Misused: Creators Pet

Gwen is the 2nd in Torchwood. She is also cited for Base Breaker in the YMMV page and also for The Scrappy.

The Wikipedia page doesn't agree with either assessment, by the way.

From the little of Torchwood that I've watched, Gwen acts as the Unfazed Everyman to the general wackiness of the rest of the cast. That's first season, though, and I have not personally watched anything past the first few episodes. Obviously, Jack Harkness is the protagonist, but I got the impression that Gwen was supposed to be coequal with him from a characterization perspective. Sort of like the Doctor's companion.

In any event, that type of character is almost impossible to have be a Creator's Pet, because their prominence in the story is integral to the story. And you need Character Shilling as well. Who in the series is boasting about Gwen's Informed Awesomeness?

edited 9th Jan '13 9:16:34 AM by Fighteer

And the "Yuu Watase series" example? The example uses "normally the male lead"- and one of the guys listed is the Big Bad of his series.

edited 15th Jan '13 12:45:20 PM by MagBas

The Big Bad as a Creator's Pet? That's funny, in a kind of stupid way.

I don't know that particular example, but we have the Villain Sue trope for a reason. It's far from impossible for a villain to be a Creator's Pet.

I hope the cleanup efforts need more people, because I'm a willing volunteer.

Namely, I'm looking at the Other page, which... well, the sports section is a mess.

The ESPN example is vexing me the most, as I don't know how a whole sports network can be a Creator's Pet by the single fact that sports is so damn polarized that you could make an argument for ESPN showing any team for more than five minutes is blatant favoritism. Not to mention that "mentioning five big markets" doesn't mean liking the teams in them. (One team mentioned, the Dodgers, were generally treated by ESPN with outright mockery of how bad they'd gotten this past year.)

Same with the Miami Heat example - of course the media is going to flock to the Heat, they have three superstar players, just won championship rings for Miami, and sell tickets like crazy. Corinthians example sounds like the same thing.

The only sports examples I'd think of keeping would be Digger (which is an actual promotional shilling character) and potentially the Big 12 Conference, where it's clear the issue is with the schools' conduct and not their level of play.

Networks as Creator's Pet? Sports teams? Fuck that.

I keep having no time to scrub this properly, but anyone with knowledge is MORE than welcome to take a firm but friendly hacksaw to any of the subpages.

I just ripped out a massive rant about the Robin Hood series because while it more than established Kate as The Scrappy (something I already knew without ever watching a single episode...she is THAT hated on this wiki...), it kind of missed the "Loved by the writers" part. Putting her on merchandise isn't so much writers loving her as marketing people perceiving commercial demand for her. If anything, that's more of an argument against her being on the page.

As for the Yuu Watase remark, I assume it's because Nakago, despite being an absolutely brutal human being, is given a sympathetic backstory and gets to essentially go to heaven on dying. Also, the author's admitted on several occasions he's her favorite character and a joke about this was cracked in an OVA. On the other hand, I think a lot of people on this wiki have trouble understanding that just because a reprehensible villain is humanized by having a tragic past does not mean everything he does in response to it is automatically excused. Nakago is not given favorable treatment and his actions are clearly intended to be taken as utterly reprehensible by the reader. A character's Start of Darkness should not in and of itself qualify as being overly favored - and Nakago, despite being her favorite character, does not return upon death unlike many, many other characters.

Oh yea, and I took Gwen off for all the reasons stated here.

Went ahead and took a hacksaw to most of Other. I think what's left are pretty good examples of Creator's Pet; I might need someone to elaborate on the BIONICLE one, but other than that, it looks decent.

edited 16th Jan '13 10:03:07 AM by LargoQuagmire

Ripped off Gwen again, but it's starting to turn into an edit war. I'd note the reason for putting it back actually enforces her as the main character - or at best, someone who breaks the universe of the show if you pull her out.

I see Gwen listed as The Scrappy on YMMV.Torchwood, which may or may not be correct, but not as Creator's Pet. Let me check the trope subpage...

Ah, yes. Wonder if it needs a lock.

edited 17th Jan '13 5:49:40 AM by Fighteer

I've noticed a lot of these entries are falling into misplaced entries of The Scrappy - i.e. a character is unpopular with a portion of the fanbase, but they consider that character "favored" because the writers haven't immediately ejected them from their scripts to please the whiners.

In other words, "The Scrappy with a big role", which isn't this trope. For goodness sake, even THE original Scrappy would count for that.

edited 17th Jan '13 10:42:49 AM by Rebochan

I've looked trough examples from works I know, and think these should be removed:

Anime: Kirby Of The Stars: Fumu/Tiff is the main character of the series. She have not made her way into any other Kirby media so she can't be considered this for the overall series. I've not seen many episodes, but I can't remember any Shilling for her either.

Video games: Pokemon: The Pikachu and Lucario examples should go. Both are WAY too popular among the fans for this trope. And there is little suggesting either is particularly favored by their creators. Pikachu was turned into the series mascot after it was used as the main Pokemon for the anime so it's omnipresence is understandable. The attention Lucario is getting is primary fueled by it's initial Ensemble Dark Horse status.

Other: Tower Of God: Rachel is, if anything, something of a subversion. The author have stated she is his/her favorite character, but she is still portrayed negatively in the series itself. Many of the fans despise her, but the actions she is disliked for is shown to be villainous by the series. She gets heavy amount of dialog Shilling from the protagonist during the first part of the series, but all of this is clearly shown to be false once her aforementioned actions take place. And while she is a main character, the protagonist's primary motivation and possibly a future main antagonist she gets surprisingly little screen time. (Also if we keep it in as a subversion we should probably move it to Web Comics.)

I can remove these myself, but would like some thumbs up here first. Additionally the Dragon Ball example (Broly) on the Anime sub-page should probably be moved to Video Games as it states that this trope only apply to the character's video game appearances.

edited 17th Jan '13 11:52:03 AM by painocus

I was unsure about the Tower of God entry, but if the work itself portrays her negatively, I'm okay with it going.

Pikachu as Creator's Pet in Pokemon? No. Axe that.

Well the thing with Rachel from Tower of God, and why it may be considered a subversion, is that before she appeared outside of flashbacks, and before she properly reunited with the main character, she was portrayed very positively and played up to be The Messiah or a Purity Sue. However she was never really shown doing much that would be worth all the praise the main character heaped upon her so it appeared as if she was destined for this trope. But when she was finally reunited with the main character she was portrayed very, very negatively. And not in a "formidable enemy" way either. (Read her entry on the comic's character page if you want details and don't mind blatant spoilers.) However, making this clear would require us to rewrite the entire example and it would still be kind of vague if it fits as a subversion of this trope anyways, so I say we should just nuke it.

I removed Pikachu from Video Games and took the liberty of removing Lucario too as even the entry itself admits that he "was never an unpopular Pokémon."

edited 17th Jan '13 1:14:17 PM by painocus

I'd like to nominate Marie from the Updated Re-release of Persona 4.

• Hated by fans: Many fans hate her for her rude, ungrateful attitude, as well as for the constant attempts by the game to make us love her.

• Loved and/or worshipped by the writers: Aside from having other characters constantly shill her (which I'll get to), the writers do their damndest to try to shoehorn you into picking her as your girlfriend.

• Character forcing: Yes. From the very beginning of the game, she's shoved into several important scenes for little reason, and it comes off as shilling as the scenes make perfect sense without her. And then she outright steals the title of Big Bad from Izanami at the very last minute in the True Ending.

• Character Shilling: Again, yes. Literally every time the topic of her comes up, everyone immediately starts praising her despite the fact she rarely, if ever, does anything to deserve it. A good example of this is when Kanji calls her beautiful mere seconds after she called him "an ugly old man" to his face.

I'm sorry, how is she "loved by the writers"? Do you have writer admissions that they want the character to be loved or she's named after someone?

Second, you seem to be stretching really hard at Character Focus when it sounds like she's not given more than the others.

Third? Your example of shilling doesn't seem to have anything to do with genuine praise...

Seriously, this isn't a dumping ground for character you don't like that get screentime.

EDIT: Oh hey, and she's not even on The Scrappy, which is kind of a problem when they're supposed to be. Sure this isn't your personal problem with her? Because I haven't played the remake yet (no Vita) but this is the absolute first I've heard of anyone hating her.

edited 17th Jan '13 2:54:01 PM by Rebochan

...Actually, you have a point.

Sorry about that, sometimes I act in the heat of the moment, so to speak. ^^;

Main character Gwen from Torchwood's been added back.

Yank it again. And tell whoever added it back to come here and justify its inclusion.

This example in CreatorsPet.Live Action TV is being edit warred over. Thread opinions?

• Gwen Cooper in Torchwood. Gwen is pushed as the character we're supposed to relate to, despite a mixed reception from the fans. Also, despite being the team member with the least seniority, she led the team while Jack was off with the Doctor. And, aside from some hurt feelings, she suffers no real lasting consequences for her actions while her teamates either die or end up like Jack.

According to the Wikipedia page, Gwen Cooper is the female lead in the show, which I'm pretty sure rather automatically excludes being a Creator's Pet.

Wiki suspension issued to pitac89. Hope that convinces him.