Too Bleak, Stopped Caring

You can cut that.

Rock'n'roll never dies!

There's also a second, imo more valid example on the same page. It goes through what books actually fall into it and why. Should that also be cut?

I doubt any individual books fall into it. This isn't a trope about comedies where all of the characters are unlikable.

I'll just give the example itself, I think the series as a whole doesn't qualify, but the plots of the books do:

• The four biggest offenders are:
  • The ending of Cabin Fever, wherein Manny's Jerkass tendencies are taken Up To Eleven as he cuts off the power to the house in the middle of a blizzard with the exception of his own room, leaving the rest of his family to die and yet he still doesn't get punished.
  • The entirety of The Long Haul. The book's plot is mostly a series of misfortune events caused entirely by the family being completely idiotic or some form of Ass Pull. The film version is even worse and is one of the reasons why fans disown the movie, besides the changed cast of course, given that the first three movies notably made the stories less of a hassle to sit through.
  • The entirety of The Getaway, for many of the same reasons as The Long Haul. Yet another series of unfortunate things happening to the family who just want to relax, with most of their misfortunes either being caused by their own idiocy or just bad luck.
  • The last two pages of Wrecking Ball end up ruining the Heffleys chance of having a new home after all the trouble they went through. Just when things were finally looking up for them, the author just had to go and mess things up again!

Especially The Long Haul is notorious in the fandom, as it's generally considered the worst book in the series because of its Idiot Plot. The family itself eventually devolves into a bickering bunch of selfish idiots, for claiming another family (who aren't really portrayed as likeable either) stole their stuff, even though they don't have any proof.

In the end, it turned out to be a misunderstanding caused by Greg, but it's left ambiguous if he opened up to it or just continued lying. Nevermind that they lost most of their remaining stuff through an accident anyway.

None of the books are “dark” though. I do think the second and third examples could fit under Eight Deadly Words if you cited reviews for both.

Edited by jandn2014 on Oct 23rd 2020 at 10:12:16 AM

back lol

I think we should remove the general example outright and hide the specific ones until we find an agreement.

As I said, the series doesn't count, as it isn't bleak and lifeless. The characters may not be all that interesting, but they're not unlikeable.

Personally, I stopped reading the series around Long Haul partly because I thought the story was so mean-spirited and frustrating to read (and also I didn't like the Denser and Wackier turn of events), and I was still in the target audience by then. But I acknowledge it's meant to be comedic and there's never any explicit messages that nothing matters. Greg is still out there hoping he becomes famous and successful one day.

EDIT: I think an obvious problem with these entries is also that these later books were added when most readers were growing out of its comedy anyway.

Edited by mightymewtron on Oct 23rd 2020 at 1:35:40 PM

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.

Yeah, I also think that the entries were added because of completion's sake, which is also why I had to delete Eight Deadly Words from the page, since it really didn't qualify.

I can only judge The Long Haul, which I hated, even when it came out. I stopped reading around the time Old School came out, which was an improvement, but the series started getting excessive and repetetive for me, so I moved on to "real" literature.

Should the Logan entry I mentioned stay or go?

This was brought to my attention by another troper.

YMMV.Chicken Little

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: The film's biggest sticking point. Michael Eisner, already not on great terms with his former partner and Dreamworks Animation founder Jeffery Katzenberg, wanted to use this movie to beat Katzenberg at his own game by trying his own studio's hand at the snarky, edgy humor Katzenberg's studio had made themselves famous for with Shrek. It's this bitterness, plus a clear lack of understanding as to why that humor worked in Shrek, that shows in the final product; the main character is a total punching bag, living in a town where everyone picks on him and whose own father never sticks up for him. Meanwhile, the only villainous character who does redeem her self ends up getting mind raped and forced to be another character's girlfriend against her will. For too many people, it wasn't Black Comedy so much as just being mean for the sake of mean.^note Ironically, this was still closer to Jeff Katzenberg's infamous "Black Friday" version of Toy Story, which similarly failed at being snarky and just came off as mean.

The redeemed part only applies to the ending which DIAA isn’t about. The main character is sympathetic and gets a happy ending (I asked how DIAA, which sounds like NO likable factions, can apply to such without answer). This sounds more like Dude, Not Funny! than dark.

Might Angst Aversion fit better? I heard that requires audiences avoid a work due to its reputation of darkness as opposed to complaining about darkness, is it?

That's largely just Designated Monkey instead of DIAA, since what put the audience off was the treatment of Chicken Little, who you even said is sympathetic. Also, Buck does apologize for his behavior late in the movie.

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.

What about this example from YMMV.Calvin And Hobbes?

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: Even if you like the strip, the fact that pretty much every character, from Calvin to Hobbes to Calvin's parents to Susie, is a short-tempered jerk, combined with the Double Standard of Calvin getting horribly punished even when he doesn't do anything wrong while everyone else gets off scott-free for their own nasty behavior, can make the strip feel needlessly mean-spirited.

I don't read the comic religiously, but from what I've seen it's just honest childhood experiences. "Short-tempered jerk" is a bit extreme.

I am a religious fan of the comic and this entry gets a lot wrong. To start with, Susie's definitely not a short-tempered jerk. She's a perfectionist and gets very mad with Calvin sometimes, but most strips depict her as a pretty well-adjusted, well-intentioned girl. Also, there's only a few examples where Calvin gets punished without doing anything wrong, and even that's often ambiguous due to not knowing how much of the strip is Calvin's imagination. Plus, the strip can be quite optimistic, sweet, and loving - just look at the Heartwarming page. That entry seems extremely cherrypicked, especially because obviously many people don't find the comic too depressing as it's one of the most successful comic strips out there.

I'd say that's maybe 30% of her time in the comic at most...she snaps in a few comics, but wouldn't you if somebody threw snowballs (sometimes full of rocks) at you all the time? My point is that the entry acts like this bad stuff happens to Calvin unprompted and it really doesn't. It may be Disproportionate Retribution but Calvin being an asshole usually kickstarts these plots.

Edited by mightymewtron on Oct 25th 2020 at 5:39:00 AM

I do some cleanup and then I enjoy shows you probably think are cringe.

I mean, except for the strips in which Calvin is rude to her (or, at most, pelts her with a snowball or water balloon) and she retaliates with violence. Of which there are several.

That said, DIAA is definitely shoehorning / cherrypicking and should be cut.

Agreed. There is no evidence that the more serious aspects of the comic negatively influenced its popularity.

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

Oh come on Calvin and hobbes really. Cut that Nonsense.

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

Okay, I think at this point Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy needs a big notice on the page about not adding comedy series you think are too mean-spirited.

I know, nobody actually reads descriptions, but it can't hurt. Because this is stupid.

Okay, like...is this even that common? How many valid examples do we even have on the actual trope page itself? A lot of the examples claim to Play With the concept (impossible), to "fall into it if" a certain condition is met (arguable) or talk only about works being kinda bleak.

It might be worth going to TRS. The problems here are constant and I wouldn't mind taking extreme cleanup measures if it means results. It's already on Tropes Needing TRS.

Edited by WarJay77 on Oct 25th 2020 at 9:13:51 AM

Current Project: Incorruptible Pure Pureness

I made an effort to scrub the description a bit.

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

This trope frequently gets misused for a work that is dark, angsty, or depressing. That is wrong. It only applies when there is no meaningful conflict because everyone is awful and the world sucks, and therefore there are no stakes for the audience. If people enjoy the work despite its tone, this trope does not apply.

I support a requirement for citations on this Audience Reaction and a few other negative ones. Thanks for tweaking the description.

Edited by ccorb on Oct 25th 2020 at 9:26:54 AM

Rock'n'roll never dies!

Bringing up the following example from I Am Not Okay With This:

• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: The comic. Things are just depressing and hopeless, then it ends with Syd confirming her belief that she's a bad person that contributes nothing but pain to the world and decides to solve it by killing herself to spare everyone the burden of having to deal with her.

It sounds like it might qualify, but could use a touch more detail.

Edited by Fighteer on Oct 26th 2020 at 4:44:30 AM

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

Endings are irrelevant to DIAA which is about it being so dark you stop caring how it ends. If they complain about the ending they did care so a strike against Apathey.

Requiring citation/proof it drove audiences away. A TRS is being planned so we can discuss that change their and then.

I am concerned that we are moving towards requiring citations for many Audience Reactions. I don't object to it in principle, but it's a Rubicon that will lead to increasing the burden for curation of examples and alienate some tropers.

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