Basic Trope: A complex story is told through fragments.
- Straight: The TV show Mystery Riddles has a narrative that spans the length of the show, which is doled out to the viewers piece by piece rather than in one huge explanative blob.
- Exaggerated: Mystery Riddles borders on the incomprehensible unless you specifically look for the plot.
- Downplayed: Mystery Riddles is divided into sub-narratives which, while impressive when put together, are also easily understood and independently watchable within their own contexts.
- Justified: The show deals with several complex characters who don't experience uniform, linear development, and the narrative reflects that.
- Inverted: The entire plot for Mystery Riddles is more or less telegraphed to the audience in the first episode.
- Subverted: Apart from the unusual presentation, the main story of Mystery Riddles is fairly straightforward and easy to follow.
- Parodied: Instead of actually making a show, the creators suture together a bunch of fragments and tell the fans: "go nuts".
- Zig-Zagged: Mystery Riddles starts out clunky and hamhanded in terms of plot, but manages to become deeper and more complex as the seasons go on, though of course plenty of fans consider the new seasons worse because they're "too weird and unfocused".
- Averted: Mystery Riddles is told in a simple, but not simplistic, fashion.
- Enforced: The story takes place across a number of different media, including its own Alternate Reality Game.
- Lampshaded: Ads for the show state: "If you don't watch from the beginning, you'll never figure out what's going on."
- Invoked: The showrunners want to emulate the successes of other prestige TV shows.
- Exploited: The writers hide their most important plot twists in the show's minutiae.
- Defied: The executives demand that the show be made into a more straightforward affair, complete with explosions.
- Discussed: The creators hold a panel on why people find mysteries so intriguing.
- Conversed: The fans are very, very dedicated following to the show's plotlines.
- Implied:
- Mystery Riddles is very popular with a small contingent of viewers.
- Alternatively, the show is a critical darling while the general public can't make heads or tails of it.
- Deconstructed:
- The various pitfalls of having so many moving parts for a show has Mystery Riddles fans run the risk of enduring highly improbable events and an inexplicable ending, or worse, no ending at all.
- While the viewers might be able to sit down and parse out what's going on, the in-story characters who are actually living the events moment to moment can't and end up Locked Out of the Loop as a result.
- Reconstructed: Thanks to talented writers, good executives and a massive series bible, the show manages to keep all its balls in the air until the conclusion.
All the pieces come together here.
