Rename (new crowner 3/9/12): Talks To Squirrels

I apologise in advance if the tag is incorrect, but I suspect that's the main problem in this trope.*

In the thread about The Doctor Dolittle, I brought up this article and the following problems were noticed:

• It is severely misused. The description is about "The Ditz or the Cloudcuckoolander suddenly displaying the ability to communicate with someone they shouldn't for information and/or comedy". The examples, however, are mostly about a character being able to talk to animals, prompting confusion with The Doctor Dolittle*
  which is about talking to animals.
  .
• Tying up with the misuse, I suspect the name is at fault. It doesn't demonstrate how this is a sudden ability, and seems to imply it's about animals only.

To demonstrate the misuse: Out of all the examples (Zero Context Examples not withstanding), I count approximately 10 having nothing to do with animals, and only 15 being correct usage.

Wick check

• Incorrect
  • Badass Adorable: Squirrel Girl is The Doctor Dolittle.
  • Belgariad: Confused for The Doctor Dolittle.
  • Crystalis: Same.
  • Dumb Is Good: Same.
  • Kaamelott: Same.
  • Non-Human Sidekick: Same.
  • Olympic Dames: Same.
  • Rhapsody A Musical Adventure: Talks to dolls and puppets, but seeing as it's on the summary itself, it doesn't look like a sudden skill played for comedy.
  • Shannara: The Doctor Dolittle
  • Squirrel Girl: OH GOD, she shows up all the time.
  • Survivor: Fan Characters: Talks to inanimate objects, but as a superpower, not sudden skill.
  • The Empath: Can tell the feeling of animals, not this trope.
  • The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy
  • The Simpsons: While Homer's statrus as an Omniglot makes this valid, the usage is incorrect, as it is potholed because of his talking with penguins only, and not with the other languages.
  • We Are All Pokemon Trainers

• Correct Usage (or at least looks like it)
  • Comedy Tropes
  • Disgaea 3 Absence Of Justice
  • Final Fantasy II (Thanks, Stratadrake!)
  • Finding Nemo
  • FriendshipIsMagicTheManeCast
  • Kim Possible
  • Language Tropes
  • Omniglot
  • PhineasAndFerb
  • The Powerpuff Girls

• Not so sure
  • Disney Fairies: For some reason, both The Doctor Dolittle and Talks to Squirrels are there, but I suspect only the first applies.
  • Final Fantasy V: She speaks to many different kinds of animals, but I don't know if it suddenly appears.
  • Hi Hi Puffy Ami Yumi: No context.
  • Persona: Talks to demons, but this looks more like Gameplay and Story Segregation and is not comedic.
  • Peter And The Starcatchers: No context, but looks like The Doctor Dolittle.
  • Screaming Gophers: No context.
  • Tangled: It seems that all Disney princesses can talk to animals, but none of them look like a sudden skill played for comedy.
  • The Emperors New Groove: Kronk is everywhere, but is it a sudden skill? Not sure.
  • Toxic Rats: No context.

The misuse rate is bad. Inbounds are also low, with only 17 of them.

My suggestion would be to rename this to something which has nothing to do with animals. But, I don't know if the description is distinct enough from Suddenly Always Knew That, and it looks redundant.

edited 26th Feb '12 2:59:06 PM by lu127

"If you aren't him, then you apparently got your brain from the same discount retailer, so..." - Fighteer

Final Fantasy II is probably correct — Guy's ability to talk to the beavers comes up precisely once throughout the entire game, no foreshadowing, and never referenced again after that.

edited 25th Feb '12 8:05:06 AM by Stratadrake

An Ear Worm is like a Rickroll: It is never going to give you up.

This can use a rename, but before we rename it, could we fix the description? It suffers from way too much Example As Thesis and not enough defining statements.

edited 25th Feb '12 8:10:13 AM by Catbert

I really have my misgivings on whether this is distinct enough from Suddenly Always Knew That.

"If you aren't him, then you apparently got your brain from the same discount retailer, so..." - Fighteer

lu 127,

I guess you could make the argument that this trope is just The Same But More Specific version of Suddenly Always Knew That. I think The Ditz part of it might make it distinct enough to warrant having a subtrope, but right now I am wondering if Talks to Squirrels should just be made a redirect to The Doctor Dolittle.

"irhgT nm0w tehre might b ea lotof th1nmgs i dont udarstannd, ubt oim ujst goinjg to keepfollowing this pazth i belieove iN !!!!!1 d

I pointed this out before, but the Talk To The Animals usage here is mostly talking to a specific kind of animal, as opposed to The Dr Dolittle, which is being able to talk to animals in general. This could be a valid split.

edited 25th Feb '12 12:42:43 PM by troacctid

Rhymes with "Protracted."

If you mean talks to squirrels specifically, not really. The misuse involved (obviously) squirrels, camels, wolves, dolls, puppets, penguins, birds, demons, frogs, turtle, and more.

Now, if you mean it could be "talks to one kind of animal", I can see it, but we might have to redefine it a little. I'm a bit concerned it will be confused for The Doctor Dolittle again, though.

"If you aren't him, then you apparently got your brain from the same discount retailer, so..." - Fighteer

I think that in many works, a character is said to talk to animals in general, but is only shown to talk to one kind anyway. A work is not generally going to touch upon whether the character can talk to insects too, and foxes too, and dodos as well. I think that's a pretty arbitrary split.

Rhetorical, eh? ... Eight!

BTW, instead of Suddenly Always Knew That, the trope this needs to be compared to is Suddenly Bilingual.

And the name isn't the only problem. The Example As Thesis definition makes this sound an awful lot like this is only about animals.

edited 25th Feb '12 5:16:03 PM by Catbert

The new picture doesn't help either, since it's Not An Example. It's an example of literally talking to a squirrel, but it has nothing to do with this trope.

The earlier one at least kind of showed the trope.

edited 25th Feb '12 5:32:43 PM by abk0100

No, not squirrels specifically, but Doctor Dolitlle can talk to squirrels, penguins, frogs, dolphins, all animals. Talks to Squirrels is only one, say just Talks To Penguins; it might not even be an animal at all, but it is only one thing: The Ditz speaks French or whatever. It is an unexpected resolution of a communication difficulty. "I speak Whale!"

It is a lot like Suddenly Always Knew That but it's a really huge specific flavor of that, it shows up a lot. And the PowerPuff Girls image is a good example I think, and a much better picture if the name doesn't have the word "squirrel" in it, the wrong part is emphasized by that.

edited 25th Feb '12 11:27:21 PM by rodneyAnonymous

Becky: Who are you? The Mysterious Stranger: An angel. Huck: What's your name? The Mysterious Stranger: Satan.

If it's really different from Suddenly Always Knew That, I guess it should stay. But I'd prefer changing the name to something that doesn't mention animals.

It does not matter who I am. What matters is, who will you become? - motto of Omsk Bird

Hm, maybe that is kind of The Same But More Specific. I agree that it is the same thing as Suddenly Bilingual.

edited 26th Feb '12 2:29:57 AM by rodneyAnonymous

Becky: Who are you? The Mysterious Stranger: An angel. Huck: What's your name? The Mysterious Stranger: Satan.

I think Suddenly Bilingual, but with members of another species, is trobable. But the title is problematic, since a a female Ditz with a squirrel affinity is already almost a Stock Character. I favor something like Knows Whale (Nemo reference) or maybe something that doesn't mention a specific animal or alien creature at all.

Wow, Suddenly Bilingual Needs A Better Description.

An Ear Worm is like a Rickroll: It is never going to give you up.

I think this is different from Suddenly Bilingual, in that when a character starts spouting off in Russian (or whatever) we already know that 1) this is a language 2) that can be used to communicate. Talks to Squirrels, on the other hand, includes talking to animals/things that might not normally be considered able to communicate, and specifically includes cases where the talk-ee just comes up with random gobbledygook that somehow ends up being completely comprehensible to the other party. (Note to self: YKTTW Suprisingly Intelligible Gibberish.)

Calling someone a pedant is an automatic Insult Backfire. Real pedants will be flattered.

I think it's probably a matter of definition as to whether this is a subtrope or Sister Trope of Suddenly Bilingual, but I think you've hit on the important distinctions.

edited 27th Feb '12 8:20:53 PM by pawsplay

The current description seems to imply that regular foreign languages count as this trope, since it mentions "an animal or a foreigner".

It does not matter who I am. What matters is, who will you become? - motto of Omsk Bird

I know; there was some question about whether Talks to Squirrels was the same as Suddenly Bilingual. I was pointing out that Talks to Squirrels covers a broader scope.

But we may want to restrict Talks to Squirrels to cases that don't fall under Suddenly Bilingual, to cut down on redundancy.

edited 27th Feb '12 4:23:50 PM by lebrel

Calling someone a pedant is an automatic Insult Backfire. Real pedants will be flattered.

Make Talks to Squirrels and Suddenly Bilingual sister tropes, which cover animals only and human languages only, respectively?

Becky: Who are you? The Mysterious Stranger: An angel. Huck: What's your name? The Mysterious Stranger: Satan.

, I agree with this.

It does not matter who I am. What matters is, who will you become? - motto of Omsk Bird

Going back to the original post, The Emperor's New Groove is a legitimate example; Tangled is not.

I'd support making this a sister trope to Suddenly Bilingual. It still needs a new name. Suddenly Speaks Whale?

Anything like that is going to be confused for The Doctor Dolittle.

As near as I can tell, the only thing that makes this a distinct trope is the idea that the person having the skill should not realistically have the skill, and it is played for laughs.

Maybe Nonsensical Language Skill? Absurd Linguistic Ability? Something like that.

edited 28th Feb '12 9:18:51 AM by Catbert

The suddenly part does make this pretty distinct from The Doctor Doolittle, who obviously display this ability on a regular basis. Learn Whale Today?

Kinda like Nonsensical Language Skill, since it more clearly covers cases where the "language" is totally made up.

Calling someone a pedant is an automatic Insult Backfire. Real pedants will be flattered.