Tropers / Sam Max

Sam Max, on cleaning duty and making sure that things are accurate in this wiki. He may not always do a good job, but he'll at least try!

If you feel that he is not doing a very good job, please state why in the discussion board. No Troper Bashing please. That's not what this wiki is built for.

All lists he's made below. They are not important, just something he felt like doing.

Pages he is watching

• Darth Wiki
  • So Bad, It's Horrible
• The Inheritance Cycle
• So Bad, It's Good

Shows, Movies, Games and Books he likes at the moment, or in some cases, did at one point

• Ape Escape
• Azumanga Daioh
• Chrono Trigger
• Code Geass
• Donkey Kong Country
  • Donkey Kong 64
  • Donkey Kong Country Returns
• Earth Bound
• Earthworm Jim
• FLCL
• Godzilla
• Guardians of the Galaxy
• Hyperdimension Neptunia (considers it a Guilty Pleasure)
• Jet Set Radio
  • Jet Set Radio Future
• Kingdom Hearts
• Klonoa (both the games and the webcomic)
• K-On!
• Lupin III
  • Lupin III (Green Jacket)
  • The Mystery of Mamo
  • The Castle of Cagliostro
  • Lupin III: The Woman Called Fujiko Mine
  • Gravestone of Daisuke Jigen
• MDK
  • MDK2
• Mega Man
  • Mega Man Megamix
  • The Archie comics based on the Classic Series
  • Mega Man X
  • Mega Man ZX
  • Mega Man Star Force
• Pokémon
  • Pokemon Adventures
• Puyo Puyo
• Rayman
• Rhythm Heaven
• Sam And Max Freelance Police
• Solatorobo
• Star Wars
• WarioWare
• Yotsuba
• Zombie Panic In Wonderland

Stuff he wants to play/see/read

• Saru Get You -On Air- (Sadly unlikely to come to the states, so I may have to watch a Fan Sub to see it)
• Mother 3 (Too bad it was never brought over to the states)
• Fallout: New Vegas (He would like the Ultimate Edition)
• Lupin III (Pink Jacket)
  • Lupin III The Italian Adventure
• The Man Who Saves the World (or "Turkish Star Wars")
• Works in the Star Wars Expanded Universe and the Star Wars Legends world.
  • Marvel Star Wars
  • Darth Maul: Son of Dathomir
• Tail Concerto

Stuff he's looking forward to

• Mega Girl R. (He doesn't care that it's a fan game!) Release Date: When it's done!
• The next Puyo Puyo game.

Writers, Artists and other creators that he likes the works of (Links lead to what they worked on unless they have their own articles)

• Discotek Media
• George Lucas
• Hayao Miyazaki
• Ian Flynn
• Kiyohiko Azuma
• Michel Ancel
• Nick Bruty
• Shigeru Miyamoto
• Steve Purcell

Pages he created

• Dreamwave's Mega Man
• Shiny Entertainment

Things he ought to get around to

• Hm...

Tropes associated with Sam Max

• The Artifact: His very username has become this; he barely even thinks about Sam & Max: Freelance Police anymore, but he came up with the username while he was big into it. For what it's worth, without revealing anything, he uses a different, more timeless username in other places. He won't reveal what it is.
• The Atoner: If he does something particularly bad, he must do what he can to make up for it, even if it kills him!
• Author's Saving Throw: If he feels there is an issue with his statements, he will at least try to fix it.
• Berserk Button: Sexist and racist people. He views them as assholes at best, especially when it's a time when they should know better.
  • Betrayal. If you betrayed him...why? He trusted you...
  • Being a new user on a forum and being accused of being a ban-dodgeer right out the gate. Especially if he tells the mods...and their response is to do nothing; not even a "we can't/won't do it" response. Without them, he has literally no way to prove he isn't ban-dodging, so it's really infuriating.
  • People who blame others for the consequences of their own actions don't get any sympathy from him.
  • People who use their autism as an excuse for horrible actions really make him mad, considering he's autistic himself, and feels it's no excuse to be a jerk.
• Cloud Cuckoolander: At times.
• Doing It for the Art: It goes without saying that any piece of fanwork is this by default; he can't legally make money off it, so he does it for his own pleasure.
• False Friend: He's had a few. Very rarely do we go back on good terms after The Reveal, and even then, there's no guarantee that they've actually learned their lesson.
• Heel–Face Door-Slam: He doesn't usually do this, at least not at first; they have either do something particularly awful and/or refuse to learn even after they've been given a chance at redemption. Either way, once he decides he can no longer give them any more chances, he slams the door on them, feeling he gave them enough opportunities to do a Heel–Face Turn, only for them to keep blowing it.
• Hypocrite: You'll see it on some discussions on this wiki.
• Informed Flaw: Unless you met this guy in person, at least some of these tropes would appear as such.
• Keep Circulating the Tapes: He's prone to this at times. Hope he won't have to rely on bootlegs...he'd rather avoid bootlegs if at all possible. Otherwise...damn you distributors/lawyers/whoever is to blame!
• Loony Fan: May not appear as such on the interweb most of the time, but in Real Life...depending on the work in question, that could be putting it lighly. He's been mellowing out over the years, but shades of it are still there.
• Money, Dear Boy: Gotta work to pay the bills, after all. Hell, lately, it's been his only remaining motivation for staying at his workplace; if not for that, he'd have left by now.
• Motor Mouth: Can be this when talking about a Video Game, a Film, a Comic Book, a piece of Literature, or even a Fan Fiction. At least, in Real Life.
• Old Shame: Most of his fanfiction. He is so ashamed, he prefers not to speak of them, and he is very grateful that he wasn't dumb enough to post them on the internet. They are happily lost in the midst of time!
  • He also typed in a Dethroning Moment of Suck for WarioWare Touched! It was poorly thought out headcanon speaking in a time when he hadn't gotten a sufficient understanding of actual canon, and he feels that's not good enough to warrant a DMOS. It was removed as a result.
  • Even some entries on this page have become this; let's just say he's become a bit more sympathetic or the Fan Dumb and Hate Dumb. Sure, what they do is still wrong, but he now has firsthand experience as part of those. As a result, those ignorant parts of the Pet-Peeve Trope entry are gone.
  • Continuing this, some older entries reeked of elitism, and that was wrong of him. Some may persist, and if so, he will remove them upon noticing them. He just needed to learn to let people have fun.
• Out of Order: He's Invoked this from time to time. It boils down to him playing the sequels before starting the original.
• Periphery Demographic: As time goes on, it's becoming rarer and rarer that he's even part of the target audience for a series. At most, he was part of the target audience when he first got into it. It's because a lot of the things actually made for his demographic don't appeal to him. That's not to say such works lack merit; it's just not for him, is all.
• The Red Stapler: If a character he likes doesn't have a plush...he may commission one special, though he's gotta keep his finances in mind.
• Self-Deprecation: He likes to do this a lot, to ensure he doesn't have an enormous ego.
• Soapbox Sadie: He doesn't like seeing this, but admits that he's fallen into that trap more than once. He hopes it never, ever happens again, but he can't say for sure.
• Sophisticated as Hell: He may not use it, but he finds it funny.
• Third-Person Person: This article only, though it slips up from time to time.
• Trauma Conga Line: Has been through waaaaaaay too much betrayal. And it wound up getting worse, and then better, and then worse again. It's a miracle he still has any sanity left!

Tropes Related to his Opinions on Works

• Adaptation Displacement: A very localized example here with Taz-Mania. In his youth, he played the first Game Boy game based on the show long before he knew the show even existed. He still has yet to watch an episode of the show, but he remembers having fun with the game. As far as he knew back then, it was based on Taz in general rather than a specific part of the character's history.
• At Least I Admit It: See Even Evil Has Standards below, but basically, while you shouldn't show blatant disregard for the fans, if you're gonna do it anyways, at least be honest about it right from the get go.
• Awesome Art: There are various works he feels have this...
  • Be it old or new, Puyo Puyo can almost always be counted on for this.
  • While the Conspicuous CG of Osamu Tezuka's Metropolis is rather dated, the traditional animation holds up very well, even beating many modern anime productions.
  • Studio Ghibli. Hands down.
  • Many comic books have this. Special mention goes to almost anything drawn by Ben Bates, but there's so many other artists as well.
  • He finds that Hyperdimension Neptunia franchise has very well done art, even if it seems to suffer from Only Six Faces syndrome at times.
  • Lupin III: The Woman Called Fujiko Mine has some of the best animation, not just in the franchise, but in anime in general.
• Became Their Own Antithesis: His most polite interpretation of Keiji Inafune, and that's assuming he was ever what the fans thought of him as rather than always being in it only for the money, seeing as how he was against Capcom's money grabbing ways, only to employ them himself when he left.
• Better Than Canon: Feels this way in regards to The Amazing Spider-Man video game, which he feels was a much better sequel to the first film than the actual film sequel.
• Big "YES!": When he learned Cranky Food Friends shut down.
• Brain Bleach: Some Fan Fic are so ridiculously disturbing, there isn't enough of it in the world to remove it! Movies like Howard the Duck have certain scenes that require it as well. Also, he wants to use it to forget Novas Aventuras De Megaman's mere existence.
  • And don't forget some of the more horrifying examples of...some things he's seen. Especially when some of them clearly put a horrifying situation...and make fetish art out of it, creating a Tear Jerker for the victim of the situation and making him create mental situations where whoever set it up really gets what's coming to them rather than getting away with it with no repercussions, as is unfortunately the norm.
• Broken Pedestal: Keiji Inafune managed this; he made promises for Mighty No. 9 he couldn't keep, either being broken completely, or being so badly fufilled as to kill goodwill otherwise. Red Ash having a Kickstarter before Mighty No. 9's release did not help him one bit; if anything, it gave him a reputation as a con man.
• Dork Age: Where this started for the Sonic the Hedgehog series is a source of debate. He's not sure where it started exactly, though he will say that in hindsight, despite what it seemed like at first, Sonic Colors and Sonic Generations were but lucky flukes rather than a true return to form, seeing as how they didn't take long to go back to old habits despite having no reason they wouldn't know that it's a bad idea. If anything, it got worse after Sonic Lost World. Sonic Frontiers, while flawed, was a huge step in the right direction, but it remains to be seen if this sticks.
  • Even the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles films weren't safe, and he says that as a fan of the third film. It started when Michael Bay got his mitts on them, and Out of the Shadows, while an improvement over the first one, still wasn't great. At the very least, he feels ''Mutant Mayhem, while not a perfect film, at least made him wanna see where future films go again.
  • The Marvel Cinematic Universe has entered one, starting with many entries starting to feel similar to each other. This started with Avengers: Age of Ultron, and while Captain America: Civil War proved that the franchise still had some life left in it, after Avengers: Endgame, it lost what direction he did have. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 was the last film he even had a shred of excitement for, with everything that comes after it being Fanon Discontinuity...and even some films that don't relate to it in some fashion.
• Even Better Sequel: The original Puyo Puyo was already a great game, but Puyo Puyo Tsu made it even better. On a very related note, Puyo Puyo Fever 2 is the best game in the entire series, in his opinion, though Puyo Pop Fever gets this for introducing Amitie to the world.
  • Wario Land 4 is this to the previous games. Its own successors haven't matched its greatness, though Wario World comes pretty close.
• Even Evil Has Standards: While Cranky Food Friends was an unacceptable reskin that should have never been made, it at least told fans to stay away right out the gate, unlike Mighty No. 9, which made several promises to fans that were either never delivered upon, or delivered upon very badly. Either way, while Cranky Food Friends was the worse idea, Mighty No. 9's execution and Troubled Production actually makes CFF look good next to it.
• Fanon Discontinuity: Would like to inform you that Sonic Labyrinth doesn't exist! Sonic never wore boots that slowed him down, and even if he did, it wasn't a Video Game! On a related note, there was no 3DS version of Sonic Lost World. Only the Wii U an PC versions exist.
  • Novas Aventuras De Megaman is just some poorly written Dark Fic with its plot in Crazyland most of the time. Even at their worst, Capcom would never approve of a Mega Man comic with nudity and violence, especially if it had mutilation of girls involved in some form.
  • What is this "Wario: Master of Disguise" you speak of? There wasn't a Wario game that forced you to use poorly implemented touch screen controls. Ever.
  • The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was in the works...but only survived in the form of a video game which, bizarrely enough, is advertised as being based on the first film. Spider-Man himself would have to wait four more years before he appeared in another movie, and another year to get another film to himself.
  • As for the Star Wars Expanded Universe, it's inverted because, while the new stuff is definitely Canon, many of the old stories are still at least partially canon.
  • Howard the Duck had its bathtub scene removed during production. Thank goodness for that!
  • What is this "Cranky Food Friends" you speak of? Nobody in their right mind would dare to make a Dolled-Up Installment of the Puyo Puyo series in this day and age, nope. Especially not one that looks generic as hell.
    • Hilariously, since the game's official servers are down, this part of the franchise's history is easier to ignore, at least where playing the games is concerned...though he'll never allow Sega to live it down.
  • Inverted with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Smash Up; it is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 5, after first four films. He just didn't realize it until it was too late to truly savor it.
    • And with that in mind, the Platinum Dunes films do not exist; TMNT was the last film, and the aforementioned Smash-Up was the last thing connected to the films that wasn't a re-release.
• Franchise Original Sin: Many a franchise has gotten worse over the years, or even in only two years...and at least some of them are thanks to issues that have been there from the start.
  • The Amazing Spider-Man had some issues with characters that could be unlikeable at times, and a dependency on romance. However, he didn't feel like it got in the way the first time. The Amazing Spider-Man 2, unfortunately, didn't actually fix these flaws. More like, made the characters more unlikeable and the romance arc took up too much screen time as well as being more badly written than before. Basically, the film didn't fix the problems of the first movie, but rather added to them.
  • The Pokemon anime always had issues with Ash being an idiot. Thing is, in the earlier seasons, it was somewhat forgiveable when you remembered that he was only getting started. Unfortunately, he's had years of experience and still makes newbie mistakes.
  • Despite what some nostalgics say, the Sonic the Hedgehog series never had the most consistent quality with its games. However, it used to be that at the very least, the poorer quality ones were spinoffs. Unfortunately, as time went on, the lower quality actually bled into the main installments.
  • Puyo Puyo had issues with the Dolled-Up Installment trope. But at least Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine and Kirby's Avalanche had the excuse of it being The '90s, where it made sense to alter it due to the need for it to sell, and in the former's case, the need to purge it of that dreadful cuteness in favor of other things; this was the era of Rob Liefeld. We also didn't have much, if any access to the internet. Cranky Food Friends, on the other hand, came out when the internet had become widespread, and when it was no longer viable to make a Dolled-Up Installment. It died a quick death, but Sega really should have thought about it for five seconds.
• Guilty Pleasures: He finds Hyperdimension Neptunia to actually be enjoyable in spite of its flaws.
• I Am Not Shazam: For the longest time, he thought Nip/Tuck was about a guy actually named Nip Tuck.
• It's the Same, Now It Sucks!: A downplayed example is Splatoon 2; it's fun, and highly recommended for a portable Splatoon experience, but it feels more like an expansion pack of the original than an actual sequel, for it's a bit too similar. In terms of asthetics, it doesn't even look very different from the original. That said, the Octo Expansion DLC goes a way in rectifying this to an extent.
• Just Here for Godzilla: Part of why he got into the Mega Man franchise is because of Roll. On an unrelated note, the 2014 film's announcement had gotten him into the Trope Namer himself for a good while.
  • He admits the modern artstyle is part of why he's into the Puyo Puyo series. Especially Amitie. She's just too great a character in his eyes.
• Lighter and Softer: He feels that Gravestone of Daisuke Jigen is this compared to Lupin III: The Woman Called Fujiko Mine, which it has a similar artstyle. Granted, it's still a fair bit Darker and Edgier and Hotter and Sexier than the typical Lupin III fare, and it has moments of Mind Screw, but nowhere near as much as TWCFM, and rather than being a Psychological Horror of sorts, it feels more like a darker version of a traditional Lupin story.
• Magnum Opus: He once considered Guardians of the Galaxy to be one not just of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but of ALL the Marvel movies ever made! He loved the film that much...but now he's not sure where that honor goes to for Marvel films in general, though he feels for the MCU, at least, Captain America: Civil War has taken that spot.
  • In terms of individual characters of all the fiction he's seen, while he can't pinpoint it, he considers Amitie to be the greatest character of them all. Of course, that's his opinion. But she is great.
• My Real Daddy: While he certainly likes the Compile-era Puyo Puyo titles, he feels this way towards the Sega era games, if mainly because of Amitie being created in the latter era.
• Narm Charm: Lupin's cheesy romantic dialogue in the Animaze dub of The Castle of Cagliostro is undeniably awkward, but given who he is, it fits him perfectly. David Hayter's fantastic performance as Lupin firmly sells it as this.
  • As noted under Superlative Dubbing below, he loves Amitie's voice in the English dub of Puyo Pop Fever; it sure sounds corny at times, but it fits her perfectly. While he's kinda sad Evelyn Huynh didn't return to the role for Puyo Puyo Tetris' dub, her successor, Christine Marie Cabanos, not only did a fine job taking the role, but actually surpassed her predecessor.
• The One Thing I Don't Hate About You: He can call Cranky Food Friends a lot of negative things, but dishonest isn't one of them. For this reason alone, he holds a but more respect for it than Mighty No. 9.
• Only the Creator Does It Right: It's very much a Zig-Zagged Trope for this guy; sometimes, he feels the new creatives did just fine with the series despite the original creators no longer being involved, and admittedly, Amitie, his favorite character of all time, owes her very creation to a change in hands. In some other cases, few, if any of the installments made after the original creators moved have managed to even come close to the originals in pure quality. Even he has to admit that, as much as he liked the Neversoft Guitar Hero games and has fond memories of them, the change in hands from Harmonix to Activision's developers did long term damage to the series.
• Pet-Peeve Trope: A few, at least when poorly done:
  • Abusive Parents: When it's there just for the sake of being there. He feels it should send An Aesop if it's done at all.
  • Adaptation Decay: Downplayed, for while he does have some problems with it, he'd still take a well-written In Name Only adaptation to a faithful adaptation that suffers from Bad Writing.
  • Darker and Edgier: Again, downplayed, because it can be done well, but it can be really jarring and nonsensical that the story would even exist if it's done badly.
  • Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: If it's too dark, he'd much rather not bother with it.
  • I Have No Son!: If it makes sense, it's not a problem (like when the parent's a good person while the offspring is an irredeemable Complete Monster), but he hates it when he believe the reasons are stupid and/or jerkish at best. The latter tends to be in anime, and it's likely he'll think there's no reason the story couldn't work without it. He's tried to chalk it up as Values Dissonance, but he can never get past the petty reasons for it, leading him to see the parents as Jerkasses and Scrappies, especially since it's rare that they even get called out for their bullshit, let alone punished for it.
  • The Masochism Tango: Yes, he hates that Trope.
  • No Export for You: If the products are said to be good or he's wanting it bad. If the products are bad, however, then it does not apply here.
  • Out of Order: He hates it when box sets, like some of the older James Bond Blu-Ray box sets, do that. At least with those, the film's were in individual cases so you could follow the Bullshit Man's suggestion, throw out the boxes and put the films in their proper order, but unfortunately, it doesn't apply to all of them.
  • Ron the Death Eater: Rarely is this even understandable, like when "being evil" is all we had when the fanfic was written, thus making it accurate to what existed at the time of its writing, or more understandable motives for seemingly evil actions are in a manual not everyone read. These are inexcusable most of the time, however. More frequently than not, this tends to happen to characters who, if they were the loser in a romatic situation in canon, would want their beloved to be happy, rather than turn into psychos. Seriously, why do that?
    • Naturally, this really grinds his gears when he adores a character for their canon portrayal, and has done his damndest to do justice to the character in his own writings. Needless to say, seeing that character portrayed that way does not sit well with him at all, not even as a joke.
  • Small Name, Big Ego: When it applies to Real Life, but fiction can be bad about it too.
  • Trolling Creator: Unless there's a good reason for it. Or his trolling just makes him/her all the more loveable.
• Porting Disaster: He feels The Sly Collection is this on the Play Station 3; while the games are certainly playable in this form, there are many audio glitches that simply didn't exist in the Play Station 2 release, and as a result, he believes that if you still have the PS 2 releases, you should just stick with them.
  • A more minor case is this with the Play Station Vita version of Child of Light; it has a lower framerate than its console versions, but while he does believe the Vita could have done a better port, if you want to play the game on the go, you're still gonna have an amazing time with this version.
    • That said, a Nintendo Switch version is coming. He expects that to have all the benefits of the Vita release with none of the drawbacks, but time will tell. Game is still worth playing no matter what you have.
  • The Play Station 2 version of Sonic Heroes is also this, though people exaggerate the extent; it's mainly lower framerate and lower quality graphics, but it's still very playable and the game is intact. That said, unlike Child of Light above, it doesn't have the advantage of being playable on the go, so if you have even one of those consoles, it might still be best to get the Nintendo Gamecube or Xbox version instead.
• The Problem with Licensed Games: He's gonna get mauled for some of these, but...
  • Yu Yu Hakusho: Spirit Detective is a pretty poor game with poor graphics and bad gameplay. On the plus side to it, however, it does follow the plot of the first season pretty faithfully...but even then, if you want to relive season one, you'd be better off buying the DVD and/or Blu-ray releases instead.
  • X-Men Legends is a pretty boring action game. He doesn't see what everyone else saw in it.
  • TRON: Evolution was also a pretty boring action game. Yeah, given the gap between the original film and its sequel both in and out of universe, an Interquel was probably necessary, but it could have been better.
  • While not a straight example of a licensed game, Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories technically qualifies, at least in its original Game Boy Advance form; he felt the Play Station 2 version was better, but still retained many of the faults of the handheld version.
• The Remake: He views Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2014) as a remake of the 1990 original, due to sharing much of the same plot with each other. Of course, he feels it's not exactly a good remake.
• The Scrappy: Many parents in anime who disown their kids for stupid or petty reasons, especially since being called out, let alone being punished for their bullshit is at best a rare occurrence. Not to mention when they do get punished, we're supposed to see it as a bad thing. Instead, he thinks they got what was coming to them. In fact, he tends to feel more for the disowned offspring even when they're the Designated Villain.
  • Also, that slug...thing from the Di Gi Charat specials, due to the fact that a joke involving him just wouldn't stop. By the time it did, it was several minutes too late to save it. Thank goodness the remaining specials got rid of him.
  • Gwen Stacy entered this realm in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, thanks in no small part to her taking a bit of a level in jerkass since the last film. Being one of two member's of the film's Romantic Plot Tumor doesn't help one bit. Shame, really; she was fine enough last time.
  • Depending on the Writer, Fujiko Mine can be this; usually when she's really whiny. Needless to say, he prefers the more competent, less whiny version found in some episodes of Green Jacket or The Woman Called Fujiko Mine.
  • The Frankensteins in the Puyo Puyo Fever duology. Not only did they pick on Amitie, unlike Raffine, they weren't even entertaing about it. Needless to say, it was quite satisfying when she beat them in a game of Puyo.
• Seasonal Rot: The Pokemon anime, from what he recalls (though maybe his Nostalgia Filter is talking; wouldn't be the first time) started off good...then the status quo became unbreakable to the point of irritation. Even in the Black & White seasons, he didn't see a whole lot change. The fact that the writers seem to be big believers in the Animation Age Ghetto doesn't inspire his confidence even a tiny bit.
• Sequel Gap: He's noticed that there's an odd trend of releasing sequels to films quite a few years after the originals. This wouldn't be so bad on its own, the the problem is what they made sequels to. He doesn't recall seeing anyone clamoring for sequels to Bad Santa, the Sin City movie and Alice in Wonderland (2010) several years after their release. There are also sequels to Avatar planned, again, despite the original leaving public consiousness. In those cases, he feels the time to properly capitalize off the originals' successes had long since passed; they would have had to release them no later than three years after the originals to stand a chance, but instead, they sat on it until demand for the sequels had long since passed, leading to Box Office Bombs that surprised only the executives and a few others.
  • That said. Alice Through the Looking Glass also had controversies surrounding Johnny Depp, who played the Mat Hatter in both films, so the Sequel Gap wasn't the only reason it bombed. He still feels that the gap did nothing to help the film, however.
  • A different negative to this is that original is beloved by many even years, or even decades after its initial release, meaning any potential sequel has a lot to live up to. The real negative comes when the sequel comes and fails to live up to it; it might have been an outright bad film, or it might have actually been a good film on its own, just not the quality of the original.
• Sequelitis: As seen in Fanon Discontinuity above, he doesn't consider The Amazing Spider-Man 2 to be a very good movie. Contrast its predecessor, which, while not a masterpiece itself, was still a decent flick. To be exact, it didn't actually fix the first film's flaws at all. Rather, it took the first film's flaws and made them worse. While he would have given The Amazing Spider Man Series another chance, he wasn't sad to see it go in favor of an MCU reboot, starting with Spidey's appearance in Captain America: Civil War and continuing in the solo film Spider-Man: Homecoming, though by the time it happened, he lost interest in the MCU.
  • Another example is Wario: Master Of Disguise, a game with bad touchscreen controls you're forced to use whether you want to or not. Even sadder since we had to wait a long while between this and Wario World. You can believe after the long wait, he expected better.
  • The 3DS version of Sonic Lost World had terrible level design that made the Wii U version (a decent, if not great game) look like a downright masterpiece in comparison. Sad, since the 3DS version of Sonic Generations was a fun game in spite of its flaws.
  • He found The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug to be a worse film due to Ending Fatigue where the movie seems like it'll end, but then it doesn't. It occurred too frequently not to notice, to the point that when the credits finally did roll, he was surprised because he expected another fakeout. Fortunately, the next film fixes that problem, and is a better film for it. That said, if he marathons the film series ome day, since it's necessary set-up for the third film, he can't just skip it and call it a day, or it'd be very incomplete.
  • Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories was most certainly this following up from the original. The card-based battle system was more intrusive than fun, for one. The Play Station 2 version, for what it's worth, he considers the better version, but it still retains a lot of the handheld version's faults. He used to say you could skip it and not miss too much, but now he views it as essentiall for understanding the story.
• Shipping: He dabbles in it from time to time. Favorite parings include Amitie x Sig, Arle x Schezo, and Spike x Helga.
• So Bad, It's Good: He's a big believer in it. Films like Plan 9 from Outer Space and Howard the Duck are contenders.
  • The English dub of Puyo Pop Fever is most certainly cheesy, but it fits the Lighter and Softer tone of the game perfectly. Amitie's voice in particular is a favorite of his.
• So Okay, It's Average: Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures isn't a bad show, but it's nothing special, either.
  • Game & Wario is the weakest in the series, but it's not bad. That said, it has moments of uneveness that bump it down to this, for while it has some of the series' best minigames, it also has some of its worst.
  • Lupin III: Alcatraz Connection qualifies; it's always awesome to see Lupin and the gang pulling heists, but unfortunately, it's bogged down by forgettable villains, a boring story and Fujiko being whiny.
• Spiritual Antithesis: Views Lupin III: The Woman Called Fujiko Mine as this to The Castle of Cagliostro. Both feature Lupin in his series 1 Green Jacket and reference the original show in various ways. Cagliostro had a Save the Princess fairy tale plot that's one of the lightest entries in the franchise. It may also be set near the end of Lupin's career. Fujiko Mine, on the other hand, is one of the darkest entries in the franchise, set before the original series, and is more of a Film Noir type of plot.
  • Puyo Pop Fever can be considered this to the first Madou Monogatari game; both have cute protagonists in school trying to succeed in their goals. But the former is a lighthearted adventure with the scariest creature still not being very scary, and the tone is overall pretty silly. The latter is not only a Darker and Edgier adventure with monsters and sights that are pure Nightmare Fuel, but certain versions can even go so far as to be Bloodier and Gorier. The kicker? One can assume they're set in the same continuity. Also, Amitie is a teenager in Puyo Pop Fever (and all games afterward), while Arle is a little girl in the first Madou Monogatari game.
• Spiritual Successor: The Fuma Conspiracy can be seen as this to The Castle of Cagliostro, seeing as how they both have Lupin in his series 1 Green Jacket, and is actually fairly close to Cagliostro in tone, and even has Lupin in his yellow fiat in a car chase scene. The animation quality is even close to Cagliostro.
• Strawman Has a Point: He's seen cartoons where the Kid Hero disobeys an order from an older figure in order to save the day. They usually respond by berating him for disobeying the order, and the kid either responds by sighing or running away in anger. More frequently than not, it's the older figure we're supposed to side with...but it falls very flat, because more frequently than not, if the kid didn't disobey them, they'd be dead. Thus, instead of the Reasonable Authority Figures we're supposed to see them as, they come off as Ungrateful Bastards who can't even be bothered to acknowledge when their judgement is wrong. Couldn't sometimes doing the right thing even if it goes against orders be a good message in itself? If you said yes, then you're not the writers of those cartoons.
• Superlative Dubbing: He's usually tolerant of even highly contested dubs, but there are a few he feels really hit the ballpark.
  • If nothing else, Amitie's voice actress, presumably Evelyn Huyhn, in the English dub of Puyo Pop Fever absolutely nails the role, capturing her bubbliness and cheerfulness and even her irritation at things perfectly. Then again, he adores the character, so he may be biased.
  • On a related note, Amitie had a completely different voice actress picked for Puyo Puyo Tetris's dub. Who was Evelyn's successor? Why, none other than Christine Marie Cabanos! She's absolutely perfect for the role, since she voices Nice Girls, and has her own charm. And she sounds appropriately cute and wonderful. Amusingly, however, it even manages to work in continuity with Evelyn Huyhn's; Christine's Amitie can actually be heard as a slightly older version of the same Amitie rather than two completely different people voicing the same character. After hearing more however, she has officially surpassed her predecessor in every way, doing justice to Amitie while putting her own spin on her.
  • Lupin III: The Woman Called Fujiko Mine has an amazing dub cast, with Sonny Strait's Lupin perfectly capturing the silly charm of the character, Christopher Sabat's Jigen, if nothing else, perfectly fitting him in the darker setting, Michelle Ruff as Fujiko herself, and Richard Epcar as the more badass Zenigata. They nail it very well, and feels that Sonny doesn't get enough respect.
• Surprisingly Improved Sequel: While he actually doesn't consider Hyperdimension Neptunia a bad game, its sequel/reboot fixed its flaws and improved on what it did right.
  • After finally getting to play Wario Land: Shake It!, he can definitely say that while it's not as good as past Wario Land games, it's a huge step up from Wario: Master of Disguise, mainly because it's better designed and utilizes the gimmicks a lot better.
  • As he noted up in the Sequelitis entry, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug had serious issues with Ending Fatigue. Thankfully, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies cured the series of that, and was much better off for it.
• Take That!: In this article a few pop up; The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and Cranky Food Friends seem to be his favorite targets (the latter definitely).
• They Copied It, So It Sucks!: Inverted with Sonic Riders; he's seen people say it's a ripoff of Mario Kart. He thinks they might have actually made a better game if they actually did copy Mario Kart's formula.
• Too Good to Last: Considers Shifty Look to be this, especially their Klonoa and Wonder Momo comics. It only lasted three years, making the loss even sadder.
  • Puyo Puyo's North American run as a whole qualifies as well. Damn you, Sega! However with Puyo Puyo Tetris being brought over and sounding like it did at least moderately well, things may turn around, yet. But only time will tell for sure.
• Took the Bad Film Seriously: This is how he feels about the cast of The Amazing Spider-Man 2. He hates the film, but the acting isn't one of the reasons; he feels the actors did a good job with the poor material they had.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic: This most frequently occurs when Values Dissonance occurs. Be it another culture or another era, characters we were supposed to side with just come off as Jerkasses here today.
  • Unintentionally Sympathetic: The side effect of this is that the people they're against, instead of being evil like they're supposed to be, just look like the victim instead, with the supposed hero(es) or the towns people being bullies.
• Vindicated by History: He considers The Twilight Saga as a whole to be this; he used to slam it as pure hot garbage. But he feels today's hot garbage is so much worse, in large part due to franchises he once loved abandoning the very thing that made them what they were to start with. He still doesn't like Twilight, but he's come to appreciate it for, if nothing else, knowing what it was meant to be and mostly sticking with it, quality aside.
• Win Back the Crowd: At least, Sonic Colors and Sonic Generations won him back on Sega as a whole. Sadly, it didn't last too long, though they seem to be, if not perfect, then at least taking steps in the right direction.