Rename: Moriarty Effect

Never heard of Moriarty. Guess I'm not a true fan of Sherlock Holmes, then. Whatever. It's a character-named trope, and it has a pesky "The" redirect (The Moriarty Effect) to boot. Anyone have a title with a more recognizable meaning? Preferably a title that refers to the character and not the process that creates it, so that it better parallels Ensemble Dark Horse. Something simple like Breakout Villain works for me.

42 wicks plus 15 wicks for its redirect, I'll start going through them for misuse, though it seems a fairly low number for a trope that's been around this long (at least, I think it's been around for a while.)

Is it that common in actual use though?

Searchable redirect seems in order in any case, for which Breakout Villian ought to serve well.

Doctor Who: [The Daleks] very nearly never appeared at all, but are now at least as iconic as the TARDIS. — this trope is a minor villain becoming the main villain, not a minor villain being remembered or popular, Incorrect

Godzilla: unexplained, and I'm not familiar, so I can't pass judgement.

Gold Digger:(The dragon Dreadwing was originally just a one-shot villain for the pilot story, which ended with him as a skeleton. Now, he's the Man Behind The Man for many of the plotlines past and present, and dueling with Ancient Gina across most of time with virtually all the other characters as pawns.) — sounds Correct

King Arthur: Mordred, Arthur's nephew/son, and Morgan Le Fay, his half-sister, remain the only villains that are well-known in the Arthur legends, even though there are loads of others. To this day, they are thus considered the biggest villains, with the only one coming a mite close to their status being Lucius, the Emperor of Rome and Big Bad of Book V of Le Morte De Arthur. — Wording suggests that there's merely a perception of them being major villains, and not actually having been so, I'm not familiar enough to call it either way from this description.

Lost: Originally scheduled for a three-episode run, the writers evolved [Benjamin Linus] into the main antagonist for most of the series. — Seems Correct

Metal Gear: Very few people who finished the first Metal Gear Solid when it came out expected [Ocelot] to be anything more than Solidus Snake's lackey in the sequel. — Can't really tell here, the series creator has always been a bit of a screwball, so it's not clear if Ocelot was given an improved role due to popularity, or if it had been planned from the start.

Neon Genesis Evangelion: [Kowaru] only appeared in one episode in the original series. Then "Death and Rebirth" advertised him heavily, he made an appearance in "End of Evangelion", was among the main cast in several AU spin-offs, and now he's become a more prominent character in the manga version and the "Rebuild" movies. — Looks Correct.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: no explanation, not familiar enough to tell.

Tin Tin : He isn't in a whole lot of albums and only briefly in most of them, but he made enough of an impression to be universally considered Tintin's Big Bad. — Again, this is about the actual series treating him as the major villain, not just the fans, so Incorrect.

Total Drama Island: No explanation, not familiar with the series.

24: heavy spoilers, but looks Correct

Wolfenstein: Description's too vague for me, unfamiliar with the work, to determine if it's correct or not.

Batman: Originally slated to be killed off in his second appearance, waaaayy back in the forties and only saved by Executive Meddling. Fast-forward more than sixty years, and [The Joker]'s got Luthor, Magneto, and Goblin beat in the "most recognizable comic book villain" department. — Correct

Battlestar Galactica: Again, no description, can't call

Dalziel And Pascoe: No description again.

Heroes: Thanks to a strong showing in Season One, [Sylar]'s become the Face of Evil for the show. — Going to call it Correct based on the description.

Yu-Gi-Oh: Kaiba and the card game were meant to be seen only once... plans changed. — Correct

This count does not count indexes, related tropes, repeated listings (The Joker is mentioned on his own page in addition to Batman) and 2 works pages directly related to Sherlock Holmes. Otherwise, all wicks are represented here.

edited 27th Sep '10 7:07:36 PM by Twilightdusk

I believe Godzilla is correct. Originally, he was pure villain who showed up and ravaged Tokyo, then he became something of a Dark Horse and spawned Only Here For Godzilla and Godzilla Threshold to become as much of an Anti-Villain as forces of nature can become.

I didn't even see a Godzilla example.

edited 27th Sep '10 6:51:42 PM by Deboss

I disagree about this trope excluding those villains that were intended to be minor but were upgraded to major: Here's the actual definition:

"Sometimes, though, a villain will be introduced who ends up being a Breakout Character in his/her own right, and thus a Villain of the Week becomes the villain of the series. ... a character "suffering" from The Moriarty Effect is one who was meant to be a one-shot throw-away that, through fan/author/executive/all-of-the-above response became not only a staple villain, but THE villain of the series. "

The part I bolded certainly reads to me like the Daleks would be a correct example, as would the Tin Tin one.

^^ It's in the character page, under King Ghidorah

^ I interpreted that to mean that the series itself has to treat the originally minor villain as a Big Bad, not just the fanbase or fanfiction. If that makes the Doctor Who example fit then fine, I don't pay attention to it much and it was worded as if to say that the Daleks are and were always minor villains in the show despite iconic status. The Tin Tin example even explicitly states that the villain was never a major force in the work, but the fans have declared him the main antagonist.

The Aurthurian one is good. There was an evolution of them as the legend got retold over time and they grew from minor characters to the main villains of it. It doesn't look like it's being misused.

^^ For context, the Daleks were originally part of a stable of generally co-equal villains and were over time refined and promoted to the point where Russel T. Davies refused to write a season finale in the re-launch that didn't include the Daleks.

Good trope, perhaps it would be less obscure if not for the bad name. Professor James Moriarty is known for many things and the trope's meaning surprised me. The problem here is Professor Moriarty has appeared so much in various Sherlock Holmes adaptations no-one knows he was in just one of the original stories, so the current title is mysterious rather than informative.

Breakout Villain is great: short, clear and a perfect partner to Breakout Character.

edited 28th Sep '10 8:34:51 AM by Camacan

Gone ahead and done the Breakout Villain redirect. I'm not sold on the title being bad enough to change but am not likely to stand in the way if consensus swings toward renaming.

see, here's the thing that i think should be clarified: who is supposed to make this minor villain into an archvillain? the description says this is done "through fan/author/executive/all-of-the-above response" but i think that's too wide. according to the current description (third paragraph, "in some cases...") i think this could be split:

on the one hand, you have the villains that were initially intended to be one-off. however, they proved popular so the creators/writers decided to keep using them, and eventually their presence was expected enough that they became major villains. this is something that happens during the series' run. the creators/authors introduce them, take notice of their popularity, and give them bigger roles accordingly. examples of these would be the daleks, ben linus, the joker, arguably morgana (she does appear in a lot of myths, with lots of different evil plots) etc.

on the other hand, you have the villains that were initially intended to be one-off, and remained one-off, but were very memorable in their one appearance (or perhaps very few, relative to the total length of the work). the creator/writer does not bring them back to the same work/series, but if you ask the audience who the Big Bad of the work/series was, they're more likely to remember this one-off villain because his villainy, evil deeds and the way they affected the rest of the characters were just that memorable. examples of these would be moriarty himself (who only appeared in the final problem and i think one other story which was a prequel), kaworu (makes his appearance and dies in episode 24), mordred (who only comes in toward the end of the legends and is basically remembered for having killed arthur), etc.

now, the latter is what i believe this trope should really be. my position is to split the former as a new trope, a subtrope of Breakout Character but for villains. note that the description for Breakout Character states that he/she "becomes a central part of the regular cast"— which for a villain subtrope would mean popping up again and again and again. moriarty himself didn't do that— at least not in conan doyle's sherlock holmes. he only does that now because he suffers from the moriarty effect and the post-doyle writers/creators were doyle's audience to begin with. so he's not a Breakout Character, at least not in doyle's stories.

also, i would be careful when using the word "minor." in this context it's meant as a character who has very few appearances in-series, but it can be taken to mean the overall impact of the character. i would never use the word "minor" for a villain that, say, managed to kill the hero for real. unless Death Is Cheap and the hero gets killed really often, of course. but in cases like moriarty and mordred, i wouldn't really use the word "minor." it's so ambiguous.

TL;DR because i talk too much: don't rename, just split into two tropes.

edited 28th Sep '10 2:11:28 PM by carla

Never heard of Moriarty.

...

This reason for renaming this really baffles me, and not just because Moriarty has for an extremely long time been household name even with people who haven't read Sherlock Holmes, going through as much Cultural Osmosis as Holmes himself, and is practically a Trope Codifier for villainy post Victorian-era, and I can't imagine anyone never hearing the name.

I'm for this rename, however, as Moriarty is known for a lot of things, this probably among the less widespread ones.

^ I agree with the last part, in that the mere fact that Moriarty is so well known is an indication that few people would know that he wasn't intended to be a major character.

I believe this is the same reason The Fonzie got changed to Breakout Character, while everyone knows who Fonzie is, few know that he was a background character to start.

At the same time though, the wicks for this trope don't show any widespread misuse, not blatantly at least, I think that should be weighed into the decision, though with so few wicks for what I think is an old, old trope, misuse may be less of a factor than lack of being used.

It's exactly the same reason The Fonzie was renamed — you are remembering correctly.

This is one where I think the name, while not being actively misused, is unclear and misleading enough that it's hampering the appropriate use.

Daleks are are this trope so hard, if the naming conventions of 3 years ago still held it would have been named 'The Dalek'.

The King Arthur wick is also correct, as Mordred and Morgan are the villains in almost every modern interpretation of the story, and both started off with bare mentions.

Battlestar Galactica's Cavils start off as minor sleeper agents, and end as the driving force of the anti-human faction of Cylons. I'd call it correct.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: the actual citation is under Ascended Extra, it's also correct.

Godzilla: King Ghidorah ... Yeah, that's wrong. he becomes a staple character after originally being a one shot enemy, but main villain? No. He's often some mind controlled lackey, and on more than one occasion has been Godzilla's sidekick. I just can't see it.

Dalziel And Pascoe, Total Drama Island, and Wolfenstein I don't know well enough to comment on, as in not at all.

edited 28th Sep '10 12:54:20 PM by Daremo

Like The Fonzie, switch with the new redirect

Is there any way to tell how long this page has been around? The page history only goes back to August. If it has only been here for a couple months, I don't know that it's current level of usage can really be seen as a negative against it.

That said, since it hasn't seen much widespread use at this time, if we wanted to switch the two names now would be the time to do it.

It's newer than August 2008. It's not on the main tropes index the Wayback Machine archived then.

Alright. Everyone seems to be fine about (or at least not against) the rename aside from carla's "split in two"...

I'm against the rename.

No significant misuse, no reason to rename.

Theoretically could be confusing is not a reason to rename.

It's a Character Named Trope that, by definition, can't pass the test for character-named tropes. The Moriarty Effect can't be the thing everybody associates with Moriarty because one of the effects of the trope is that people don't realize the character used to be a minor villain. It's the exact same reason The Fonzie had to change.

I can give a weak support to a rename. I can agree that the title - alone - can be confusing, but then again I am familiar with Holmes so that is a personal bias.

edited 5th Oct '10 5:30:23 AM by Ghilz

I am fairly sure The Fonzie was actually misused. Most of the examples of this trope get it right.

Besides which, we do have the context word "effect" in the title anyways.

Still maintain that seeming to be a bad name without any bad effects does not make a name actually bad.

"effect" doesn't tell us much. Moriarty Noteriety maybe would work but...