Parodies often delight in pointing out works' contradictions and silly nature. But sometimes, parodies mistakenly spoof a work that's ''intentionally'' contradictory or silly. The spoof writer misses the point of the original, mocking it for entirely intended qualities.
Similarly, parodies often play with original works by throwing in silliness of their own. But the writer may underestimate the original's capacity for incongruous situations, characterization or dialogue, falsely thinking such elements will necessarily parody the source. The result is a silly work but one that duplicates the original rather than mocking it.
For parodies that understand the original's irony and seek to mock the irony itself, see SpoofingSpoofiness.
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!!Examples
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[[folder:Fan Works]]
* TeamFourStar's DragonBallAbridged played the ''Ginyu Force'' as a parody of sentai anime series. The Ginyu on the original DragonBall already WAS a parody of said animes, so they didn't actually add anything new with that.
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[[folder:Film]]
* The second ''JohnnyEnglish'' film received some criticism for this. The films present themselves as parodies of Bond films -- all of which(with the exception of the Timothy Dalton and Daniel Craig films) are so over-the-top and tongue-in-cheek that the entire genre of "James Bond parody" is completely superfluous.
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[[folder:Live Action TV]]
* One of the very last BobHope specials on NBC tried to lampoon [[Film/{{Batman}} the 1989]] ''[[Film/{{Batman}} Batman]]'' [[Film/{{Batman}} movie]], and had Hope done up as Jack Nicholson's Joker. The dialogue had a light, derisive tone that evidently conflicted with the writers' view of serious superheroes and supervillains. Actually, the Joker takes this exact tone (he is named "the Joker" after all) and even volleyed [[RedundantParody the same sort of insults]] in the real movie as those the special featured.
* Cirque de Soleil parodies often ignore the fact that the shows are often extremely funny and not simply two hours of posing and pretentiousness.
* A particular problem with British comedy shows in TheEighties was impressionists "doing" people like "Dame Edna Everage", "[[SomeMothersDoAveEm Frank Spencer]]" and "[[ThePinkPanther Inspector Clouseau]]", completely ignoring the fact that these were already comedy caricatures created by Barry Humphries, Michael Crawford and PeterSellers respectively, leaving absolutely nothing left to parody.
** ''TheOffice'' both parodies and invokes this trope; David Brent, the manager, fancies himself a genius comedian, but the very fact that his 'act' is basically limited to riffing on these kind of characters is a pretty clue that ultimately he's got nothing.
* Andrea Martin of {{SCTV}} once remarked that the only show they couldn't satirize was ''LaverneAndShirley'', because they couldn't come up with any situation that was more ridiculous than what the show already did.
* Parodies of the Energizer Bunny, which tend to forget that one of the Bunny's original gimmicks was interrupting absurd parody commercials. That they all make the same joke (stretching the "it keeps going and going" line until it becomes annoying) doesn't help.
* ''MADTv'' did a parody music of {{Jewel}}'s ''Intuition'' video and ''0304'' pop album, labeling her a pop sellout... except that video and album were satire of the then current teen pop trend. The [[http://youtu.be/8Ilh1ewceco Intuition original video]] featured such mockery as texts reading "Jewel's voice sounds much better now that she's dancing" and a pyrotechnics performance that ended with the fire department's arrival.
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[[folder:Music]]
* There's a "response" to ''[[TheLonelyIsland The Lonely Island's]]'' "Jizz In My Pants" called [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJsQcnB6GC0 "Puke In My Mouth"]]. Those behind it fail to see the original was a parody, [[SelfDeprecation self-deprecating]] and ''actually funny''. The result is you get a bunch of attractive women who spend the entire song mocking ''other'' people.
* RayStevens' song "Teenage Mutant Kung Fu Chickens" spoofed ''TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles'', which was itself a parody of FrankMiller's ''Ronin'' among others. There was also a whole genre of ''Ninja Turtles'' [[FollowTheLeader parody knockoffs]] of which Stevens appears unaware when he made his own parody knockoff.
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[[folder:Video Games]]
* Pretty much all the stuff that's played for laughs (like stupid guards and rescuing hostages on the toilet) in ''Mesal Gear Solid'', the MetalGear parody in ''VideoGame/ApeEscape 3'', is stuff that was played for laughs (or at least played non-seriously) in the actual series. The ending line of the PAL version ("I go wherever the wind takes me. So long as war never ends, I will always have a place in this world.") would not sound remotely out of place in the actual games - the canon is already so deliberately over-the-top that it's pretty much impossible to parody.
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[[folder:Western Animation]]
* The old cartoon ''Batfink'' is basically a spoof of... the silly [[Series/{{Batman}} Adam West Batman]] show. Which was a spoof of superheroes to begin with.
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If I'm understanding the distinctions correctly, I think the Bob Hope/Batman example should be Parody Plagerism.
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Worded as-is, you're right. But I think there's an added layer, in that the skit writers overestimated Batman's seriousness. I edited this example and differently-worded entry under Parody Plagiarism.
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RayStevens' song "Teenage Mutant Kung Fu Chickens" spoofed ''TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles'', which was itself a parody of FrankMiller's ''Ronin'' among others. There was also a whole genre of ''Ninja Turtles'' [[FollowTheLeader parody knockoffs]] of which Stevens was probably unaware when he made his own parody knockoff.
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* One critic complained about this regarding the second ''JohnnyEnglish'' film: the films present themselves as parodies of JamesBond (in his cinematic iteration), but all of the James Bond films (with the exception of the Timothy Dalton and Daniel Craig films) are so over-the-top and tongue-in-cheek that the entire genre of "James Bond parody" is completely superfluous.
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* Both ''ScaryMovie'' and ''ShriekIfYouKnowWhatIDidLastFridayTheThirteenth'' use ''{{Scream}}'' as the main target of their parodies. However, ''Scream'' is actually a self-aware parody of slasher movies.
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How is DB Abridged's Ginyu Force an example? They didn't spoof it seriously. They spoofed it UpToEleven.
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''ScaryMovie'', if I remember right, did target ''Scream'', but it mocked ''Scream'''s self-aware nature. Thatputs in in the category of [[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/discussion.php?id=nmrdmtcymfb54bpb20axojv2 Spoofing Spoofiness]].
With Ginyu Force, did it treat Ginyu Force as a spoof or as a serious work?
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But Scream itself is parodying self-aware movies, many of which themselves border on self-parody, which Scary Movie just doesn't seem to get.
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''Scream'' wasn't parodying movies' self-aware nature. If the movies it parodied were self-aware, then ''Scream'' could be an example of SpoofingTheIronicFilmSeriously.
''ScaryMovie'' though DID parody ''Scream'''s self-aware nature. Exchanges like this:
Buffy: "Oh is this where I'm supposed to bleed?
Oh, look, I'm bleeding. I'm running, I'm running. Help! Now
here is where I fall and break my leg,
leaving me helpless."
She sighs, like she's indulging him. She trips and twists
her leg grotesquely. We hear a
loud snap.
BUFFY (CONT'D)
There ya go, mister scary killer. I'm
panicking now. God, somebody please
help me!
Killer gets down and viciously attacks. We hear flesh
tearing and ripping as blood sprays
everywhere.
BUFFY (CONT'D)
So, I suppose this is where my guts
get ripped open? Whatever…
Killer raises a meat clever the final blow. He lifts her
severed head.
She rolls her eyes.
BUFFY (CONT'D)
Oh, look at me. I'm all dead.
BUFFY (CONT'D)
I'm a gross scary severed head. Come on,
Pul-leeze!
This extract doesn't treat the source material as a normal horror movie. It treats it as a parody. ''ScaryMovie'' then ''parodies'' the parody, exaggerating the self-awareness to ridiculous lengths beyond what ''Scream'' includes.
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That's not really parody, though, because it's the same joke as the original. It's a lampoon. The supposed humor arises from the absurdity. As for Scream itself, I'd say it spoofed the ironic film ironically.
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Scream doesn't "spoof" scary movies. It lampshades certain tropes while playing others completely straight. Scary Movie spoofing it doesn't mean they didn't get the point.
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It's exaggeration. For the sake of mockery. That's parody.
It took the concept from the original then pushed it to the point of being ridiculous. To parody horror tropes, ''ScaryMovie'', among other things, exaggerated the {{fanservice}} connected with the slasher victims. To parody parody tropes, it, among other things, exaggerated the characters' self-awareness.
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But the characters already had exaggerated self-awareness, meaning that Scary Movie basically missed the point.
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What do you mean by "exaggerated" self-awareness? The characters in ''Scream'' had self-awareness. More so than people in normal fictional works or in real life. ScaryMovie exaggerated that self-awareness to ridiculous lengths - a character continues to lampshade cliches even as she's being killed. Merely mocking the tropes would have mocked ''Scream'' as a work of horror. Mocking the ''lampshading'' mocked ''Scream'' as a work of parody.
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If it's moreso than in normal fictional works or in real life, that's exaggerated. One or the other, well, RealityIsUnrealistic, but not both.
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No, moreso than in normal fictional works or real-life is "self-aware." Most people in normal fictional works or real-life are not at all self-aware that their stories obey genre conventions.
So you can be self-unaware. You can be self-aware, parodying tropes. Or you can exaggerate and parody self-awareness itself.
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Austin Powers works as a parody of, among other things, the original Casino Royale. Part of the reason it works is that, when Casino Royale was originally made, it was really outrageous, and used then-current mores as a platform for parodying James Bond. Looking back, Casino Royale now looks dated in some ways... Austin Powers parodies how "hip" Austin was in the 1960s. Scary Movie is basically just saying, "This is the face you're making. Duuuh!" Scary Movie may parody some of the tropes in Scream, but itself fails as a parody because it doesn't seem to grasp when Scream is already being ironic. It's a strawman parody.
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This trope isn't about whether works parody effectively. Many poor parodies will miss this list. We're working on an entire ParodyFailure ''index'' now.
This trope is for parodies that fail to understand their source material's ironic nature. The writers of ''ScaryMovie'' clearly watched ''Scream'', picked up on its attempts at genre-savviness, and chose to mock it.
Maybe they didn't do the best job. But they didn't make this particular mistake. For instance, if I were to say "hey, look at me, I'm the ''ScaryMovie'' people! I think I know how to make parodies! Look at how dumb my face is!" - then, I wouldn't be writing very good satire, but I would be aware that I'm mocking a parody.
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I wasn't commenting on its effectiveness, although its (lack of) effectiveness does hinge partially on its failure to aim at the correct target. It's not as if the makers of Scream didn't consider the irony ridiculous... Still, this has become a tangent. Scary Movie, though likely an example in my eyes, is clearly not a GOOD example.
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Ok, brain, thanks for finding the right phrase right after I hit send... Scary Movie is seemingly unaware that the level of irony being exaggerated in Scream was already present in the movies being parodied. Scary Movie is sort of going "Look at how dumb your face is!" and Scream is all like, "Dude, I was making that dumb face to be funny."
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The way I see it, Scary Movie was going "Look how dumb your face is when you're trying to be funny!" And Scream would shoot back "Uh, but I'm trying to be ''funny''," and Scary Movie would respond with "Yeah, but you look so DUMB."
Not brilliant thoughts from either party, but I think Scary Movie understands Scream is trying to be funny (/ironic) so it doesn't belong on this trope.
(Complicating matters, other parts of ''ScaryMovie'' simply mock ''Scream'''s horror aspects, all irony aside. And, in fact, these parts of Scream simply intend to be horror, all irony aside.)
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* In a ''SaturdayNightLive'' [[http://www.spike.com/video-clips/48bii9/funeral-for-a-friend-supermans-funeral sketch]] parodying TheDeathOfSuperman:
** Lois Lane wonders why Clark Kent hasn't shown up at Superman's funeral. In the comics Lois knew that CK was Superman by then.
**The Flash says that Superman could run as fast as he could but never mentioned it. Guess we dreamed all those "Superman vs the Flash" races over the years.
** LexLuthor shows up bald, whereas in the comics of the time he's his own clone son with long flowing red locks.
** TheHulk also appears in HulkSpeak mode, when in the comics he was in "Professor" mode at the time.
EDIT: OK, rereading that I realized it may be NotAnExample of this. But it's an example of '''something''' dammit! One of these Parody Failure spinoffs, or perhaps just ParodyFailure itself.
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The SNL skit sounds like they MissedTheDeconstruction or something.
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maybe we should have a trope Taking the Parody Seriously
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The SNL/Death of Superman sketch seems like just plain DidNotDoTheResearch.
I think this is becoming a potential YMMV, but I don't know if we should take that step because then it could become ComplainingAboutShowsYouDontLike Parodying Shows You Do.
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I think I have a page quote:
-->''They shouldn't satirise [[Series/TheAvengers the show]], though. It was ''already'' tongue-in-cheek. This is a sendup of a sendup, so it's cancelling itself out.''
-->-'''Nick Setchfield''', ''SFX'' magazine, on ''Film/TheAvengers1998''
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Didn';t the SNL sketch use Hulk's HulkSpeak as a joke, having him suddenly turn smart when making a speech? If so, they did know better, but they were just going by audience expectations.
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Hulk speaks in HulkSpeak before and after a prepared speech which was delivered intelligently. In then-current comics he didn't speak in HulkSpeak at all. And it would have been very OutOfCharacter for him to joke around like that at a funeral.
-->I.. I wish I.. Hulk not good with words. Hulk write it down. ''[takes out sheet of paper, then puts on reading glasses]'' "Superman was that rarest of things. Every superhero owes him a debt of gratitude and homage. His life was a super-human expression of the noblest asperations of man. And, in death, he has become the ideal. Of my friend Superman, I can only say this: he was.. my.. hero!" ''[removes glasses, near tears]'' I.. Hulk.. just.. Hulk.. Hulk just not the same! ''[smashes podium to bits]'' Enough said.
I will give them credit for having a black GreenLantern. And black Robin I can live with - there are only so many actors on SNL at a time, if the one they have left over to play the thankless role of Robin happens to be ChrisRock, so be it.
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It's Saturday Night Live. It does spoofs. Characters are supposed to act out of character in it, unless the humor specifically comes from a character being the straight man or such.
If the Hulk can talk intelligently when making a speech, and this is used for a joke, it's likely that the writers knew that the Hulk is intelligent and were playing on the fact that the audience would have only known a version that is years out of date.
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I think the issue is that not all parodies are for the crowd that's actually familiar with the work in question. Despite the Hulk in the comics being erudite, most people only remember the Hulk from the TV show, and ''that's'' the Hulk that they parody. That might be in itself a trope (ParodyGap?)
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^ Batman, between the Adam West show and Tim Burton movie. That is all. (Which would also qualify for this trope, if we didn't broaden ParodyGap for any case where the PopculturalOsmosis is out of date.)
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''NeverSayNeverAgain'' definitely was a parody, if an indecisive one, but are you so sure about the other SeanConnery / RogerMoore movies? Or do you just perceive them this way, since the world has changed so much since then?
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Hulk Bald Lex = FirstVersionWins ?
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'''Aping That Clown'''?
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Most of these examples seem too... opinionated. Yeah, I understand that the trope is talking about making a parody of a parody, but some examples like the DBZ Abridged example and the "Puke in my mouth" example are written like they suck.
In otherwords, I'm getting the "I don't think these examples are funny" vibe.
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Actually, the very idea of this trope seems mean spirited. I'm sure some of the creators of these spoofs DO know that the original source material is a spoof. I think this should be rewritten to basically say, "this is a parody of a parody."
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I don't like this trope. Not because it's bad, no, it's brilliant.
But you cannot look at something and tell whether they know what they were doing, or in this tropes case, you can't tell if they were ignorant of the case.
I say this for the 3rd time... This should be rewritten as "A parody of a parody."
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I've YKTTWd [[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/discussion.php?id=nmrdmtcymfb54bpb20axojv2 ParodyParody]] too. We're splitting both off from the same, vague ParodyFailure trope.
Parodying parody's fine if you're parodying the way it parodies. But if you parody it as though it were serious, you are not parodying well. That goes for whether or not you knew the original was a parody (if you did, you may be even more at fault).
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That comes as subjective.
The reason why I feel this way is because I checked out the "puke in my mouth" example, and the way that I see it is that they did there own version of the song. Afterall, how can you not know The Lonely Island version's was suppose to be funny? The major difference is that the Lonely Island was doing spoofing themselves. Their version spoofed others, which is also typical of most comedians.
So yes, I'm honestly defending them. Whether they are funny or not is not the question, I understand how unpopular the video is, its the fact that it is still their own version of the parody and you CAN make a version that spoofs the original content of a parody.
And I go back to the ScaryMovie and the DBZ Abridged example. They exaggerated everything to make it funny or dare I say it, ''funnier.'' I found Scary Movie a more memorible movie than Scream.
I am defending what you believe is a bad idea.
...yeah, this trope would get barraged by people with a difference in opinion. Nothing personal, but thats where I see this going.
And now that I see it, I think the ParodyFailure Trope itself is a very bad idea.
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Yes, ParodyFailure is bad. I want to remove it. Others would prefer to leave it as a supertrope.
This trope is not about whether the examples are good or funny. They might be. They may well not be. But all of them spoof something that was itself a spoof without properly taking the original's nature into account. Even if the example ''knows'' the original is a spoof, it does not take that into account for its response.
Going to the specific examples:
*Puke in my mouth. Maybe it was funny, maybe it wasn't. But it fails as a satiric response to JizzInMyPants. The spoof only makes sense if the girls were responding to actual full-of-themselves clubbing douches. But since that's not the case, the song makes no sense - as a spoof. It would be like releasing a song about targeting StephenColbert by making fun of the Republican platform. (Except even that sort of song might ironically pretend not to understand StephenColbert is a parody. That isn't the case here. Unless the girls are pretending not to notice the men jizzing in the their pants, and that's the joke? No, the song doesn't indicate that.)
*ScaryMovie: Not an example. It's an example of [[http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/discussion.php?id=nmrdmtcymfb54bpb20axojv2 Spoofing Spoofiness]]. Yes, it made fun of a spoof, but it mocked the way that the original was a spoof, for the sake of humor.
* DBZ Abridged: I don't know, I just copied that from ParodyFailure. Were they parodying the way Ginyu was a parody? If so, not this trope. Did they parody it as though it were an actual anime character? If so, this trope, no matter how entertaining the result.
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Well, you provided a good explaination that I can't argue with, so I'll leave you alone. This trope may work.
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MADTv did a parody music of {{Jewel}}'s ''[[http://youtu.be/8Ilh1ewceco Intuition]]'' video and ''0304'' pop album, labeling her a pop sellout...except that video and album were satire of the then current teen pop trend.
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