Surprisingly Similar Stories / Troper Entries 0-I

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1810072342

• The villain is an emotionless mastermind who displays Lack of Empathy to all living beings. Their Motive Rant reveals that they despair of the state of the world, which they say has been rendered unchangeable because the continued will of supreme beings sustains it the way it is. Some of the beings in question are benevolent, or at least the benevolent side of neutral, while there is also a counterpart being that is violent and chaotic. The villain seeks to summon the benevolent beings into their world so they can use their presence to ultimately remake the world into their own desire. Some of these supreme beings normally reside in Another Dimension parallel to that of the main story, which exists outside of reason and where everything rational breaks down.
  Blaz Blue Centralfiction or Pokémon Platinum^*Cyrus' rant in question takes place at Celestic Town.?
• Two men arrive from abroad in a remote community with profiteering on their mind, and quickly become the centre of everyone's attention. Unable to make any money off them immediately, they spend some time wandering about the community and getting to know it. In doing so, one of them comes to realise he'd rather live here than his previous life, and the other falls in love with a woman they meet while there. In the end, they don't get their money, but they do stop the community from destruction and the second guy gets his girl (although in one case it's only implied).
  Local Hero or The Road to El Dorado?

3_D_S

• This film is a Darker and Edgier ending to an acclaimed series; it is said by some to invalidate previous endings within the established canon. It is notorious for brutally killing off characters on a scale unprecedented in canon history, and while the rest of the story had the overlying arc of stopping a Greater-Scope Villain from causing a Depopulation Bomb apocalypse, this film reveals that not only were the heroes' efforts completely useless from the start, in some ways they were even helping the villain achieve his goals. The film's ending and Signature Scene takes place as the villain succeeds in causing the apocalypse in a staggering Downer Ending - almost all of the protagonists slowly dissolve into nothing in the presence of a person they greatly care for (with one notable exception not getting to see a person important to them), accompanied by a noticeably off-kilter (either tonally inappropriate or suspiciously absent) soundtrack. The final scene shows the instigator of the apocalypse in a void room with orange-red walls and filled with water of the same color. In this room, the girl he loves (who had also died previously for the sake of the instigator's character arc) appears before him in the body of a child and asks him if achieving the end of the world was really worth it; the instigator reacts to this with distress, and is then shown exiting the void room and sitting down to watch the sun set on a broken world.
  End of Evangelion or Avengers: Infinity War?

Tropers/{{4tell0life4}}

• A Mobile Phone Game where you travel to multiple different time periods, trying to fight the anomalies of time from ruining the space-time continuum. You get companions with you, including a time/dimension-traveling Cool Car. You collect multiple fighting units, each with their own powers and specializations (including a Limit Break of their own), and level them up to become stronger - the catch is, quite a number of them (especially the best ones) would need real money. Then at the end, the Big Bad invades your present day, where the final battle ensues. As it turns out, the Big Bad did everything with good intentions.
  Plants vs. Zombies 2: It's About Time or Fate/Grand Order?

A Carlssin

• The hero puts something incredibly valuable into his jacket pocket, then carelessly loans his jacket to... er... either a kangaroo or a beautiful young woman.
  Titanic (1997) or Kangaroo Jack?

Adept

• A young heroine, famed for her red hair, is driven out of her homeland and is forced to leave her sheltered life due to some unfortunate circumstances, and cuts off her special hair to escape the clutches of a selfish noble who desires to "own" her. Throughout her journey away from home, she endures a lot of hardship, such as traveling in harsh environments, facing bandits and human traffickers, catching illnesses, etc., but manages to survive thanks to her True Companions. She wins the hearts of many people and earns the loyalty and admiration of others much stronger than herself, through her sheer determination and compassion for others. Although she is beloved by all, she is closest to her tight-knit group that include her obvious Love Interest, a young medical prodigy, a slightly goofy but extremely dedicated aide, a quiet and serious swordsman, and an Ambiguously Bi Lovable Rogue who sometimes flirt with both leads. Later into the story, the heroine re-encounters her Abhorrent Admirer, and through her strength of character, manages to inspire him to become a better person and a worthy leader of his own right. This reformed man would prove to be an extremely useful ally for the heroine as she gets involved in larger conflicts, and despite retaining his romantic feelings for her, could never be anything more to her than a friend. Also, despite being a Shōjo manga, this brave heroine's story has attracted a decent male fanbase.
  Yona of the Dawn or Snow White with the Red Hair?

Albertosaurus

• A young person who is closely related to the family that rules the known world, but has grown up in exile due to the actions of a parent, has to travel to the capitol for the imminent election of a new emperor, who will succeed the dying current emperor. There are two candidates and the loser will die. There, the protagonist has a dangerous romance while treachery at court is afoot. The world is ruled by a pale-skinned elite which places a high value on blood purity and the local priesthood has suppressed the worship of a goddess who was once held in high esteem, but the story ends with this old order collapsing due to the actions of the protagonist. There's also quite a bit of incest involved.
  The Stone Dance of the Chameleon or Inheritance Trilogy (N. K. Jemisin's, not Paolini's)?
• The finale to a long-running storyline involves many heroes from previous instalments resisting a massive invasion by the forces of evil. In the end, when all hope seems lost, the Big Good sacrifices himself to release a blast of energy which destroys all the forces of evil.
  Power Rangers in Space or Magic the Gathering's Invasion Cycle?

Alignment

• A popular twenty-first century work known for (among other things) its portrayal of queer characters, killer soundtrack, unexpected success and popularity, and infamous hiatuses. It's a story with alien dystopias, off-the-wall humor, a goofy and adorkable dark-haired protagonist and many greater spoilers and revelations later on. Several of the most popular characters are also walking spoilers, which is a bit frustrating for newcomers since the story starts quite slowly in the first part and takes a while to pick up the pace and get really epic. The major plot-relevant alien species first introduced has no concept of biological parents, due to a bizarre and not entirely explained method of reproduction involving machines and raw genetic material. This is plot-relevant later on.
  • One major character, Rose, might not be exactly human, but passes for human better than her friend — a visibly alien girl who is very neat and tidy, and also very proper (but still terrifying in a fight with that bladed weapon of hers — don't mess with her. Or Rose.) In at least one canon universe, Rose is the distant (dead) mother of a compassionate young main character after having led a rebellion to try and free humanity from the grip of an alien empire and a pink-associated dictator. Her child is raised by friendly aliens.
  • The other girl mentioned earlier, who may or may not be Rose's girlfriend, has a short stylish haircut and wears a sash around her waist after being run through with something onscreen. She also wears ballet flats, and has very fair skin. Her most obvious nonhuman feature(s) can be found on her head. Her placement in the alien caste system is very specialized, and she may not have wanted it, but the events of the story (or the events before it) allowed her to leave or avoid that line of work.
  • Another major character is a grumpy alien who is one of the first outsider aliens the protagonist interacts with. They are initially antagonistic, frustrated by the trouble the protagonists have caused them. The alien is hammy and prone to bizarre insults, but proves to have some Hidden Depths later on, eventually joining forces with the protagonist. This character turns out to be quite a dork, muddling their way through earth culture and also drawing shipping charts at one point. They're a Walking Spoiler for the aliens, but well-known enough people often see them before actually getting involved in the work.
  • At one point, one of the aliens helps to protagonist to drill to the center of a planet to retrieve a weapon of mass destruction called "The [blank]r".
  • Yet another shared plot device is an accepted mechanic for fusing characters together, either temporarily or permanently. At least one major character is a permanent fusion via this method. When it happens, there's a flash of light, and the fusions often have a different color scheme than the original pair.
    • One entity created this way is unstable and under massive amounts of emotional stress due to their components hating each other. (One component is a very controversial and dangerous blue-associated alien character.)
• Now... is all of this describing characters and concepts from Steven Universe, or Homestuck?

• Two young siblings make a plan to save or help someone dear to them. The unique power of human souls is involved. Mistakes are made though, and the plan goes horribly wrong. The sweet-natured gentle brother loses his physical body and ends up in an unfamiliar and unwanted other form, while the other sibling takes on more mundane physical injuries. This incident ultimately grants one sibling access to some powerful and unique magic abilities and provides personal motivations for several characters, so this whole sequence of events acts as the important backstory to the main plot. However, it is not shown right from the beginning.
  Are these siblings Ed and Al? Or Chara and Asriel?

• The story opens with a Switched at Birth scenario in which one infant is The Antichrist. The title features the word "Omen". At least part of the story is set in England. But is the genre primarily horror, or comedy?

Alvin

• This film is a low-budget, black-and-white story of people fighting against reanimated corpses. Because it's in the Public Domain it may be repeatedly aired by community-access TV. Both films are generally considered epitomes of a level of quality.
  Really good quality or really bad quality?
• This is a black-and-white Christmas classic that has been imitated quite often. In it, a man is Driven to Suicide by troubles that are basically due to one other person. His life is saved by someone who is rewarded with a promotion. At the end of the movie the would-be suicide is financially in good shape and in good spirits, even though his enemy is apparently not punished (or even on screen again). James Stewart is in it.
  Is he playing the suicidal man or in another subplot entirely? This Very Wiki's entry for the second movie compares the two.

Amethyst Leslie

• In the future, Earth would be so polluted and covered with garbage to the point it becomes unlivable to humans and they evacuate the planet and let robots do the cleaning for them. Is this the backstory to Vectorman or WALL-E?

Andyroid

• Due to circumstances beyond her control, a down-to-earth working-class girl is forced to hang out with a flighty Upper-Class Twit and other eccentric characters, including a big guy who's friends with a much smaller guy and a hopelessly romantic blonde who starts out with a crush on one of the major characters, despite having never met them. Despite driving each other up the wall (and the occasional intervention of a creepy black magic practitioner with a shadow motif), the guy and girl grow to love one another.
  The Princess and the Frog or Ouran High School Host Club?
• A series that chronicles the occasionally weird everyday adventures of a group of female friends, which includes a somewhat naive bookworm, an energetic and boastful girl who fancies herself a great athlete but is actually kind of a klutz, her hard-working and more level-headed Friendly Rival, a girl who frets over her appearance a lot and is usually the most serious of the group, a bashful animal lover, and one girl who's not all there.
  Azumanga Daioh or My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic?
• After dying in an accident, a shiftless teenager gets a new job dealing with the supernatural and meets some bizarre new friends. The Grim Reaper turns out to be quite friendly.
  Dead Like Me or YuYu Hakusho?
• A barefoot girl with light-based powers is kept in a remote tower by her mother for the mother's own selfish and sinister purposes. A social outcast stumbles upon the girl and, armed mainly with an improvised weapon, helps her earn her freedom.
  Tangled or ICO?
• A girl kept alone in a high tower for unscrupulous reasons is rescued by a smart-alecky thief who's initially after a big treasure connected to the girl's heritage. She ends up falling in love with him as he helps her earn her freedom. At one point, she tries to bargain with the villain in order to save the thief's life after he gets mortally wounded.
  Tangled or The Castle of Cagliostro?
• A band of Ugly Cute creatures who live underground and are skilled craftsmen are victims of Fantastic Racism, including being unfairly accused of eating babies and being pressed into forced labor by one of the villains. They are saved from the brink of extinction and gradually welcomed into society thanks to the efforts of a rough-and-tumble hero (who's not at home in the world of nobs and snobs) and his bossy, outgoing, upper-class lady friend. One of the major characters in the story was raised by the creatures in question for much of their childhood.
  Snuff or The Boxtrolls?
• A pseudo-medieval town is powered by the stories woven by its ruler, a Well-Intentioned Extremist who hides their face in public. A motley band of outsiders (including a know-it-all with a nice hat who is considered an expert in their field) end up travelling to the town, where they unravel its mysteries, reveal the truth, and help bring a truly happy ending to the inhabitants, including a young woman who has no idea of her secret connection to the town's history.
  Witches Abroad or Professor Layton vs. Ace Attorney?
• An alien known only by a nickname uses an unorthodox method of travel to journey through space with a boisterous companion who is often baffled by his eccentric behavior. Everywhere he goes he seems to find someone in need, and he helps them with his wits more often than brute force. He faces a number of bizarre enemies, but his most common foe is a Large Ham whom our hero frequently tries to convince to give up his evil ways.
  Doctor Who or Wander over Yonder?
• A darkly-humourous video game with an elaborate crafting system in which your character, trapped in a fantasy world, must learn to farm, gather, build, fight, and dabble in the dark arts in order to make their way home.
  Don't Starve or Graveyard Keeper?

Aqua Eclipse

• In a Civil War, there is a 'good' side and a 'bad' side, but the leaders of both sides are both antagonists, and the sides themselves aren't good either. The leader of the 'bad' side, i.e. the Big Bad, is a tyrannical government leader who is Obviously Evil and Would Hurt a Child, and was in an Unequal Pairing with his love interest before they left him; while the leader of La Résistance, i.e. the 'good' side, is willing to do anything, including killing innocents, to achieve victory. The main character(s) is/are morally grey, despite being on the 'good' side; and the leader of the 'good' side gets killed around the end of the war by someone most people thought of as a hero and a good person, which creates mistrust among the 'good' side.
  Is this the Manburg Rebellion or Mockingjay?^note Credit goes to @lwalmart on Tumblr for this one.

Argon2

• Not only did the Greek gods really exist, but they survived into the modern era. To prevent the Big Bad Cronus from rising against them once more, the pantheon establish an Extranormal Institute for their descendants- most of whom have supernatural abilities like precognition, Super-Strength, and...being really, really attractive. (The suckiness of that last one is often lampshaded.) The series' protagonists are a clique of such students, and the plot meshes their struggles to defeat Cronus with the difficulties of normal teenage life.
  Percy Jackson and the Olympians or Class of the Titans?
• Humanity allies itself with a race of sapient, Earth-dwelling animals, eventually forming a benevolent civilization capable of space travel. This civilization's enemies attempt to destroy it by travelling back in time and giving one species sole dominance over Earth, breaking the alliance before it is even formed...unless the hero(es) can stop them.
  Is the protagonist a cat or a dolphin?
• A sorceress magically suppresses the emotions of a young boy so she can enslave him. The boy's friend- an emotional but courageous girl- resolves to free him, eventually achieving this goal through the help of various other aristocrats, criminals, witches, and The Power of Love.
  The Snow Queen or The Irregular at Magic High School?
• In this children's cartoon, a cat-themed royal guard is recreated after the Rightful King Returns. They take on the responsibility of fighting usurpers and keeping peace between all animals- a task they are helped with by the spirits of their dead predecessors.
  Thunder Cats or The Lion Guard?
• A wild animal is trapped in a futuristic dystopia created by the long-dead human race. To escape this dystopia, he must convince the humans' poisoned and ignorant slaves that he means no harm, find a mechanical harness, and navigate the dangers of many artificial, decrepit environments.
  Is he in the sea or a dome?
• An evil sorceress plots to reclaim her magic by kidnapping a baby dragon. She's helped in this by a young female minion, who hates the abuse the sorceress puts her through but stays in the hope of obtaining more magic of her own. However, the minion defects to the heroes' side upon learning that the sorceress intends to kill the dragon, not just abduct it.
  Is the minion a bunny or a pony?

AskNostalgiaBum

• An old person tells of a love story that happened a long time ago, involving a girl and boy (one British and one American) who love each other dearly. Unfortunately, the girl is being forced to marry some rich asshole. The girl attempts suicide at some point and the boy (mostly) dies at some point. They are eventually reunited at the end.

Titanic (1997) or The Princess Bride?

• A possession of a Greco-Roman god is stolen and a young hero with a connection to the ocean must undergo a dangerous coming-of-age quest (joined by a friend or two) to return it safely. Really, though, the hero is only going on the quest to save a loved one of his. They face a violent biker along the way, and after an experience in a much-feared location, it turns out the real thief is really someone no one expected.

The first Percy Jackson and the Olympians book, or The Spongebob Squarepants Movie?

• Some children go on a series of adventures in a mysterious place and time. Most adults are too stupid or evil to help them along the way. The main villain is always making plans to go after the kids, often using disguises. The creator inserts himself into the story as a completely different character.

A Seriesof Unfortunate Events or Lazytown?

AutumnLeaves

• It’s a play. Two guys and two girls are caught in a Love Dodecahedron on a summer night in a forest. One of the guys has flirted with one girl before but now has his sights set on the other. The two girls used to be the best of friends before all that romantic trouble began. There is a mischievous forest spirit who gets the young men lost in the woods, and there is also a love spell made with the help of flower or flowers. The ending includes several couples getting married. A Midsummer Night's Dream or The Snow Maiden?
• There is a boy who takes turns between wangsting and being heroic. The Big Bad has killed at least one of his parents. One of the villain’s henchmen, though, is in love with the boy’s mother who has beautiful eyes. Said henchman ends up turning against the Big Bad and dies in battle. His last words can be summarized as "take this" and he gives the boy some important artifact. The boy unexpectedly appears before the main villain, who’s gloating over his supposed victory, and kills him. Harry Potter or Julius Caesar in Egypt?
• A babysitting heroine. A blond soft-spoken antagonist with mismatched eyes. Sexual tension in a bizarre fantasy setting with a lot of stairways. Also involves meddling with the passage of time, a strained relationship between family members who are not blood relatives, and a name getting pronounced wrongly as a Running Gag. Hogfather or Labyrinth?
• It’s a medieval Crapsack World. A tomboyish, misunderstood girl from a noble house with a wolf sigil runs away from the castle and finds herself among the lowest classes, disguised as one of them, and has romantic tension with a guy who shares his family’s distinctive hair color. There is also a very clever dwarf whose philosophy goes like “turn your weakness into a strength”, and someone from the girl’s family wins every battle but loses completely in politics. The girl’s brothers have extremely rare animals as familiars and communicate with them. Additionally, there is a beautiful and fierce blond woman with violet eyes, an outsider in this country, whose beloved husband has been turned into a Blank Slate. A Song of Ice and Fire or The City Without Memory?
• A count falsely accuses the land’s ruler of a terrible crime, an aristocrat secretly dabbles in black magic, and someone from the ruling family gets turned into a swan. The Sorcerer's Daughter or Lohengrin?
• A dark-haired girl who suffers from the aloofness and borderline neglect of her parents gets someone from her family kidnapped by a magical being from another world. She has to undergo a quest in that world to save them. Some of the Big Bad’s subordinates help or at least feel sorry for her. That other world includes a room that looks like her own but is in fact a creepy replica. The villain claims to love her and offers to make all her dreams come true. Coraline or Labyrinth?
• A kindhearted blond girl falls in love with an older man with a mysterious past. His sociopathic dark-haired wife attempts to frame him for murder by provoking him into killing her in one case or killing herself in another. Rebecca or Downton Abbey?
• A cheerful curly-haired All-Loving Heroine is magically turned cruel and selfish (complete with an Expository Hairstyle Change) and completely forgets about her beloved. The latter tries to invoke True Love's Kiss on her while she is sleeping but fails: it only freaks her out. She has a brief fling with another man, a Jerkass who was attracted to her before her memory loss as well, but doesn't particularly care for him either. Her memory and personality end up getting restored. Sorcerers or Once Upon a Time?
• In a 19th-century English novel, two sisters (the elder is a Proper Lady and the younger is more passionate) find themselves impoverished after their father's death, their wealth passed to an uncaring relative. The younger sister falls deeply in love with a handsome young man, and among the exchanged presents is a lock of hair. The young man later breaks up with her via letter and goes on to marry a Meal Ticket. The girl eventually finds love with an older military man who had been pining for her for the better part of the novel; and her elder sister marries a kindly relative of the man who had pocketed the heroines' inheritance. Am I talking about Sense and Sensibility or No Name?
  • There are additional surprising similarities between No Name and Sense and Sensibility’s film adaptation: namely, that the older military man falls in Love at First Sight with the younger heroine and that he brings her to safety in a Bridal Carry when she is dangerously sick, his care for her in her sickness prompting her to start falling in love with him.
• In this loose adaptation of a Speculative Fiction piece, there is a Romance Arc between a young man, with slightly curly dark hair and a wide smile, who is also very skilled at wordplay and Xanatos Speed Chess, and a proud Sugar-and-Ice Personality girl whose name starts and ends with "A" and is derived from a word meaning "love"; she deeply loves and is protective of her family. In the climactic scene, he is sentenced to hang and already stands on the gallows with the noose around his neck before the information that saves him gets revealed. The TV adaptation of Going Postal, or the episode of Sechs Auf Einen Streich based on The Twelve Dancing Princesses?
• In this story, a character finds themselves in a Muggle and Magical Love Triangle and chooses the muggle love interest. The "magical" part of the triangle is The Dragon to the Big Bad, and their feelings start as an Entitled to Have You Villainous Crush but grow much deeper. As the character and their love interest try to escape the Big Bad's realm, the magical suitor blocks their path and begs the character to stay with them. A Scarpia Ultimatum option is briefly brought up, but ultimately the Romantic Runner-Up decides on I Want My Beloved to Be Happy, lets the couple leave, openly defies the Big Bad, and soon afterwards undergoes Objectshifting. The magic that defeats the Big Bad in the end is based on tears. Now, are there a male main villain and a two girls-over-a-guy love triangle, or a a female main villain and a two-guys-over-a-girl love triangle?
• In this opera set in the late 18th century, a mentally unstable young man is in Mad Love with a wealthy girl far above his station and acts as Stalker with a Crush towards her. One of the dramatic scenes occurs at a ball after the performance of a saccharine pastorale. The young man's attempt to win the girl indirectly leads to her death. In the finale, the unlucky baritone suitor in the Love Triangle is the only one of the triangle left alive. However, is the baritone the mentally unstable guy in question or his romantic rival?
• The hero acts suspicious in the heroine's eyes but is in fact trying to protect others from the villain(s), and the heroine runs after him to confront him but unwittingly ends up leading the villain(s) to him. In an exemplary case of Poor Communication Kills, the hero doesn't want to tell the heroine the truth (he is hiding an important object/person), which leads to him getting tortured by the villain(s) who need(s) to find what/whom the hero is hiding. The heroine uses a villain's own possession as a weapon against him in their final confrontation. Is it an adult-themed verismo opera or a children's sci-fi novel?

Ayasugi

• The crew of a ship in deep space wakes up to find some oddities and discrepancies, including inexplicable injuries. They come to the conclusion that their memories of the past few days have been erased, and despite oblique warnings by a mechanical crew member, decide to investigate further. They discover that they themselves willingly allowed their memories to be erased, to protect themselves.
  Red Dwarf episode "Thanks for the Memory" or Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Clues"?^note The similarity is acknowledged by the Red Dwarf writers (who wrote their episode several years before the TNG one aired, and mistaken for plagiarism by Patrick Stewart until he watched more of the Red Dwarf episode and found it hilarious.

Azorius24

• In a grim, Dark Fantasy style world filled with the ruins of dead gods, an ordinary person is given a crown-like artefact by a mysterious entity, granting them Reality Warper powers. They must then face off against other entities equipped with these crowns as they learn to control their abilities... Are we talking about Cult of the Lamb or Kill Six Billion Demons?

B

BabClayton

• Film begins with all the animals coming to see the birth of the new Prince, who also happens to be the Main Character. The Film then shows their childhood, before one of their parents gets killed. We then Time Skip to their Adulthood, where they fall in love with a childhood friend. The film climaxes with a huge fire and then the epilogue book ends the beginning of the film, with all the animals coming to see the birth of the Main Character's offspring, as said Main Character looks down from a giant rock.
  Am I describing the Story of Bambi or The Lion King?
• Our Heroes travel through time, in order to obtain powerful stones which, when combined together, can give whoever holds them the powers of a deity. This leads to our Heroes meeting past versions of themselves, as well as one of the stones requiring a sacrifice in order to be obtained.
  Is this the Story to Avengers: Endgame, or the Chaos Emerald saga in Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog?
• Our Hero is Frozen and wakes up in the future, where he befriends a robot and goes on adventures through Space. Futurama or Red Dwarf!?

Balaur

• The honourable leader of a noble house takes on a dangerous new job on the behest of a ruler, even though he is well aware of the danger. He ends up being betrayed and losing his life to an enemy house with unusual sexual predilections. However, his son, and said son's mother survive, and lead the fight against the murderous enemy house. It also has a leader with a powerful, prophesied child going native and learning to control powerful animals. Incest abounds.
  Is it A Song of Ice and Fire or Dune?

BalkanTrope

• A successful Romanian comedy show from PRO tv set at the countryside which mocks Romanian society and politics and who's characters include: A whore, A Drunkard, A ditzy teenage girl, A moustached villager with a hat that is friends with The Alcoholic, A fat bartender with a diminutive name A corrupt, dumb and incompetent cop, A Kleptomaniac, A former expat who likes to brag and gets involved in various unorthodox ways to make money, A corrupt and incompetent mayor and a corrupt priest.
  Is it VacantaMare or LasFierbinti?

Barberbarberjoe

• A purple-clad hero that normally shapeshifts must now use a different set of abilities and team up with their Pirate Girl arch-nemesis, in order to defeat a new common foe (with the hero doing most of the work). Said Pirate Girl double-crosses the hero in the end as part of a plan and maintains the status quo.
  Am I talking about Wario Land: Shake It! or Shantae and the Pirate's Curse?

bluhedgehog

• Something very important happens in the ancient past. Thousands of years later, a bespeckled archeologist and linguist is giving a report to a group of people who think him crazy. Said linguist is recruited by an elderly benefactor who requires their expertise in ancient languages. A revelation in the translation leads to a formation of an expedition team, which uses a Stylized "A", which is just the letter "A" without a crossbar, as a symbol. The team is stranded while on their expedition, using the linguist to attempt to make it back home. Once they come across indigenous people who have trouble communicating with anyone but the linguist (for a time), the linguist comes to form an attraction to a powerful political woman, and also teaches basic literacy, as the ability to read and write is forbidden. It later turns out the leadership of the expedition had an ulterior motive, and the big bad ends up dying while trying to escape the indigenous people and heroes joining in battle against him. The heroes manage to find the way home, but the linguist stays with the woman he met earlier now his wife.
  So, Stargate, or Atlantis: The Lost Empire?
• James Marsden plays a man who needs some spice in his life. Enter a small mammal who acts like a human. Said mammal is on the run, and it is up to Marsden's character to help. The relationship between the two is strained at first, but eventually, the pair come together in solidarity and mutual respect. When the big bad makes his power play, Marsden's character helps out, but it's the mammal's use of their talent that saves the day. The two end up living together as a result.
  So, Sonic the Hedgehog (2020) or Hop?

BokhuraBones

• The protagonist is a single woman in her late 20s working as a journalist for a Japanese media conglomerate. She is characterized as being assertive and driven, which helps her achieve professional success and distinguishes her from the other, more traditional office ladies at the business. However, this also means that she must deal with the ingrained sexism of Japanese society, a situation which is compounded by her markedly blunt, unfeminine personality and interests. In addition, she finds additional troubles with her personal life, as her desire to succeed leads to great amounts of stress and periods of self-doubt. Although she has an attractive, successful boyfriend who appears to be a good catch, he is just as career-oriented as she is, leading to difficulties in their relationship. They can go months between seeing each other, and even when they do, communication is strained and sex is unsatisfying to non-existent.
  You're My Pet or Hataraki Man?
• A beautiful, kind, and spunky, if somewhat flighty and possessive, blonde finds out right before graduation that her boyfriend is breaking up with her. Undeterred, she drops her plans for a fashion career and follows him to law school (without alerting him to this until she gets there). Once enrolled, however, her stylish clothing and intense personality set her apart from the careerist-minded crowd and leave her feeling isolated, and her ex shows no desire to get together again. There is a Nice Guy who might just be an alternate romance option, though...
  Legally Blonde or Golden Time?

BossKey

• A land of fantasy Horny Vikings is under attack by dragons, and it's up to an outsider in their society to end the winged menace by defeating the dragons' cruel leader, thus freeing man and wyrm alike from its grip. Along the way, our hero befriends a dragon and gains knowledge of the dragons in order to vanquish this evil, riding toward the final battle on a dragon's back.
  How to Train Your Dragon or The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim?

Bowbowis

• A blue colored platforming hero from the 16-Bit era debuts on a new console generation only to be rife with Camera Screw, Loads and Loads of Loading, a narmy english dub, and much slower gameplay than its predecessors. Meanwhile the protagonist is largely Out of Character and Out of Focus, in favor of his partly red colored, formerly evil, Ensemble Dark Horse ally, who recently came Back from the Dead, and is fresh off his own spinoff game where he starred as an Amnesiac Hero. As well as a new, younger character with the ability to hover, who is The Scrappy, and was originally manipulated into opposing the heroes by a villain who has a personal history with the aforementioned Ensemble Dark Horse. However, he realizes his mistake and teams up with the others, and largely got Rescued from the Scrappy Heap in future installments.
  Sonic the Hedgehog (2006) or Mega Man X7?

bpants98

• This 2019 film is a sequel to a popular film from the 2010s featuring Chris Pratt and Cobie Smulders. Following the events of the previous film, an alien threat has caused a crisis on Earth. The local superhero team decides they've had enough of the alien threat and travel to another planet to try and undo the damage done, but their mission is unsuccessful. 5 years later, the Earth is left in a state of ruin and while most of its inhabitants have moved on with their lives, the main protagonist has not. When things seem hopeless, a character from another time period arrives in the present and helps the protagonist with a heist that'll (presumably) save the world. But things go wrong when the time-traveling villain reveals his plan to destroy the world, so the heroes round up the villain's victims, including a resurrected monarch, to rally against him and his forces and the world is restored when the villain is erased from existence.
  The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part or Avengers: Endgame?
• The film opens with a prologue where a wizard tries to keep an artifact out of the hands of an antagonistic force, only to get defeated in the process. The main protagonist's journey begins when he encounters a girl with an amazing ability and he goes through most of the adventure with a red object on his back. The main antagonist wears red and black and is a parent of two children in another universe. The protagonist and the girl end up in another world after going through an interdimensional portal, where the girl shows the protagonist that worlds outside of his own exist, but they're not fully explored because they're not important to the plot. The two explore the new world in search of a wizard who may be able to help them. The protagonist is brought before a council of heroes who don't trust him, but they easily get defeated when their base is infiltrated. The antagonist kills two characters by erasing their face and severing them with a circular object respectively, and then they get rid of the protagonist's key to foiling their plans. At the film's climax, the protagonist tries to control his inanimate body to get back to his world and confront the antagonist. When the antagonist sees that their children in an alternate universe see them as a villain, they pull the plug on their plan and destroy their Artifact of Doom.
  The LEGO Movie or Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness?
• In this sequel to a classic 90's movie, a boy and his maternal guardian take a vacation via airplane, but the boy gets separated from her after ending up in a city. The boy stays at a hotel through shady means which, after they're exposed, force him to get out of the hotel and wander the streets of the city. When the boy's maternal guardian gets to the hotel and learns he was forced out, she decides to search the city for him. After the climax, the boy is safely reunited with his maternal guardian.
  Home Alone 2: Lost in New York or Babe: Pig in the City?

C

Caiaphas The Sympathist

• In a World… where there exists a discrimination between two big groups of the population, a man who grew up among the less-fortunate group and believes that they are all being oppressed by the other group dons a mask due to horrible facial scarring resulting from this oppression and rallies the members of his group to rise up in a rebellion against the others. An outsider who originally had no plans to get involved in this conflict ends up being a key player in it, in no small part because of their desire to protect their friends. Along the way, the stranger learns that the masked rebel is being supplied with weapons from a corrupt dealer and focuses a significant part of his fury against a public figure with close ties to the state who turns out to be as bad as (if not worse than) the masked rebel. After this figure's malevolent nature is revealed to the public by a female subordinate, a confrontation occurs between him and the masked rebel which is a crucial point in the story.
  "Doctor Who and the Caves of Androzani" or The Legend of Korra?
• In a city in an alternate-universe Earth, a group heavily based on rapid technological advancement and its introduction for use by the bulk of the population is suspected of partaking in less-than-savory activities by a loner. As he gradually finds out, this group is in fact in cahoots with the corrupt police force, running an operation to take poor people and criminals off the street in for their own operation, which entails their transformation into part-machine beings that have had most of their human will stripped away. The man behind the whole scheme, the group's leader, possesses a deranged pragmatism that dictates that it is but destiny that this operation should go through, bringing an age of metallic dominance upon the planet by wiping out all "imperfect" organic life. Together with a group of rebels doing their best to oppose this group and its leader, the loner must use his own cunning and abilities to bring an end to the madman's scheme.
  Thief II: The Metal Age or "Doctor Who and the Rise of the Cybermen?"
• This notorious work of social oppression features a protagonist that, although appearing silent before the world, proves that he possesses a memorable personality. The story concerns this man's adventures as part of a group that rebels against an immeasurably large group known as the Combine, mainly against the member who operates closest to them. This is a figure the Combine wants the bulk of the populace to perceive as trustworthy and benevolent, but who in truth is cruel and manipulative. Near the story's end, this figure tries to put the silent protagonist's colleagues in doubt as to the true nature of a figure he views as a benefactor. Ultimately, the rebels' combined efforts, although insignificant to the Combine as a whole, manage to strip the figure of their authority for good.
  It's gotta be Half-Life 2, right? Or... is it One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest?
• The protagonist of this dark, dreary piece starts out as a sad, dissatisfied everyman, whose experience with a woman suddenly causes his life to take an unexpected turn as he finds himself in the middle of a crisis that eventually comes to involve many deaths. Though the woman could be branded as the pivotal cause behind the crisis, it also revolves around a tough-guy figure that the protagonist comes to regard as his only true friend in a midst of people who treat him with contempt and adversity. As the story continues, however, the protagonist's mind becomes more and more broken, as he comes to perceive every truth and facet of the people that surround him. Things finally come to a headway at the end, as the woman is at her most helpful but the protagonist discovers that the tough-guy is in fact an ethereal, chaotic version of himself, and the man directly responsible for all the death and destruction. After a final, decisive confrontation, only one of them survives, but it does little to quell the chaos and destruction that the tough-guy's scheming has caused.
  Fight Club or Dark Seed II?
• In this film adaptation of a story that originated in print media, Edward Norton plays a mild-mannered person who has to deal with regularly losing himself to a completely uncontrollable alter-ego that revels in violence, chaos and destruction in a citywide scale.
  Fight Club or The Incredible Hulk (2008)?
• Set in a Bad Future version of London, this story features a society ruled over by a sinister, shadowy group whose leaders rarely, if ever, show their face in public, and if they do, it is done in disguise, mostly presenting themselves to the public via a popular personification of themselves as a whole. Despite a pretty general perception of this group being malevolent, most of the population nonetheless works for them, if only to keep their livelihood. Many of them wear blue overalls constantly, while the group's most trusted members wear black. While they try to run a mostly normal life, they know that holding any sort of contempt towards the group will bring them trouble, and so if they do, they try their very best to keep their opinion secret. The plot concerns a man who finds himself in this society but bears a strong link to the past, having lived in a time before the group seized power, with a distinct memory of an event concerning an explosion that was part of what eventually led to that. Seeking the help of the worker class, this man leads a furtive campaign against the group and their leaders after a figure he silently trusts gives him a message indicating that there are more people behind their cause. Along with his younger companion who also dresses in blue, this man meets the figure and begins to take part in a clandestine rebellion against the group's highest authorities. Along the way, the pair stumble into an old-fashioned business run by a bushy-haired caretaker who later turns out to be a villain, and holds them hostage. At the climax's beginning, it turns out that not only was the pair's supposed ally playing them, he is ultimately THE villain of the story.
  Nineteen Eighty-Four? ...or Professor Layton and the Unwound Future?
• A group of peoples that have lived among humanity since its beginnings, but have always conspired to rule and manipulate others from the shadows. Many believe that the biblical Cain was their first member. Their most outspoken leaders seek peace and order through control and coercion, though there have been known cases of members of the group exploiting the benefits of being a member For the Evulz, and others who change their mind and attempt to rebel against the other members, having come to hate what it means to be a member of that group.
  Vampires or Templars?
• A man with a morally dubious past who has reformed into a kind, loving person finds a kindred spirit in a woman whose suffering is similar to his. After the woman suffers a death that could very well be blamed on others, the man is left to care for her daughter, raising her in a place that is mostly isolated from human society. After the girl grows up and develops eye-catching beauty, a single look exchanged between her and a young boy makes them fall in love. The man initially disapproves of this relationship and is eager to do anything he can to keep the girl away from the boy, but as he learns more about him, the man eventually comes to care for the boy as much as he does for the girl. In the final act, the man goes through a desperate struggle to make sure the boy, who has put himself in a situation where he might never see them again, is reunited with the girl. Although the story has no clear-cut villains, the two characters that come closest are an authority figure with an unhealthy attachment to order and pragmatism and a mean-spirited, sycophantic but selfish Frenchman created by Victor Hugo.
  Les Misérables or Hotel Transylvania?
• This is a video game set in the early 20th century, about an ex-detective turned private eye who is beckoned to a bizarre, anachronistic environment filled with barely-human beings who want him dead in order to rescue a young girl dressed in blue. One of his most notorious opponents is an old man with an eyepatch who ends up putting himself out of commission. Some of the names in the lore include two characters named Comstock and DeWitt who have similar skills, though DeWitt's are greater, and a woman named Elizabeth who has time-related supernatural powers.
  BioShock Infinite or Alone in the Dark 2?
• In this story set in a universe where most tales straddle the line between sci-fi and horror, a team of scientists and researchers travel to a remote, inhospitable location where humans have virtually no history. Once there, they being conducting an archaeological investigation but soon find vestiges of an extremely old civilisation, mostly in the form of images in the walls of caverns, as well as preserved specimens of primordial beings. Though some of these beings are dead, at least one of them breaks free and, despite showing signs of intelligence, kills several members of the team without a second thought. The other researchers continue on, though they eventually find out that they are being threatened by different, far more menacing beings. Eventually, it is revealed that the intelligent beings are Ancient Astronauts who created humanity to perform menial tasks, and never meant for humans to survive or evolve beyond that. However, they also created a race of beings that were physically superior and could take on many forms, including a famous tentacled one, though these beings ended up turning against their masters and becoming a threat to humanity as well. In the end, at least two members of the research team survive, though they are scarred by the experience, and it is implied that the monsters they have faced will come back to threaten humanity in the future.
  At the Mountains of Madness or Prometheus?
• A young, somewhat inexperienced American arrives at a European town where a murder has just taken place. They gradually get to know the locals and become especially attached to a particularly charming young girl. Eventually, they hear rumours of dark witches being responsible for the murders, and the girl is killed by one of these witches. In the finale, it turns out that almost every one of the people the American was living with was a dark witch, and they intend to kill them. The American comes face to face with the leader of the witches, an incredibly old sorcerer originating from southern Europe, who tries to use the death of the girl against them. However, they manage to overpower and kill the witch leader by stabbing them with an improvised weapon, which results in the death of the rest of the coven.
  Suspiria (1977) or Ben Jordan 3: The Sorceress of Smailholm?
• In this early 2000s PS2 videogame, a Fish out of Water protagonist suddenly arrives in a place that's completely alien to him, though his display of considerable personal skills quickly helps him fit in with a certain circle. From the get go, his backstory makes references to what he perceives to be an Archnemesis Dad, though as the story progresses we see the relation between these characters grow more complex. The protagonist is also quickly insinuated into a relationship with a girl his age whose father is regarded as an important figure, is mentored by an older man with similar skills whose full range of character isn't revealed until near the end, enters into a rivalry with a rude guy with a peculiar hairstyle, and faces off with a monstrous, unnatural marine creature. This creature is ultimately revealed to be a pawn, and must be pacified by entering its mental/spiritual world and eliminating the ethereal presence of a manipulative villain that lies within, consumed by the notion of world destruction. The Final Boss is a monstrous amalgamate of the primal selves of two Archnemesis Dads fought in a trippy Mental World, one of which is the protagonist's, but in the ending the protagonist and his real dad are finally able to reconcile.
  Final Fantasy X or Psychonauts?
• This popular role-playing videogame follows a plucky warrior-explorer who is suddenly tasked with rescuing an attractive lady with immense potential for power and keep her safe. The hero succeeds, but in doing so earns the enmity of a notorious evil warlord whose name starts with 'Mal' whom most of the world fears, but who seems to be working as an agent for a shadowy higher command. The hero proceeds to travel around a series of celestial bodies accompanied by various allies, including (but not limited to) the rescued lady, a snarker with trust issues and a personal vendetta against the warlord whom the protagonist met at the adventure's beginning, a hard-hitting furry nonhuman, an unapologetically forward robot, and a Lovable Rogue who initially acted like he would be in opposition to the hero. At a pivotal point of their journey, the hero's group is confronted by the dark warlord and is faced with an unexpectedly strong onslaught of power which leads to the lady being captured and tortured while in the villain's grasp, eventually leading her to a Despair Event Horizon which the hero tries to bring her out of. Following this, the hero comes into some revelations concerning the villain, learning that although he did not embark on his Start of Darkness of his own volition, he nevertheless chose to abandon his perceived former master and try to seize the mantle of dark lord for himself. The final act of the game takes place on a space station where the villain has seized control of a superweapon and has a climactic confrontation with the hero, who ends up striking him down. In his final dying moments, the villain wonders how things may have been different if he had been given the same chance of going down a better path that other characters in the story were afforded.
  Knights of the Old Republic^*The Light Side route specifically or Xenoblade Chronicles 2?

CaptainLhurgoyf

• In this epic (and very long) adventure story, all life on earth is faced with destruction as a result of a storm of airborne debris, and the only way to preserve humanity is to create a new planet to relocate to. In order to do this, a small and diverse group of people, including a no-nonsense short-haired young woman who turns out to be less cold than she comes off as, must cross portals in space leading to several themed planets where the rules of time don't work as they're used to. Along the way, they encounter members of a previous expedition with similar goals that have been suspended in time, one of which decides that the mission is hopeless and tries to kill the team, killing off a minor character before he himself dies unceremoniously. Stable Time Loops are key to success, and Matthew McConaughey is involved in some way.
  Homestuck or Interstellar?
• A popular animated television series that became one of the most recognizable and influential of its era, this show centers around a sword-wielding hero with long blonde hair and his talking animal sidekick as they have adventures in a post-apocalyptic world in which both magic and advanced technology coexist. A prominent villain is a powerful evil sorcerer with a skull for a face.
  Adventure Time or He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (1983)?
• This elaborate and lengthy comic series is broken up into a series of arcs, referred to with a specific term, not all of which follow the same characters. The first arc is commonly regarded to be both the weakest and non-indicative of the rest of the series, and the third introduces a group of otherworldly beings themed after a set of objects used in divination and each associated with a different color which become the most famous aspect of the series despite not being present at the beginning. Most of the protagonists are members of the same family who all have names starting with "J," and the first one to be introduced has a name that's some variation of "John." Besides them, there are a number of diverse and colourful characters, many of which, including protagonists, end up being gruesomely killed off at some point (always accompanied with the word "dead" captioning the scene); these include a flamboyant young man with an at least partially purple pompadour who gets killed by a vampire in a memetic fashion and a wise parental figure with an Arabic-derived name who is seemingly killed off twice, the first time when an otherwise ineffectual villain shoots them with a magical weapon and who exhibits copious amounts of Ho Yay with a character introduced earlier in the story whose associated colour is purple. The most iconic antagonist in the series is an evil immortal who wears a brightly-coloured coat, lives in a mansion in a desert city, leads a small army of minions with different powers, and can control time. Late into the series, a Cosmic Retcon reboots the universe, and future arcs take place in an alternate history following new characters that still have the same last names as the protagonists of previous arcs (including that of the aforementioned villain). The series is known for its Mood Whiplash, being both incredibly dark and incredibly silly at times, its wide array of Shout Outs, and the eccentric behavior of its author, whose initials can be written as "AH" and whose Author Avatar of an egomaniac artist is a supporting character. While originally a cult classic, it became extremely popular on Tumblr, attracting a huge and devoted fanbase and spawning many memes.
  Now, is that specific term Acts or Parts?
• The central conflict in this series is a choice the protagonist must make between sacrificing themselves through a process that will eventually destroy their body and soul in order to prevent the universe from descending into entropy, or revoking this and living for themselves. They are guided in this by a mysterious being with pendulous facial features whose motives are shrouded in mystery and who may be using them for their own ends. A central theme is the concept of holding onto hope in a world that is harsh and uncaring, and this is metaphysically and literally tied to the very nature of humanity, with those who lose hope also becoming the same monsters that must be fought. Souls are a tangible object in the setting and are obtained from said monsters, being used as a resource to fuel one's magical power and life force.
  Dark Souls or Puella Magi Madoka Magica?

Captain Peregrin

• A show touted by fans as a Deconstruction of the Magical Girl genre, featuring the eponymous Magical Girl who wears a pink-and-white Minidress of Power and happens to be the personification of Hope. The Transformation Trinket is a gem that's actually a Soul Jar fashioned into a piece of jewelry. She gets her powers from a white-haired individual who becomes increasingly menacing as the series progresses. She also has a dear friend who becomes the very thing they were fighting against, and meets a black-haired person who is made out to be a villain at first, but eventually the two of them grow very close. At the end, she forfeits her human form in order to save the world.
  Is it Puella Magi Madoka Magica? Or Princess Tutu?

Ccorb

• In this massive blockbuster based on a Long Runner toyline, the protagonist is involved in a series of unusual events upending their life in a seemingly idylic toyland. A nonconformist banished from their society sends them on a cross-universe mission to Set Right What Once Went Wrong, which eventually takes them to the human world where they are being played with, and which is causing the issues they're experiencing. Features Will Ferrell as a Corrupt Corporate Executive who eventually turns out to be not as soulless as we thought he was.
  Is it a PG-rated faux stop-motion flick or a PG-13 rated live action one?

Chabal2

• A team of teenagers with Elemental Powers seek to restore the elemental balance which has been thrown out of whack a long time ago, while opposed by the fire-elemental bad guys (who are fought early on while their powers are weakened in the heart of the water-elemental's home at the North Pole, and later at full strength at the climax). Fire powers are strengthened by meteors. The youngest of the group has wind powers, uses a staff and helps set off the plot; the male fire user is a hot-headed idiot; the female water user is a healer, they are helped by a magnificently-bearded old man, and run into many a Fantasy Counterpart Culture. There is little in the way of modern weaponry, except for fire-powered naval artillery. The shippers can be charitably described as "batshit insane", with every conceivable ship permutation receiving a Portmanteau Couple Name.
  Golden Sun or Avatar: The Last Airbender?
• A Scotsman takes the throne thanks to violent action and eventually falls in battle. He will never have sons, and the throne will pass to the descendants of his best friend. Strange prophecies and witches are involved, while the manipulative women who try to force their men into murder are dead by the end.
  A Scotsman in Egypt or Macbeth?
• A white-haired boy, his brown-haired best friend who's better at fighting, and the girl who's in love with the former and annoyed by the latter. All three are inseparable until the Pretty Boy betrays the other two, leading them to run for their lives, slowly gaining a group of disparate and supernatural friends. The girl is still attracted to the Pretty Boy and oblivious to her bodyguard.
  Is this a series suitable for younger audiences or to be kept out of their hands at all costs?

Carlandrea

• An ancient war comes to an abrupt halt after one of our heroes accidentally awakens an extremely powerful, long-lost entity with the power to end it. Our heroes assemble a rag-tag, multinational team to travel the world and defeat the entity behind the war. Our heroes include but are not limited to: a couple of family members who are here to support each other, the lost heir to a royal family that fucked up pretty badly and who is hoping to fix their fuck-upedness, and one person who is technically an ancient magical spirit who is walking around in an apparently frail human body for world-saving reasons. Our main villain is a drama queen who doesn’t quite live in an active volcano. These heroes go on a long and harrowing trip across the world. They traverse an abandoned underground tunnel, are relentlessly attacked by enemy forces, and find that the ancient, impenetrable stone city that holds the line for the rest of its kingdom is desperately clinging to its existence and its walls, and the leadership is crumbling, to put it mildly. Finally, at the most desperate moment, the drama queen villain is defeated by the mercy of the protagonist and the support of his friends.

Is the entity that wakes up and kicks off the plot the One Ring or the Avatar?

Chelzero

• A group of brave astronauts leaves on a journey to find new home for mankind. Our protagonist is a crew on board this expedition. He leaves his child on Earth. Thanks to Time Dilation, the two are separated not only by distance but also time. The protagonist returns to Earth at last after securing a colony. Though little time has passed for the astronaut since his departure, his child has grown old in his absence.
  Interstellar, or "'39"?

Commander Visor

• A Disney Princess show about a heroic long-lost teenage princess adjusting to her new life and how to rule over her kingdom while going on miscellaneous slice-of-life tales and adventures with her new friends while protecting her land from an old evil sorcerer and her lackies that want to take it over? Said princess discovering/gaining magic light powers related to why she disappeared in the first place? A Light/Darkness Juxtaposition between two MacGuffins? And a Season 3 about betrayal and redemption, revolving around a formerly heroic character(s) having a Face–Heel Turn because they felt unloved as The Unfavorite/Always Second Best in comparison to their "sister" figure (the princess) and are scared that I've Come Too Far to be redeemed/forgiven, especially by said "sister"? Said former hero also gains powers opposite of the princess's powers while also being manipulated by the Big Bad into these beliefs in order to use her/him as a tool to accomplish their evil plans to destroy/take over the kingdom? The heroes and former hero having to accept the Awful Truth that they're enemies now and that they have to hurt each other to defend themselves? Meanwhile, a former teen villain changes their allegiance when their father gets Taken for Granite and also has a Missing Mom? Eden Espinosa and James Monroe Iglehart are in this? Are we talking about Tangled: The Series or Elena of Avalor?

Crazed Ninja

• In this campy children's film, an ordinary teenage protagonist is constantly annoyed by their younger sibling, until they inadvertently cause said sibling to fall into danger at the hands of a group of mythical beings led by a villain with an excellent singing voice (played by a famous musician, no less), who the protagonist had heard about, but didn't think was real. The film takes place over the course of a single day, as one of the two parties is under a time limit to complete their goal.
  Is the time limit on the protagonist or the antagonist?
• This wildly popular retro-inspired indie video game stars a child who falls down and ends up underground, where the entirety of the game takes place, and where there are tons of monsters. You are told right away who the antagonist is, but after they are defeated, the game is still far from over. The cycle of life and death is one of the central themes of the game, and hearts are a recurring motif as well. The game features multiple paths, with the True Final Boss being an all-powerful goat monster who fires some rather ridiculous Bullet Hell patterns.
  The Binding of Isaac or Undertale?

Critica7

• A polarizing sequel to a well-recieved game, liked by critics but not really by general audiences, which villainizes the main character of the previous game while starring a new character who is supposed to be seen as "badass" but is generally accused of coming across like a walking stereotype with none of the depth of the previous main character. There's also a variation on a Zombie Apocalypse involved. Is the sequel [PROTOTYPE 2] or The Last of Us Part II?
• A story set in a fantasy world with a continent-spanning, multi-faceted conflict starring a brooding Northman whose father was betrayed and murdered who seeks revenge against the killer, a harsh and uncompromising would-be ruler with little patience for corrupt nobles and a sidekick well-versed in dark magic, a wise-cracking scoundrel with more brains than courage who faces discrimination because of his appearance, one of the last survivors of a family closely associated with dragons who seeks to be kind and benevolent but frequently finds that No Good Deed Goes Unpunished, and a wicked sorcerer who seeks to conquer what's left after everyone else destroys each other. But are these people Robb Stark, Stannis Baratheon, Tyrion Lannister, Daenerys Targaryen, and Euron Greyjoy or Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd, Edelgard von Hresvelg, Claude von Riegan, Rhea, and Thales?

Cyber Tiger 88

• The heroes of a long-running series enter a Venice-inspired city. The main character of the group is romanced by a girl of a different species while the antagonist(s) use the city’s Lost Technology to control ancient evil beings. Towards the end, a character that’s mostly blue in color dies and that’s the only plot point most people know about the story. The question is whether the fore-mentioned character is a speedy hedgehog, or a psionic wyvern.

Cyclone

• This well-liked film starring Mark Hamill involves the potential misuse of a powerful space-based energy weapon, which is later turned against our heroes. The film serves as the finale of the main protagonist's story arc as he fully comes into his own and out of the shadow(s) of his predecessor(s). Story arcs set earlier but published after help show how the world came to be the way it was when we first met said protagonist, including information on his very birth. Clearly, this is Return of the J-...
  • ...-edi or ...-oker?
• In the 2015-2016 season of this comic-based TV show, the ancient secret organization that has been plaguing our heroes for multiple seasons is dissolved, just in time for Hive (which has long-standing connections to that organization) to take center stage as the big bad of the season with an attempt to remake the world into a "better place."
  • Is this Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. or Arrow?
• This popular franchise includes novels, tabletop games, video games, and even appearances on the small screen. The setting of this franchise is a place that used to be a single monarchy filled with rival noble houses. After The Coup happened and the ruling monarch died, a dispute arose over who was the rightful heir to the throne, leading to a five-way Civil War. At some point, a dramatic wedding day resulted in the apparent downfall of one of the five factions. One major antagonist is a power-hungry Entitled Bitch with blonde hair from a noble house known for their wealth and an impregnable fortress that has never fallen (until it does). Her brother is a Warrior Prince, the rightful heir of his house, a legend on the battlefield, and actually the biological father of her son. The Civil War is interrupted by the arrival of a foreign army claiming to inherit the right to rule from the pre-coup dynasty, enforcing it with force of arms and distinct military advantages over the pre-existing factions that are difficult to counter. Dragons are a thing in the setting too.
  • So. Dragons. Are they 60-ton giant stompy robots designated DRG-1N or actual fire-breathing reptiles?
• So, despite having parents with superpowers, our protagonist starts this Superhero School story with no superpowers, though by the end of the story, he ends up with multiple superpowers, and he struggles under the pressure of living up to the legacy of the world's greatest hero, the local embodiment of The Cape from whom he inherited his Super-Strength. One of his classmates is a quiet, broody guy with Playing with Fire powers who really, really doesn't want to be associated with his father at all and gets into at least one fight with our protagonist, but he mellows out over time, while another is a cheerful, friendly girl who is a lot more powerful than she seems, is one of the protagonist's best friends, and has a very obvious secret crush on him. Despite this high school being the world's premier Superhero School, there is at least one bully whose attitude is a lot more villainous than one would expect for someone studying to be a superhero, but no one really seems to comment on this. One of the teachers has Make Some Noise powers, and the school also has coursework dedicated to Gadgeteer Genius type super science. Also, for all that the setting is presented as an optimistic and hopeful world, Fantastic Racism against people without superpowers or the "wrong" superpowers abounds and isn't really addressed with any depth. There's also indications of a largely off-screen relationship between a fire-wielding male character and an ice-wielding female character.
  • Is it a Disney movie or a highly successful franchise that started with a still-ongoing manga?
• In this world of superheroes and supervillains, our 15-year-old protagonist, having been bullied by a former friend for years, starts the story dreaming of being a hero, despite — at least at the beginning of the story — not having powers suited to heroics. The protagonist is new to their powers and often discovers new aspects of them during crisis moments. Said powers also end up causing unintentional injury at least once. Shortly into the story, the protagonist meets a number of other superpowered teenagers and, despite some early friction, eventually becomes close friends with them. At one point, the protagonist rescues a preteen girl from a crime lord supervillain who has imprisoned her in order to exploit her superpower. It is later revealed that the government organization responsible for regulating superheroes has a few skeletons in its closet, as does at least one of the greatest heroes of the setting. One of — if not the — most powerful antagonists of the story is someone who has actually given other people powers of their own.
  • Is the protagonist an inspiring hero or a terrifying villain?
• While it has plenty of action, the focus of this science fiction story is more on dialogue than combat. Within the setting, there's a physically strong Proud Warrior Race Guy species that has a long-standing grudge against a species of Space Romans, and humanity had a disastrous first contact encounter that led to a war. Much of the story revolves around a blue space station that serves as a center of diplomacy and trade which is led by a multispecies council who represent the major powers with embassies for the minor powers, and the plot revolves around the latest iteration of a galactic cycle that has repeated many times due to the actions of Abusive Precursors, the main antagonists of which are visually identified as resembling flying black aquatic creatures in space. The protagonist is a decorated officer in Earth's military who, at one point, steals at least one experimental ship built in cooperation between Earth and another species, incorporating technology from multiple species and with a bridge layout that is non-standard for Earth ships. A dark-skinned Captain Anderson briefly commands such a ship.
  • Is this a TV show or a video game?
• This is a show with a largely female cast about teenage school students who hunts The Soulless supernatural monsters of the setting. Well, until the school is destroyed at the end of the show's third year, marking a distinct change in the format and setting of the show. Let's focus on one of the major supporting characters. He's a bit of a doofus who serves as an Audience Surrogate and, unlike his friends, lacks any real training or superpowers, so in combat, he tends to get by with stubborn determination. He allegedly shows promise as The Leader and The Strategist, regardless of how well the show portrays this, and the show very subtly (intentionally or not) suggests he's a lot smarter and more capable than he's given credit for. His best friend — at least in the early part of the show — is an incredibly hot but really shy Significant Green-Eyed Redhead who is totally into him but Cannot Spit It Out, but he's Oblivious to Love until it's too late. She was also his first real emotional support in some fashion. He's very protective of his friends, even though they're much better fighters than he is. You can mess with him all you want, and he'll just take it, but mess with his friends, and he will not stand for it. He will fight and give his all for them, to the point that he would happily give his life for any of them, though that can also be tied to his low self-esteem. It is the death of one his close friends that leads him to take a merciless position regarding the show's antagonists. Oh, and he had or has a relationship that's vitriolic at times and romantic at others with a Tsundere Rich Bitch who goes through significant character development after losing access to her family money — which had been largely attained through crooked business or accounting practices by one or both of her parents — and she also ends up impaled through the midsection in front of him after the cast has its first confrontation with an old enemy in some time.
  • Am I talking about Xander Harris or Jaune Arc?
• Speaking of RWBY, this young woman with a red and black color scheme has a special power above and beyond her semblance that is centered around her eyes, and her choice of weapon is something of her own creation. She is a visiting student from a foreign Huntsman Academy, and the headmaster of the local Huntsman Academy and his people, including his top team, have placed their trust in her and her team. Despite this, it turns out that they are secretly working with a revolutionary faction fighting for an oppressed group and led by a person with a tendency to resort to violence as the first option. When the battle lines are drawn, the power of one of the Four Maidens is aligned against the headmaster in a battle over control of the Relic, and once the dust settles, the Academy has fallen, the kingdom has been depopulated, and Penny Polendina has been killed by a member of Team JNPR.
  • Is that Cinder Fall in V2-V3 or Ruby Rose in V7-V8?
• In this decades-long-running franchise, an allegedly secret operation run by the US military (that also recruits a number of civilian specialists) fights for freedom in an ongoing conflict with a technologically-advanced enemy they colloquially refer to as "snakes." Occasionally, they have to deal with politics, including conflict from higher up in the chain of command and hostile elements within the US government. The secrecy of the operation is also limited, with an awful lot of people finding out about it. Russia also has its own counterpart operation, and the program is not always limited to Americans, sometimes with international oversight as well as international recruits, but the franchise itself retains a very America-centric flavor and perspective despite these elements.
  • Is it G.I. Joe or the Stargate-verse?

CyokieRevott

• An intelligent, academically-inclined teenage boy goes to Boarding School. He's used to following the rules and is prepared to do so at his strict new school, but everything changes when he meets an attractive, rebellious Blithe Spirit. He is captivated by this student, who teaches him to have fun and let himself go. He doesn't feel worthy of the other student's friendship, and they entrance him so much that he begins to lose his grip on his other relationships. His grasp on reality regarding them is shaky due to the way he idealizes them. Unfortunately, this causes him to make a Tragic Mistake that indirectly causes the other student's death, turning his entire world on its head and making him realize that his whole life had started to revolve around them. Many details about the death and the other student's mindset and mental health are left ambiguous. He deals with crippling guilt over the incident, but eventually coming to terms with the other student's death helps him grow.
  • And now, for the important part: is the Blithe Spirit a girl or a boy?
    

D

Daibhid C

• In this UK-centric Massive Multiplayer Crossover, a monstrous being based on a Harry Potter character threatens Londoners, but is defeated by the awesome power of Mary Poppins. A character from recent James Bond films also appears in the work, but isn't really involved in this storyline.
  The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Century 2009 or the opening ceremony to the London 2012 Olympic Games?
• In a fantasy world, a young girl thoughtlessly triggers an emotional outburst from An Ice Person. Up until now, the ice-creating character has kept a tight control on their powers, but now the land is plunged into Endless Winter. The girl must go on a quest that takes her to the newly formed Ice Palace, not so much to defeat the ice-caster as to talk them down with The Power of Love, since the story makes it clear that they're not really villainous. Oh, and there's a talking snowman.
  Frozen or Wintersmith?
• In this instalment of a long-running series, an eccentric engineer invents a spacecraft with a radical new power source. Unexpected factors threaten the flight of this ship, which in turn could mean The End of the World as We Know It. During the ship's launch there's a Shout-Out to the song "Magic Carpet Ride", possibly as a reference to its use in Apollo 13. The ship's crew end up making an unexpected First Contact with aliens who look a lot like one of the species on board the ship, only more dignified and powerful.
  Star Trek: First Contact or The Last Hero?
• This July 2018 multiple-of-ten comic is the culmination of a recently reignited Will They or Won't They? between two long-running characters who finally got engaged. While billed as the wedding issue, in the event the bride (who has a feline codename) has a conversation with her blonde best friend (whom she hasn't really been shown interacting with for years) which convinces her not to go through with it. The fallout from this is seen in subsequent issues.
  Batman (Tom King) #50 or X-Men: Gold #30?
• In this volume of a series of children's novels about a boy called Johnny who has fantastic adventures, he and his friends visit the past by means of a trolley that can travel through time.
  Is the "trolley" what Americans would call a shopping cart or what Brits would call a tram? (Credit to Paul A, who pointed this out on alt.fan.pratchett many years ago.)

DaggerQuill

• A musical based on a popular Greek myth, featuring an Adorkable demigod hero charming a Broken Bird in spite of her snarky, jaded exterior (part of which involves giving her a flower he got through his powers). She sings a song about how she’s falling in love with him despite the fact that she should know better based on her backstory, and is followed by a harmonizing Greek Chorus (all wearing the same monochrome dresses) representing a well known group of minor Greek Goddesses. They’re happy together for a short while, but due to the Broken Bird making a deal with Hades, lord of the dead, she has to go down to the Underworld. The hero, spurred by his mentor and his love for her, goes down to rescue her from Hades. Does the story have a happy ending or is it a tragedy?

Darkblade

• In a medieval-ish post apocalyptic world humanity has been hunted by nearly unstoppable monsters. Even hiding behind mostly effective walls humanity is losing a slow war of attrition against the monsters. One day the walls fail to hold back the monsters and a young boy looses his mother to the monsters. Barely escaping with his own life he swears that one day he will rid the world of the monsters. Years later he finds some Applied Phlebotinum that allows him to fight the monsters on equal terms at the expense of his humanity. Some people see him as a saviour others are less than pleased with him shaking up the status quo.
  Attack on Titan or The Warded Man
• A long running speculative fiction franchise that recently had a landmark anniversary. Over the course of the decades the franchise has run several different actors have played the titular roll. Among the older seasons there are seven iconic portrayals that are held as sacred by parts of the fandom. A hiatus in the nineties in which movie(s) no one is sure what to do with came out before the franchise was renewed in two thousands. Also the most famous classic incarnation wore a scarf.
  Doctor Who or Kamen Rider?
• A young female aspiring artist witnesses a demon hunter kill a demon. Although initially frightened by his arrogance and violent tendencies she starts to fall in love with the hunter after she gets dragged further and further into his darkly magical world. Eventually it is revealed that she has some ties to this world herself and is important to the main villain's plans. The villain himself is a fallen demon hunter who is now using their evil powers along with his own abilities for his own ends.
  GARO or The Mortal Instruments?
• A TV show about a down on their luck middle class suburbanite that turns to drug dealing to maintain their lifestyle.
  Breaking Bad or Weeds?

Darkestabsol

• Our main character is a guy who survives an attempt on his life via poison, but not without unintentional alternate effects on his body. From there, he goes to return to normal. The primary villains are a tall thin person (Who also happens to be the person who caused the main character's poisoning) and a big guy who isn't as smart as the tall person.
  Is this Case Closed or The Emperor's New Groove?

DBZFan102

• A series starring a cocky protagonist who excels at his particular area of expertise and has a blue color scheme (though not without at least one notable red accessory) fighting to save the world from a madman with a red color scheme. He's big on The Power of Friendship and a Friend to All Living Things, and along the series befriends an Adorkable blonde, blue-eyed inventor who grows more confident due to the hero's influence, a Girly Girl who follows him around because of her blatant crush on him, a dark, brooding Rival who is allied with the aforementioned red-colored maniac and battles a man known for his climbing skills. He also unlocks at least one Super Mode over the course of the story.
  Sonic the Hedgehog or Pokémon the Series: XY?
• An organization created with the purpose of researching, cataloguing and capturing supernatural entities, locking most of them in containment cells should they prove dangerous to mankind. They also classify said entities in order from least to most dangerous.
  But are they a bumbling quartet openly in the service of the US goverment, or a vast secretive cabal that answers to no one?

Decaf Grub 47393

• In this fanfic of a beloved cartoon, an eleven-year old man with the plan and a close friend run far away from home in search of a long-lost relative. During the journey, the hero falls in love with a raven-haired female while evading attempts to bring them back home.
  Is this Finding Dad or On the Run: A Loud House Story.
• In this classic motion picture, the film opens with the main character dying. A reporter than goes on to interview the people in the main character's life, some of which liked the man and some of which despised him. The reporter attempts to piece together the meaning of a cryptic puzzle the dead man left behind, only for the mystery to remain a Riddle for the Ages.
  Is this Citizen Kane or Immortal Beloved?

Densetsu No Kaboom

• A formerly heroic male character loses his mother and gains a high rank in the Evil Empire while also getting a cool Laser Blade and helmet. Some years later, another male character closely related to the first one engages in a tearful "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight with him, and after an incident involving lightning, the first character dies.
  Star Wars' or Mother3?
• At the beginning of the story, there are two siblings. One is shy and sheltered, and has blond hair; the other is more adventurous and has red hair. Events separate them from each other as well as their parents. Three years later, the younger sibling goes on an adventure with three friends, including someone raised by strange magical creatures as well as an animal sidekick; this adventure eventually leads to them finding the older sibling, who had gone into the mountains and never returned. The two siblings have grown apart in this time, and the elemental powers of one end up almost killing the other, but by the end the two have reconciled and things turn out well.
  Frozen or Mother 3?
• A villain works their way into a high-ranking group and manipulates their coworkers to get them out of the way in order to put themselves on top. Their evil plan involves the use of flowers which cause normally docile and intelligent anthropomorphic animals to lose their senses and go berserk. They are eventually thwarted by the two protagonists, who initially met each other on antagonistic terms but became partners over the course of these events.
  Zootopia or Cave Story?
• This is the story of an alien invasion of Earth, opposed only by a young scientist and his sister. The titular protagonist and several other major characters have three-letter names. The aliens' MO for invasion involves bombarding the entire surface of a planet at once to wipe out all life.

Iji, or Invader Zim?

Diamonddmgirl

• This infamous fanfic shares its name with a song. A character who, in canon, was just a bit weird is now evil for no reason. A girl is oddly happy when another girl who is supposed to be one of her best friends is killed and her body is desecrated. Again, the first girl's motivations are barely explained.
  My Immortal or Cupcakes (Sergeant Sprinkles)?
• The villain has been raising someone else's child for their own selfish purposes, keeping the child away from others and making them think that all other humans are evil. The child has long light hair. When they are in their late teens, they meet another human around their age who has brown hair. Said other human isn't anything like what the long-haired person thought that humans were like, causing them to doubt everything the villain taught them about the world. Eventually the long-haired character sides with the villain, only to realize that they were wrong when they're in the tall building they grew up in. The villain then tries to kill the brown-haired character in that same building. This story also features oddly helpful animals, people going over ledges without getting hurt and criminals dressed in medieval clothing.
  Do the law-abiding citizens wear medieval clothes too, or are they dressed like modern day New Yorkers?
• This Animated Musical features a redheaded princess whose parents are both dead for a change. She ends up in the middle of a love triangle between a man who accompanies her throughout large portions of the plot and a prince who she got engaged to before she met the other guy, or so she thinks. The princess has an older sister who also makes frequent appearances but does not get a love interest. The sister is more closely connected to the supernatural than the redhead. It turns out the prince is evil and a liar and the true villain of the film. He wants the rest of the royal family dead for political reasons and manages to immobilize the redhead princess, after which the non-human (also non-animal and non-plant) comic relief guy proves instrumental in freeing her. In the climax a major character seems to die stopping the villain and then comes back in a way that involves the supernatural aspects of the older sister. Many scenes feature snowy landscapes, and the main plot takes place in Scandinavia.
  Frozen or The Secret of Anastasia?

Disney23

• A famous baseball player becomes disgraced after his misses a ball that costs his team the game. He is scorned and attacked by everyone around him to the point he attempts suicide, but in the end, he is given another chance and wins in the end.
  Is it the Kingdom Hospital episode "Butterfingers" or The Simpsons episode "The Boys of Bummer".

dmeagher13

• A princess is locked in a tower for most of her life as a result of a magical enchantment placed on her. Naturally, she yearns to see the outside world. A Jerk with a Heart of Gold eventually stumbles across her tower, and agrees to take her to and show her the outside world, not because he cares for her (or at least admits that he does) but because of his own ulterior motives. They oppose a villain who wants to exploit the princess for their own selfish reasons. Eventually, the bad guy manages to get ahold of the princess but is thwarted in their moment of triumph, the Jerk over comes his selfish ways, the enchantment on the princess is broken and they fall in love and live Happily Ever After. Both had a profound impact on the landscape of animated movies, albeit with the first of these films killing fairy-tale based animated films at the start of a decade, while the second revived them at the start of the next. Are we talking about Shrek or Tangled?

Donald The Potholer

• An asteroid is on a collision course with the planet! What passes for a regional government decides that the best course of action is to send a rocket equipped with what is essenially Black Box technology to the asteroid to get rid of it. The power source of the rocket is extracted from the essence of life itself, and the de facto head of said regional government is tied in to the comapny that makes this energy. The Remnant of an environmental extremist group suceeds in sabotaging this rocket forcing the only remaining plan to be their plan: the unleashing of a more concentrated projection of said energy at the asteroid. The group suceedes in unleashing this projection with the help of the Player Character. As it turns out, the asteroid's collision course with the planet was a premeditated act by a third party with amazing powers of its own, which has to be defeated by said Player Character in the Final Battle of the storyline.
  Final Fantasy VII, right? How about The "Delta Episode" of Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire?
• Over the course of about two years, this "Ace" of his profession became a Legend, defying the odds time-and-time again, turning certain defeats into spectacular victories. Then, when all seemed well for him and his friends, he was framed for a heinous crime! He was relegated to exile for a significant period, during which things went From Bad to Worse for this man's nation. He only got back into the game with the help of a friend-^note possibly lover-turned-Reasonable Authority Figure. That and the existence of a spy, whose activities include bombings and murder. But, with the aid of a loud, brash, mistrusting youngster, a (perceived) traitor from the other side, and a lady who peppers her speech with some Gratuitous Foreign Language, this Ace is able to Set Right What Once Went Wrong, capturing the spy and restoring the reputation of a man unfairly tarnished.
  If the profession is "fighter pilot", the "Ace" is Christopher Blair.^note And the specific game for most of the events is Vengeance of the Kirathi. If the profession is "Attorney", the "Ace" is Phoenix Wright^note with the specific game being Dual Destinies.
• An organization located in a tropical region undertakes a project to better the lifestyles of living beings in that world. However, that organization's Director takes a bit of a maniacal turn, favoring another species of beings over the beings the project is intended to serve. Said Director suborns a known criminal into doing their dirty work while the rank and file of the organization still follow the Director's orders until the Director reveals their true colors. The Player Character fights the Director in a place out of their world in the final battle of the primary storyline.
  Said Director, of course, is Lumine. And it's the same being: dying and extending your hair, adding two letters to your name, changing your operative gender, and traveling to another game series won't allow you to evade justice for long!^note i.e. Lusamine. Only applicable to the original versions, though.

Dragon_Feathers

• A multiethnic team of young adults and their big, adorable, white non-human companion save an Americasia City of Adventure from a man in a white, red, and yellow mask. There is a suave, blue-eyed man who wants the hero's skill for his own use, but is rendered helpless by said masked man in the middle of his plan. One of the villains is motivated by revenge for the death of a female family member. Big Hero 6 or the first season of The Legend of Korra?

• In this 2014 smash hit movie, an everyday guy (played by Chris Pratt) accidentally finds an Artifact of Doom while doing his job. He finds himself dragged into a humorous, world-hopping adventure to defeat an Evil Overlord along with a Ragtag Bunch of Misfits including: an attractive Action Girl, a comically serious guy with a dark color scheme, a Talking Animal, and a Big Guy made of something other than flesh. Does Chris Pratt play Emmett or Star-Lord?

• This story, aimed at teenagers, takes place In a World… (but with the first installment taking place entirely in a City of Adventure) where some people have superpowers and use them to oppress and terrorize non-powered people. An organization that uses glove-shaped weapons is dedicated to bringing down these superpowered villains. One of the main characters is an 18-year-old who saw his father killed in front of him as a boy. It turns out that the leader of the Cape Busters group actually has very strong powers himself, and secretly uses them to give the group their edge. The second book's villain has water powers. The series began in 2012. The Reckoners Trilogy or The Legend of Korra?

• An animated musical from a major studio made in the 1990s has a heavy Christian influence and is based on a very old story, but isn't nearly as Narmy or Anvilicious as such cartoons usually are. In fact, it's quite dark for a "family" movie. Its opening song alone features racial oppression and Family-Unfriendly Violence, which persist throughout the film. The protagonist becomes estranged from the man who he had grown up with as a family member, and eventually witnesses his death (which was likely divine intervention). The two men have an opposing duet song. The film's best song is Nightmare Fuel in visuals and lyrics, and is at least a sort of Villain Song. Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame or DreamWorks Animation's The Prince of Egypt?

Disciple

• A forgotten hero of a previous conflict returns to civilization from unexplored territories to face the threat of an evil power bound to a mask hell-bent on destroying the world, with the aid of a desperate, manipulated pawn. The hero must gather four revered figures together in order to stop the antagonists. Along the way, the hero is accompanied by a snarking character who formerly worked with the antagonists and is only helping out because he/she needed the hero's help to escape a deserted location at first. He/she then proceeds to blame everything that got him/her stranded on the hero. The hero starts off the game in a much weaker state then he/she was before, and must spend the first portion of the game "healing" himself/herself. In addition, the hero must also retrieve an important object taken from him/her prior to the start of the game. Over the course of his/her journey, the hero is given advice by a cryptic, creepy character who aids in the "healing" process, a town on the verge of destruction in denial of its fate, helps a soul stuck between life and death let go and move on into the afterlife, defends farmers from invaders from another planet, reunites a couple in a hotel, uses a mask to gain entry into a bar, is asked by someone in said bar to perform, proves the innocence of a character facing an execution ordered by a royal after trudging through a swamp, journeys to a desert land filled with spirits, assassins that appear out of nowhere, and faces the long-gone ruler of a vast empire. The hero stops the antagonist's attempted Colony Drop and defeats him with the possible aid of an 11th-Hour Superpower. The game ends with the hero returning back to the unexplored territories once more. The hero returns later in the series as a restless spirit in order to give aid to the new generation of heroes.
  Is this The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask or Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords?

Divra

• A proerty created by a British comic book artist about a group of Badass Normals who are trying to kill utterly monstrous expies of your favorite superheroes and destroy the shady entity that created and controls them. Is this The Boys (2019) or The Ten-Seconders?

E

E1craZ4life

• Starting out as a Visual Novel Dating Sim, a one-sentence disclaimer hints at nasty surprises to come. Your character is a student at a Japanese school who is classmates with their childhood friend. At school, they meet a shy and timid bookworm, a Tsundere, and the school's most popular girl, all of whom the player character starts to date. As the player gets to know his suitors, strange events start happening, and people are being killed. The game itself starts to glitch out until it's no longer playable, and the villain (who carries a heart-shaped pen) reveals herself to be a Medium Aware AI who's trying to get through to the player themselves. The player's choices in the game determines what kind of ending results from the playthrough. Is the game How To Date A Magical Girl! or Doki Doki Literature Club!?

Eevee_em

• Near the beginning of the story, a 10-year-old boy finds out that he is the chosen one. Later, he is told by a girl about his age that he must go out and collect three special gems (One of which is red and associated with fire, one of which is blue, and one of which goes with the theme of the other two), and take them to a sacred place that one would associate with religion. This task would be fairly simple, except that the main villain has been causing problems since before the hero started his task, forcing said hero to overcome many obstacles. The girl knows how to play a special song on the ocarina, and this becomes a plot point. The hero may or may not have multiple love interests.
  Pokémon 2000 or the first part of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time?
• A game by Masahiro Sakurai with a strong focus on multiplayer. In addition to the main mode, there's a mode that focuses on exploring a large area in order to collect powerups for a short contest at the end. There's also a mode that features a top-down perspective and seems like a simplification of the main mode at first, but actually plays quite differently than anything else in the game. There are exactly three panels of "achievements" to fill up. It's possible to assemble the legendary Dragoon by collecting its three pieces and then have Kirby ram someone with it.
  Kirby's Air Ride or Super Smash Bros. for 3DS?

Edwar

• This is a series made by a controversial MegaCorp, which takes a lot of cues from nostalgic movies made decades ago. The story introduces the stranger with mysterious powers found in the woods and secretly protected and fed by the young protagonists. There is the main heroine who thought her best friend is a good person, only to learn she was sitting next to her Archenemy the whole time. A single Action Mom who has to deal with the evil monsters that tried to kill her son, and her son who has a psychic connection with the villain of the story. She is in love with the town cop and together they discover mysterious underground tunnels full of monsters. The Villain Protagonist who can subject its victims to Mind Rape and wants to reform the world in his image.
  Stranger Things or The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power?
• The story is about two women who fight over who inherits the throne after the monarch of their country dies, and their indecisive king who rules through the most prosperous era of their kingdom. The first woman is the protagonist of the story, she is fiery, outspoken and is deeply loved by the king. She has to fight to secure the throne for herself and her children from those who think a woman should not hold so much power ever. The second one, is outright ignored by the king, despite giving him the heir he wanted, she is a Proper Lady, but deeply resents the heroine for the freedom she has, and is constantly paranoid about her. There are a lot of scene dedicated to women giving birth and their struggles in a patriarchal and deeply religious medieval society that threats them like Baby Factories, and lot of time skips. Characters who go from children to adults being played by different actors, while the already adult characters don't change at all, and apparently, they didn't get old either in the 2 decades that passed. The backstabbing, manipulative Evil Chancellor of the king who tries everything to stop the heroine from becoming the queen and sides with her paranoid rival to make sure is her son that inherits the throne. The protagonist favors red, while her rival favors green or blue gowns. But because this is a Tragedy, nobody gets what they want in the end.
  Is this about Rhaenyra and her sons, Alicent, King Vserys, Aegon the Second and Otto Hightower or Hurrem and her sons, Mahidevran, Suleyman, Shehzad Mustafa and Ibrahim Pasha?

Edward Gil

• In this Pokémon game, the villain is a mother driven made with More Than Mindcontrol from a Pokémon that didn't realize what it was doing. Upon being freed, she falls into a coma. Are we talking about the fangame Pokémon Uranium or the more recent official Pokémon Sun and Moon?

Eliaskelham

• A fan smitten with a major celebrity manages to become close to them. He discovers she had been secretly in love with another, and was pregnant with his child, with said pregnancy and relationship spelling a likely end to her career. His idol's love interest turns out to be a monster and murders the both of them. The fan is killed and then reincarnated as a celebrity kid, retains memories of his previous life, and enters the entertainment industry, leveraging his position in order to identify his idol's killer and bring him to justice. He then goes about exposing the circumstances behind his idol's death under the guise of making a production about it. Are we talking about Oshi no Ko or Om Shanti Om?

El Squibbonator

• A blonde teenage girl learns that she is destined to defend the world from supernatural threats. With the help of a magical mentor, she battles evil on a daily basis, doing so under an alias passed down to her by her predecessor in the field. Eventually she develops a romance with a mysterious love interest who has powers of his own. Her enemies' plans frequently involve transforming her classmates into monsters, forcing her to fight the people she trusts. Now, who is this brave young woman: Usagi Tsukino or Buffy Summers?
• A giant robot, built by a genius scientist and controlled by one of his younger relatives, serves as the world's first line of defense against threats no one else can fight. The robot, despite ostensibly being a weapon controlled by the human protagonist, is regularly treated as a character in his own right, and at seems to have a heroic personality. Is this robot named Gigantor or Frankenstein Jr.?

Emma Iveli

• In a Medium Blending sitcom episode involving children's toys, we are treated to an alternate universe. However one of the characters, thanks to a toy, begins to get visions and flashbacks of another world. After some digging around, he discovers the world he knows is only a fantasy caused by a combination of injury and the harsh reality of growing up. The character decides living in a fantasy world based around toys is better, but after realizing that there are things that only the real world can offer he knows that he must go back to reality.
  Community episode "G.I. Jeff" or The Simpsons episode "Brick Like Me"?
• An episode of an animated sitcom has an episode dealing with Boy Bands and Subliminal Messages. Guest starring at least one member of *NSYNC.
  The Simpsons episode "New Kids on the Blecch" or Gravity Falls episode "Boyz Crazy"?

Endark Culi

• This Nippon Ichi game has a notably darker tone than most other games by this company, with violent deaths and sexual abuse being important to the plot. It begins with the player creating a name for the mostly-silent main character, though no matter what is chosen, the true importance of this name isn't revealed until near the end. Your main ally, and the character that gives the protagonist most of their strength, is foul-mouthed, desires world domination, and views most events through the protagonist's eyes due to limitations on their powers. You are able to encounter and befriend other unique characters over the course of the game, including a ditzy girl with some beastly features and a lot of determination, and a fellow with some farm animal features that acts friendly and naïve until his true intentions are revealed and he becomes a threat. The game's grand finale takes place soon after exploring a world other than your own, and the ultimate Big Bad is considered to be a god. The foul-mouthed character was a DLC character for Disgaea D2: A Brighter Darkness, classified as a monster-type, and could also be obtained in Disgaea RPG during a limited collaboration event.
  Soul Nomad & the World Eaters or The Witch and the Hundred Knight?
• This role-playing game's setting is a dark fantasy, with humanity at war with dragons ever since a past betrayal. The main protagonist is a member of a knighthood devoted to hunting down dragons and their devoted followers; however, in a twist of fate, he ends up being saved from near-death by those he sought to kill, and is given a magical blessing (which includes gaining draconic features) that now makes him an enemy of his former comrades. Now on the other side of the conflict, the hero learns that the Fantastic Racism was Based on a Great Big Lie (thanks in part to someone beloved by humanity caring too much for someone on the opposite side of the conflict) and tries to save the world; unfortunately, the woman that's been providing him with the most vital information has been secretly manipualting him for a greater goal, causing a lot of destruction in the process. One prominent member of the hero's former knighthood has a Villainous Breakdown and continues trying to kill the protagonist and his allies even after the rest of humanity places their trust in the protagonist's cause. The game ends with the woman's success and subsequent death, and noting that there are still some loose ends that need to be tied up.
  Dragon Star Varnir, or Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga?
• This game is from a point-and-click mystery series with science fiction elements. This installment involves people dying due to extremely fine cuts. There's some Sequencing Deception, primarily in the fact that events that seemed to "split" from a single point and occur in parallel timelines are actually similar events occurring at different points in the same timeline. While the main antagonist is dealt with during the story's events, the Greater-Scope Villain gets exactly what they want, because their plan involved Exploiting the Fourth Wall and the player trying to achieve a Golden Ending confirms their belief that their universe can be influenced by an outside presence. Oh, and towards the climax, the main protagonist learns they were engineered and has a conversation with an older model of themself.
  Head AS Code, or AI: The Somnium Files - nirvanA Initiative?
• This Strategy RPG was released in 2022, published by a very well-known and influential company that has created both video games and anime in the past. This game is rather dark, with sympathetic characters (including a party member or two) killed off along the way. One of the defining features of this game is the use of a three-pronged Karma Meter, with each philosophy connected to a color: Red for decisions fueled by passion and a willingness to fight for your cause, Yellow for actions that are meant to achieve a goal at any cost, and Green for choices that seek a peaceful resolution above all else. The protagonist's moral-based decisions will determine how the game ends, but each ending tied to a major philosophy will end up abandoning at least one of their allies. However, there's also a secret "fourth" route, only accessible by making specific decisions throughout the entire game, that leads to uncovering the full truth about the setting and lets all of the protagonists stick together.
  Triangle Strategy, or Digimon Survive?
• This is an Otome romance visual novel at least partially written by Uta Amamiya, and presented by Otomate. The main protagonist is a young woman who finds herself trapped in an alternate world with a bunch of attractive men, and quickly learns that the stakes are deadly. More than one of her love interests is someone she used to know, but due to amnesia, she doesn't recognize them at first. One of the men is actually responsible for her current situation but hiding their true identity, and at least one other is willingly supporting him for his own reasons. The visual novel was originally exclusive to Japan and launched on the Playstation Vita. Its first port was released three years later, and it was released in North America, but those two events do not coincide.
  Psychedelica Of The Black Butterfly^note Initial 2015 release, then a NA Vita release followed by a worldwide PC release in 2018, or Charade Maniacs^note Initial 2018 release, followed by a JPN Switch release in 2021 followed by a NA Switch release?

Enricc 1

• Both TV shows focus on a Fish out of Water having to adjust to society after they were held captive from society. They both have main characters that still need to mature due to living sheltred all of their lives. The person who held them captive is a Faux Affably Evil man who lied to them about the outside world and never let them go outside with the excuse of an apocalpyse. Both protagonists struggle with relationships due to them being sheltred for so long they do not know how they work. The Deuteragonist in both shows is a Jerk with a Heart of Gold that slowly learns to become nicer thanks to the main character. Both stories focus on the main character learning how to adjust to society due to them being locked away for a lot of years.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, or Somewhere Boy?

F

FernandoLemon

• This Adventure Game from the '90s stars a male Deadpan Snarker protagonist, with a female sidekick of about the same age helping him on his quest. Both are looking for the truth to a mystery long-thought to be a myth regarding an ancient culture, with them travelling all over the world on their search for answers and uncovering multiple MacGuffins that lead them forward. Eventually, at the story's climax, the duo faces head-to-head with the Big Bad Ensemble at a location of great significance for that ancient culture, before the place is destroyed in front of them, killing the villains. The mystery has been solved, but all evidence that any of this existed has been destroyed. Oh well, at least the main characters have each other, as they reaffirm their love for one another despite their initially rocky relationship!
  Broken Sword: The Shadow of the Templars or Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis?

Floria

• During the Cold War, someone with the initials AR attempts to found an Objectivist utopia. The project goes downhill in dramatically dreadful ways that are gradually revealed to the audience. The Fantastic Drugs the community manufactures don't help.
  BioShock or The Fountainhead Filibuster: Tales from Objectivist Katanga?
• An early 21st century sci-fi(ish) series with a devoted following among geeky types. It is the product of an infamous Trolling Creator with a fondness for playing with tropes and Kill the Cutie. It features a mixed-gender ensemble (including multiple Action Girls as major characters), non-earth planets, a Badass Adorable girl with long dark hair, a socially privileged young male who has skills that can help the injured and is platonically close to a Badass Adorable cute girl, a dark-skinned male character fond of edged weapons, a sinister MegaCorp, a sun of unusual color, psychic powers, and lots of snark. It's also spawned its share of memes. Its representation (or lack thereof) of racial diversity has caused controversy in some quarters.
  Firefly or Homestuck?
• A snarky, eccentric, perpetually unshaven British Badass Bookworm and a snarky, competent, take-no-crap, much shorter American woman of color solve mysteries in contemporary New York State in this Setting Update of a popular literary property.
  Elementary or Sleepy Hollow?
• In this new adaptation of a longstanding pop culture franchise, a Badass Bookworm Great Detective fights crime in a large American city. Rather than his customary male sidekick, the detective's companion is a tough Asian woman whom he mentors in detective work. One of the major villains is a beautiful, dangerous British-accented woman who is a leader in a vast criminal organization.
  Elementary or Beware the Batman?
• A goodhearted (but not to be underestimated) East Asian Badass Bookworm teams up with an eccentric, socially inept, European genius detective of the opposite gender, and they develop a close bond, with the relatively normal nice Asian acting as the other character's Watson. The European detective character has high-status ancestry and a less than friendly relationship with their father. They are not emotionless or lacking in the capacity for kindness, but they're not the warm and fuzzy type at all - although they do defrost to some extent. Together, they solve murders. Despite the European detective character's strong resemblance to Sherlock Holmes, this series does not take place in Victorian or Edwardian London.
  Elementary or Gosick?

Fogsgse

• So, there's this legend about an evil monster that was put in a hidden place over a thousand years ago. In the present day, there are these attacks that seem to suggest that the monster has returned, and one of the victims is a person who knew something. Eventually, the secret entrance to the hidden place is found by two intrepid 12-year-olds. One of them has black hair while the other has red hair, and also, one of them wears round glasses. Bringing along a cowardly comic-relief character, they go into the hidden place. The bad guy is already there, and he delivers a monologue in which he explains what's really going on. The bad guy is then defeated, but he doesn't really die, and the redheaded relative of the redheaded 12-year-old is rescued. In fact, everyone who was attacked lives, and a bearded man gives the heroes a reward. Oh, and this story was first released to the public in 1998.
  Is this Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets or The ClueFinders 3rd Grade Adventures: The Mystery of Mathra?

FourFiveOne

• This work stars talking animals as the main characters. After two friends are separated, one tries to find the other. The main character, a former pet whose name starts with an "M", briefly joins a group of animals dedicated to the destruction of humankind. One of the other characters that journeys with the protagonist for a while is a brown-furred dog. There's a minor character named Tiberius.
  The Secret Life of Pets or War With No Name?

FoxMccloud

• Long ago, in a Crapsack World, mankind was terrorized by large, monstrous creatures. Human society managed to survive against these monsters, and eventually creates some vague semblance of peace. One day, a superior monster massacres an unprepared town, and allows its weaker kin to resume their devastating attacks on human settlements. Our protagonist, who survived the massacre, decides to join the fight against these creatures. However, they discover that they have the ability to wield the powers of the monsters they fight, making them mankind's best hope to win this war.
  Are these monsters dragons or Titans?

Frozenwolf150

• This comedy series was created as an intentional parody of other superhero stories. In this setting, superheroes are dime a dozen, with a wide assortment of wacky powers. Many of them are either narcissistic or completely useless, spending more time arguing than actually doing their job. The main protagonist is virtually indestructible, but the source of his power is never explained. He has a carefree goofball personality, but his sidekick takes the superhero job a lot more seriously. He lives in a small apartment and often has trouble making ends meet. He typically runs his daily errands in full costume, but nobody bats an eye. When he shows up to save the day, his fights often cause a lot of collateral damage that he doesn't seem to care about. At one point, the moon gets partially damaged thanks to the actions of a world-destroying supervillain.
  Is this The Tick or One-Punch Man?

Fubuki

• In this Pixar movie, two people meet for the first time, don’t really care about each other but don’t exactly dislike each other either. One of them is convinced he can do something which he clearly cannot and the other thinks he’s an idiot for believing it. Shortly after, they clash and develop a drawn-out rivalry during which the dreamer slowly gains the upper hand. When the realist does something stupid, the dreamer reacts, things escalate, their lives get turned completely upside down, and they have to reluctantly work together to get them back. The dreamer eventually is close to despair by learning from a more reliable source than his companion that his dream is impossible for him to reach, and deliberately evokes a Fly Or Die situation in which he fails at what he’s dreaming about and comes/believes to come close to getting himself killed. The realist goes after him with the help of a Ragtag Bunch of Misfits. The dreamer also has a Heroic BSoD which the realist gets him out of by revealing his own insecurities. They then save each other’s lives, team up to get out of a very dire situation in a great showdown, and end up moving and living together as best friends.
  Toy Story or Monsters University?

G

Gamermaster

• An incredibly powerful black haired demon lord loses his power and position due to a young woman and is reduced to working a bottom of the barrel job that he takes incredibly seriously. Among the people who join him in his quest to regian his power are: his loyal white haired second in command, an ordinary teenage girl, a child that can turn into a sword and views said teenage girl as a Cool Big Sis, the woman who caused him to lose his powers who happens to be an angel and is constantly shipped with him in-universe, and a Butt-Monkey.
  Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten or The Devil is a Part-Timer!?

Ghostsoul

• Five kids accept a 'gift' from the same Well-Intentioned Extremist who stuffs their souls in inanimate objects. They are also made into Unwitting Pawns forced to forever fight, which drives them insane as they suffer A Fate Worse Than Death The very thing they had been 'gifted' had caused them to become corrupted inside.
  Five Nights at Freddy's or Puella Magi Madoka Magica?

Gives-you-hugs

• This is a series about six babies—including a pair of twins and one who can't even speak to the other babies—and the people who look after them. Stories tend to revolve around either the lives of the caretakers or how the children misunderstand things they've seen and/or been told.

Rugrats or Gakuen Babysitters?

GrandCheese

• A Dramedy with religious themes set in America in the 20th century and focused on a family where the queer father leaves his wife and kid(s) for his male lover, who he later breaks up with. Has a case of Cerebus Syndrome as it progresses. Are we talking about Falsettos or Moral Orel?

The Great Conversation

• Released in the late New Tens, this beat-driven pop Concept Album with an overarching narrative about fame and celebrity and multiple lyrical motifs is the sixth studio album by an American artist who started in a niche genre but recently settled in electronic pop, although the album ends with a simple bittersweet piano ballad.
  Panic! at the Disco's Pray For The Wicked, or Taylor Swift's reputation?

gunslingerofgilead

• A modern day extension of Arthur's Knights of the Round Table act as defenders against the greatest threats known to man. The operatives of said agency take their monikers/codenames from the original knights (i.e. Galahad, Perceval, Lancelot, etc.), and new agents are only inducted upon the death of another. This is the basic set-up of both Kingsman: The Secret Service and The Order: 1886, separated by roughly 130 years and taking place in different genres (spy fiction vs Gaslamp Fantasy respectively).

H-I

Happy123boy

• A school where things are relatively normal. Classes proceed without much incident. Two characters even begin to start to fall in love with on another. Then one girl's machinations begin to ruin everything; causing bloody deaths that have lasting effects on all characters involved. One of the victims is one of the love-interests. Now, are we talking about Danganronpa 3 - Despair Arc or RWBY: Volume 3.

HellKillUsAll

• The future of a kingdom is at stake, especially a very respected individual, when a former student of theirs is out for revenge. Now a current student of the master must use all they can in a new environment to stop this evil and restore peace.
  Is it Kung Fu Panda or My Little Pony: Equestria Girls?
• A child-like character becomes a newspaper reporter to his Bad Boss. However, once his friends start alienating him, he wants to reveal the truth, but the boss threatens to blackmail and overwork him if he comes clean. However, our hero uses the newspaper as a way of clearing himself and giving the boss his just desserts.
  Is it theSpongeBob SquarePants episode "The Krabby Kronicle" or the My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic episode "Ponyville Confidential"
• A redheaded Rebellious Princess wants to be her own person and make her own decisions, something her royal parent doesn't approve of. Their differences escalate to the point where the parent destroys the princess's most beloved possession during a bitter argument, something the parent later regrets. The princess then runs away from home and makes a deal with a shifty witch to make their dreams come true via a magical transformation, but it only causes trouble in the kingdom, making both parties put aside their differences and become stronger on their journeys.
  Is this The Little Mermaid or Brave?
• A film about toys, both original and preexisting, that contains a plot point about whether toys are meant to be put on display or if they're meant to be played with.
  Is this Toy Story 2 or The LEGO Movie?

Harley Quinn Is Great

• Bimble's Bucket reuses the same basic premise from The Dreamstone. A lot of the cast are even unsubtle tweaks of counterparts from the latter. Naturally applies as It's the Same, Now It Sucks! to some of its detractors.

Hero Gal 2347

• A human finds that his alien Heterosexual Life-Partner is being affected against his will by something which is turning him savage. Said friend tries to resist, but is ultimately unable to do more than stall the process. The human attempts to keep his friend safe until he returns to normal, even as his now out-of-control friend takes aim at him. Ultimately, he does something extremely risky to keep his friend from harm. However, his care pays off, and the story ends with the two of them together and unharmed. As a last hint, the human's first name begins with J and the alien is called by a name starting with S.
  All-Star Superman #4 or Star Trek: The Original Series episode "Amok Time"?
• A character abruptly falls in love with someone high-status but inappropriate. Said character is struck with a curse which threatens to upset their whole life. The character's friends, knowing that the Curse Escape Clause has to do with true love, attempt to break it, but, owing to a misunderstanding, their first attempt is totally unsuccessful. Ultimately, the spell is broken, but the love which breaks it is platonic, not romantic.
  Frozen or DuckTales (1987) episode "A DuckTales Valentine"?
• A group of people are dealing with an attack by a hostile alien. However, through the course of the adventure, the heroes realize that the alien is not normally aggressive. It's attacking out of a Mama Bear/Papa Wolf desire to protect its children. The heroes smooth things over and they and the alien part on friendly terms. Home (2015), Chicken Little, or "The Devil in the Dark"?

Hqami

• A boy named Ricky who likes rapping has lost his parents prior to the story and is raised by an older female relative. A blonde girl dislikes him at first but they end up becoming friends.
  Rapsittie Street Kids: Believe in Santa or Ricky Rapper?
• People are given star ratings, which ruins everyone's lives. The Black Mirror episode "Nosedive" or the The Amazing World of Gumball episode "The Stars"?

Ikacprzak

• Alien mentor recruits five teenagers to fight off alien invasion, teenagers use animal-based powers to fight, transforming into alternate forms via "morphing". Both series take place in California.
  Animorphs or Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers ?

ImperiumAstarte

• A clan gifted with both prodigious skill and an overarching legacy comes into conflict with a villain who is equal parts sadistic and perversely charismatic. The family would eventually defeat the villain but not before he wreaks a grievous harm to one of the family's members that would deeply affect them in the years to come. Eventually the villain would resurface by taking control of the body of the same person he had previously harmed and would subsequently confront the family's latest heir who, unlike his straight laced predecessors, is a streetwise delinquent. In the climax, the villain attacks and nearly kills the heir's mentor but in the end is defeated for good through the use of his own tricks being used against him and his head getting blown up.
  Is this the climax of Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker or JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders?
• In a world where individuals who have surpassed perceived human limitations are the majority, a young man who lacks those traits finds himself ostracized by his peers and is socially unable to pursue his dream job. Not willing to back down so easily he soon finds an unlikely benefactor in the form of one of these enhanced individuals who helps him achieve his dream by donating his traits. The youth is also confronted by someone from his past who is also considered "perfect" and was superior in everyway to him in their youth .
  Is this the plot of Gattaca or My Hero Academia ?
• After a Shared Universe is struck by a cataclysmic event, a select group of specialists are sent back in time in order to take steps of reversing said calamity. In the climax however the Big Bad attacks the group's headquarters, prompting a fight that involves both the Big Bad and the previous enemies fought as well as the many allies from earlier arriving in the nick of time. In the end, the Big Bad and his minions are finally defeated but only through a Heroic Sacrifice made by one of the main characters.
  Is this Fate/Grand Order or Avengers: Endgame?
• An Eastern European immigrant travels to America (specifically New York City) in the hopes of experiencing a better life away from the horrors back home. Upon arriving however they find out that living in America is just as bad as their home country and find themselves involved in the seedy underworld of New York.
  Is the immigrant a Jewish mouse or a Yugoslavian veteran

IúkaSylvie

• A boy wields a katana against horrific monsters, for some of whom he expresses sympathy nonetheless. He opposes a mysterious man who spreads a special substance to turn people, including the boy's loved one, into monsters.
  Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba or the second season of Kaiten Mutenmaru?
• A child goes on a quest to vanquish a demon that has frozen the land.
  Horus: Prince of the Sun or Tweeny Witches: The Adventures episode "The Ice Witch and the Dragon of Fire and Ice"?
• A hot-headed Mage Born of Muggles defies tradition to make people happy with her magic. It's a Slice of Life until the second half of the series introduces the main antagonist, who utilizes technology for their own ends.
  Little Witch Academia (2017) or Tweeny Witches?

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