Ambiguous Name (New crowner 4/4/12): Heroic Pet

I see three problems with this trope (although I could only choose one reason to list in the drop box):

1. The name doesn't imply that a pet is the star of the show, just that there is a pet that is heroic. Basically, this is a premise trope, but the name implies a characterization trope.
2. The page has almost nothing but zero context examples.
3. The trope is unhealthy. It goes back at least as far as August 2010, but has only 23 wicks and 3 inbounds.

Also, the description is really short as well, but there's a thread on special efforts for that.

edited 22nd Feb '12 2:06:11 PM by DragonQuestZ

...The way this is, I'd send it back to YKTTW. It has the bare minimum of a description and the examples have no context. The name seems to be the least of its problems.

Well even then, upon relaunching, it would still need a better name to indicate that the pet is the star.

I have the same problems with it that you mention. I was even considering taking it to TRS myself.

The page needs to be renamed to something along the lines of Heroic Pet Show, Heroic Pet Story, Heroic Pet Fiction, etc. I have seen it used mistakenly to refer to a character type.

The name Heroic Pet can be re-purposed for pets that are heroic, whether or not they are the star of the show. There is Badass Pet YKTTW draft. Some have already suggested Heroic Pet as a better name.

One thing I would ask is that we do not cut the page before sending it to YKTTW, especially considering sending stuff back to YKTTW can sometimes take longer than expected.

Why heroic? Isn't the premise just Protagonist Pet? Still sounds like a character trope, though... Just add Story or something after?

No, it isn't just a pet as the protagonist. That would include stuff like Garfield.

This is specifically about pets that are heroic. Ie, they go around saving people. Lassie, Flipper, Skippy the Bush Kangaroo, that sort of thing.

True, if you look at the examples. The description... doesn't say a whole lot.

Well, Pluto is there. Not a whole lot more heroic than Garfield.

edited 22nd Feb '12 5:05:11 PM by Feather7603

Pluto is misuse, but most of the examples fit the heroic pet model.

For example Heres Boomer is, according to The Other Wiki, "a stray dog that traveled around helping people in trouble."

edited 22nd Feb '12 5:11:59 PM by Catbert

I agree that there's a genre that revolves around heroic pet animal protagonists doing stuff. It's largely an ageing genre now and almost all the examples I can think of are decades old now, but it's still a genre.

So should we kick this back to ykttw, or try to repair it here?

I think do some basic fleshing out here so it's more than just a skeleton, then kick it to YKTTW.

Not right now, but over the next few days I can help expand on the existing examples and write up a better description. Also, I don't see any pressing reason to cut the current article. It can stay there until the YKTTW is ready to launch under a new name.

How about this:

A Heroic Pet show is a show that stars a non-anthorpomorphic pet or companion animal that regularly engages in heroic acts. Such animals are always physically normal, and in live action shows are potrayed by real animals. They also do not talk or otherwise display sapience, nor do they have supernatural powers.

They do, however, tend to be shown as being somewhat smarter and more aware that most real life animals, and generaly demonstrate a remarkable ability to follow specific instructions, usually along the lines of "Go get help, Tropey" or "Take the rope to Trope Tan, Tropey!" They will also often take the initiative to do whatever needs to be done to rescue a person. This is phenomena is known as Timmy in a Well.

Most Heroic Pet shows center on a family that owns the pet. In these shows, the daily lives of the human characters will play an important role. However, it is the animal that will always get the title billing, and the animal will perform some act of heroism at least once an episode. Such stories will often feature A Boy and His X, in that there will be a child who has the most interaction with the animal. The child is often the character who ends up needing to be saved, but this is not always the case.

Other works depart from the family centered model. They may, for example, mix Cop Show with Heroic Pet show by having the lead animal be a police dog.

The Heroic Dog is the most common form of animal found in these shows, but other animals are also used. See also Heroic Dolphin. This should not be confused with Animal Superheroes, who genenerally display sapience and supernaturual powers.

edited 23rd Feb '12 9:50:07 AM by Catbert

That works. I don't see anything glaringly wrong with it.

Yeah, that looks good.

Now would the name just require tweaking (this is to avoid confusion with this ykttw I have), or a major overhaul?

I think it's this one has enough examples right now that if we flesh those out, add the longer description, and crosswick, we'll be good with a rename. Most of this isn't a redefine. It's a flesh out.

edited 23rd Feb '12 9:27:07 AM by shimaspawn

I didn't see anyone here call for a redefinition, just a new name and fleshing the trope out.

I know, that's part of why, while this trope needs a lot of work, it doesn't quite need YKTTW again.

Well it seemed like it was a possibility, but Catbert's description showed we can just take care of that here.

Latter on today I'm going to expand on most of the examples. I'm familiar with several of the shows, and the rest I can use The Other Wiki to get enough information from

I can also think of a few more works worth mentioning on the page, but not all that many. It isn't a particularly huge genre, especially once you exclude stuff like Animal Superheroes that are their own distinct thing, and heroic pets that are not the main feature of the show but are simply a Team Pet, Gratuitous Animal Sidekick etc.

In addition to heroic pets that are the start of their own show, heoric pets without their own show can go on the Action Pet YKTTW draft that is being worked in. Brain from Inspector Gadget would be a good action of an Action Pet that doesn't belong in the Heroic Pet Show genre.

edited 23rd Feb '12 11:08:15 AM by Catbert

So would the action pet ykttw be a Super-Trope, or a Sister Trope?

Heroic Pet Story is a genre trope. Action Pet is a character trope. While all Heroic Pet Stories will feature an Action Pet, not all Action Pets will be in Heroic Pet Stories.

edited 23rd Feb '12 11:48:10 AM by Catbert

You mean it's a Sub-Trope.

Not really. I don't think character trope can be a subtrope of a genre trope.

Heroic Dog would be a subtrope of Action Pet.

Heroic Dog Show would be a subtrope of Heroic Pet(Show).

But Heroic Dog would not be a subtrope of Heroic Pet(Show) because they aren't tropes of the same nature.

edited 23rd Feb '12 12:18:42 PM by Catbert

A Sub-Trope can work that way. The linking element is what makes them related. The differentiating element (being a whole show) is what makes it distinct from other examples.