Have a question about how the TVTropes wiki works? No one knows this community better than the people in it, so ask away! Ask the Tropers is the page you come to when you have a question burning in your brain and the support pages didn't help.
It's not for everything, though. For a list of all the resources for your questions, click here. You can also go to this Directory thread
for ongoing cleanup projects.
Ask the Tropers is for:
- • General questions about the wiki, how it works, and how to do things.
- • Reports of problems with wiki articles, or requests for help with wiki articles.
- • Reports of misbehavior or abuse by other tropers.
Ask the Tropers is not for:
- • Help identifying a trope. See TropeFinder.
- • Help identifying a work. See MediaFinder.
- • Asking if a trope example is valid. See the Trope Talk forum.
- • Proposing new tropes. See TropeLaunchPad.
- • Making bug reports. See QueryBugs.
- • Asking for new wiki features. See QueryWishlist.
- • Chatting with other tropers. See our forums.
- • Reporting problems with advertisements. See this forum topic.
- • Reporting issues on the forums. Send a Holler instead.
Ask the Tropers:
openMissing Morbius references? Print Comic
Did the Marvel character Morbius used to have a Nightmare Fuel page? Or a presence on some other Marvel-related Nightmare Fuel page? Also, I seem to recall there was a page that mentioned how Morbius once absolutely massacred a particular group of evill humans, but I can't seem to find any such references... Am I imagining things, or maybe they were deleted, or maybe I just haven't found them yet?
openSpoiler policy - Ghost Rider Print Comic
Back in August, this note was added to Ghost Rider (2022), just above the list of examples:
Given that it's the latest volume in a series that's been running on and off for 50 years, with the return of the original protagonist in place of the Legacy Character versions of recent decades, I can see that it may have some late arrival spoilers for everything that's gone before, but declaring the whole page Spoilers Off seems a bit much.
The tropers who are actively following the series and updating the page seem fine with it, but it does seem inconsistent with our usual approach to works pages for serialised works (and in general, I think).
Should I just delete it and start tagging spoilers?
EDIT: Note also left on discussion page & PM sent to active tropers, pointing to this ATT.
Edited by Mrph1openCustom WikiWord not displaying? (X-Men '92) Print Comic
Help!
I may be missing something really obvious here, but -
ComicBook.X Men 92 is displayed as X-Men '92 on its own works page.
But X Men 92 isn't picking up that formatting when I link from other works pages. And looking at ‘referenced by’, this seems to he a wider issue for its other links.
Is it a known bug? Is there a workaround of any sort?
Thanks!
openCustom WikiWord and CamelCase issues at page creation Print Comic
Hi,
I’m sure I should understand this one by now, but it's still bugging me (no pun intended):
X-Treme X-Men (2001) should have been ComicBook/XTremeXMen2001 (to match ComicBook/XTremeXMen2022, ComicBook/XTremeXMen2012, ComicBook/XTremeXMen and pretty much every other XMen title across the franchise. But it's actually ComicBook/XTremeXmen2001.
As it was a redirect for a while, until the other pages were launched and disambiguation was needed, I've only just noticed the issue (I didn't launch the page, and haven't checked all the way back to see who did).
Do we have a way to fix this so that we don't have to put incorrect CamelCase on every trope or works page that links to it? If so, does that mean we need to cut and recreate it? Or are we doomed now that a custom title is set?
Thanks!
Edited by Mrph1openDoctor Fate Print Comic
I was just at YMMV.Doctor Fate, and I noticed Dork Age and Audience-Alienating Era are listed in two separate entries, but they're supposed to be the same exact trope due to Renamed Tropes. What should be done about this?
openTroper struggling a little with new page creation Print Comic
Troper ~Miscellaneous Soup has just created a new Fantastic Four (2022) page. I've sent a couple of notifiers, but there's no one single issue here, as it's got quite a few gaps that need addressing:
- No indexing
- No crosswicking
- Links to Main for Fantastic Four, Fantastic Four 2018, Marvel Comics and Black Mirror, all of which should have specified a namespace (and were mostly redlinks that would have been visible in any preview).
- Mixing examples for published stories and pre-release examples from solicitations/promos, sometimes without clearly marking which is which.
- Misuse of at least one trope (Anthology Comic, which should have been Rotating Protagonist)
It looks like they were an active troper years ago (all the way back to 2013), but have just returned after a long break.
I've done a quick update and may do more, but they might need a little assistance with current site rules & customs. Thanks!
Edited by Mrph1openSelf-reporting - image replacement Print Comic
So...
As a new(ish) troper, when I started actively editing works pages, I swapped out a fair few images for 'better' versions on both ComicBook and Characters pages. By which I mean different images that looked better, not just permitted quality upgrades.
At that point I hadn't fully understood the Image Pickin' rules and how they also applied to non-trope pages with existing images that weren't Image Pickin' approved.
Now, after much more troping, I have a much better understanding of the tools and customs for making that sort of change.
I've never had notifiers on this, and other tropers working on the same pages seemed to be comfortable with the changes. But. This is one of those things where I have seen other tropers get notified and suspended months or years after a change. And I'd prefer not to get caught up In that months or years further down the line, especially if that comes up multiple times on different occasions for the different images.
So what's the best way to make it right? Is it a case of leave it and deal with it if a particular image is challenged, or should I try to look back through history and take the cases to Image Pickin' (or elsewhere) to get them reviewed and confirmed or overturned?
Edited by MacronNotesopen "Bruce Wayne is Batman...'s roommate?" Trope name? Print Comic
Is there a trope name for when characters in a story are unable to piece together a heroes secret identity in spite of any logical evidence pointing to that person? Even if you can accept the fact Superman can hide behind a pair of glasses, there may still be circumstantial evidence pointing to Clark Kent being Superman.
One example would be, Peter Parker is the only photographer who can get any photos of Spiderman and most of the time they are taken from impossible angles. Yet even when characters or villains bring up this connection Peter has to Spiderman, no one reasons that maybe they are one in the same. They either ignore this conclusion or come to a totally inaccurate one(e.g like the Joker does in the Lego Batman movie, though is played for comedic effect).
Is it just an extension of Paper Thin Disguise? Or is there another trope name for this type of occurrence in comics?
openClosing quotes? (Works page stingers) Print Comic
I've seen a few pages with a second page quote at the very end, after the final " ---- ", most recently added to ComicBook.Immortal Hulk.
However, I can't seem to find anything via Administrivia, ATT or forum searches to say whether this is an accepted practice or something that shouldn't happen.
Do we have any guidance / precedents for this?
EDIT: subject line updated based on first reply
Edited by Mrph1openImage pickin' - portraits for character pages? Print Comic
I can't find anything on Administrivia, so just want to confirm -
- If there's a page that only covers a single character, and just has one top-of-page image, I’m guessing it's similar to a normal Works (e.g. ComicBook) page in that it doesn't need Image Pickin' to choose an image, but that it might end up on a thread there to help reach a consensus or resolve an issue with an existing/deleted image?
- In a similar way, if a page has multiple characters, I'm assuming each one's tackled individually and gets its own note if it goes via Image Pickin' - I've seen one or two like this for MCU pages, but nothing in Administrivia to explain?
Additionally, where there's a Characters page for a particular work that shares characters and continuity with others (e.g. a Marvel Universe series), I'm guessing that character images should ideally be from, or at least representative of, that work?
E.g. if a series stars the grey Hulk that's occasionally appeared over the years (same character, different appearance and powers/personality), any Characters page entry for him for that particular series and its works page should show that grey Hulk, as seen in the comic, not the green one seen elsewhere (in practice, I guess that example would normally be a wikilink pointing back to the Hulk's main character page, not a duplicate list of tropes, but I assume it could/should still have an image alongside?).
Sorry to bombard ATT with questions - just trying to get a clear understanding on this.
Thanks!
[Edited - managed to find some threads and examples which partly answered this, but still hoping for a steer on the points above]
Edited by Mrph1resolved Character pages - navbox 'index' links and crossreferencing? Print Comic
Are there any guidelines for start of page navbox 'indexing' (the cross-referencing wikilink kind, rather than [[index]] tagging) on Character pages, for the cases where a work or franchise has a huge number of characters across a large number of sub-pages?
Looking at Characters.X Men Arakko (and the other X-Men Characters pages), I count 19 lines of links in the navbox before the page itself starts, mapping out approximately 50 different X-Men character pages. Presumably that also needs to be updated on all 50(ish) of the character pages any time it changes.
That's not an exhaustive list either, as it doesn't directly link to some of the single-character pages or the works-specific pages for particular comic books.
Most of these characters range across the wider franchise, appearing in multiple Marvel Universe comics and webcomics, so are not specific to any one comic series and their Characters page names don't mirror a particular works page.
(It's also using WMG tagging, which I’m not used to seeing outside of WMG pages, but I’m assuming that's not a problem?)
Looking at other sprawling franchises -
- Characters.Star Wars takes a different approach, with a single link back to the top-level page - e.g. as seen on Characters.Star Wars High Republic Era Jedi.
- Characters.Star Trek uses a much shorter list of links on subpages, mapping back to the relevant series (e.g. on Characters.Star Trek Deep Space Nine Federation And Bajor)- but its characters tend to be series-specific so it doesn't have quite the same structural challenge.
Is this approach fine 'as is', should it be condensed/removed in a similar way to Star Trek & Star Wars, or can it be streamlined in a different way (e.g. hide it in a folder to save space)?
Thanks!
EDIT: Edited to fix terminology and make navbox references clearer.
Edited by Mrph1openBetsy Braddock/Psylocke Print Comic
The new Dawn of X relaunch sees Betsy Braddock become Captain Britain and her identity as Psylocke is taken by Kwannon. I'm unsure of what should be done with the page exactly, other than that I know it'll need some overhaul soon because it'll be strange for it to remain the same way soon.
For example, Ms. Marvel used to specifically refer to Carol Danvers, but since becoming Captain Marvel it was changed to Carol Danvers, whereas the original Ms. Marvel is now a general page describing the legacy.
I asked this on the discussion page of Psylocke, but got no replies. It seems no one has seen it. So I'm asking here, what should be done?
My idea was similar to the Ms. Marvel case: make a page for Betsy Braddock covering her specifically, and make Psylocke a general page for the two. It could provide bios for both, tropes for Psylocke as an identity in general, and specifically the bio and tropes for Kwannon (who doesn't seem to have any entry due to her obscurity beforehand outside the "Freaky Friday" Flip).
What do you think?
resolved Trivia tropes - KeepCirculatingTheTapes Print Comic
As I understand it, Trivia tropes can't be played with - no aversions, subversions etc.
With that in mind, if something like Keep Circulating the Tapes stops being relevant, does it get deleted entirely, or does it get updated to acknowledge it was a historical issue?
For context, pretty much all of the Marvel UK early 1990s comics have been unavailable since the imprint imploded in 1994. Last week Marvel started republishing them digitally, with a second batch today.
A thirty year gap feels significant. But it's also no longer the case.
Is there a standard way to approach this?
openvalid deletion? Print Comic
Paul A removed this example from Sexually Transmitted Superpowers (plus a similar example from an adaptation):
- Played very darkly in The Sandman (1989): in "Dream Country," wealthy author Erasmus Fry reveals that he owes his superhuman inspiration to the fact that he was able to bind the muse Calliope to him. Though he knew that it was possible to gain inspiration by simply wooing Calliope, he found that simply locking her in a room and repeatedly raping her was effective enough to get ideas. Ultimately, Fry sells Calliope to Richard Madoc, an up-and-coming author in desperate need of inspiration; Madoc continues the use of the Muse as a Sex Slave, allowing him to become a Renaissance Man author capable of working in multiple genres and assuming perspectives that would normally be outside his abilities. Unfortunately for both Fry and Madoc, it's indicated that the inspiration gained from raping Calliope will not grant long-term success, leaving them wealthy but forgotten while authors who sought legitimate inspiration are cherished and remembered. However, before he can learn this, Madoc finds himself becoming a target of Calliope's ex-boyfriend, Dream.
Their argument in the edit reason is "Being inspired to write a novel is not a superpower".
Thing is, as I understand it that's kind of the whole point of the Muses: they're goddesses who literally represent the concept of artistic inspiration.
So, what do y'all think?
Edited by StarSwordresolved Trope grouping query - character sheets Print Comic
Hi,
I suspect I know the answer to this one, but just want to double-check before I start making sweeping changes across multiple pages (which I'll call out on discussion pages, but may not get a consensus from the tropers working on them).
There are a fair number of superhero comic Characters pages that group a character's superpowers in a way that seems to contradict How to Write an Example.
An extreme case would be the Vulcan folder in the initial 'Royal Family' section of Characters.Marvel Comics Shiar.
- Vulcan has been given a lot of useful powers over the years, so his entry has Superpower Lottery.
- Beneath that, we have broad categories such as Energy Absorption
- And beneath them we have Flight,
- Power Nullifier
- and other individual powers
- More than a dozen of them, in total.
- Beneath that, we have broad categories such as Energy Absorption
Firstly, the powers are only grouped there, not individually listed as their own alphabetical-ordered tropes in the main list. Even if they're not strictly subtropes, I’m pretty sure that goes against the Administrivia guidance.
Secondly, three levels of bullets feels like overkill, and they are written as if they're a long list of subtropes (with one power trope per bullet and the trope name immediately after the bullet), not wikilinks within example text for the initial trope.
…so, as well as adding them to the main list as tropes in their own right, I’d like to restructure and rewrite the multi-tier bullets as noted above. Probably combining some examples into a single bullet, e.g.
- After duplicating the powers of his fallen teammates in Deadly Genesis, Vulcan acquired both Petra's Dishing Out Dirt and Sway's Time Master powers - and he temporarily had access to Darwin's Adaptive Ability as well.
Does that sound like the right approach for this sort of situation?
As mentioned, this is probably an extreme example, but there are plenty of others - one recurring theme seems to be that characters with a particular power source (e.g. Powered Armor) get those abilities listed as double-bulleted subtropes within that trope, not in the main trope list.
Thanks!
Edited by Mrph1resolved Character page images - size? Print Comic
Looking at character sheets where there are a significant number of characters listed on one page, with images for each one, I’ve seen image widths 350, 300 and 250 all used as standards. Plus a few where the images on a single page aren't set to any standard size (which can look a bit untidy on the page).
Administrivia mentions the 350 for top of page images, but I can't see any similar guidance on this (and 350 does look quite big in this context).
Is there any written guidance on this, or a consensus on which it should be?
Thanks!
resolved Recap page approach - X-Men (Chris Claremont) Print Comic
Just putting this on a new thread, as requested - it started as a comment on another ATT query about similar edits by the same troper, which has now been resolved.
ComicBook.X Men Chris Claremont, created June 23 this year, seems to be envisioned as an umbrella page for the writer's time on all of the X-Men related comics, not just the titular X-Men. As such, there's some potential for overlap with arcs and series within that era that already have their own works pages - e.g. ComicBook.The Dark Phoenix Saga and ComicBook.Magik.
As part of this, it's attempting to add more than 200 recap pages, one for each comic issue of the Claremont-as-writer era (including those spin-off miniseries etc. which are covered by other Comic Book works pages but don't have dedicated recaps). Redlinks on the recap index suggest that the plan is to put all of these under the X-Men (Chris Claremont) page naming rather than against their existing ComicBook works pages - e.g. the aforementioned Magik is listed as Recap.X Men Chris Claremont Magik Vol 12, not just Recap.Magik Vol 12.
I’ve recently added links to the existing ComicBook page leading to the existing works (again, ComicBook) pages for some of the story arcs that happened within that X-Men run, which frankywifeey274's deleted again, and he's (politely) explained in PM that these won't be needed because the new recap pages, and links to those works pages from the recap hub page, will cover that.
As mentioned on the other thread, I don't have a strong view on this, if tropers have actually got the time and energy to create all of those pages - but it seems to be a solo project at the moment and, in light of the comments on the previous thread, if this is going to be problematic (or reversed as it was for the Webcomic.She Is Still Cute Today recap pages that launched the other thread), it's probably worth calling out and letting them know before they sink all that time into creating it.
Thanks!
Edited by Mrph1resolved AuthorAppeal - reusing characters? Print Comic
I'm seeing a few examples where tropers have added the Author Appeal trope because writers have reused familiar / favourite characters in shared-universe comics. For example, from the new ComicBook.Defenders Beyond works page:
- Author Appeal: The new Defenders roster is comprised almost entirely of characters Ewing's either created (Taaia) or written before, from Mighty Avengers and The Ultimates to Loki: Agent of Asgard.
As per the trope page, Author Appeal is "a particular gimmick or kink is so widespread and prominent that it is interpreted as a specific reason the creator actually produced the work".
I can see how that might be applied to an attribute of the characters - although that seems to veer closer to Creator Thumbprint unless it goes into kink territory.
But simply reusing existing characters, whether or not the writer created them, doesn't feel like it fits.
I'd originally asked the same question on the discussion page for the trope itself, but didn't get an answer - flagging it here just to ensure I'm not misunderstanding before I delete someone's work (I don't see a more appropriate trope to move it to?).
Thanks!
Edited by Mrph1openDark Crisis Print Comic
Mirror Noir just made some rather opinionated edits on Dark Crisis and its YMMV page.
I think it's fair to say that he is trying to editorialze his opinions. What do you think?
Just earlier today, I had made a new folder on Characters.Marvel Comics Deities for Yahweh/God. However, towards the end of my editing time, I realized that a good portion of the tropes there are from Howard the Duck MAX, which is a mature audience satire, so the canonicity may be murky. I don't have the book, but I was reading off of the Marvel Wiki, which seems to consider that book canon. Should I comment that folder out?