So Bad, It's Horrible is one of the more flame-bait-y parts of the site, so a cleanup thread is needed to ensure that works aren't added simply because someone doesn't like them.
If you want to list a work under this, keep the following in mind:
- The work must have very few fans or defenders (both genuine and ironic). It should fail to appeal to any type of audience.
- Being offensive in its subject matter isn't enough.
- It isn't horrible just because a certain critic disliked it, though their reviews can be used as sources and citations.
- The work should have notably poor reviews (e.g., less than 3/10 on IMDb, or single digit scores on Rotten Tomatoes)
- For a Moral Substitute to qualify, it cannot even appeal to its target demographic.
- Please be polite while writing and as much as possible, avoid falling into Complaining About Shows You Don't Like. Instead, focus on explaining why the work is horrible.
Edited by Twiddler on May 20th 2024 at 5:34:49 AM
If something doesn't do what it's supposed to do then it failed at its purpose, simple as that.
Came for the tropes, stayed for the cleanup.Exactly. And when it's a medical product that fails at its purpose... well, I guess Head-On was marketed as a painkiller rather than an actual treatment for a disease, but still, I consider that a lot worse than, say, an ineffective dishwashing tablet.
Now technically, HeadOn wasn't advertised as doing anything. That was kind of the point.
Can sporting events be horrible? If so, I think The Disgrace of Gijón could qualify. It was a blatantly fixed World Cup match where both sides knew they would qualify if West Germany won 1-0 and stopped trying to score after 10 minutes. Both teams got booed, including by their own fans, commentators told viewers to stop watching, and the result convinced FIFA to have the final group games at future world cups simultaneously so something like it could never happen again.
Edited by Hfxjfrvnn on May 11th 2024 at 9:10:07 AM
Usually events need to be just all around bad. From crappy weather to broken promises to dangerous scenarios.
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure PurenessEven if it doesn't accomplish its purpose, the issue is that it's not egregiously bad by the standards of homeopathy. Why do we have an example for HeadOn, but not any other alternative medicinal product? And if we did have such examples, it'd overtake the page as there are so many of them.
The example isn't saying HeadOn sucks, it's saying homeopathy sucks. A single product, and a rather harmless one at that, is being singled out when there's a whole category of identical or worse products out there.
x3 Honestly if sporting events could qualify, we'd be up in butthurt fans here.
I don't think they can't, but need more than just bad gameplay (fixed or not).
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure PurenessWe do have Ten Cent Beer Night and Disco Demolition Night on Horrible.Advertising.
Orcus on His Throne will always be my pet peeve.I think we had Horrible.Sports a long time ago, but it was a recipe for team fans squabbling about outcomes they didn't like. I think sticking to stadium events unrelated to actual matches is the best decision.
I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.Yeah I think the thing with most sporting events is that even if a team gives a really bad performance and loses a game, it will not be horrible for all since fans of the opposing team will be happy they won. I guess there are players you could call "horrible" as players based on statlines, which would be a pretty objective measure.
My thought though is that events need to just be all around awful. Like I swear we had a sporting event already up where tickets were priced so cheaply that everyone got wasted and rioted?
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure PurenessAre you thinking of Ten Cent Beer Night? The issues there were about the cheap accessible beer more than the game itself.
I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.I think so. I'm not sure where that entry is now, but I know it was there once upon a time. (Edit: It's under advertising)
My point being that I don't think we can qualify sports games as horrible solely for bad gameplay. The events we have up now have absolutely horrible organizing/gimmicks/weather/location/etc, often many of those things at once, so I don't see why sports should have different rules.
Edited by WarJay77 on May 11th 2024 at 11:46:39 AM
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure PurenessThe only sporting events I know of that could even approach meeting the standards of "So Bad It's Horrible" based on the actual sports performance itself are the 1904 Olympic marathon (which was a disaster of weather, dust, lack of water, and multiple kinds of cheating), and that one Olympic badminton match where both teams were trying to lose in order to get a more favorable match up in the following round.
Bigotry will NEVER be welcome on TV Tropes.Whoa nelly newtron and War Jay disagree. Joke aside, I think its just not worth it, having sports section. If something DOES probe to be too much trouble to be worth it, it simply is redlinked and we call it a day.
Edited by AegisP on May 11th 2024 at 8:50:40 AM
Discord: Waido X 255#1372 If you cant contact me on TV Tropes do it here.Yeah, those sound like contenders.
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure PurenessI actually just watched a video about the 1904 Olympic marathon the other day and I can get behind it being added.
"Pardon me, that extremely loud and extremely deep voice you may have just heard. It was me. Oh, it is such a long story..."I mean yeah, I'm a distinct person and Jay and I don't have to blindly follow each other's word. I know the whole "not the same person" joke is a Running Gag but it doesn't need to come up this constantly.
We can discuss re-adding sporting events, and those do sound horrible. It's just that it is currently on the PRLC, and I can imagine there may be a ROCEJ issue depending on what's considered "unsafe" or "poorly managed" for a sporting event may vary per person/culture/etc.
Edited by mightymewtron on May 11th 2024 at 12:04:06 PM
I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.Frankly I'm not even sure we were disagreeing; I think we were generally both touching on the same points, just explained differently. Or perhaps we were talking about two slightly different things, since the only thing I even actually directly responded to Mew on was the Ten Cent Beer Night thing.
In any case, I don't think an entire sports page would need to be remade. If we get any, they can go to "other".
Edited by WarJay77 on May 11th 2024 at 12:06:44 PM
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure PurenessOne team's So Bad, It's Horrible is often the opposing team's Moment of Awesome.
Therefore, game results should not be added.
Edited by Nen_desharu on May 11th 2024 at 1:28:13 PM
Kirby is awesome.Yeah, it's highly unlikely that there's any more than a small handful of sporting events that would qualify. They can definitely live in the "other" section. My statement about knowing two instances that might qualify was a statement missing its first half. I've spent perhaps an excessive amount of time learning about the dumb and embarrassing side of sports. I could give you countless examples of bad, strange, or stupid sporting events. The thing is though, that most of them either appealed to the fanbase of the team or athlete that won, or has a certain ironic charm and is widely replayed to laugh at. I wasn't saying "I know of two." I was saying, "I know a lot of stupid sports stuff and even I only know of two."
Bigotry will NEVER be welcome on TV Tropes.Keep in mind, my own argument on the subject started with me basically saying "I think sports could count, but in a specific circumstance that isn't common". I don't think it's actually that likely for most sports events to apply; I just didn't want to pretend that they were outright impossible (nor did I want to lower our standards for the examples suggested).
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure PurenessI feel the Spain 2000 Paralympics Basketball team could count as Horrible, since the team cheated by having players lie about having disabilities, which lead to their medals being revoked and the Paralympics removing events with intellectual disabilities.
I'm actually not seeing HeadOn on Horrible.Advertising, and the ad campaign is much closer to So Bad, It's Good than actually horrible.