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Overshadowed By Controversy Cleanup

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Overshadowed by Controversy has several examples, particularly under the Fan Works, Webcomics, and Web Original folders, that don't fit the trope as described. The controversy is supposed to overshadow the work, so if it doesn't do that it shouldn't count as a valid example.

The media folders, such as Anime or Western Animation, could also use a look, as some entries deal with shows, while others deal with actors, fans, or creators. Additionally, some of the entries are not controversial anymore or are not known enough to overshadow the show completely, and others seem closer to Never Live It Down.

Some examples even point out that the controversy was debunked or died down eventually, which doesn't fit the trope, as well as examples saying things like "time will tell if [x] can recover." I originally tried the Real-Life cleanup section, and then a TRS thread, but I hope this is the right section to help us clean up this trope's examples. ^^

MOD NOTE: For something to be overshadowed by controversy; it has to have a significant, arguably overwhelming impact on that work/creator/thing that’s provable by pointing to actual evidence beyond social media likes or a news report. The controversy has to be bigger than the thing for it to overshadow the thing.

For a work, did it bomb directly due to the controversy? Was it pulled from shelves or streaming services? Nothing like this? Then it most likely doesn’t count.

For a creator, did they lose their job/get banned or lose all of their sponsorships or are unable to get any work directly due to the controversy? Did they at least retire directly because of the controversy? Nothing like this? Then it most likely doesn’t count.

Valid examples would be people like Gina Carano or Louie CK. As they were both fired and black listed for their controversies. Or Johnny Depp and Amber Heard are now more known for those controversies than their actual careers. Clearly being overshadowed by it.

If only chronically online people like us are going to be aware of something, it definitely doesn’t count. The controversy has to be so big that even people who are rarely online or know very little about something, would still have heard of the controversy.

Edited by kory on Oct 4th 2025 at 10:21:54 AM

Delibirda from Splatsville Since: Sep, 2020 Relationship Status: I wanna be your dog
#1576: Apr 20th 2021 at 11:00:58 AM

Isn't OBC only about works?

"Listen up, Marina, because this is SUPER important. Whatever you do, don't eat th“ “DON'T EAT WHAT?! Your text box ran out of space!”
Zuxtron Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel from Node 03 (On A Trope Odyssey)
#1577: Apr 20th 2021 at 11:01:09 AM

I'm another person who mostly associates Barbra Streisand's name with the Streisand Effect.

mightymewtron Word Up from New New York Since: Oct, 2012 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Word Up
#1578: Apr 20th 2021 at 11:02:05 AM

[up][up] Creators can be OBC.

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.
bwburke94 I am mad scientist! It's so cool! from 1.048596% (Y2: Electric Boogaloo) Relationship Status: She does the things you do, but she is an IBM
I am mad scientist! It's so cool!
#1579: Apr 20th 2021 at 12:41:54 PM

The Streisand Effect is a part of internet culture, but the public at large doesn't associate Streisand with that picture of her house.

2025: the year it all ends?
RallyBot2 (Elder Troper) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
#1580: Apr 20th 2021 at 1:25:49 PM

[tdown] from me. She's known for other things first and foremost.

PlasmaPower Piece of Cake. Since: Jan, 2015
Piece of Cake.
#1581: Apr 20th 2021 at 11:14:13 PM

Huh. I'm surprised people know her other than trying to sue because of a image of her house.

Anyways, here is another List of Transgressions. Phil as a whole is a controversial figure, but I think the masturbation incident is the one thing I've seen people who don't hate-watch him bring up.

  • The King Of Hate, already a divisive figure for his gaming skills (or lack thereof) and rude attitude, is also infamous for many things besides his Let's Plays. This includes his jokes about women, ethnic minorities and homosexuals that many found to be offensive; his apparent inability to take criticism or respect others' opinions; rude behavior towards his own fanbase; his treatment of John Rambo, Respect the Pact (which led to them both cutting all ties with him) and former girlfriend Leanne (PandaLee); accidentally recording himself masturbating on-stream; and other behaviors that many people consider disgusting in a very off-putting way. All of this has caused him to go from a merely polarizing figure to an outright hated one. For individual examples:
    • His playthrough of Splinter Cell: Conviction is known almost entirely for having been hit with a fraudulent copyright strike by somebody going by "Steve Jones", who falesly claimed to have been representing Ubisoft.
    • His Dead Space 2 demo playthrough is best known for him doing a lengthy bit about Isaac Clarke being a Nazi and killing Jewish people, which got him banned from Blip.tv and which he didn't apologize for until 2019.
    • His Kingdom Hearts I let's play has become notorious for the finale stream, where his then-girlfriend (the aforementioned PandaLee) antagonized some of his viewers. When said viewers retaliated by arguing with her, he responded by ranting at them and putting the chat in sub-only mode. To this day, it's the incident many detractors point to when accusing him of being rude and toxic towards his fanbase.
    • His Sleeping Dogs playthrough gained infamy for the many "Asian" jokes he made. Not helping matters were his attempts at defending them, first claiming that the game was "setting him up" for such jokes by virtue of being set in Hong Kong and then saying nobody was offended at him repeatedly joking that Wei Shen was a gay prostitute.
    • The Nioh alpha stream is best known for him masturbating at the end of it... not knowing the camera was still on. While only his face and part of his torso were visible, it was still clear what he was doing, and him trying to deny the incident by claiming he was just scratching his leg only brought more attention to it.
    • Project 7, an attempt at a proper webshow, is best known for some shady financial behavior on Phil's part. Having been shelved due to a combination of Phil moving from Connecticut to Washington state and the show's graphics editor being unable to continue working on it, Phil used the promise of a continuation/reboot of the series as a high stretch goal to lure more and higher contributions to his Patreon account. But after reaching this goal, Phil put the series on indefinite hiatus without offering refunds to those who contributed believing they would see Project 7 return. In a later video that was to "debunk 7 years of slander" he claimed that the goal was for a Project 7 trailer, though his critics have shown the original offering not stating anything of the such.
    • His Scarface: The World Is Yours playthrough is notorious for him rage quitting partway through because he learned a YouTuber going by the handle Fred Fuchs was making a "This Is How You DON'T Play" montage of the playthrough. He refused to continue playing it despite his fans' requests, simply because he didn't want to give Fuchs more footage to use in his montage.
    • His Let's Play of Sonic Adventure 2 is infamous for his bashing of the game and especially the Fan Hater attitude he adopted, saying that people who defended the game had "rose-colored glasses". Phil later tried to backpedal on the former by claiming he was just expressing his opinions, but his refusal to take back his comments about the game's fans failed to quell the ire.

Edited by PlasmaPower on Apr 20th 2021 at 3:21:25 PM

Thomas fans needed! Come join me in the the show's cleanup thread!
DDRMASTERM do you wanna have a bad time? from Someplace, Utah, USA Since: Apr, 2013 Relationship Status: You cannot grasp the true form
do you wanna have a bad time?
#1582: Apr 20th 2021 at 11:27:42 PM

[up] Phil is mostly just a controversial figure who’s best known for being terrible at gaming and hostile to critics. I mean, what kind of person would brand themselves “The King of Hate” without intending to be controversial.

Edited by DDRMASTERM on Apr 20th 2021 at 12:32:27 PM

Delibirda from Splatsville Since: Sep, 2020 Relationship Status: I wanna be your dog
#1583: Apr 21st 2021 at 12:26:05 AM

We can just remove it. Could violate ROCEJ too.

"Listen up, Marina, because this is SUPER important. Whatever you do, don't eat th“ “DON'T EAT WHAT?! Your text box ran out of space!”
ooh Since: Jul, 2012
#1584: Apr 21st 2021 at 12:41:59 PM

Have a couple concerns about a few movies listed in Live-Action Films

  • Beauty and the Beast (2017):
    • The film's spectacular visual effects were overshadowed by a lawsuit over the motion capture technology used for the Beast character and Emma Watson's comments about said technology which Rearden may use in its unprecedented lawsuit against producer Disney and two other major Hollywood studios over their use of the technology in question in certain films.
    • There was also Bill Condon making a big deal about the film's version of LeFou being gay. Debates immediately sprang up about how while it was nice to finally have an officially gay character in a Disney film, selecting a pathetic comic relief villain for the role wasn't exactly progressive.note  And then there was a backlash from some conservatives leading to some theaters in the Deep South refusing to screen the film, Malaysia to ban the film, and Russia giving it an adults-only rating. And then the film was released and it turned out the only gay content was a blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot of him dancing with another man at the end, leading to numerous accusations of making a false promise to draw in an LGBT audience (known in the community as "queerbaiting," which has gotten increasing scrutiny). Condon made a further statement that he very much regretted bringing the issue up at all.

  • The Hateful Eight saw itself being marred by several controversies:
    • A month before the film was released, its director Quentin Tarantino joined a rally against police violence, causing police unions around the country to declare they would boycott the film, and not provide help to any future projects of his. This caused his fans to get up in arms themselves, especially when an NYPD spokesman said there would be "a surprise" for Tarantino when the film opened, sounding for all the world like some kind of mob boss. They reneged on whatever the plan was shortly before the opening, having finally realized they were only giving the film free publicity (and from the more cynical suspicions, realizing that busting some heads at the theater would only get them more bad publicity).
    • A 140-year-old antique guitar lent by a museum (that cost about $40,000) was accidentally destroyed during filming. Kurt Russell (the actor in the film who destroyed the guitar) wasn't told that it was supposed to be swapped with a fake prop and ended up destroying the real one by mistake, freaking out everyone on set and getting a genuinely horrified reaction from co-star Jennifer Jason Leigh (which, alongside the entire take, was kept in the film). This pissed off the people who lent it in the first place and the museum director stated that they weren't told that a scene involving a guitar being smashed was in the script. Said museum also stated that they will no longer lend guitars to film productions.
    • Tarantino himself would be dragged into the Harvey Weinstein rape scandal when evidence surfaced in early 2018 that Tarantino had been aware of the accusations while making movies with his studio in the '90s, but had done nothing about them; it's been said that he felt so guilty about it he allowed Kill Bill star Uma Thurman to reveal some extremely troubling details about that film.

I think that most of these controversies aren’t worthy of merit. The visual effects issue in ‘’BATB’’ and the smashed guitar in ‘’Hateful Eight’’ seem more like fringe issues. The “gay moment” in ‘’BATB’’ was controversial, but it seems like the film as a whole hasn’t been overshadowed. Same with the big fuss police unions made over Tarantino. And Tarantino’s ties with Harvey Weinstein has nothing to do with ‘’Hateful Eight’’.

Siegfried1337 Calabash. from The Eastern Luminant Since: Sep, 2018 Relationship Status: Will you go out with me to the End?
Calabash.
#1585: Apr 22nd 2021 at 7:35:48 AM

[up] I only knew The Hateful Eight as a mere western movie. Probably cut.

Eh, good enough.
miraculous Goku Black (Apprentice)
Goku Black
#1586: Apr 22nd 2021 at 7:36:47 AM

I have genuinely never heard of those for the hateful 8 so just cut them.

"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."
Merseyuser1 Since: Sep, 2011
#1587: Apr 22nd 2021 at 1:52:10 PM

Would this example fit for Real Life, under Actors, Film Makers and Presenters:

  • British television presenter Alastair Stewart, well-known for ITN News and Police, Camera, Action! will forever be associated with two controversies:
    • His drink-drive arrest in 2003 which resulted in him losing his job as presenter of that show, but he was kept on for one final season in 2007 due to the Grandfather Clause. Incidentally, he admitted on the second episode of Police, Camera, Action! in 1994 to being caught drink-driving, but Values Dissonance was in play, as back then, drink-driving wasn't treated as major as today.
    • A racist tweet/argument with a student which resulted in him losing his job on ITN News permanently and moving to a smaller, more obscure network.

HashiriyaR32 Since: Jan, 2001
#1588: Apr 22nd 2021 at 2:42:28 PM

Only ever heard of the DUI incident from his Police, Camera, Action! days.

RallyBot2 (Elder Troper) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
#1589: Apr 22nd 2021 at 6:04:39 PM

Honestly, it might be a better idea to put stricter guidelines in place for creators being OBC. There's far too many "writer or actor did a Bad Thing(TM)" examples that neglect to even mention the "overshadowed" part of the trope.

mightymewtron Word Up from New New York Since: Oct, 2012 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Word Up
#1590: Apr 22nd 2021 at 9:27:27 PM

[up] That's a TRS issue. If I could put one restriction, I'd say it has to be a single controversy overshadowing the rest.

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.
ImperialMajestyXO Since: Nov, 2015
#1591: Apr 22nd 2021 at 11:28:54 PM

I'd like to dispute DSP's removal. While I agree that the tree was overly long, he's not "intentionally controversial". The reason he adopted "The King of Hate" as his title was because he used the criticism he got as a motivator. He doesn't intentionally set out to be controversial like a troll.

DDRMASTERM do you wanna have a bad time? from Someplace, Utah, USA Since: Apr, 2013 Relationship Status: You cannot grasp the true form
do you wanna have a bad time?
#1592: Apr 23rd 2021 at 7:11:29 AM

[up] Feel free to give a write-up then. Might help to mention his decently successful past in the Fighting Game Community too as prologue to how he became controversial.

PlasmaPower Piece of Cake. Since: Jan, 2015
Piece of Cake.
#1593: Apr 23rd 2021 at 7:40:34 AM

[up] Like I said before, the masturbation incident is the one I see most people who don't hate-watch him bring up.

Thomas fans needed! Come join me in the the show's cleanup thread!
DDRMASTERM do you wanna have a bad time? from Someplace, Utah, USA Since: Apr, 2013 Relationship Status: You cannot grasp the true form
do you wanna have a bad time?
#1594: Apr 23rd 2021 at 10:52:23 PM

Let’s get back to the question of the time limit on politicians for term end +10 years. Should it be a crowner or just agree to go with it?

Coolnut Since: Jan, 2001
#1595: Apr 24th 2021 at 7:16:37 AM

[up] Reading all this, end +10 is perfectly fine.

bwburke94 I am mad scientist! It's so cool! from 1.048596% (Y2: Electric Boogaloo) Relationship Status: She does the things you do, but she is an IBM
I am mad scientist! It's so cool!
#1596: Apr 24th 2021 at 7:17:30 AM

+10 works for me as well. It's long enough that there shouldn't be any issues.

Edited by bwburke94 on Apr 24th 2021 at 6:26:53 AM

2025: the year it all ends?
themayorofsimpleton Short-Term Projects Herald | he/him from the Island of Koridai (Captain) Relationship Status: I won't say I'm in love
RallyBot2 (Elder Troper) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
#1598: Apr 24th 2021 at 5:28:35 PM

If no one objects in the next couple days, we can go ahead and make this official. To make sure we're all on the same page, the NREP entry would be

  • Overshadowed by Controversy (For politicians and political examples onlynote : 10 years after the event or 10 years after the politician leaves office, whichever comes later): Due to the general Flame Bait of political discussions, a longer waiting period is warranted.

mightymewtron Word Up from New New York Since: Oct, 2012 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Word Up
#1599: Apr 24th 2021 at 6:15:05 PM

[up] Did we run it by the NREP cleanup? I can't recall.

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.
RallyBot2 (Elder Troper) Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
#1600: Apr 24th 2021 at 6:28:15 PM

I posted in the thread; not much has happened over there in a while.


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