Linking to a past Trope Repair Shop thread that dealt with this page: What's the point of this page?
, started by drdeathray on Aug 31st 2011 at 2:49:31 AM
Previous Trope Repair Shop thread: Needs Help, started by MarqFJA on Aug 24th 2016 at 6:46:28 PM
Sorcerer in training
Would an episode of Blossom fit this trope?
Blossom is light skinned with dark hair, as is her father (and brothers). In a flashback episode, she imagines her Missing Mother teaching her about female reproduction. Phylicia Rashād played the mother. (For a quick reference, she used to play Clair Huxatable on The Cosby Show.)
I'm not sure if this would be this trope or unreliable narrator/memory.
Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving. -Terry Pratchett Hide / Show Replies
Depends; did Phylicia Rashād appear as her mother in any other episode, or was it just a one time gag?
I think this page might just need to be axed. Once you research genetics past high school biology you start to learn that almost anything is possible, and some 'impossible' scenarios are actually quite common. Eye color and hair color, the two main entries on this page, are NOT adequately explained with Punnett squares. If this page exists at all it should probably avoid any mention of genetics and focus only on particularly jarring casting decisions or scripts that bring attention to dissimilar features.
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Alas, this does not mean that any representation of fictional genetics makes sense. Also, the main point behind Hollywood Genetics is that fictional scenarios are way more often that is realistic, not merely that they are impossible.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
I feel the need to point out an example on this page that is not an "aversion" but actually a straight example of this trope:
- Averted in a House episode in which the patient knew he was adopted all along, due to an easily-ignored feature he couldn't possibly have.
The feature in question is a cleft chin— the show states that two parents without a cleft chin can't have a child with one. This is, plain and simple, incorrect. It's rare, but possible. (This troper is a living example of a child with a cleft chin born to two parents without cleft chins; as such, she did research immediately after seeing this episode.) I'd add this to the main page, but can't figure out how to reword it properly and don't want to start natter.
Taking this into account, I agree with the above troper that this page needs cleanup at the very least.
How did a page on how Hollywood fails genetics, fail genetics?
Take this paragraph
"In genetics, inheritance is explained by there being different "alleles" of genes. For example you can have a "gene" that controls eye colour and an "allele" for blue eyes, and allele for brown eyes and so on. Alleles can be "dominant", "recessive" or "co-dominant". You always have two alleles for each gene (one from each parent) so there is a 50/50 chance that each parent will give you a given allele they have."
There is no such thing as a gene for blue eyes/brown eyes/green eyes. Eye color works through polygenic inheritance. In polygenic inheritance you have several alleles and each allele is the same. The only difference between them is if they effect the outcome or not. For example it would work like this.
0 alleles that affect the trait: Blue eyes / 1-2: Green eyes / 3-4: Light brown eyes / 5: Brown eyes / 6: Dark brown eyes
Capital letter means it affects the trait so if your gene had the alleles Aabb CC you would have light brown eyes. If your gene was aabbcc you would have blue eyes. In each set of letters you get one from your mother and one from your father so if your mother was AAB Bcc (light brown eyes) and your father was aabbcc (Blue eyes) you would have to end up with Aa Bbcc (green eyes). If your parents were both Aa Bb Cc (Light brown eyes) You could end up with blue eyes if you received every allele that doesn't add towards the trait.
Edited by 74.163.30.100
The South Park example used as the page image really doesn't fit - a 1/64 chance obviously means that it will happen.
And btw, my Dad is 6'1 and I am 5'4, so the part about "inexplicably large discrepancies in height between parents and children" doesn't ring true. These things just happen.