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resolved Permanently missable optimisation
Is there a trope similar to Permanently Missable Content, but instead of quests or loot, it's for optimising Level Grinding?
Eg the protagonist of Chrysalis (RinoZ) evolves several times before he learns that he can get a special bonus by first maxing out all his body part mutations before evolving; there's no way to retroactively get those bonuses, so he's missed out on extra strength he could have had. Plus, he didn't know at first about the possibility of absorbing a Special core to gain access to superior evolution options, so he's missed out on that.
Or there are Pokémon who need to delay evolution if they want to learn specific moves. Depending on the generation and the specific situation, it may or may not be possible to gain the moves later via Move Reminder.
And Nordom from Planescape: Torment, before the Enhanced Edition, will permanently miss out on stat upgrades if you don't use the right dialogue in the right order.
resolved "No one would accept those conditions... wait, they just did?"
Alice wants to hire Bob to do a task for her (Bob is a detective). Bob doesn't want to do it, so, to get rid of Alice, he sets up the ridiculously high price for his services, expecting her to go ask someone else. To his surprise, she agrees without bargaining, as if it's nothing to her (it really is, but that's besides the point).
I need to find something which may describe Bob's behaviour in this situation.
resolved Clothing Copies Wallpaper
A gag where a character's clothes correspond exactly to the wall behind them, sometimes blending so seamlessly that the wearer appears to be a disembodied head and limbs.
For instance, this
Far Side cartoon where a woman is wearing clothes that look exactly like the wallpaper, or this
Garfield strip where the wallpaper looks exactly like Garfield's stripes.
resolved Gaming Collectibles Videogame
Basically just collectibles in a game. They may serve a practical purpose in one way, while they're just simply rewards in another. The Trophies and Stickers from the Super Smash Bros. games for example. (Not to be confused with Collect-a-Thon Platformer, a specific genre of games with a specific focus on collectibles to progress.)
resolved Boring Vacation Slideshow
An incredibly boring activity that only the person doing it will find fun: showing off a picture slideshow of their trip or vacation. Usually a comedy trope, I've seen this one multiple times.
- The Simpsons does this three times:
- In "Krusty Gets Busted", Homer is not looking forward to seeing Patty and Selma's vacation slides of their trip to Mexico. He stops on the Kwik-E-Mart on his way home, leading to him seeing Krusty (actually Sideshow Bob) robbing the store. Bart and Lisa do end up watching the slideshow, and don't enjoy it.
- In "Kiss Kiss, Bang Bangalore", Patty and Selma kidnap Mac Gyver. However, he starts getting too interested in escaping from their house and annoys them nonstop. To get him away for good, they tie him up and show him pictures of their vacation; he's begging to be let go by the end of it.
- In "Flaming Moe's," Homer has a boring night watching Patty and Selma's vacation pictures, so he goes to find a drink in the kitchen; he doesn't have any, leading to him creating the Flaming Homer that sets up the plot of the episode.
- In Arthur, one of Francine's embarrassing memories in "Kids are from Earth, Parents are from Pluto" is having her dad stay in class on an open night. When the teacher shows slides of a field trip (mostly just pictures of trees, narrated in a boring and slow voice), he falls asleep and snores loudly.
- In SpongeBob SquarePants, "A SquarePants Family Vacation" has a framing device of SpongeBob inviting his friends to something they'd all enjoy, only for it to turn out to be his vacation slides. They're all disappointed and want to leave, but he manages to keep them in for long enough to show them.
resolved Cowardly Boss Videogame
Is there a trope for a videogame boss that's considered hard or annoying not because he's deadly, but because he runs/teleports so often it's almost impossible to land a hit on him? So the difficulty for the player isn't really to avoid dying, but to beat him before running out of time or resources?
I mean 'cowardly' not as a characteristic of the character, but as something perceived by players.
resolved Hallucination POV
I'm thinking of the thing that happens in visual media where a hallucination is revealed to be a hallucination by the view switching to a different camera angle and at the same time switching to showing the reality. (Or, alternatively, switching from the reality to the hallucination.)
For instance, two characters are talking, and then the camera switches to a wide shot that reveals that one character is actually alone in the room and talking to thin air. Or there's a group of characters where one is insisting that they can see something that nobody else can see, and when the camera is pointing over that character's shoulder the audience can see it too but in the wide shots it's invisible.
Do we have a page for that?
resolved So close to the finish line
Is there a trope for when a character is forced to do something to get a reward; they are doing good, but just when they are about to reach the goal or a timeframe is about to end, they slip, and all their effort is wasted?
resolved Piñata Gag
A joke involving characters hitting piñatas, usually as part of a birthday party or celebration. The pinata may be shaped like something funny, it might contain something decidedly unwanted (or even nothing), or the blindfolded person may miss and end up smashing something else.
- SpongeBob SquarePants: In "Krusty Katering", when Mr. Krabs caters a kids' party, the pinata is in the shape of his business rival, Plankton. The blindfolded kid ends up hitting him instead, quickly turning the party violent and destructive.
- The Simpsons: In "Let's Go Fly a Coot", Homer ruins Nelson's birthday party by filling his pinata with rice cakes.
resolved Tech Will Be Transparent In The Future
An easy way to indicate that a setting is 20 Minutes into the Future is to show smartphones/monitors that appear to be made wholly of transparent glass.
Edited by Azorius24resolved Alien Jerk Anime
What's the trope for when the alien (or time traveler, whatever) goes to our world, and won't shut up about how humans are backwards and filthy, stupid savages who should be exterminated at a whim?
resolved Your name, your name, MY NAME! gag
A gag where two people, often two people who dislike each other, greet each other by saying each other's names when they see each other, and then a third person excitedly butts in by saying their own name. I have seen this gag in The Owl House and I am pretty sure I have seen it in a few other places but I don't remember most of them anymore.
resolved Evil hooded fantasy men
Like ringwraiths or dementors. Often on horseback, usually in black. These are so common, I'd be surprised if it wasn't a trope.
resolved Furry Cultural Equivalence Western Animation
A Funny Animal is stereotyped as part of the culture of the place where his real life species is found. e.g., an alligator behaves like a Florida hillbilly, a Zebra has a stereotypical African accent, a kangaroo acts like an "ocker", and so on.
resolved Killer found by saying something only the killer would know Live Action TV
Ok so imagine crime drama where a woman is killed and they are interviewing the husband, the husband says something like "please detectives, find the man who stabbed my wife 12 times" but the cops never revealed to the husband that she was stabbed, or that it was 12 times, so how does he know? Obv it means he is the killer
resolved Alternate Universe Culture
A Parallel Universe where it's mentioned works of art/fiction went in a different direction than ours.
For example, a universe where Tolkien lived long enough to fully complete and revise all his works to his satisfaction but Shakespeare's Hamlet was lost in a fire, one where Harry Potter is only six books long but A Song Of Ice And Fire is finished, etc.
resolved Blueprints-dropping future villain Film
Is there a trope for a geeky character who's carrying around a bunch of papers (of their own inventions and/or research), who drops them awkwardly, being humiliated by the boss? I noticed it happening with Cheetah in the new Wonder Woman movie, and the same thing happened with Electron in Amazing Spider Man 2, and Catwoman...
resolved Ambiguously Gay, but in-universe
If the cast disagrees on a character's sexuality, is it just Ambiguously Gay used in-universe, or some other trope?
For example, there are two characters of the same gender who are very close—a minimum of Heterosexual Life-Partners. One of their friends (who likes same-sex ships) thinks they're as good as married. A few other friends think their relationship is completely platonic.

Is there a trope for a character, usually a TV Genius, who can read a page in a few seconds or even faster?