Do you have trouble remembering the difference between Deathbringer the Adorable and Fluffy the Terrible?
Do you have trouble recognizing when you've written a Zero-Context Example?
Not sure if you really have a Badass Bookworm or just a guy who likes to read?
Well, this is the thread for you. We're here to help you will all the finer points of example writing. If you have any questions, we can answer them. Don't be afraid. We don't bite. We all just want to make the wiki a better place for everyone.
Useful Tips:
- Make sure that the example makes sense to both people who don't know the work AND don't know the trope.
- Wrong: The Mentor: Kevin is this to Bob in the first episode.
- Right: The Mentor: Kevin takes Bob under his wing in the first episode and teaches him the ropes of being a were-chinchilla.
- Never just put the trope title and leave it at that.
- Wrong: Badass Adorable
- Right: Badass Adorable: Xavier, the group's cute little mascot, defeats three raging elephants with both hands tied behind his back using only an uncooked spaghetti noodle.
- When is normally far less important than How.
- A character name is not an explanation.
- Wrong: Full Moon Silhouette: Diana
- Right: Full Moon Silhouette: At the end of her transformation sequence into Moon Princess Misty, Diana is shown flying across the full moon riding a rutabaga.
Other Resources:
For best results, please include why you think an example is iffy in your first post.
Also, many oft-misused tropes/topics have their own threads, such as Surprisingly Realistic Outcome (here
) and Fan-Preferred Couple (here). Tropers are better able to give feedback on examples you bring up to specific threads.
For cleaning up examples of Complete Monster and Magnificent Bastard, you must use their dedicated threads: Complete Monster Cleanup, Magnificent Bastard Cleanup.
Edited by Synchronicity on Sep 18th 2023 at 11:42:55 AM
low-poly Shinri
Bumping this. (including the Central Theme one linked there)
I want to know if the following is a Shout-Out for West Side Story: An episode with 2 rival gangs. One of the members of one gang is going out with Maria, the sister of the head of the other gang. When Maria's brother is murdered, a member of the first gang, named Tony, warns off Maria's boyfriend.
Because the difference in age is marginal in these cases (and are already on Other Me Annoys Me), are these safe to cut from I Hate Past Me?
- Daffy 1: Listen to bub, if you wasn't me, I'd smack you right in the puss!
Daffy 2: Don't let that bother you, jack!
- Bender-2: Hey! Who are you?
Bender-3: [dressed in a tuxedo] I'm Bender from way at the end. I came back to put this rub-on time code on Fry's ass.
Bender-2: So, what are you now, a butler? "Spot of tea, please, jerkwad!"
Bender-3: It's called class, you yokel. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a buttocks to tattoo.
Angry babby
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
That sounds like enough parallels to presumably be a Shout-Out.
Depends on how the work plays it. If the character gets annoyed by an attitude their "past" self holds that they no longer do, I'd say it still counts as a play on I Hate Past Me. But as is, it's probably just Other Me Annoys Me as you said, as the issue is just with their selves, not their time differences.
he/him
From Theatre.Sir Thomas More:
- Anyone Can Die: Being based on real events, the play doesn't contain a single character who's sure to survive to the end.
- Foregone Conclusion: The fact that More died for his beliefs in the real world makes it obvious that he won't back down, or survive, in the play either.
Feels like the second trope is accurate, the first is misuse?
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
Yeah, the first is not the correct trope I think.
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
In Glass Onion, a character says "circumspective" evidence while clearly meaning "circumstantial". Is this Perfectly Cromulent Word or Malaproper?
I would say thats malaproper
Which is already listed on the page
Edited by Khoshekh6 on Aug 8th 2023 at 6:35:35 AM
He/Him
Found this in YMMV.Two Set Violin
- Harsher in Hindsight: As more and more violists are genuinely hurt by and speaking out against viola jokes, this Running Gag on the channel becomes hard to watch.
Violinists, or people in general, defending viola players isn't a new thing if I recall. Feels like misuse. What do you guys think?
Edited by AudioSpeaks2 on Aug 8th 2023 at 9:50:43 PM
Art Museum Curator and frequent helper of the Web Original deprecation project
The page lists the example under both tropes and I am trying to figure out which one is the better fit.
Am I a weirdo?
Hindsight has its own dedicated thread.
I agree that Malaproper is the correct trope.
From CerebusSyndrome.Western Animation:
- Avatar: The Last Airbender gets more angsty in each season. This is more the characters coming to realize things are bad rather than the plot getting heavier. After all, by the third episode, the show had established the lead character as the lone survivor of a genocide. The series also started adding far more dangerous enemies, going from the Prince Zuko and Admiral Zhao in the first season to Zuko's sister Princess Azula in the second season and father Firelord Ozai in the final season. In spite of all this, the series never lost its sense of humour, preventing it from falling too deep.
I don't really think ATLA counts for Cerebus Syndrome. Like the entry itself says, ATLA had darker elements from the beginning, and it's tone, subject matter, and genre are consistent for the whole show. It's not an episodic comedy that becomes a serialized drama. It's a fantasy adventure story that alternates between one-off episodes and an overarching plot, Half-Arc Season style, with a core plot that's taken seriously but a large amount of comic relief, and it's that from the beginning.
Am I right here, do you guys think it counts?
Big Catch, Sparkle Edition
Yeah, that's misuse. It was always meant to go in that direction; heck, the show literally started with an innocent group of people being invaded by an imperial military and then just a few episodes later we see the dead remains of Aang's entire temple.
Edited by WarJay77 on Aug 8th 2023 at 1:11:41 PM
Currently Working On: Incorruptible Pure Pureness
Though granted, it's been a problem right from the start of the page whether Cerebus Syndrome is supposed to apply in cases where it was preplanned or not. (Don't even get me started on Cerebus Retcon...)
In this case I don't think it matters if it was planned or not, because there isn't actually enough of a change in tone and genre to be Cerebus Syndrome anyway. The real issue it shows is that Cerebus Syndrome gets used as "the work gets 'darker'", when it's actually much more specific.
Edited by TheMountainKing on Aug 9th 2023 at 10:59:26 AM
Beyond being meta and troping real life... do these examples fit at all in This Is No Time to Panic ?
- The "no time to panic" can apply to TV shows themselves, also. An example: House struggled in the ratings shortly after its debut, so FOX decided that the show needed a villain. By the time the episodes with the newly created Edward Vogler actually aired, the show was already a big hit. Apparently, the writers knew what they were doing all along.
- Apparently learning nothing from this, they proceeded to repeat the "you can't have a show without a villain" shtick in the third season with Detective Tritter.
- Another example: Seinfeld took multiple seasons to become a hit. It's highly unlikely that a show would be allowed to stay on the air that long without becoming a hit if it were to debut now.
Am I a weirdo?
Those look like blatant misuse.
I mainly fix indentation issues
TheMountainKing: I strongly agree with you. Avatar: The Last Airbender isn't a series I would call dark or gory, but it doesn't shy away from showing hard stuff either, even in season one. They not just tell you about the airbender genecide, they show you the corpses of Gyatso and other firebenders to prove it. Zuko's backstory ends with a scene of him kneeling, crying, and begging his father for mercy, only to end up with a pretty gruesome burn on his face. And let's not forget Jet, an episode in which the antagonist is a group of orphaned children who want to drown an entire town full of other children (the episode even uses a scene with a doll to clarify that there were children in the town).
StFan: I'm not quite sure, but I don't like how complainy and negative the examples are.
Edited by SoyValdo7 on Aug 9th 2023 at 6:39:14 AM
Valdo
Am I a weirdo?
I agree that lacks word of god stating that the change was in response to criticism.
Then it is not an example. On the other hand, would this better fit What Could Have Been? It is still a notable change.
low-poly Shinri
Idk wherelse to ask so here we go.
So I was editing Previous Player-Character Cameo (specifically the Trails Series) and I came across this.
- Avin and Mile from Legend of Heroes IV (I in English) pop up again in The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the Legend Of Heroes IV seems to be in different continuity than Trails but I dont know how to reword the entry without being ignorant about it.
She/Her | Currently cleaning N/A
Is Adoption Angst flexible enough to cover parents having angst about their children being adopted, i.e. worrying they don't love their parents the same way? It's not listed in the Playing With page, but it feels like something must cover it.
I'd consider that an appropriate variant, but I obviously can't speak for any sort of official standpoint.