Five-Man Band cleanup

Key word there is "original form". Tropes are flexible. There's no reason creators today couldn't have seen the ensemble model and modernized it with more girls (or even all girls), while keeping the roles in-tact.

We'd just need to collect enough fitting examples of Five-Man Bands that have more than two girls, which won't be hard to do at all.

I think the issue is (and this is more of a fundamental problem with the site, IMO) - how essentialist is a trope concept like this? When does 'updating' it make a new trope?

That's not something I expect to have a clear-cut answer, but I think it needs to be out there in the conversation.

Edit: Hell, wasn't there originally supposed to be a "modern Team of Five" trope that coexisted with Five-Man Band? I can't remember anymore but something like that rings a bell.

Edited by nrjxll on Sep 15th 2019 at 4:04:50 AM

I remember the old Five Bad Band and The Psycho Rangers. I'm not sure if the former is still a thing, though.

But yeah, TRS probably would be better to give a clear explanation of why it's not all that workable. We have little reason to keep it the current way it is other than an outdated Admin fiat, and that's not really a good reason in itself. But noting why it's also not a good way to do it is something that needs to be brought up besides "cause it's outdated". I gotta admit that in itself is barely a reason for change alone. And we've only mentioned bits and pieces of how limiting it is(just for the sake of it). We're at the moment a case of "if it isn't broke, don't fix it", which means we need to prove why it really is broken.

Well, if we can prove that there exist a solid number of female-majority groups that otherwise fit perfectly into the current model, that'll prove the trope occurs in more ways than the old-school "4 guys and The Chick" version or the slightly more modern "Two Girls to a Team" version.

The entire reason we're limited to the current gender-ratio is the assumption that this trope is just an outdated ensemble used in older media, but there's no reason to believe that, if the newer version does exist as I think it does.

TRS is probably the best way to handle it now. Then we can clean up using this thread with what may be the new definition. That sound good?

Yep.

all that said, does the gender make up of the FMB affect the definition of The Chick as a standalone concept, or can that be updated to its sandbox to match its other four counterparts? Would the sandbox just remove mention of the FMB for the time being until the gender ratio is sorted out.

The Chick is hard because while it doesn't have to be in an FMB, it was intended to be the token female. Giving the band another female member broadens the definition to being the sweet one that binds the group together, and must be female even if there's another female on the team.

If the gender ratio changes, the second definition is workable, but then it does bring us into conflict with The Heart and if that should be allowed. If the gender barriers are severed, why couldn't a male character take that role?

The Chick, being gender-specific and intended to fit the one single female character in a traditional FMB team, does throw things into question.

Like, I could understand that at least one female is required, possibly. But it doesn't have to be The Chick, which The Heart can easily replace. The most important part is the personality overall. They're interchangeable enough to work, that is, the point of The Chick wasn't just being female, but they had a heart-based personality that kept the band together. It's at this time basically The Heart + Female as the role. Being any other role can be female, it feels like it's really just outdated at this point.

That's the thing. Right now, the Five-Man Band roles have been kept intentionally outdated, because of the belief that it only "really" exists in older, outdated works. If this is true, then The Chick needing to be female is outdated for a reason.

Hmm. Makes me wonder if making a sister trope for a different kind of group might be in order. Do we have a generic team trope as is, where it doesn't have a main limit on members, namely for those works with bigger groups and all. Though that might be pointless considering the characterization tropes still have their place in the Character Sheets anyway.

The Team

Honestly, I have asked over and over and over and over and over and over and over again and never really gotten an answer as to why people want so badly to identify teams of characters as a Five-Man Band when we have The Team.

Edited by nrjxll on Sep 18th 2019 at 3:17:38 AM

IDK, but I also don't like the idea of just shoving all "rejected" FMB teams into The Team when they otherwise would fit Five-Man Band if not for gender-restrictions. I'm wholeheartedly for moving genuinely shoehorned groups to The Team, but if it walks like a FMB and quacks like a FMB...does it really matter that there are three girls?

Honestly, I question whether Five-Man Band is actually a meaningful pattern with narrative significance (in other words, a trope) as opposed to a list of Rorschach blots that people think look like bunnies.

I mean, we could also make a Sub-Trope of The Team to cover examples that have exactly six members, no more than two of whom are girls, one of which must be a Tomboy with a Girly Streak... but why?

Edited by HighCrate on Sep 18th 2019 at 6:06:46 AM

With what HC said in mind, it's probably a good idea to bring it to TRS. It looks like it could have more issues beyond being outdated.

Hmm, yeah, I agree.

what i meant about bringing up The Chick is specifically updating it to it's sandbox definition, regardless of what the rules of the band are. Read the sandbox here.

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On a related note, I'd argue that while The Heart could replace The Chick if there weren't gender restrictions on the band, sometimes The Heart of the team is the Magnetic Hero (variation on Leader), or the Gentle Giant (Variation on Big Guy), or the Tag Along Kid which isn't in the band at all if they Everyone's Baby Sister.

Like The Chick is usually The Heart, but the femininity aspect of it is important too both as a standalone trope and I'd argue as part of the band.

Edited by acrobox on Sep 19th 2019 at 11:31:59 AM

Also as to the case of why FMB deserves to be a subtrope of The Team, but not any other arbitrary make up is based on pattern recognition like all tropes. This one specifically finding its roots in shows like Gatchaman, Super Sentai, and various action figure lines and tie in shows between the 70s-90s. And because those things have such an impact you see it in more recent content as well.

Like Power Trio is a subtrope of The Team because we see 3 a lot. And there are a ton of specific make ups of Power Trio that all have their own trope (whether thats personality, or appearance, or video game stats, or yes even specific roles and gender make up) because we see a lot of those. And those should be respected as tropes without agressive shoehorning.

If you look at any trope for too long or too closely this entire website is Rorschach test bunnies and totally meaningless.

I agree, but also, that's what makes me concerned about The Heart. See, I can see and even make a case for allowing more (or all) girls on an FMB team. But I can't see as much of a case for allowing The Heart in place of The Chick, and that's not because I don't think a man can fill the role. I've just not seen any valid examples where a man does fill the role. Any time it shows up, it seems other characters are shoehorned as well. Using The Heart seems to be a sign that the characters are being forced into the pattern, rather than people just identifying roles that actually exist.

I could be wrong, but we need to keep this in mind going forward. We can't just change the definition of a trope because we'd like it better that way. We can only change it to fit how the trope actually occurs in storytelling.

...And, well, this is really a discussion for TRS. Does anyone want to start on that thread?

and...and this will be my last post for the night... if there is a problem with the FMB, it's a missing Super-Trope thats for sake of discussion we can call Five Heroes. Five Heroes doesnt need to respect roles, or gender, or anything. Not Two Foil Pairs And A Mediator, not FMB without gender restrictions, not a Venn Diagram Of Power Trios. Just Five Heroes.

The same way we have the general Duo Tropes, Power Trio, Elite Four. Like you wouldn't struggle to shoehorn three dudes into Three Faces of Eve just because its an established subtrope of a group of three. Or shoehorn Blonde, Brunette, Redhead if you have characters with Blue, Brown, and Red hair and just say Blue is Blonde because it otherwise fits and tropes are arbitrary anyway.

Then you dont need to scrap or overhaul FMB, you just acknowledge that yeah a lot of times hero teams come in fives even if they don't fit the roles and gender make up of most sentai teams.

Edited by acrobox on Sep 20th 2019 at 12:03:32 PM

A quick question that I think could be answered here: Is it appropriate to use the various Five-Man Band roles (The Big Guy, The Chick, etc.) in isolation from the team dynamic of the FMB as I have seen them used every now and again in that context but the descriptions only talk about FMBs?

AFAIK they're general team dynamic tropes that do not require the team to even be particularly close to a Five-Man Band. I could be wrong but that's how I've always seen them used historically.

yeah the five tropes can exist individually without being part of the band.