Reality Ensues/Surprisingly Realistic Outcome cleanup

I agree; someone do a wick check and let's take this to TRS...

...Once some of the backlog clears. Some threads have been locked for months, while others are still in the "resolution" stage; I personally think that if we want more threads to be brought to TRS, we should work on closing some of the older threads, first. Even if this one opens quickly due to consensus, that's still contributing to the backlog and keeping other threads indefinitely locked...

The good thing is that this gives us ample time for a wick check.

Please take this to TRS. I'd be perfectly happy with throwing out this trope and starting all over.

I suppose the question becomes, then, who's willing to waste an hour or two going through 117 wicks for what's certainly not going to be immediate payoff?

Edited by Crossover-Enthusiast on Jan 27th 2020 at 7:04:57 AM

And it's not an easy wick check, either. Reality Ensues requires a "convention" to break, so you need to know the work's genre/narrative patterns/previous installations. [X] is "typically" done unrealistically, but THIS show subverts expectations of [X] by being realistic. Oh and it's commonly something that occurs briefly and for humor value.

Edited by Tabs on Jan 28th 2020 at 8:41:14 AM

I'm not entirely convinced it's a trope in the first place. Most examples of 'subverts expectations based on past history of the show' or similar tend to fall under other tropes.

What's left is really a case of 'troping' is 'a writer got it right for once instead of wrong' and that feels either like stopped clock syndrome or PSOC.

But that's just my feeling based on my own experience of how the trope gets used. Whether or not it's borne out by the wick check is another matter.

Edited by Wyldchyld on Jan 31st 2020 at 2:17:10 PM

Hi everyone! So there has been a lot of removing on the Animated Films page of Reality Ensues for Teen Titans Go! To the Movies. It keeps getting removed with no real explanation. I will put the entries here, and if it needs to be cleaned up or removed or put under a different trope, please do so. Thank you.

• Reality Ensues:
  • Doubles as Reality Subtext for the show itself, but the film deconstructs and discusses the Designated Hero status of the Teen Titans. They realize that constantly goofing off and not actually doing much superhero work has resulted in them not being seen as true heroes. This is what drives the Titans, especially Robin, to go to Hollywood to make a movie about themselves and prove their worth. Not even Slade thought they were worth his time when they cross paths. It's not until they show genuine heroics that everyone (Slade included) starts to take them more seriously.
  • In the show proper, the Titans usually get away with their antics with little to no consequences. Here? Not so much. Case in point...
    • Balloon Man just keeps robbing the people of Jump City while the Titans were playing their song, until the Justice League arrives.
    • The Titans (sans Robin) causing their usual shenanigans throughout the Warner Bros. studio causes Jade to change her mind about making a movie about the whole team to focus only on Robin, the one Titan that didn't cause any trouble. Though this was most likely invoked.
  • The movie also paints the Butt-Monkey trope in a more realistic light. Robin, like in the show, gets repeatedly mocked. However, unlike in the show, he takes it pretty hard and is pretty insecure as a result, especially since everyone (excluding the other Titans) are treating him as this throughout the movie. This is also part of the reason why Slade succeeds in mind manipulating him, whether to bring his guard down so he can escape or take control of him in the climax, even though Robin knew what he was doing. Specifically, when everyone in the theater sans his friends laughs at him for thinking he's anywhere near as important as a utility belt, he runs out of the theater embarrassed and in tears. Despite his status in the superhero world, he's also still a teenager who just wants some recognition.
  • When the Titans talk about their terrible fates had they not become a team, Cyborg mentions that he could've become a professional football player. Before the others can point out that such a thing actually sounds like a good deal, Cyborg talks out the less glamorous side of it. Namely, the serious injuries, going broke, and having to compete on a reality dance show.
  • The Titans time travel to prevent superhero origin stories from occurring, thinking that they will be the only superheroes around to have a movie. However, when they succeed and travel back to the present, they find the world in ruins and supervillains running amok. Realizing that with no heroes, the world has become a horrific wasteland, villains can do any heinous crime they want, and no more movies from being made, they go back to restore those origin stories.

I've removed these example from Recap.RWBYV 5 E 13 Downfall:

• Reality Ensues:
  • Hazel's Feel No Pain Semblance doesn't keep him from taking damage. Both Nora and Weiss land critical blows on him because of this. It also means he can't ignore damage after a certain point, as Weiss' attack leaves him struggling to get up.
    • Removed: the next episode shows he's functioning perfectly fine despite having taken this injury, so there's scene misinterpretation going on here. But, also, this is more along the lines of Logical Weakness: his ability to to feel no pain, not immunity to injury — the whole point of the Semblance is that he can't feel the pain from the injuries that he takes — which requires him to actually take injuries in the first place.
  • Nora's Semblance doesn't make her immune to the effects of electrocution; when Hazel holds her down to prevent her from escaping his constant lightning attack, she screams in agony until her Semblance powers up enough for her to throw him off.
    • Removed. The point of the scene is about what a super-powered, vicious beast the normally placid Hazel has become just because he such a bad hate-boner for the Big Good, and he's trying to torment the Big Good by hurting the teenagers who are with him; Nora feeling the pain of electrocution is more like a Logical Weakness (being struck by lightning makes her stronger but doesn't automatically make it a pain-free process) coupled with 'villains being vicious' — there's no narrative being interrupted by real life here).
  • The long awaited Team RWBY reunion. Neither a grand, epic moment where Blake heroically swoops in and saves the day, nor a tender, tearful scene where the four share a group hug. Instead, everyone freezes up and just stares at each other, at the worst possible moment, given the important fight going on. Ruby quickly breaks it up, ordering Yang to go after Raven and Cinder; she and Blake have just enough time to nod an acknowledgement to each other before they're pulled back to their respective fights.
    • Removed. The season's climactic battle is still in full swing and the villains about about to reach the MacGuffin. Heroes putting aside personal feelings such as a full-blown reunion until after the plot finishes is a narrative norm, not a case of real life interfering with a narrative norm.

Edited by Wyldchyld on Feb 9th 2020 at 11:42:09 AM

I need some help with the Reality Ensues section on No Such Luck, No Such Love. After looking at it, I realized that some of the examples might not fit. I think the first one is fine, but I think that #2 and #3 don't fit at all since they don't seem to be breaking any sort of narrative (and in #3's case, it's just Pragmatic Villainy). I'm not sure about the rest of it, though.

• Reality Ensues: The events of several episodes are Deconstructed. There is no Reset Button, unlike in canon where Lincoln is shown not being affected by the end of certain episodes; in this story, he is revealed to be pissed off about being blamed for things that weren't his fault (the grocery store incident in "Cereal Offender"), being told to stay out of his sisters' affairs when all he is trying to do is help them (the Sister Fight Protocol in "Brawl in the Family"), and getting treated like a butt-monkey throughout the series, and he begins to hate his family (especially his sisters) for being put through all of this. It just goes to show that people won't just forget about bad things that happen to them and that they will be angry at the people involved.
  • When Lincoln tells Clyde and Ronnie Anne about his family locking him out of the house for being "bad luck", he makes them swear not to tell anyone else about it because locking a child out of the house for any reason is illegal, which could result in his parents getting arrested and his sisters being separated by getting sent to different foster homes. The only reason he didn't pull through is that he isn't spiteful enough to do so and is willing to give them a second chance.
  • In Chapter 13, Chandler gives Lincoln his backpack and P.E. bag after dodgeball practice. Girl Jordan, who finds this generosity to be unusual for him^note Although he was nice to Lincoln at the end of "Jeers for Fears", that episode is part of season 3 while "No Such Luck" is in season 2, questions Chandler on his intentions. He tells them that if Lincoln goes inside the locker room, then he will get attacked by the boys in there, which will result in everyone in the room, innocent or not, getting detention because the culprits will deny being involved and Coach Pacowski won't bother to try and figure out who the instigators of the fight were. Chandler giving Lincoln his stuff means that the latter doesn't have to go in there and get beat up, which also means no one gets punished.
  • In Chapter 16, Lynn tells Lincoln that the team she lost against cheated and she apologizes for blaming him, but Lincoln refuses to forgive her. As he points out, just because Lynn apologized doesn't mean that he can just forget about everything that happened to him and act like everything is okay now.
  • In Chapter 17, their repeated failure to properly parent their children has led Lori to lose respect for her mother and father.
  • In Chapter 25, Lori looks over the plans of the Sister Fight Protocol and sees that it's very outdated; it was created with only the five older sisters in mind when Lucy was the baby and before Lincoln started using the linen closet as a bedroom, and while it was good to use as a place to cool down back then, it's no longer viable since Lincoln is now occupying it. Additionally, the bathroom and kitchen are no longer usable since Lori realizes that everyone in the house needs to have access to those areas. All of these issues requires Lori to rework the protocol so that it benefits everyone, and includes everyone, as she realizes while the protocol was initially meant to keep their toddler brother out of their problems, Lincoln is nearly a teenager now and, as recently proven, is just as likely to get into a fight with his family as the rest of them. She does consider abolishing it entirely, but rejects that option, as there still needs to be some sort of plan in place for when they fight
  • In the same chapter, Luna is revealed to have bought the drawing tablet for Lincoln, but she realizes that he might think that she's trying to kiss up to him and try to buy his forgiveness and might reject it due to how great the gift is. Luna resolves to carefully plan out how to present the gift to Lincoln so he doesn't assume that she is grandstanding him.

Unless the show is really optimistic or zany, they sound like they're all reaching. Actions have consequences.

This was added to Pixar

• For the case of Marlin and Nemo, relying on a loon that is practically insane is not too good of an idea and it caused them to get diverted when trying to find Dory. They only needed to rely on Becky because her flight was needed to enter in the Marine Life Institute and only found Dory with Becky’s ‘help’ by pure luck.

It's been awhile since I've seen the film, but this seems to be mistaken as to what happened.

Sorry if this "is" an example...

I think the first one works, but cut the rest. The entries about Lori realizing how outdated the protocol is and Luna realizing Lincoln could easily take her gift the wrong way feel like they fit under different tropes, though.

Sorry for the double post, but I just had a thought; if we all agree Reality Ensues needs a trip to the repair shop, but don't want to slog through the wicks solo, how about a few people tackle twenty or so wicks each? When someone's finished their check, bring the results here; examples you aren't sure can also be brought here for feedback, then added accordingly. Once we get to 118 wicks, I'll compile everything and start a TRS thread.

Edited by Crossover-Enthusiast on Feb 26th 2020 at 6:25:04 AM

Pick 20 random wicks anywhere on the list? I'm up for that.

Yeah, basically.

Alright, as long as we can all manage to pick unique wicks. I usually use a number generator to do it, so it may be helpful if we all generated 20 numbers and made sure none of us had the same numbers.

I was thinking about that problem, but actually, what if it's not a problem? Like: wick overlap is bound to happen when selecting at random, and when it does, we could use that opportunity to compare answers. ("Hey, what did you get on question 12, The Defenders (2017)? ... Yeah, me too") I remarked before that Reality Ensues is difficult to check because examples either need to describe the convention/setup being subverted or we need to know about the setup ourselves. Thus, we might see how much our individual standards vary for this trope.

And then grab a few more wicks to check so the total is 118.

Eh, my concern is just that a wick overlap would mean we aren't all actually checking 20 unique wicks. But the way you put it makes it seem like less of an issue.

I think I might focus on checking pages in the RealityEnsues/ namespace.

Edit: Okay, I was going to do my "randomize some numbers and check those numbered wicks", but there's an insane amount of wicks here. How insane? That when transferring the info to google docs so I could actually number them, it gave me 300+ pages of information, and lagged when I tried to number it.

SOOOO, we'll do this in a different way, where I actually just randomized the list and chose the first 20 wicks that were generated.

Also, I usually split everything into folders based on how the wick is used, but this is a little more complicated, so I'll just post the context of the wick and we can judge.

Edited by WarJay77 on Feb 28th 2020 at 4:06:18 AM

I have some 13,900 lines on my sheet, so picking overlapping wicks is probably really low, actually. Darn.

2510 5283 12108 12812 6984 11542 7558 153 4875 12072 4161 7281 881 11907 1014 10977 11798 10288 10563 4425

"actions have consequences" = People Sit on Chairs/Square Peg, Round Trope

• GLOW (2017): She ends up failing out of med school due to her wrestling schedule. However, she admits to Sam in Season 2 that she probably would have ended up failing anyway, and only even went there because her parents wanted her to.

• Bruce Almighty:
  • Many of the things Bruce does for his immediate gratification have lasting and sometimes disastrous consequences. Pulling the moon closer to Earth causes a tsunami and a meteor impact screws up power grids.
  • Bruce drops the prayer beads when he drives over a pothole and in taking his eyes off the road for too long, he crashes his car.
  • At the end, Bruce drops to his knees in the middle of the highway and gets hit by a truck.

• Dwarf Fortress: When the game's physics isn't hilariously buggy, it can produce some of this.
  • For instance, adamantine items are ridiculously valuable, don't bend or break under any amount of stress once formed into items, can be sharpened to an incredible edge... with density akin to balsa or Styrofoam. This means that while adamantine plate armor gives you less weight than the chainmail of other metals with much, much more of the strength and edged weapons are capable of producing a One-Man Army in skilled hands, adamantine maces, warhammers and whips are a joke.
  • For that matter, while the armor itself is nigh-impossible to penetrate, non-rigid adamantine objects still provide little protection from blunt force, meaning you can be hurt by a bronze mace even when wearing adamantine chain-mail.
  • You also cannot go around kicking ass with your bare hands and no armor, as even the most skilled wrestlers are still highly vulnerable to any armed opponent.
  • Thanks to Procedural Generation of Forgotten Beasts made as Mix-and-Match Critters made from any variety of materials given magical animation, they can sometimes only survive by having Plot Armor. For example, a Forgotten Beast made of ash could be Famed In-Story having shaped the world's history, but it loses that Plot Armor when it encounters the player and its ashen body will likely fall apart in a stiff breeze shortly thereafter.

• Nomad of Nowhere:
  • In Episode 2, contrary to what Barty hoped, magic cannot solve your problems (or at least, the Nomad's magic cannot). In the case of bringing the Mill's wheel to life, it made things worse by destroying the homes of Bliss Hill.
  • Episode 3 follows up on this when the Nomad saves Bliss Hill from a bounty hunter and the townsfolk thank him, yet at the end of the episode, the sheriff asks him to leave again and never return. The reason? The Nomad's the only one who can do magic, and and if word got out, it would immediately attract even more bounty hunters to Bliss Hill. So, while they're grateful, they can't harbor a wanted man of the Nomad's caliber.
  • Episode 5 has an Undertaker with a rather morbid sense of humor. When he uses one of his puns on a visitor, they admit they understood the joke, they're just offended by the unprofessionalism of the joke.
  • Episode 8 has the Nomad board a train wearing a purple bandanna as a disguise. Skout immediately sees right through it and even lampshades on how obvious of a disguise it is.
  • In Episode 12, Skout tells it straight to Red Manuel's face that being a jerk won't win him the respect he craves.

• Tropes P to T: Araki doesn't shy away from portraying the implications of the character's action when he needs to.
  • When Jotaro and the other heroes must fight on board a plane only Kakyoin can fight against the Stand, Tower of Gray. The superhuman strength and pyrokinesis of Jotaro and Avdol's respective Stands making it too easy for them to accidentally damage the fuselage or cause an explosion, destroying the plane.
  • Hol Horse tries to intimidate regular people by threatening them with his Stand, only to be reminded they can't see it because they're not Stand users.
  • Yoshikage Kira, being a serial killer, relies on quiet and stealthy measures to kill people - however, in a one-on-one fight with somebody on equal footing, he easily gets his ass kicked, as his first encounter with Jotaro can attest to.
  • Josuke, Okuyasu, and Shigechi find an abandoned lottery ticket, and try to cash it in. However the endorsement on the back is none of theirs, and the three are nearly arrested for fraud before Josuke uses his stand to change the signature. Afterwards Josuke's mother freezes his bank accounts since she doesn't trust him with that much money.
  • In part 5, Mista shoots Doppio, in Bruno's body, multiple times and claims the shots are non-fatal. Doppio still bleeds out even if none of the shots were instantly lethal.

• The Streets of San Francisco: Bittersweet Ending: "School Of Fear." Two of the four kidnapped problem students, return to school, the only girl amongst them drops out, while the remaining one might or might not come back. As a teacher points out to Stone and Keller in the Epilog, "you can't win them all."

• The Red Vixen Adventures: The plot driver of Shadow of Her Sins and Shadow of Doubt. Ali has to first face prosecution for the crimes she committed as a slave, and then Salli must deal with her mother's understandable reluctance to approve of an affair between the Heir of their noble house and a convicted criminal.

• Big Storm Episode: Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble! has Lightning Look-out, which combines this with The Lost Woods. Dixie and Kiddy have to dodge the lightning as it strikes, and it's also a bad idea to swim underwater in this level, as you'll be shocked regardless if the actual lightning bolt hits you while underwater.

• Professor Arc:
  • Team RWBY tries subtly communicating their plans to each other with silent glances so as not to tip off Professor Arc. Since he's standing right in front of them, he notices immediately and thinks to himself how cute it is that they think they're being subtle.
  • Jaune's exploits end up with him being put on TV. Unfortunately, this reveals his deception to his family(who believed he was teaching schoolchildren), and angrily show up at Beacon to try and take him back, fearing he could die or get himself arrested for his fraud.
  • During the Battle of Beacon, many of the students join in the defense of their school. Unfortunately, they end being completely outmatched by the older and more experienced criminals and extremists, especially when Salem's forces join the attack. Ruby herself gets put out of commission early on by Adam's attack. It only the timely intervention by their more experienced teachers and older soldiers that saves them from certain death.
  • This happens repeatedly for laughs in the Chapter 56 omake. Professor Port's attempt to use the Air Vent Escape doesn't work because air vents aren't meant for full-grown men, let alone one as big as him. Karate chops to back of the neck aren't a one-hit KO. Dressing as the Enemy fails because he doesn't do a good impersonation of the other soldiers. Throwing the Distraction doesn't work if they see the distraction get thrown, not to mention they just call for back-up instead of wandering off to investigate. He only succeeds via a cardboard box used Metal Gear style as a Kansas City Shuffle rather than like in the games.

• Day of the Tentacle: The Humans Laverne tries to free in the future initially refuse to escape. The only place they can go is the wild, where their odds of survival are pretty slim, and even if they do survive its only a matter of time before they're recaptured. So, they choose to stay in the safety and (relative) comfort of their cell instead.

• A Dragon's Flight: After hatching Azantys Lyarra/Visenya no longer can stay in Winterfel.
  • Constantly wishing an innocent child gone in both senses of the word and making no secret of your irrational hatred toward her, can make people look at you with suspicion when said child disapears, right Catelyn?
    • Ned tells Robb about Visenya's true origin and makes him swear an oath to declare for her when the time comes. Catelyn is kept Out Of The Loop because neither of them can trust her with Lyarra/Visenya's safety and best interests.
  • While passing through the Riverlands, Lyarra sees just how badly the current regime is treating the Targaryen loyalists. Lord Velaryon has little trouble convincing his fellow crownland lords to support his schemes to make life difficult for Stanis once he has a Targaryan heir in his safekeeping and a hope for a restoration.
  • Lyarra did not consider Sansa worth the effort of changing her mind after Catelyn and the septa turned the younger girl against her. Sansa comes to regret it, and even prior to Lyarra's disaperance it did hurt her to know that she was not worth the effort.

• Heretics of Dune: The series as a whole shows just how disastrous these tropes would be in reality.

• Non-Lethal K.O.: The player in Deus Ex can Non Lethal KO opponents with riot batons, cattle prods, and crossbow-fired tranquilizer darts. Although the tranquilizer crossbow averts the trope a bit, as while shooting someone in the body will render them unconscious, a shot to the head will kill them. Your character's brother encourages the use of these non-lethal weapons because he's working with the 'enemy', while two of your co-workers encourage you to Kill Em All.

• P to R:
  • The short story "In The Cage" by Henry James ~ Lale
  • A Song of Ice and Fire ~ Babyhenchy1
  • "I've known you my whole life! I've seen you NAKED! You don't think I would recognize you because I can't see your cheekbones?!" ~ Monolaf317

• Reckless Gun Usage: The scene between Buzzy and Duffy in 11:14 could be shown in gun safety classes as "Things You Must Never Do." First, Duffy points it at Buzzy's head when he has no intention of harming her. Then Buzzy picks it up, twirls it and starts playing cops-and-robbers with it...knowing it's loaded because the bullets fell out when she twirled it and she put them back in. It's sheer luck that nobody's hurt when the gun goes off.

• EverythingGaiden v2: Badass Normal: Miranda, despite her Super-Strength, is largely this, particularly considering she comes from The Roaring '20s and thus doesn't get so many chances to use her Charles Atlas Superpower.

• What is a Person Worth?: Lincoln and Clyde's entire fight with Chandler and his gang; it quickly escalates out of control when Lana intervenes after seeing Lincoln on the verge of being pummeled, only to be seized by the much larger boys and flung into a nearby lake where she suffers suffers several cuts and bruises. Lana is severely shaken by this and cries her eyes out as Chandler and his friends laugh at her. Seeing someone as tough and determined as Lana humiliated like this is a very unsettling sight, and Lincoln is so infuriated by this that he proceeds to absolutely destroy Chandler and his gang before rushing to his little sister's side.

• Terminator The Sarah Connor Chronicles S 2 E 22 Born To Run:
  • Miranda Rights: An unusual case for a TV show, as Reality Ensues. Rather than having her rights read at arrest (as most shows do), she's advised when she gives her testimony, which is what they do in Real Life.
  • Reality Ensues: (Or as close to it with time travel) Since John time-skipped forward, he was not around to lead the revolution against the machines; therefore, when he arrives in the future, no one knows who he is and only doesn't get shot as a terminator since Weaver leaves him before the dog shows up with the rebels.

• The Orville S2 E10 "Blood of Patriots":
  • Just because they face a common enemy doesn't mean the Krill are ready to accept the Union as equals. They still have their near-fanatic sense of superiority and know full well how the Union needs them.
  • After losing his wife and daughter and spending years in a Krill POW Camp, it's no surprise that Orrin isn't at all sanguine about the idea of a peace treaty.

• The Nobody of Ever After High:
  • In the first couple of Chapters, everyone would have to learn how to fight the invading Heartless sooner or later, and Roxas won't be the only one to fight them off.
  • Invoked by Roxas to Apple, who is hesitant about fighting. He tells her his enemies are not like the ones from the Stories, and she will have to fight.
  • More touched on with Courtly, as the Wonderland Kids haven't forgiven her completely, unlike the series.
  • For Roxas, when eight girls (Apple, Briar, Cerise, Maddie, Poppy, Melody, Namine and Amora) love him, there's bound to be some competition for his hand. He learns this the hard way in Chapter 68, "Love-Struck".
  • The Forever After Fighters learn as a whole from their time in Mutation City (aka TMNT) that a team as large as them can easily get spotted, as pointed out by Amora. After that, smaller teams are made when going on missions.
  • The Caribbean has Jack telling Roxas and his team to pretend to be on his crew for the meeting of the Brethren Court. Given that no minors would be allowed on their own, he is doing them a favor by having them be on his crew.
  • Forest of Fate 2, the second visit to the aforementioned World, has Merida and her family catching onto the fact that the Forever After Fighters are not what they seem after revealing their Digimon and Sparrow's sudden knowledge of the Sniper Nobodies.
  • Dexter, Humphrey, Hopper, Duchess and Merida, while able to hold their own in a fight, are still inexperienced with dealing with dark forces and doubt their abilities in Chapter 94.
  • Chapter 95 shows that Briar did indeed have consequences for poisoning Raven's cake from the events of "Apple's Birthday Bake-Off", as she is unable to help in baking any cakes, or even participate in the Baking Contest.
  • Apple's sleep deprivation causes her to hallucinate.
  • Despite Briar having earned her sword, and gotten training from Roxas, she is still inexperienced and loses most battles.

Edited by Tabs on Mar 4th 2020 at 3:47:08 AM

A lot of them I wasn't sure about while a few other I think I got wrong. I would appreciate if someone could look them over. It's my first time doing a wick check so I apologize in advance.

Edited by KToonz on Mar 1st 2020 at 9:53:45 AM

Looks fine to me, but we'll need to go over all the examples later, anyway.

I think we should move our current wicks into a sandbox for convenience.

I'd rather leave them here; that way, the wick checks won't be lost when the sandbox is cut.

Why would they need to be preserved? The sandbox wouldn't be cut until the TRS is over and done with...so what's the harm?

We'd do the actual discussion here, but condensing it into one space makes them easier to read and discuss as a group.

Edited by WarJay77 on Mar 1st 2020 at 9:45:15 AM

Phew, okay, got mine done. I had to manually delete some stuff before I randomized the list and jiminy crizzle there's a shit-ton of Character/ and Recap/ wicks. Took me a minute to scroll through each alone.

Anyway:

• NightmareFuel.Rocky: Rocky's fears about being a washed up bum and journeyman who has never lived up to his potential has really struck a chord in the hearts of audiences when it comes to the real fear of having to give up their dreams in order to deal with real life. Uh... I think I'll take this to the Nightmare Fuel clean up, instead...
• Characters.Nothing Special: After she's forced to kill Lyla, she visibly shaken and quickly throws up. Sure, it was in self-defense and to save her father and loved ones. But it's the first time she had to do something like that and against her mother no less. This is just "thing happens, then this other thing happens because of it".
• Characters.Arrowverse Freeland Criminals: His little outburst at the grant board results in him being escorted out of the building by security and, as implied by the Cardboard Box of Unemployment he's carrying, expulsion. This is just "thing happens, then this other thing happens because of it".
• FanFic.Ragnarok: Mello and Matt don't blend in well in the middle of Tokyo. ZCE, sounds like misuse. Cleaned up the page while I was at it though!
• Characters.Carmilla The Series:
  • Bring It: His response to an angry mob? To stand on a wall yelling, "Can't touch this, farmer dudes!" This backfires. Sounds like "thing happens, then this other thing happens because of it".
  • Reality Ensues: Letting a man who doesn't like vampires become the head of a school full of vampire students and other supernatural phenomena, of course he's going to order a detainment and hunt against them. Sounds like "thing happens, then this other thing happens because of it".
• Recap.Memory Records Volume 2 Chapter 5 Two Idiots:
  • While healing magic can heal wounds, they can't destroy the bacteria on it, which forces Glenn to get first aid to disinfect it before applying healing magic. Sounds like different trope entirely.
  • Nina may have been trained in military martial arts by Aldo, but even she is scared when faced against someone who truly wants to kill her. Misused, probably covered by another trope.
• SomeAnvilsNeedToBeDropped.Fan Fic: Fanfic.Bitter Tears An Anon A Miss Fic:
  • The fic does a much better job at portraying the effects of cyberbullying than the original canon counterpart did; even when the culprits are caught, everybody still has to live with the consequences and stigma associated with what has happened, and it's made clear that none of this stuff will go away anytime soon.
  • In real life, Easily Forgiven is extremely rare and it CANNOT be applied to acts of betrayal. If you do something that seriously hurt somebody, it doesn't matter if it was intentional or not; you have to accept that they have to take time to forgive you no matter how remorseful you are. You also have to accept that in some cases, they may NEVER be able to forgive you.
  • Bottling up your emotions and ignoring a problem will not make it go away. In fact, it's far more likely to make everything worse. You need to be honest with yourself and others about your feelings and accept that there is a problem before you can fix it.
  • Being angry at people for cyberbullying is understandable, but you will be punished if you physically assault them because that is NOT acceptable no matter what they had done.

General analysis; the first two sound like "thing happens, then this other thing happens as a consequence of it", and the last two are just "this is Bad, don't do it in real life". Different examples from the same fic were also brought up earlier in the thread.

• The Dom Reviews: The little skit demonstrating The Dom's criticism of film!Katniss always pulling her bow back long before she shoots, one of the potential explanations being that "the draw weight on all of her bows has been so laughable her arrows should have been bouncing off of anyone wearing thick clothing." Misused pothole
• Film.Fill The Void: Shira was all too eager to marry Pinchas Miller, a boy who was suggested to her despite not really knowing him. When she has the chance of speaking with him she finds out he's a rather dull fellow and the match goes nowhere. "Thing happens, then this other thing happens", probably fits another trope
• AdaptationalBadass.Video Games:
  • In Wonderland at least, in the second game it's driven home that in the real world, Alice faces the very real dangers of being a mentally unstable teenage girl in Industrial Revolution London. ZCE
• Weird Currency: Much like Metro 2033 before it, the Mutant Year Zero tabletop game uses bullets as currency. Unlike Metro, they don't have the luxury of manufacturing new rounds at all, so they aren't picky with the quality. This can become a problem once the right Ark projects have been completed, as the ability to mass manufacture new rounds causes them to nosedive in value as a currency. The associated games of the setting each have their own weird and practical take on it, with the animal mutants of Genlab Alpha trading in food, the robots of Mechatron using their daily energy ration, and the people of Elysium using standardized credits and metal coins. Elysium also adds the "Currency" Ark/Settlement project, bringing the whole system back around. I think the pothole's used correctly...
• VideoGame.Solatorobo: So, the people found a replacement for oil. That's a great thing, right? Except not. The new found energy that replaced oil made its price plummet down... And resulted in the Old World breaking into a massive war for it that would have literally destroyed the planet. Misuse???
• FanFic.Victory At Ostagar:
  • Tara Surana is made Warden-Commander of Ferelden after Bronwyn dies in the first ending. But she is quickly forced to resign, because of prejudice against elves and mages, in favor of Carver Hawke – a Ferelden-born human with influential relatives.
  • Alistair picks the rose in Lothering, but by the time he's ready to give it to Bronwyn it's fallen apart.

Both are "thing happens, then this other thing happens"

• TearJerker.Beelzebub:

The Reveal in Chapter 173 that Furuichi knew all along that the tissues granting him the power of demons are slowly killing him. He's just so weary of being the Butt-Monkey that he's willing to risk his own life if it means having a taste of what it's like to be one of the main characters.

Furuichi: This is a fight with my pride on the line. Being called a lolicon, pervert, Creep-ichi, Mob-ichi or whatever... and just laughing it off... how is that any different from being dead?

• This could be seen as a brutal case of Reality Ensues, since what Furuichi experiences is technically bullying and many victims develop low self-esteem and become suicidal. Misuse, fits better under Deconstruction.

• Anime.Patlabor: A large point of praise for the series is how it takes great pains to not depict just a realistic robot in the Labors themselves, but in how it incorporates Labor and technological development into something coherent and unique. Just about every element of the series is accounted for in some way, be it the Labors being extremely fragile so they can support their own weight, or the fact that the Patlabors are usually supported by multiple small vehicles to relay orders and intel on-the-fly thanks to Labors having shielded cockpits and thus limited ability to see. Fits better under Shown Their Work
• Webcomic.Sluggy Freelance: While stuck in an alternate dimension where everyone's emotions are literally on display to be read, Torg spends months laboriously cobbling together a ring in secret so he can propose to Zoe. She turns him down because he's been avoiding her without explanation and keeping secrets. "Thing happens, then this other thing happens as a consequence of it"
• Film.Ma: Ma tries to win over another group of teens by buying them booze like she did with Maggie and her friends. When she leads the teens to her house, they just drive off with the alcohol. ???
• Characters.Club Pretty Cure: Cloud Cuckoolander: She has her moments; for example, at the start of "Quinceañera", she rather loudly imagines herself doing the Mexican Hat Dance (complete with an Imagine Spot with her in a China Poblada costume)... inside the school library. Her friends (and, indeed, the whole library) are annoyed at her for this and respond with a Big "SHUT UP!" (in unison, even!), after which she quickly apologizes. Obviously, It Makes Just As Much Sense In Context. Misuse
• Characters.Hitman Blood Money: Karma Houdini: Subverted. While he managed to avoid legal consequences for the accident at his park, his victory in court couldn't salvage his reputation or finances. Things continue to go downhill for him from there, culminating in him being killed by an assassin hired by the father of one of the accident's victims. Maybe misuse?
• LightNovel.The Circumstances Leading To Waltrautes Marriage: Jack becomes exhausted from climbing a mere ten meters up the tree, and he quickly runs out of water and food. Later, his hands are all scratched up and he becomes faint from the thin atmosphere and coldness. He eventually loses his grip and falls. I can see the reality, but the example doesn't have tropes to take the fiction from.

Also, made a sandbox for the wicks.

Edited by Crossover-Enthusiast on Mar 2nd 2020 at 12:16:11 PM