Is this a plot or an ensemble?: The Magnificent Seven Samurai

Okay, there are a few things that just bug me about this page and have for a while. The start of the page describes a plot, which goes pretty well until the end of the fourth paragraph. Here, it just segues into something vaguely reminiscent of an ensemble definition, but without any explanation of how that ensemble connects to the earlier discussion of the plot. The very first line sort of ties it in, but the line before that leads the reader to expect a summary of the plot rather than a listing of character types, most of which have no additional information explaining how they specifically tie in to the plot described earlier in the article.

This is also linked as the seven-man grouping on Cast Calculus, but it is very different from ensemble-specific articles like Five-Man Band, Four-Temperament Ensemble, Power Trio, or even Six Student Clique, and seems a bit out of place to me.

Thoughts?

I'm a little bit confused as well.

It's both, really. It's a work that uses multiple elements from The Seven Samurai, almost always including a central band of seven particular character types.

This trope started life as a YKTTW about groups of seven characters. That proved to be too general, but it was realised that there was a viable trope in 'the seven characters recruited for a specific mission'. So this trope is part plot/part character grouping.

Okay, that makes some sense. There should maybe be some kind of edit for clarification, but I do not really understand the trope's intent well enough to make it myself; does anyone have any ideas?

The first paragraph seems pretty useless

I've tweaked the definition to add the plot elements that are most commonly present.

Better, but there still is a lot of stuff that doesn't seem necessary

Care to elaborate on that?

Could someone give me a laconic? That is, what's the central point of this trope?

"Seven characters recruited for a specific mission, usually to protect a group that cannot fight effectively from invaders of some nature"

So it's a plot trope?

It's both a plot and an ensemble.

It's a Whole-Plot Reference. It's a plot trope at heart, but it's dependent on a certain ensemble cast to drive that plot. Cutting that cast away from the plot would be like cutting out the identical twins from the Parent Trap Plot, the mad entrepreneur from the Charlie and the Chocolate Parody plot, or the Ghosts of Christmas from Yet Another Christmas Carol - you might still have a plot, but it's not this plot.

edited 2nd Oct '11 12:54:29 AM by Specialist290

Sorry for the double post.

Since there's been no further discussion for over a week nor any serious proposals to change it, can we consider this one resolved and move it out of the queue?

Sounds like a plan...