Five-Man Band has been receiving a lot of misuse. As was concluded in this TRS thread
, it needs a massive cleanup. There are over 30 subpages and almost 3500 wicks to be gone through. This thread is for organizing the cleanup effort and discussing any and all examples to be added and cut.
What is correct use of the trope?
- The characters must be part of a team, that is, a team dynamic must exist between members of the band.
- There must be exactly 5 team members
Format for examples
In an effort to cut down on misuse as well as get rid of all the Zero Context Examples, we are trying to shift all examples to the following format. If you are familiar with a current work and can do a writeup for it, please do so and post it here.
The sandbox for sorting examples is here.
Completed
Subpages:
- Other (Moved and redirected to a Just for Fun page, as that is what is was acting as.)
Still needs work
Wicks (Related To page
):
- B-V
I will keep this post updated with the progress made, and any other needed information.
Edited by MacronNotes on May 19th 2022 at 8:59:40 AM
Then we probably shouldn't touch it until we know for sure what the gender ratio should be.
I'm sorry to just barging in. I don't know if this is how I should do it, but I want to ask about an example I found on the page that I really think is not very good.
- Robotboy: Professor Moshimo entrusts Robotboy to 10-year-old Tommy Turnbull, his biggest fan. While being protected by Tommy and his two friends, Lola and Gus, or "G-man" as he calls himself, Robotboy learns how to behave and act as if he were a real boy.
- The Leader: Robotboy does not really lead since everyone is teaching/guiding him on becoming like a real boy, but since his development as such guides activities, it still fits, kind of. So we are already having doubts if Robotboy is really an example or not. And while his name is on the title, Robotboy is mostly a device (hehe) that drives the plot rather than an actual character.
- The Lancer: Tommy, a Generic Guy meant to teach Robotboy how to be a normal person. He is the main character of the show, and he is the one that tends to take the role of leader in many situations.
- The Smart Guy: Prof. Moshimo, The scientist who invented Robotboy, he keeps in touch with the kids to send upgrades for Robotboy or help them fix the problem of the day. He is the worst for me, since there is the detail that he is literally at the other side of the world, so he is not with the kids most of the time. If anything, he would be the Big Good of the show.
- The Big Guy: Gus, a Large Ham Fat Best Friend to Tommy. He is Fat, but he tends to be a Leeroy Jenkins that needs to be saved frequently.
- The Chick: Lola, the girly Tsundere. Ironically, she tends to have a better record when it comes to fighting (without counting Robotboy).
separately do we want to put up a crowner to vote on the gender restrictions.
options being:
- Bands where Chick is female:
- Classic Band - Allow only 4:1, male:female
- Modern Band - Allow up to 3:2, male:female - (What the cleanup thread has been following)
- Progressive Band - Allow any gender make up, including all female teams, as long as The Chick is female
- Bands where Chick is not necessarily female:
- Inverted Band - Allow gender inversions - 4:1, female:male where The One Guy is "the chick" / The Heart
- Boy Band - Allow all male teams where a male "chick" is The Heart
- Open Band - Remove gender restrictions
The bottom three probably requires a whole nother discussion, but thought i'd leave them on there.
Any other options we've seen get traction?
Edited by acrobox on Jul 11th 2019 at 8:32:59 AM
Sorry for interrupting. I don't know how far along this project is, but may I delete this on Wild Ride?
- Five-Man Band:
- The Untouchables
- Big Bad = Kharos
- The Dragon and The Brute: Selvans
- Evil Genius = Fufluns (okay, this is a stretch, but he does think differently from the rest)
- The Dark Chick: both Vanth and Tura
- The Trickster, Seer, Hunter, Sorceress, and Keeper of the Guardia.
- The Hero and The Big Guy = The Hunter
- The Lancer = The Keeper
- The Smart Guy = The Trickster
- The Chick is done by both The Sorceress and The Seer.
- The Untouchables
Edit:
I'll remember that from now on. It's deleted.
Edited by Tabs on Jul 22nd 2019 at 8:22:31 AM
Chop it with extreme prejudice.
Basically, you can safely cut any example that's missing context, has blatant shoehorns, or misuses the trope (such as having more than one character per role). That's also a clear attempt to sneak a Five Bad Band example in.
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Yeah, I think it's crowner time.
Edited by WarJay77 on Jul 21st 2019 at 1:42:49 PM
Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper WallSorry to come in again. I just saw the sandbox and I think that Phineas and Ferb might be an example.
- The Leader: Phineas, the idea guy. He is the one that drives the plot and who comes with the ideas for the day.
- The Lancer: Ferb. He contrasts with his brother by being quieter and more hands on with their projects.
- The Smart Guy: Baljeet. He is nerdier than the main duo and tends to help whenever the boys need more brainpower when calculating their plans.
- The Big Guy: Buford, the local bully. He helps the boys whenever they need muscle to carry out their ideas.
- The Chick: Isabella. The only girl on the group, she always supports Phineas with his ideas and is the one helping with the teamwork. Very sweet but dependable and resourceful.
Man this thread has really taken off. Whatever happened to the band from The Maze Runner that I put up a while ago?
Weirdly enough I can't find it on the book's page history (there's just a shoehorned example)
- The Maze Runner Thomas and his friends in The Death Cure
- The Leader: Thomas, The Hero of the story who is the unofficial leader of the team.
- The Lancer: Newt, Thomas' best friend and most trusted ally, who's much quieter and less level headed than Thomas.
- The Smart Guy: Jorge, Who's knowledge of WICKED and the outside world are invaluable to the group.
- The Big Guy: Minho, Thomas' other friend who's much stronger and aggressive than the rest of the group.
- The Chick: Brenda, Thomas' Love Interest who provides emotional support for him and usually is the one to break up arguments among the group.
Edited by papyru30 on Mar 4th 2020 at 11:17:18 AM
I recently removed a Five-Man Band entry from Man of Medan since Five-Man Band is not YMMV.
"I squirm, I struggle, ergo I am. Faced with death, I am finally, truly alive."I've felt the gender ratio seems kind of pointless. The Chick at most has the counterpart in The Heart, which fits the entire main point of it. Other than that, every single trope can be fit onto a male or female character without any differences. With that in mind, it'd still be a very restricting trope as is, so it's not like it's hard to work with.
Shadow?Yeah, I also think the gender restriction is a bit silly, but we're also troping this as it occurs in-media, not how we think it should occur. The subpages had plenty of (now gone) examples where the only issue was that the team was all female, but they all seemed to fit the trope otherwise.
I guess what I'm saying is, expanding the gender-ratio allowance may open the door to more misuse, but it can also allow more genuine examples that came from a different time-period.
Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper WallThat's how I look at it. Right now, a ton of proper examples are unusable over a silly reason.
The other thing is, I don't remember the ruling if The Chick is able to be replaced by The Heart, as long as it fits otherwise. Since that's just the male version of The Chick but fits in every way otherwise. Since being simply female isn't the entire point. Being feminine/girly, or being the least violent, trying to get people to come together, etc. Though The Heart seems like it's not meant to really be an actual male counterpart by name alone, but only for the usage of this trope at most? If that's the case, it's probably a bad way to do it.
Shadow?![]()
That's out of date. Now that Eddie isn't the admin anymore, his fiat can be undone with consensus.
The thing is, there's been a lot of need for a proper discussion about the gender-ratio that we haven't been able to have yet. I don't feel it's right to just say "oh, well, Eddie said so a few years ago", when it can be argued that the trope has evolved with the times and what used to have a strict gender-ratio no longer does.
The discussion doesn't need to happen here, but I do think it's long overdue.
Edited by WarJay77 on Sep 14th 2019 at 10:59:28 AM
Working on: Author Appeal | Sandbox | Troper WallThe discussion does not need to happen here, yes, but I think you need to think a bit more about whether it is needed. The argument back then - that the trope is a very specific one that in its original form always involves one woman and four men - isn't simply invalid on its face and you'd need to refute it first.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman

Well, it has a reference to the gender ratio...