Well the answer is the character "alters the mission objective". In mission creep, the mission objective never changes. It's the same just becomes far more complicated to achieve and has to be achieved in untraditional means and forms.
Like in The Lord of the Rings, the overall mission is oppose Sauron and the Fellowship aim to do that but along the way they realize that merely transporting Frodo to Mount Doom won't suffice because the ring will corrupt them, they attract too much attention travelling together and Sauron's forces are already marching. So they split up to properly co-ordinate and organize the overall goal. The mission hasn't changed but it now means that they have to go to the kingdoms of Rohan and Gondor, and that Aragorn is finally going to have to become King and that the Ents have to rise and so on...and all of that in some way or another plays a part in Sauron's defeat.
Well the overall ark of Star Wars Rebels also features this: They start out just trying to defend Lothal against the encroaching Empire, but by Season 3 they are part of a wider rebellion to ultimately bring down the Empire all across the galaxy.
And the one mission where Ezra goes against explicit orders does - I think - fit the trope: He was to go to this one garbage treatment facility and see whether the Y Wings that were to be scrapped were still there. They were, but the Empire was beginning to incinerate them. So Ezra (who had the whole crew of the Ghost working under him at that point) changes the mission from recon to retrieval, endangering his life and the lives of his comrades and getting chewed out later on Even though the mission was largely successful
Edited by Jhonny
Just word it that way, but emphasize that Ezra is still doing his mission (find out about the Y wings) but doing it by expanding his operations beyond original scope.
The Star Wars Rebels example
The following was deleted, any opposition to reinstating? Please give reasons:
- Star Wars Rebels has a number of missions that start out simple enough "Find this object", "free this prisoner" or the likes, but end up becoming much larger and more complicated in scope by whatever shows up once they're there. Ezra Bridger has a particular tendency to alter the mission objective halfway through even when given explicit orders to the contrary - naturally almost getting people hurt or killed in the process. The Season 2 Finale probably takes the cake in this regard as it started out as "Go to Malachor and see what's there" and ended up with two or three dead inquisitors, a Sith holocron in Ezra's possession, Ahsoka missing and presumed dead and Maul weirdly obsessed with his "apprentice" Ezra
Hide / Show Replies