Fanfic / Total Drama: Some Stars

Total Drama: Some Stars is a Total Drama fanfiction by Bored_Commentator and Dollarino, set shortly after the events of Pahkitew Island, on said island. Characters with a tendency to overshadow the rest and characters subject to all forms of We Hardly Knew Ye, Out of Focus, etc (and Izzy), from the pre-Pahkitew seasons are pit against one another on two teams. On the Limelight Lions is Duncan, Heather, Courtney, Owen, Mike, Zoey, and Scott. The obscure otters have Anne Maria, Tyler, Brick, Eva, Dawn, Noah, and Izzy. Competing for the series' usual grand prize of a cool million, these 14 contestants must endure the machinations of Chris McLean, as well as those of his newest intern, Dave.

Five chapters were posted, out of a planned 13 plus a bonus chapter (which would include the alternate ending to whoever wasn't the selected/victorious finalist), and the series stopped being updated for awhile until Bored_Commentator returned and posted the three and a quarter chapters that were completed but never moved over to Archive of Our Own. All spoilers for the canonical series will be left unmarked.

---

This fanfiction contains examples of:

• Aborted Arc: Owen trying to get Izzy to notice him again is cut short by Courtney and a lot of sharks.
  • Heather's inter-team alliance is pretty quickly dropped at the end of the episode setting it up.
• Bald of Evil: Dave's hair still hasn't grown back. He covers it with a fedora at the very end of the first episode.
• Big Bad Ensemble: The majority of the Limelight Lions are very credible potential villains, and Courtney, Heather, Scott, and Mike have (even if by technicality in Mike's case, which still counts due to implications that Mal's personality fused with his own) all actually been the Big Bad of a canon season. You can also throw Dave into the mix, but he's not that good at it until Episode 4. It's been slowly subverted as time goes on, as Heather and Courtney formed an alliance where they both see themselves as the one to eventually betray the other to get ahead, Mike and Scott are the first Lions to go, and Dave's Hostile Show Takeover occurs in episode 4 out of 13. His defeat actually turns out pretty easy. Ultimately, according to "chapter" 6's notes, had the series been written to its conclusion, Noah's more traditional alliance and Eva's One-Man Army schtick would have carried them to the finale, with Heather acting as a threat of her own until the penultimate challenge.
• Big Bad Friend: Dave to Tyler, with poor results for the latter. After Heather and Courtney stop openly gutting at one another's throats, they start to view themselves as this to the other.
• Big Bad Wannabe: Dave took over the island... and then he did little at all with that newfound power aside from make a new intro for the show.
• Big "NO!": Dave, when Chris makes him an intern.
• Break the Cutie: Zoey... Doesn't take Mike's sudden increase in antagonism well.
• Brilliant, but Lazy: Noah puts this to his advantage when it comes to the hide and seek challenge. When everyone else is running and hiding from the opposite team's designated leaders as the countdown ticks down, Noah just sits down, cracks open a book, and waits for Owen to find him mere meters away. Then he distracts him from finding his fellow Obscure Otters.
• Character Development: Noah and Brick grow to tolerate one another and work together increasingly well throughout the season, even if they still find themselves disagreeing on a lot of mannerisms and strategies.
• Cloud Cuckoolander: Izzy, of course, but Dave is pretty firmly in this role as well.
• Cowardly Lion: Brick, of course, taking on the scary parts of challenges boldly and being clearly horrified at the prospect each time.
• Cloudcuckoolander's Minder: Eva and, to a lesser extent, Noah, to Izzy.
• Cutting Off the Branches: The introduction for the first episode establishes that Shawn was the winner of Pahkitew Island in this continuity, and Owen is referred to as "the original Total Drama winner." Zoey is said to have won All Stars, and it's implied Heather won World Tour.
• Dead Fic: Admitted as such in the "sixth chapter," released long after the first five, explaining where the story was planned to go, showing the original idea board/plan for the series, and linking to four chapters that were never posted to Archive of our Own (the last of which being incomplete).
• Deadpan Snarker: What would Noah be without this? Eva is also surprisingly capable of doling it out when she isn't enraged.
• Delayed Reaction: Tyler has a decent few of these, and never once seems to notice it.
• Disc-One Final Boss: Mike has taken several levels in jerkass, and it's more than implied that this is because Mal, the Superpowered Evil Side Big Bad of All Stars, had much more of an effect on the Split-Personality Merge in the finale of that season than Mike would care to admit. This, combined with the canonical nature of this merge, makes him into an absolute force to be reckoned with... And then he's eliminated first by his eammates, at Duncan's behest. Courtney would follow suit in Episode 7.
• Distressed Dude: Tyler has been taken hostage by Dave at the end of Episode 4, and will presumably spend Episode 5 as one.
• Dogged Nice Guy: Owen, towards Izzy. Dave was the less sympathetic variant towards Sky in his own season.
• Dragon with an Agenda: Heather and Courtney both clearly have zero trust in one another.
• Establishing Character Moment: Mike's first appearance has him impersonating Manitoba Smith to mess with Manitoba's wife, laughing and hanging up when she starts crying.
  • Zoey's is showing her go into a bit of a hipster-esque rambling, showing that the authors intended to give her characterization, possibly relating to her better-received personality prior to Characterization Marches On.
• Fandom-Specific Plot: A Total Drama fic about a fanmade season? You don't say!
• Flanderization: Clucky the Chicken only got mad/violent in Pahkitew Island because Rodney pushed her Berserk Button. In this, she's immediately Ax-Crazy, and stays that way until Dawn and Owen calm her down.
• Foreshadowing:
  • Plenty of instances, the most subtle of which so far being that Dave, as an intern, bonds with Tyler the most out of the contestants, and mistakes him for Topher. Guess who's Dave's replacement as an intern!
  • Anne Maria sure fusses over her hair a lot at the start of episode 2. It'd be a shame if something burned it all away.
  • Episode 7's script has Tyler mention having wicked chessboxing skills. While it wasn't written if this was an accurate statement or not, this was a buildup for the finale involving Chessboxing.
• Friendly Enemy: Owen gets like this with everyone on opposing teams anyway, but it's most apparent here with Noah.
  • Heather shows Anne Maria a surprising amount of genuine kindness at the end of chapter 2. She knows the pain of being struck bald and then eliminated on international TV.
• The Ghost: Heather and Alejandro's and Tyler and Lindsay's relationships are still going strong and mentioned a decent amount; it just so happens that Alejandro and Lindsay are both not competing. Getting revenge on Sky is Dave's biggest goal, and she isn't on the island either.
• Heel–Face Door-Slam: Late into Episode 1, Mike's new demeanor is shown to even be bothering him in the confessional, but he winds up getting the boot without even being able to apologize for his misbehavior.
• Heroic BSoD: Anne Maria when she loses her hair. Dawn enters one after learning the truth about Pahkitew Island. Meeting Clucky the Chicken helps her get over it just in time for her self-organized elimination.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: Well, Ambiguously Bi Life Partners in the former's case, but Owen and Noah still take time to interact whenever they can, even if being placed on separate teams has put a damper on their ability to be as buddy-buddy as they were in canon. Owen also qualifies with Duncan, on his own team.
• Hidden Depths: Topher enjoys fishing, as seen by his introduction.
• Hidden Heart of Gold: Zoey, upon adopting her "commando" persona once more, tries to force herself to be just as much of a standoffish loner as she was when she did it at the end of Revenge. Her kind heart shines through extremely easily, though, and she even begins to question if it's really worth keeping up the persona.
• Hipster: Zoey shows signs of returning to this characterization.
• History Repeats: The elimination of one character is very similar to the character's elimination in their actual debut season. After the (coincidentally horror-themed) fourth episode ends with no elimination, Dawn is eliminated during the fifth episode. They take it much better this time than the last due to the actual circumstances beyond that.
• Hostile Show Takeover: Dave manages this at one point.
• Ignored Epiphany/Comically Missing the Point: After Zoey's attempt at Talking the Monster to Death, Dave seems about ready to perform a Heel–Face Turn... right after he burns the money in front of Sky.
• Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain: Nothing seems to go right for Heather. Dave Double Subverts this, being able to perform a Hostile Show Takeover, but barely doing anything aside from mess around in the control room until people catch up to him.
• Intelligible Unintelligible: The cast doesn't seem to have trouble understanding Tyler whenever he's rendered incoherent to the readers.
• Irony: At the beginning of episode 2, Anne Maria questions whether she brought enough hair product for the entire season. Later that same chapter she loses both the competition and her hair.
• It's Personal: Downplayed with Anne Maria, who is all too passionate about the circumstances of the first elimination, claiming Mike "killed Vito" and ought to be punished for it, though she didn't play any direct role in said elimination.
• Jerkass: Courtney definitely qualifies for this after leaving Owen for dead against a bunch of robotic sharks.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: With wildly varying levels of "jerk" and "heart of gold," Noah, Eva, Duncan, Anne Maria, Mike, and Heather all qualify.

• Killer Rabbit: Clucky the Chicken is even more violent and angry than she was in the actual show.

• The Leader: Brick is the acknowledged leader of the Otters. Although the Lions don't have an acknowledged leader (Owen is named official leader in chapter 2, but doesn't do much particularly authoritative and is gone by the end of episode 5), Duncan is the de facto leader. Despite his insistence to the contrary, he's the most openly heroic of the bunch, and takes the initiative to get two of the team's most effective villains out.
• Limelight Series: The entire point of the Obscure Otters is that nearly all of them are Out of Focus (and even Izzy, the member among them with the most overall screentime, only even made it past to the merge of one season thanks to being returned to the competition at the merge). Downplayed, though, since they're just as capable of being eliminated early as the Limelight Lions.
• The Load/Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Owen is of little use to the Limelight Lions for a decent amount of the challenges, until he makes up for it late into episode 3. It's not fast enough to win the challenge, but it does impress his teammates enough for him not to be a serious candidate for elimination. Then he plays a pivotal role in holding off Eva and winning the Lions episode 4's challenge. Courtney doesn't ever let him forget his failures, and ultimately winds up throwing him to robotic sharks to advance in episode 5.
• Manipulative Bastard: Scott's lovable idiot tendencies he abruptly gained in All Stars? All portrayed as a front. He's actually no less conniving than back in Revenge of the Island. Duncan, Zoey, and possibly Owen are the only ones to catch on, but it's more than enough.
• Mauve Shirt: Dave is the one intern shown, but he tries to break into the game and win the million himself. His plan involves a Hostile Show Takeover. After he's kicked off the show as punishment, Topher shows up again and fills the hole.
• Morality Pet/Living Emotional Crutch: Dawn, for Eva, helping her rein in her Hair-Trigger Temper. She's naturally distraught at Dawn's elimination, citing Dawn's status as such, but Dawn reassures her that she'll be able to manage.
• Multiple Endings: The story's non-canonical ending (in which whoever places second in the finale wins instead) will be written as chapter 14 of the 13-chapter/episode fic.

• Non-Gameplay Elimination: The incident with Owen and the sharks leaves him unable to continue competing.
• "Not So Different" Remark: Courtney and Heather vehemently denying this (in very similar manners to each other) is a Running Gag in the first several chapters. Even after they decide to patch things up, they're both faking it and assuming the other has fallen into their trap.
• Official Couple: Courtney and Scott either never had their canonical breakup or made up shortly afterwards.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Noah screams in horror after what happens to Owen in episode 5.
• One Dialogue, Two Conversations: Tyler and Dave become friends and allies in the first chapter after discussing their respective love interests. Tyler and Lindsay are literally the most stable couple in all of Total Drama, whereas Dave and Sky... weren't. Tyler being The Ditz, he doesn't seem to get that Dave's intent of winning the money for a girl's sake is... very different from his own, and they agree to help each other when they can. He seems to have realized it now that Dave's turned him into a Distressed Dude and taken the million-and him-hostage.

• Out of Focus: Anne Maria is the only member of the Obscure Otters to get no extra Character Development beyond her newfound distaste for Mike. She's also the second contestant to go.
• Pet the Dog: Heather expresses utmost sympathy when Anne Maria is left bald, even offering to let her borrow things from her vast wig collection sometime.
• Posthumous Character: An odd variant, as Mike's alternate personalities, namely Vito, Manitoba, Mal, and to a lesser extent Svetlana, are all referred to by himself or other characters.
• Related in the Adaptation: Noah and Dave are revealed to be cousins.
• The Rival: Zoey and Eva develop a feud reasonably early on.
• Ron the Death Eater: Mike is a fairly straightforward In-Universe example, his suddenly becoming an asshole being a major source of interpersonal conflict during his run on the show. Ironically, Word of God is that both authors agree that their Mike is better than his actual self, and that they partially regret his early elimination for this exact reason. At least he still has redeeming traits, though.
• Running Gag: Several, such as Scott eating dirt, Duncan ineffectually hiding his heart of gold (carrying over from All Stars), Owen's ineffectual attempts to win Izzy back, Izzy ditching the rest of her team to antagonize someone, Heather and Courtney denying how similar they are while fighting, Mike slipping into the verbal tendencies of his alternate personalities, Dawn's sudden failure to talk to animals and general unsettled feelings with the island, Zoey's ineffectual attempts at seeming like a loner, Courtney being embarrassed yet flattered at Scott's various "romantic gestures." and Dave's mistaking everyone for members of his own season. Tyler being rendered unable to speak but still trying to, incoherently.
• Screw This, I'm Out of Here!: Anne Maria in Episode 2. Dawn tries to follow suit in Episode 4, but the person in charge of giving the boot was a bit too preoccupied at elimination time.
• Script Fic
• Ship Tease: The story is tagged with "implied Duncan/Zoey" and "implied Eva/Izzy," after all. The former has definitely started being teased, whereas with the latter, Eva and Izzy, while hanging out whenever it isn't obstructive, haven't really been teased as much.
• Shout-Out:
  • Noah refers to Brick as Pvt. Pyle, a moniker he takes a good bit of offense to.
  • Dawn floats down a long drop harmlessly by holding Clucky the Chicken over her head at one point, even referencing Sam, the show's resident gamer, as the one who gave her the idea.
• Sleep Cute: Dawn, throughout the early parts of episode 2.
• Small Role, Big Impact: Mike is the first voted off, but is pivotal to the Character Development of Zoey and Duncan.
• Spotlight-Stealing Squad: The Limelight Lions having this status in canon is lampshaded heavily. Chris shows heavy favor for them and considers the members of his team some of his prime moneymakers. The first time they lose a challenge he pretty much flips out.
• Starter Villain: Mike. The character is even referred to as "first boss" in the post-chapter notes for episode 1.
• The Stoner: Implied when, in response to Duncan producing a lighter when told his team would need to start a fire, Dawn does the same.
• Stylistic Suck: Total Dave Domination, whose intro literally consists of Dave flipping through photos and singing a shortened version of the theme song.
• Super-Strength: Eva, of course. In episode 5, she uproots an entire tree in a matter of moments with her bare hands.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Lampshaded when Dave's Running Gag of mistaking contestants combines with his running into Noah. He mistakes him for himself.
• That Came Out Wrong: Owen, naturally, has at least one of these moments with Noah.
  Owen: I'll show you how the other team plays!
• The One Guy: Duncan is the last male remaining on the Limelight Lions.
• Too Clever by Half: Scott is eliminated right when he tries to put his clever plan into action.
• Too Powerful to Live: Mike, since he still seems to have abilities gained from the Split-Personality Merge. Eva is a subversion, as her behavior has led her to be regarded as a valued teammate by the Obscure Otters. The longer into the competition she lasts, in fact, the more aware she is of this trope, and manages to be the primary threat among strategists just by being that good, which would have carried her to the finale.
• Traumatic Haircut: Anne Maria's hair being burned off causes such a Heroic BSoD that she willingly leaves the island.
• Unexplained Recovery: Ezekiel is, to the cast's surprise, more or less back to his pre-monstrous self for reasons completely unexplained. No one questions it afterwards and he's all too happy to get back home.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Tyler helps Dave in his Hostile Show Takeover without even realizing until he's being held hostage.
• Visual Pun: Eliminated contestants "get the boot," which is to say a literal giant boot flies in and kicks them away from the island.
• Wham Episode: Episode 4 ends on the note of Chris getting the boot, cementing Dave's hostile show takeover. He even changes the title!
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Where did Clucky the Chicken go by the time of the fifth elimination ceremony?

---