To-do list:
- Clean up examples for Blood Brothers. Move any examples that fit to Sworn Brothers, and remove any that don't.
- Clean up on-page examples.
- Clean up wicks.
Original post:
Blood Brothers is a trope about two characters making an oath or explicit bonding activity/scene to be brothers/sisters/siblings/family in spirit. However, a considerable amount of misuse and zero/partial context examples use the trope for a variety of close non-familial relationships that don't involve an oath or pact.Me and other tropers did a wick check on Blood Brothers Wick Check and here's the findings:
- Characters.Grandmaster Of Demonic Cultivation Mo Dao Zu Shi Jin Guangyao:
- The current leader of the Jin Clan of Lanling and Jin Ling's paternal uncle. The illegitimate son of the late clan leader Jin Guangshan, his meteoric rise to the position of Cultivation Chief was not without its difficulties. He swore an oath of brotherhood with Nie Mingjue and Lan Xichen, and is the third and youngest brother. Together, they were called the Venerated Triad.
- He became sworn brothers in Lan Xichen and Nie Mingjue after the Sunshot Campaign, forming the Venerated Triad. Unfortunately, while he's close to the former, his relationship with Nie Mingjue was far more strained.
- Characters.Koihime Musou Anime: Female example. At the start of the story, Kan'u and Chouhi swear a vow of sisterhood. In the second season, Ryuubi wants to become Kan'u's sworn little sister too, but Chouhi decides to make her Kan'u's sworn older sister without Kan'u's permission. Eventually, Kan'u gives in and calls Ryuubi her "Aneue".
- DarthWiki.Project Alter: Jekyll himself becomes something between this and Papa Wolf during this canon’s events of Fragments of Silver regarding Tatsumi (though Tatsumi at first calls him "pops" or even "gramps", they become more sibling-ish eventually and it's revealed that they outright declared themselves Blood Brothers), eventually developing into his Team Mom-ish character in the events of FGO. He notes that he’s taking after Utterson, surprised at how much of a natural he is. Unfortunately, it makes Tatsumi’s death even more painful. (Relevant part is under the spoiler)
- EnsembleDarkHorse.Video Games: Yakuza: Akira Nishikiyama; Kiryu's sworn brother, due to his appearance in 0 where he fought against and alongside Kiryu. Fans wanted to see more of their brotherhood, but to their dismay his downfall plays a huge role in Yakuza 1/Kiwami, where he even goes to an extent to redeem himself by blowing up the 10 Billion yen alongside himself after killing Jingu
- Fanfic.Harry Potter And The Artificer Legacy: For returning the Sword of Gryffindor to them, Harry is officially declared a sworn brother of the Erdunn dwarves, complete with the Erdunn sigil appearing on his arm.
- Film.Butterfly And Sword: Under A Minor Kidrocuction: A flashback scene midway shows how Meng, Sister Ko, and Yip meet as kids and how they become sworn blood siblings. Seems correct
- Heartwarming.This Bites: The three mates of the Straw Hats, at Cross's insistence, perform a brotherhood ceremony.
- Malevolent Mutilation: The Blood Pact opposing Gaunt's Ghosts during the Sabbat Worlds Crusade are so named because they ritually cut their hands against the jagged edges of their patron's Power Armor to seal their loyalty to him and their solidarity as fraternal warriors. They also tend to engage in further scarification, cutting chaotic glyphs into their faces and scalps in order to demonstrate their dedication to the Ruinous Powers. Even those tend to be covered up by the iron masks they wear which are shaped into grotesque and monsterous faces.
- One Degree of Separation: Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation: Mo Dao Zu Shi: Pretty much every plot-relevant character is directly connected to each other by blood, marriage, sworn brotherhood or adoption. Somewhat justified, as the story revolves around the five most notable clans, akin to nobility in the cultivation world, and it is common for nobles to be all related to each other.
- Script.John Boorman Lord Of The Rings: Aragorn and Boromir swear an oath to become blood brothers partway through the script... which apparently involves licking each other's blood off Arwen's thighs.
- Series.Action: Hilariously inverted. A very drunk Peter declares he and Adam to be this, then stabs both himself and Adam through the hand with a toothpick. Adam's horrified reaction shows the feeling is not mutual.
- Series.Novoland Eagle Flag: Asule and his bodyguards Tie Yan and Tie Ye cut their hands and press the wounds together when they swear to be brothers.
- Theatre.Blood Brothers: Right there in the title. When Mickey and Eddie meet as children, they decide to become Blood Brothers to solidify their best friend-ship.
- Theatre.The Burnt Part Boys: Pete and Dusty. According to Pete, they swore to be "everlasting eternal soul twins under the crab-apple tree by [Dusty's] house in 1955." For context, they both would have been seven years old during this.
- Anime.Revolutionary Girl Utena: "Utena vows to protect and support Anthy no matter what the cost, but being a Mind Screw show, just getting there is half the battle..." Sounds more like a Declaration of Protection than this trope. Utena and Anthy didn't make a pact to be "sisters.
- Characters.Danganronpa The After: Chapter 3 reveals that Miyuki was actually his adoptive brother who took in kid!Ryohei who was kicked out of his own house. Characters are adoptive siblings.
- Characters.Five Funny Nights At Freddys: Freddy and Bonnie are thick as thieves and have been since 1970. Only tells us that these characters are close. No mention of pact/vow.
- Characters.Innocent: He once referred to his servant, Andre Legris, as his foster brother. No pact mentioned.
- Characters.Metro: Heterosexual Life-Partners: He is clearly a very close comrade of Artyom and they virtually consider each other Blood Brothers after the above mentioned blood transfusion in D6. Characters are close. No mention of pact/vow.
- Characters.Off The Grid: It's revealed in Season 4, Episode 11 that he and Clint are brothers. Characters are literally brothers by blood.
- Characters.The Sevenwaters Trilogy: With Aidan of Whiteshore. As children they'd made a blood promise to be friends until death. Blood oath to be friends, not siblings.
- Characters.Strikeforce Morituri: The warriors of the Horde are closely bound to their tentmates, fellow warriors from the same faction. At one point this is compared with humans' affection for their parents (a connection which isn't shared by the Horde - or, at least, not so strongly). Characters are close. No mention of pact/vow.
- DarthWiki.Beyblade C Square: They're all unrelated to each other (barring Sacha and Sandro), but share a near-brotherly bond of friendship. Characters are close friends. No pact/vow.
- DarthWiki.Rise Roleplay: Rodrig, on ambassador duty, going to meet Autumn at her home on a remote planet and sharing a beer together under a tree. The fact that a massive and bloodthirsty cyborg dinosaur cared enough for a small human woman who grew up in a brothel fought together a few times and that 6 years later he still cared about her is truly heartwarming. Characters who are close and fought together. No mention of pact/vow.
- Film.Bullet In The Head: The film is about the disastrous effect of Gold Fever and the horrors of The Vietnam War on the bond between friends, which in Woo's other movies was all but unbreakable. Talks about the bond between friends. No pact/vow.
- Film.The Killer 1989: The boss of the triad, Wong Hoi, who is the nephew of the guy he sent Jong out to kill, would rather kill Jong than hand over the money that Jong's handler Fung Sei promised to him. Meanwhile, a cop by the name of Inspector Li Ying (played by Danny Lee, who is good at playing Cowboy Cops in general) has picked up Ah Jong's case, and as he gets to know both the assassin and the woman that he's going through hell for, the two heroes on opposite sides of the law develop a respect for each other that soon turns into a bond of friendship akin to blood brotherhood. Characters are close. No pact/vow.
- Film.Transformers Film Series: Characters are close. No pact/vow.
- The human warriors of the NEST team love their Autobot comrades as such:
Epps: We have shed blood, sweat and precious metal together.
- Enough so that even when disbanded and living peaceful lives by Dark of the Moon, they immediately reunited to take revenge for the murder of their Autobot brothers at the hands of Dylan Gould.
Sam: Why are you helping me?
Epps: 'Cause that asshole killed my friends too!!
- The human warriors of the NEST team love their Autobot comrades as such:
- Film.Wonder Seven: Blood Brothers and a Sister. The titular seven are a band of orphans who were raised together, grew up together, and consider each other as a family. Characters consider each other family, but no pact/vow.
- Recap.Supernatural S 08 E 01 We Need To Talk About Kevin: Benny calls Dean his brother, foreshadowing episode 5 of this season. Not sure what the foreshadowing is referring to, but no pact/vow mentioned.
- TearJerker.Top Gun The death of Goose, Maverick's copilot, best friend and practically blood brother in an Ejection Seat accident, of course. Characters are close. No mention of pact/vow.
- Theatre.Thrill Me: Nathan and Richard sign a contract in blood per Richard's instruction, and then Nathan clasps Richard's hand while they're still bleeding to seal the deal. Missing the 'brothers' aspect as it doesn't specify what the contract is about.
- Characters.Angie Tribeca: Atkins has one with Commissioner Bigfish, who took a bullet meant for Atkins back in The '70s.
- Characters.Green Lantern Hal Jordan: With his fellow Green Lantern earthmen: Guy, John and Kyle and fellow GL Kilowog, each owing each other his life many times over.
- Characters.Outlander Jamie And Claires Family: He and Jamie became this after Jamie's mother and youngest brother died in childbirth.
- Characters.Spies In Disguise: Jeff and Crazy Eyes are from the same flock.
- Characters.Star Wars Rebel Heroes: With Han.
- Characters.Yakuza 2: Was this with Terada back in the latter's days as one of the Four Kings of Omi, and even teamed up together so as to bring down the Tojo Clan. Unfortunately, Takashima only saw Terada as a means to an end.
- Characters.Young Justice 2010 The Team Season One: With Beast Boy as she gave him a life-saving blood transfusion in "Image" with the implication in "Alienated" that she has given him other ones.
- DarthWiki.The Exterior: Arthur and (quite surprisingly) the Sun Wizard become this in the final film.
- Fanfic.Marshall Gone Missing: Marshall and Chase with a slightly morbid context of Marshall promising not to die before Chase.
- Fanfic.Streets Of Rage Saga: Musashi, Kato, and Yamato formed such a bond taking down the Zeed organization.
- Fanfic.Watashitachi Wa Roger Kaizoku Desu We Still Stand Proud: Shanks and Buggy. To the point where Shanks swore a mystical vendetta against Shiki on Buggy's behalf.
- Literature.Nightfall Series: Vampires can become this after drinking each other’s blood.
- Manga.Gorgeous Carat: Ray and Azura. (Commented out)
- Recap.Dan Vs S 3 E 13 Dan Vs Summer Camp: Chris does this with Dan, albeit with spit instead of blood. Dan's a little weirded out by that. I think they probably mean they swore an oath of brotherhood with spit, but it's not very clear.
- Recap.Supernatural S 08 E 05 Blood Brother:
- Benny and Dean.
- Dean and Sam.
- Dean and Castiel.
- And even Benny and Castiel.
- Series.Camelot: Arthur and Kay. (Commented out)
- Series.Kamen Rider Kabuto: Yaguruma and Kageyama.
- Series.Kamen Rider Kiva: Otoya and the Arms Monsters.
- Series.Toshiie To Matsu: Nobunaga and Toshiie. (Commented out)
Conclusion
I think a rename might help. Maybe Sworn Brothers or Sworn Family? Also, disambiguating Blood Brothers between "sworn family via oath/pact/bonding scene", Blood Oath and other related tropes sounds like a good idea.
EDIT: Looks like Sworn Brothers is already a redirect.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Dec 25th 2023 at 9:32:44 AM
Opening.
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
Sworn Brothers might get the pact/vow part across better, but I'm not 100% sure, so I'll wait for more opinions.
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
(she/her)
maybe Sworn Brothers Vow / Sworn Brothers Pact then (if that's not too redundant).
Macron's notes
Captain of USS Bajor
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
That seems like it would work.
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
the Retromancer
Is this just a smaller version of Family of Choice?
If focused explicitly on a vow, it can work though.
Edited by Amonimus on Nov 15th 2023 at 11:14:53 PM
TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
(she/her)
^ Yeah, it's similar to Family of Choice but explicitly requires a vow + 2 characters (dunno if the trope should be expanded to include more characters or not) . It's like a (often symbolic) form of Blood Oath between friends to show their commitment to each other.
Edited by MacronNotes on Nov 15th 2023 at 3:25:43 PM
Macron's notes
Hmm. Wikipedia seems to think the phrase Blood Oath is specific to the ritual described by this trope. We'd need to check Blood Oath for this, but maybe we could move this trope to that name (and maybe broaden it a bit), and move Blood Oath to a name like Signed In Blood?
If we don't want to do that, maybe we could name this something like Blood Brother Rite, or go the Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs route and call it Blood Brother Oath?
the Retromancer
Blood Oath can't be on the table until after it's checked.
TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
I don't have any objections expanding this thread to cover Blood Oath in addition to Blood Brothers if someone did a wick check for Blood Oath.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Nov 16th 2023 at 7:06:50 AM
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Captain of USS Bajor
Blood Oath's description specifically cites Blood Brothers' current definition as a subtrope.
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
I copied the TRS tag on Blood Brothers to Blood Oath since we're discussing whether to do a wick check for the latter.
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
(she/her)
I started Sandbox.Blood Oath Wick Check a few so I will work in bursts
Macron's notes
(she/her)
I have been out of it the past two weeks sooo I dunno when I will finish the wick check. I think I'll save it for the weekend.
Macron's notes
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
Clocking due to a lack of activity.
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
(she/her)
Honestly, i think the issue with Blood Brothers stands on its own and I don't know how i feel about a thread hinging on a another trope no one but me is attempting to work on wick checking. Shouldn't that be done beforehand? I can try finishing the check before the clock runs out but I dunno if I have the energy or time to do much on the site at the moment.
Edited by MacronNotes on Dec 18th 2023 at 6:32:09 AM
Macron's notes
Useful Note
Maybe the laconic is the reason for misuse. It says "Two or more people don't need to be biologically related to call each other brothers or sisters."
Welcome to Corneria!
the Retromancer
Liking the idea to rename to make vow/pact clear.
TroperWall / WikiMagic Cleanup
Absolute Rainbow & the tales between worlds
Sworn Brothers don't need to be redirect anymore. Make that the new name.
Absolute Rainbow
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
If someone could compile a list of crowner options, we could hook a crowner and shut off the clock. In addition, we can shift focus back to Blood Brothers and save Blood Oath for another day (or just do nothing with it) if that would be preferable.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Dec 19th 2023 at 3:34:28 AM
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
Hooked a crowner for whether to rename Blood Brothers and shut off the clock. I'll go ahead and remove the TRS banner from Blood Oath since we're only tackling Blood Brothers for now.
Edit: Just to clarify the removal of the TRS banner from Blood Oath, this isn't ruling out restarting work on Blood Oath if anyone wanted to do that (or it could just be given its own thread in the future if problems are found). I was going by how it was determined that Blood Brothers can be fixed without us needing to do anything with Blood Oath in this thread.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Dec 19th 2023 at 4:34:13 AM
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Pretty sure the trope name came from Hong Kong Heroic Bloodshed movies which featured strong bonds between (usually male) characters, who may or may not be part of an organization (criminal or otherwise) that treat each other as family. They're usually explicitly called this trope by name or its alternate too, but a ritual isn't always shown, if ever.
I'd suggest having Sworn Brothers be the main trope name since that's usually what these characters refer to each other in-universe, and redefine it to fit the laconic definition.
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
I agree that Sworn Brothers is a better name, and I have a feeling it'll be popular if renaming continues to have consensus and we move on to choosing a new name.
Patiently awaiting the release of Paper Luigi and the Marvelous Compass.
Absolute Rainbow & the tales between worlds
I agree too. Sworn Brothers is more fitting.
Crown Description:
It was decided to rename Blood Brothers since it is a trope about two characters making an oath or explicit bonding activity/scene to be brothers/sisters/siblings/family in spirit, but a considerable amount of misuse and zero/partial context examples use the trope for a variety of close non-familial relationships that don't involve an oath or pact. What should the trope's new name be?
To-do list:
Original post:
Blood Brothers is a trope about two characters making an oath or explicit bonding activity/scene to be brothers/sisters/siblings/family in spirit. However, a considerable amount of misuse and zero/partial context examples use the trope for a variety of close non-familial relationships that don't involve an oath or pact.Me and other tropers did a wick check on Blood Brothers Wick Check and here's the findings:
Epps: 'Cause that asshole killed my friends too!!
Conclusion
I think a rename might help. Maybe Sworn Brothers or Sworn Family? Also, disambiguating Blood Brothers between "sworn family via oath/pact/bonding scene", Blood Oath and other related tropes sounds like a good idea.
EDIT: Looks like Sworn Brothers is already a redirect.
Edited by GastonRabbit on Dec 25th 2023 at 9:32:44 AM
Macron's notes