Discussion Main / DarknessInducedAudienceApathy

This was never posted, so this TRS thread renamed the trope to Too Bleak, Stopped Caring.

Linking to a past Trope Repair Shop thread that dealt with this page: Complaining, started by Sakubara on Oct 11th 2017 at 2:00:40 PM

Perhaps a better name for DIAA could be something along the lines of "Meaningless Drama, Meaningless Resolve", or "World Completely Empty", to better fit the examples that are supposed to be in DIAA. Also, as for the Half-Quake examples I put on this page some time ago, is there any element of unnecessary show bashing in it? I don't think there is, but I've made some REALLY idiotic contributions in my day, so my judgement might be clouded somewhat.

Is it possible to add the entire genre of Cosmic Horror Story here?

Note to Editors: [...] If people enjoy the work despite its tone, this trope does not apply.

This is nonsensical. The whole purpose of YMMV is that it's subjective, yes? What one person finds unceasingly dark another person would find really encapsulating. Otherwise, just make this trope objective.

I don't really like this trope. Not because of the idea, but because of the examples. The presence of show examples for this trope suggest that, despite this being a YMMV entry, nobody could possibly be able to enjoy the show in question on any of its other merits just because the characters within can be seen as "unlikable" or "unsympathetic", among other reasons for it. I'm not suggesting an overhaul of DIAA to get rid of any examples besides those that discuss the trope, limiting the listing of show examples to the YMMV pages of the shows in question, but it's something to think about, especially on a site with as broad a spectrum of opinions as this one.

I think this trope either needs the examples cut or a complete clean up because its becoming Complaining About Shows You Don'tLike because people just use this trope due to a particular scene they don't like or just flat out hate the show to begin with.

Is it possible for writers to deliberately invoke Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy (especially the hopeless variant) to make a meta-based point or comment?

I have never seen ANY of Darren Aronofsky's movies, but I can tell that he is prone to this trope.

Could Event Horizon qualify? The more it fleshes out how The Company operates, the less I start to root for The Company. Okay, scratch that, I never rooted for The Company, but I did root for the characters. But the characters are shown doing shady, downright unethical stuff as well. And since the opposing side is Chaos and Mordor, I'm not exactly rooting for them, either. At the least, if it's not DIAA, it's starting to go that route, in my opinion.

In fact, if you set aside the large amount of HFY and future vs past curb-stomping present in these fics, I'd almost prefer that The Company fails utterly.

I'd like to contest Cat Dog being on here... Especially since, after watching the series, there were many episodes where CatDog won. And I believe it may have been the point to have CatDog as the lone good guy in the show. It was in the theme song: "Alone in the world is the little CatDog... Out on the road or back in town, all kinds of critters putting CatDog down..."

Now, even though I liked the show, Ed Edd N Eddy probably should be an entry here because there ARE people who feel that there are no likable characters in the show and that the stories are mean-spirited, like Rowdy C of TV Trash. Is that OK?

Ask The Tropers has confirmed that DIAA can apply if a work has characters audiences would root for, except their efforts are futile, their successes fleeting, they screw things up "worse", and/or they are irrelevant in the story compared to the unlikeable factions.

Many examples of DIAA seem to fall under this. Should the main page be revised to reflect this?

Can this trope apply if there are those that audiences would root for, except that they fail to actually achieve anything worthwhile?

I want an opinion on replacing the current page quote with this:

"Ruined World + cast of jerk = I don't care what happens to these guys"

—Demotivational Poster◊

Delteted this, beccause the period (2003-2007) is actually full of popular, financially successful, and fondly remembered storylines. The DCU had a period like this, from approximately the Graduation Day storyline (the Sudden Downer Ending of Young Justice) to the Sinestro Corps War. Geoff Johns (who wrote both the aforementioned storylines, though Graduation Day was mandated by Executive Meddling) may have slipped a bit of meta-commentary on this into his Infinite Crisis, as this trope is essentially the reason why the villains of that story want to destroy the universe and remake it in their image.

I think this page needs some seriously cleaning up, to be honest. The examples seem to have progressed from "It's set in a world completely without hope, filled with completely unlikeable characters engaged in a conflict that will have no meaningful resolution however its resolved" into "well, some dark things happen sometimes, and the characters are sometimes a bit unlikeable". Several of the examples are questionable (the Community example seems to be just complaining about one of the characters, the The Critic is apparently this because the main character was an Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist for a season, etc.).

In short, one way or another I think this page needs a bit of an overhaul.

hey hey my friend-nice site!

Removed the Final Fantasy XIII entry. The entry was:

• The plot of Final Fantasy XIII is one of the most depressing of the series. The central theme of the first game is dealing with imminent death, and how to deal with the loss of someone you care about. By itself, that wouldn't be so bad. But, the game is so persistent about making its characters miserable and its setting more and more increasingly hopeless that, when everything does turn out okay, it feels like an Ass Pull. On top of that, the sequels retcon the plot of the first game into a "Shaggy Dog" Story, since they reveal the fal'Cie's plan to summon the Maker wouldn't have worked, which means all of that suffering the characters went through was for no reason.

The FFXIII-2 entry is:

• Final Fantasy XIII-2 manages to pull this trope even harder. Not only does the bad guy win, but Serah dies trying to defeat him, Lightning becomes crystallized, Noel gives the bad guy exactly what he wanted, and he and Hope are trapped at ground zero of a massive Time Crash. But wait! What if you go for 100% Completion to unlock the game's true ending? That'll make everything turn out better, right? Nope! The bad guy still wins, and he even mocks you for thinking that it was somehow going to help.

"Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy occurs when a conflict exists that simply lacks any reason for the audience to care about how it is resolved. This is often because the setting is extremely but meaninglessly Darker and Edgier, and/or all sides are abhorrently, equally evil — or at least, far enough gone that any difference between the two is splitting hairs."

In neither case are all sides are abhorrently evil, the protagonists are protagonists, the setting is not meaninglessly Darker and Edgier (even if you did compare it to previous games).

There is dramatic tension. The situation isn't hopeless, and the Hope Spot, Ass Pull or not, is still a Hope Spot. The plot is bleak at points, but not apathetic.

XIII-2 is much closer, but the majority of the game/it's entire theme is overcoming a person's fate, the protagonists end up doing a lot of good, and it's only a plot twist at the end that turns things around. A good portion of the game is quite hopeful.

A long time ago, I posted that Grey's Anatomy was prone to this trope. Why did someone delete it?

Cut:

• What few setting spoilers are available for Third Edition Exalted hint that this problem may continue, given that they heavily emphasize that the Realm is going to lose what little moral ambiguity it still had, and become an explicitly horrible empire of horror founded on exploitation and rape. Ironically, Holden Shearer wrote this part.

Not an example of the trope. Having one ruthless, imperialistic power is not the same thing as everyone being ruthless and imperialistic; it's not even a guarantee that every member of that power is ruthless and imperialistic, nor does it ensure that said power cannot be reformed or defeated. If they set it up so both the Realm and the people opposing it are utter bastards and there's either no hint that it can be improved or no out-of-character reason to try, then we can list it here.

Under Film we have a line about drugs/drug use... whoever the editor was that put that in, I think they were probably thinking in terms of dramas like Requiem for a Dream- but, if you count stoner comedies, then the vast majority of "drug use" films would not qualify. Cheech & Chong, Harold & Kumar... whatever Anna Faris is called in Smiley Face, those are clearly protagonists we are supposed to be cheering, and unless your audience is a bunch of hardcore prohibitionists, simply doing drugs (and acting dumb on drugs) doesn't really lead to this trope.

It hasn't even aired yet, but Gang Related seems to absolutely reek of it. I wish FOX would never make those kinds of shows again because that's why Lone Star failed.

Cutting The Great Gatsby as an example, sice it seems like the person writing it hadn't actually read the book.

Why was Sidekick deleted?

Seriously guys, can we have some neutrality in the Spec Ops the Line entry? I get it, the some people feel the game is Rail Roading or unfairly judging the player, but that's on the game's YMMV page for a reason.

Yet we keep getting nattery edits that go on tangents about it or say that the game sold poorly.

The entry says that the game mocks the player and gives some quotes as examples, we don't need people adding "But it really, REALLY mocks you and it's totally unfair"

I really don't think that Darker than Black should be in here. None of the major factions are actually "evil", and while there are unambiguously evil characters, they all get defeated. The first season even has a pretty happy ending. The second season might fall into this for the first couple of episodes, but this changes when more of the story comes out.

I'll wait and see if anyone wants to contest this though before deleting the entry.

I'd contest Codex Alera. The entry admits it's only based on the first book, but doesn't really seem to understand what was going on. Threats of rape? Performed by one guy, Kord, who never gets a chance to go through with them (though he has in the past) and is killed off karmically at the end of the novel. Odiana's backstory is horrible, but is also exceptionally crappy by the standards of the setting and not really indicative of what the world as a whole is like. Too many antagonists? While the aforementioned Kord is pretty much totally evil, the three main antagonists are Fidelias (a Well-Intentioned Extremist), Aldrick (a Noble Demon) and Odiana (a Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds). Most of the ordinary Alerans we meet aren't evil at all, just people trying to live their lives, and even Kord's eldest son wants out of the "family business" as a slaver. The same is true for the Marat- though intially played as brutal barbarians, it's eventually revealed that this is just one particularly cruel leader and his followers, and most Marat aren't any more malicious than anyone else; by the end of the novel, that leader is dead and his replacements are far less bloody-minded and willing to work for peace. At the end of the story, the day is saved, the Big Bad's plan is spoiled, the two most evil villains (Kord and Atsurak, the Marat war leader) are dead, and things are really looking up. The very worst thing that happens in the novel is that the Vord wake up thanks directly to our protagonists' actions, but the true significance of that won't be apparent until later in the series. Alera is a deeply flawed society, to be sure, but I'm not sure where the person who added this entry got the idea that it's such a total Crapsack World.

Remove Ninenties Anti Hero, Because they are still far less evil than the villains.

I'd like to contest the Ultimate Alien example. The way I read it, this trope is not just a general trope for "dark" things, but specifically about works where both sides are so abhorrent the audience doesn't care who wins. Ultimate Alien simply does not fulfill these criteria - we always prefer Ben and his team to whatever villain they are facing this week. The only episode which even comes close to this is the Absolute Power two-parter, and even that isn't really an example.

Can i talk to someone about this? It's from the Code Geass entry:

It's already going that way early in Season One; the very first episode features Lelouch mind-controlling a platoon of soldiers into suicide and doesn't seem at all moved, and a few episodes later he carries out an operation which involves sacrificing his own troops without their knowledge as well as endangering and killing numerous noncombatants, making it rather difficult to sympathize with the protagonist.

Okay, i'm not going to try to deny that Code Geass fits this trope, because from what i can see, it does. But i am going to say that this particular entry seems a little harsh. Lelouch does some evil things, i can't (and wouldn't try) to deny that either. But other than the fact that it leaves out some information (like the fact that the Mooks were Asshole Victims). And most importantly: that part about him sacrificing his own troops a few episodes later? That's not even true.

I'm guessing that the person who posted that was talking about the battle of Narita, where he did not sacrifice his own troops, he sacrificed the JLF's troops. A dick move? Yes, but the only time he knowingly sacrificed his own soldiers was waaaaay at the end of the series. And he also didn't realize that his actions there would indanger the innocent civlians.

Basically, i'm asking someone to tone down the message and make it a little less biased against Lelouch. I'd do it myself, but as you can probably tell, i'm too biased towards Lelouch, therefore i can't really be trusted to edit it fairly. either.

Could we possibly remove the idea that the Eastern Front was a case of Evil vs Evil? I'm not Russian and I absolutely despise the Soviet Union, for the most part, but it seems utterly wrong to state that the Soviet Union was just as bad as Nazi Germany, especially since the former was never as close to being as aggressive as the latter. I want to avoid a edit war, which is why I'm asking first, but it seems like a bad idea to have any real life examples anyway...

In the Fallout 3 example, it's mentioned that you often have to side between factions who are both scumbags. When does this happen? Almost all of the quests have a clear 'good' faction, and the ones that don't are done well.

In the Tenpenny Tower quest, the leader of the ghouls turns out to be an asshole, but the player doesn't know that until after the quest is complete. Before that, he agrees to try and compromise with the tower residents.

The only two other times I can think of that qualify (in a very long game with lots of decisions) are the main quests of The Pitt and Point Lookout. Desmond is a demanding jerk in Point Lookout, but he keeps his word. In the Pitt, there's a whole lot of Gray and Gray morality, but I think it's done well enough not to qualify. Both characters have plasible, realistic reasons for doing what they do, and it makes sense for the player to have to choose.

Pick a 2000 AD title.

Any 2000 AD title.

''One of Yahtzee's common criticisms of video-games with Black And Gray Morality is that often the writers fail to give either side of the game's conflict any sympathetic qualities, leaving the player fighting for/as an unlikeable group/character, against a group/character that are even worse. As mentioned in his review of Bad Company 2: Yahtzee: Is there not some third side to this conflict I can join? Preferably one that isn't full of dicks?''

that's not really true. it's more when gameplay and story fail to intersect resulting in Moral Dissonance. like In Bad Company where your own side are firing on you just to make the game harder or like in RPG where no minds you nicking stuff. He likes games where the hero is a bastard and the game knows it.