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. We don't discuss Complete Monster or Magnificent Bastard examples; please don't bring them up.
Edited by SeptimusHeap on Jul 17th 2025 at 8:59:01 PM
Change it to what, and is it a small enough of a tweak to not require going through TRS first?
On a different note... Would a story that pits your typical Magical Girl Warriors against a Government Conspiracy's completely mundane Humongous Mecha (hypothetical example: the Sailor Soldiers vs. an army of mass-produced Metal Gears) count as an example of Cool Versus Awesome?
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.I'm a bit unsure whether I should change a certain example to remove it saying it's a subversion of Screw Yourself or not so I posted an Ask The Tropers. Got directed here to ask my question via PM.
Anyway, here's the case which I guess I should explain more clearly:
In Battleborn, there is a society made up of clones of the exact same guy, the kingdom of Mikes. A number of them are attracted to one another, some of which are even in relationships with one another such as the case of a happily married Mike couple. It's pretty much selfcest in every sense of the word.
That being said, all of the Mike clones are completely naive about actual sex. As part of a joke, it's revealed that every Mike doesn't know what two people who are in a relationship actually do together. Even the clone who is literally married to another is naive about the subject. His relationship with his significant other though is still presented as being a typical happy marriage. It's just since the Mike clones don't know about sex, it would appear his marriage with someone who's basically himself involves a lot of love but no actual sex. Basically Screw Yourself but without the screwing?
That joke anyway is where the problem arises. A fellow troper basically added that because of what's established via the joke, that the clones don't know about sex, it's a subversion rather than a straight example of Screw Yourself. I initially edited his addition to say it's subverted a bit because of the obvious clone attraction however I'm thinking that saying it's a subversion on the grounds that there's no actual sex involved/ the clones not knowing about sex should be taken out. The situation with the Mikes as best seen with the married couple would still be considered Screw Yourself as there is genuine intimacy even though it's not of a sexual kind/doesn't involve sex.
That there is kinda where my confusion whether I should pursue this action or not has propped up due to certain things with the Screw Yourself trope itself hence why I'm asking for some opinions/clarifications.
Whether something described above is a subversion of Screw Yourself or not since it involves attraction but no actual screwing.
I mean Screw Yourself's definition talks about involving sex but it also includes this line: Technically, any intimacy between a character and their Enemy Without will be this.
Also a good number of the trope's examples involve sex but there are a few that just simply involves simply love as far as I can tell. Most notable of the latter kind would be Narcissus from Greek Mythology example.
Long story short, my question is about whether the "Demi-humans" in Interviews with Monster Girls are "monsters" in the meaning of several monster-related tropes.
In this series, Demi-humans (Demis for short) are constructed as Human Subspecies / The Mutant that carries traits of legendary creatures. In Funimation's promotional image
◊, back-center and back-right are full humans and the remaining four are Demis, so you can see—the only one that look a bit less human is the dullahan at lower-right.
This universe also seems to treat Demi status as, using American terminology, a "protected class," so the government does provide support to them, like a bag of human blood per month for vampires.
So, do these Demis apply to the following tropes?
- Cute Monster Girl: Outside of Himari, every female cast member is a cute-looking Demi.
- Monsters Anonymous: There exists government-funded support groups for Demis.
It's a bit tricky, but I find that for the purposes of troping, they fit. There's a good In-Universe justification for why they're human-looking, but at the end of it, from an outside perspective, they're still classical monsters.
The second would fit regardless, though, since they still have those special inhuman needs.
edited 24th Jan '17 10:32:54 PM by AnotherDuck
Check out my fanfiction!Interesting use of Strong, but Unskilled right here:
- Strong, but Unskilled: Diana states that her magic can easily be stronger than hers with enough passion but she is considered an idiot with no finesse.
It sounds like it fits, but the rest of the character's examples say that her magic is near non-existent, but she has the potential to be strong. But for the moment, she's not strong. And not skilled. Is that played with, Not An Example, or a straight example?
edited 25th Jan '17 6:08:28 AM by Larkmarn
Found a Youtube Channel with political stances you want to share? Hop on over to this page and add them.It fits as far as what Diana makes of it. At the very least, the example is written from her perspective, and that's her assessment. It's also probably true. It's hard to tell if the actual magical feats performed were particularly powerful, as there's little to reference them with, but they're there.
Check out my fanfiction!![]()
Awkward use of pronouns there. Even in context, "her magic was strong than hers" is something that's easy to stumble over when you read it. I'd change it to "Akko's magic was stronger than hers".
Aside from that, I agree with Duck, with the caveat that if (and only if) Diana's opinion is not considered trustworthy in the work, then I might insist on calling it a Discussed Trope. Otherwise, though, it just looks like normal exposition, so straight trope.
Speaking words of fandom: let it squee, let it squee.Could someone take a look at these examples from the Emerald City page:
- Not Quite Dead: Tip thinks she killed Jack after he kissed her, but he survived.
- Psychic Link: West is unperturbed when Dorothy hits East with a police car, seemingly killing her, but she becomes visibly (and vocally) distressed when East is shot in the head and actually dies.
- Railing Kill: Happens to Jack after he kisses a very upset Tip in episode 3. Tip pushes him away, causing Jack to crash through the railing of the balcony they're standing on and fall to a Disney Villain Death.
- Scenery Porn: As can be expected from a series directed by Tarsem Singh, every episode contains spectacular vistas both natural and architectural.
x6 yes those definitely count. The series itself investigates Our Monsters Are Different pretty well.
And while they look mostly humanish Hikari has vampire fangs, Yuki has all the traits of a Yuki-onna, and Satou lives an extremely dangerous life being a Reluctant Monster succubus.
Later episodes should go more into government organizations around demis.
edited 26th Jan '17 7:07:25 AM by Memers
from Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
- Darker and Edgier: In contrast to Heavenly Sword's fantasy set or Enslaved's colorful post-apocalypse, it's the most mature game from Ninja Theory.
These are three separate works that just happen to have the same creator.
No Medication for Me is the choice to stop taking medication, right? Not just forgetting to?
Also, how do you do quote boxes?
Disambig Needed: Help with those issues! tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=13324299140A37493800&page=24#comment-576![]()
Correct. It requires a conscious decision to go off the meds. Quoting in the forums is done with [[quoteblock]] text [[/quoteblock]]:
- Not Quite Dead: Not enough information to determine whether it qualifies. The trope's description also seems to indicate that it happens mainly to villains. The basic idea is that the heroes deliver a seemingly killing blow, then walk away confident that they defeated the villain, only for him to show up a few scenes later having miraculously survived (or been healed/repaired).
- Psychic Link: Not an example, as written. It says absolutely nothing about the trope.
- Railing Kill: Crashing through a railing seems to fit the intent of the trope, even if the description is more specific. Certainly, the page image agrees.
- Scenery Porn: Fits the trope, but the "as can be expected from X" thing falls under Word Cruft.
Could someone take a look at these examples from the Emerald City page:
- Staying Alive: Killing a witch in Oz is a singularly difficult proposition as they have a tendency to not stay dead unless killed by another witch. It remains to be seen if East's seemingly permanent death was the result of it being a Boom, Headshot! or the result of it being self-inflicted.
- Traveling at the Speed of Plot: The time different characters take to travel is vastly inconsistent. East's body reaches the Emerald City for her funeral long before Dorothy and Lucas get anywhere near it. Justified by Dorothy not being from Oz, Lucas being amnesiac, and possible use of either magic or technology.
- Staying Alive is for when characters inexplicably survive fatal situations without even the handwave of invulnerability or being pulled from the rubble. One scene they're dead, the next they're up and kicking, no explanations. As written, the example sounds more like Nigh-Invulnerability or a variation of Immortality.
- Traveling at the Speed of Plot: If there are reasons given for why characters travel at different rates, then it's not an example of the trope. TATSOP is when travel times are widely inconsistent with no explanation, or at best a Hand Wave. There's an implied supertrope: travel in stories always takes the amount of time it needs to for the plot to work.
edited 31st Jan '17 5:27:53 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"I'm wondering if this counts as The Chosen Many for Spells, Swords, & Stealth:
- When Russell got the first campaign module for the games he DMs, he thought he lucked out on a limited edition. Then he gets the second book without ever having ordered it and has to drive half a day to a convention to get the third, which is also under his name despite not knowing about it until the last minute. The woman who gives him the third book reveals that multiple people have been jumping through the same hoops. As strange as this is and other happenings have been, only at the end of the third book does Russell and his group learn that there is something unquestionably magical going on and that they're a part of it.
edited 31st Jan '17 5:41:25 AM by sgamer82
I don't think so. The Chosen Many is explicitly about an organized team or society of supers who share the same power set and are individually "chosen" to become part of that group. Such stories are almost always about a single protagonist who gets chosen and has to discover his identity within the group, prove his worth to the group, or in some cases find the group (since his powers come without an instruction manual or a support number).
edited 31st Jan '17 6:11:56 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"Well, if they are a mix-and-match ensemble of powers, then it wouldn't count. But if, say, there were an explosion at the Flying Brick factory, such that the power enabler widgets got flung around the city and picked up by "fated" individuals, who then banded together to form the Flying Brick Squad, complete with matching uniforms ("No capes!") and Obstructive Code of Conduct, then yeah, it could be an example.
Most cases of The Chosen Many are about pre-existing groups that the protagonist must variously discover, fit into, save, or resuscitate. To have the story be about the initial formation of such a group from a common origin story would be a significant variation. And they must share a common power set. That's crucial.
edited 31st Jan '17 7:27:43 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"I'm this case, the "power set" is they're tabletop gamers whose characters have an active effect on another world (whether it's the world of the game or a world affected by the game I'm not 100% sure.). The company that creates the modules seems to be trying to re form an artifact that bridges the two worlds.
edited 31st Jan '17 7:50:19 AM by sgamer82
Then it's definitely not the trope as it stands.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"Considering how often I've seen Narm misused, would someone mind taking a look at these examples:
YMMV.Agents Of SHIELDS 4 E 12 Hot Potato Soup:
- Narm: After several episodes building up the mysterious leader of the Watchdogs, it's quite a letdown that it's just some random guy we've never heard of before. On top of that, his mission is immediately revealed to be based on a silly misunderstanding that Coulson is behind all the weirdness of the MCU, significantly reducing his intimidation level.
- Narm:
- Medusa's mini-rant to O5!Beast in #2. She flies into a rage that they would break the truce and endanger her people after all they did to help. Ignore that it's exactly what the Inhumans have been doing and that their "help" has garned no positive results after 8 months because it is played entirely straight as Beast is given no retort.
- All New X-Men #18. All of it. O5!Cyclops makes a monologue about how awful old!Scott was, repeatedly runs into Inhumans who call him out, the X-Men are disgusted with him due to Scott's actions which aren't all that different from what they did,}} he sees an article titled Cyclops: Mutant Hitler? with a comical picture of Old!Scott with the Hitler 'stache, Angel points out they only have two weeks to live, Scott reacts as if self-preservation is the ultimate Moral Event Horizon and declares the X-Men have made a Face–Heel Turn. He's then possessed by Mosaic who had also possessed Magneto, giving access to Magneto's memories where it's revealed Emma just happened to tell Magneto exactly of her plans causing Scott to vow to kill Emma. It's about as subtle as a sledgehammer.

@3149 — sorry; I read the three definitions together, and they seemed to be evidence for "Dark Fantasy isn't consistently defined" (your thesis for paragraph two) instead of an alternative to my post.
@3150 — yes, because Urban Fantasy has a consistent definition of "any fantasy taking place mostly in a city"; the genre is defined by the setting.
I'll suggest if we're going to use the definition from 3147, we should change the second line of Dark Fantasy.
Link to TRS threads in project mode here.