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Sister series to Animorphs about four teenagers with opposing personalities Trapped In Another World, where all of the classical polytheistic gods, demons, and legendary heroes from various mythologies fled when people stopped worshiping them in the "Old World". It had many of the themes of Animorphs, but aimed at an older audience, so it got to include "fun" subjects such as alcoholism, homophobia, religious intolerance, prejudice, obsessive compulsive disorder, and the best of all — homosexual pedophilic rape.
Includes examples of:
- All Myths Are True
- Barrier Maiden: The "gateway" Senna, though she has her own agenda.
- Badass Decay/Flanderization: David starts by seeming like a more badass Jake, even with/made more impressive by how he was a loser in the "real world", but his weaknesses eventually overtake him until mental weakness is more or less his defining feature. Unusual in that it arguably worked out for the better, letting the other three become stronger while he hit bottom.
- Beware The Nice Ones: Holy manslaughter, April.
- Big Bad: Depending on your viewpoint, Loki, Ka Anor, or Senna.
- Big Creepy Crawlies: The Hetwan.
- Black And Nerdy: Jalil.
- Bloody Murder: Witch's blood is poisonous. Loki's blood (which is black, and freezes as it bleeds) is apparently burning hot.
- Born In The Wrong Century: David.
- Bury Your Gays: Bye bye Ganymede.
- Cain And Abel: Senna and April.
- The Caligula: Most of the gods, but Neptune exemplifies the trope.
- Cloudcuckoolander: What everyone thought Senna was, before the events of the series.
- Cowardly Lion: Christopher is no less able than any of the other characters, and push comes to shove, he shows it. Otherwise, he's usually the first to advocate running away.
- Dark And Troubled Past: The entire main cast.
- Darker And Edgier: Essentially, it was a darker and edgier take on a lot of what made Animorphs popular.
- Dont You Dare Pity Me: Several characters express this.
- The Drag Along: Everyone, at some point, but most notably the Expy of Marco, Christopher.
- Dysfunction Junction
- Expy: Christopher was a thinly veiled expy of Marco from Animorphs, but more of a jerk, and with an odd honorable streak.
- Arguably, though, Jalil was the true expy, inheriting much of Marco's intelligence and insight.
- I'd say David is at least partly Jake.
- More like a Jake wannabe.
- I'd say they're all expies - Senna is a genderswap of the Animorph's David, April is Rachel and Cassie together, David is what would happen if woobie Tobias took Jake's role, Jalil is a human Ax, and Christopher is the genre savvy Marco.
- Flanderization: Subverted. The characters seem to be playing it straight for a few books, but eventually grow depths that shed a different light on past actions.
- Flaw Exploitation: Senna does this to everyone throughout, but especially in the climax of the story. Poor Jalil...
- Fiery Redhead: April. She's green-eyed to boot, and, of course, has an Irish ancestry.
- Friendship Moment: Mostly between Christopher and Jalil, when they stick up for each other despite their many arguments, especially when that lapses into the "real world."
- Freudian Excuse: Senna, though the book is narrated from her point of view, thus leaving the reader unsure what exactly to believe.
- There's no particular reason to believe otherwise, though, since she's not narrating at you, but in general. It did happen to work particularly well, 'cause Senna was shown to be human, but just as menacing.
- Genre Savvy: Played with, or possibly satired: Christopher babbles about how the laws of movies and TV are inescapable, and even predicts his own death through redemption.
- Gosh Dang It To Heck: Played straight at times, averted at others.
- Heroic Wannabe: David starts out as this and develops into more of a hero before being gradually deconstructed back into this.
- Heterosexual Life Partners: Christopher and Jalil unwillingly drift in this direction.
- Honor Before Reason/Horrible Judge Of Character: David in his protection of Senna.
- A House Divided: Most of the series. It's rare to actually find the four agreeing on any course of action.
- Immortal Immaturity: Pretty much ALL of the immortals, save the Celtic ones.
- Informed Judaism: David, only brought up when Christopher feels like being a Jerkass.
- I Want To Be A Real Man: David.
- High Octane Nightmare Fuel: Powers a lot of the tension in the story. Ka Anor, in particular, is
an insectophobe's anyone's worst nightmare. Ka Anor is Fear.
- Jade Colored Glasses: Done in a mild way to April, as she didn't break, but she definitely became more cynical.
- Jerkass/Jerkass Facade: Christopher wavers between the two, but is more the latter, which he admits at one point.
- Lampshade Hanging/Catch Phrase "Welcome to Everworld" serves as a general-purpose lampshade.
- Messiah Creep: Ironically, atheist/agnostic Jalil, who evolves from a guy trying to rationalize the situation to the one with the most power to stop Ka Anor and genuinely cares about morality and such. Might also be "Leader Creep", since by that time, David has lost some of the others' trust, while Jalil's been building his.
- Mighty Whitey: Subverted. Early leader David is Jewish, while later, leadership shifts to African American Jalil.
- Mind Game Ship: Perpetrated and exploited by Senna, especially towards David.
- Mommy Issues: Subverted; Senna's mom was generally a nice person who did want her daughter to be safe, but was too overwhelmed. Others would probably her situation sympathetic; Senna doesn't.
- Mysterious Waif: Senna.
- Nakama: Takes a long time to develop, but it's very fulfilling to follow its development.
- Official Couple: April and Jalil.
- Power Trio/Token Trio/Three Amigos: Superego Jalil, Id Christopher, and Ego April, during the time that David was bewitched away from the group.
- Pretend Prejudice
- Psycho For Hire: Keith
- Ragtag Bunch Of Misfits
- Raising The Steaks
- Redshirt Army: Everyone that is allied with the core four; played straightest with the Vikings.
- Red Oni Blue Oni: David and Christopher (red) to Jalil and April (blue).
- Rape Is Ok When It Is Female On Male, averted: Senna's degree of control over David is portrayed very creepily.
- Relationship Writing Fumble/Slap Slap Kiss: Expy Christopher seems to have inherited this from his original, Marco. He has a Slap Slap Kiss relationship with April, and admitted to finding her attractive. The Official Couple, Jalil and April, struck this troper as surprising because of this.
- Screwed By The Network: Because there was a chance the series could be renewed, the ending was deliberately vague. As a result, the books end with David having just come out of hitting bottom, and proceeded to mostly ignore him and leave him isolated, most likely because there wasn't enough length left to devote to building him back up. In addition, the Ka Anor plot ends up reading like a better foreshadowed, lighter version/prelude to the Animorphs' Bolivian Army Ending.
- Sibling Yin Yang: The malicious, crazy Senna and the generally kind, sensible April.
- Single Issue Psychology: See its entry at the trope page.
- The Slacker: Christopher.
- Space Whale Tear Jerker: Ganymede's death and Christopher's reaction.
- Square Cube Law: Lampshaded when a character points out that the elephant-sized wolf shouldn't be able to move, let alone dragons being able to fly.
- Took A Level In Badass: April, Jalil, and Christopher.
- Trapped In Another World
- Unobtainium: Coo-Hatch steel.
- Villain Episode: The book which Senna narrates.
- What The Hell Hero: Even more than Animorphs; a lot of the four's actions qualify on some level, but justified in that they really have little choice, most of the time.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: David, who thinks he's the Knight In Shining Armor in an adventure story. Worn away, but never completely dispelled.
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