Remember the New Guy?

What do you mean, "Larry wasn't always in the show?"

Ada: You... knew each other?
The Dark Id (as Leon): Well, the script says I did, but hell if I've ever seen that guy before the cutscene just after the fight with Todd.

— The Dark Id's Let's Play of Resident Evil 4

A previously unmentioned character who was apparently an important figure to the cast and up to date with all facets of the story, as though they were just... off screen or something. It comes about because the writers want to introduce a new character, but don't want to come up with a complex introduction where everyone meets them and learns what they're like—it's just easier to pretend that everyone automatically knows them, and the relationship is ready-made. "Oh hey, that's my old rival!" "Oh, this is my brother/sister whom I've never told you about," etc. Characters who are frequently mentioned but not seen, then make their first appearance are not this trope, as what matters is their existence was not previously established.

Simply stated, this is a character making their first appearance well into the middle of the narrative but is introduced as though the audience should know who they are. It makes you wonder how the best friend of the protagonist has been hidden all this time.

While not ideal due to the lack of Chekhov's Gunman, this can work if the character (and the actor) proves compelling enough for the audience to suspend their disbelief, or that there is enough backstory that explains where they have been up to this point. A large enough school, workplace or military organization typically have loads of characters that it's unreasonable to expect each individual to have been represented ahead of time. Such places commonly rotate staff or student body, and they may have been around just long enough to be on a First-Name Basis with the cast but that's all. It's also possible there's an in-story reason for the character to have been absent, they may present themselves as The Nondescript or The Generic Guy because they are in Witness Protection. Among the most clumsy versions is the Long-Lost Relative. This trope can be especially disruptive if the new addition doesn't fit the tone of the series or is too obvious a Suspiciously Similar Substitute.

The subverted, Watsonian version of this is the Backstory Invader, when a newly-introduced character actually wasn't there before, but the characters are made to believe they were due to Fake Memories, Reality Warping, or a Cosmic Retcon. Can also be lampshaded in-story by having the new guy be part of a VERY large family, so even his relatives in the cast don't recognize him at first.

When a character's ex not only is subject to this trope, but also attempts to barge back into the character's life, you have a New Old Flame.

Related to (no pun intended) Long-Lost Uncle Aesop, but while the Long-Lost Uncle is usually a one-shot character to deliver An Aesop, Remember the New Guy is basically a new main character retconned out of thin air—in fact, the term "Retroactive Continuity" was originally coined to describe this trope.

If the character is going to be killed off or written out straight away, this trope can be used to turn them into a Mauve Shirt beforehand.

Many crossovers set in the same universe frequently contain this as a method of bringing the cast of the two series together.

Compare Cain and Abel and Seth, Cousin Oliver and New Neighbours as the Plot Demands. Can often occur in combination with Suspiciously Similar Substitute, when an actor is no longer available and a new character is quickly brought in with minimal introduction to fill the role. Contrast Chuck Cunningham Syndrome, in which a character disappears with no explanation. When an adaptation takes steps to avert this, it's an Early-Bird Cameo. Also compare Unknown Rival, which can sometimes result in the opposite situation where the audience is familiar with a character, but the other characters aren't, even in situations where they really should be. Sometimes results from a character being given an Adaptational Late Appearance, when they were Adapted Out of their debut but show up later and are still treated like they've always been there.

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Examples by work:

• Star Trek

Example subpages:

• Anime & Manga
• Comic Books
  • The DCU
  • Marvel Universe
• Literature
• Live-Action Films
• Live-Action TV
• Video Games
• Western Animation

Other examples:

Asian Animation

• Tobot Galaxy Detectives: Averted at first. While they still had no build-up or moment of being created, the Rescue Squad and Captain Police still have to be introduced and/or explained to Tyler before he could start calling them in. Played Straight with Commander Universe and Tank Guy, though.

Comic Strips

• In For Better or for Worse, Gordon tells his friends that Tracey Wells has known him since kindergarten, they used to play together, and her parents visit his parents. Gordon's friends Mike and Lawrence encourage him to date her, saying that she is cute and nice. Despite the fact that Tracey is seemingly well-known to several of the main characters, she had never been mentioned or seen before in the strip. Once she actually appears, she sticks around, eventually marrying Gordon and remaining in the cast until the strip ends.
• Madam & Eve has done this several times, usually by having family members come by to visit — examples include Mother Anderson's identical twin sister and Eve Sisulu's mom. The most notable case would be Gwen's son Eric, who was abruptly introduced in 1993, appeared in a few strips, then promptly forgotten.^note Then he reappeared again before being permanently written out.
• Malaysian 4-panel comic strip Lawak Kampus introduces a couple of new characters related to Bepop (who's in the very first issue) in the 13th issue, including Bepop's (unnamed) younger sister (who attends the same school as her brother) and pet alpaca. Who becomes recurring characters in later installments.

Fan Works

• Contraptionology!: The shy and polite Bell Pepper, and the straitlaced and formal Pepper family, are OCs introduced as long-time Ponyville residesnts. This is explained as them mainly keeping to themselves on their farmstead a ways away from town.
• Guardians of Pokémon: Ash Ketchum's younger sister Chibi and twin brother Dash. Lampshaded as far back as the first chapter.
• My Immortal: Most of the Harry Potter characters appear to have met Ebony sometime prior to the story. Word Of Satan even tries to explain why Draco is Out of Character by saying that he already knew Ebony. Oddly, averted with Harry himself, creating one of many continuity problems (apparently, Harry was in Ebony's "goff" band before they first met).
• My Brave Pony: Starfleet Magic:
  • Turns out, the second main antagonist of My Brave Pony: Starfleet Magic II is Cadance's brother Fratello, who we never heard of before. Not to mention that Equestria seemingly has been invaded by robots around 15 years ago, of which no one has a memory of.
  • Another example would be Krysta's adopted son Twink, who suddenly appears with no foreshadowing in My Brave Pony: Starfleet Magic II, Episode 1. When asked about why he suddenly appears, Dakari-King Mykan answered "New characters get thrown in all the time (everyone knows that)".
• Lampshaded in the commentary on The Prayer Warriors Battle With the Witches, when the protagonist, Michael, is referred to as a "dear friend" and follower of Jerry; the commentary says "If he's so dear, why is he only appearing now?" Then again, it's a less extreme example than most cases, since he was earlier shown carrying out Jerry's orders to execute Mary for adultery in The Evil Gods Part 1.
• The Star Trek: Voyager fanfic “Distortion” does this for Ensign Anne Rudbeck, a former Maquis who is revealed to be a communications expert who was apparently so skilled at the job that Janeway is amazed she hasn’t heard of the woman before now. Justified as the fic reveals that Rudbeck hates Janeway for stranding them in the Delta Quadrant and deliberately kept herself low-key until she could find an opportunity to break away, hurt Janeway, and get home by herself.
• In The Curse of the White Sword, Will and Elizabeth return to the Black Pearl to face the threat of the resurrected Copperhead Wellings, a pirate whose ship, the Bloodstone, was said to be the only other ship capable of matching the Pearl for speed.
• In The Choices of Earth, Dekker, the government’s expert on the 456, has worked with UNIT in the past, to the extent that he collaborated with the Third Doctor on a few projects.
• Lampshaded in Yu-Gi-Oh: The Other Abridged Movie, an adaptation of Toei's Yu-Gi-Oh! movie:
  Yugi: Those bullies are being mean to Gary Stu!
  Joey: Who the hell is Gary Stu?
  Yugi: I don't know, but apparently, he's my best friend.
  • In the original, Yugi never claimed to know Shougo (the character Gary Stu is based on) very well. They were just neighbors.
• Daria fandom has Veronica, the third Morgendorffer sister. Her original story had this trope Played for Drama—Daria couldn't remember her, but everyone acted like she'd always been there, leading to a mystery of whether it was an elaborate trick or some kind of Laser-Guided Amnesia. Other fans then started including her in stories, often with the joke that Daria literally can't remember her from day to day. Otherwise, she's just an added element for AU fics.
• Played with in "The Only Way to Go". Captain Kanril Eleya is aware of the real story of the Battle of Goralis and was based out of Deep Space 9 at the time of the battle, but she hadn't been added to The War of the Masters yet so she didn't appear in Faces In The Flames. Rather than retcon Faces, the authors justified her absence with her having been dealing with a problem with the Tzenkethi when everything blew up.
• The Shadow Alicorn in Princess Trixie Sparkle is Luna's best friend from infancy. They were inseparable as foals, yet he doesn't exist in canon. This is lampshaded when Luna asks why that Shadow hasn't seen her since she came back from the moon. It's also shown that Luna kept Shadow a secret from Celestia.
• Lampshaded and Played for Laughs in Sonic X: Dark Chaos when Eric the Hedgehog shows up out of nowhere and Chris asks who he is.
  Chris: You guys never told me there was another hedgehog like Sonic on your planet!
  Amy: Yeah, and there's a reason for that.
  Knuckles: Believe us Chris, you're lucky he didn't get teleported to your world with us last time.
• The Kimagure Orange Road fanfic Ordinary World nonchalantly introduces us to Kyosuke's cousin, and Akane and Kazuya's older brother, Musoka. However, things are not as they seem. Musoka really IS Akane and Kazuya's older brother. He's also an extremely powerful telepath that can implant and remove memories. The reason we've never seen him before is because he removed his existence from the character's memories, and what we've seen is what they remember (since Kyosuke is, as always, narrating the story from the future). It gets ever stranger, since Musoka creates the character of the Master of ABCB from whole-cloth and pretends to be him; meaning he's actually been there all along!
• In Daring Do and the Journey to the Center of the Earth, Gummy appears halfway through with absolutely no explanation and is treated as if he was with the main characters all along. In this case, Gummy is an established character in the show, but had not previously been mentioned in the fanfic at all.
• This is justified for Hoshi in Cinders and Ashes: the Chronicles of Kamen Rider Dante, as he only met two canon characters in person once prior to the story's beginning, one of them died and the other feigned ignorance of knowing them out of guilt. Had his Creation not give him the Volcano Belt, Hoshi wouldn't have even been involved in the anime to begin with. However, this isn't the case for Setsuna's brother and father, who both weren't even mentioned in the anime, even as the father has a connection to one of the Creators and is eventually revealed to be a producer she worked with in canon, as well as Dan Izumi, Ohnishi's friend from high school.
• In Ruby and Nora, Cardin Winchester doesn't appear until the last full story, Cold, as the one heading up Atlas' military under Jacques Schnee's dictatorship, but the other characters remember him as previously being at Beacon Academy.

Films — Animation

• In Despicable Me 2 Gru does this for the major villain. Justified as he was a villain twenty years ago, and had faked his own death.
• Disney Direct to Video sequels seem to do this quite a bit:
  • Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp's Adventure does this with the junkyard dogs. Tramp was apparently best friends with their leader Buster and possibly part of their gang, but Tramp is shown to be a loner during the original film.
  • The Lion King II: Simba's Pride introduces an entire pride of lions who supposedly were present during Scar's reign and supported him. They all look different enough from everyone who was seen in the first film that it's clear they weren't there, and there are even a couple males among them. Meanwhile, Simba's mother Sarabi does the opposite of this and disappears off the face of the earth with no reason given.
  • In The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea, "Ursula's crazy sister" Morgana is introduced as the Big Bad. Of course, she was never shown in the first movie; there wasn't even any implication of Ursula having a sister, and the old characters already know her. Some fans believe that the only reason Morgana was created is that Pat Carroll wanted to return for the sequel, despite Ursula being long dead.
• The Disney Princess franchise, which originally included Snow White, Cinderella, Aurora, Ariel, Belle, Jasmine, Pocahontas, and Mulan already in the lineup when it first launched (along with Tinkerbell and Esmeralda, who unlike the first eight, were eventually retired shortly afterwards), had public coronation ceremonies that officially welcomed new members into the lineup, with Tiana, Rapunzel, and Merida all properly being added into the lineup this way, however, despite Moana and Raya also eventually being added into the lineup as well, they did not receive a public coronation ceremony and simply just appeared right out of nowhere.
• Megamind vs. the Doom Syndicate (and the TV spin-off it was a Pilot Movie to) introduces the eponymous Doom Syndicate (consisting of Lady Doppler, Lord Nighty-Knight, Pierre Pressure, and Behemoth) and a new Big Bad named Machiavillain, who were Megamind's old friends that he caused trouble with back when he was a supervillain and the mentor who trained him in being a supervillain respectively. The movie treats the characters as though they had always existed in the setting, even establishing that Roxanne was acquainted with Lady Doppler prior to Doppler becoming a supervillain, even though the original movie gave no indication that any of these characters existed (with their existence directly contradicting what had been established about Megamind's character in the first movie) or that there were even other superpowered beings in the setting at all besides Megamind himself or Metro Man.
• The Nightmare Before Christmas: During Halloween Town's preparations for Christmas, we're suddenly introduced to Igor, a never-seen-before assistant for Dr. Finkelstein.
• Lampshaded in Penguins of Madagascar when the Big Bad Dave makes his big entrance; none of the penguins has a clue as to who he is.
• Totally Spies! The Movie has Jerry's assistant Tad and Alex's pet pig Oinky. Since the movie is a prequel to the series, their absence in the series is explained with Tad getting arrested and Oinky going to live at an animal shelter. Though Tad is replaced by an agent named Vincent, whose absence in the series is not explained, Oinky would later return in season 6.
• Toy Story 2. When Woody meets Wheezy the Penguin from Toy Story 2, his reaction is why he's up on the shelf with him instead of being away to get his squeaker fixed. Justified in that either Andy or Molly may have gotten Wheezy either for Christmas or their birthdays between the first two movies, maybe even for the Christmas they were celebrating at the end of the first one. After all, Buster and Mrs. Potato Head were also Christmas gifts at the end of the first one… Oddly enough, Woody and Buzz do mention being friends with Wheezy prior to Toy Story 2 — in an "out of character" interview with the characters about the "filming" of the first movie.
• The Transformers: The Movie notoriously killed the beloved cast of the cartoon (traumatizing many children in the progress) largely to sell new toys of never-before seen new characters. Justified as there was a 20 year Time Skip between the end of Season 2 of the cartoon and the movie.
• In Cars, real-life NASCAR driver Richard Petty played the veteran racer Strip Weathers, who retired at the end of the film. Cars 3 introduces his nephew Cal, played by Petty's real son and fellow racer Kyle, as Lightning McQueen's friendly rival. What makes it feel odd is that he too is now on the verge of retirement, implying that he and McQueen have a long-standing relationship, and also has a very minor role.
• Scooby-Doo! and the Reluctant Werewolf gives Shaggy a girlfriend in the form of a woman named Googie. Granted, this film also has Shaggy as professional racecar driver, making it even weirder than the other two Scooby movies of the time.
• In Jonny Quest vs. the Cyber Insects, Benton's old colleague Dr. Eve Belage is implied to have known him ever since childhood, but she wasn't mentioned in the previous film or the series.
• Weathering With You is something of an Alternate Continuity follow-up to Your Name and has as a moderately important character Taki's grandmother, who Hodaka, Hina and Nagi first meet when clearing the sky so she can hold a memorial for Taki's grandfather who passed away the previous year. As per this trope, Taki having a living grandmother or a grandfather who was alive during that film's events and died during the Time Skip to the Distant Finale were things completely unmentioned previously.

Multiple Media

• BIONICLE:
  • Nuparu and Hahli appeared in the second story arc in a web animation, alongside Kotu who was meant to be introduced the previous year but didn't show up in the story proper, only in the character sections of the website and an off-hand mention in the Mata Nui Online Game. Both Nuparu and Hahli then became major players, pushing aside former characters and were even sold as toys. Nuparu is especially conspicuous, being an important miner engineer, yet he wasn't alluded to in any of the mine-related side quests of the MNOG. Later years would be more conscious about introducing new characters.
  • An intentional version of this was attempted in the prequel film Legends of Mata Nui, which you'd expect would deal with how the Makuta became known. Instead, after manipulating things from behind the scenes as a mysterious force and never being mentioned by other characters, Makuta reveals himself at the end and everyone acts as if they had always known him. What they're surprised about is that he's become evil, while the audience was meant to be shocked that he was at one point good. In fact, he has been a high ranking governing figure all this time, a fact no one had mentioned before, masquerading as another authority figure to gain more power. This "twist" was intended as a prequel hook to another movie that would properly explain Makuta's background and how others had known him, which never got made. Years later, his origin was detailed in books and online stories.
• Marvel Cinematic Universe:
  • Avengers: Age of Ultron introduces Dr. Helen Cho, a renowned Korean scientist who serves as a medical and scientific ally to the team. She's close friends with both Bruce and Tony, but like Alexander Pierce below, she is neither seen nor mentioned in any of the previous movies.
  • Black Panther: Wakanda Forever:
    • The film adds Aneka, a member of the Dora Milaje, to the supporting cast. Unlike the audience, every main Wakandan character is already familiar with her - she seems to be on friendly terms with Shuri and it is even implied she's in a relationship with the already established character Ayo.
    • There's also an example pertaining to a species rather than a character. The movie, alongside Ms. Marvel (2022) from earlier that same year, officially introduces the concept of mutants into the franchise's lore, with Namor explicitly using the term to describe himself. There had been no mention of mutants in the MCU prior to these instances, even though Namor being hundreds of years old would logically suggest that the possibility of people being born with superpowers has existed for at least centuries.^note This case at least has some real world justification, as the MCU was previously unable to use mutants due to the X-Men's film rights having belonged to 20th Century Fox until Disney purchased the company in 2019.
  • Alexander Pierce is introduced in Captain America: The Winter Soldier as a high-ranking member of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Nick Fury's close personal friend. Prior to his debut, he'd never been mentioned in The Avengers or any of the other MCU films. Word of God from the creators was that this is one of the major reasons Jasper Sitwell was chosen to be a HYDRA mole. Most of the double agents in the movie were new characters that hadn't appeared in any other films, and the filmmakers felt it'd be a cop-out to introduce such a massive conspiracy and not have it involve any established characters.
    • Pierce's situation seems especially odd that in that it appears he's Fury's superior (or at least the politically-appointed head of SHIELD while Fury is the operational leader), whereas The Avengers implies that Fury reported directly to the Council. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. further confuses the issue because a flashback established Pierce had been in a high-ranking position years earlier. Avengers: Endgame retconned him into having a role in the events of The Avengers, showing that he was involved in the retrieval of Loki's cosmic scepter (which contained the Mind Stone) following the Battle of New York.
  • Daredevil (2015):
    • Benjamin Donovan, the crooked lawyer overseeing Wilson Fisk's affairs while Fisk is in prison during season 2, was not mentioned at all during the first season.
    • Lampshaded in season 2. When helping Matt with his tie prior to Grotto's funeral, Karen mentions having a brother, who has never been so much as discussed up until this point. Matt is surprised as Karen has never mentioned having any siblings before, to which Karen simply replies, "You never asked."
  • The Defenders (2017): Only two of the Hand's five leaders were introduced in prior series: Madame Gao through Daredevil (2015) and Iron Fist (2017), and Bakuto in Iron Fist. The other three - Alexandra, Sowande, and Murakami - are this trope. While Bakuto and Madame Gao made cryptic references to Alexandra's existence during Iron Fist, Murakami is an egregious case as Stick mentions that Murakami pulled the strings behind Nobu's operation in Daredevil, yet Nobu at no point gave any indication he was a subordinate to a Finger. Especially since Nobu was the one assisting Madame Gao in doing business with Wilson Fisk.
  • Iron Fist (2017): The Bulletin reporter that interviews Ward Meachum is Jennifer Many, who appears to be a veteran reporter, but was never seen nor mentioned in any of the Bulletin scenes in Daredevil (2015).
  • The titular heroine of Captain Marvel (2019) is stated to have been around since 1995. However, she never appeared nor was mentioned in any of the MCU films until her solo movie, which was justified by S.H.I.E.L.D. having covered up the events of her movie and her having been in space since then. Nick Fury was the only one who was aware of her existence, yet he never bothered to use the pager she gave him to contact her until he was snapped out of existence along with half the universe, making her introduction to the Avengers very late.
    • Likewise in the same movie, the Skrulls were established as having been hiding in refuge from the Kree way before the events of the films. Not only were they never mentioned either, but their war with the Kree is a retcon from the Kree-Xandar war in Guardians of the Galaxy (2014). The Stinger of Spider-Man: Far From Home revealed that Talos, the leader of the Skrulls, and his wife were impersonating Nick Fury and Maria Hill respectively, apparently implying that the Skrulls were hiding on Earth during the entire franchise.
  • The Stinger of Spider-Man: Far From Home introduces S.W.O.R.D., a seemingly new government organization that acts as a counterpart to S.H.I.E.L.D. from the earlier movies. WandaVision subsequently establishes that S.W.O.R.D. has been around for quite a while and has funding and resources on par with S.H.I.E.L.D.'s, despite never having been seen or mentioned in any of the prior movies or even the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. TV show.
  • Thor: Ragnarok:
    • Due to having become a fugitive after the events of the previous movie, Heimdall has been replaced as the guardian of the Bifrost by a new character named Skurge. Despite never having appeared in the previous films, Skurge has apparently been around for a while, and claims to have fought alongside Thor in the past. It's handwaved by having Thor not recall the battle in question, which makes sense given all the crazy adventures he's gone on by this point.
    • Justified case with Hela. She's Odin's eldest child and Thor and Loki's older sister, but all evidence of her existence was covered up by Odin after she went rogue and had to be imprisoned. Throughout the movie, she's shown to be bitter about the fact that nobody remembers her.
  • Thor: Love and Thunder introduces Axl, the son of the deceased Heimdall, and his mother Grace. Both characters were implicitly among the Asgardian refugees who escaped at the end of Ragnarok, but at no point in that movie did Heimdall ever mention having a wife or child.

• MonsterVerse: The Godzilla vs. Kong novelization and the Kong: Skull Island Cinematic Adventure guidebook both state that the Apex Cybernetics corporation have had a history with Monarch for years, the latter work in particular making Apex and Monarch out to be sister organizations since the masquerade-ending events of Godzilla (2014): Apex have handled Titan-related infrastructure and technology whereas Monarch have handled defence, Apex have done contract work for Monarch (which is implied to have contributed to Monarch's radical advancement and new resources in-between 2014 and Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)), and Apex have shadowed Monarch everywhere the latter organization built an outpost or ventured inbetween 2014 and 2024. Despite all the above, there is absolutely no reference to Apex existing in Godzilla: King of the Monsters nor its associated spin-offs (not even during the global Titan crisis with King Ghidorah), nor are Apex referenced in either of the Godzilla vs. Kong prequel graphic novels. The closest we got to a direct Apex reference in the pre-Godzilla vs. Kong MonsterVerse was early mentions of Apex's technology chief Ren Serizawa, by name and familial relation only, in the Godzilla: King of the Monsters supplementary materials.
• Star Wars:
  • Rogue One is a prequel to A New Hope about how the plans for the original Death Star were stolen, and introduces Director Orson Krennic of the Imperial Security Bureau as a primary player in the Death Star's development, butting heads with both Grand Moff Tarkin and Darth Vader himself during the film. Justified since he's killed near the end of the movie and has his position in charge of the Death Star taken by Tarkin, explaining why he didn't appear in A New Hope.
  • In the final season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars, we see events from Revenge of the Sith, but this time from different perspectives, with Ahsoka appearing and often just missing particular moments from the movie.

Music

• Brave Saint Saturn's first album was a Rock Opera about fictionalized versions of the band's three members as astronauts. Their second album was a sequel, but a new member (Andy Verdecchio) had joined the band by then, so the liner notes wrote about him as a crew member as if he had been on the mission from the beginning. For the third album in the series, Andy was just as abruptly written out of the crew—this time, he was a cosmonaut on a completely different spacecraft.
• Queen: Freddie Mercury (1946-1991) didn't give interviews too frequently, but he did grant at least ten per year since he became famous in '74. Very often, he was asked about his favorite singer(s) and answers used to include Robert Plant and, depending on the era and occasion, people like Michael Jackson, Aretha Franklin, Montserrat Caballe, etc. His band mates, his former girlfriends and boyfriends, biographers (official and unofficial), people who worked with him (producers, engineers, guest musicians) were also asked about Freddie's favorite singers and more and more names came including Prince, David Bowie, etc. Paul Rodgers had never been mentioned as one of his influences until late 2004 when Brian May and Roger Taylor decided to go on tour with him as "Queen + Paul Rodgers." Then, he'd suddenly become "Freddie's favorite singer" and had apparently been all along. When the partnership ended, Freddie's alleged admiration for Mr. Rodgers was never mentioned again.
• "But do you recall/The most famous reindeer of all?" Back when the song was written, this trope was in full effect, as Rudolph was brand new after debuting in a 1939 story by Robert L. May which became a song in 1949 by Gene Autry with the help of May's business partner. Several Rankin Bass specials and light-up lawn decorations later, it could be argued that Rudolph is, in fact, the most famous reindeer of all - or at least the most distinctive, since all the other reindeer have no real character traits. The line in the song itself is pretty funny—the singer takes for granted that "You know Dasher and Dancer...." So why would there be any question of the listener recalling the most famous one?
• Tag Team's first single "Whoomp! (There It Is)" (which was also the first track from their first album) has the line "Tag Team back again".
• Vanilla Ice's first hit "Ice Ice Baby" has the line "Ice is back with my brand new invention". Somewhat justified in that the song was originally the B-side to "Play That Funky Music", so he was "back" from the A-side.
• The Backstreet Boys' "We've Got It Goin' On" derives its title from a line in the chorus, "We've got it goin' on for years". While this line would definitely ring true over 20 years later, when it was released that wasn't quite the case, as it was their debut single.

Podcasts

• Edith invokes this in Interstitial: Actual Play episode 2, where the party has to pretend to be students in High School Musical. When Ms. Darbis asks her to introduce herself to the class, she just claims that she's been going to the school for the past four years. Everyone buys it.
• On episodes of Shuffle Quest featuring a guest game master, regular GM Tom Harrison plays as Tasha. She has always been part of the team and is in no way a stand-in for Terok (who does not exist.)

Professional Wrestling

• A characteristic of TNA, particularly whenever Russo has the book, especially in 2007. The most obvious cases being Samoa Joe's girlfriend, the entire Latino Nation, SoCal Val, Matt Morgan, PAC and Peyton Banks. A sufficiently hardcore pro wrestling fan might have known a few of these people already, indeed many of the live audience members seemed to, but to those who only watched TNA they just showed up with no fanfare yet were put into positions of focus.
• When CMLL's deal with Ring of Honor became official, three luchadors were sent by the former to compete in the latter's World Six Man Tag Tournament, the legendary Último Guerrero, the up and coming Hechicero and, as Kevin Kelly called him, "our old pal Okumura". Again, a hardcore pro wrestling fan probably did know Shigeo Okumura, but there wasn't any reason for anyone just watching ROH to know who he was.
• Kane was introduced as The Undertaker's heretofore unknown brother along with the backstory that one of them was responsible for the fire that killed their parents.

Radio

• Adventures in Odyssey introduced the eccentric mailman Wooton Bassett this way in "Welcoming Wooton", and to a certain extent, the entire Washington family (most notably Ed) in "The Toy Man." The latter was a little jarring, given that Ed Washington went from not being a character to the conveniently dilemma-solving manager of the new Whit's End in a single episode.
• In The Men from the Ministry's first series the General Assistance Department had a second secretary called April Adams, who was quickly forgotten in series 2 and in the Finnish version had her role replaced by other characters such as Mr. Wilkins. However, when the Finnish run adapted the episode "The War with the Isle of Wight" in 1998, the creators apparently couldn't find a way to replace her role adequately with another character, leading to Ms. Adams popping into the office for one episode, and then never to be heard from again.
• Parodied in one episode of John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme, in a Yet Another Christmas Carol parody. Christopher Muscheer has been established as having a wife and son, but in the future scene, when his son is berating him for neglecting his family, he asks "And what of your sister?" and gets the reply "My sister? You cared so little for my sister you didn't even bother setting her up earlier in the story!"

Tabletop Games

• Warhammer 40,000 has a rather extreme example with the Necrons and their C'Tan masters, who when introduced were not only major parts of the galaxy's backstory and indirectly responsible for some pretty significant things (namely the transformation of the Warp and its denizens from pure Chaotic Neutral to malicious Chaotic Evil, and the creation of the Orks and the Eldar), but had managed to hide on numerous planets undetected and undiscovered for approximately sixty million years. They are also apparently ancient enemies of the Eldar, despite no Eldar ever mentioning them before.
  • Also standard procedure whenever new characters and units get added to the game. Some of them manage to avert it, particularly in the case of new Tau units (as they, unlike most other factions, are still regularly producing new technology), but it's more common for the trope to be played straight instead. When this happens, expect older pieces of lore to receive a Rewrite in order to include them. Probably the most dramatic is the Swarmlord, who when introduced was suddenly present and in command for every decisive battle in the Tyranid wars.

Theatre

• In Henry IV, Part 2, Pistol is introduced as a long-established member of Falstaff's criminal/military crew, despite not having even been mentioned in Part 1.
• In Macbeth, Macbeth hires two murderers to kill Banquo and Fleance, but three show up to do the deed. Since the Third Murderer is of no real consequence, this may be a case of textual corruption. Alternately, Shakespeare just needed a reason for the murderers to talk about what they're doing rather than just doing it, and a new guy who doesn't know what's happening is a convenient device. Another reading of it is that the third murderer is Macbeth himself in disguise, as he is so paranoid he has to see the act being done before his own eyes. Finally, there is at least one performing group whose interpretation of the above is to have the third murderer kill off the first two. Dead men tell no tales.
• Westeros: An American Musical: The Night's Watch arc from the original story is covered by two songs, the first taking place before Jon Snow's Fake Defector stint with the wildlings and making no mention of it, the second long after he's done the stint and returned to the Night's Watch. Because of this, Jon is never seen properly meeting Mance Rayder as he was in the original story, with the two instead turning out to already know each other in "Sword in the Darkness".

Theme Parks

• Disney Theme Parks:
  • Walt Disney World's 2010-2014 expansion of Fantasyland (aptly dubbed New Fantasyland) is treated this way in the official tie-in material, explained as always having been there, though unbeknownst to us due to a recently-broken curse placed upon it.
  • A similar mythology was used for the opening of Mickey's Toontown in Disneyland: the "neighborhood" had been there since before the opening of the park, but humans weren't allowed in until 1993.

Web Animation

• Battle for Dream Island: Profily is introduced late in Season 4 and claims that they have "been part of the gang" forever. Flashbacks are shown where they are in previous episodes.
• Dingo Doodles: Dingo heavily lampshades this when introducing the character Sneeze, who is one of the most important NPC characters in the campaign but didn't show up in the first episode of Fool's Gold and so the audience would have no idea why he is so important due to the story being in Anachronic Order and the first episode being the middle of the campaign.

Webcomics

• In El Goonish Shive, Carol was previously known only as a reporter, but she was revealed in the New and Old Flames storyline to be Sarah's sister, which was understandably already known by all of the main characters, but the reveal itself was sloppily lampshaded.
• Most secondary characters in Frivolesque are introduced in this fashion, most notably Delphine, Marie-Neige roommate, who is mentioned for the first time in chapter 4 but has been supposedly living with her for years.
• The first chapter of Gaia spends most of its time setting up the five main student character, Ilias, Lilith, Alissa, Ryn, and Sandril, before the Red Hall attack kicks off the main plot. At the start of the second, Ilias gets a missive from the other four, and asks his mother about a "Zoltan," who decided to move, and "Aaret," killed in the attack. There was no mention of either in the first chapter, in which the main five seem a fairly tight-knit clique, nor are there any obvious candidates among the miscellaneous students.
• Gorgeous Princess Creamy Beamy was well into its second story arc when the character of Cheesecake Saint Cherrywell was introduced. Played for laugh, since she explained being disguised as someone else and having the flu during her earlier appearances, which is why we've never seen her at all before.
• Happens quite a bit in Joe vs. Elan School. Specifically, later chapters introduce staff members at the titular school that had apparently been around for a while and made Joe's life hell, and the graduation chapter introduces a hitherto unmentioned teacher who had shown kindness and helped make the school a tiny bit more bearable. Not long after Joe leaves the school, the comic introduces a Girl Next Door character that Joe had apparently known his entire life up until the night he was taken to Elan.
• A particularly poignant example can be found in Least I Could Do, when a guy named Noel knocks on Rayne's door. Noel, as the audience is told, is actually Rayne's best bud and wingman from years back, despite never being mentioned prior in the comic's run. Rayne initially acts grumpy about the sudden reappearance, but it doesn't take long at all for Noel to replace John as the number-two character in the strip.
• Parodied in Penny Arcade with Jim, who was apparently part of a Power Trio with Gabe and Tycho (complete with being The Kirk to Gabe and Tycho's McCoy and Spock). Unfortunately they never really mentioned him before (or since!) and by the point he's first mentioned, he'd been dead for six years.
  • He tried to get revenge for being forgotten in his next appearance... five years later.
• Dale in Questionable Content was established as a regular at Coffee of Doom in his first appearance. This one feels much more natural than other examples of the trope can be, though, as the fact that actual customers are rarely shown in scenes set at Coffee of Doom despite the business being fairly successful had previously been lampshaded and most of his subsequent appearances involve interactions with a character who explicitly didn't know the main cast beforehand.
• Justified in Schlock Mercenary. The Toughs are a mercenary company anywhere between several dozen and a few hundred strong, not all of them identified. Introducing a new character can and has been as simple as giving one of them a name and a job that lets the audience know what he does.
• Joan from Namir Deiter was introduced as already being friends with main character Tipper and her best friend Gabby. Within ten strips, she was Gabby's live-in lover and the newest cast regular.
• Cosmic Dash: Chapter 4 marks the first appearance of a crew of Space Pirates with a long-standing grudge on the Lucky Strike Transport Company. Played with in that the main characters practically forget they exist when not confronted by them.
• Weak Hero:
  • Rowan is the best friend of one of the protagonists that ends up being integrated into the main group. That said, he didn't actually show up until Episode 47, explained as him having temporarily moved to Australia prior to the start of the story.
  • Eunchan is a close friend to Jake Ji, who is effectively The Dragon (albeit a nice one) to the main antagonist. However, Eunchan doesn't show up until a good 110 episodes into the webcomic, long after Jake and his friend group have been established. This is explained as Eunchan having been suspended from school for reasons that are never stated.
• Parodied with Trevor from Sam & Fuzzy, who similarly to Larry is lazily written into the comic at one point and Fuzzy is the only one who notices that he wasn't there before. It turns out his appearance was a Dream Sequence and Trevor is a Loony Fan who used a memory-alting machine to insert himself into Fuzzy's memories. In his subsequent appearances in the real world he keeps acting like he's been a member of the cast all along, while no-one knows who he is.

Web Original

• Bored: Played with. Byron is introduced out of nowhere as a long-time coworker of the cast in what initially looks like a prank. Then a montage of Byron digitally inserted into older episodes is played and it turns out that Byron has been there all this time: Alan just can't remember him. He then becomes a proper recurring character.
• DSBT InsaniT: Bus doesn't appear in the show proper until episode 7, and when he does, Koden, Amber, and Frog treat him as a longtime friend despite his existince barely hintend at prior.
• JonTron has Rockington (a large rock with a face drawn on it), who appears briefly in the intro to one episode, with Jon talking to him like they're well acquainted. The next time he's mentioned, Jon somehow managed to lose him.
• Princess Amira was introduced in the Neopets Lost Desert Plot as being the eldest daughter of the late King Coltzan III, who inherited the throne of Sakhmet after his murder. But previously, Princess Vyssa was his only child and according to her Neopedia article (written prior to the Lost Desert Plot), she was his heir. Amira's sudden appearance was explained by her having been away on official business before.
• The writer of the Noob is trying to have the different media both complementary and potentially independent from each other. One of the consequences is that a medium sometimes has a character formally introduced in another just appear with everyone already knowing them.
• Parodied in Ultra Fast Pony. After the girls get invited to Twilight's brother's wedding, Applejack actually interrupts the theme song to complain about how he's never been mentioned before.
  Rarity: Twilight, you can't just randomly decide that you've always had a brother!
  Twilight: What?! I have always had a brother, I just haven't talked about him until now.
• Sailor Moon Abridged lampshades this with Serena's friend Molly's friend Katie, the Victim of the Week when Nephlite is first introduced.
  Molly: I'm really worried about Katie. She's just not the same person as before. Even though she's never been mentioned before, and will never be mentioned again, she's really important to me now.
• vanilla.ice forgot to formally introduce Robert Edward O. Speedwagon during the Phantom Blood spoofs in Vaguely Recalling JoJo. In-universe, Dio, Jonathan and George question Speedwagon after he shows up.
• In-Universe, Paul Pasadena's appearance is this to Again A Fanfic Critic and RegretfullyYours when he suddenly appears out of nowhere in the middle of Benny Leo Johnny And Rae Meet The Slender Man.
• Invoked and parodied in "Film Riot" when its revealed that stark has been hiding in the attic for the years he was absent. we are then treated to a series of shots from past episodes with him greenscreened in.
• Parodied in Half in the Bag's episode reviewing Sinister and Paranormal Activity 4, where Mr. Plinkett claims he's always had the ghost of a murder victim living with him. When Mike and Jay express confusion, scenes from past reviews are played with the character spliced in, never interacting with anyone else.
  Mike: Wow. I need to stop drinking.
  Jay: And I need to stop snorting Comet.
• Parodied by Homestar Runner in their 2015 fan Halloween costumes round-up, with Strong Bad "recognizing" a humidifier in the background as "a dead-on Humidibot costume", and we're treated to a brief scene with Strong Bad interacting with a talking humidifier named Humidibot.
  Humidibot: Hey, Strong Bad! I'm Humidibot!
  Strong Bad: Yeah, I'm aware of that, Humidibot.
• Pokémon's extreme usage of this trope is parodied in the Solid jj video "The Curse of the Pokémon Master", where Ash Ketchum laments over how he was lied to about there only being 150 Pokémon and he can't realistically catch 'em all due to the fact that there's over 1000 and counting.
  Ash: And again, this is not being presented as new information, this has been known! And you're telling me now that God is a fucking Pokémon?! Like, every religion is wrong? We- we celebrated Christmas! Who the fuck is Jesus?! Are you saying this whole time Jesus has just been completely non-canon?
• Parodied in an episode of Smosh that revolves around Anthony and Ian discovering the dead body of Anthony's cousin under a rug. As a joke, they remember a montage of scenes from previous episodes with Anthony's cousin awkwardly edited into the background.
• Survival of the Fittest has regular occurrences of this due to the extended pregame prologues prior to the students going into the death game. Characters who joined the cast far later in real time are treated as if they were there all along. This was much more pronounced in earlier versions, where new characters could join midway through the game and as a result, would appear on the island on Day 6 with the narrative brushing it off with a 'they were hiding'. Humorously played with in 'I Was There Too!' as Darlene Sylvia relates various high profile events in V7 pregame which she was supposedly around for, in the background and unnoticed.
• Episode 15 of Sublo and Tangy Mustard has the main duo having picnic with previously-seen characters, with the exception of Mandrell, who has never appeared before. When Sublo finally asks who he is, he admits he just happened to wander into the picnic and stuck around since nobody seemed to mind.
• In the intro to Seth Skorkowsky's video on player communication, Kevin, never before seen player, complains to Seth the Game Master that rest of their player group is acting like he's not there and taking all the best loot. When Seth brings it up to regular members of the group, Mike and Dweebles push back that Kevin never has useful ideas and his character cannot even use the loot they took...all while very confused Todd is repedatelly asking "who the hell is Kevin?".

Other

• Often occurs in dreams: your dreaming mind will make up some completely fabricated dream character that you and everyone else in the dream will still treat like just another person they've known all their lives.

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