Do we really need it?: Medium Shift Gag

I'd like to draw attention on the Medium-Shift Gag trope, that I discovered today.

Is it really necessary to distinguish this from Medium Blending? Now, I understand the concept of Sub-Trope, and Medium Blending already has some (like Sudden Videogame Moment or Animated Credits Opening) but here the distinction with Medium Blending in the trope description isn't very clear, and most of the examples are already in Medium Blending, or look like they could be put here.

I'm not calling necessarily for a merge with Medium Blending, but Medium-Shift Gag would need some serious work to stand on its own and be clearly differentiated.

edited 27th Jan '12 11:59:53 AM by StFan

They could use some cleanup, but they sound different to me. Medium Blending is the storytelling technique. Medium-Shift Gag changes medium temporarily for a quick laugh.

For Medium Blending, it happens all the time. Medium-Shift Gag would be, say, Gunnerkrigg Court turning into Order Of The Stick for three panels and then back.

My gripe (which I noted in the YKTTW) happens to be the use of the word "medium", but that's admittedly minor.

Isnt this just Art Shift?

Not entirely. You can't exactly call it an Art Shift if the series suddenly moves to real life actors or something.

Anyways, I can see a distinction between the two.

Medium Blending is when two or more different mediums appear at the same time. For example, The Amazing World Of Gumball will have hand-drawn western animation characters on the same screen as a CG Dinosaur, felt puppets, and 8-bit spiders, all while set on a real-world background.

This is the blending part, because they're all seen together at once.

Medium-Shift Gag is when the entire scene suddenly changes to something else other than the norm, usually for a joke, but it goes back to normal soon afterward. It can be an Art Shift. They can overlap.

FLCL even lampshades this during the last episode when they have another scene play out entirely like a Manga.

edited 28th Jan '12 10:22:30 AM by DRCEQ

Where would you limit this though and what types?

The FLCL second bullet point seems to be about South Park style animation which isnt a different "Medium" that is just Art Shift.

Negima Second Season switching to a live action model of the building they were in then blowing it up for kicks is this?

Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei's switching to a Handdrawn◊ flip book◊, claymation [1]◊ [2]◊, Cut outs◊, Yonkoma and such? Its still animation though.

Switching to a Visual Novel style presentation? (which is still the same art style.)[3]◊ [4]◊

Madoka Magica's Witches?

edited 28th Jan '12 11:10:54 AM by Raso