Archived Discussion

This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.

Cryptic Mirror: Quick trope check, would Ash fit the trope of Unlucky Every Dude? Getting hit by the Gender Bender makes him/her really unlucky but male Ash was described as being an average high school guy before that and he does fit the rest of the trope description.

I wouldn't think so. You can't really project any other character interpretation on Ash except grease monkey and racer.

Kyeudo: Can someone put up one of the better pictures for the comic, like maybe the origional cover art? The current one isn't Chris's best work.

Holy crap, I thought that was fan art, yeah that is a pretty poor pic.

John 17 Martin: Does Failure Is the Only Option apply to Misfile? I have only read a little of it, so I hesitate to edit the main page to say so.

No. They never have gotten a chance to fix the Misfile, so they've never failed to fix it.

Cryptic Mirror: I've changed the entry: __>* Vapor Wear: Fallen angels apparently don't approve of brassieres.

because the only fallen angel (i.e. one that is expelled from Heaven) is Rumisiel and the thought of Rumi...No. Just... No

Haven: Just Archive Binged and, wow, this was a lot better than I thought it would be. The explorations of gender relations, identity, etc. are really good, not to mention its status as a really weird Coming of Age story. For some reason I thought Ash was going to be a complete Cosmic Plaything and it would just be too bummer-y to read, but I'm glad that aspect of it isn't played up so much that it overpowers the rest of the story's tone (but also that it's not completely ignored, of course).

Moved the following debates to the discussion page:

Vapor Wear - Angels apparently don't ~~approve of~~ need brassieres.
- A certain guy-turned-girl didn't originally like bras either, but came around to it eventually. S/he absolutely hates thongs though.
  - This troper has no idea why Ash even had to wear a thong. There's the "pantylines" excuse, but s/he was wearing a loose-fitting dress.
  - because it wouldn't show through the high slits would be my guess
  - Fanservice/author cruelty potential, most likely. This troper speaks from experience when she says that visible panty lines are far preferable to a perma-wedgie...
Weirdness Magnet - A lot of weird stuff just happens to all happen in a small town in Western Massachusets.
- Starting with an abandoned mine and a mountain road more appropriate to Colorado.
  - Um...they're called the Berkshires. Mountain roads aren't hard to find. (As for the mine...well, they abandoned it for a reason, didn't they?)
  - I've been all through the Berkshires and those ain't the Berkshires. too steep, for one thing.
- It's implied that Ash was still a rather tomboyish girl even in the retconned history, so the change might not be as huge as some think; there's also the implication that dear ol' Dad isn't as clueless as he seems, but goes along under the theory that the truth will eventually come out.
- The only difference noted between the "girl Ash" and the "post-misfile Ash" is that by all accounts "girl Ash" was completely straight and "post-misfile Ash" is completely lesbian.
  - Not if James and the family photo album are to be believed. Molly also seems to imply it's a character shift for Ash

Failure Is the Only Option does apply to Misfile. A lack of attempts to change back is not necessary. It applies because a successful change would end the story.

Mandy's Law is in full effect. It doesn't need numerous attempts to restore gender. It needs the gender change to have been from male to female.

So, what, ANY change from male to female is classified as Mandy's Law? That's not a particularly well-named trope, then. Perhaps we should call it "Male to female transformation," a title which has the benefit of being more concise. Unless you're perhaps suggesting that the amount of mtf transformations is disproportionate to the amount of ftm transformations and that, for some reason, that deserves a trope. (Token Transgender Transformation, anyone?) From the Mandy page quote: "Once a girl has been created, circumstances will conspire to keep her a girl." This isn't what I see happening here.
- It is happening in that Rumisiel isn't being allowed back into heaven where he can change things back. Also, Xaphriel has locked down the depots so even if Rumisiel was back he couldn't change things. Any problems with the name of the trope belongs in discussion on that trope's page, not here. But my reading of the trope agrees with your first statement.
  - My issue is not with the name of the trope, but rather with your reading thereof. Of course, my issue does not seem to matter, as your reading seems accurate to the page. The trope seems to be unrelated to the titular law, and is thus reminiscent of the Catapult Turtle gambit, but that, as you say, is an issue for another page.
Further, from Failure, "On shows with premises like these, there will be episodes in which the characters make an attempt to actually resolve the premise." Which isn't necessarily happening, and isn't necessarily not happening. Discuss.
- That's a fair point. I think the trope still applies, but it's worth noting that it's because resolving the misfile ends the story, so attempts to resolve it won't be reasonable for the story.
  - Possibly, but that's still more than a stone's throw away from Gilligan's Island, where getting off the island would end the show, but at least they tried. Then again, I'm not so sure the story would be over if the misfile were resolved, as I for one would continue reading if the world changed back, and the skipped time(and alternate memories) of the main characters' lives caused new storylines to develop.

Archived Discussion Webcomic / Misfile