History Main / Metaphorgotten

--> UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush: "Fool me once, shame on... shame on... you? Fool me, ya can't get fooled again."

* Whatever [[https://twitter.com/ChinaEmbIreland/status/1377302554489544710 this tweet]] by the Chinese embassy in Ireland was suppose to be. It starts with the term "wolf warrior" (a term used critically to describe aggressive Chinese diplomats on social media) and goes downhill from there. The poster probably wanted to flip the comparison around around and call the west the wolf (by using a fable where a wolf stops at nothing to slander a sheep). But [[BigBadassWolf wolves are cool]] and we can't have China be a puny sheep!

* John Lennon does a visual gag in ''Film/AHardDaysNight'' where he pretends to snort a bottle of soda pop, as in "snorting coke" -- but it's a bottle of [[GettingCrapPastTheRadar Pepsi]]!

* ''Theatre/TheOddCouple II'': Oscar and Felix painfully go through several different metaphors, before Oscar says he can't remember what they started out talking about.

->''"Look, you screwed the pooch hard. Big time. But then you did the right thing: you took the dog to the free clinic, you raised the hybrid puppies... alright, not my best analogy."''

->''"You screwed the pooch hard. Big time. But then you did the right thing: took the dog to the free clinic, you raised the hybrid puppies... alright, not my best analogy."''

->''"Look, you screwed the pooch hard. Big time. But then you did the right thing: you took the dog to the clinic, you raised the hybrid puppies... alright, not my best analogy."''

-->''"You screwed the pooch hard, Peter. But then you did the right thing; you took her to the free clinic, you raised her hybrid puppies...okay, that's not the best analogy."''

The trope generally follows one of two paths. The metaphor begins with a solid concept but quickly degenerates into a repetition of the actual situation only projected onto the metaphorical concepts. "You can't make an omelette without [something much more unpleasant than breaking a few eggs]" seems to be particularly popular, perhaps because it lends itself well to BlackComedy. It is also possible for the metaphorical concept to [[AttentionDeficitOohShiny distract the speaker]] so that the metaphor is forgotten.

->''"A good story is like a good bowel movement: it's only really satisfying once it's ended. Because if you just keep going, then eventually your body runs out of shit and moves on to pushing all of your internal organs out of your sphincter, until only a foul-smelling shell remains, and anyone who wants to get in on your incredibly long poo gets turned off, because they need to have gone through all of the poo up to that point to have the necessary context and this is where the analogy is breaking down somewhat."''
-->-- '''WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation''''s [[http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/2757-DC-Universe-Online review]] of ''VideoGame/DCUniverseOnline''

* Detective Bramley in the FracturedFairyTale‎ ''Film/{{Se7en}}'' [[Literature/SnowWhiteAndTheSevenDwarfs Dwarfs]] is a master of this:

-->'''Goofy:''' Just keep on track, and the world will be your clam.\\
'''Max:''' Oyster, Dad.\\

-->'''Tom-Tom''': Okay, you can wipe off the "doe-eyed Disney/{{Bambi}} watching her mother get shot [[CrossesTheLineTwice strapped to the back of a van]]" look from your face!

* Anna from ''Disney/{{Frozen}}'' falls victim to this in the CutSong "More Than Just The Spare," prompting her to later call herself, "[[SelfDeprecation a girl who's bad at metaphors.]]"

* A lot of the humor in ''Literature/HelpMyStoryHasTheMarySueDisease'' is based on this. For example:
-->''"Trust that your readers aren’t goldfish. (If they were goldfish, you’d already be world famous for teaching fish how to read and the problems with your writing wouldn’t actually matter anymore, because, holy shit, you taught fish how to read.)"''

** The narration of ''Discworld/NightWatch'' has this to say about Vetinari, then a student Assassin: "His movements could be called cat-like, except that he did not stop to spray urine up against things."

* ''Webcomic/TheWayOfTheMetagamer'', [[http://wayofthemetagamer.thecomicseries.com/comics/pl/32804 here]], when discussing the ContinuitySnarl between the Literature/{{Discworld}} books Discworld/{{Pyramids}} and Discworld/SmallGods.

-->--'''WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation''''s [[http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/2757-DC-Universe-Online review]] of ''VideoGame/DCUniverseOnline''

--> '''Lando''': [[Film/TheFellowShipOfTheRing I don't think they know about second breakfast.]] We're about to serve up some justice.

-> ''"A good story is like a good bowel movement: it's only really satisfying once it's ended. Because if you just keep going, then eventually your body runs out of shit and moves on to pushing all of your internal organs out of your sphincter, until only a foul-smelling shell remains, and anyone who wants to get in on your incredibly long poo gets turned off, because they need to have gone through all of the poo up to that point to have the necessary context and this is where the analogy is breaking down somewhat."''
-->-- '''WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation''''s [[http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/2757-DC-Universe-Online review]] of ''VideoGame/DCUniverseOnline''

* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociated_Press Dissociated Press]] is a way of generating reams of metaphorgotten prose.

[[folder:Web Comics]]