Must be Monday. New podcast! Just click on the fancy logo below.
SubpagesMain
|
|
|
 | This entry is trivia, which is cool and all, but not a trope. On a work, it goes on the Trivia tab. | |
|
An Orphaned Reference is a scene or line that refers to something that has been cut from the final version. In milder cases, this only means that what was supposed to be a Meaningful Echo loses its additional meaning; in more severe cases, the lost background information can cause apparent Noodle Incidents, Plot Holes or Ass Pulls.
Compare The Artifact. See also Dub Induced Plothole and Adaptation Induced Plothole; all adaptation and dub examples go there. Some video game examples may overlap with Dummied Out.
Examples
open/close all folders
Anime and Manga
- Hilariously lampshaded in Dragon Half, when Dug Fin is horrified to discover no one knows who he is. He gets a hold of the series' first episode on videotape and reviews it, only to discover all his scenes were cut from the final version!
- In Little Nemo Adventures In Slumberland, Nemo has a dream where he goes down to the pantry and sees a note on the ice box saying "You promised", before water bursts out and floods the house. Viewers watching the old VHS cut would make the connection that Nemo had just broken his promise to King Morpheus, but miss out on the double meaning because of a deleted scene while Nemo was awake where he promised his mother he'd stay out of the ice box and not eat the pie she'd baked.
Films — Animated
- In Lilo & Stitch, Lilo is shown to enjoy taking photographs of the obese tourists who come to visit the island, which the audience is meant to assume is just part of her quirky personality. However, a deleted scene shows tourists asking her if she's going to "Hula dance" for them, and who all seem to have a very stereotypical and condescending view of Hawaiians. Then, in a surprisingly somber moment, she expresses frustration with the way visitors treat the actual natives of the island. The added context makes it clear that the photos are Lilo's way of dealing with white visitors, rather than a harmless quirk.
Films — Live-Action
- Scott Pilgrim vs. The World has some milder ones:
- "Is that seriously the end of the story?" — Originally, this was Kim's response to Scott's flashback about how he met Knives on the bus (she dropped her books, he picked them up), later echoed by Ramona when she hears it from Knives. The flashback scene was cut in the final version.
- In an early, discarded version of Scott and Ramona's first date, Ramona was seen lighting a cigarette, saying she smokes only on special occasions. Scott was supposed to be echoing her after his battle with Roxy, when he says he only drinks on special occasions.
- In The Sixth Sense, when the protagonist realises he's a ghost, there is an echo of the boy saying "I see people". The line "I see people" was not used in the final cut (he only says "I see dead people").
- Several in Monkeybone.
- Harry Knowles of Ain't It Cool News had two cameos as a next-door neighbor, wearing shirts that said "Lucky" and "Stiff"; one of the cameos was cut.
- The stain on Stu's Grim Reaper costume is explained from a deleted scene, that showed him stealing it.
- In the end of The Goonies, Data has a line about the Giant Octopus, which was cut from the film. It was included in the Disney version, however.
- An example of this trope is actually in the title of Batman Forever. The title seems odd to many audience members until they realize it is in reference to a line of dialogue that was in a deleted scene.
- Monty Pythons Life Of Brian originally had a whole subplot about King Otto, who was to have been A Nazi by Any Other Name. The only mention of Otto in the final film is the appearance his crack suicide squad in the final scene.
- In The Wizard of Oz, there's a scene where the Wicked Witch is giving instructions for her flying monkeys to intercept Dorothy's party, and she says, "They'll give you no trouble, I promise you that. I've sent a little insect on ahead to take the fight out of them." This was in reference to a deleted scene where a bug called the Jitterbug bit them and they broke into a dance number.
- In Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Eddie scolds Roger for dancing for the bar patrons and potentially blowing his cover while "I'm out there risking my neck out for you". It's a fairly generic line, except that the immediate events don't warrant it; Eddie went from leaving Roger in the hidden room at the bar straight to his office, where he meets Jessica, and then back out to find Roger dancing. The line makes more sense when one considers the deleted scene (included in the comic version) that would have followed Roger's drop-off, where Eddie is caught snooping in Jessica's dressing room by Judge Doom and is sent to Toontown, where he is given a "tooneroo", a toon pig painted on top of his head. He goes back to his office to wash it off, which then segues to his encounter with Jessica.
- Star Trek Generations had baddie Soran make a hammier than usual remark about Geordi's heart just not being in a conversation. Which made no sense on its own, but referred to a cut scene that involved him torturing Geordi by repeatedly stopping his heart. You can see the cut scene here
 .
- It also has Dr. Crusher saying "I removed the nanoprobe" (that Soran used to stop Geordi's heart), leaving the audience to wonder "what nanoprobe?"
- In National Treasure, there's a quick moment where one character is seen grabbing a knife. It was never put to use later; the production team was planning on it, but cut that element out (partly for ratings reasons).
- InThe Lord of the Rings, Faramir's lines "A chance for Faramir, captain of Gondor, to prove his quality," and "Tell him I send a mighty gift" were supposed to be Meaningful Echos of what his father Denethor says to him earlier, in Osgiliath. However, the scene in Osgiliath was deleted, so the lines ended up sounding a little off from Faramir's characterisation. The Osgiliath scene was restored in the Extended Version of the film.
- In the Richard Lester cut of Superman II when Clark sees General Zod taking over the White House, Lois tells Clark "You didn't know", only for Clark to reply "He knew". Clark is referring to Jor-El telling him about the Kryptonian villains, but those scenes were removed from the Lester cut.
- Three Men and a Baby had a deleted plot thread about Jack Holden (Ted Dansen's character) appearing in a dog food commercial. This explains the cardboard standees of him that pop up in a couple spots in the final cut that inspired a famous Urban Legend.
- In Wing Commander, the Pilgrim is asked at one point about his pilgrim pendant, to which he replies that he doesn't have it anymore. The reason why he lost it is never explained in the movie. The reason for that is because a scene where he stabs a traitor with the pendant was filmed but cut from the final version of the movie.
- There's a deleted scene from Kung Pow where an old man writes "MOUTH" on the Chosen One's face. There's a scene or two in the final cut where this writing is still visible.
Live-Action TV
- In The Sarah Jane Adventures episode "Whatever Happened To Sarah Jane" Maria is wiped from time and only Alan remembers her. Chrissie pays Alan a visit after time has been altered and tells him they never had a daughter. Alan protests that Chrissie was at their house earlier and saw Maria. This refers to a cut scene earlier in the serial where Chrissie does indeed visit the house and sees Maria.
- When the first few hour-long episodes of Cheap Seats were cut down to a half-hour, a few references and jokes were left orphaned. Example: in the "Superdogs/Superjocks" episode, there was a warning in "What 2 Look 4" for an obscene number of dog-puns. The subsequent edits chopped out the majority of them. (there were still some groaners, but not enough to justify a warning.)
- The producer's cut of the Parks and Recreation episode "Halloween Surprise" includes a scene where Chris recommends that Ann try "dating herself" instead of getting involved with anymore men, but this was cut from the aired version. In the next episode, "Ben's Parents", Ann mentions that she can't date Chris because she is dating herself. Although she explains what she means, it comes slightly out of nowhere.
- This can occasionally happen on Wheel of Fortune, of all shows. Typically, the producers will edit out a cycle of turns if it doesn't affect the score or the puzzle (for instance, if all three players consecutively call wrong letters, hit Lose a Turn, or hit Bankrupt when they have no money). In some instances, host Pat Sajak has made reference to such turns — most often in the form of telling a player that a letter was already called, when the first such instance was edited out; saying that a player hit Bankrupt X amount of times; or making some comment conducive to finally uncovering a letter after several wrong ones were called, even though the home viewer only saw one or two at best.
Tabletop RPG
- The Avalon sourcebook for 7th Sea has a Destiny Spread that grants the character a "1 Point Druidic Secrets Advantage." But Druidic Secrets didn't make it to the printed book.
- Mutants & Masterminds Second Edition Silver Age book has a referenceto A villain's handbook that never materialized.
Theater
- Ruddigore: Originally in the second act, Old Adam was to have changed his name to Gideon Crawle when he turned evil along with his master. This change of name was undone, but one reference to Gideon Crawle inexplicably remained.
- Shakespeare had to deal with it (or at least his literary executors did): In the First Folio there are various references to things which were changed from the original "final" texts. For example in Henry IV there's a reference to Oldcastle in the stage directions, which is the name Falstaff first had until some descendants of the real Oldcastle complained. There's also a punny line that only works with the name Oldcastle.
- Due to time constraints, many stage productions of Sweeney Todd cut the second part of the contest scene between Todd and Pirelli, where they compete to pull a person's tooth quickly and cleanly. However, few if any productions alter Todd's line before the contest, that he "can shave a cheek and pull a tooth with ten times more dexterity" than Pirelli.
Video Games
- In The Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion there's a quest hook that can be added to your list about the Black Horse Courier needing more staff. The quest itself was never added to the game.
- In Portal 2, while fighting Wheatley, he will comment that he didn't expect you to survive up till then because all the others he tried to escape with died. Word Of God says that this was a reference to a subplot that was ultimately dropped, but they kept the line because they thought it sounded fitting and might incite curiosity into what happened while Chell was asleep.
- In Escape Velocity Nova, the Universe Chronology included in the bundled documentation mentioned something called TCTLIDS being discovered and used to create a Fantastic Drug called FATE. The game's FAQ reveals that TCTLIDS was supposed to stand for "The Creature That Lives In Deep Space" before being removed from the Nova universe during its development.
Visual Novel
- The eighth Episode of Umineko No Naku Koro Ni makes a reference to Land of the Golden Witch, an arc which was supposed to be the original Episode 3 of the series. When the author saw that everyone found both Legend and Turn to be too difficult, he scrapped Land and released Banquet of the Golden Witch instead. In-universe, Land of the Golden Witch is the third message bottle from Rokkenjima that was never found.
|
|
