Rename (29/05/12): Gene Hunt Interrogation Technique

No, because this is the hero doing it, just as with the Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique.

I'll concur with OP. This is merely a Played With form of Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique.

Really. That's all it is and nothing more.

The page doesn't need to exist separately from Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique.

edited 28th Oct '11 9:17:15 PM by SeanMurrayI

But we definitely don't want to cut it. It has so many inbounds.

If it's really the same, why wouldn't we merge it instead of cutting?

I agree. A merge would be better especially if it has wiks that aren't duplicated. Plus we keep the inbounds. It's just better for the wiki.

Well, this trope is more Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique meets Cool and Unusual Punishment, but yeah, it's close enough to merit a merge.

Good points. I've changed my vote.

I still think its a separate trope. At the risk of drawing Mad's ire by actually saying this, we've kept tropes separate on thinner reasons, and I for one think consistency is a good thing.

But can you provide us with concrete example of such an occurrence? Without that, I don't see any reason why this should be a separate page.

Played With variations are generally not regarded as separate tropes, and as far as I can tell, that's our standing policy.

edited 29th Oct '11 8:41:08 AM by SeanMurrayI

I must say, I'm not averse to having the Cool and Unusual Punishment section broken off from simply torturing people for information.

I actually do agree, though, that it's different enough to remain separate. It's not really just Interrogation By Torture Played for Laughs. It's specifically torturing with strange and absurd methods. It doesn't have to be funny at all—a quick glance through the examples and I see that very few of them are actually comedic. Angelus torturing Giles with chainsaws in Buffy, for example, is not funny.

What we have here is a classic case of subtrope and supertrope, with a misleading laconic. Yeah, if all you read is the Laconic and the Playing With, it's gonna look like a Playing With variant of another trope, but...well, if you look at the actual trope, those are just plain wrong.

edited 29th Oct '11 12:29:06 PM by troacctid

What qualifies as strange or absurd?

I'd guess one where the method of torture is non standard for the time period.

Look, are we going to define tropes by the description or by the examples?

Anyway, we could make it not a subtrope of Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique, because that assumes it's the Hero doing Torture, and...

Okay, actually this whole family is entirely messed up. How about we establish a clear hierarchy?

• Torture: extracting information from people through violence and violent threats.
  • Cold-Blooded Torture: The same, except done in cold blood: deliberate, thought-out, distanced, professional. Implies a dehumanization of the performer and a demeaning of the victim. They might kill their victim because they're so expedient and blasé about the whole thing that they forget they're dealing with people. As an analogy, if this was an assassination, it'd be the sort where the villain just shoots you.
    • Technical Torture: It's not just deliberate and thought-out, it's actually routine and organized and elaborate*
      ^{Cold-Blooded Torture in general doesn't need to be like this, it can be as blunt as just electroshocking}
      the victim's [[spoiler:genitalia until they speak or die or the organs fall off, burnt to a crisp, which needs no expert), and requires a Torture Technician of at least some expertise. Again with the killing analogy, this would be analogous to sending an Assasin rather than a Hitman.
      • Chinese Exquisite Torture: the memetic and legendary sophistication of the methods used by Imperial China's Torture Technicians has such a strong presence in fiction (and popular myth) I'd support giving it its own page.
  • Hot Blooded Torture: Torture done with a sincere, emotional intent to hurt and terrify. The torturer is very emotionally invested in what tbey are doing. They might kill their victim because they got too caught up in all the violence. If this were an assassination, it'd be an Extreme Mêlée Revenge.
  • Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique: Though I'd rather call it Tortured By Heroes. When Torture meets What the Hell, Hero?, as the protagonist is doing it. Sometimes the narrative is set up so that there are no other options, and makes the victim a deserving Jerkass.
  • Cool And Unusual Torture: When the methods used are exceptionally bizarre, creative or amusing. Distinct from Cool and Unusual Punishment because the point isn't retribution or deterrence (at least not primarily) but information-gathering.

edited 29th Oct '11 12:55:48 PM by PacificState

Creative. Atypical. Whatever. Some examples from the examples: putting a golf tee in their mouth and practicing your swings, psychological torture with a blowtorch and a popsicle, an unspecified method involving ginger beer and loud popping noises, giving them a swirly in a urinal, eating fish and chips in front of them (the perp is a vegan on a hunger strike), dressing them up in girly makeup and wigs and telling them how pretty they look...

Actually, I think Hot Blooded Torture and Cool And Unusual Torture is a reasonable split.

edited 29th Oct '11 12:56:04 PM by troacctid

No, Torture should be at the top, but "extracting information from people" isn't what we want at the top. That's why Cold-Blooded Torture is part of it. Tortured For Information would be the trope between Torture and Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique.

Er, look, if it ain't for extractin' information, it ain't no torture, it be punishm-

...Nevermind.

I always thought torture was just for prying intel out, and the rest was called punishment/penance/penalty...

Nope. Torture is the act of inflicting lots of harm. Why it's done isn't important.

Most of the examples are still about data-gathering... Subtrope, then?

• Torture:
  • Torture For Information
  • Cruel And Unusual Punishment

edited 30th Oct '11 1:06:30 AM by PacificState

Well, random torture isn't used very often beyond the plain old Cold-Blooded Torture, so when somebody breaks out the thumb screws, it tends to be for a reason.

When prince Humperdnick got Welsey tortured in The Princess Bride, all he wanted was to hurt him as much as possible.

I think that's Loves the Sound of Screaming.

No wait, it was indeed Cold-Blooded Torture.

edited 30th Oct '11 1:31:04 AM by Deboss

Relevant: Interrogated for Nothing vs Torture Always Works

I can provide you with dozens. Start with the Pretty Boy/Bishonen split, where "Bishonen" is "Pretty Boy, but Japanese and younger" (or any of the other dozen or so tropes that boil down to "Universal Trope X, but in Japanese works" that people somehow feel are separate tropes just because they're being performed in Japanese...), or the Band Of Brothers/True Companions split where True Companions is "Band of Brothers but not in a combat situation".

Again, I know I risk ire here, but I do think consistency is important.

edited 30th Oct '11 9:53:33 AM by Worldmaker

Well, Band of Brothers would be a subtrope of that. And many of the tropes "in JAPAN" have actually very different connotations in that culture.

We need more non-Western cultures, but Japan is the only one with this sheer volume of output...

edited 30th Oct '11 10:05:46 AM by PacificState

Nonsense. Pure, utter, nonsense. Its not enough to create a separate trope. I've heard this argued over and over and over, and somehow my response question is never answered: "Yeah? If that's so then why are there so many non-Japanese examples? If that's so, why is the oldest example from Ancient Mesopotamia and not Japan? If that's so, when are we going to start making pages for how this trope is used in Rwandan media?" Somehow it doesn't wash, and verges (to me) on Fan Myopia.

Besides, now you're arguing about hair-splitting, which, if you go back and reread my previous post, was my entire point. "Bishonen is different from Pretty Boy because in Japan the Pretty Boys are usually younger"... seriously, that was someone's argument for not just merging those two pages. Seriously. "Younger" is enough for a separate trope?

And yet we kept that page separate. Because of "younger". But now, apparently, "Over-the-Top torture that's taken Up To Eleven to the point that its ridiculous, using bizarre and sometimes funny methods" isn't enough of a difference from "just plain torture" to keep it as a separate trope.

The inconsistency bothers me. Truly.

edited 30th Oct '11 10:18:00 AM by Worldmaker