Unclear Description: Too Smart For Strangers

Deadlock Clock: Jan 13th 2020 at 11:59:00 PM

SomePerson Since: Sep, 2016 Relationship Status: All I Want for Christmas is a Girlfriend

#1: Feb 27th 2019 at 6:47:31 PM

What started out seeming like a pull-thread for what I thought was a terrible image raised an important question: is this trope about a Stock Aesop about stranger danger, or is it about kids' shows dropping that particular anvil in a Very Special Episode?

Wick Check

A Lesson Learned Too Well:
- More nuanced Stranger Danger Aesops tend to be aware of this as a danger. The Berenstain Bears book about Stranger Danger had the entire later part of the plot being about Sister having learned the lesson too well. Very Special Episode interpretation.
Discredited Meme:
- In the commentary for the same video, he cited this trope as his reason for not including the famous "bad touch" clip, mentioning also that, really, it was good advice and it was pretty ballsy of the show to make it. References an episode of Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, which I think is the Very Special Episode interpretation.
Pandaing To The Audience (wow, what a spectacular trope name that we should definitely keep!):
- South Park had Sexual Harassment Panda, but he was just a guy in a suit.
  - Not if you asked him.
  - This is a subversion in that this particular "panda" was actually quite revolting, given his Too Smart for Strangers spiel.
  - Probably misused, very likely shoehorned.
Scare 'Em Straight:
- So what if a kid winds up a twitching vegetable afraid of venturing into the outside world? At least he won't get kidnapped by a lollipop-wielding child-molester or hit by a bus while jaywalking and smoking crack. Should probably also pothole to Bad Samaritan, but other than that given the context it could go either way.
The Body Parts That Must Not Be Named:
- In fact, this trope is often why works which try to teach about "good and bad touches" end up being clumsily-written. Given that the pothole doesn't cover "works which…" I'd call this the Stock Aesop interpretation.
AdventureTime.Tropes A To C:
- Under Adult Fear (which it should really have its own subpage for):
  - Your child being manipulated and then outright bullied by strangers on their way to school and keeping the truth from you all the time. Shoehorned; fits neither.
Animation.The Legend Of Lucky Pie:
- Stranger Danger: Pie tells Lucky not to approach the mermaid too quickly as he will seem like a pedophile. Discussion of the trope; could go either way.
Anime.Super Mario Traffic Safety:
- Too Smart for Strangers: A safety tip about not talking to strangers is given. Bowser acts as a "stranger" who tries to kidnap the little girl. It's a 5-minute PSA that covers a few other topics; according to Trope Talk this isn't a Very Special Episode.
BeamMeUpScotty.Live Action TV:
- A number of folks (usually haters who wish to add another black mark to the series) believed that Barney said the message, "A stranger is a friend you haven't met" in the episode Playing It Safe^noteThis rumor originated on the alt.barney.dinosaur.die.die.die newsgroup . He never actually said that! Not once. In said episode, Derek is the one who brings up the subject and notes that "Strangers are people you don't know, and they could be bad people!" In traditional Barney fashion, a song is sung a little while afterwards reinforcing the message.
  Never talk to strangers
  That's very good advice
  'Cause you just can't tell
  If they're good or bad,
  Even though they may seem nice
  Even though they may seem nice
  - Very Special Episode interpretation—see below on the other location it appears in.
BrokenAesop.Anime And Manga:
- In Cowboy Bebop's "Toys in the Attic" episode, an episode devoted to twisting An Aesop in increasingly silly ways, Ed's already silly lesson of "If you see a stranger, follow him!" is broken by Ed losing interest in the "stranger" and falling asleep. Very Special Episode interpretation, also a parody.
Characters.Bio Shock Infinite:
- Bread, Eggs, Milk, Squick: The narrations shown in the game go over Stranger Danger, standing for the national anthem...and gun maintenance. Not really enough context to say. If someone who's played the game would like to pitch in here that would be great.
Characters.Bittersweet Candy Bowl:
- Too Smart for Strangers: Subverted. He rebuffs David's and Molly's separate attempts to get him to go with him, only for him to be tricked and cajoled into following strangers. Troper is confused by the title; not an example.
Characters.Jumanji The Animated Series:
- Tragic Keepsake: Since the cartoon can't show him being dead, his burnt-out Bag of Holding is used as a stand in after he is striken by lightning. So much of a sinkhole I've already removed it. Why was this added?
Characters.Mindhunter:
- Too Smart for Strangers: He [the principal] is introduced censoring a speech that Holden is going to give to a school class about the MacDonald Triad, rendering it vague to the point of nonsensical. I looked up the Macdonald Triad and it could arguably be a valid example. It should probably be moved to Holden's trope list, but it supports the Stock Aesop interpretation.
Characters.Pathfinder Archfiends:
- (under: "Folca focuses his efforts on spreading terror and death among the young of mortals.")
  - Stranger Danger: Obviously his inspiration. Could go either way.
DBZAbridged.Tropes S To Z:
- Too Smart for Strangers: Parodied in the Namek saga with Gohan three times, the first with Vegeta then Krillin and then Super Kami Guru and each time getting more sexual innuendos. The line itself was parodied later with Goku: Not quite enough context here, although as with other parodies it could probably go either way.
DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything.Western Animation:
- (under MLP:FiM) Oh dear God THIS SCENE from "The Cutie Re-Mark". Everything from Twilight's creepy way of asking Rainbow Dash to do "something" for her and Rainbow Dash's clearly horrified and uncomfortable reaction is one bag of M&Ms and a black van away from a Sonic Sez segment. Seems to be merely Bad Samaritan.
FamilyUnfriendlyAesop.Live Action TV:
- The League of Gentlemen has an in-universe example with Legz Akimbo, whose "educational" plays for kids about social issues all contain this trope. Examples include "Everybody Out!" about homosexuality (if a family member doesn't accept your homosexuality "they can go kill themselves, like Mom did!") or "Perv Swerve" about Stranger Danger (anyone you meet in the real world could be a paedophile, so only trust people you meet online!) Very Special Episode interpretation.
FamilyUnfriendlyAesop.Western Animation:
- (under Caillou) Played straight with one infamous episode, which had Caillou being afraid of a man just because he doesn't know him. His mother then actually leaves him alone with said man to teach him to get over his fears. While this is apparently intended to be a subversion of the Stranger Danger specials of the 1980s-1990s, it remains that Caillou's mother leaving him alone with someone who's a complete stranger to her as well is irresponsible for being a statistically slight but potentially very terrible risk to take with her child. Very Special Episode interpretation.
Fanfic.The Outside:
- Stranger Danger: Played with, strangers aren't shown to be inherently bad but Ryuuko does come across a "nasty dude", who's implied to be child predator. Stock Aesop interpretation.
Film.Department Q The Keeper Of Lost Causes:
- Too Smart for Strangers: Played with. Carl looks into Merete's romantic life for suspects first, noting that 95% of the time, women murdered in Denmark are killed by their lovers or men they rejected, but it turns out to be some guy she hooked up with at a conference, and whose only other connection to her is a shared childhood trauma he blames her for. Confusion with Bad Samaritan.
Funny.Game Grumps Arin And Danny:
- Danny tells a story about smoking pot on a friend's porch, both of them heedless that the porch faced the fence of an elementary school playground. When they realized the children were gathering to watch, they quickly stopped smoking and tried to hide their pot, only to have one kid announce loudly "Those are bad guys!" Cue emotional devastation. Somewhat shoehorned.
Funny.Honest Trailers 2016 Episodes:
The Nostalgia Critic: Nobody knows. How about Turtle Tunes? The one where they reworked public domain songs with lyrics about stranger danger? Could go either way.
Funny.Tom Servo 3:
- The Too Smart for Strangers poops. All fucking nine of them! It's a parody of the Trope Namer, and also NSFW. Not entirely sure how to count this one.
Literature.Little Red Riding Hood:
- Too Smart for Strangers: Nope, she wasn't. It's often used as An Aesop. Given that it applies to the tale as a whole, probably the Stock Aesop interpretation.
Literature.Missing Since Monday:
- Stranger Danger: Sort of. Jessica wasn't a stranger to Mike, Maggie, or their father, but Courtenay certainly didn't know her. This was a rare example where the dangerous person was a woman rather than a man. Probably the Stock Aesop interpretation, but could require further input.
Manga.Kono Bijutsubu Niwa Mondai Ga Aru:
- Stranger Danger:
  - Collette's first impression of the new club advisor, Tachibana-sensei.
  - Invoked towards Usami and Uchimaki when they were helping a mother find her lost daughter. The daughter won't come near them when they finally found her, no thanks to a certain masked person heavily implied to be Collette.
  - I can see some elements of the trope here, but I'm not sure which way to put it.
NightmareFuel.The Berenstain Bears:
- Sister's fear of strangers in "The Trouble With Strangers". The worst of it actually comes early when Papa reads several newspaper articles to Sister regarding stranger danger. Among them is a headline reading Stranger Bothers Cub. Suddenly Bear Country doesn't look much safer than real life — if anything, it seems particularly riddled with kidnappers and sex offenders. Very Special Episode interpretation.
OhCrap.Fan Works:
- In Cinema Snob Reviews Frozen (a fan comic where The Cinema Snob reviews Frozen), Snob does this when Kristoff asks Anna about her parents telling her not to talk to strangers, because he thinks the film will go into Too Smart for Strangers territory. He is so grateful when it doesn't. Stock Aesop interpretation.
PlayingWith.Bedouin Rescue Service:
- (under Subverted) Alice and Bob end up getting hurt or killed by going off with a stranger. Misuse probably related to assumptions from the trope name.
PlayingWith.Spotlight Fallacy:
- Straight: While watching the news one morning, there is a lot of news coverage of the abduction of a little girl named Alice. Bob is worried for his kids, so he becomes more protective of them, and constantly reminds them not to talk to strangers. (For example, where he used to allow them to walk to school by themselves, he now insists on driving them.) Stock Aesop interpretation.
Recap.Supernatural S 14 E 04 Mint Condition:
- Stranger Danger: Averted. While Dean isn't particularly worried about the people in the bunker he does remind Sam that he doesn't know any of them and that's a perfectly valid reason to stay in his room rather than going into other parts of the bunker. Seems more Downplayed to me, but anyway, could go either way; I'd need more context.
Series.Diffrent Strokes:
- Too Smart for Strangers: One of the more infamous examples. Zero context.
SoYouWantTo.Write An Aesop:
- You, the writer, didn't do the research: If someone out there knows a fact that you got wrong, they might decide your Aesop is meaningless- after all, why listen to an author who doesn't know what they're talking about? Examples of common research failures are a Disease-Prevention Aesop where viruses live on surfaces or the weather makes people sick, a Drugs Are Bad message where people trip on mild drugs like pot, or a Too Smart for Strangers lesson which acts as though strangers are the only people who could molest or kidnap children. Stock Aesop interpretation.
SouthPark.Tropes R To V:
- Too Smart for Strangers: Parodied three times over. Zero context.
Trivia.Barney And Friends:
- Beam Me Up, Scotty!: Contrary to popular criticisms, Barney has never stated that "strangers are friends you've never met."^note Instead, the very opposite was stated by Derek in the episode "Playing It Safe" (he said that they're not only people you don't know, but that "they could be bad people."), which led to a short Too Smart for Strangers moral using a play of Little Red Riding Hood and a song (in traditional Barney fashion) to reinforce the message. Sounds like the Very Special Episode interpretation.
UsefulNotes.Mc Donalds:
- Too Smart for Strangers: The second commercial seemed to be trying for this, but instead, it just comes off as incredibly creepy. Stock Aesop interpretation.
VideoGame.Evil Genius:
- Too Smart for Strangers: Apparently averted in America, since the radio announcement when you successfully kidnap someone in the Mid-West includes advice that people take "basic self preservation" steps like "not taking candy from strangers." Parody; could be either.
VideoGame.Wardner:
- Adult Fear: The game averts Too Smart for Strangers- The hero and the princess brainlessly follows a complete stranger who is offering to take them to a Fantasia (whatever that is), and the princess is then kidnapped and the hero is left to try to save the princess on his own. Possibly confused by the "Too Smart For" part of the title.
WarpThatAesop.Western Animation:
- W.I.T.C.H.: A young girl has gone missing? Screw getting information and evidence yourself, believe everything a random kid tells you and accuse a bunch of other random girls of killing her despite them having zero ill-will towards her! It's not like she was last seen spending a lot of time around a grown man whom she'd recently met, it's clearly the red-haired girl that yells at her calculator that's evil! More misuse as "the concept of strangers being evil" instead of a moral about that.
WebVideo.The Annotated Series:
- Stranger Danger: The subject matter of Tricky People, Professor Garfield: Internet Safety, and Boys Beware. Mocked and deconstructed to Hell and back, especially with the last one. Very Special Episode interpretation.
WesternAnimation.The Adventures Of Teddy Ruxpin:
- The Missing Princess features a five minute one about stranger danger.^note Stock Aesop interpretation.
YMMV.Caillou:
- (under Family-Unfriendly Aesop) One infamous episode had Caillou being afraid of a man just because he doesn't know the guy. What does his mother do? Why, leave him alone with said man to teach him to get over his fears! While this is apparently intended to be a subversion of the Stranger Danger specials of the 1980s-1990s, it remains that Caillou's mother leaving him alone with someone who's a complete stranger to her as well is irresponsible for being a statistically slight but potentially very terrible risk to take with her child. Very Special Episode interpretation.
YMMV.Fantastic Beasts The Crimes Of Grindelwald:
- Ho Yay: Vinda meets Queenie using tactics right out of the Stranger Danger playbook. She finds an attractive, vulnerable young woman all alone and invites her home. Queenie gets uncomfortable and tries to leave but Vinda pressures her to stay. She also keeps pouring Queenie tea even after she refuses, mirroring how real life people manipulate politeness to slip someone a spiked drink. Definitely fits under Bad Samaritan.
YMMV.Tricky People:
- Narm: A Stranger Danger PSA with upbeat musical numbers, a Totally Radical mascot, and a Bumbling Sidekick for the villain is funny. All of that contrasted against a serious, realistic portrayal of a sexual predator is hilarious. Stock Aesop interpretation.

Side note: that took me 6 hours. I will probably never do this again except when I have far more free time than I know what to do with. Also, if someone who favors the VSE version would check my work, that would be awesome.

Summary

Usage as a Stock Aesop: 12
Usage as a Very Special Episode: 10
Unsure/could go either way: 10
Shoehorned/mistaken/zero context: 13

Conclusions

It's about an even split between the 2 views, with Stock Aesop in a narrow lead. I also notice that a lot of the usage assumes that it merely means "strangers are bad"—an interpretation for which Bad Samaritan is much better suited.

Recommendation

Since the Very Special Episode interpretation is fully compatible with the Stock Aesop interpretation, we should go with the latter. This would essentially make it a Sister Trope to Drugs Are Bad.
The new trope name should be Stranger Danger Aesop, to make it consistent with what it's called by The Other Wiki and in common vocabulary. Simply Stranger Danger should become either a redlink or a disambiguation page, because it seems to imply more than what the trope actually is.
We should go through the wicks and correct the ones that should be directed at Bad Samaritan.
The current image needs to be tossed out.

Edited by SomePerson on Feb 27th 2019 at 8:52:26 AM

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Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life

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#2: Feb 28th 2019 at 11:44:24 AM

I'm opening this. Again, very good OP.

I agree that the confusion between the stock Aesop and the idea of kids outsmarting would-be assailants is enough to justify distinguishing them.

Edited by Fighteer on Feb 28th 2019 at 2:45:36 PM

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Brainulator9 Short-Term Projects herald from US Since: Aug, 2018 Relationship Status: I get a feeling so complicated...

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#3: Feb 28th 2019 at 12:54:25 PM

Previous discussion: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1551217667075970900

I suggest making a separate trope for "strangers are bad news" scenarios that do not involve deception, unlike Bad Samaritan, or Pædo Hunt Aesops, like with this trope.

By the way, the AoStH example may or may not be a Very Special Episode example, as it's a And Knowing Is Half the Battle, as with all other episodes. Judge for yourself:

Edited by Brainulator9 on Feb 28th 2019 at 3:57:40 PM

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rjd1922 he/him | Image Pickin' regular from the United States Since: May, 2013 Relationship Status: Love is for the living, Sal

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#4: Feb 28th 2019 at 2:59:46 PM

I don't see any logical reason it has to be a Very Special Episode.

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Jeduthun Won't you be my neighbor from Up the airy mountain, down the rushing glen Since: Nov, 2010 Relationship Status: Crazy Cat Lady

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#5: Mar 4th 2019 at 1:16:00 PM

Definitely the description can stand to be clarified; I somehow never even noticed it was specifically defined as a Very Special Episode.

Agreed with OP that this is most conveniently thought of a sister trope to Drugs Are Bad, where instead of drugs it's strangers. Also, both were huge in The '80s.

Surely the Stock Aesop and Very Special Episode readings are two sides to the coin, rather than mutually exclusive? As with drugs, the Stock Aesop was (thought to be) serious enough to warrant being presented via a VSE or PSA. Bad Samaritan meanwhile is simply the best character type to set up the narrative, as you can't have a story about stranger danger without a dangerous stranger.

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SomePerson Since: Sep, 2016 Relationship Status: All I Want for Christmas is a Girlfriend

#6: Mar 5th 2019 at 4:46:20 PM

I kinda agree with your third paragraph; they are somewhat the same. Thing is though, the VSE reading would pretty much cover a subset of the examples under the Stock Aesop reading, so I'd prefer to err toward the latter.

And yes, that's exactly why I suggested listing it as a Sister Trope to Drugs Are Bad: they're both shoehorned morals that were ever-present on kids' shows in the 1980's but have since fallen out of fashion.

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Brainulator9 Short-Term Projects herald from US Since: Aug, 2018 Relationship Status: I get a feeling so complicated...

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#7: Mar 22nd 2019 at 11:37:29 AM

Made a crowner.

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SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu

#8: Mar 23rd 2019 at 2:50:39 AM

That crowner seems to be overly narrow. There are a number of other proposals in this thread.

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Brainulator9 Short-Term Projects herald from US Since: Aug, 2018 Relationship Status: I get a feeling so complicated...

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#9: Mar 24th 2019 at 10:32:11 AM

~Septimus Heap, I have created a new crowner here.

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SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu

#10: Apr 23rd 2019 at 3:02:09 PM

OK, attached it.

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#11: Jun 6th 2019 at 9:53:45 AM

Calling in favor of making it a Stock Aesop.

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#12: Jun 6th 2019 at 1:06:16 PM

I probably should have specified that none of the options were mutually exclusive.

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#13: Jun 16th 2019 at 7:14:14 AM

What I'm seeing here is that we need to clean examples/wicks and tighten the description, is that right?

There was plenty of discussion about renaming in the earlier thread, but I think the crowner was called too early to decide on a rename in this thread.

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.

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