Audience-Alienating Premise cleanup

I heavily doubt Bile Fascination had much to do with it (Morbius being rereleased to capitalize on the memes and bombing spectacularly is a good example) and think it was more due to name recognition, the fact that a huge comedian is attached, and the large marketing push. I edited the Opinion Myopia entry to be less bashy (as the entry outright called people claiming that the show’s massive numbers weren’t genuine, and rather conspiracy theorists) but do agree that the show’s massive debut probably isn’t due to Bile Fascination since the vast majority of people aren’t involved with online discourse surrounding it.

You had to actually go a theater and buy a ticket to see Morbius. Streaming makes hate-watching far more convenient. Hell, Morbius had a lot of hate-watching, of a pirated digital release. Bile Fascination definitely plays a significant part.

Yeah uh Morbius actually trends really high on Netflix. I've seen it in the top ten viewed films for my country multiple weeks.

Fun thing I learned from the Box Office Bomb cleanup thread: Morbius didn't actually bomb. So I'm not sure it's even valid because of that.

Velma got thrashed by critics on release too (like in the Entertainment Weekly review that called Norville a beta male), I'm sure part of the Bile Fascination was related to that even among people who don't really go looking for internet controversy too closely.

Anyways, I'd say turning Scooby-Doo into a generic Animated Shock Comedy might qualify for Audience-Alienating Premise because of the lack of overlap between Scooby fans and Animated Shock Comedy fans, but it's kind of weak when Velma already fits on the Uncertain Audience, Bile Fascination, and Shallow Parody pages.

Edited by PhiSat on Apr 4th 2023 at 10:28:48 AM

You know what, that's fair. I still think works like Tusk and Hendrix's early work are relative examples of AAP that only succeeded as much as they did because of previously built up clout but I understand the need for absolute proof especially with some early examples such as the Wachowski Sisters' Speed Racer of all things which seem to be mainly based off of vibes. There's also the fact that it might not all be complaining about shows the troper dislikes - there may be some hipster appeal in your work being esoteric enough to put people off that may bias people in a certain direction.

Good points have been raised about Velma but I'd maybe point to the Tainted by the Preview elements such as the trailer outright advertising the In Name Only elements and radical tone shift (with a mix of Self-Deprecation and Postmodernism). I'd argue that such humour is kind of inherent in the premise of Velma but also that In Name Only adaptations tend to be alienating when that aspect is actively advertised. I'd definitely understand not including it, though, although I think there's so much overlap between AAP and Uncertain Audience that to me they are sister tropes. But that's just how I personally categorise things and relate to these tropes, that is not objective. I apologise for maybe coming in a little strong there.

Another thought - is it possible that Bob Dylan's Self-Portrait maybe falls under AAP just because it was kind of a radical departure from what people wanted out of a Dylan album especially with a lot of writing not done by Dylan himself (Self-Portrait is a covers album). The title is ironic in that regard and the execution made people confused as to whether it was an intentional example of Stylistic Suck or not. Again, arguments could be made that it's not AAP, for sure.

Edited by YeetBoiSwag on Apr 6th 2023 at 6:16:23 PM

Given some of the examples I’m seeing, and some I’ve cut, I feel we might need a hard threshold of some kind for how successful a work in a medium has to be to count towards this trope. I.E. like a million units for a console Video Game. But maybe that’s too restrictive, especially for a big franchise that’s expected to sell far more than that. It might also encourage people to just list failures by default, which misses the point that the premise specifically has to be a contributing factor in its failure.

Thoughts?

You make a good point about raw sales vs expected sales.

If a work wildly underperforms compared to its contemporaries, past franchise entries and/or future ones, theres definitely a case to be made. But it would still need to be speific, as there are lots of reasons for this to underperform besides just people potentially not liking the premise.

Sorry about the post again but if you look in the history for Heathers 2018's YMMV, it appears AAP has been removed for going against the point of the movie. Uncertain Audience likely plays into the show's divided reception but I do think people like Sarah Z and critics as a whole called the show bad from first principles due to the heavy-handed satire of Political Overcorrectness present in the first episode and the idea of marginalised people being more popular. I agree that the show in general is about how being part of a protected class allows you to weaponise that to hurt others BUT the idea that such people would be a dominant group likely wasthe element that caused people discomfort.

Found this on YMMV.Sakura Wars 2019

• Audience-Alienating Premise: Part of the reason why the game's popularity ended up petering out shortly after release is that with the exception of Sumire and a brief cameo appearance by Sakura Shinguji, all of the characters from the previous games were Put on a Bus and do not appear at all. Also, the game's Genre Shift to third person action combat put off many longtime fans who preferred the old turn based tactics gameplay.

I looked up the sales figures on Wikipedia and it sold a respectable 203,003 copies in Japan (sources 55 and 56) and it even won the Japan Game Awards for "Future Division". So I don't think it would count since it manage to get something that respectable.

Would like other peoples opinion before I take action though.

I think it's misuse because it doesn't sound like it involves the premise putting people off.

Question/remind me, fanfics are for the most part exempt from AAP, correct? Because last week, I removed an "example" of AAP from the YMMV for the My Hero Academia/Ben 10 crossover fic Heroes Never Die It's Hero Time, citing the requirements for APP and in hindsight, I should’ve consulted this thread before removing it.

Even if we had objective ways to measure the reception of fan works, "people who like/dislike Character X won't like this" isn't AAP. You were right to remove it.

The Lord of the Rings: Gollum has this:

• Audience-Alienating Premise: Though the Obvious Beta launch did things no favors, even when the game was first announced, many fans were actively wondering why it was being made. Gollum is certainly an iconic character, but not one many believed could carry a game by himself. Being a stealth game with no combat, a rather niche genre for games, and launching at full price didn’t help sell people either. These factors, alongside scathing reception, led to the game selling very poorly.

This game hasn't been out for very long, so it might be too soon to judge this game's sales. And it's just poorly-made in general, which makes it hard to judge if the poor sales are due to people not wanting to play a game about Gollum, or just not wanting to play a bad game in general.

Audience-Alienating Premise might need to go on No Recent Examples, Please!, and/or exclude works that have received significant criticism for reasons beyond just their premise.

There have definitely been a lot of reviewers, Youtube videos, and commenters saying they don't understand why a Gollum game was made in the first place. Even back in 2021 when the game was first teased there was confusion over the game's premise. I think it could be a contender.

Edited by PhiSat on May 29th 2023 at 9:10:36 AM

I would downvote NREP, as I think a negative pre-release response would favor a work being AAP as opposed to disliked on other merits.

I agree.

The problem is that so much of the misuse is citing people complaining about the premise without considering whether or not it actually affected the work's success. Prerelease opinions don't actually matter - what matters is what happens once the work actually comes out.

to NREP, as there's not yet any measure of objective failure.

I don't think this needs to be NREP.

Yeah, anyone who isn't a huge Tolkien nerd probably isn't interested in a game about a character who basically serves as a glorified roadblock, and anyone who is interested will be alienated about how shallow and poorly the ideas are executed.

Umm, is this example I added to Cats & Dogs valid?

I have no idea why I wrote the good enough bit, which defeats the premise of AAP.

It's not the premise that's the problem (the Cats Are Mean trope has been done a lot) but the execution, and I'm pretty sure the film was decently successful as it got a sequel.

Edited by mightymewtron on Jun 5th 2023 at 8:55:55 AM

Sooo, cut?

Yeah, this is a movie that more than tripled its budget in box office.

You can't really claim it "killed" audience's interest at that point.

Definite cut.