Too Bleak, Stopped Caring

cut - wrong place

Edited by Merseyuser1 on May 24th 2021 at 11:50:41 AM

I've stumbled across a bit of a legacy issue. Because of the name change, I don't know how long this entry has been on the Too Bleak, Stopped Caring page.

• RWBY has gotten progressively darker and grimmer since the end of Volume 3, with beloved characters being murdered or otherwise maimed or traumatized, and the political situation of Remnant becoming more and more reminiscent of Game of Thrones, where mundane humans prove themselves capable of worse atrocities than the Made of Evil Grimm our heroes have been fighting until now. Their idealism is tested relentlessly as they try to walk a line between the lesser of two evils, between maintaining a deeply-inequitable status quo put in place to keep an eldritch evil at bay, or trying to take the fight to a Big Bad that literally can not be killed. Although they do win small victories along the way, the overall trend is a downward one, and a vocal faction among the Broken Base wishes it was still just a lighthearted action show about cute girls punching monsters.

There was a load of edit warring about this back in 2016, which resulted in a consensus being built about whether it applied to the work. The consensus was that it doesn't because the show doesn't suffer from things like the heroes being almost as evil or morally bankrupt as the villains, or the show having no internal hope of a resolution being found.

Obviously, this consensus was reached a few years ago, and a lot has happened in the show since then, including some significant plot reveals. However, there's been no discussion since on overturning that consensus (or reconfirming it).

I've therefore removed the entry on the basis of the existing consensus and put the entry here just in case anyone thinks this subject needs to be revisited.

Edited by Wyldchyld on May 24th 2021 at 12:35:39 PM

[wrong thread]

No worries.

Edited by ginsengaddict on May 24th 2021 at 11:52:38 PM

Whoops, wrong thread, sorry Ginseng. You want this one.

Is it just me, or this one also needs the chop-chop? This is from the Video Game sub-page btw:

I acknowledge this is just me because I´ve seen a walkthrough of Drakengard 1 only, but from what I can read on Youtube comments on the OST or the story itself for example it´s not hated, at least nowadays. And Nie R: Automata definitely is not impopular because of its bleakness. As an example, I went to Metacritic and Nier:Automata has 8.9 overall user opinion, and Drakengard has a 8.2.

Like, yes: both plots and characters are bleak, but it didn´t make the games unlikeable and for sure Automata has a shit-ton of fans. Or maybe it can be cut because it mentions some sidequests not the overall plot of the game, or because in both I´m not sure if it counts when it´s the Intended Audience Reaction. So: it´s scissor time and substitute it with Angst Aversion instead?

Pls forgive my ability to use the markups lmao. And as an aside I wonder if there is a reliable way to identify DIAA/TB,SC in fanfics, at least the Fan Fiction.net ones.

Edited by syncsns on Jun 10th 2021 at 10:37:32 AM

I mean, I haven't played Drakengard, but when the most sympathetic character in your game is literally a child molester, I'd say you have a pretty good shot at this trope.

Isnt nier automata one of the most popular games in the world?

How would that count as this?

~WackyPancake But 1. that´s just one character, then you´d have to judge if the plot and the rest of characters is too dark (it is) but 2. that character, Leonard, is not a child molester per se, he in fact he represses his paedophilia. 3. ironically he is one of the more honorable characters (I remember even the game page itself acknowledges this) and most importantly .4 it still didn´t make the game impopular, at least with time.

Edited by syncsns on Jun 10th 2021 at 10:46:41 AM

Wasn't it a flop, anyway? It has a fanbase, but the fanbase seems to consist mostly of people who like it because you play as a murderous psychopath and everyone is a terrible human being. This is not a trope about works no one likes, it's about works that can't really become widespreadly popular beyond their niches because they're relentlessly bleak.

Also I'm pretty sure it's outright stated in the Japanese version that the Leonard character avoided some sort of massacre because he was out molesting children in the woods. Of course if you played the international version this is obscured because it was evidently too disgusting.

Edited by WackyPancake on Jun 10th 2021 at 7:50:31 PM

Dammit, I think you got me with Drakengard 1. Now that you mention it, somewhere in this Wiki it stated that it was impopular when it first came out... But I at least don´t have proof of it! If you do please feel free to share.

Leonard though wasn´t molesting, he was masturbating.

This however, I still think it could be cut. Btw, I don´t know either.

Edited by syncsns on Jun 10th 2021 at 11:25:42 AM

Nier should probably be cut, yeah.

There's this on YMMV.Total Drama:

• Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: Many of the audience finds the show too overly off putting, as with the studios other shows thanks to nearly everybody being a Jerkass. The mean-spirited humor can go too far as well.

Who is this "audience" exactly, isn't TD popular? The later seasons are more niche, but that's because of the writing quality in general. Can TBSC apply to arcs? I feel like this would fit the Courtney/Duncan/Gwen Love Triangle. Also, can TBSC apply to Sadist Shows? I'm asking because there's an example on YMMV.Popee The Performer. PtP has a sizable fandom, but I think it's closer to a Cult Classic than anything, which I don't think is large enough to disqualify it.

Edited by RainbowPumpqueen on Jun 11th 2021 at 11:47:02 PM

I brought this up on ATT, before I realized that there was a dedicated cleanup thread for it.

So awhile ago I moved a Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy entry on YMMV.I Care A Lot to Too Bleak, Stopped Caring here, because to my knowledge that is now what the trope is called, but Charles Phipps recently added another entry using the defunct trope.

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: A lot of people watched the movie to see Marla get destroyed after her Establishing Character Moment. Many were distressed she remains the protagonist.

What should I do? The trope doesn't exist anymore, but if I touch it will become an edit war.

Edited by Bullman on Jun 14th 2021 at 3:33:08 AM

The simplest way is to page ~Charles Phipps to this thread so they can understand what the problem is.

Oh. You mean ping them. I have never learned to do that. How do you do it?

Edited by Bullman on Jun 14th 2021 at 3:36:14 AM

Sorry, didn't know it got replaced.

It's okay. I am glad we could work this out. So is it cool for me to remove it? Or should someone else?

Edited by Bullman on Jun 14th 2021 at 3:38:34 AM

Re: the Total Drama example: the later seasons did get pretty mean-spirited and put off a lot of audience members, but ultimately a lot of the characters were still lovable and had fanbases. And the show still has a fanbase, especially after Ridonculous Race won back the crowd.

Isn't Total Drama basically a screwball comedy/parody series at its core? It's a bit sociopathic sometimes, but it'd be pretty hard for it to qualify for this trope.

Also, the show is successful enough that variations of it continue to this day, so I don't think it has alienated too many people.

Edited by WackyPancake on Jun 14th 2021 at 11:24:04 AM

Since this matter has been settled, you can remove it with a link to this discussion.

Okay. Done. Removed it with a link to this discussion.

TooBleakStoppedCaring.Fan Works

• A Puppet to Her Fame is notorious for its grim dark and heavy levels of abuse. Even MLP story reader ObabScribbler acknowledged that the story was difficult even for her, stating she felt horrible after finishing up a reading afterwards.

The fic has 1629 likes to 69 dislikes, suggesting most audiences are not put off. I recall cleanup agreeing a (even noted) reviewer disliking it isn't proof enough as the proof must be for large amounts of audiences being put off. Thoughts?

MLP fanfiction is already so incredibly niche in the first place that I doubt that fic can be considered "widely successful". Haven't read the fic, but the success argument does not disqualify this particular work.

Much like Complete Monster, I have a hard time taking this trope seriously when applied to fanfic because fics can take any work or character and turn them into edgy grimdark for the lulz, often because there's some cachet associated with this sort of thing: an audience for works that make Fluttershy rape Dora in Yoshi's sex slave pit or Snow White chainsaw massacre the Seven Dwarfs.

We shouldn't dignify works like that with recognition on TV Tropes. I'm not saying that the specific work cited above is doing this, but it's a warning sign. I'd prefer it if we restrict treatment to fics that at least take the canonical work they're drawing from seriously.

Edited by Fighteer on Jun 14th 2021 at 6:49:55 AM

Well, I mean, There Is No Such Thing as Notability, right?

99% of all fanfic is shit, but if it has a trope page, I suppose it can qualify.