If not rename, at LEAST redirect farm...: Offscreen Inertia

Indeed, a search without omitting tropes still shows only a few hundred results, but lots of these are people using the term off this board to describe thing. I'd say it is slowly catching on, even if the specific term did originate here.

For redirects: Character Status Inertia maybe?

Edit PS: The inbounds has already increased to 2,006. I'd say it is performing pretty well.

edited 6th Nov '11 5:39:53 AM by Auxdarastrix

That's....a really weird number of inbounds compared to the wick count. My first thought on that would be that it's due to the trope namer being really popular, much more so than the trope is actually used. Both the inbound and wick count seem to be growing though, based on the stats in this thread. Currently: Tethercat Principle found in: 91 articles, excluding discussions.

This title has brought 2,006 people to the wiki from non-search engine links since 20th FEB '09.

I'm less concerned about the name than I am about the definition, which may need some tweaks for clarity.

I think I'll still support a soft-split for the In-Universe examples.

edited 6th Nov '11 3:11:52 PM by troacctid

Bump. Are we gonna DO anything here?!?

There is a distinction, I believe. The trope form of this (which I'm assuming to be "Character is seen doing [x] at the end of a scene, and when we see him some unreasonable amount of time later, he's still doing [x].") has enough examples on its own to warrant an article, even if it is considered a subtrope of Brick Joke. That's a very concrete event that can be cataloged without interpretation disputes, as opposed to the YMMV form (which I'm assuming to be "Character was last seen doing [x] and never stopped on-screen. These are the implications of that.")

I still like the soft-split option.

I kind of like this name. It's catchy.

If it must be renamed, though, I'd say something like Last Action Inertia would work. Offscreen Inertia is alright, but it doesn't really imply the trope to me in full...

I favour a hard split. I don't see how the Brick Joke variant relates, except insofar as it is a Brick Joke.

What?

This isn't supposed to be about brick jokes at all. I definitely favor the hard split, then. Actually, no, I'd argue that that isn't even a part of this trope at all. That's just a run-of-the-mill brick joke.

The Tethercat Principle is about how when characters are offscreen, it's assumed they're still doing whatever we last saw them doing. The Brick Joke variant being referred to is when, after being offscreen for a long time, we cut back to a character and find out they really were doing the same thing that whole time. For example: "Played with on an episode of The Colbert Report. Musical guest Rush starts playing "Tom Sawyer" at the end of the show while Colbert prepares to go to sleep. Next night, as the show starts, Rush is still playing "Tom Sawyer . . ."

There are also some other types of In-Universe examples on the page, like some that are Lampshaded, or other variants like the golems in Discworld who, apocryphally, would carry out their commands continually unless told to stop.

I feel like there's good reason to separate the In-Universe examples from the Audience Reaction ones.

edited 15th Jan '12 6:46:17 PM by troacctid

Bump. So are we separating the examples?

As long as we're talking about this here, why can't we merge No End In Sight into this trope? Because in all honesty, I think that name works better for this trope than an overly specific version of it.

No End In Sight is a subtrope. Technically we can't merge them, but NEIS can be lumped to TP as an internal subtrope.

Crowner gently placed on thread.

Calling crowner as overwhelmingly in favor of merger under a name TBD. To do:

• Write a description for the merged trope.
• Choose a name for the merged trope.

Made a sandbox for the trope. Any name suggestions, besides Conservation Of Narrative Momentum?

Offscreen Inertia is better.

Alt names crowner and already hollered for hooking.

Crowner hooked.

That's the wrong crowner...?

The right crowner was here.

Newtons First Law Of Character Action is a terrible name, don't understand why people have upvoted it. This isn't a character trope. Has nothing to do with "character action".

edited 8th May '12 1:02:31 PM by troacctid

That's where the "character" comes from.

Case in point: If a toilet is overflowing in the first act, then when you come back to it in the third act you expect the whole bathroom to be flooded. So there don't have to be any characters present at all. (If there were, you'd hopefully expect them to have called a plumber at some point.)

edited 8th May '12 1:07:49 PM by troacctid

Is this the correct crowner?

Yes. Also, Newtons First Law Of Story Action.

Bumping for votes.