History Main / VindicatedByHistory

* ''Franchise/TheLegendOfZelda'' has a rather interesting relationship with this trope, often dubbed the "Zelda Cycle" - ''Majora's Mask'' was considered a poor or just average game. When ''Wind Waker'' was made, all of a sudden, ''Majora's Mask'' fans start crawling out of the woodwork, while ''Wind Waker'', [[CriticalDissonance while beloved by critics, was hated by fans]], had its fans chased out of boards. The second ''Twilight Princess'' came out, where were all these "Celda" haters? ''Nowhere to be found'', while ''Twilight Princess'' was given "It's ''Ocarina Of Time'', so it sucks.". And then when ''Skyward Sword'' was released, mysteriously, ''Twilight Princess'' fans who were absent throughout the early 00s suddenly emerged to talk about how poor ''Skyward Sword'' was...

** ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIIIMorrowind Morrowind]]'' was, until ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion Oblivion]]'', considered the worst game in the series and a symbol of everything wrong with the industry. Three years later, it's suddenly granted ImmunityToCriticism.

* Similarly, ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' has a rather interesting voyage...at first it was released on prime-time and was canceled due to ratings. Yet its impact earned it ImmunityToCriticism and DVD sales were large enough to have the series revived. Nowadays, fans of ''Family Guy'' are practically chased off the internet by {{Fan Hater}}s.

* Expanding on the brief description of the band above, ''Music/{{Queen}}'' was regularly panned by music critics during the 1970's, due to their pomp and general goofiness. Then-renowned music critic Dave Marsh even called them [[GodwinsLaw "the first truly fascist rock band."]] After their disco-centric 1982 album "Hot Space" flopped, they were more-or-less written off as relics of 70's flamboyance and excess (although they did have a hit song in 1984 with "Radio Ga Ga"). However, Freddie Mercury's death from AIDS in late 1991 and their 1975 hit "Bohemian Rhapsody" appearing in the popular 1992 comedy WaynesWorld caused a major resurgence in the band's popularity, with many critics seriously reconsidering their prior dismissal of the band. They are now almost unanimously considered to be one of the greatest rock bands of all time.

* ''Rolling Stone'' magazine, due to its [[LongRunner decades long history]] and changing staff, tends to praise bands and albums that its prior reviewers once trashed, like Music/BlackSabbath, Music/LedZeppelin, ''Wish You Were Here'' by Music/PinkFloyd, and ''Ritual de lo Habitual'' by Jane's Addiction. One of the more extreme cases is critic Dave Marsh calling {{Queen}} [[GodwinsLaw "the first truly fascist rock band."]] Queen is now one of the most beloved rock bands in the world. Especially in Hungary. Although Queen didn't win the critics over until [[DeadArtistsAreBetter Freddie Mercury died.]]

* Expanding on the brief description of the band above, ''Music/{{Queen}}'' was regularly panned by music critics during the 1970's, due to their pomp and general goofiness. After their disco-centric 1982 album "Hot Space" flopped, they were more-or-less written off as relics of 70's flamboyance and excess (although they did have a hit song in 1984 with "Radio Ga Ga"). However, Freddie Mercury's death from AIDS in late 1991 and their 1975 hit "Bohemian Rhapsody" appearing in the popular 1992 comedy WaynesWorld caused a major resurgence in the band's popularity, with many of those critics seriously reconsidering their prior consensus of the band. They are now almost unanimously considered to be one of the greatest rock bands of all time.
** Their final album with Freddie Mercury, 1991's "Innuendo," was slammed by critics upon release and mostly ignored by the general public. However, once it was revealed that Mercury was dying of AIDS during the album's recording (his diagnosis was never publicly confirmed until a mere days before he died), the album's mix of silliness/goofiness and serious personal questioning made a lot more sense. It's now considered by many fans and critics to be one of the band's best post-1970's albums.

** Their final album with Freddie Mercury, 1991's "Innuendo," was slammed by critics upon release and mostly ignored by the general public. However, once it was revealed that Mercury was dying of AIDS during the album's recording (his diagnosis was never publicly confirmed until a mere days before he died), the album's mix of silliness/goofiness and serious personal questioning made a lot more sense. It's now considered by many fans and critics to be among the band's best post-1980 albums.

* ''Music/{{Queen}}'' was regularly panned by music critics, due to their pomp and general goofiness. After their disco-centric 1982 album "Hot Space" flopped, they were more-or-less written off as relics of 70's flamboyance and excess (although they did have a hit song in 1984 with "Radio Ga Ga"). However, Freddie Mercury's death from AIDS in late 1991 and their 1975 hit "Bohemian Rhapsody" appearing in the popular 1992 comedy WaynesWorld caused a major resurgence in the band's popularity, with many of those critics seriously reconsidering their prior consensus of the band. They are now almost unanimously considered to be one of the greatest rock bands of all time.

* Gaming in general has this happen. People have noticed a pattern - when it's the "Current" thing, haters are more likely to speak up. However, a few years later, fans ''of'' gaming (at that time) look upon it with a NostalgiaFilter. Makes one wonder where those fans were when it was the current thing!

* The 18th-century publication of Henry Fielding's ''Literature/TomJones'' was a source of outrage for the whole of English society, who believed it to be the work of the Devil. It remained unpopular for 200 years, finally being recognized as a literary treasure in the early 1960s.

* John Huston's ''TheMisfits'' has gained momentum after a disastrous initial run.
* The original ''TheManchurianCandidate'' didn't fare as well as it could have due to its star [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Manchurian_Candidate_%281962_film%29#Releases Frank Sinatra pulling it from release after the Kennedy assassination.]]

* LouReed's album ''Berlin'' (1973) was torn down by critics back in the 1970s, but eventually found acclaim as a great record.
* TheRamones' first record peaked on the Billboard charts at #111, and while subsequent releases would fare somewhat better (1980's ''End of the Century'' made it all the way to #44), none of them would even be remotely considered hits. Only four songs by them entered the Billboard charts. Today, the Ramones are considered one of the most important rock bands of all time for writing a huge chunk of the blueprint for punk rock.
** Similar with both IggyPop and {{Kyuss}}; they didn't sell many records but they are now acknowledged as the godfathers of punk and stoner metal.

*** The negative reviews even came as early as 1971; [[WordOfGod Elton mentioned in an interview]] he did for a BBC special he filmed to promote ''Madman Across The Water'' that a review mentioned an album Elton played on was good ''even though'' it had Elton John in it. It got ''very'' intense at the height of Elton's can-do-no-wrong "glam" period of 1972-76.

** McCartney in general was critically reviled as a soppy, over-whimsical soft-rock artist in TheSeventies, especially by critics still upset at the Beatles' breakup in 1970. It didn't help that he recieved lots of negative press (and a very public feud with JohnLennon) in the early '70s during the Beatles' legal battles (he received legal advice that he had to sue the other Beatles to indict Allen Klein, which rubbed off his bandmates the wrong way) and McCartney's appearance in ''LetItBe'' gave him the image of dominating ControlFreak. Years later, his albums would be critically re-evaluated as thhey were reissued in 2009.
* {{Jellyfish}} made only two successful albums and was not a precursor to a commercially successful nor critically acclaimed musical movement, but many modern acts associated with Alternative PowerPop can claim to be infuenced by the band, so much so that a boxed set (''Fan Club'') and an all-star tribute album (''Sensory Lullabyes: The Ultimate Tribute To Jellyfish'') were released in the years following the [[TooGoodToLast short-lived band's]] breakup. Recently, the band's two studio albums were remastered and rereleased on vinyl by an independent label.

* ''{{Zoolander}}'' was wounded at the box office by the September 11th attacks on the Trade Center and the Pentagon, which took place the previous week. The world was therefore not in the mood for comedy or in many cases even to leave the house. Since then the film has more than made up for the theatrical misfortune with DVD sales, and BenStiller has discussed the development of a sequel.

** Of course, said hatedom hasn't stopped the show from being among the highest rated shows on Fox.

* Critics were not impressed with ''Literature/AlicesAdventuresInWonderland'' when it was published in 1865, praising the illustrations over the story. It slowly gained in popularity when its sequel, ''Literature/ThroughTheLookingGlass'', was published, and nowadays both books are called Creator/LewisCarroll's [[MagnumOpus Magnum Opuses]] and two of the greatest pieces of literature ever written.

** Similarly, two particular characters from Warner's Golden Age, Marvin the Martian and the Tasmanian Devil, each appeared in only five shorts in the 1950s and garnered no popularity at the time. They have become major Looney Tunes supporting stars since the Golden Age ended, aging much better than a number of characters who appeared in 10 or more Golden Age shorts.

* While it received outstanding reviews at the time of its release in spring 1994, ''VideoGame/SuperMetroid'' was not initially viewed as the ground-breaking, genre-shaping game of its time. That honor instead went to Rare's ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry'', released later that year amidst a slew of hype surrounding its revolutionary use of prerendered 3D sprites, and so all the "Game of the Year" awards for 1994 went to it instead. It was only a couple of years later, once all the fifth-generation systems were out and ''Donkey Kong Country'''s then-groundbreaking graphics began to look dated, did ''Super Metroid'' finally get the limelight and the full praise it so widely receives today as [[SoCoolItsAwesome one of the greatest games of all time]].

** One of the main reasons why ''Super Mario World'''s popularity grew over time was because, in 1991, its level of depth was unheard of in a platformer, so most critics and gamers initially didn't know of its many secrets and easter eggs.

* ''Franchise/SuperMarioBros''

* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaMajorasMask'' had the poor luck of being a follow-up to ''[[VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime Ocarina of Time]]'', one of the most critically beloved games of all time. Its reception was mostly lukewarm, with the chief complaints about the game being that it recycled graphics from its predecessor and its shortness, with a mere four dungeons, and for a long time it was mostly known as "the weird Zelda". A decade or so later and the fanbase for ''MajorasMask'' has grown considerably, with many people loving the bleak, sinister atmosphere, the creative (if somewhat difficult) dungeon design, and the massive amount of sidequests. [[note]] A [[WebVideo/BenDrowned certain frightening]] AlternateRealityGame hasn't hurt matters either.[[/note]] GameFAQs even voted ''MajorasMask'' the greatest game of TheNoughties!
** After the release of ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTwilightPrincess'', a similar phenomenon happened to ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheWindWaker'', which (until then) was castigated for its lighthearted, cel-shaded artstyle and sea-based gameplay.
*** Zelda has a rather interesting relationship with this trope, often dubbed the "Zelda Cycle" - ''Majora's Mask'' was considered a poor or just average game. When ''Wind Waker'' was made, all of a sudden, ''Majora's Mask'' fans start crawling out of the woodwork, while ''Wind Waker'', [[CriticalDissonance while beloved by critics, was hated by fans]], had its fans chased out of boards. The second ''Twilight Princess'' came out, where were all these "Celda" haters? ''Nowhere to be found'', while ''Twilight Princess'' was given "It's ''Ocarina Of Time'', so it sucks.". And then when ''Skyward Sword'' was released, mysteriously, ''Twilight Princess'' fans who were absent throughout the early 00s suddenly emerged to talk about how poor ''Skyward Sword'' was...

* ''VideoGame/LuigisMansion'', when first released, was criticized by fans for not being a [[Franchise/SuperMarioBros Mario]] Platformer, and for being [[ItsShortSoItSucks very, very short]], and was overall seen as a weak title for that reason alone. While people still criticize its shortness, which is not without reason or merit, it is more universally praised nowadays. It now has a [[VideoGame/LuigisMansionDarkMoon sequel]] on the Nintendo3DS, released in 2013.

* ''VideoGame/PaperMario'', while critically acclaimed, had the bad luck of being near the end of a software generation, with people anticipating the Gamecube, and for [[TheyChangedItNowItSucks not being]] ''VideoGame/SuperMarioRPG'', of which fans were waiting for a sequel since the previous generation. Its popularity didn't take off until well into the GameCube era, when used copies started popping up and people decided to try it with the lower price. It became a big enough success (audience-wise, though not sales until the {{Wii}}'s Virtual Console) to be the first Mario RPG to get [[VideoGame/PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor a sequel]]. ''Paper Mario'' also launched Nate Bihldorff from a freelance writer who barely got hired for anything to Nintendo's current primary localization writer, now well known enough that he was a host at Nintendo's booth at E3 2012. The ''Super Mario RPG'' fans have also since learned to accept it and put ''Paper Mario'' on equal standing with it.

* The Transformers UnicronTrilogy (except maybe Energon. Ugh.) Armada was downplayed due to its GottaCatchEmAll attitude with Mini-Cons, and Cybertron for its [[DullSurprise limited animation]]. However, both have picked up in popularity due to later season story lines, and "[[http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Ambush Ambush]]" is considered to have some of the best CG of ANY Transformers media up to that the time.