History Main / ContinuitySnarl

*** The special is, as far as this Troper can tell, being ignored by Johns while he's writing BrightestDay. It's probably for the best.

** The change in their MO (see ContinuityDrift) from "The Russians [-IN SPACE!-]" to ProudWarriorRaceGuys is hinted at in one recently-affected Klingon mentioning having felt fear for the first time since childhood. Apparently they got more underhanded because their personalities were also altered to be more human. (This may also be filed under HumansAreBastards, or maybe UnfortunateImplications.}

The longer that this goes on and as more teams take over, the more chance there is of a Continuity Snarl. The more {{RetCon}}s are made, [[ResetButton reset buttons]] pressed, and the more the 'verse enters into DisContinuity or a DorkAge.

** This snarl is pretty much exclusive to the anime. As a result, fans don't particularly consider the filler as canon.

* For the most part, ''{{Digimon}}'' takes place in different continuities. However, there are still some pretty big snarls, mostly in the videogames. Digivolution lines get mixed & matched, changed, et cetera. Ryou is somehow from ''[[DigimonAdventure Adventure]]'', has encounters with the Digi-Destined, and gets sent to the ''[[DigimonTamers Tamers]]'' universe by Milleniummon. None of this is addressed in either show, and for that matter, where is the other Ryou? Or his family? What happened to all of that data that Monodramon absorbed from Milleniummon? This thing was supposed to have surpassed the Sovereign. Speaking of, how many ultimate evil Digimon or ultimate godlike Digimon are there by now? So who's top dog? And how can there be a Dark Seraphimon if corrupting a Seraphimon causes a Daemon to be born? How did [=WarGreymon=] and [=MetalGarurumon=] DNA Digivolve if Gatomon still had her tail ring? Americanization also adds problems. Was Kokomon reborn? How did Diaboromon survive if the virus behind it was destroyed? And for the piece de la resistance, is it even POSSIBLE to Digivolve in ''[[DigimonXrosWars Xros Wars]]''? If not, then how do Digimon like Seadramon exist?

* For the most part, Digimon takes place in different continuities. However, there are still some pretty big snarls, mostly in the videogames. Digivolution lines get mixed & matched, changed, et etera. Ryu is somehow from Adventure, has encounters with the Digi Destined, & gets sent to the Tamers universe by Milleniummon. None of this is addressed in either show, & for that matter, where is the other Ryu? Or his family? What happened to all of that data that Monodramon absorbed from Milleniummon? This thing was supposed to have surpassed the Sovereign. Speaking of, how many ultimate evil Digimon or ultimate godlike Digimon are there by now? So who's top dog? And how can there be a Dark Seraphimon if corrupting a Seraphimon causes a Daemon to be born? How did Wargreymon & MetalGarurumon DNA Digivolve if Gatomon still had her tail ring? Americanization also adds problems. Was Kokomon reborn? How did Diaboromon survive if the virus behind it was destroyed? And for the piece de la resistance, is it even POSSIBLE to Digivolve in Xros Wars? If not, then how do Digimon like Seadramon exist?

* Stand forward, the ''LegionOfSuperHeroes''. The Websnark rant linked above goes into detail, but it's worth noting that there have been at least three separate reboots of the series, that there have also been a number of smaller [[CosmicRetcon Cosmic Retcons]] that involved things like long-standing characters being retroactively replaced with entirely different people, and that DCComics is currently featuring at least two vastly different versions of the group. And as if that weren't bad enough, an upcoming Superman storyline will have all the currently existing versions of the Legion team up.

*** This is slowly becoming even more terrifying as multiple versions of Optimus Prime (and other recent introductory 'Hall of Fame' inductees) seem to be considered the ''same character'' by Hasbro, a concept so mind-twistingly awful to anyone trying to sort canon on the Wiki that everyone basically refuses to ask Hasbro to clarify their position for fear of what the answer might turn out to be.

*** Furthermore, some characters actually ''are'' "multiversal singularities", meaning the same character in every continuity existing at once, not just a new alternate version. This leads to some headache inducing retcons among other things.

** The latest incarnation of the Transformers mythos is still neonatal (a couple of months old as of this writing), and it's ''already'' turning into a ContinuitySnarl. According to the powers that be, the video game ''TransformersWarForCybertron'', the novel ''Exodus'', and the upcoming TV series ''TransformersPrime'' are all part of the same continuity. The problem is, the plots for ''Exodus'' and ''War for Cybertron'' are so disparate and contradictory as to be completely incompatible, and based on what little we've seen of ''Prime'' (IE the character designs), it owes more to the [[Film/{{Transformers}} movie]] continuity than it does to ''War for Cybertron''. (For example, Megatron is explicitly stated to consider scanning an Earth alt-mode to be beneath him, so the character design we've seen is clearly his original Cybertronian body -- and yet it bears very little resemblance to his ''[=WfC=]'' design, and he doesn't even turn into the same ''type'' of vehicle.) Time will tell whether the ''Prime'' cartoon will make any attempt to address these discrepancies, or whether it will [[ShrugOfGod quietly sweep them under the rug and ignore them]], and [[MST3kMantra encourage the fans to do the same]].

** There is official word on most of the ending of ''Deception'', though [[AllThereInTheManual only on Armageddon's website]]. Basically, [[XanatosSucker Shujinko]] and [[MagicalNativeAmerican Nightwolf]]'s endings worked together to end [[BigBad Onaga]].

* PostCrisis, {{Hawkman}} is the poster child for this trope. Originally, the ''Hawkworld'' mini-series was supposed to retell the origins of the SilverAge Hawkman, but after it became a success, DC commissioned a ''Hawkworld'' regular series, taking place where the mini-series left off, resulting in a total reboot of Hawkman's continuity (a la the post-Crisis reboot of WonderWoman), despite the fact that the Silver Age Hawkman was already established in post-Crisis continuity, and prior to the relaunch, briefly joined the [[JusticeLeagueOfAmerica Justice League International]]. This was followed up with several attempts at fixes, each of which simply made the problem worse. Hawkman's continuity was described, according to DC editor Mike Carlin, as "radioactive". In the wake of [[CrisisCrossover Zero Hour]], the various incarnations collapsed into the "Hawkgod", who was essentially an AnthropomorphicPersonification of the Hawk-Continuity Snarl. After this, DC editorial declared the character [[{{ExiledFromContinuity}} off-limits]] to the writers from 1996-2001.

** Carter Hall, the GoldenAge Hawkman, was eventually pulled out of the snarl in the pages of ''[[JusticeSocietyOfAmerica JSA]]''. The Silver Age version is still in limbo. Carter had a few of the Silver Age concepts (most notably a connection to Thanagar) attached to him during the process. He also includes a simplification of one aspect of the Hawkgod; the Hawkgod's previous avatars included several of DC's historical characters with vague connections to hawks, and these have been {{retcon}}ned into Carter's [[{{Reincarnation}} former incarnations]].
** And now Jim Starlin, for reasons known only to himself, has written a ''Hawkman'' special in which a godlike-being points out to Hall that his Egyptian origin doesn't make sense, and insists on calling him by the SilverAge version's name. Just when you thought it was safe to go back in TheDCU...

* Is MarvelComics' [[CaptainErsatz Superman equivalent]] ''The Sentry'' a SilverAge hero who erased all knowledge of his existence so an evil being called The Void would not exist? Or is he a superhuman with mental problems who read a comic book and adopted the identity? Or is he the results of SuperSerum experiments with The Void being actually a part of his fragmented mind? Who knows?

And that's just if there's only one main work in the Shared Universe to begin with -- if you [[TheMoorcockEffect bring together many different characters and storylines]] set in the same universe and [[CrossOver cross them over]] with each other, you have ''many different continuities going on at once''. Trying to keep everything straight between them can be an exercise in complete madness, as the continuity between them is completely tangled up and near-impossible for anyone to unpick.

** Part of the reason behind that is that, at the time, Lovecraft had a very "pulp fiction" attitude towards his stories - not only did he have very little intent to create a cohesive continuity framework into which all of his stories could be inserted (ultimate Lovecraft fanboy August Derleth's opinions notwithstanding), but he tended to see each story as somewhat self-sufficient and exclusive. Mentioning the same occult book in multiple stories or inserting a reference to a character from another story was more a method to create the feeling of [[WhatsASecretFour artificial depth]] to the story at hand rather than trying to imply they all took place in a consistent universe. Lovecraft never really bothered to maintain continuity in his OWN stories, let alone all the stories written by his friends and associates that used shared references.

*** Luckily, the latter game [[ResetButton never happened]], [[SoBadItsHorrible thank ye gods]].

** Not to mention that very strange issue of just how many Gods there even are. Just one? Three? Three aspects of one God? Is Jesus God or human? The concept of the Trinity was a compromise put together to help any of this make sense?

TV Tropes. Similar Tropes get confused, edits are made & reversed, policies & Tropes are changed over time, & no one's on the same page.

***That's all well and good, except...In the [=DS9=] episode [=Blood Oath=], 3 TOS "dark skin and goatee" Klingons (Kang, Kor, and Koloth, played - in an attempt at {{FanWank}} - by the original actors) show up ''in [[StarTrekTheNextGeneration Next Gen]] makeup''! And Jadzia Dax clearly recognizes them, and says nothing about it. [[spoiler: Unless the [[StarTrekEnterprise Enterprise]] episode says that, sometime between TOS and DS9, every Klingon got gene therapy,]] we're back to square one.

** It's quite easy to make it fit in canon if you ignore the one part where Phoenix says he has not seen him since [[spoiler: Miles' trial]]. All is revealed within spoiler brackets: [[spoiler: The case that made Milesy give up prosecuting was not Ace Attorney's case 4. It was case 5. Recall Damon's little "We're not so different" speech at the end of that case. It really dug into Miles' soul, and after a little consideration, he leaves a certain note in his office and disappears.]] This problem was basically made due to bad porting. If they changed the background in Phoenix's little "Haven't seen him since" monologue, this whole problem would have never existed.