Not Thriving: Suit With Vested Interests

From the description on how common it is: "If you've seen a Disaster Movie or Monster Movie, you've seen this trope" Yet it only has about 12 examples and 14 wicks. Not sure if it's really as common as stated, and if we already have this in other tropes.

Description and definition seem clear enough and it's distinct from other tropes. I say send it to YKTTW for entry pimping.

Name seems pretty opaque if you don't already know what it is. I'm really tempted to make a joke about oil companies and global warming, but I will let the Rule Of Cautious Editing Judgment reign.

It's not very opaque to me, although I know that anecdotal data aren't a very reliable source.

It took me a minute to get it without looking at the page, but when I did, the lightbulb was very bright and I don't think that I'll ever forget what the trope is.

Other than a lack of examples, I don't see much of a problem.

Well, one thing we can do to get examples is take out the generic subbullet under Jaws in Live Action Film that simply says "Ditto for an innumerable number of "killer animal" B-movies following the leader." and actually list and crosswick the examples.

edited 26th Dec '13 8:01:38 AM by Madrugada

Agreed. The biggest issue with this trope seems to be that it's slow in hitting critical cross wicking mass for people to be aware of it.

There's still something that bugs me about the name, especially for a trope this common - I think it has something to do with the use of the word "suit" as a personal noun - but I'll let it go for now.

That's a fairly common slang term for executives. It's listed in at least three dictionaries: Random House, Collins, and American Heritage as (Slang): A business executive, especially upper-level management.

edited 26th Dec '13 11:13:34 AM by Madrugada

Yeah, Suit is a common term for what this trope is talking about. It's in every single dictionary I've looked in. The name is fine. It's just lacking enough wicks for critical mass.

How easy is it to add a redirect called Exec With Vested Interests to a similar name? Also, should I remove the word "common" from the description?

I'm familiar with the term, it just doesn't seem like the sort of term you'd expect TV Tropes to use. Maybe something more like Vested Interest Villain, or something relating more directly to a disaster movie plot or The Jor-El? Like I said, I'm trying not to push this too hard, but something still bugs me about the redirect suggestion .

Well, the Suit with Vested Interests generally is neither an executive, nor a villain. He is often slightly antagonistic, but he's generally not evil. Just not helpful. And he's rarely actually in charge of the company. He's often answering to off screen higher ups. So calling him an executive makes people assume that he actually needs to be in charge, when he's generally not.

I mean, he's generally worried about losing his job and a lot of times the heroes need to convince him to work with them, so calling him a villain really confuses the issue. Especially if he ends up helping save the day in the end.

So they're both very misleading rename suggestions.

edited 26th Dec '13 7:31:44 PM by shimaspawn

Just stumbled onto The Ditherer. Are that and the Suit trope related?

Not in the least.

While The Ditherer can like the Suit with Vested Interests both mishandle problem situations:

• The Ditherer: Hesitates at taking a decision, often until it's too late.
• Suit with Vested Interests: Has some ulterior motive (the "vested interest", often of an economical nature) to prevent the problem from being addressed.

Bumping this, because there seems to be a small conflict on th example order in the Film section. I did alphabetize it, and then someone un-alphabetized two entries with the reason " don't get how the two first example end up getting bumped down, it shouldn't happen and it can create entries which are written on the thought that one has read what is below them. These are the most explanatory of the example about what the trope is. They shouldn't end up haldway down their own category underneath one-liners. "

I am not sure how the examples below rely on the ones (now raised out of alphabetic order). Comments?

I don't know that he was referring to those examples specifically, he may have just been enforcing what he perceived to be the standard "first in first out" order in place on 99% of the wiki and justifying it in general terms (never mind that entries shouldn't be referring to the order in which they appear on the page anyway...). If he has a position relating to this specific case, it seems to be that entries that are more illustrative and explanatory should be higher on the list than short borderline Zero Context Examples, which is problematic but has little to do with whether or not certain entries "rely" on others.

(If it is now wiki policy to alphabetize entries within folders, does that have a Long-Term Efforts thread?)

edited 1st Jan '14 2:43:42 PM by MorganWick

It's not policy, although alphabetic order is usually preferred - hence, I did it as I was cleaning the page. Seems like a case for reverting them.

It's not policy for examples; that's still FIFO, since that way makes it easier for readers to see if there are new entries. Some folks prefer it, but it's not the "preferred" style either. However, if you want to alphabetize the examples, go ahead, but be prepared to keep it tidy yourself, because most editors will still put the new entries at the bottom.

edited 1st Jan '14 3:00:33 PM by Madrugada

Personally, I support to use a purely alphabetic order. I am not sure if I understand the arguments given for the re-ordering and it strikes me as a worse than either alphabetic or by-addition order.

edited 1st Jan '14 3:11:18 PM by SeptimusHeap

I think it's simpler if the ordering on trope pages throughout the wiki at least tried to be uniform, whatever it is.

I put back into temporal order because I have literally never ever seen anything ever that indicates it should be any other way. And also because it makes it looks good and reads well.

Same thing could be said of alphabetic order as well. That said, I am not entirely sure what the preferred method here is. There was/were some discussions in Wiki Talk - I'll have to dig them out.

edited 2nd Jan '14 12:25:44 PM by SeptimusHeap