Speculative Troping Cleanup

Cut some speculative lines on SegaSonic Bros. that said the red and yellow Sonic recolors were later retooled into the characters Mighty and Ray. There's no evidence for this, and other behind-the-scenes info about the characters' and games' origins seems to contradict this.

Found this on Creator.Richard Burton:

As there's no quote confirming this, and how the example also seems to argue with itself, it strikes me as pretty speculative.

Would the part that I've bolded that was recently added to this example from ReleaseDateChange.COVID 19 Pandemic Related Examples count as speculation.

• Paramount's adaptation of Clifford the Big Red Dog was pushed back from November 13th, 2020 to November 5th, 2021. It later moved forward to September 17, 2021, but was later pulled from the schedule due to concerns over the spread of the delta variant. The divisive reception to the reveal along with the disappointing opening weekend box office of the below-mentioned Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins also likely played a factor.

This was recently added to Free Guy, does the part I've bolded count as speculation?:

• Ending Fatigue: The movie seems to have ended first with Millie and Keys becoming a couple, but where it should have gone to the credits, we instead get one more scene in the game world. The scene reveals Buddy survived his apparent deletion, implying the filmmakers wanted to remove the Unfortunate Implications of his death after the events of 2020.

This was just added to The Last Duel and it strikes me as a bit premature:

• Star-Derailing Role: Industry trades have already seen this movie as the death knell for Jodie Comer's film career after it flopped hard.

I found this on All Girls Want Bad Boys:

• There's a bit of a deconstruction here, as during the time in question Daenerys is stuck between trying to be a nurturer or a conqueror. She is attracted to people who can be her destructive Id for her, and ultimately rejects Quentyn when he proves unwilling/unable to master her dragons and be the destructive force she wants. Ultimately, by the end of the book she has decided to give in to her dark side and become a conqueror herself without using surrogate men instead: "Dragons plant no trees". The final books will show whether she can be brought back from this and/or have a relationship with someone who is not destructive.

This seems to me like speculating on what will happen in future books.

Edited by RustBeard on Oct 20th 2021 at 10:04:40 AM

Sorry to add to the pile of unanswered questions, but Funny.Ghostbusters 1984 suggests a reason why Egon suffered no ill effects from looking at the trap is because he doesn't have a soul.

This is despite outright acknowledging that it's a fan theory, and that a more likely reason that looking at the trap is dangerous is because it could damage one's eyes.

Feels like fancruft at best.

The Lost Aesop page has an entry for the Star Trek TNG episode "Ethics", which includes the following:

Should it really count as an example of Lost Aesop if it's not clear whether there even was an Aesop to lose? The way the episode was handled made it seem like it may not have been trying to send a message one way or another - that it was just trying to encourage the viewer to think.

My understanding of Lost Aesop is that it means "you don't know what the moral is".

The page description makes it sound like it's for cases where the work was clearly set up to teach some sort of Aesop, but either it gets abandoned before the work can properly deliver it, or what the work is actually trying to teach is ambiguous. Plenty of works either don't bother trying to teach any sort of Aesop, or present all sides of a complex issue in the context of encouraging the audience to think for themselves (which "Ethics" felt like it was doing).

Edited by DoctorWTF on Nov 21st 2021 at 12:45:01 PM

Does this example from Trivia.Devils Reign Marvel seem like speculation, especially since it starts with "Possibly"?

• Real Life Writes the Plot: Possibly with Otto Octavius' inclusion in the event. While it picks up Otto's return to the Big Apple towards the end of Nick Spencer's Spider-Man (and role in Spider-Man Beyond), it's also not hard to see Otto's prominence as a means of tying into the then-upcoming release of Spider-Man: No Way Home.
  • That being said, Zdarsky's admitted he's enjoyed the chance to finally write Otto (as the character wasn't available during his Spectacular Spider-Man run).

This is from Characters.Ghostbusters Film Series Ghostbusters:

• Collector of the Strange: Molds, fungus and spores, mostly. He may even possibly find the scent of them attractive.

For reference, the character is Egon. I've never seen anything that had him commenting on the smell of fungi. Should I axe that line?

Yeah, I don't recall him ever mentioning the scent of them.

On Heartwarming.The Loud House Season 3:

• The fact that Lori wants to marry Bobby and have eleven children of her own with him. And it's implied that she wants more boys than her parents did because, as the eldest sister, she is observant enough to pick up that Lincoln does get bothered by being the only boy, and she'd rather not have any sons of her own go through the same problems.

I think the bolded part is speculation; I always assumed that she imagined more boys because it's just statistically more likely to have more than one son.

I kiiiind of see the logic in it, since it would've been easy to just palette-swap the Loud kids for the quick gag, so maybe it could be reworded into how her fantasy is more gender-even than the Loud family and what that implies, but I don't think that implication is deliberate, you're right.

Does this count as speculation? (From UnfortunateImplications.Live Action TV)

• In the wake of the George Floyd protests, a large number of cop shows, including COPS, Live PD, and Chicago P.D. were called out for presenting a very one-sided, very black and white view of the police as good guys who all too often were right for doing the wrong thing in the pursuit of justice. This backlash against what has been described as "copaganda" ultimately got the former two shows cancelled, and may have started the police procedural's decline into Discredited Trope territory.

Too early to call. Whack it.

I've removed that line.

I found this awful entry in Trivia.Generator Rex

• Executive Meddling: For the Conspiracy Theorist in you, this might be the reason that John Cena had to step down from voicing Hunter Cain in episodes after the debut. It's a shame because Cena did a surprisingly good job, but it's probably likely that WWE executives didn't want their number-one draw (whose primary audience is little kids, mind you) connected to an Ax-Crazy, hypocritical, fantastic racist. That... or Cena's WWE schedule is just too time-consuming to make time for voice-acting.

The simple solution is 99% likely to be the real answer here.

Found this on Trivia.Dutch:

• Divorced Installment: Rumor also had it for a while that the film was originally penned as a possible sequel draft for Uncle Buck. It's never been officially confirmed, though the protagonists of both films are very similar.

If there's actually something credible behind the rumors, it can stay.

I couldn't find anything confirming the rumours.

This was just added to YMMV.Smiling Friends.

• Inspiration for the Work:
  • In various streams and videos, Zach Hadel had mentioned that one thing he disliked in most modern adult cartoons was how bland the backgrounds were, frequently naming Family Guy as the primary example. As of such, many believe he and Michael made sure that the backgrounds were filled with hidden gags and detail solely to address this criticism.
  • Similarly, many theorise the overall optimistic tone of the show and it’s jabs at apathetic and misanthropic behaviour was done to criticise the overall nihilistic tone many adult cartoons now have, with said tone being popularised by another Adult Swim show, Rick and Morty.

First of all, Inspiration for the Work is Trivia, not YMMV. Secondly, it doesn't look like either of these were directly confirmed by Word of God.