History Main / ParodyRetcon

* ''VideoGame/WatchDogs'' received overwhelming criticism fostly aimed at its protagonist, Aiden Pearce, for being a NeverMyFault DirtyCoward FailureHero and {{Hypocrite}} who ruins his family's life with his RoaringRampageOfRevenge. Alongside this was the games extreme GameplayAndStorySegregation where the character espouses a NeverHurtAnInnocent but spends most of the sidequests killing criminals for money. This is so drastic that some have interpreted Aiden and the game itself as being a {{Deconstruction}} of typical video game protagonists. When asked about this, [[WordOfGod writer Kevin Shortt said it was entirely intentional.]] However this has been taken to be this trope in trying to save face, as these comments only came years later and in response to blog posts, and ignores the various merchandising of [[IconicOutfit selling "Aiden's iconic hat and jacket" on the Ubisoft store]] and that in universe Aiden's characterisation isn't the only issue with the game.

* ''VideoGame/WatchDogs'' has been interpreted by some as being a {{Deconstruction}} of typical video game protagonists with protagonist, Aiden Pearce, being a FailureHero and {{Hypocrite}} who ruins his family's life with his RoaringRampageOfRevenge. When asked about this, [[WordOfGod writer Kevin Shortt said it was entirely intentional.]] The best evidence is this is true is interviews have cited ''Series/BreakingBad'' as an influence on Aiden.

* The Music/BeastieBoys like to pretend that their first album, ''Licensed to Ill'', was a parody of rap and frat boy attitudes -- despite the fact that the album seems to be a straight example of these attitudes as opposed to a send-up or even a subtle parody. The video album makes their intentions painfully clear, as does the fact they originally wanted to call it "Don't Be A Faggot".

* ''Film/BackToTheFuture'', per film legend, was nearly called ''Spaceman From Pluto'' at the insistence of a [[ExecutiveMeddling meddling executive]]. He went as far as to send Creator/StevenSpielberg a note asking for this change, along with a few suggestions for how to [[TitleDrop work the title into the movie]] (because it had nothing to do with the movie otherwise). Spielberg responded by thanking the exec for the joke note and telling him how everyone found it really funny -- and the executive was too proud to admit he was serious and [[SureLetsGoWithThat went along with it]].

* The "social experiment" variant of the trope is a [[MemeticMutation popular Internet meme]], referring to a person who would make an inflammatory post, get a negative response, and respond that he wasn't serious and that it was all a "social experiment" to [[{{troll}} get a rise out of people]]. It's actually fairly common for people to do this for real, but they're not fooling anyone. The more enterprising posters will even [[https://i.imgur.com/AsH1Gk0.png mock people for "falling for it"]]. A variant of the variant is the "[[https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-was-only-pretending-to-be-retarded I was only pretending to be r***]]" meme.
* To try and prove that he played ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong'' on original hardware, now-disgraced competitive video gamer Billy Mitchell once released a video in which he ostensibly swapped the circuit board of an arcade cabinet. However, the video clearly shows him putting the same board back into the cabinet that he took out. When questioned about this, he claimed that the video was ''satire'', a claim that was hard to take seriously, as it was never presented as such, and the only way to detect the supposed "satire" was to identify the minor physical differences between ''Donkey Kong'' and ''Donkey Kong Jr.'' boards in Mitchell's dark, grainy, out-of-focus footage. The claim was completely ruined when photographs of the machine circulated, showing that even if the board was as he said it was, the ''joystick'' was replaced with an eight-way stick (which is illegal in competitive ''Donkey Kong'').

* In late 2013, ''Slate'''s Aisha Harris made a case for more inclusiveness when it came to who portrayed SantaClaus, prompting then-Creator/FoxNews commentator Megyn Kelly to offer her take on the issue, which led to her saying that "Santa just is white." Several pundits, including Creator/JonStewart, took her to task for it, leading her to clarify her remarks and say they were "tongue-in-cheek." Stewart found that rather difficult to believe.

* ''Film/TheRoom'' is probably the most famous example. Creator/TommyWiseau (director, writer, and star) intended the film to be a dramatic melodrama, only for it to be SoBadItsGood and critically panned on its release. The film's "fans" asked him if he meant the film to be funny, and in a fit of AscendedFanon, he started calling it a BlackComedy (it even says so on the DVD case). Everyone else involved with the production claims that Wiseau treated the project with the utmost seriousness during filming, and they further suspect that the whole affair plot was based on [[WriteWhatYouKnow a real past relationship of Wiseau's]]. Most fans of the movie are inclined not to believe Wiseau, if for no other reason that he only started calling it a "black comedy" when the idea was suggested to him, and he still describes the film's contents [[TookTheBadFilmSeriously in melodramatic, passionate terms]].

* Music/BrokenCYDE, a {{Crunkcore}} group, consistently pulls a ParodyRetcon when they're doing poorly, but [[IndecisiveParody switches back]] to DoingItForTheArt whenever they're doing well commercially.

* ''Film/UnitedPassions'' is a film about the formative years of world soccer governing body FIFA, which was widely panned for being melodramatic and glossing over the organization's history of corruption -- especially given that [[HarsherInHindsight FIFA was in the midst of a serious corruption scandal at the time of the film's release]]. The stars later tried to claim that they knew people wouldn't take kindly to the film and tried to make the characters look as cartoonish and ridiculous as possible -- especially Tim Roth, who played FIFA chief Sepp Blatter, who in real life was forced to resign as part of the scandal.

* ''Webcomic/{{Sonichu}}'' creator Christine Weston Chandler insists that the webcomic is a parody, but it's not clear what she's even trying to satirize. It turns out that she was worried about avoiding copyright infringement and had heard that parodies qualify as UsefulNotes/FairUse (this didn't stop her from absolutely flying off the handle when she saw parodies of her work, such as ''WebComic/{{Asperchu}}'').

* ''Webcomic/{{Sonichu}}'' creator Christine Weston Chandler insists that the webcomic is a parody, but it's not clear what she's even trying to satirize. It turns out that she was worried about avoiding copyright infringement and had heard that parodies qualify as UsefulNotes/FairUse.

* To try and prove that he played ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong'' on original hardware, now-disgraced competitive video gamer Billy Mitchell once released a video in which he ostensibly swapped the circuit board of an arcade cabinet. However, the video clearly shows him putting the same board back into the cabinet that he took out. When questioned about this, he claimed that the video was ''satire'', a claim that was hard to take seriously, as it was never presented as such, and the only way to detect the supposed "satire" was to identify the minor physical differences between ''Donkey Kong'' and ''Donkey Kong Jr.'' boards in Mitchell's dark, grainy, out-of-focus footage. The claim was completely ruined when photographs of the machine circulated, showing that even if the board was as he said it was, ''the joystick'' was replaced with an eight-way stick (which is ''banned'' in ''Donkey Kong'' score competition).

* Valerie Solanas wrote ''[[StrawFeminist The SCUM Manifesto]]'', which among other things calls for "[[{{Gendercide}} the eradication of men]]". People didn't notice until ten years later, when she became famous for trying to kill Creator/AndyWarhol, and she claimed it was satirical (in the vein of ''Literature/AModestProposal''). No word on whether the assassination attempt was "satirical", however.

* Creator/NeilGaiman mentions in ''ComicBook/TheSandman Companion'' how he initially envisioned the character Thessaly as a satire of the [[NewAgeRetroHippie "new-age pagans"]] who popped up in feminist circles in the 80's and 90's, marketing themselves as a LighterAndSofter version of traditional witchcraft: Thessaly, despite looking like a new-age witch, is more of a [[GoodIsNotNice jerk]] and practices a very brutal version of witchcraft. As of the 2010's, however, Thessaly, and her premiere story "A Game of You", has been criticized for transphobic and gender-essentialist overtones. Gaiman has since claimed that Thessaly was specifically based on an actual trans-exclusionary radical feminist he'd encountered, and that readers weren't supposed to agree with her dismissive attitudes towards the transgender character; others argue that this is undermined by Thessaly otherwise being the most competent character in the arc.

* To try and prove that he played ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong'' on original hardware, now-disgraced competitive video gamer Billy Mitchell once released a video in which he ostensibly swapped the circuit board of an arcade cabinet. However, the video clearly shows him putting the same board back into the cabinet that he took out. When questioned about this, he claimed that the video was ''satire'', a claim that was hard to take seriously, as it was never presented as such, and the only way to detect the supposed "satire" was to identify the minor physical differences between ''Donkey Kong'' and ''Donkey Kong Jr.'' boards in Mitchell's dark, grainy, out-of-focus footage.

* ''The Concorde... Film/{{Airport}} '79'' was marketed as a comedy after critics pointed out all of its unintentionally hilarious scenes. It still didn't help at the box office. In fact, this was so indicative of the [[CondemnedByHistory impending death]] of the air disaster movie genre that it paved the way for ''Film/{{Airplane}}'' to do a full-on parody and finish the job.

* Used InUniverse in ''Webcomic/TheOrderOfTheStick,'' due to it having NoFourthWall. Zz'dtri the drow wizard is initially defeated after Vaarsuvius points out that he's a ripoff of [[OverusedCopycatCharacter Drizzt Do'urden]], causing [[OurLawyersAdvisedThisTrope the lawyers]] to appear to drag him off. [[spoiler:However he returns much later in the story, stating that he got off by declaring himself a parody of Drizzt and returned to working for Nale.]] Out-of-universe, Zz'dtri actually ''has'' [[https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0044.html always been a near-explicit parody]] of Drizzt.

* The "social experiment" variant of the trope is a [[MemeticMutation popular Internet meme]], referring to a person who would make an inflammatory post, get a negative response, and respond that he wasn't serious and that it was all a "social experiment" to [[{{troll}} get a rise out of people]]. It's actually fairly common for people to do this for real, but they're not fooling anyone. The more enterprising posters will even [[https://i.imgur.com/AsH1Gk0.png mock people for "falling for it"]]. A variant of the variant is the "[[https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-was-only-pretending-to-be-retarded I was only pretending to be retarded]]" meme.

* Creator/NeilGaiman mentions in ''ComicBook/TheSandman Companion'' how he initially envisioned the character Thessaly as a satire of the [[NewAgeRetroHippie "new-age pagans"]] who popped up in feminist circles in the 80's and 90's, marketing themselves as a LighterAndSofter version of traditional witchcraft: Thessaly, despite looking like a new-age witch, is more of a [[GoodIsNotNice jerk]] and practices a very brutal version of witchcraft. As of the 2010's, however, Thessaly, and her premiere story "A Game of You", has been criticized for transphobic and gender-essentialist overtones. Gaiman has since claimed that Thessaly was specifically based on an actual trans-exclusionary radical feminist he'd encountered, and that readers weren't supposed to agree with her dismissive attitudes towards the transgender character; others argue that this is undermined by Thessaly otherwise being the most competent characters in the arc.

* Music/LouReed of Music/VelvetUnderground: Depending on which day of the week you ask him, his album ''Music/MetalMachineMusic'' (a double album of [[BrownNote nothing but multitracked feedback noise]]) is either a TakeThat to his record company, a parody of Serious Music (John Cale in particular), a drug-fuelled mistake, or actual Serious Music.

* Music/RobinThicke has tried to pass "Blurred Lines" off as a parody in the wake of its lyrics being denounced as misogynistic. He even went so far as to claim the ''[[Film/AnchormanTheLegendOfRonBurgundy Anchorman]]'' character Ron Burgundy as inspiration.

* Inverted with ''Film/TheIncredibleMeltingMan''. The director has gone on record to say that he intended it from the start to be a parody of monster flicks (which considering its ridiculous premise and being made about 20 years after the heyday of such movies in the 1950s, isn't hard to believe), but that the final product ''isn't'' one. It ended up being a hot mess thanks to ExecutiveMeddling, when the studio insisted that he play it all totally straight against his wishes.

* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Friedman Thomas Friedman]] got some attention for his Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention: "No two countries that both had UsefulNotes/McDonalds had fought a war against each other since each got its [=McDonald's=]", basically a folksy attempt to express the logical (but not foolproof) opinion that economically stable countries have few incentives to go to war. First published in a 1996 ''New York Times'' column, he also featured it in his 1999 book ''The Lexus and the Olive Tree'', and apparently meant it in utter seriousness. Weeks after the book was published, forces of the [=McDonald's=]-happy NATO countries [[UsefulNotes/TheYugoslavWars bombed Yugoslavia]], with a few [=McDonald's=] locations sustaining damage. Critics also found earlier cases of conflict between two countries with [=McDonald's=]. In response, Friedman claimed that his theory was done "with tongue slightly in cheek".

* The creators of ''WebVideo/CinemaSins'' have usually responded to critique of their videos by claiming that they're intended to be satirical, and that the narrator of the series is more of a "character" who represents anal-retentive {{Caustic Critic}}s on the Internet. They also claim that a certain percentage of the sins written for each video are intentionally wrong "as a joke". Of course, since none of them are actually ''presented'' in such a way, how do you know which are which? Well, if you can prove the point wrong, then that was obviously one of the "intentionally wrong" sins and you just missed the joke!

* [[LetsPlay Let's Players]] who are known for complaining about video games being hard when they're really not very good at them (like WebVideo/GameGrumps or LetsPlay/TheKingOfHate) occasionally deflect criticism by claiming that they're playing poorly on purpose and portraying a character who sucks entertainingly and [[NeverMyFault blames everything but himself]]. While the "Let's Play Curse" is a known phenomenon in the genre, the problem with these Let's Players is that they generally ''don't'' suck entertainingly, often forcing the viewer to watch them try the same thing several times and fail in baffling ways (like getting stuck or ignoring game mechanics), and their complaints sound too genuine to be acting.

* Ray Comfort now claims that his infamous "Banana: The Atheist's Worst Nightmare" argument was satire. The video argues for intelligent design by showing how the banana is apparently perfect for human consumption -- ignoring the fact that this is because of centuries of selection and cross-breeding by humans, and that wild bananas are much less human-friendly (with thicker skins, sour flesh, and large inedible seeds). No one on any side of the debate could figure out what it was even supposed to satirize; it was very clearly just an [[CriticalResearchFailure unresearched argument]] that blew up in his face.
* In 2011, PETA created ''VideoGame/SuperTanookiSkin2D'', a game about a {{tanuki}} trying to reclaim its skinned fur from [[Franchise/SuperMarioBros Mario]], and said that the Mario games were sending the message that it was okay to wear fur. After the expected backlash and an official statement from Creator/{{Nintendo}}, PETA claimed it was all "tongue-in-cheek". PETA did the same with [[{{Franchise/Pokemon}} Pokémon]], as shown [[http://features.peta.org/pokemon-black-and-white-parody/ here]].

* After the pornographic UsefulNotes/Atari2600 game ''Custer's Revenge'' received heavy criticism, the president of the company that created it said "our object is not to arouse, our object is to entertain". This despite the fact that its cartridge calls it "erotica".

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* Music/PeterGabriel is fond of using this to explain his early lyrics, especially the ones from the Music/{{Genesis}} days.

* Creator/NeilGaiman mentions in ''ComicBook/TheSandman Companion'' how initially envisioned the character Thessaly as a satire of the [[NewAgeRetroHippie "new-age pagans"]] who popped up in feminist circles in the 80's and 90's, marketing themselves as a LighterAndSofter version of traditional witchcraft: Thessaly, despite looking like a new-age witch, is more of a [[GoodIsNotNice jerk]] and practices a very brutal version of witchcraft. As of the 2010's, however, Thessaly, and her premiere story "A Game of You", has been criticized for transphobic and gender-essentialist overtones. Gaiman has since claimed that Thessaly was specifically based on an actual trans-exclusionary radical feminist he'd encountered, and that readers weren't supposed to agree with her dismissive attitudes towards the transgender character; others argue that this is undermined by Thessaly otherwise being the most competent characters in the arc.

* Creator/NeilGaiman mentions in ''ComicBook/TheSandman Companion'' how initially envisioned the character Thessaly as a satire of the [[NewAgeRetroHippie "new-age pagans"]] who popped up in feminist circles in the 80's and 90's, marketing themselves as a LighterAndSofter version of traditional witchcraft: Thessaly, despite looking like a new-age witch, is more of a [[GoodIsNotNice jerk]] and practices a very brutal version of witchcraft. As of the 2010's, however, Thessaly, and her premiere story "A Game of You", has been criticized for transphobic and gender-essentialist overtones. Gaiman has since claimed that Thessaly was specifically based on an actual trans-exclusionary radical feminist he'd encountered, and that readers were ''supposed'' to disagree with her dismissive attitudes towards the transgender character, even though she is otherwise portrayed as the most competent character in the story, and continues to play a role in the series afterwards (and even receives two spin-off miniseries.)

* In ''ComicBook/TheSandman Companion'', Creator/NeilGaiman talks about how he created Thessaly as a parody of the {{New Age Retro Hippie}}s who popped up in feminist circles in the 80's and 90's and sold people on a LighterAndSofter version of traditional witchcraft, with Thessaly looking like a new-age witch but practicing a very brutal version of witchcraft. In recent years, as Thessaly's premiere story, "Game of You", has been criticized for transphobic and gender-essentialist overtones (i.e. the lone transgender female character being killed while her cisgender female friends all survive, all because of a spell that only works on cisgender women), and Thessaly herself being criticized for referring to a transgender woman as a man, Gaiman has claimed that Thessaly was actually based on a trans-exclusionary radical feminist he'd encountered, and that readers were ''supposed'' to disagree with her dismissive attitudes towards the transgender character, even though she is otherwise portrayed as the most competent character in the story, and even though she continues to play a role in the series afterwards (and even receives two spin-off miniseries.)

* The Music/LemonDemon song [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDYj_4RCcrg "The Satirist's Love Song"]] is about someone using this trope to explain a failed relationship:

* ''Film/UnitedPassions'' is a film about the formative years of world soccer governing body FIFA, which was widely panned for being melodramatic and glossing over the organization's history of corruption -- especially given that [[UnderminedByReality FIFA was in the midst of a serious corruption scandal at the time of the film's release]]. The stars later tried to claim that they knew people wouldn't take kindly to the film and tried to make the characters look as cartoonish and ridiculous as possible -- especially Tim Roth, who played FIFA chief Sepp Blatter, who in real life was forced to resign as part of the scandal.