Line #18 Main/WatsonianVersusDoylist


1	->"There are ''no'' inconsistencies in the ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' books; occasionally, however, there are alternate pasts."
2	-->-- '''Creator/TerryPratchett''' on alt.fan.pratchett, wearing his Watsonian hat.
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4	->"Maybe the Patrician in ''Literature/TheColourOfMagic'' was Vetinari, but written by a more stupid writer?"
5	-->-- '''Creator/TerryPratchett''' on alt.fan.pratchett, wearing his Doylist hat.
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7	When a creator answers a question about their work, should they provide an InUniverse answer or a RealLife answer? The former is the Watsonian perspective, the latter Doylist.
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9	The terms [[note]](which seem to have originated, or at least been popularized, on the Creator/LoisMcMasterBujold fan mailing list)[[/note]] reference ''Literature/SherlockHolmes'':
10	* '''Watsonian''' commentary relates to Dr. John Watson, Holmes' friend and [[DirectLineToTheAuthor supposed chronicler of his adventures in-universe]].
11	* '''Doylist''' commentary relates to Sir Creator/ArthurConanDoyle, the RealLife author of the ''Holmes'' stories.
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13	Simply put, if you were to ask a question about Sherlock Holmes, you would probably get a different answer depending on whether you asked Dr. Watson or Sir Arthur.
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15	'''Watsonian''' or '''in-universe''' or '''diegetic''' explanations function within the logic of the narrative. Watsonian explanations are things like "Character X was lying", "He had plastic surgery over the summer", and "The main character fell off a cliff". Tropes which take a generally Watsonian perspective include:
16	* AnthropicPrinciple
17	* AuthorsSavingThrow
18	* Some forms of DeathOfTheAuthor
19	* FanWank
20	* FridgeBrilliance
21	* FridgeHorror
22	* HandWave
23	* InUniverse
24	* JustifiedTrope
25	* The many justifications that follow {{Headscratchers/Headscratchers}}.
26	* {{Retcon}}
27	* WildMassGuessing
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29	'''Doylist''' or '''out-of-universe''' or '''exegetic''' commentary considers the work as a created object, and prefers exegetic explanations with particular attention to the author's intentions. Doylist explanations are things like "The author changed his mind" or "The actor died, so they had to retire the character" or "They didn't have the budget for an animatronic puppet, so they changed the character to an ordinary human". Doylist tropes include:
30	* ArtisticLicense and all of its subtropes
31	* TheCharacterDiedWithHim
32	* DependingOnTheWriter
33	* DiedDuringProduction
34	* ExecutiveMeddling
35	* EnforcedTrope
36	* ForgotAboutHisPowers
37	* IdiotBall and all its subtropes
38	* TheLawOfConservationOfDetail
39	* TheOtherDarrin
40	* PanderingToTheBase and all of its subtropes.
41	* PlotHole
42	* RealLifeWritesThePlot and all of its subtropes
43	* RuleOfIndex and all its subtropes
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45	A more modern example might be the proliferation of RubberForeheadAliens in the ''Franchise/StarTrek'' series. It is revealed in a ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode that an ancient humanoid race "seeded" the galaxy with their genes, thereby causing humanoid intelligent life to evolve independently throughout the Milky Way. This is the Watsonian explanation. The Doylist explanation is that RubberForeheadAliens are cheap to produce, require relatively little imagination to write for (MostWritersAreHuman, after all) or design, allow the audience to easily read the emotions of alien characters, etc. (And budget was always a concern for ''Franchise/StarTrek''; when Klingons first exhibited the RubberForeheadAliens trope it was an ''improvement'' on their previous make-up!)
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47	Another example is the InUniverse example in ''Theatre/NoisesOff'', where Freddie is such a method actor, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjkRw2GAxRo he needs a motivation for everything]]. The director and his co-stars initially tell him it's because the jokes later in the play will have no sense without certain things happening, and that he also plays the Sheik because it's part of a joke. But because Freddie's deeply depressed from a recent divorce, Lloyd gives up and gives him a Watsonian reason for why his character is doing anything and why he looks exactly like the Sheik.
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49	{{Consistency}} plays a major role in whether a trope is Watsonian or Doylist. By default, Watsonian tropes are defined by '''Internal Consistency''', and are susceptible to '''[[ContinuityLockout Excess of Internal Consistency]]''' in the hands of an author that doesn't know how to restrict information to focus on the narrative. Meanwhile, Doylist tropes are defined by '''External and Genre Consistency''', and could suffer from '''[[WillingSuspensionOfDisbelief Lack of Internal Consistency]]''' if the author doesn't have the ability (either by ExecutiveMeddling or their own writing skills) to address the narrative oddities in their work. Administrivia/TropesAreTools, and neither explanation is more preferable than the other.
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51	When PlayingWithATrope, note that sometimes a Doylist explanation is interjected purposely into a narrative; for example, in ''Film/MontyPythonAndTheHolyGrail'' the Knights of the Round Table (or what is left of them) are chased by the Legendary Black Beast of "AAAAAAAARGH" in the common surreal Creator/TerryGilliam style transitional animation, and are eventually cornered with no chance to escape. What saves them? The animator suffers from a fatal heart attack. Series with NoFourthWall or as little of one as possible exaggerate this line of thought so that the Doylist answer ''is'' the Watsonian one; for instance, the titular ''ComicBook/TheUnbelievableGwenpool'' has many of her actions motivated by the knowledge that she'll be doomed to being CListFodder or trapped in ComicBookLimbo if she fails to be an important enough character in the Franchise/MarvelUniverse for future out-of-universe writers to use.
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53	On a less absurdist note, DirectLineToTheAuthor is a way of smuggling Doylist explanations into a Watsonian paradigm by introducing a fictional author. And finally, most creators don't stick to strictly one interpretation, as the page quotes from [=PTerry=] suggest -- it should be also noted that in ''Discworld'', Watsonian and Doylist perspectives frequently overlap with each other, as "narrative causality" is a commonly accepted force in-universe...
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55	Conversely, some authors acknowledge that they don't have complete hold over the characters they've created and allow them to operate on their own logic -- which is an example of Watsonian perspective influencing Doylist one.
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57	As a fun aside, in the German-speaking fandom of the ComicBook/DisneyDucksComicUniverse, the two ways of analyzing the stories are called ''Donaldismus literaricus'' (which treats the work of Creator/CarlBarks and others as works of art and literature) and ''Donaldismus archaeologicus'' (which treats them as factual reports from the Earth-like planet called ''Stella Anatium'' -- the Star of the Ducks). In the D.O.N.A.L.D. (''Deutsche Organisation Nichtkommerzieller Anhänger des lauteren Donaldismus'' = German Organization of Non-Commercial Adherents of True Donaldism) the latter tends to dominate. WesternAnimation/DonaldDuck comics are SeriousBusiness, definitely.
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59	Compare and contrast LiteraryAgentHypothesis, which tries to have it both ways by positing that Doyle was acting as Watson's literary agent by writing a fictionalized account of the real events that happened to Watson.

Context Main / WatsonianVersusDoylist