have a single meaning and thus have maximum lexicographical weight. Everyone's all very skeptical about this until the conference's guests get stuck on a MadnessMantra of "...ish". And all the written text around them spontaneously develops errors.

** "[[{{Alien}} Even in space, you could hear it scream]]."
** "[[MobyDick Call me Ishmael..!]]"

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: At one point during ThisTropeIsBleep Peri utters "We're ***ed."

* ThisTropeIsBleep: At one point the Doctor equips himself, Peri and Cawdrey with linguistic devices that bleep out ***.

* MagicalDatabase: Book is trying to become one.

--> "Pages of text books are spilling out on the floor! Covered in nonsense verse! The translation systems are speaking in tongues! And the attendee listings for the conference, which I've personally checked three times has... has...! ''[[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotHeinous TYPOS''!"