Is Like You Would Really Do It specific to death?

So, the Like You Would Really Do It page describes "it" as specifically a character dying. However, I have seen it used to refer to other changes.

• YMMV.Bluey The Sign — The "it" is having the main characters move house.
• YMMV.Arthur — In two examples, the "it" is getting rid of a location.
• YMMV.Inside Out — The "it" is a girl running away.

Are these misuse?

As the Laconic says, "Plot Armor ruins the dramatic tension regarding (what seems like) a character's death or something almost as dire."

The Arthur examples seem rather weak to me, but I think the Bluey and Inside Out ones reach the sufficient dramatic criteria.

While that is what the laconic says, the actual description is indeed death-specific. Note that the bolded line was added unilaterally last year.

Edited by WarJay77 on Apr 26th 2024 at 9:51:25 AM

A meetup location getting removed, moving house, and deciding to run away are very weak examples. I can see a few non-life-threatening examples making it, but they really have to threaten things integral to a character, like their livelihood and home (which can ruin their life).

I suppose it'd be good to check usage to see if this should be renamed, expanded, or something else.

How is this one on YMMV.El Goonish Shive?

• Like You Would Really Do It: One of the main threats in Sister III is magic changing, causing the entire magic system to be altered and everyone but a select few to have to start gaining magic again from scratch. Considering the comic spent a decade expositing about how magic and each characters' individual spells work (and just did an entire NP arc explaining all of Ellen's spells in detail), it was fairly obvious that magic wasn't going to change completely.

It's not a character death, but it is a large part of the comic's premise that's under threat.

These examples feel like the eay it's being used is "Like You Would Really (Change The Work's Status Quo)"

I would say 90 percent of examples are about a character dying in some fashion, either a main character or an established child. Broadly speaking, I've always perceived the trope as any form of direct attack against the status quo and the audience is aware that any changes like that will be reverted somehow because the work is still ongoing. Double if there are physical actors involved, since there is such a thing a contracts. In a show where Death Is Cheap even if a character dies we are just waiting for the resurrection. In fact the difference between Breaking the Fellowship is the knowledge that it will be mostly temporary, while The Fellowship Has Ended is about a true, final split.

The non-death examples are likely misuse under the current definition, but I'd argue that it ought to be expanded somewhat (if brought to TRS). While I agree that the Arthur examples are pretty flimsy, I'd disagree that the Bluey and Inside Out are "very weak". Context is necessary: a character moving wouldn't be a particularly serious affair in some other works, but in a preschool show in which nobody is going to die, the chance that the entire world of the main characters could change takes its place as "high stakes". Still likely misuse under the current definition, but if expanded, I don't see why they wouldn't count.

I'm looking at the original YKTTW and it seems the original point of the trope wasn't "like you would really kill a character for good that would result in a Wham Episode and Nothing Is the Same Anymore", but "like you would really kill a character when the tone of the work is too upbeat for it or because it would take more balls than we think you have". So any definition that centers the shift in the status quo involved would necessarily amount to a Trope Transplant, in which case we might as well incorporate any significant shift in the status quo the audience doesn't buy will happen.

Edited by MorganWick on Apr 27th 2024 at 11:27:34 AM

Yeah I agree it's more of a status quo shock. For instance it works well with Bluey because the house isn't just a house, it's the setting of the show for its lifetime. The stakes are also more preschool level and that leaving a setting that has been iconic for a franchise is definitely worthy of the "it".

Why yes, I am still kinda annoyed at it.

Edited by Ookamikun on Apr 30th 2024 at 3:19:00 AM

So basically Nothing Is the Same Anymore subverted?

Edited by eroock on Apr 29th 2024 at 12:07:57 PM

So would it be worthwhile to have two articles (both YMMV), both about threats that the audience doesn't buy, but one about it being too dark for the work, and the other disrupting a status quo element in an episode that isn't important enough to do so? (Death of a main character would fall under both.)

^ Do you have an example of the first that is not also the second?

Well, the current description leads with the idea of the Littlest Cancer Patient being menaced by a serial killer. If we want to go even more extreme, we could go with a Vile Villain, Saccharine Show who's menacing a helpless little baby that we've never heard of, something that wouldn't be a status quo shift per se but would still be at odds with the tone of the work or even potentially scar children in the target audience.

But this has me thinking about how much the original point of the trope even applies anymore, because works seem to be a lot more daring than they used to be. Are there examples of the first category that wouldn't be examples of the second anymore, or are works more willing to do anything short of a major status quo change that you can't rule anything out?

Think of a single-instalment work like a film, tugging at heartstrings with a Littlest Cancer Patient. Or any show with an unnamed but very adorable baby being threatened by the monster. The first doesn't have a status quo to keep up and the second doesn't affect it, but both would make things dark and possibly unsuitable for children.

I do feel that there are some cases where there would be serious dramatic tension that doesn't involve death, like The Hero pulling a Face–Heel Turn and/or going to jail seemingly for good, but there is probably nowhere else to put them (except maybe Status Quo Is God, but I tend to associate that with issues resolved at the ends of the episodes that start them).

Then there are cases of the most iconic and recurring individual villain making a Heel–Face Turn, like in Doctor Who S36 E8 "The Lie of the Land":

• Upon its initial airing, few viewers believed that Missy/The Master was actually capable of the Heel–Face Turn this episode suggested she was attempting to make, if only because s/he's the franchise's most popular standalone villain and has personality that the Daleks and Cybermen do not. As it turned out, she was capable but her previous self wouldn't have it and killed her. This, combined with the Master's Joker Immunity, resulted in most people being unsurprised by the next incarnation being evil again when debuting less than two years later.

The last part was changed by me because it had been out of date for a few years.

Just to add: With a Foot on the Bus's description even includes a direct citation to this trope, despite it has nothing to do with death.

Usually, if he's a main character, this is as far as the bus will go, as an actual departure would be a very dramatic change, or even force the story to end on the spot. Did you think that he would really do it? For secondary characters, it is a way to point their importance to the story: if his leaving would change so much, that means he is important.

And I admit I listed this trope in relation to a Deuteragonist on that basis.

Edited by SamCurt on May 5th 2024 at 3:34:07 AM