A very common fictional concept is that the characters are unaware of the fact that they are characters in somebody else's work of fiction.
This separation between the characters' world and the audience is the
Fourth Wall — named for the imaginary wall at the front of a stage play beyond which the actors are (usually) not supposed to cross.
It's an
Omnipresent Trope, because the separation of fiction and audience helps preserve the latter's
Willing Suspension of Disbelief: The fictional characters treat their story as
Real Life, and audience interprets it the same way.
See
Three Wall Set for the production implications of this concept; for example,
The Couch often directly faces the
Fourth Wall.
Straight uses of the
Fourth Wall are
far too numerous and trivial to list, compared to examples of
Breaking the Fourth Wall or when there is
No Fourth Wall.
The exploration and subversion of the
Fourth Wall is a common trait of
Post Modernism.
Not to be confused with
That web show done by Linkara that reviews bad comic books.
Big list of related pages (overlaps somewhat with
Metafiction Demanded This Index):
