History Theatre / SwanLake

* BigbadFriend: In some productions Rothbart doubles as Wolfgang, Siegfried's tutor.

* DownerEnding: There are a few alternative endings including, [[spoiler: Siegfried's accidental betrayal causes Odette to turn into a swan permanently and Siegfried is left alone to mourn her]] and [[spoiler: Siegfried attempts to fight Von Rothbart with the result that they both fall into the lake and drown, leaving Odette both widowed and cursed forever]].

* {{Leitmotif}}

* AllegedLookalikes: Disguised as the white swan...despite being dressed in black.

* ClipItsWings: [[BigBad Von Rothbart's]] power is typically broken at the end by injuring one of his wings.

* {{Disneyfication}}: Depending on the staging, the BittersweetEnding may be changed to HappilyEverAfter. The same change was made in the animated feature ''TheSwanPrincess'', a direct example applied to the ballet's plot.
** Interestingly, the HappyEnding seems to have been the original, but ExecutiveMeddling (or something of that nature) caused it to be changed to the BittersweetEnding accepted today.

* ''{{Webcomic/Roommates}}'' has an arc (''The Such Stuff...'') which is best described as ''Swan Lake'' [[XMeetsY meets]] ''{{Film/Inception}}''. As expected it's a massive MindScrew which gets a lot easier on the brain if you know the basic storyline of this ballet. It also has a villain who introduces herself as "Odile" and a dream sequence which discusses the RevisedEnding controversy.

* ''PrincessTutu'' (a fairytale based series which take considerable influence from ''Swan Lake'')

* ''BarbieOfSwanLake''

* PropheticDream: In versions where the prologue is used, Siegfried dreams of Odette and her transformation before meeting her. [[spoiler: In one variation, this turns out to also be a DyingDream that he has in the finale]].

* The second game in the ''DarkParables'' PC game series presents Odette (only identified as the SwanLake Princess) as a PosthumousCharacter.

* DownerEnding: There are a few alternative endings including, [[spoiler: Siegfried's accidental betrayal causes Odette to turn into a swan permanently and Siegfried is left alone to mourn her]] and [[spoiler: Siegfried attempts to fight Von Rothbart with the result that they both fall into the lake and drown leaving Odette both widowed and cursed forever]].

** [[spoiler:TogetherInDeath]]: [[Odette and Siegfried at the end]].

* DistressedDamsel: Odette and all the other swan maidens.

* PowerOfLove

** [[spoiler:TogetherInDeath: Odette and Siegfried at the end]]

* ''AboutSidorovVova''

* ''{{Loom}}'', a 1990 PC adventure game, used SwanLake for the [[PublicDomainSoundtrack entire sound track.]]

* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler: When Siegfried accidentally confesses his love to Odile, he seals Odette's fate: her spell is now unbreakable. Odette, doomed to swan form perpetually, leaps into the lake and drowns herself. Unwilling to live without her, poor Siegfried follows suit and the two [[TogetherInDeath die together]]. Sometimes, the two are shown rising to heaven in an apotheosis.]] In some versions of the ballet, this is [[spoiler:changed to a happy ending, where Odette lives and she and the other swans are freed from their captivity, and sometimes this includes Odile being redeemed as well.]] ''See ''{{Disneyfication}}'', below''.

Many critics have disputed the original source of the ''Swan Lake'' story. The Russian ballet patriarch Fyodor Lopukhov has called ''Swan Lake'' a "national ballet" due to the swans which are common in Russian romantic lyrics, while many of the movements of the ''corps de ballet'' originated from Slavonic ring-dances. According to Lopukhov, "both the plot of Swan Lake (despite the fact that it is based on German source), the image of the Swan, and the very idea of a faithful love are essentially Russian". Though the scenario is (as in the case of ''Theatre/TheNutcracker'') tenuously based on a story by a German author, in this case Johann Karl August Musäus' ''Der geraubte Schleier'' ("The Stolen Veil"), this provides only the general outline of the plot; the Russian folktale "Literature/TheWhiteDuck" also bears some resemblance to the story of the ballet and might have been another possible source. The contemporaries of Tchaikovsky recalled the composer taking great interest in the life story of Ludwig II, the Bavarian King and Count Palatine of the Rhine, who was constantly associated with the symbol of the Swan, and whom "whether consciously or not"” Tchaikovsky chose as the prototype of the dream-haunted Prince Siegfried.

* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: Prince Siegfried is said to be based on [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_II_of_Bavaria Ludwig II]], the nineteenth century Bavarian monarch often referred to as "the Swan King."

Many critics have disputed the original source of the ''Swan Lake'' story. The Russian ballet patriarch Fyodor Lopukhov has called ''Swan Lake'' a "national ballet" due to the swans which are common in Russian romantic lyrics, while many of the movements of the ''corps de ballet'' originated from Slavonic ring-dances. According to Lopukhov, "both the plot of Swan Lake (despite the fact that it is based on German source), the image of the Swan, and the very idea of a faithful love are essentially Russian". Though the scenario is (as in the case of ''TheNutcracker'') tenuously based on a story by a German author, in this case Johann Karl August Musäus' „''Der geraubte Schleier'' ("The Stolen Veil"), this provides only the general outline of the plot; the Russian folktale "Literature/TheWhiteDuck" also bears some resemblance to the story of the ballet and might have been another possible source. The contemporaries of Tchaikovsky recalled the composer taking great interest in the life story of Ludwig II, the Bavarian King and Count Palatine of the Rhine, who was constantly associated with the symbol of the Swan, and whom "whether consciously or not"” Tchaikovsky chose as the prototype of the dream-haunted Prince Siegfried.

Many critics have disputed the original source of the ''Swan Lake'' story. The Russian ballet patriarch Fyodor Lopukhov has called ''Swan Lake'' a "national ballet" due to the swans which are common in Russian romantic lyrics, while many of the movements of the ''corps de ballet'' originated from Slavonic ring-dances. According to Lopukhov, "both the plot of Swan Lake (despite the fact that it is based on German source), the image of the Swan, and the very idea of a faithful love are essentially Russian". Though the scenario is (as in the case of ''TheNutcracker'') tenuously based on a story by a German author, in this case Johann Karl August Musäus' „''Der geraubte Schleier'' ("The Stolen Veil"), this provides only the general outline of the plot; the Russian folktale "TheWhiteDuck" also bears some resemblance to the story of the ballet and might have been another possible source. The contemporaries of Tchaikovsky recalled the composer taking great interest in the life story of Ludwig II, the Bavarian King and Count Palatine of the Rhine, who was constantly associated with the symbol of the Swan, and whom "whether consciously or not"” Tchaikovsky chose as the prototype of the dream-haunted Prince Siegfried.