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Ask the Tropers:
openVideo Examples
How do you edit video examples again? Asking since I recently finished the work page for the source of one of the video examples on Self-Destruct Mechanism and want to edit it so that it links back to that.
openTabletop Games and/or Magazines?
A question that is starting to bug me: in the "Tabletop Games" folder of tropes, I frequently see (and probably added a few myself) examples related to a roleplaying game, but actually coming from a magazine devoted to it (most often, Dragon for Dungeons & Dragons).
However, should such examples be placed instead in the "Magazines" folder? And when crosswicking, should they go on the Magazine's work page, or the game's?
openProblematic entry Film
The YMMV page for the Black Panther film has the following entry under Alternate Character Interpretation:
- Is Killmonger a Death Seeker? Besides refusing medical help after his defeat, he always chooses the self-destructive path. He kills his girlfriend and burns the sacred garden, implying that he isn't interested in having an heir or leaving a legacy for himself even though he's a prince with a legitimate claim to the throne. Furthermore, despite having the skills and connections, Killmonger also chose not to follow a more heroic career like becoming a costumed vigilante, entering politics or starting his own company, thus denying himself the chance to help others and live a life of luxury without the needless deaths. The fact that Killmonger pursues self-defeating atrocities implies that he doesn't care about what happens to himself so long as everyone experiences his suffering. This only makes his evil plan more horrifying in hindsight, since it amounts to a murder-suicide as he intentionally wants millions of innocent lives to die alongside him.
The idea that Killmonger is a Death Seeker may be a valid interpretation, but the entry doesn't make its case very well. Most of what it says simply applies to villains in general not using their skills in a better way, and while Killmonger may be willing to die if necessary, he doesn't seem to see his cause as self-destructive. The specific examples the entry cites don't support this either (burning the garden does not affect his ability to have children, and killing his girlfriend was done in order to kill Klaue, which his entire plan depended on). The last sentence seems especially problematic, as it states this interpretation as though it were fact.
Edited by Javertshark13openExtremely small "Referenced By" page Videogame
So I recently discovered this 'Referenced By' subpage for the Halo franchise that appears on every single game's subpage bar as a redirect. It was created in February of this year by darkemyst and has only been edited three times since, with the last edit being in May of this year.
It also only has six examples and not all of them even seem to be valid, which has me thinking it should be cut. To list all the examples and my thoughts on them:
- Aldnoah.Zero: The Hypergate looks very similar to the African portal that leads to the Ark from Halo 3.
- This entry provides two image links on the page itself, one of which is broken and just redirects to the main page of Bungie's website (and they don't even own the Halo franchise anymore). I found a working image and frankly the similarities seem fairly superficial, though I suppose the argument could be made that it's a reference: Hypergate (Aldnoah)
◊, Gate at Voi (Halo)
◊
- This entry provides two image links on the page itself, one of which is broken and just redirects to the main page of Bungie's website (and they don't even own the Halo franchise anymore). I found a working image and frankly the similarities seem fairly superficial, though I suppose the argument could be made that it's a reference: Hypergate (Aldnoah)
- Guardians of the Galaxy: Peter's laser pistols bear more than a passing resemblance to the Covenant Plasma Rifle from Halo: Combat Evolved, or also the laser pistols from The Black Hole (1979).
- The Expanse: While at first glance the Ring's design is reminiscent of a lifeless Halo, Manéo Jung-Espinoza's attempt at flying through it reveals that it actually operates more like the Supergates built by the Ori.
- Both of these entries openly admit that the similarities are vague and limited enough that it could be a reference to something else entirely, which makes them invalid IMO.
- Marathon: The Eternal Level name "These Caves Can't Be a Natural Formation" is a line from Halo: Combat Evolved
- The Marathon series pre-dates the Halo franchise which made me seriously scratch my head at this. I had to dig through our page on the former to find out that this is apparently a reference to a fan-made total conversion mod called Marathon: Eternal that was released after Halo. Not sure if that's valid.
- Quake: The Blaster in Quake IV can fire either single, extremely weak shots or more powerful charged shots in a manner similar to the Plasma Pistol.
- This is an extremely basic and generic gameplay mechanic that many, many shooters have adopted for many, many weapons throughout gaming history. Edit history shows that it was also in the above category of "the entry outright admits it could be referencing something else" until the last edit on May 10th 2021 - specifically, pointing out that it's equally similar to the "Dispersion Pistol" from Unreal I.
- Minilife TV: In "Spirit in the Sky", Master Chief's helmet is one of the items in Chris's swag pile.
- This is possibly the only inarguably valid entry on the page and it's for a LEGO stop-motion web series sitcom I've never heard of.
openEdit War on YMMV/MushokuTensei
On YMMV.Mushoku Tensei, Tropers.Qubritz added the following
(bolded for emphasis) to a Broken Base entry:
- One of the most controversial aspects of the story is its very premise as a "Redemption Arc". The main problem with it stems from the possibility of "redemption" being used to justify horrible or terrible actions based on the idea that the perpetrator will "grow up" or "learn from it". This is further compounded by the fact that the behavior being condemned for is also "rewarded" in a sense, such as when Rudeus winds up marrying three of the women he once sexually-harassed, he and Eris wind up together despite her horrible abuse of him, and Paul winds up marrying the woman he had an affair with.
In retrospect, the entry should probably be reworded to further explain what the audience is split on regarding these points (basically, whether or not Rudeus deserves "redemption"note He is implied to have been a pedophile that masturbated to nude photos of his own niece before being reincarnated., whether the ending "rewards" people for crappy behavior, and whether or not it sends the wrong message about "redemption" in general). But, on top of that, the bolded section is a gross oversimplification of the actual issues with those characters. As I edited here
, the two are mutually toxic to each other.
Eris is introduced as a Spoiled Brat who is verbally and physically abusive to Rudeus when he is brought in to be her magic tutor. This is very much Played for Drama and not treated as amusing.
After he arranges a fake-turned-real kidnapping, she grows to like and respect him and from then on, the few times she does hit him, it is portrayed as the usual anime Tsundere/Double Standard: Abuse, Female on Male/Pervert Revenge Mode anime hijinks and absolutely Played for Laughs, as it's clear that the two of them are really into each other and everybody pretty much expects Rudeus to bed Eris at some point Her father even explicitly gives him permission in a moment of Deliberate Values Dissonance. (They're both like physically 12 at this point, btw, although Rudeus was a middle-aged man in his past life. And absolutely still sees himself as an adult.) At the same time, Rudeus makes an attempt to take off and steal Eris's panties while she's asleep, and after her father does arrange for her and Rudeus to go to bed together, Rudeus ignores an uncomfortable Eris after she changes her mind and tells him to stop until she is forced to hit him. (And I repeat, Eris is about 12 at this time, while Rudeus is a 30-something implied pedophile in the body of a child.)
The "Eris is the unambiguous abuser toward Rudeus" aspect of their relationship literally doesn't last longer than the first full episode she's introduced (in the anime). The majority of their screentime features the two of them being basically flawed, awkward people, and one of them being too young to be attempting the relationship they have. Even if we accept that Eris is an abusive brat, and is still pretty violent after she catches feelings for him, he is still mentally an adult, while she is a child.
NOTE: I'd also like to state that, after my first edit, Qubritz agreed that "mutually-abusive" was a better way to describe their relationship. Then, shortly afterwards, he suddenly sent me a PM out of the blue asking to chat, which quickly turned sour after we had a disagreement about the portrayal of a fictional character, and he turned pretty hostile.
Then, after I blocked him, he re-added
the bolded section. Again, after previously agreeing that "mutually toxic" was the best way to define their relationship.
resolved self-promotion in tlp comments
so there's a tlp draft
being proposed. (full disclosure: I have my own issues with the proposal that are unrelated to my question and have made that explicit in the comments for the draft.) My question is: does the site allow self-promotion outside of explicit forum threads? the sponsor wrote in the comments that they have a youtube channel that discusses the trope they are proposing and then linked it in the comment. is that allowed? disallowed? allowed but frowned upon? Felt weird about it tbh, so i'm asking here.
openFan Works and Recursive Fanfiction getting mixed with source material
I've been told that Fan Works aren't to be discussed on pages for source material, and fan works aren't exempt from this, not allowing Recursive Fanfiction to be discussed on the source fan work's page. What I'm worried about, however, is works with communities where Fan Works - and even Recursive Fanfiction - are closely associated with each other to the point of crossovers between Fan Works being common, and the content of fan works (recursive or not) even impacting the perception of the source material.
To give a specific example, Friday Night Funkin': Corruption is a Game Mod of Friday Night Funkin' well-known for recursive Game Mods that involve characters from other existing Game Mods (whether they be characters invented for a mod, or characters from pre-existing works as portrayed in a specific mod) dealing with the main conflict of Corruption. While some stuff I think I know how to handle from past experience (such as removing the Drinking Game subpage's section on recursive Corruption mods), one thing I don't fully know how to handle is certain examples and bullets on the YMMV subpage that allude to recursive mods and the base Corruption mod (such as a "Seinfeld" Is Unfunny example which describes the reception of recursive Corruption mods affecting the reputation of Corruption itself).
While I am wondering about the mixing of source material, Fan Works, and Recursive Fanfiction in a broader sense, I'm especially curious how to handle scenarios where reception towards a work is especially affected by fan works (including when such happens between a fan work and recursive fan works).
Edited by BrashBusteropenEverybody Hates Hades question
Everybody Hates Hades is about mythological death gods being depicted as more evil in adaptations right?
As the examples have several examples like Hell Girl, Everybody loves large chests, heart strikers and the dungeons and dragons stuff seems to use original villains who aren't based on anything.
Plus some examples just use Death itself as a concept being portrayed as a bad guy. Which I'm not sure is correct either ?
resolved A troper who keeps posting dubious tropes on the Final Fantasy 7 Remake Main Character section. Videogame
Someone named Frankie 3 keeps re-posting the same ill-fitting tropes on Tifa Lockhart's character page despite me and other tropers already having pointed out why he needs to stop doing it. Like for example, trying to pin the "Token Good Teammate" label to Tifa when the rest of the party aren't even evil people, at worst having some anti-heroic traits that don't even scale into particularly dark levels. And then there's him posting links to some random wiki to try and add proof of claim when it directly violates troping rule that pages are only for what is found within the work itself. What should be done about him?
Edited by 9thOutworldsManopenFire and Blood Designated Hero Literature
I feel like the YMMV for Fire and Blood calling Jaehaerys a Designated Hero is wrong and should be removed because 1) Jaehaerys did plenty of legitimately great things for Westeros. 2) It was Baelon who let Alyssa humiliate Vaegon in the training yard. 3) Jaehaerys sending Vaegon to the Citadel was something Vaegon himself was happy to do. 4) Saera and her male consorts were legitimately awful people and Jaehaerys treated his daughter very well until he learned of her many misdeeds. 5) Jaehaerys had a good argument as to why trying to bring back Saera from Lys would cause nothing but trouble and correctly guessed that his daughter wanted nothing more to do with her family. 6) Arranged marriages like the ones Daella and Viserra had are commonplace amongst Westeros nobility. And 7) Westeros is an inherently male oriented culture and Jaehaerys passing over Rhaenys as his successor, while sexist, would be the expected choice for him to make.
Edited by Chubzhacopenweird redirect thing
I'm not sure this is the right forum to ask this, but a few times today, I've been on TV Tropes, only for my browser to automatically redirect me to a "virus scan" website (not always the same one). Obviously not legit. What's weird is that it's only happening on TV Tropes, and I ran a virus scan on my PC (using the software I actually bought, not the sketchy websites) and nothing came up.
Is this happening to anyone else? I'm wondering if something's up with the site itself or if it's just my computer.
openVandal/troll
This troper
has created at least two
pages
with just one nonsense word each, seemingly for the sole purpose of trolling. They also created this
Haiku that's not a proper Hiaku (because the middle line only has 6 syllables instead of 7), and is Shaped Like Itself at best. These are their only edits on this wiki.
openMinimal-effort work page.
The Atomic Time of Monsters seems to be a page for a Kaiju story of some description. I'm not clear on further details because, as can be seen there, the page's contents consist only of a picture and the phrase "This Page is under-development by one person please be patient". It has been worked on by only one editor, Drago491, and has not been edited since June. The page's url also wasn't capitalized properly.
Normally I'd simply say to cut it, but the associated character page has work put into it — the grammar and formatting both have problems and there are several ZCEs, but those are all issues that can be rectified fairly easily assuming some work is put into them. That by itself makes me think that there's probably value in trying to salvage the page instead of just cutting it altogether.
I'm not wholly familiar with the site's policy in this matters, so I thought I'd look for some feedback. What should be done here? The original editor (who I'll contact once I'm finished writing this) obviously has enthusiasm for creating pages, which I think we shouldn't discourage, but evidently something needs to be done to bring the page up to wiki standards.
openIs this Bowdlerization? Anime
There is a troper
who on
more than one occasion
has made edits that are solely to remove the word "queer."
Admittedly, as someone who uses the word for myself, I'm sensitive to the issue and the ridiculously new controversy around the term, but the word means something specific, and appears to be an allowed word on this wiki, so I don't believe it should simply be removed.
Berserk Button: misusing Nightmare Fuel
openRemoval of Ambiguously Gay/Bi on JoJo pages
tiger20 made some edits to some Character pages for JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, mostly Characters.Jo Jos Bizarre Adventure Phantom Blood and Characters.Jo Jos Bizarre Adventure Battle Tendency. These edits had a lot of issues, mainly from a large quantity of misspellings (to the point where I'm not sure if they're typos or genuine mistakes), but I fixed those and sent a PM.
Something I'm not sure needs undoing is the removal of Ambiguously Gay and Ambiguously Bi on those pages, with no edit reason given:
- Ambiguously Gay: Completely devotes his life to supporting Jonathan after gaining his friendship, extending said devotion to his descendants after Jonathan's untimely passing, all while never marrying himself (note that "he never married" in an obituary was a British euphemism for homosexuality). Meanwhile he's never shown as attracted to women aside from Joseph teasing him and Erina about having Unresolved Sexual Tension, though their reactions indicate that this is not the case.
- Ambiguously Bi: Caesar's Establishing Character Moment shows him to be quite the lothario around women, but at one point Messina teases him about having a crush on Joseph, and he doesn't exactly deny the allegation. That the first thing he does upon reuniting with Joseph is a stock Tsundere reaction doesn't help his case.
I feel like there is a good amount of evidence for Speedwagon being Ambiguously Gay, though Caesar being bi is a bit weaker IMO. Still, removing LGBT tropes without any discussion or explanation feels suspicious. Do these examples look okay, and should they be re-added?
Edited by ZuxtronopenLiterature / Her Father's Daughter Does not even HAVE a description!
I dont care enough to research and add one myself. What do?
openIs there a way to request a trope rename? Videogame
I feel like the trope "Self-Sacrifice Scheme" is a bit of a mouthful and sounds more underwhelming than it often is.
At the same time, the name "Hangman's Gambit" sounds mysterious and interesting, but is used for a very mundane purpose: literally just a game of Hangman in Danganronpa.
Hangman's Gambit always sounded like a phrase perfectly suitable for those times when a character sacrifices their life, or pretends to do so in the case of faking their death, in order to increase the chances of a desired outcome in a different endeavor. For example, dying to rile up a crowd of people, or faking their death to make a targeted individual/group focus on something else. This is, by my understanding, exactly what a "Self-Sacrifice Scheme" seems to be.
With this in mind, would it be possible to request that we rename "Self-Sacrifice Scheme" to "Hangman's Gambit"?
If not, could it be made as a subtrope specifically referring to situations where the goal is uncertain and the death is meant as a means of manipulation rather than a direct path to that goal?
Edited by illeatyourselfopenTroper with persist indentation problem
On 26th Jul, I sent them an indentation notifier for this edit
. They did reply and acknowledge it, too bad since it appears that they do not actually learn. I sent them two more indentation notifiers on 1st Sep (regarding this
) and 26th Sep (regarding this
.
Yesterday, they did it again
. I sent them another notifier and wait a day to see if they'll fix it. They don't, despite making two more edits on another articles. So I fix it myself and made this report.
openrequesting an addition Anime
I was surprised that Guts from Berserk isn't on the anime and manga section of the Hurting Hero trope examples. This may sound dumb, but I'm kind of nervous that I'll mess up the formatting if I do it myself, so I just thought I'd suggest instead.

Do we have a trope for the phenomenon where real life cities (or parts thereof, like a street) embrace the fact that a popular work of fiction is either set in that city, or in a fictional city that just happens to have the same name? Like how Metropolis, Illinois declared itself Supermans hometown due to sharing it's name with the fictional city that the man of steel lives in. Or how the German city of Bremen fully embraced the fairy tale of the Bremen Town Musicians.
If not, is this trope worthy?