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openImpatient Growth Fixation Bottleneck
Do we have a trope for that certain critical period of personal growth (potentially an entire character arc) where, among a group of talents/experts/empowered, there is a member suffering from noticeable decline/stagnation compared to their peers (or at least a rival) in spite of their efforts? (A staple of the shonen genre)
Said fixated character may train themselves to breaking points for seemingly meager gains. They may compare themselves to other members of their group or to that of a rival, angered or confused as to how/why those individuals are growing faster/stronger than themselves. Their personality may warp/deteriorate, becoming more aggressive or depressive, liable to snap out at others even when they come bearing constructive criticism or empathy/pity. They may be liable to consider and exploit shortcuts, whether they be as benign as copying others' techniques or potentially self-destructive like taking drugs for instant undeniable results.
Friends of said character may be torn between offering direct support, or take a more hands-off approach with the understanding that coddling them will only undermine their self-confidence and stunt their growth.
Successfully overcoming this period may yield lasting results of significant character development often achieved through improving/creating something that is truly their own and subsequently overcoming a meaningful conflict through their own efforts (bonus points if they won through the virtues of accumulated effort while their defeated opponent took shortcuts).
(Note: If we don't have this specifically as a trope, permission granted for others to take a first stab at it.)
openVillain lair cutscene
A cutscene in a video game or movie showing the villain in their base, plotting or watching the hero through screens.
openAndrogynous looks feminine
A character design trope where Ambiguous Gender/Nonbinary characters lean more towards a feminine appearance within the design scale. Do we have this?
Edit: edited for clarity.
Edited by Crossover-EnthusiastopenUntitled Print Comic
So here's the situation; the protagonist wakes up in the morning and finds out that a bounty hunter is after his superhero alter ego and is minutes away from finding his apartment. He does so by following old heat signatures. So the protagonist, who knows who that bounty hunter is cause he's read his file, immediately comes up with a plan to cover his identity; he jumps off the window to get a drop on the hunter (the window is almost on top of a skyscraper, so nobody on ground level would notice when it broke), and then he follows the same path he took the previous day to cover his old trail, and jump out of his apartment again, while telling the AI assistant to pretend she didn't know who the masked guy is. All to disassociate his heroic alter with his real identity.
I was thinking Indy Ploy, but the whole thing seems too complicated for that. So is it that or Xanatos Speed Chess?
Edited by LermisopenBattle Costume Switch Anime
A character that is constantly changing costumes akin to Final Fantasy games where changing jobs alters the look of the character. This is meant in a "magic" sense not just a plain clothes switch. Sakura Cardcaptor is a good example of this.
Edited by snipermawsopenDoesn't Know They're Not Human
Exactly What It Says on the Tin. An alien or monster either born and raised by humans or are of earth origin think that they're human instead of something else.
openSliding across the hood of a car
I think this was a not too uncommon trope in old cop shows. A character will jump and slide across the hood of a car to get to the other side of the car quicker. This would often be followed by a car chase. Apparently common in The Dukes of Hazzard.
openJust Take A Paternity Test
- Tweet: "I love how mamma mia could easily be solved by a paternity test but fuck that let’s have a musical instead"
openArbitrarily long charge
Two characters charge at each other. Despite being only feet apart, they have time to do a lot of screaming and give long speeches about how they hate each other, will never forgive the other for something they did, are no longer holding back, or whatever else before they actually get within striking distance.
It's really common in shonen anime. Do we have a trope that specifically covers situations like this?
Edited by BattleMasteropenIncoming disaster, gotta think fast
Something bad (localized disaster ranging to full-on apocalypse) is about to happen. Probably no one knows what. A savvy character gets to work preparing food, supplies, etc. while everyone else is still reeling, knowing that things are about to go From Bad to Worse
openForeign Admirer, hostage?
You know how in some stories, someone, usually a girl, visits a foreign country for some reason and meets someone with great power, political or not, and said foreign admirer, tries to spend more time with her and possibly dazzle her with luxury and/or power into staying? She may or may not be impressed, but chooses to go home for some reason, only to find she's basically being held hostage, either directly or indirectly? Does this fall under "And Now You Must Marry Me!" or is there a trope specific to an instance like this? The admirer doesn't always seem to intend marriage, so I'm not sure.
I'm talking like what happened to Maddie in the one episode of Suite Life on Deck, or Fran in that one episode of The Nanny. Any thoughts?
openRich Youth = Tennis Racket Web Original
A quick way to establish a character as a foppish old money heir, in works taking blace before the 1950ies, is to give him a tennis racket. Usually implies the character belongs to a country club, or studies in a classy college, and that he's sporty enough to be a physical threat.
openA contrast between supervillains and regular criminals.
The idea is in some superhero stories the hero contrasts how their enemies can vary from fantastic ones like supervillains trying to take over the world with a doomsday device or an eldritch abomination threatening to destroy reality to mundane ones like common thugs, murderers and rapists, almost always the mundane enemies seem to be the more monstrous.
Examples: - In Webcomic/Nefarious issue "99 lives" Mack mentions how the emotional rollercoaster from going between the two as well as Mayapples Friendly Enemies relationship with Crow contributed to him becoming a Scrap Heap Hero.
- In the Teen Titan fanfic Transition Jinx tries to connect to Raven over the fact that she had an terrible father too. In this story Jinx's dad had among other things let a Pedophile Priest have his way with her and tried to shoot her. Raven agrees with Jinx that her dad is worse than Trigon since you can at least expect a Demon Lord to be a total bastard.
Edited by MuppetopenWound backfire
Wounding the monster only causes things to get worse - e.g. wounding a Xenomorph just spills their acidic Alien Blood everywhere, hurting Azi Dahaka from Iranian myth causes swarms of vermin to emerge from the wounds, wounding a Hydra just causes a Hydra Problem, etc.
Usually requires the hero to either defeat the monster without killing it or find a way to kill it without breaking its skin.
openNo using later gear Videogame
Basically, in most video games you unlock more powerful items as time goes on; pretty standard. However, if the game also allows you to replay levels it doesn't allow you to use those more powerful items when you're replaying, to prevent breezing through the level.
openFound an Abandoned Robot Anime
The story starts with a character finding a deactivated robot in the trash or somewhere else, with the ensuing story usually revolving around their relationship.
Examples include Gunnm, Chobits, Made in Abyss, the French manga Green Mechanic or the more recent Heart Gear.
Related to A Boy and His X I suppose.
Edited by Lyendith
Character A is trying to con character B, but as it turns out, character B was also trying to con character A.