Too Bleak, Stopped Caring

That has insufficient context.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

I think DIAA could apply to comedies if it's just too mean-spirited to be funny or is offensive without Crossing the Line Twice. In addition, a series with an optimistic ending could also be DIAA if the ending was too little, too late or didn't make up for all the suffering in the story itself.

"Blowing it up always works" -RIP Goblin Boommaster, 2014-2015

Here's one regarding Tangled: The Series that I think needs to be addressed.

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: Many people who disliked Cassandra's villain arc in the third season had this reaction. Almost every episode ended with her descending further into villainy, and her increasingly dangerous and destructive behaviour made it hard to root for her to be saved. Detractors even felt that this undermined the overarching message that people deserve a second chance as they instead felt that Rapunzel should cut her losses and stop trying to save her fallen friend.

....That isnt really an example. I dont even know what it is ? Arc Fatigue ?

"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."

A while ago I removed this Bloodborne example

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• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: Before the game even begins, the city of Yharnam has been nearly exterminated by a plague and warped into a hellish nightmare by Lovecraftian horrors. Human blood is used for literally everything in the city, from alcohol to medicine. Nearly everyone left in the city are corrupt dicks, bloodthirsty Hunters, violently insane townsfolk, horrific monsters, or all of the above. The few who aren't all have terrible things happen to them, and (with a few scant exceptions) there's nothing you can do to help them. And that's all before the Genre Shift into Cosmic Horror Story and the fact that two out of the three endings are blatant "Shaggy Dog" Story moments... and the last one may or may not be much better. Combined with the tremendous Gorn, depressing gothic environments, and Mind Screw lore, it's difficult to find anything even remotely positive or hopeful here.
  • A good deal of this comes down to interpretation; given how vague much of the game's lore is, different players will have different perceptions of what truly happens, which Word of God has confirmed is intentional. For example, while the setting is very bleak, it's not set on an automatic world-ending apocalypse like Dark Souls. Indeed, over the course of the game the Hunter does basically solve the problem by stopping the spread of the Scourge via dispelling the Mensis Ritual, cutting off the sources of the Beastly Scourge by killing Mergo and Ebrietas, saving the few individuals that had a chance (e.g. Eileen is implied to have survived, and most of the Chapel residents can as well... albeit all are banged up and traumatized), ending Kos's curse, and killing all of the actively malevolent characters like Micolash, the Witches, the Beggar, and Amygdala. The endings leave it very ambiguous as to whether these will be actual long-term fixes, but your character at least accomplished something. If nothing else, unlike Dark Souls, the world isn't ending any time soon and your actions made sure that the crisis is localized to Yharnam.

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Now, you might want to type "you don't need to ask for an example that sabotaged itself in the same breath" and that is true. I know enough about the material to know the refutation is accurate. What makes me wonder is if there are similar examples following that format:

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• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: Example
  • What might as well be an edit reason for removing it.

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Only found out about this thread, so apologies if folks already made such observations.

Edited by UltraWanker on Dec 1st 2020 at 7:05:37 PM

The Adams Family movies have an entry. They're comedies, so cut?

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: For some, the Addams being Darker and Edgier from the 1960s Dom Com (and Truer to the Text of the original comic strip) ends up making them come across as less Dark Is Not Evil and more Obviously Evil. While the films clearly mean to portray the Addams as more honest, friendly, and accepting than the hypocritical, judgmental Stepford Smilers of white suburban America, some feel those same suburbanites have every reason to fear/dislike the Addams since they regularly engage in acts of vandalism, destruction of private and public property (smashing windows with golf balls, stealing stop signs to cause accidents), animal abuse (burying a cat alive), manslaughter, murder, arson, and cannibalism with barely a shrug. While this can be chalked up to the Addams being Obliviously Evil, some viewers find that both groups are pretty unpleasant: Obliviously Evil versus Faux Affably Evil, and thus in some cases it's hard to vote for anyone. The movies stick pretty close to the original Charles Addams cartoons which potray them as Affably Evil with a very different approach towards good and evil. The humor comes from most of their enemies acting nice, while being greedy and ruthless which the Addamses appreciate having the aforementioned worldview.

I'm not even reading that. Chop away.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

From YMMV.The Fly 1986:

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: This is one of David Cronenberg's most accessible films along with The Dead Zone, and in fact his most popular, due in part to having genuinely sympathetic characters. Even so, many viewers then and now find its extreme Body Horror and the ultimately tragic demise of its protagonist too much to take. The choice to drop the "monkey-cat" reel (see Unintentionally Unsympathetic below) was specifically to avoid this trope, as the first test audience no longer cared about Seth's plight after he slew the mutant creature. This was also a reason none of the epilogues tested well, as Cronenberg discusses in the book Cronenberg on Cronenberg — the denouement was so devastating that audiences couldn't accept a hopeful coda.

Haven't seen the full movie myself, but it's generally highly regarded by critics and audiences, so I wouldn't say it turned audiences away.

I get the feeling the trope being avoided by the deleted scene was Moral Event Horizon. A pet peeve with some horror fans with some happy epilogues is that they seem rather contrived, so saying "this epilogue is sad but it makes the most sense" wouldn't really cut it. The example from its wording also seems to confuse apathy with "this work is so effective at being tragic I can't take it." They're not the same thing in the slightest, otherwise all tragedies ever would be lumped in the trope.

Edited by UltraWanker on Dec 5th 2020 at 9:52:50 AM

How about this entry on the movie Scrooged?

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: As noted above, several people criticized the film for really amping up the mean spirited nature of the story. Noticeably, at times it can feel like the ghosts care a lot more about torturing Frank than truly teaching him a lesson. To some however, this just makes the film all the more funny.

Or this one on the movie Mousehunt?

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: The main reason the film didn’t do so well. The mouse and the brothers are both sympathetic in concept — the mouse had its home destroyed by accident as the brothers do their renovations, and the brothers have had their lives fall apart due to circumstances they have little control over — but the three are also terrible people and take destroying each other's lives like a personal mission. Everyone else in the movie is also a Jerkass to some degree, and the amount of physical and emotional abuse going around makes for a Black Comedy that is very heavy on the black. Even with the mouse and the brothers both getting a happy ending eventually, it takes a lot of suffering and punishment for them to get to that point.

Both of these movies were comedies and both had happy endings. So wasn’t the main characters's suffering all worth it in the end?

Edited by BrianKT on Dec 5th 2020 at 10:14:16 AM

Yes, so both are invalid examples.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

Bringing up the following example from The Fanatic:

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: It's hard for the audience to sympathize with either Moose (for his stalking tendencies towards Hunter and what he does to him) or Hunter (for being an all-around Jerkass).

Insufficient detail.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

So, there are a couple of entries for the reboot Planet of the Apes trilogy that I'm not sure really fit the trope.

Now, I won't deny both of these films do get dark. But, I hesitate to say the really qualify for the trope. Both of these films were widely praised by both audiences and critics, and I found little that suggested people were off-put by the darker tone. The entry for War even points out how the ending is relatively happy after all the crap the main characters are put through. Maybe these entries fit under for Angst Aversion, but I wanted some second opinions.

Thoughts?

Have not seen either so make of it what you will.

The first one is very vague, while the second seems to apparently be taking issue with the antagonists doing antagonist thing.

The films' main problem is that due to serving as a prequel series to the original Planet of the Apes (1968), there can be no peaceful coexistence between apes and humans, and it's hard to become invested in the story knowing that the more sympathetic characters (especially on the human side) are essentially Doomed by Canon.

However, I would agree that Angst Aversion is a more fitting trope than Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy, since the films were still very popular with both critics and audiences.

Si tacuisses, philosophus mansisses.

Foregone Conclusion is probably more accurate for prequel works like this, I think.

But the new trilogy series aren't prequels to the original film, they're reboots. Aside from the timeline not matching up at all, human civilization was destroyed by nuclear warfare in the first film, whereas in the reboot trilogy it was undone by a global pandemic.

Obviously, the films have to end with the apes becoming the dominant species if the title is to make sense, but it's not really a Foregone Conclusion since these are different characters than the original series.

Edited by chasemaddigan on Dec 7th 2020 at 5:12:27 AM

At the very least, those examples mentioned before will have to go.

Bringing up the following example from Scott Snyder:

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: While his series are always critically acclaimed, those who don't like him usually cite this as the reason why. His stories are sometimes accused of wallowing in evil without offering enough hope to counterbalance it.

Sounds like a violation of Examples Are Not General.

From on YMMV.Jojos Bizarre Adventure Stardust Crusaders:

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: Quite a few factors can come into play here. First off is Dio Brando's reintroduction as DIO, who was a character that made the events of Phantom Blood come off as gratuitously cruel. He's not nearly as sadistic here as he was there, but this is already not a reassuring sign. Second, the Monster of the Week formula indicates that characters are bound to die left and right, preventing character depth for a lot of them. Thirdly, Jotaro and Polnareff are Base Breaking Characters, so whether or not you find their shenanigans enjoyable is heavily up for debate. And finally, having half of the entire main group die can come across as a needless downer, especially given that Avdol had cheated death beforehand, and Kakyoin was Out of Focus for the entirety of the second half. Needless to say, many fans who aren't too fond of this part can find themselves uttering the Eight Deadly Words.

While Part 3 does have its detractors, I don't think anyone hates it for being too dark. It's loaded with lighthearted, comedic moments, its heroes are mostly likeable people, the villains are mostly Hate Sinks who are satisfying to see get beaten up, and the good guys regularly earn meaningful victories. Dio's return isn't really something that lots of people complain about; if anything, the all-caps DIO is one of the most beloved and iconic characters in the entire series, if not in all of manga. The bit about characters dying isn't relevant here, since it only really kicks in near the end of the story, so if you get to that point then you're probably already too invested in the story for it to count as "Apathy".

The main criticism is generally the Monster of the Week formula making the part rather formulaic and repetitive, with lots of Plot Irrelevant Villains whose episodes can be skipped without missing anything important. But that has nothing to do with Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy.

Edited by Zuxtron on Dec 9th 2020 at 11:45:50 AM

The example definitely appears to veer into criticising the writing style than elaborating on the trope it's apparently supposed to be.

Bringing up the following example from Arli$$:

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: One of the reasons Arli$$ isn't better known these days is that the title character really is a scumbag. While a sitcom with an Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist is nothing new, many viewers and critics felt Arliss was just too unlikable to center a show around, without being entertaining enough to compensate.

This is on Jingle All the Way:

Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: A common complaint about this film is the fact that almost the entire cast consists of assholes; with few characters to actually sympathize with, certain parts of the film can be more frustrating to watch than anything.