History Main / SecondHandStorytelling

* Important parts of [[BadassCrew Ala Rubra]] backstory in ''Manga/MahouSenseiNegima'' are told/shown by [[UnreliableNarrator Jack Rakan]] and Kurt Godel.

* Creator/FromSoftware's [[VideoGame/DemonsSouls Souls]] [[VideoGame/DarkSouls Series]] [[VideoGame/{{Bloodborne}} games]] all employ this ''extensively''. Intro movies describe the setting, and select minimum of exposition comes from the few [=NPCs=] you'll meet, the ''vast majority'' of story must be extrapolated from environment, item locations and item descriptions.
** One excellent example comes from Demon's Souls. The Valley of Defilement is a slum society sunken so deep into a canyon that it never sees daylight. Poisonous, leechy swamps, droves of plague rats and massive mosquitoes make the place nearly unlivable, but the Church sought to change this some time before the game began. You're never told about this initiative, of course. But you do find the missionary-knights' remains.

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* The original ''Literature/{{Dune}}'' novel by Frank Herbert. Interesting scenes or important plot points, such as the initial journey to the planet Arrakis in a spaceship of the mysterious Navigators' Guild or Paul Atreides drinking the lethal Water of Life, are either touched on only fleetingly or narrated by characters in retrospect, several weeks later. The chapter simply ends and cuts away from the action about to unfold to a different scene in the next chapter, with characters sitting around their camp fire and telling each other what happened. In both movie adaptions (the [[Film/{{Dune}} 1984 movie]] and the [[Series/{{Dune}} 2000 three-part mini-series]]) we actually get to see it on screen.

* The Broadway version of Disney's ''Disney/TheLittleMermaid'' features the entire backstory between Ursula and King Triton being told through dialog and/or song. Subsequent versions of the show featured an even more in intricate in depth backstory and details that explain why Ursula was unloved by their father, Poseidon, why he gave her the magic shell, how she killed all her other siblings but forgot to kill Triton, and how she is in fact responsible for the death of Ariel's mother which in turn lead to Triton hating humans. We aren't shown any of this.

** In the ''ComicBook/XWingSeries'', Corran Horn tells Gavin Darklighter, who's interested in [[InterspeciesRomance dating outside of his species]], the story of his very hot date with a Selonian, the moral being that even assuming there are no massive anatomical issues, problems can arise.
** ''Literature/DeathStar'' has Admiral Motti's mentor tell him about an excellent sharpshooter whose blaster misfired in his hand, giving an untrained thug time to shank him. The moral here was that no matter how good something was - say, the Death Star Motti so admired -- something could always go wrong.

* The climax of ''Film/BurnAfterReading'' suddenly cuts to two minor characters discussing the aftermath of said climax followed by the credits.[[TropesAreNotBad Contrary to what you'd expect]], this ends up creating one of the [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments funniest scenes in the whole movie]].

* ''Film/TwelveAngryMen'' is third-hand storytelling. The entire play/film takes place inside the jury room and consists of the jurors arguing about events that they themselves only know about second-hand. It's also an intensely gripping film, regularly appearing around #10 on the IMDB top 250 list, proving once again that TropesAreNotBad.

Occasionally this is used for a TakeOurWordForIt, or to set up TheRashomon. Battle-related Second-Hand Storytelling is sometimes preceeded by a ChargeIntoCombatCut. Related to FramingDevice, but "framing device" applies more to cases where the second-hand story is a very large piece of the story and presented with all the vividness of the main narrative. Particularly bad examples have a tendency to turn this into a OffscreenMomentOfAwesome. Please keep in mind, however, why this is [[TropesAreNotBad not always bad]] - making it impossible for anything important to happen if the protagonist is not present is, after all, a prime trait of the BlackHoleSue. Compare with the NoodleIncident, wherein the Secondhand Storytelling incident is presented as something tantalizing that is only referred to obliquely.

[[folder:Theatre]]

* The Broadway version of Disney's ''Film/TheLittleMermaid'' features the entire backstory between Ursula and King Triton being told through dialog and/or song. Subsequent versions of the show featured an even more in intricate in depth backstory and details that explain why Ursula was unloved by their father, Poseidon, why he gave her the magic shell, how she killed all her other siblings but forgot to kill Triton, and how she is in fact responsible for the death of Ariel's mother which in turn lead to Triton hating humans. We aren't shown any of this.

* In ''WebVideo/DoctorHorriblesSingAlongBlog'', the title character's first (and failed) attempt at his initiation into the Evil League of Evil is relayed to the audience by him through his video blog. To wit: "Captain Hammer threw a car at my head."

* On ''Series/{{Merlin}}'', Morgana is captured by the Sarrum of Amata, who uses her MoralityPet to lure her into a trap, chain her at the bottom of a well-like cell, and keep her there for two years before she eventually escapes. We don't get to see any of it - in fact, when the Sarrum relates the story, he skimps on the details, giving us no understanding of how exactly Morgana was captured, or how she escaped.

* A common problem in ''Fanfic/InThisWorldAndTheNext'', along with failure to use ShowDontTell.

* Used to great effect in Creator/AlfredHitchcock's ''Literature/{{Rebecca}}''.

* ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire'': Due to not being a POV character, everything Robb Stark does after he became King in the North is relayed after the fact, usually to his mother (and POV character) Catelyn. His entire story in ''A Clash of Kings'' is essentially told to the reader in a three page dialogue between mother and son after the fact.

* This is why Weevil had to stop working for Keith in ''Series/VeronicaMars''.

* Every episode of ''Series/GroundedForLife'' makes full use of this trope in combination with {{flashback}}s.

* The fate of Miss Kitty Fantastico in ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer''.

* Isaac Asimov made such use of this trope that in the introduction to a collected edition of the ''Literature/{{Foundation}} Trilogy'', he called himself out for it, rather apologetically.

[[folder:Theater]]
* 90% of plays, out of necessity.
* [[JustForFun/TheZerothLawOfTropeExamples William Shakespeare]]. This was an extremely good strategy for him: not only did Elizabethan theatre use minimal sets and props (making elaborate scenes difficult to stage convincingly) but, more importantly, Shakespeare's greatest strength by far is his use of language, and so he really can describe a scene (even one that would not require elaborate staging) much better than he could show it. Scenes that might appear odd or even {{Narm}}-ish if simply performed on stage can seem much more meaningful when a character describes them, and allows us to hear the character's thoughts about the events as they tell it (Theatre/{{Hamlet}}'s "antic" confrontation of Ophelia, which we hear described from Ophelia's point of view, is one such scene). Nonetheless, many modern film adaptations seem to feel obligated to show the scenes on camera anyway, sometimes with a voiceover, because people have come to expect movies to show everything.
** The Chorus' justly famous opening (and closing) of ''Henry V'' is a HUGE LampshadeHanging for this, humbly asking the audience to forgive them for not managing to fit the fields of France on a tiny Elizabethan stage.
** The beginning of ''Theatre/MacBeth'' is just one long string of people coming up to King Duncan and telling them what a great warrior and wonderful human being [=MacBeth=] is, for -- pretty-much singlehandedly, the way they tell it -- defeating two Scottish rebels ''and'' their allied invasion forces from both Ireland '''and''' Norway.

* The beginning of Tim Burton's ''Film/{{Batman}}'' has a bunch of {{Mooks}} telling stories about the rumor of the Batman. Since Batman dresses up as a bat to play on criminals' fears, this scene [[JustifiedTrope is very effective]] at showing that it's working.

* The climax of ''Film/BurnAfterReading'' suddenly cuts to two minor characters discussing the aftermath of said climax followed by the credits.[[TropesAreNotBad Contrary to what you'd expect]], this ends up creating one of the [[CrowningMomentOfFunny funniest scenes in the whole movie]].

* [[TheZerothLawOfTropeExamples William Shakespeare]]. This was an extremely good strategy for him: not only did Elizabethan theatre use minimal sets and props (making elaborate scenes difficult to stage convincingly) but, more importantly, Shakespeare's greatest strength by far is his use of language, and so he really can describe a scene (even one that would not require elaborate staging) much better than he could show it. Scenes that might appear odd or even {{Narm}}-ish if simply performed on stage can seem much more meaningful when a character describes them, and allows us to hear the character's thoughts about the events as they tell it (Theatre/{{Hamlet}}'s "antic" confrontation of Ophelia, which we hear described from Ophelia's point of view, is one such scene). Nonetheless, many modern film adaptations seem to feel obligated to show the scenes on camera anyway, sometimes with a voiceover, because people have come to expect movies to show everything.

* Creator/FromSoftware's [[VideoGame/DemonsSouls Souls]] [[DarkSouls Series]] [[VideoGame/{{Bloodborne}} games]] all employ this ''extensively''. Intro movies describe the setting, and select minimum of exposition comes from the few [=NPCs=] you'll meet, the ''vast majority'' of story must be extrapolated from environment, item locations and item descriptions.

* Creator/FromSoftware's [[DemonsSouls Souls]] [[DarkSouls Series]] [[Videogame/{{Bloodborne}} games]] all employ this ''extensively''. Intro movies describe the setting, and select minimum of exposition comes from the few [=NPCs=] you'll meet, the ''vast majority'' of story must be extrapolated from environment, item locations and item descriptions.

* The vast majority of ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}'' is [[SpeechCentricWork told through dialogue]] (through the form of text boxes called pesterlogs or dialoglogs), leaving other important events to occur offscreen, and talked about later. This includes such moments as [[spoiler: [[OffscreenMomentOfAwesome the Trolls fighting against]] [[StarterVillain the Black King]] and [[TheUnreveal any meetup/fight between the protagonists and]] [[TheGhost the Denizens]]]]

Second-Hand Storytelling has a long tradition dating back to ancient Greece, where the traditions of Attic Drama insisted that ''none'' of the action actually take place on-stage. Whenever a character dies in ancient tragedy, for instance, the event is related by an eyewitness in the messenger speech.

There's an event that is important to the storyline, but instead of showing us the event itself, the writers have the characters telling us about it, sometimes in retrospect. Because hey, it's cheaper. (Never mind that the first maxim people learn as writers, "ShowDontTell", discourages this very thing.)

* [[FromSoftware FromSoftware's]] [[DemonsSouls Souls]] [[DarkSouls Series]] [[Videogame/{{Bloodborne}} games]] all employ this ''extensively''. Intro movies describe the setting, and select minimum of exposition comes from the few [=NPCs=] you'll meet, the ''vast majority'' of story must be extrapolated from environment, item locations and item descriptions.

* In Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, George Smiley's encounter with Karla is only shown by Smiley telling someone about it, and is stronger for it. It really expresses Karla as an enigmatic force.

* 90% of plays, out of necessity. Especially [[TheZerothLawOfTropeExamples Shakespeare]]. This was an extremely good strategy for him: not only did Elizabethan theatre use minimal sets and props (making elaborate scenes difficult to stage convincingly) but, more importantly, Shakespeare's greatest strength by far is his use of language, and so he really can describe a scene (even one that would not require elaborate staging) much better than he could show it. Scenes that might appear odd or even {{Narm}}-ish if simply performed on stage can seem much more meaningful when a character describes them, and allows us to hear the character's thoughts about the events as they tell it (Theatre/{{Hamlet}}'s "antic" confrontation of Ophelia, which we hear described from Ophelia's point of view, is one such scene). Nonetheless, many modern film adaptations seem to feel obligated to show the scenes on camera anyway, sometimes with a voiceover, because people have come to expect movies to show everything.
* The Chorus' justly famous opening (and closing) of ''Henry V'' is a HUGE LampshadeHanging for this, with all The Bard's eloquence: ''"...But pardon, and gentles all,The flat unraised spirits that have dared On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth So great an object: can this cockpit hold The vasty fields of France? or may we cram Within this wooden O the very casques That did affright the air at Agincourt? O, pardon! since a crooked figure may Attest in little place a million;And let us, ciphers to this great accompt, On your imaginary forces work. . .Think when we talk of horses, that you see them Printing their proud hoofs i' the receiving earth; For 'tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings, Carry them here and there; jumping o'er times, Turning the accomplishment of many years Into an hour-glass: for the which supply, Admit me Chorus to this history; Who prologue-like your humble patience pray, Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play."''