Misused (first Alt-Names crowner 21 Feb 2021): Crazy Awesome

Right. Even if we go with that solution, a rename is pretty much necessary.

I'm not sure you understand where I'm coming from. What I'm talking is about redefining Crazy Awesome as "character loved by the audience due to their insanity" while also moving the current meaning and its examples to a different trope. In no way am I suggesting we should do the former but not the latter.

Right, but that's still not what the majority of the misuse is; most of the misuse comes from people thinking it's just "Awesome, but more awesome than usual", thinking that "Crazy" is a modifier, not a descriptor. So, if we keep Crazy Awesome, people will continue to get it wrong in that specific way.

Ah, now I see what you're getting at.

That's not something with an easy solution, I don't think. I'd suggest creating another trope called something like "Insanely Awesome" to avoid confusion, but I'm not sure how effective that would be or whether it would be tropeworthy.

Still, I have a couple ideas. Maybe we could make Crazy Awesome a disambiguation. Or maybe we could open a cleanup thread.

Well, it's a trope with 4K+ wicks, a cleanup thread is standard practice. And a disambiguation page would be used if there were multiple tropes that the link could have reasonably meant, such as The Kingdom.

Personally, I think Insanely Awesome still sounds like it means "extremely awesome" instead of "mentally unstable character who is awesome". Awesomely Insane would make more sense.

Edited by GastonRabbit on Feb 17th 2020 at 3:13:55 AM

I'm not digging on the word "awesome"; that still seems ripe for misuse as "crazy character that I really like."

Effectively Insane maybe?

I'd prefer something like Loved For Their Insanity for the YMMV concept, although I'd like to see if the title should specify that this is a character-only thing.

Just trying to avoid using "crazy" or "insanely" as an intensifier, Ambiguous Syntax and whatnot.

Edited by Brainulator9 on Feb 17th 2020 at 5:12:21 AM

I should probably elaborate further. If we end up doing a "split" of the trope (one for the definition it currently has, one for the "awesome because they're crazy" misconception), then a disambig might help mitigate some confusion and avoid other misunderstandings. Whereas if we keep the Crazy Awesome name for the "audience thinks they're awesome because they're insane" misunderstanding, we can use a cleanup thread to prune misuses.

That's actually what I was getting at with the name, a character who's... well, insanely awesome. Would a trope like that help clear up some confusion?

Edited by ImperialMajestyXO on Feb 17th 2020 at 2:33:53 AM

I misread your post. As I said in a previous post, I'm currently sick, and at the moment, a headache is hindering my thinking skills.

No worries. Get well soon.

Why do we need a trope for gushing about characters the audience really likes?

Isn't that what most of Sugar Wiki is for?

Not sure what you're getting at.

I'm not convinced that "Character is popular due to having Essential Madness" is any more notable as an audience reaction than "Character is popular due to having literally any other trope" would be.

Seconded.

I agree.

I'm not sure I'm making myself clear enough. What I'm suggesting is to redefine Crazy Awesome as "character considered awesome by the audience in large part because they're crazy", along the lines of Creepy Awesome.

But this doesn't have to be mutually exclusive to moving the current examples to Essential Madness or a new trope. To quote that one Old El Paso commercial, "Porque no los dos?"

Well, I don't see why Creepy Awesome, and other similar reactions such as Awesome Ego, are noteworthy either. The "fans love them" aspect seems unnecessary and arbitrary.

Agreed. The existence of other gushing "tropes" doesn't excuse this one.

I guess I'll say that my post could be taken as more of an "if we keep this concept". I agree that such outlets for tropers' gushing should be either purged, limited to In-Universe/Intended Audience Reaction examples, or moved to Sugar Wiki.

I'll be the first to say this: I see more value in The Scrappy than Magnificent Bastard. The Scrappy, despite being inherently negative and inviting complaining, is a thing that writers can take note of to avoid the pitfalls of negative audience reception. On the other hand, Magnificent Bastard, as I see it, is an amalgamation of several concepts, some tangible and some not, that have been placed under a single dubiously natural banner solely to create another avenue to gush about David Xanatos from Gargoyles.

I'm also inclined to agree that tropes were we just call a character awesome, regardless of why, are a bit weird. If we need to keep it with the fixed definition, moving it to Sugar Wiki might make sense, to allow for the gushing. Or it won't fix anything and it'd be a waste of time; IDK. Just spitballing.

I was surprised that Crazy Awesome wasn't already moved to Sugar Wiki, due to its gushy but relatively definable nature.

Edited by Albert3105 on Feb 19th 2020 at 8:59:53 AM

Missed this in my previous posts:

Funny you should mention that, because there actually was such an Audience Reaction. Fan Favorite was cut for being a meaningless Intended Audience Reaction, since it was just "prominent character is liked by fans" (with little to no overlap with any objective trope(s)). Here's the TRS thread.

Personally, I think "(insert objective trope here), but liked by fans" just combines objective tropes with the now-cut Fan Favorite, and is thus The Same, but More (of the "trope X done well" variety). That said, this thread is about what to do with Crazy Awesome, so those would need their own thread(s).

Edited by GastonRabbit on Feb 19th 2020 at 1:37:15 PM

previous record

All other options in red. Crowner appears stable (only one vote difference).