Hindsight Cleanup

Pulling this from YMMV.Steven Universe Future's "Funny Aneurysm" Moment entries:

• Pearl giving away toilet paper rolls in "Bismuth Casual" may seem like a poorly timed joke as the episode was aired in the midst of a coronavirus pandemic, which caused a shortage of several supplies, notably toilet paper, due to people overstocking.

Stating as the edit reason "Just like random references to the word "Corona", random references to toilet paper aren't made better or worse because of coronavirus. Posted entry in the Hindsight Cleanup Thread for good measure."

Edited by sgamer82 on Mar 25th 2020 at 6:41:53 AM

It also can't be a "Funny Aneurysm" Moment if the two events are happening around the same time.

Edited by PlasmaPower on Mar 25th 2020 at 3:07:08 PM

This was re-added to Space Jam under Harsher in Hindsight:

• A key plot point in the film is that the NBA is shut down for the season due to the Mon-Stars making the basketball players sick. In 2020, growing concerns over the spread of the Coronavirus (and some players testing positive for the disease) led to the NBA ending the season much earlier than planned. The coincidence did not go unnoticed.

I wonder how many depictions of toilet paper shortages/hoarding are references to what happened in 1973.

At least the athletes are actually sick in that one

I think media coverage gives weight to certain comparisons not being something a random editor thought up.

That's true for Unfortunate Implications, but I think the Hindsight tropes are supposed to be more focused on there actually being a connection then on who makes it.

From YMMV.Jo Jos Bizarre Adventure Vento Aureo

• Harsher in Hindsight: Cioccolata uses his Stand Green Day to murder a ton of people in Rome by infecting them with flesh-eating mold. Horrifying, yes. More horrifying that the coronavirus outbreak that initially began in China spread to Italy, and the death rates are rising from it. Bonus points to trashmen and other people still doing their jobs despite the virus as well.

Seems like another stretch. A disease-manipulating character in Italy is a pretty tenuous connection (if mold even counts as a disease).

In case anyone is wondering, that last sentence is referencing how Cioccolata is defeated by being thrown into a garbage truck.

Edited by Zuxtron on Mar 26th 2020 at 6:11:31 AM

Coronavirus isn't "flesh-eating mold".

My thought is that if it gets media attention, there's enough weight to make it an easily reachable conclusion.

The Cioccolata example can be cut. Four notes, though sorry, Mista:

• I thought it was the lengthy punch barrage that mostly did Cioccolata in.
• Funnily enough, Green Day is similar to Purple Haze, which is a virus.
• Cioccolata and coronavirus both target old people, amirite? \j
• I would not have gotten the reference to trash; I would have assumed that it was referring to people still working during this time.

Found on Saturday Night Live:

• In the Casey Affleck episode, Hillary Clinton shows up at an electoral college member's house, Love Actually style, to beg her not to vote for Donald Trump, with the final cue cards reading "but keep in mind/if Donald Trump becomes president/he will kill us all." The suggestion became less funny during the 2019-2020 coronavirus pandemic.

Right, because we all know that Trump engineered the virus and is solely responsible for all the deaths in the US, and that if Hilary was elected, all diseases would be eradicated.

Cut it.

In non-coronavirus related news, I found this on YMMV.Magneto under Hilarious in Hindsight:

• In the 1978 Fantastic Four cartoon episode The Menace Of Magneto, Magneto is depicted as an obnoxious but petty criminal of little regard. Reed Richards even claimed to have never heard of him, and as he didn't have an appointment, had the Baxter Building doorman tell Magneto to "get lost".

...To be frank, I don't even have the foggiest idea how this is supposed to fit.

Maybe the idea is how much more well-known Magneto is nowadays, but even that’s a reach. Cut.

Now that the game seems to be done with major updates, I’d like to begin a cleanup for YMMV.Crash Team Racing Nitro Fueled. I’ll start here:

• Hilarious in Hindsight: With their release dates being only one month apart, this game and Team Sonic Racing were considered to be Dueling Games. As it turns out, Chick Gizzard Lips (Stew's co-host) is voiced by Roger Craig Smith, the voice of Sonic. Then he got the chance to drive later on, to boot. Keep
  • During production on Nitro Kart, the idea of bringing back CTR tracks with updated graphics◊ had been thrown around but ultimately scrapped. 16 years later and it's the Nitro Kart tracks getting that treatment in a Crash Team Racing remake. Keep
  • The twitter user Nitro Neato drew Tawna as a witch, a few days before her official witch skin got unveiled. A fan artist draws Ms. Fanservice as a Hot Witch, and then the official game, which was already known to give costumes to characters, makes an official such costume? Who could have guessed? Delete
  • Back in Nitro Kart, Cortex dismissively referred to the Norms as clowns in a cutscene, which causes Big Norm to call him one in retaliation. Cue the Neon Circus Grand Prix, in which Cortex gets a clown skin. Maybe?
  • The presence of promotional items based on Sour Patch Kids and Trident Vibes suddenly made more sense once the Winter Festival Grand Prix was fully unveiled, as it comes with a track and items themed around sweets. Maybe a coincidence, but maybe on purpose. I’m unsure.
  • As it turns out, Stephanie Sheh had subtly teased her role as Yaya Panda over a month before her official reveal...on a Twitter post about pandas. Yeah, this was on purpose. Delete.
  • A family-friendly racing property's characters being transplanted into a dire post-apocalyptic setting for one season? Sounds like what happened to one of Team Racing's sources of inspiration, doesn't it? If not exaggerated, keep. I don’t fully trust the editors of these pages though.
  • All those incidents of horribly glitched racer models performing other ones' animations were already funny, then later they seemed prescient of an actual abomination being done for real: Megamix. Maybe? Both the glitches and Megamix◊ are unholy abominations, after all.
  • Thirteen days after the Geary Day celebration mentioned under Memetic Mutation below, Geary wound up having a set of daily challenges themed after him. Amusing, but every most characters get the daily spotlight every so often anyway. I’m unsure.
  • The Twitter user Esmael J drew a picture of most of the female characters with Rustland-themed skins, giving Liz a skull facepaint and skull shoulderpad. Once the Gasmoxia Grand Prix arrived, Liz's space pirate outfit just so happened to have a skull pattern on it. Delete. I’m against these fan-art ones on principle.
  • The Twitter user Hudson Hatley reposted this comic featuring Emperor Velo, a mere four days before his confirmation. In addition, some fan artists had depicted Velo being angry with Oxide for "stealing" his title of fastest racer in the galaxy, yet the CTR TV report shows that Oxide actually invited Velo, as they're on friendly terms. Delete the first part, as Velo was already datamined before the reposted comic. As for the second part, it depends on how widespread the fanon interpretation of the characters’ relationship really is.
  • Canadian Guy Eh posted this montage of pitched-up N. Tropy voices, the day before Baby Tropy was confirmed (with high-pitched voices to match). Not noteworthy fancontent. Delete.

Thoughts?

Edited by ShinyCottonCandy on Mar 27th 2020 at 6:48:07 AM

Why the fanart ones? Are you assuming the costume designers were looking at them for ideas?

Simply put, I don’t believe the fanart instances are singularly notable. If you look hard enough, you could find fanart of anything that ends up being similar to the final product.

I'm starting to wonder if this entry from YMMV.Avengers Endgame counts:

• The iconic shots of a completely empty New York City that represented just how badly Earth was affected by Thanos's Snap were already shocking and depressing when this film came out, but they now feel downright eerie after the sudden spread of the Coronavirus a year later caused several cities across the globe, including New York to become quieter and emptier than normal due to citizens being advised to self-quarantine themselves to remain safe from the virus.

Should we remove it or keep it?

Edited by gjjones on Mar 27th 2020 at 2:03:32 PM

That was already brought up and dismissed as a shoehorn. Did someone re-add it?

Seriously, it should not be this hard to get people to stop shoehorning this stuff. I mean, I have a diagnosed anxiety disorder manifesting as severe hypochrondria - I really shouldn't be feeling like a voice of reason here.

Anyway, I've now removed it as misuse.

I mean, I get it. People are stressed; they're seeing connections where there aren't any. Hell, today I watched a Seinfeld episode that mentioned events getting cancelled and one of the characters had a cold. ^note "The Opposite", if anyone cares. I'd never put it in a Hilarious in Hindsight example, but I won't lie and say that those things didn't jump out at me.

So I understand why this is happening, but that doesn't mean those examples aren't still shoehorns.

I recently checked YMMV.One Piece to see if there was an entry because of a scene where a character demanded toilet paper and other supplies in exchange for medical care. Fortunately there wasn't but we've had at least one such entry come up before so I was a bit paranoid.

You either become paranoid due to the virus, or because of how much is mentioned in the site.

From YMMV.Demolition Man:

• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • The 2032 method of non-touch greeting and even reacting to being touched with disgust is this in the wake of the 2020 COVID-19 coronavirus outbreaks. While there was a non-touch greeting that looked like a high-five that stopped just before the hands touched, nobody reacted to casual touch with disgust. Really reaching. Cut.
    • This also makes the three seashells a "Funny Aneurysm" Moment after reports of people stocking up on toilet paper to the point of low supplies in stores. Again, reaching. Cut.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Arnold Schwarzenegger is briefly mentioned as a former President, with Huxley explaining that his popularity forced an amendment to the Constitution to allow him to run. Now, Schwarzenegger is a former governor of California, and there is a serious and fairly popular movement to amend the Constitution to allow naturalized citizens to become president. "The thing that happened in the movie hasn't happened in Real Life, but it totes might!" Reaching. Cut.
  • Gamers may find it difficult to hear the name John Spartan, Prisoner 117 without thinking of John-117 the SPARTAN-II Super-Soldier of Halo. "That guy's name sounds like another guy's name in another thing what I like!" Cut.
  • In 2015, the supposed year of the Franchise Wars, Taco Bell's parent company reported a generous upturn in earnings, while McDonald's and Burger King started to go into a slight decline. This is even funnier when one considers that TV broadcasts of the film often delete the Taco Bell reference due to carrying commercials for its competitors. Reaching. Cut.
  • Phoenix wants to know where the Radio Shacks are in the future. Well, Simon, there aren't any. Could be legit?
  • Dr. Raymond Cocteau's Political Correctness Gone Mad police state is eerily prescient of so-called "social justice warriors" of The New '10s. Reaching, cut.

There's these examples from FunnyAneurysmMoment.The Simpsons regarding politicians:

• There's the line in "Weekend at Burnsie's" when Homer, who's been smoking medicinal marijuana after getting pecked in the eyes by crows, states that he can go up to The President and "... blow smoke in his stupid monkey face, and he'd be sitting there groovin on it!" This line would be considered horrifically racist during the presidency of Barack Obama.^note It doesn't help that Barack Obama himself had large ears as well, not to mention that he actually did smoke marijuana in his college days.
• Homer sees a movie called Hail to the Chimp at the drive-in theater in the Season 9 episode "Dumbbell Indemnity." This scene would become very racist in the Obama era.
• In "The Italian Bob", the family go to Italy and Homer gets in trouble for seemingly impersonating Benito Mussolini, which he explains was actually him "doing Donald Trump". We'll just leave it at that.

What hit me was how the example about Trump^note Which originally said he got in trouble for retweeting a Mussolini quote on Twitter was edited to just have the part explaining why this is a FAM to instead feature a sinkhole to ROCEJ, making this a ZCE, when it should have been cut as a whole (Though I may need to know if examples involving politicians should be cut whether they are about them winning/losing an election or not). As for the Obama examples, I'm assuming those should be cut, too?

Edited by FridgeGuy2016 on Mar 31st 2020 at 7:38:26 AM

The Obama ones feel like a real stretch, and the last one is the exact sort of useless neener-neener ROCEJ sinkhole we've been trying to cut down on. Burn them all.