Stock Parody Jokes cleanup

Was given permission to make this thread after making this Ask The Tropers post for it.

We've decided that Stock Parody Jokes needs an on-page cleanup. Here are some problems with the pages:

• Some of them are just making comments about the quality of a work (such as "the Super Mario Bros movie is bad" or "the later SpongeBob seasons are just mean-spirited grossout") instead of specific kinds of jokes parodies do.
• Some of the examples are getting redundant (nearly every work with anthropomorphic animals has a "the show is furry bait" example).
• There are some ZCEs that don't elaborate on why certain jokes exist, or just mention a certain element of a show without mentioning what kinds of jokes parodies make about them.
• Some of them are more about the creators or fanbase than the work itself.

I found this under Harry Potter. Both have to do with the creator:

• Parodying J. K. Rowling's Word of God, such as her confirmation that Dumbledore is gay or her statement that Hogwarts didn't have bathrooms until the 18th century, by creating new bizarre new pieces of lore that didn't appear in the books.
• Jokes about J. K. Rowling's controversial statements on subjects such as politics and LGBTQ+ rights.

The second one is worse; it has nothing to do with her books in the slightest.

Also, there's these two entries about Super Mario Bros from the Video Games subpage:

• Hotel Mario is bad.
• The 1993 live-action film is bad.

These are little more than shoehorned complaints.

I mean, they are bad. But I'm not sure how that's a "joke" or a convention of the series that is frequently parodied in spoofs.

Edited by WackyPancake on Jun 12th 2021 at 11:53:55 AM

Are they really ZCE's? Is there a rule that we need to say why the joke is there or is saying what the joke is enough?

They both qualify as "making comments about the quality of a work instead of specific kinds of jokes parodies do" (mentioned above).

This example from the Live-Action TV subpage might count, but it seems a little bit like a complaint shoehorned into the trope:

• Hallmark Channel Christmas movies all have the exact same plot, with a woman from the city visiting her hometown and ultimately choosing a man over her career. Also, there are no ethnic or LGBTQ+ characters in sight, unless they're stereotypes.

Edited by themayorofsimpleton on Jun 12th 2021 at 6:02:41 AM

For instance, I added this example to the western animation page under Avatar: The Last Airbender.

• The characters mocking their portrayal in the live-action film adaptation.

This is better than the two Mario examples, since it's not just "the movie is bad", it specifies what kind of jokes people make about the movie.

The second sentence feels like an actual parody joke more than the first one.

Edited by MrMediaGuy2 on Jun 12th 2021 at 3:05:01 AM

Here are some examples on the western animation page I have issue with.

• Big City Greens:
  • The show being a rip off of The Simpsons. Sounds like a commentary on the show's quality instead of specific parodies of it.
• Caillou:
  • The show being unbearable torture endured by parents of small children. More bashing.
• Family Guy:
  • The whole show being a Darker and Edgier knock-off of The Simpsons. Sounds like bashing.
  • Seth Macfarlane being a furry for using Brian as his Author Avatar and frequently including him in sex jokes and Interspecies Romance. Joke about the creator.
  • The show shoehorning in Cutaway Gags at any opportunity, even if they're completely unrelated to the scene.
  • The show relying on Overly Long Gags to pad out episodes.
  • The show using pop culture references as a substitute for humor. All three sound like bashing.
• Filly Funtasia:
  • The show being nothing but a cheap My Little Pony knockoff. Bashing.
• The Get Along Gang: Originally, people joked about the gang constantly preaching that The Complainer Is Always Wrong to extreme levels. However, now that the series has gained a cult following and most viewers have noted that the trope isn't all that prominent as Mark Evanier infamously said it to be, more recent parodies involve declaring the show to be furry bait or the gang being a sort of Mafia for kids. Another "furry bait" example.
• Heathcliff & the Catillac Cats:
  • The show itself being furry bait, especially because of Cleo. Another furry bait example.
• He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (1983):
  • Skeletor being an idiot villain who is evil because he likes being evil. Skeletor being a one-note villain could be a genuine parody joke if it elaborated more.
• Hey Arnold!:
  • Arnold's grandparents are actually his parents because of his football-shaped head. Elaborate please.
• The Loud House:
  • The episode "No Such Luck" being subject to many, many Fix Fics to try to make the consequences of the family's behavior towards Lincoln more "realistic". Fandom joke.
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
  • Pinkie Pie canonically had sex with Cheese Sandwich, got pregnant, and gave birth in the Distant Finale. These jokes usually involve confetti and other party supplies flying around during intercourse.
    • Or confetti and other party supplies flying around when she farts. Should be integrated with the above example.
  • Every new character, location, and form the characters take only exists so Hasbro could sell more toys. Could possibly be reworked, but as is it just sounds like bashing.
• Peppa Pig:
  • The characters are actually gigantic. Elaborate.
• ReBoot:
  • Mocking the show's dated CGI. Comment about quality.
• The Ren & Stimpy Show: Literally nothing about the show is consistent between episodes or even within them. Sounds like a comment about quality.
• Samurai Jack:
  • Aku praising a curvaceous woman's figure by calling her "EXTRA THICC!" Sounds more like a Memetic Mutation.
• Sid the Science Kid:
  • Pointing out how Uncanny Valley the animation and the character models look. More bashing.
• The Simpsons:
  • Former showrunner Mike Scully being a Troll who made changes to the show simply to piss off viewers. Joke about creator.
  • The show's Seasonal Rot leading to increasingly desperate, tired, or lame attempts at humor, often overlapping with Were Still Relevant Dammit. Bashing.
  • Episodes after the Seasonal Rot using political references as a substitute for humor. Bashing.
• South Park:
  • Earlier parodies treat the show as a depraved Grossout Show that's nothing but poop and gore.
  • Later parodies treat the show as an Author Tract for Matt and Trey's libertarian political views. Both sound like bashing.
• SpongeBob SquarePants:
  • The show after Season 3 consists of nothing but gross-out humor and Kafka Comedy. Bashing.
• Tom and Jerry:
  • Every installment, barring the Gene Deitch shorts, is Strictly Formula to the point of being identical. Bashing.

I would say that "Caillou is unbearable for adults", "Family Guy ripped off The Simpsons and relies too much on cutaway gags and random pop culture references", "The Simpsons is extremely past its prime", and "South Park is nothing but dick and fart jokes" do qualify for this trope.

It's not really bashing, since many parodies do raise those points. Parodies are often not nice and will mock their targets mercilessly. It shouldn't be used as an excuse to shoehorn complaints, though.

Edited by WackyPancake on Jun 12th 2021 at 12:51:17 PM

I guess my issue is that I feel like the examples should elaborate a bit more on what kinds of jokes people make when making jabs at those works.

I added that, but the reason it comes across as negative is just because that's what parodies depict the movies as being. (I consider Hallmark movies a Guilty Pleasure for the record.) Many parodies boil the characters down to pure stereotypes and depict the movies on the channel as nearly identical. The SNL parody is a good example of this, as is the Jacksfilms parody — I can cite them in the example.

Also, like Wacky said, many parodies are likely going to depict the work in a negative manner. But the lack of context on the "parody" part of most examples leads to these coming across as just troper bashing, rather than explaining trends in parodies.

In fact, many of those are never things I see in parodies or even fandom spaces — Ren & Stimpy is more often mocked as a Gross-Out Show than mocked for a lack of consistency (most people seem to like the fact that it has a variety of expressions, as that's what the creator wanted). I have also never seen anybody call Big City Greens a ripoff of The Simpsons or compare them much at all. Am I just out of the loop? Hell, South Park is a show I actually know well, but I don't think parodies really mock the show's views much at all — critics in general do that, but not parodies. I only know one parody that mocked it for being Anvilicious, the Drawn Together movie, and that movie was hated for it.

And this example was removed for being related to the fandom, but I argue it should be re-added:

• The entire Periphery Demographic being made up of nothing but Psychopathic Manchildren.

Nearly every parody of MLP:FIM at least references the fandom because their reputations are so intertwined (the show itself is full of Fandom Nods after all). Bob's Burgers did it, College Humor did it. If your age rating allows you to make fun of bronies when you make fun of MLP, chances are you will. Parodies will often make fun of the creator and fandom, and I don't think it's a problem to acknowledge that if it's actually common.

Edited by mightymewtron on Jun 12th 2021 at 7:02:11 AM

Ren and Stimpy is usually more often parodied as just being an aimless pile of weird faces and grossout. It is a (deliberately) inconsistent show in terms of staying on model, but that's not something the parodies really hinge on.

That's my issue with a lot of these types of examples. They feel less like stock parody jokes and more like stock criticisms.

This is why I think it'd help to rework the examples to include examples of specific parodies (whether by fans or other media creators) that share the trend, but that might require TRS to be a requirement.

Edited by mightymewtron on Jun 12th 2021 at 7:32:38 AM

Here are more examples I found under Harry Potter. Both come off as bashy:

• The Gringotts goblins being Jewish caricatures.
• Harry has no discernible personality and is just a vessel onto which the reader can project themselves.

Can we focus less on "are these too bashy" and more on "are these actual jokes in parodies or just criticisms"? Because you're gonna be hard pressed to find legit parody jokes that aren't at least a little mean to the work.

That said, both of those seem to be plain criticisms. The latter might be valid but IDK how many parodies outright mock Harry's blandness, especially compared to others in the genre who tend to have similar issues.

Edited by mightymewtron on Jun 12th 2021 at 7:53:20 AM

Removed both. I found these under Live-Action TV:

Game of Thrones:

• The series jumps the shark once it overtakes the books. This is a criticism.

• Glee:
  • The show oozing Narm and all the average tropes of a Very Special Episode.
  • Having the characters make a big Narm-y deal out of every touchy subject or even mundane topics such as failing a test or losing their cell phones. I'm not sure on this. These do seem like complaints disguised as jokes, but the Narm is something that's been parodied.

• Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: The show's biggest fans are preachy far-left liberals. This is just complaining about the show's fans.

The Glee examples seem like the same thing said twice. One way that it could be reworded is, "The characters make a big deal out of every touchy subject, or even mundane topics such as failing a test or losing their cell phones, usually leading to a sudden musical number."

I have seen a parody of John Oliver's fanbase on Billy on the Street but I have no idea if it's a common parody.

Edited by mightymewtron on Jun 12th 2021 at 8:09:20 AM

It's definitely a common stereotype of John Oliver's fanbase. My issue is can we have examples that are basically people stereotyping the fanbase. That seems like asking for trouble.

I think the Hey Arnold! thing is a reference to how late-life children are more likely to have cranial deformities, while the Peppa Pig thing is a reference to the "Peppa is 7'1" meme.

If the parodies consistently depict the fanbase in that way, then yes, we can have those examples. But simply stereotyping a fanbase is not an example unless that stereotype is present in the works making fun of the show.

I went ahead and edited the Glee examples. I still think allowing examples regarding fans gets too close troping real life.

But the entire point of this cleanup is that this isn't our own opinions as tropers. It's meant to refer to common jokes in other fictional works. It's not like we don't have tropes like Take That! or Straw Fan or anything else making fun of fictional depictions of fans.

A lot of heavily parodied works involve their fans being mocked in a certain way as well. Besides MLP, Star Wars is another one coming to mind.

Here are some ones from the animated films page.

These ones are stock criticisms instead of stock parody jokes.

• Chicken Little: Buck Cluck being the worst parent in all of fiction.
• Shark Tale:
  • Oscar is an asshole.
  • Most of the characters are very ugly.

Here are a whole bunch of "popular with furries" examples. (Note that I added the Robin Hood one, because that's a well-known fact about the film.)

• The Lion King:
  • The film being a gateway drug for the Furry Fandom. (shares this with Robin Hood and Sonic the Hedgehog)
• Robin Hood:
  • The film being a gateway drug for the Furry Fandom. (shares this with The Lion King and Sonic the Hedgehog)
• Zootopia:
  • Making fun of the movie being Popular with Furries, usually by showing off Rule 34.
• The Secret of NIMH:
  • The film being a Closet Key for furries.
• Animalympics: The film being a gateway for the Furry Fandom.