BRUTALLY Subverted

I'm not strawmanning.

I didn't claim that you said that descriptions are bad. I only said that following your and shimaspawn's interpretation of Word Cruft, we could as well conclude that this is the case, so that interpretation is not enough, so we need somethig more specific that defines why some things are Word Cruft and others aren't.

And Bailey didn't even comment at your post, I don't see why you replied to that.

Anyways, looking at the A.I. Is a Crapshoot page, I still say that noting that a subverted example is brutal, isn't more value judgemental, than saying that it is Played for Laughs with Pintsize in Questionable Content.

You could say that adding that wick is redundant, because readers should guess that from reading the context of how annoying and silly the AI are there, but it still helps to clear the tone of the example, in case it didn't go through with a shorter description.

And if it's:

• Big Damn Heroes: Brutally subverted, after the villain captures Bob he's tortured to death

does "brutally" really add anything? Even if it's not Word Cruft in the usual sense, is it necessary?

Maybe it's not something crucial, but it spells out something that is only implied by the rest of the entry.

It is useless to be that pragmatic about only mentioning crutial info.

We could as well leave out the part that he was "tortured". If he dies, that alone subverts the trope, what happened before that is needless elaboration. The "villain" part doesn't add much either, it's logical that the killers of someone who the heroes tried to save according to the wick, can only be bad guys. So it could be:

• Big Damn Heroes: Brutally subverted, after the villain captures Bob he's tortured to death.

• Big Damn Heroes: Subverted, Bob gets killed after he is captured.

edited 17th Feb '11 8:09:07 AM by EternalSeptember

You're still at it, ES. I don't see the point of having this debate if you're going to continue to distort our meanings or play false slippery slope fallacies.

Discussing the details of how a trope applies is not affected in the least by this. Taking your examples:

• Big Damn Heroes: Brutally subverted, after the villain captures Bob he's tortured to death.
• Big Damn Heroes: Subverted, after the villain captures Bob he's tortured to death.

Let's play "Spot The Difference" between these two examples.

edited 17th Feb '11 8:11:07 AM by Fighteer

Than prove how is it different.

You just set up overly exclusive criteria, and when I point out how that would exclude a bunch of writing forms that are usually accepted, you just say "Well, those are different".

Saying that "A.I. Is a Crapshoot is Played for Laughs", adds a non-crucial, but useful note about the example's tone, compared to "A.I. Is a Crapshoot is Played Straight"

Saying that "A.I. Is a Crapshoot was burutally subverted", adds a non-crucial, but useful note about the example's tone, compared to "A.I. Is a Crapshoot is subverted"

Why should be the first one acceptable, but the second one unacceptable?

Edit: I think my example's description also answered yours.

edited 17th Feb '11 8:19:53 AM by EternalSeptember

My point is that there is no difference between those examples, other than excessive verbiage. Also, as Played for Laughs is one of the defined methods of Playing with a Trope, it's as relevant as any other datum about the example.

• Big Damn Heroes: [Played straight,] Bob rescues Alice. (Played straight is implied and is not necessary to state usually)
• Big Damn Heroes: Subverted, Bob tries to rescue Alice only to find out that Alice already rescued herself.
• Big Damn Heroes: Played for Laughs, as Bob makes a total fool of himself.

I have a hard time picturing how Played for Laughs applies to BDH, but you see the point, I hope. Now the Word Cruft versions.

• Big Damn Heroes: Snarkily played straight, Bob rescues Alice.
• Big Damn Heroes: Hilariously subverted, Bob tries to rescue Alice only to find out that Alice already rescued herself.
• Big Damn Heroes: Smarmily Played for Laughs, as Bob makes a total fool of himself.

Remove the stuff ending in "-ly" before the usage of the trope and you lose zero relevant information.

edited 17th Feb '11 8:22:08 AM by Fighteer

Played for Laughs is still a variation of Played straight, in that the trope as it is described must happen, it is just the style and the set-up that makes it funny.

Big Damn Heroes is indeed a confusing example of that variation. AI Is A Crapshot was a better example. In Questionable Content, the requirements of AI Is A Crapshot are fulfilled. Pintsize is crazy, so it is not subverted, but he is more like a mischievious gremlin than an omnicidal maniac, so even if it is Played Straight, the content beyond the required elements of the trope are notable for how they portray the trope.

As I tried to say in #94, many of the adverbs are attempts at following the same format with examples where it isn't "played for", but portrayed with a similar style to those.

And BTW I have no intention of protecting things like "amazingly", or "brilliantly", these obviously don't add anything related to the writing style, writer intention, or context, just gushing.

If "amazingly" and "brilliantly" don't add any information, how is "brutally" any different? They're all three the same thing — the opinion of the person who wrote it on how well it was handled.

Brutality is not necessarily a value judgement, it's an execution form, as a counterpart of drama, humor, hotness, cuteness, or thrillingness. None of these are considered better than the others, these are just ways to treat a subject.

We have not just the "Played for" entries, but also a long list of tropes, that treat these concepts objectively as styles.

If I a subversion caused large amounts of Gorn, it's not a praise to call it "brutal", it's just a statement, like calling a scene that caused a sad plotline "dramatic".

edited 17th Feb '11 9:25:54 AM by EternalSeptember

How about an example that states that the trope was subverted, resulting in a lot of Gorn?

As I understand it the "Played for" tropes imply authorial intent. "Brutally" just means that the troper who wrote it thought it was shocking or whatever.

More or less. Played for Laughs and Played for Drama can themselves be a form of Word Cruft when overused. Generally they only work in contrast to the usual intent of the trope; e.g., a serious trope used for comedy. I mean, A.I. Is a Crapshoot is usually Played for Drama, so announcing this fact amounts to pointless rambling.

Yes, but that's only caused by the wording. The examples themselves often imply the same level of author intent as "Played For X", it's just unfortunate that this particular wording got spread.

Maybe we could try mass-replacing them with "Subverted For X", but always cutting the words would cause unneccessary content loss.

You could try rewriting some of them for that wording, but I don't think that it would catch on.

edited 17th Feb '11 10:22:44 AM by EternalSeptember

Fighteer, you 'd at my post before the statement "you're strawmanning my argument, deliberately", but I'm not sure what you're referring to.

Er... now I'm not sure why I did that.