Ensemble Dark Horse Cleanup

We're not supposed to base it upon arcs, but the series as a whole. It's a matter of whether they were a main character/important character or not. Just about everyone is an important character in the series at one point or another. It's a rotating cast in that sense. It's really just best left off the trope due to the nature of the series.

Bulma and Gohan have both been consistently important enough to be permanently disqualified from Ensemble Dark Horse, even if they've been Demoted to Extra (which I think has happened?).

Agreed with Gohan, but Bulma I'm iffy on. She still contributes to the plot, but I'd say after Namek she's really not a main character. Even in the Android arc, where she built a freaking shutdown for the Androids she doesn't really directly affect the plot much (discounting her future counterpart sending Trunks, that is).

When series are that type of Long Runners that is next to impossible, the new guys always get some kind of focus before being demoted to ensemble.

Senran Kagura is almost as bad as each game the newbies get the forefront in some way right next to the Hanzo mains then demoted.

Bulma was the co-main character when Dragonball started, she got demoted right after the pilaf arc and never took the mantle back.

edited 28th Apr '17 8:51:00 PM by Memers

I removed Kramer from YMMV.Seinfeld, since he is one of the four main characters and is absent in exactly two episodes in the entire series' run.

I'm starting to think we should have a trope for Fan Favourite/Fan Favourite Character, in the same vein as Creator's Favourite: characters who have the most fans of the cast, regardless of their status in the show.

edited 4th May '17 4:37:17 PM by maxwellsilver

I'm positive Fan Favorite was a thing at one point years ago that got cut for not being tropeworthy.

Fan Favourite doesn't really work, since it's basically just going to collect a bunch of main characters, ensemble darkhorses (who shouldn't be listed, since it's a subtrope), and a whole bunch of gushing. Or at least, that's been the prediction of most people who've said anything about it, which may or may not be based on actual experience. I happen to agree with that. "The audience reacts as expected" isn't much of a trope.

Fan Favorite was a thing and I helped to expunge it from the wiki. It was nothing but gushing and ZCEs.

It's all gushing, here too.

A fan favorite would need to be curated I would think, they would need proof like some official character poll and such. Which do exist and imo are a trope in of themselves and do greatly affect works, like Hyperdevotion Noire Goddess Black Heart wouldn't exist if it wasn't for a character poll putting Noire on top objective Fan Favorite that got her promoted.

edited 6th May '17 10:44:33 AM by Memers

Now that is something I could get behind.

Is there something there that Breakout Character or something similar doesn't cover?

There's an issue on YMMV.ARMS with editors adding an entries concerning Twintelle. Which while she is popular she's also part of the main roster and isn't that much more or less promoted than other characters in the game.

As I mentioned in the other thread, that makes her prominent enough that she'd have to be an absolute superstar compared to all other characters and to the game itself to qualify.

The trope is about popularity relative to prominance, and if someone doesn't have any characters who're significantly more prominent (i.e. on a higher character tier, where a single main character would be the highest tier), then they can't really qualify.

A little late but.

Breakout Character is when they elevate an Ensemble Dark Horse to their own work. None of that is required to be a Poll Favorite. Companies will occasionally pull a Wolverine Publicity with them but not always.

For example for the character polls for the Tales Of Franchise they flat out banned Yuri and Leon from appearing in said polls as a 'hall of fame member' to give others a chance to be on the polls. It's been ~10 years and they were the top of every one till the ban. The only real Wolverine Publicity is their costumes occasionally appear in other games as DLC.

Love Live apparently do nothing with their character polls [1] except instigate waifu wars. They were running them even before the series had actually started and only had release one single image of the 9 characters.

Negima used polls to determine who actually got focus or needed retooling.

edited 5th Jun '17 9:26:38 PM by Memers

Feel free to start a TLP about it. Poll Favourite probably evades some of the problems of Fan Favourite.

On the Trump and ROCEJ thread, we're debating Trumps entry under EnsembleDarkHorse.Real Life.

While a Dark Horse in the original definition (Dark Horse Victory), and does fit the criteria of unexpected popularity, can someone with his significant (majority according to popular vote) amount of critics qualify?

What is the like/dislike ratio that's the cutoff point for Darkhorse / Base-Breaking Character?

edited 11th Sep '17 4:00:30 PM by Ferot_Dreadnaught

Trump should be deleted because obviously he's a shoehorned example. Lots of people can't stand him, actually.

I'd say there's probably a segment between Ensemble Dark Horse and Base-Breaking Character where the character doesn't fit either. However, they're not two tropes on the same scale. They have different definitions.

Someone running for US president doesn't fit Ensemble Dark Horse. There's no ensemble, and if it is one, it's a major character. "Unexpected popularity" refers to someone who becomes popular despite minor focus, not someone people didn't expect was actually popular.

The way the people use the trope in the politics section looks more like Dark Horse Victory than Ensemble Dark Horse. There's a reason those are separate tropes.

It's brought up on the Darkhorse thread that, since politicians are not part of an ensemble, they can't begin to qualify. Most of them are just examples of Dark Horse Victory.

It also list the US founding fathers, who I believe are not minor characters.

That each candidate has campaigns to make them widely known and promoted seems that by definition they are too heavily promoted to qualify.

Also, politicians almost inevitably have enough detractors to be Base Breaking Characters, exempting them.

I question if Ensemble Dark Horse can work in real life since it dosen't offer any way to distinguish minor characters from major (it seems being a Darkhorse immediately makes them too "major" to be a Darkhorse by this wiki's use), or distinguishing them from Base Breaking Characters. Any thoughts on that?

I honestly don't think Ensemble Dark Horse should - or rather, can - have real life examples at all. The only thing I can think of that even comes close are random everyday people that go memetic such as Batman bin Suparman, and that still feels like a major shoehorn and/or covered by something else.

On EnsembleDarkHorse.Real Life, the only example I think is actually even somewhat legitimate is the mascot one under Other. That's the only one you can argue some kind of focus. On the other hand, that's kind of like saying a fan character would qualify as an example under the canon work if it's popular enough, which we definitely don't allow.

I'm unsure if we should disallow all real life examples, or just cut the bad ones. Which is the entire section as it stands. The proper course of action would probably be to bring it up in the Real Life Section maintenance thread, discuss, and vote there.

It's not that I think we should disallow Real Life examples, but it's that this is one of those things where like said, there cannot be a Real Life example. It's like Chekhov's Gun; it relies on existing in a narrative to an extent that it's just impossibl (note that CG isn't NRLEP, but has no real life section).

Just removed Jimmy Early and Effie White from Dreamgirls . I know the page isn't as popular as the ones discussed here, but I am a huge fan of the movie and the characters listed were main characters. Main characters do not count.

For The Proud Family, I deleted Zoey and Oscar as examples. It's because the former is much of a Base Breaker and is controversial and the latter is a main character.

I also deleted the Cowardly Lion and the Scarecrow from YMMV.The Wiz because they are main characters.

For Ed, Edd n Eddy, I think that only Rolf qualifies as an Ensemble Dark Horse because he isn't controversial. With Jonny and Marie Kanker, they come off as base breakers and they are controversial. They aren't as controversial as Kevin, Sarah, and Jimmy though.

edited 1st Nov '17 7:04:08 AM by MsCC93

I agree do nuke Real Life section

EnsembleDarkhorse.Steven Universe lists pretty much every single character in the show who didn't start off as a member of the main cast. I think that Peridot at least can almost certainly be cut, considering how she was the show's first major antagonist which means that she had a big role right from her introduction.