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openGuys Sing, Girls Dance
Not sure if this is a trope already, but this is referring to how settings (particularly video games) that have performance as a character class tend to have the men sing and play instruments, while the women dance (often in revealing outfits).
Examples off the top of my head:
- Final Fantasy Tactics: Male characters can become Bards who specialize in aiding allies after gaining enough levels in Summoner and Oracle, while their female counterparts can become Dancers who specialize in weakening enemies after gaining enough levels in Geomancer and Dragoon.
- Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Hurdy is a male Moogle who has Bard as his unique class, while Penelo is a female Humenote albeit treated as a Viera in some cases who has Dancer as her unique class.
- Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade: Elffin is a male Bard recruitable in one story branch of the game, while Larum is a female Dancer available on the other branch. For game balance reasons, neither of them can be in the party at the same time since Bards/Dancers in Fire Emblem specialize in providing units Extra Turns.
- Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade: Siblings Nils and Ninian are similarly a male Bard and a female Dancer respectively. While they're not split by branch, they are never available at the same time due to plot reasons.
- Ragnarok Online: One possible second job for Archers is the capability to become a Bard or a Dancer. Male Archers can become support-oriented Bards who play instruments to buff allies, while Female Archers can become whip-wielding Dancers who specialize in inflicting debuffs on foes.
openDescribe this power set
Taromancy: Gaining insight into the future by using tarot cards.
Astrology
Cold reading
openReversed Reversal
A situation that can be played for drama or humor: something with a binary state (an on-off switch, a MacGuffin and an identical-looking decoy, etc.) keeps getting switched from one state to the other.
- A Jame Bond movie has Bond switch the Big Bad's computer tape with an audio one. Unfortunately, he disposed of the real one by putting it down the Bond Girl's bikini, who interpreted this as her needing to switch the tapes, which she did.
- In Asterix, two hostile Gaul chieftains (both Too Important to Walk and are carried on shields) are negotiating, with one turning his back on the other. His shieldbearers believe they're supposed to do the same, ruining the chieftain's attempt at drama.
- In Good Omens, three babies are present in the maternity ward, an American politician's son, the Antichrist and a third one. There's a Satanic plot to switch the first two babies out, but because two of the cultists do so separately, the Antichrist ends up raised by a perfectly normal couple instead of being in a position to start Armageddon.
- Often seen when playing Uno, when a player uses a reverse card but the next also uses one.
openAnimal noises are speech
Animals make normal animal noises like barking or neighing, which other animals understand as actual sentences. Like in Air Buddies when the dog and the goat are having a conversation in English, and then it cuts to the perspective of the humans, who hear it as "Woof!" "Maa!" "Woof!" "Maa!" Or how Warrior Cats uses "he mewed" as a dialogue tag. Can be Animal Talk if multiple species can understand each other's noises.
openda da da da da CHARGE!
Is there a trope for that fanfare that goes "da da da da da" and then has someone yelling "CHARGE!"? It seems like there should be, but I can't find it.
openSignificant differences between different versions of the work Literature
In Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, near the end of the book, Malfoy says he has to kill Dumbledore because otherwise Voldemort will kill him. Dumbledore's answer in the American version:
Dumbledore's answer in the British version:
openEven Translated Animals Don't Speak
A situation where Animal Talk results in animal thoughts being expressed in a human language, but said thoughts aren't really communicating anything important.
- One Far Side strip has a scientist invent a helmet that translates dog barks, and it turns out they're all saying "Hey! Hey!" In another, birdsong consists solely of "hey baby", "you and what army", etc.
- In Rover Red Charlie, dogs barking is actually them saying "I'm a dog!" no matter the situation.
resolved Everybody Followed Fashion in the Past Live Action TV
A flashback scene will feature characters wearing stereotypical fashion items of the era, to an exaggerated level, even if in the series' present time they just dress in clothes that might be common in different settings, such as suits, white shirts, and so on.
For instance, in The Simpsons, Dr. Hibbert has a short hairdo that doesn't really stand out, but in flashbacks he'll have jheri curls, braids or dreadlocks depending on the era.
Even Homer wears a nondescript white shirt and jeans, but is fashion-focused on flashbacks, like in That '90s Show, he wore an 8-Ball jacket over a hoodie... even though when the show actually aired in the 90ies, he had the same white shirt.
Might be a Justified Trope in that characters might care more about fashion when they're young, but still...
open"Dude, Not Funny" as an Audience Reaction Trope.
When a joke is meant to elicit laughter, but at least a few other people in Real Life find it offensive. It's just like the in-universe trope but as a YMMV trope.
openTrope where a Reasonable Authority Figure purposely but unofficially gives the heroes a break
Is there a trope where a Reasonable Authority Figure purposely gives the heroes an opportunity to get something they can't officially give them? For instance, if they can't give them something they need, but go out of their way to tell them where it is before leaving them unsupervised?
Edited by halyasgirlopenFine, have it your way.
Somebody keeps defying whatever order or advice is someone else giving them. At one point the advice giver is fed up with the ignorance and just says something in the line of "have it your way/do whatever you want".
openIs there a trope that aptly describes Scrimblos?
The meme about Scrimblos by 'n large refers to Collect-a-Thon 3D Platformers from the 5th and 6th gen, following the same beats as Mario 64 and Banjo-Kazooie in gameplay and artistic design. You can obviously be a Collect-a-Thon without being a Scrimblo, the games I think most people associate with the term are character-oriented (often of the small, mascot variety) and no more than PG-13 in tone, like Gex, Pac-Man World, 40 Winks and Vexx. A lot of them might also be Mascots With Attitude, but stuff like Banjo isn't while being in the same vein as those examples, and this would exclude games from the 4th gen.
I have the feeling there's a single trope that aptly describes what I'm talking about, but I haven't found it on here. Anyone have any ideas?
openThe Audience Is The Problem
The creator of a work is called out for a controversial aspect of his work. It turns out they agree with the criticism, the problem is the audience either loves it or doesn't want to see the opposite.
e.g. Men Are the Expendable Gender mentions that for all the perfectly justified reasons the trope is bad (infantilizing women, reinforcing that they shouldn't try to use violence, etc.), the simple fact is the audience doesn't want to see women getting disemboweled or brutalized like male characters do.
resolved Early Career Weirdness
Does Early-Installment Weirdness cover cases where a creator's early output is significantly different from what follows? (e.g. an author writes one realistic novel for adults, and then spends the rest of her career writing children's fantasy)
If not, do we have something that does cover it?
openboss cliff Videogame
A videogame boss fight against a Kaiju-sized enemy where the player stands on top of a cliff while the boss stands on the ground at the bottom of the cliff, allowing the player to interact with the boss's torso, arms, and head instead of just its feet. Often also a Stationary Boss, since if the boss moved away from the cliff edge the player wouldn't be able to hit them.
Examples
- the second Metal Gear Ray fight in Metal Gear Rising
- The Human-Reaper in Mass Effect 2
- the Reaper on Rannoch in Mass Effect 3
- The Icon of Sin in Doom Eternal
- The raid boss version of Oryx in Destiny
The Icon of Sin and Oryx are notable as examples that aren't also Stationary Bosses, as there are multiple "cliffs" they regularly move between over the course of their respective boss fights.
openRepetition Madness
Is there some kinda supertrope to Incessant Music Madness, Broken Record, Annoyingly Repetitive Child, Overly Long Gag, etc. that’s just “repeating things over and over is annoying”, or is it a Missing Supertrope currently?
Edited by SnowskyopenThe inconspicuous Literature
Hi
What's a good trope for a character who is retiring, shy, doesn't leave much of an impression on people around her, just gets on with things in the background, doesn't stand out in a crowd or indeed at all, and once she's out of the scene, other people struggle to remember her face and general appearance? The Faceless doesn't really seem to fit, and I'm looking for something that conveys an ides of "The Anonymous" or "The Inconspicuous". Thanks!
What is the difference between “Sherlock Scan” , “Eagle-Eye Detection”, and “Hyper-Awareness” ?
((Trying to describe a doctor/nurse character who can accurately diagnose a patient’s illness even without tests/equipment))