Just What Is an "Enforced Trope"

We'd need a wick check first; I've never actually seen "Enforced Trope" just namedropped on random examples, but that doesn't mean it never happens. It just means I haven't seen it. But with so many wicks, it must happen.

Edited by WarJay77 on Dec 30th 2023 at 1:37:55 PM

I feel like doing a wick check for Enforced Trope (or any of the Playing With tropes) is going to be problematic as a lot of times people don't wick those.

Personally, I do think having an item like this is helpful as it can show how a trope can come about by external factors. I guess I personally like to see how something like Executive Meddling, censorship, or budgetary concerns can cause a trope to come about.

Edited by SharkToast on Dec 30th 2023 at 11:05:46 AM

Why not just mention them as Executive Meddling or Censorship Tropes examples?

I mean, I see the other ones wicked all the time. But we have to have some sort of usage check if we want to make any headway, and seeing how it's used when actually wicked can help determine if there's any value outside of Playing With hypotheticals.

I have written examples that namedrop Enforced Trope in explaining how the trope appears. Not sure how common it is across the site, but it's not unheard of, at least. I personally find it useful an would be sorry to see it go.

Edited by Eievie on Dec 30th 2023 at 1:40:22 AM

I started working on the wick check (Sandbox.Enforced Trope Wick Check), it only takes 50 wicks. If anyone else wants to help, go ahead.

I think the Real Life example you have in ZCE is misuse because Real Life doesn't have a creator (in the fiction sense) who can intentionally use a trope.

Fixed.

Update on the wick check. At the moment, only 36% of the sample fits the trope description, and 44% is misuse. What is interesting, however, is to see how the trope is used. We have everything from the expected Executive Meddling to the influence of the public's morals and values (Moral Guardians, Censorship Bureau), and even that the creator purely wanted to incorporate certain tropes.

It is very broad, only the point of "Constraints of the medium" mentioned in the description can be applied to many situations. For example, you are working on an educational program for children, and that means certain limitations on what you can say or show, or you are working on a game/mod for a game, and the engine simply cannot do certain things, or you are working on a tie-in for another work, and there are things you cannot change. Virtually any explanation of what a trope is in a work is a potential example of Enforced Trope.

It goes without saying that this is definitely Trivia, not only because the examples focus on behind-the-scenes information, but because the trope description straight up said: Keep in mind that since this is behind the scenes...

Edited by SoyValdo7 on Jan 1st 2024 at 5:10:45 AM

It appears(?) we've mostly come to a conclusion about this: This is Trivia, not a Playing With variation. How do we go about implementing it now? Must it additionally go through the Trope Repair Shop?

Edited by Eievie on Jan 2nd 2024 at 1:47:28 AM

I mean, yeah, it does. TRS is always needed if you want to change a page's classification.

Added it to TRS Queue. I listed me and Soy Valdo 7 as people who could launch it, just cuz we did the wick check? If anyone wants in or out, feel free to add or remove your name.

I would add that a rename is a must if it's decided it's not a metatrope.

We have not yet answered this question of whether the trope is redundant. So I also suggest:

• Disambig the trope. The ones I can think of would be Executive Meddling, Moral Guardians, Pragmatic Adaptation, Executive Veto, Media Watchdog and Troubled Production.
• Make it an example-free index of all tropes that are forced into a work by things beyond their creators' control.

EDIT: also, we should credit StarSword as well, they help in wick check.

EDIT: fixed

Edited by SoyValdo7 on Jan 2nd 2024 at 8:35:00 AM

Don't forget Media Watchdog for the disambig option

Edited by Nen_desharu on Jan 2nd 2024 at 8:50:57 AM

The queue will take months, so we've got plenty of time to sort it out before then.

I still think it's be better as a Super-Trope, an umbrella to cover oddball examples like "medieval patron requires artist include trope" that are uncommon enough that making a designated Sub-Trope for them doesn't make sense. Does anyone have a counterargument, why treating it as an index and cutting out those miscellaneous examples would be better?

Edited by Eievie on Jan 2nd 2024 at 9:52:00 AM

Uh, yeah... can you name some things that would be a subtrope? And keep in mind, subtropes always have to fit into the main trope, not just sometimes.

The phrasing of the question makes me worry I'm missing something obvious, but — off the topic of my head — it seems like Executive Meddling, Executive Veto, and Product Placement would always fit?

Executive Meddling, if anything, is the supertrope; because it does not simply apply to tropes being in a story, but to anything the executives force upon the creatives. Even on the page itself it says it's the reason for many examples of Enforced Trope. You'd be switching the trope relationship entirely.

Executive Veto is something of the opposite — it's not allowing something to be in a story. It forces creators to find an alternative, but they don't necessarily dictate what that alternative is — just that trope X isn't involved

Finally, Product Placement is an odd one. It's hard to even necessarily call it a "trope" because it's not narratively impactful most of the time, but that might be semantics since it's currently classified as one. I guess this one would be a potential subtrope, but it's just one trope. I can't think of many others that are in similar positions.

The reason I specified the whole "must be ALWAYS the supertrope" issue wasn't for some sort of trick question, but because I sincerely could not think of a single trope that is always an Enforced Trope. It feels like a bizarre thing to make a supertrope for since it's a specific scenario surrounding a trope's usage, not something we're always aware about and definitely not something that's common enough to be an index in my eyes... unless you completely changed what it even means.

Edited by WarJay77 on Jan 2nd 2024 at 1:46:28 PM

Executive Meddling as supertrope would mean budget constraints, time constraints, and actor constraints fall through the cracks.

Rubber-Forehead Aliens is virtually always enforced. The only non-enforced example I could think of is like a parody riffing on the trope, after it was already established for enforced reasons.

Time-Shifted Actor is virtually always enforced. If there were no actor and time constraints, I think most would agree that having the character at different ages played by the same actor at different ages would be ideal. But if the scenes all need to be shot this month, we do what we can.

As I'm writing this I realize they're both on an index, Real Life Writes the Plot, which is basically always enforced tropes.

Edited by Eievie on Jan 2nd 2024 at 11:20:47 AM

Well... yeah? But that's how the tropes are defined. Making Enforced Trope a supertrope would mean altering it past the point of recognizability, to where you may as well just be making something in the TLP instead.

Edited by WarJay77 on Jan 2nd 2024 at 2:15:44 PM

Hey guys... look at Serendipity Writes the Plot. This is it, right? This is basically the prexisiting version of what we're talking, about in terms of reworking Enforced Trope?

Well, that's close. But "technical limitation" is still pretty narrow compared to your idea.

No, it includes most of what I just said. They seem to cut a distinction between:

• "outside forces (inanimate)" — Serendipity Writes the Plot
• "outside forces (animate)" — Executive Meddling, if defined kind of loosely?

I was specifically worried about miscellaneous examples being lost between the cracks. This addresses that: just sort it into one of two relatively broad categories. Time/budget/actor constraints are Serendipity Writes the Plot. Medieval art patrons are Executive Meddling.

I could really get on board with this framework! I could see how it makes since to delineate between someone else trying to impose their opposing will on the story — competing creative visions — and circumstances outside anyone's control.

Edited by Eievie on Jan 2nd 2024 at 11:49:36 AM

What would a supposed supertrope do that Creativity Leash doesn't aside allowing examples that don't fit elsewhere? Should Creativity Leash be a supertrooe instead?