History Main / CollateralAngst

* Manga/SailorMoon's friends exist only so that they can get into dire straits and we can see how heroic Usagi is as she copes with such tragedy. ''Especially'' in the manga version of ''Stars''.

Someone's in trouble. The type of trouble can vary enormously -- they could have been brutally attacked, raped, recently bereaved or blaming themselves for a catastrophe they couldn't stop. So now they're laid up in hospital with half their body in plaster, or mid-HeroicBSOD. Even the most cynical of viewers can't blame the poor soul for going a bit {{Emo}}.

Some stories make things even more peculiar by having the casualty apologise for being hurt. They will use phrases such as "being a burden" or "letting you down" to express their guilt. If the injured party is more upbeat and has coped admirably with the tragedy, they may try to cheer up their distraught partner, apparently oblivious to the irony of their actions as they do so. It's doubly strange if the victim is dealing well with their situation, but they then have to rescue their other half from the HeroicBSOD they've suffered.

Someone's in trouble. The type of trouble can vary enormously - they could have been brutally attacked, raped, recently bereaved or blaming themselves for a catastrophe they couldn't stop. So now they're laid up in hospital with half their body in plaster, or mid-HeroicBSOD. Even the most cynical of viewers can't blame the poor soul for going a bit {{Emo}}.

* Both Kisa and Rin are viciously attacked by Akito in ''FruitsBasket''. Rin in particular is badly injured after being pushed out of an upper floor window. However, both girls seem to discount these events in their catalogue of tragedies. Kisa is more worried about the bullying she suffers at school, while Rin desperately searches for a cure to the Sohma curse in between hospital visits. Their love interests, Hiro and Hatsuharu respectively, on the other hand, angst constantly about their failure to protect their girlfriends. Hiro especially sees his inability to stand up to Akito and prevent the attack as an insult to his masculine pride and proof that he is unworthy of Kisa.
* Shuichi from ''{{Gravitation}}'' is brutally gang raped, actually submitting to the attack in an attempt to preserve his boyfriend's reputation... despite the fact that said boyfriend, Yuki, has just dumped him. Shuichi's best friend seems to be the only one who takes the attack seriously, and he storms off to Yuki's house, both to reprimand him for the way he's treated his friend and to inform him of the rape. Yuki responds by threatening Taki, the leader of a rival band and the one who ordered Shuichi raped. After this display of machismo on Yuki's part, Shuichi himself seems to get over the rape remarkably quickly. A few chapters later though, it's Yuki who has a not-so-HeroicBSOD, claiming that it's his fault that Shuichi had to suffer (which is at least somewhat correct) and resulting in Shuichi comforting Yuki for the trauma Shuichi's rape inflicted on the novelist (which just seems plain wrong). In fact, it seems the rape was only there as an introduction to Yuki's [[DarkAndTroubledPast dark past]].
** Yuki's angst at the attack on his boyfriend seems doubly bizarre since, in the manga at least, his first sexual encounter with Shuichi [[VictimFallsForRapist wasn't entirely consensual on Shuichi's part]].
** The attitude of Collateral Angst is reflected by the characters within the story as well: only when Yuki is affected by these events does record company owner (and Shuichi and Taki's boss) Tohma decide to take action against Taki. He didn't really care about Shuichi being raped, but making Yuki cry warrants serious punishment. Then again, Tohma's a bit [[{{Yandere}} scary and weird to begin with]].
* SailorMoon's friends exist only so that they can get into dire straits and we can see how heroic Usagi is as she copes with such tragedy. ''Especially'' in the manga version of ''Stars.''

[[AC:{{Comics}}]]
* The ''GreenLantern'' plot arc where Kyle Rayner's assistant Terry Berg gets gay bashed focused more on Kyle dealing with the angst of such a thing happening to his best friend, tracking down the assailants and scaring the bejeesus out of them, and eventually deciding that he was running out of faith in humanity and taking off for the stars. All while Terry, the one who actually got attacked, lay in traction.
* One of [[WebVideo/AtopTheFourthWall Linkara]]'s problems with DC's ''IdentityCrisis'': Sue Dibney is raped, but the story completely ignores the issue of how the attack affects her in favour of focusing on how it affects ''everyone else.'' He goes on to point out the the comic's multiple narrators are all men, so while rape as a plot device (Linkara argues) is used by bad writers as "a thing that happens to women", an actual woman's take on the attack isn't provided, let alone the victim's own experience. [[http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/linkara/at4w/34012-15-things-that-are-wrong-with-identity-crisis Here's the episode]] for more details.

* In ''GranTorino'', Sue is beaten and gang raped by her own gangster cousins to get back at her, her brother, and Walt for standing up to them and challenging them, though the movie focuses more on Walt's reaction, partly because the attack immediately followed his own browbeating of one of the gangsters. Not to mention that he was the main character of the film.

* ''LittleWomen'': It's painful for Beth to die young; it's more painful for Jo to live without her DeadLittleSister. [[CreatorBreakdown As Louisa knew firsthand]].

* Deconstructed in ''Side Effects.'' Izzy's mother shows more angst than Izzy, but it's strongly implied that this is because Izzy is in denial about her illness. Her mother is actually treated rather badly for her constant tears and histrionics.

* Deconstructed twice in ''{{Scrubs}}'':

* ''Series/{{House}} M.D.'' often treats House's addiction, disability and destructive personality more as a problem for Wilson than a problem for House. It gets to the point where even the idea of anyone feeling sorry for House because of any of these reasons seems ridiculous, even though FridgeLogic tells us it really shouldn't be.
** Later flipped. When Wilson runs into a serious problem of his own--[[spoiler: namely, ''terminal cancer'']]--it's all about House. Even other people act like Wilson is awful for not performing his LivingEmotionalCrutch duties for House.
-->''Wilson'': I'm ''[[spoiler: dying]]'', and it's all about you!

* Most people feel soooo bad for [[GreekMythology Hercules]] when he accidentally kills his wife and children. The actual wife and children who've just been brutally beaten to death, of course, are generally unnamed.

* Many AIDS stories focus more on the (generally straight, while the party with AIDS is gay) supportive healthy friend character and how sad they're going to be when their friend is dead, rather than the person with AIDS themselves. ''Parting Glances'' plays it dead-straight, even with a scene in which (cool, accepting) Nick comforts Michael when he cries.
** ''{{RENT}}'' is a little less supportive of this trope during "Goodbye Love," when Roger snaps a sarcastic "poor baby!" after Mark says that the reason he keeps himself emotionally withdrawn is because chances are very good that he'll outlive his friends with AIDS.

* One of [[WebVideo/AtopTheFourthWall Linkara]]'s problems with DC's ''Identity Crisis'': Sue Dibney is raped, but the story completely ignores the issue of how the attack affects her in favour of focusing on how it affects ''everyone else.'' He goes on to point out the the comic's multiple narrators are all men, so while rape as a plot device (Linkara argues) is used by bad writers as "a thing that happens to women", an actual woman's take on the attack isn't provided, let alone the victim's own experience. [[http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/linkara/at4w/34012-15-things-that-are-wrong-with-identity-crisis Here's the episode]] for more details.

* One of [[WebVideo/AtopTheFourthWall Linkara]]'s problems with DC's ''Infinite Crisis'': Sue Dibney is raped, but the story completely ignores the issue of how the attack affects her in favour of focusing on how it affects ''everyone else.'' He goes on to point out the the comic's multiple narrators are all men, so while rape as a plot device (Linkara argues) is used by bad writers as "a thing that happens to women", an actual woman's take on the attack isn't provided, let alone the victim's own experience. [[http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/linkara/at4w/34012-15-things-that-are-wrong-with-identity-crisis Here's the episode]] for more details.

* In ''GranTorino'', Sue is beaten and gang raped by her own gangster cousins to get back at her, her brother, and Walt for standing up to them and challenging them, though the movie focuses more on Walt's reaction, partly because the attack immediately followed his own browbeating of one of the gangsters.

* Most people feel soooo bad for Hercules when he accidentally kills his wife and children. The actual wife and children who've just been brutally beaten to death, of course, are generally unnamed.

** Yuki's angst at the attack on his boyfriend seems doubly bizarre since, in the manga at least, his first sexual encounter with Shuichi [[RapeIsLove wasn't entirely consensual on Shuichi's part]].

* One of [[WebOriginal/AtopTheFourthWall Linkara]]'s problems with DC's ''Infinite Crisis'': Sue Dibney is raped, but the story completely ignores the issue of how the attack affects her in favour of focusing on how it affects ''everyone else.'' He goes on to point out the the comic's multiple narrators are all men, so while rape as a plot device (Linkara argues) is used by bad writers as "a thing that happens to women", an actual woman's take on the attack isn't provided, let alone the victim's own experience. [[http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/linkara/at4w/34012-15-things-that-are-wrong-with-identity-crisis Here's the episode]] for more details.

** ''{{RENT}}'' is a little less supportive of this trope during "Goodbye Love," when Roger snaps a sarcastic "poor baby!" after Mark says that the reason he keeps himself emotionally withdrawn is because chances are very good that he'll outlive his friends with AIDS.

* ''MySistersKeeper'' seems set up for this trope. A young girl has leukaemia, tragic: we learn about her mother's constant state of panic and worry over looking after her; her father's shame over not being able to help and tendency to withdraw to his fire station and astronomy for peace; her brother's frustration at getting no attention from a family so wrapped up in her condition that he becomes a juvenile delinquent; and her younger sister, who was born for the sole purpose of being her organ donor, and who gets tired of being seen only as a means to keep her sister alive. The plot of the book focusing on the lawsuit that said younger sister launches to get medical emancipation to prevent her parents from forcing her to donate a kidney to her sister. Precious little attention is given to Kate, the actual girl with a terminal illness. It's worth mentioning that the book has a shifting first person perspective so that all of the above characters (as well as a lawyer involved with the case) have at least a few chapters which they narrate, which give us an insight into them, what they're like and how they develop over the course of the book... except for Kate, naturally, whose narration is minimal and whom we mostly learn about through other people's eyes.

But he writers aren't directing the audience's sympathies toward the victim but instead toward someone close to the victim. While the victim is recovering, their significant other is raving "I failed to protect him/her!" or "What happens to our relationship now?" Entire plot lines are devoted to how this person gets over the tragedy.

* ''{{House}} M.D.'' often treats House's addiction, disability and destructive personality more as a problem for Wilson than a problem for House. It gets to the point where even the idea of anyone feeling sorry for House because of any of these reasons seems ridiculous, even though FridgeLogic tells us it really shouldn't be.

* One of {{Linkara}}'s problems with DC's ''Infinite Crisis'': Sue Dibney is raped, but the story completely ignores the issue of how the attack affects her in favour of focusing on how it affects ''everyone else.'' He goes on to point out the the comic's multiple narrators are all men, so while rape as a plot device (Linkara argues) is used by bad writers as "a thing that happens to women", an actual woman's take on the attack isn't provided, let alone the victim's own experience. [[http://thatguywiththeglasses.com/videolinks/linkara/at4w/34012-15-things-that-are-wrong-with-identity-crisis Here's the episode]] for more details.

* Most people feel soooo bad for Hercules when he accidentally kills his wife and children. The actual wife and children who've just been brutally beaten to death, of course, are generally unamed.

* Many AIDS stories focus more on the (generally straight, while the party with AIDS is gay) supportive healthy friend character and how sad they're going to be when their friend is dead, rather than the person with AIDS themselves. ''Parting Glances'' plays it dead-straight, even with a scene in which (cool, accepting) Nick comforts Michael when he cries.

* In ''GranTorino'', there is a scene where we discover that Sue has been beaten up and raped by her own gangster cousins as part of a retaliation against Walt (Clint Eastwood's character). Yes, this makes absolutely no sense... it's only purpose is to give Walt a reason to rage and punch through glass and shit, thereby making her Collateral Angst for the plot.
** This makes perfect sense in a CompleteMonster kind of way because it wasn't about Walt but about Sue. She stood up to Spider's gang, even challenged them. There's no way that they would have let her get away with that, especially since she was a woman.

[[AC:Other]]

[[AC:Other]]
* Many AIDS stories focus more on the (generally straight, while the party with AIDS is gay) supportive healthy friend character and how sad they're going to be when their friend is dead, rather than the person with AIDS themselves. ''{{RENT}}'', while it has the textbook supportive friend Mark Cohen, consciously avoids this by spending equal time on pretty much every member of the ensemble cast, while ''Parting Glances'' plays it dead-straight, even with a scene in which (cool, accepting) Nick comforts Michael when he cries.
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Someone's in trouble. The type of trouble can vary enormously -- they could have been brutally attacked, raped, recently bereaved or blaming themselves for a catastrophe they couldn't stop. So now they're laid up in hospital with half their body in plaster, or mid-HeroicBSOD. Even the most cynical of viewers can't blame the poor soul for going a bit {{Emo}}.

But here's the weird thing: The writers aren't directing the audience's sympathies towards the actual victim. They're being directed towards someone close to the victim. Whatever tragedy befell them is seen as an even bigger tragedy for their best friend, teammate or love interest. While the victim is recovering, their significant other is ranting and raving "I failed to protect him/her!" or "What happens to our relationship now?!!" Entire plot lines are devoted to how this person gets over the tragedy. The fact that the victim would be perfectly justified in complaining that Mr. Shouty is not the one with three fractured ribs and a broken leg is glossed over.

The real point of the story isn't "the victim was attacked." It's "look how protective/self-loathing/angsty/loving the victim's friend is." The whole scenario was just a set up for the unharmed-but-angsty guy or girl to get some CharacterFocus. The person who was hurt is just CollateralAngst.

Working off the same logic as [[StuffedIntoTheFridge throwing females into various appliances]], the "victim" is almost always a woman (or the {{Uke}}) and the person doing all the angsting is usually her lover or older brother figure. This trope tends to play on the assumption that men aspire to the KnightInShiningArmor archetype and want to protect the women in their life from any and all danger. Any failure to do so is such a blow to their sense of identity that it eclipses the tragedy of the girl being attacked. Alternatively, it sets up a revenge scheme to prove just how devoted he is to his other half... or to showcase his violent side.

Some stories make things even worse by having the casualty apologise for being hurt. They will use phrases such as "being a burden" or "letting you down" to express their guilt. If the injured party is more upbeat and has coped admirably with the tragedy, they may try to cheer up their distraught partner, apparently oblivious to the irony of their actions as they do so. It's doubly irksome if the victim is dealing well with their situation but they then have to rescue their other half from the HeroicBSOD they've suffered. You'd think the last thing you'd want to do to someone who's recently suffered a great deal is make them handle your issues.

The only glimmer of hope for a "damage victim" is that they are important characters in their own right. Once they've recovered, it'll be business as usual. It could be worse... If the wronged party isn't just injured, but dies in a particularly pointless way just so the hero can angst about it, they were probably StuffedIntoTheFridge. Someone who is living, breathing CollateralAngst -- to the point the reader/viewer wonders if they're ever out of the hospital -- and has little plot importance or characterisation beyond that is a DisposableWoman. Of course, [[AlwaysFemale two X-chromosomes are required]] to qualify. [[GenderFlip Usually]].

* Shuichi from ''{{Gravitation}}'' is brutally gang raped, actually submitting to the attack in an attempt to preserve his boyfriend's reputation...despite the fact that said boyfriend, Yuki, has just dumped him. Shuichi's best friend seems to be the only one who takes the attack seriously, and he storms off to Yuki's house, both to reprimand him for the way he's treated his friend and to inform him of the rape. Yuki responds by threatening Taki, the leader of a rival band and the one who ordered Shuichi raped. After this display of machismo on Yuki's part, Shuichi himself seems to get over the rape remarkably quickly. A few chapters later though, it's Yuki who has a not-so-HeroicBSOD, claiming that it's his fault that Shuichi had to suffer (which is at least somewhat correct...) and resulting in Shuichi comforting Yuki for the trauma Shuichi's rape inflicted on the novelist (which just seems plain wrong). In fact, it seems the rape was only there as an introduction to Yuki's [[DarkAndTroubledPast dark past]].

* Shuichi from Gravitation is brutally gang raped, actually submitting to the attack in an attempt to preserve his boyfriend's reputation...despite the fact that said boyfriend, Yuki, has just dumped him. Shuichi's best friend seems to be the only one who takes the attack seriously, and he storms off to Yuki's house, both to reprimand him for the way he's treated his friend and to inform him of the rape. Yuki responds by threatening Taki, the leader of a rival band and the one who ordered Shuichi raped. After this display of machismo on Yuki's part, Shuichi himself seems to get over the rape remarkably quickly. A few chapters later though, it's Yuki who has a not-so-HeroicBSOD, claiming that it's his fault that Shuichi had to suffer (which is at least somewhat correct...) and resulting in Shuichi comforting Yuki for the trauma Shuichi's rape inflicted on the novelist (which just seems plain wrong). In fact, it seems the rape was only there as an introduction to Yuki's [[DarkAndTroubledPast dark past.]]
** Yuki's angst at the attack on his boyfriend seems doubly bizarre since, in the manga at least, his first sexual encounter with Shuichi [[RapeIsLove wasn't entirely consensual on Shuichi's part.]]
** The attitude of Collateral Angst is reflected by the characters within the story as well: only when Yuki is affected by these events does record company owner (and Shuichi and Taki's boss) Tohma decide to take action against Taki. He didn't really care about Shuichi being raped, but making Yuki cry warrants serious punishment. Then again, Tohma's a bit [[{{Yandere}} scary and weird to begin with.]]
* Deconstructed twice in {{Scrubs}}:
** When his best friend, Ben, is diagnosed with leukaemia, Dr. Cox doesn't cope well. Ben, in a rare subversion, actually calls him on this behaviour, pointing out that he's the one with the disease, and could use his friend's help rather than having to cope with Cox's issues.
** Later in the series, Dr. Cox is traumatised by Ben's death. He's annoyed at how well Jordan is coping with the death of her brother, to the point that she has her best friends staying with her. They're out enjoying themselves while Cox openly grieves. Not until the end of the episode does he realise that Jordan has been seriously affected by her brother's death, and her friends are offering comfort where he failed to do so. Arguably, Cox was as close to Ben as Jordan was, but the theme of self-pity at someone else's expense remains.

* Many AIDS stories focus more on the (generally straight, while the party with AIDS is gay) supportive healthy friend character and how sad they're going to be when their friend is dead, rather than the person with AIDS themselves. RENT, while it has the textbook supportive friend Mark Cohen, consciously avoids this by spending equal time on pretty much every member of the ensemble cast, while ''Parting Glances'' plays it dead-straight, even with a scene in which (cool, accepting) Nick comforts Michael when he cries.

* A big part of JodiPicoult's ''HandleWithCare'' is the fact that while Willow is physically injured for most of the book (she has brittle bone disease), it's her mother, Charlotte, that does all the angsting - and it's her mother's lawsuit that threatens the family, not Willow's disease. Even Charlotte is forced to realise that the court case she's set in motion is more about herself that Willow.
* The book ''MySistersKeeper'' seems set up for this trope. A young girl has leukaemia, tragic: we learn about her mother's constant state of panic and worry over looking after her; her father's shame over not being able to help and tendency to withdraw to his fire station and astronomy for peace; her brother's frustration at getting no attention from a family so wrapped up in her condition that he becomes a juvenile delinquent; and her younger sister, who was born for the sole purpose of being her organ donor, and who gets tired of being seen only as a means to keep her sister alive. The plot of the book focusing on the lawsuit that said younger sister launches to get medical emancipation to prevent her parents from forcing her to donate a kidney to her sister. Precious little attention is given to Kate, the actual girl with a terminal illness. It's worth mentioning that the book has a shifting first person perspective so that all of the above character s(as well as a lawyer involved with the case) have at least a few chapters which they narrate, which give us an insight into them, what they're like and how they develop over the course of the book... except for Kate, naturally, whose narration is minimal and whom we mostly learn about through other people's eyes.
* In ''Gran Torino'', there is a scene where we discover that Sue has been beaten up and raped by her own gangster cousins as part of a retaliation against Walt (Clint Eastwood's character). Yes, this makes absolutely no sense... it's only purpose is to give Walt a reason to rage and punch through glass and shit, thereby making her Collateral Angst for the plot.
** This makes perfect sense in a CompleteMonster kind of way because it wasn't about Walt but about Sue. She stood up to Spider's gang, even challenged them. There's no way that they would have let her get away with that, especially since she was a woman.
* The ''GreenLantern'' plot arc where Kyle Rayner's assistant Terry Berg gets gay bashed focused more on Kyle dealing with the angst of such a thing happening to his best friend, tracking down the assailants and scaring the bejeesus out of them, and eventually deciding that he was running out of faith in humanity and taking off for the stars. All while Terry, the one who actually got attacked, lay in traction.

Some stories make things even worse by having the casualty apologise for being hurt. They will use phrases such as "being a burden" or "letting you down" to express their guilt. If the injured party is more upbeat and has coped admirably with the tragedy, they may try to cheer up their distraught partner, apparently oblivious to the irony of their actions as they do so. It's a double WallBanger if the victim is dealing well with their situation but they then have to rescue their other half from the HeroicBSOD they've suffered. You'd think the last thing you'd want to do to someone who's recently suffered a great deal is make them handle your issues.

* The book ''MySistersKeeper'' seems set up for this trope. A young girl has leukemia, tragic: we learn about her mothers constant state of panic and worry over looking after her, her father's shame over not being able to help and tenancy to withdraw to his fire station and astronomy for peace, her brother's frustration at getting no attention from a family so wrapped up on her condition that he becomes a juvenile delinquent and vandal, and her sister who was born for the sole purpose of being her organ donor who gets tired of being seen only as a means to keep her sister alive with the plot of the book focusing on the lawsuit she launches against to prevent her organs from being taken involuntarily. Precious little attention is given to the actual girl with a terminal illness. It's worth mentioning that the book has a shifting first person perspective so that all above character (as well as a lawyer involved with the case) have at least a few chapters that they narrate which give us an insight into them, what they're like and how they develop over the course of the book... except for the girl naturally who's narration is minimal and who we mostly learn about through other people's eyes.

-->''"#17: "Collateral Damage Man" is not an appropriate name for a super hero."''
-->--[[http://theglen.livejournal.com/16735.html 1,350]] {{Things Mr Welch Is No Longer Allowed To Do In An RPG}}

Examples:

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<<|CharactersAsDevice|>>

* Deconstructed twice in Scrubs:

* In Gran Torino, there is a scene where we discover that Sue has been beaten up and raped by her own gangster cousins as part of a retaliation against Walt (Clint Eastwood's character). Yes, this makes absolutely no sense... it's only purpose is to give Walt a reason to rage and punch through glass and shit, thereby making her Collateral Angst for the plot.

Compare TrialByFriendlyFire, when a hero comes to the conclusion that CollateralAngst is a better option than holding their fire.

-->''#17: "Collateral Damage Man" is not an appropriate name for a super hero.''
-->-[[http://theglen.livejournal.com/16735.html 1,350]] {{Things Mr Welch Is No Longer Allowed To Do In An RPG}}