Don't worry about that, because that trope really is about the show.
Art Museum Curator and frequent helper of the Web Original deprecation project
Nizzemancer
This should have another name, Seinfeld was never funny, if you think it was you would probably fail an IQ-test designed without a failing-criteria...
~- Light travels faster than sound. That's why people seem smart until you hear them. -~ Hide / Show Replies
That's only your opinion, though. Not a reason for a rename.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
I never found anything even slightly funny about Seinfeld, either. And the one time I saw an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, I had no enthusiasm to curb.
Edited by hbquikcomjamesl
Why do I keep coming here and realizing I was saying something I'd already said months earler. Sounds about like the kind of thing a Seinfeld (or Curb Your Enthusiasm) plot would be based on.
Edited by hbquikcomjamesl
Thank god, for the rename.
Art Museum Curator and frequent helper of the Web Original deprecation project
Oh, great, some offensive due who comes on and insults those of us with comedic taste - which is SUBJECTIVE - which misunderstands the original trope, which was about onjectivity in a sense, gets away with trolling and causes a rename.
Seinfeld Is Unfunny was used not for pure comedy reasons but for originality reasons. Like it or not, Seinfeld did normalize a lot of modern sitcom tropes and it's a world famous show that everyone has heard of.
Nizzemancer, I think your insulting post here is out of order, and if you clearly can't ascertain SUBJECTIVE taste to something OBJECTIVE like the fame of a show, you don't belong here.
Edited by TheZodiac
Sounds good on paper (he/him)
Per TRS
, Seinfeld Is Unfunny was renamed to Once Original, Now Common due to misuse
Not a change for the better to me. Now it's bland to the point of not meaning as much, and the misuse still persists.
Now that there's a new name for this trope, should there be acronym redirect for it? OONC
The editor who primarily focus on video game tropes
I believe the title of this trope should be changed to "First-Mover Disadvantage" since there are still individuals who find "Seinfeld" funny.
Edited by OUSIsITH
Linking to a past Trope Repair Shop thread that dealt with this page: Redirect farming, started by nuclearneo577 on Feb 27th 2011 at 12:16:15 AM
Linking to a past Trope Repair Shop thread that dealt with this page: Misused, started by AsrielMSK on Jun 28th 2018 at 5:02:06 AM
Previous Trope Repair Shop thread: Needs Help, started by WhatArtThee on Nov 28th 2015 at 3:15:24 AM
Previous Trope Repair Shop thread: Needs Help, started by WhatArtThee on Feb 6th 2016 at 10:09:47 PM
Previous Trope Repair Shop thread: Unclear Description, started by WhatArtThee on Apr 18th 2016 at 9:33:06 PM
Previous Trope Repair Shop thread: Misused, started by WhatArtThee on Jul 3rd 2016 at 7:30:11 PM
Previous Trope Repair Shop thread: Ambiguous Name, started by WhatArtThee on Apr 20th 2017 at 2:47:04 PM
I think this trope needs some changes. Many examples on this page, including the titular Seinfeld, are still beloved even if the tropes that made them unique are now commonplace. The definition should be more changed to "Something that was unique but now wasn't." regardless of current reception.
Just another day in the life of Jimmy Nutrin Hide / Show Replies
120% Asian
Can someone PLEASE tell me what the hell that is on the page image?
Try to please everyone who isn't going to whine about everything like a complete dick Hide / Show Replies
It's super effective.
Wasn't Doctor Who (prior to 1996) low in production values even for the time?
Hide / Show Replies
Doctor Who was pretty much on par for 1963, I think. Compare the production values for The Outer Limits, which began the same year. The problem is that they never really progressed out of the "practical effects and still image compositing" stage in the early 80s.
Many of the examples in the video games section do not fit this trope, at least in their present wording. Examples like Megaman Battle Network, the Oregon Trail, and text-based RP Gs, among others, aren't referring to the fact that the original was copied or adapted ad nauseum, which in turn takes away from their playability. Rather, they're bemoaning the fact that, due to better technology or added features, the original no longer holds up well. This seems more like a simple case of games generally improving; it's like saying, "well, compared to Super Mario Galaxy, Super Mario Bros really doesn't hold up very well," rather than addressing the fact that nearly every element found in SMB is present in most subsequent platformers.
Edited by girardiparty Hide / Show Replies
This is a constant problem with a lot of the video game examples, take, for example, the N64 Zelda games, both of which are considered masterpieces (Majora's Mask less so, but still) and considered quite playable today, enough that Ocarina was capable of being a Killer App in remake form for the 3DS thirteen years later. Their Seinfeld Is Unfunny complains about graphics only...which is kind of daft seeing as video game development is in a constant arms race to develop better graphics. Nowhere are gameplay or storytelling mentioned.
"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."
Hey i have a question about the Ben 10 franchise current state with omniverse is it considered deader than disco or Seinfeld is unfunny?
Edited by 111.92.65.118 Hide / Show Replies
I don't think either fits.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Oh,Well its just the omniverse show remains in hiatus and also most people are not interested in that show.
Hey,Is it all right if Power rangers and Archie comics are going to be part of Seinfeld is unfunny and Deader than disco tropes most never mention about them except some .
Hide / Show Replies
Nah, "never mentioned" is not what either page means.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
Removed from Web Original section:
- Its sister show, Big Brother Sim Edition also has the same thing - Word of God says "season one sucks". Season three (The most recent one) is a surpsingly huge improvement over two.
I'm unfamiliar with the work, but it sounds more like a case of It Gets Better / Growing the Beard rather than this trope.
Edited by Korodzik
It's super effective.
However, it doesn't seem like anything shocking after gorging on anything made past 1992, where every sci-fi setting is a Crapsack World, the "heroes" are dubious at best, and the best ending you'll manage is a Bittersweet Ending.
This statement seems dubious, unless I'm watching too many shows that blur the line between sci-fi and fantasy that "don't count".
Keeper of Porn
Re: the Harry Potter fanfic cliche entry: "Most fanfic ever?" I can think of a dozen fandoms that would look at that statement and chuckle (Star Wars, Star Trek and Doctor Who would probably laugh themselves unconscious)
And that's not even counting anime/manga.
My name is Freezer and my anti-drug is porn.
Howzabout we rename this "Seinfeld is Unoriginal"? Unfunny is not really what this is about.
A lot of the examples used here in my opinion are YMMV. I watch a lot of these movies that happened before I was aware of them and may not understand the full gut-punching impact they may have had on pop-culture and cinema, but I still appreciate the movies. If Die-hard or alien is on TV, I'll watch it, I've watched Casablanca, Blazing Saddles etc. and appreciated the scenes called out in the example even though they've been used and reused mainly because the original seems to do it much better than the imitator.
A lot of the examples seem to be (no offense intended) chest puffing about how "I knew about something before it was popular". Like hipsters following coffee shop singer song writers that get signed to a contract by a record company and suddenly their younger siblings have their album much to their disgust.
Does this trope have a countertrope for things that DO hold up against their successors? Maybe that's an UR-example but I'm not sure, Ur doesn't always mean first.
Shouldn't the part that says "Most pop culture originates in the US, and other countries get it much later" be changed to "Most American pop culture originates in the US, and other countries get it much later" since there isn't just one "pop culture" pool for the planet? I mean, most pop culture probably comes from China or India, seeing as they produce an enormous amount of songs, movies, plays, books, etc.
All the videogame entries need to be reworked. Something being seen as outdated because technology improved is not what this trope is about.
I am a bit uncertain about the Casablanca semi-example (why is it a bullet-point under Carrie, anyway?) - while the movie may well be an example (I haven't actually seen it), the current description for it effectively says that it was Vindicated by History (how can the prevailing opinion at the time of its release be that a movie is clichéd because it had such an impact that key portions of it was copied/parodied/otherwise overused?), only beginning to be seen as a great movie after Bogart's death. Should it be removed? Alternatively, if it is an example of this trope, could someone who actually knows enough about it to say *why* it is an example rewrite the description?
You know that interview that Bill Murray recently gave ''GQ''? (If you didn't read the full thing, you might have heard the Garfield/Coen Bros bit quoted elsewhere.) In it, there's the following exchange:
- Like I never saw, what's-his-name, Larry David's show.Curb Your Enthusiasm?No! The other one. With the other guy.Seinfeld?Seinfeld! I never saw Seinfeld.Come on.Really! I never saw Seinfeld until the final episode, and that's the only one I saw. And it was terrible. I'm watching, thinking, "This isn't funny at all. It's terrible!"
Regardless of whether he's joking or not, that last line would make an ideal page quote. Agreed?
Hide / Show Replies
I disagree. Part of the problem with the name "Seinfeld is unfunny" is that Seinfeld uses a sense of humor that's not for everybody, so to a lot of people it wasn't funny when it first aired. It wasn't for them. That quote seems to suggest that it wasn't for Bill Murray. So it would probably increase the confusion already caused by the name.
Edited by memetics
- Well, the last episode wasn't very funny outside of the context of all the other episodes it references. That was probably the problem Bill Murray had with it. (That last episode didn't strike me as very funny *with* knowlegde of context, but then again, it was more about the call-backs and wrapping up the show than anything else.)
I'm not getting the Super Mario 64 one. It's considered one of the top five best games of all time, if not the best, by a majority of gamers.. The line makes it sound like it's just another platformer to people.
Hide / Show Replies
Name notwithstanding, Seinfeld Is Unfunny isn't intended as a criticism per se — the point isn't that Super Mario 64 isn't considered good, only that it isn't recognized as innovative.
The child is father to the man —Oedipus
You gotta get yourself some marble columns
Removed:
- Before Pippi Longstocking, children's books were supposed to be educational or to teach proper behavioural conduct. Then Pippi came along and she had no interest in obeying adults or acting like a proper young lady, and the whole book was simply entertaining rather than educational. There was a moral panic at the time, but childrens' books about kids having fun and getting into trouble are normal and accepted now.
The Alice In Wonderland weren't especially educational, and were in fact published as Deconstructive Parody of that sort of thing. Unless you want to make the case that they were intended for adults to begin with. Pippi Longstocking may have been a new thing in Swedish children's literature but not in Western children's literature.
The child is father to the man —Oedipus
Somebody has got to add Space Ghost Coast to Coast to this list. It basically defined the template for the type of ironic, absurdist, self-referential humor that dominated everything that followed it on Adult Swim.
Hide / Show Replies
Then add it yourself.
Just don't type "How Did We Miss This One" when you do so.
Put me in motion, drink the potion, use the lotion, drain the ocean, cause commotion, fake devotion, entertain a notion, be Nova Scotian
You gotta get yourself some marble columns
Some bullets I removed as nattersome but are too clever to lose or have useful or interesting links, or the removal can be disputed:
- The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Intentionally, it was supposed to be So Bad, It's Good. That was one of the reasons it attracted a cult following. The other reason was that it appealed to gays, bisexuals, transvestites, and just plain "weirdos" back in the 1970s. Thirty (and more) years later, there's less of a stigma against those groups, not to mention there have been countless other cult films released since then, which leads some people to ask "What's the big deal?".
- Also, what made it so enduring was the audience participation. Roger Ebert said it best: this wasn't a movie so much as a long-running social phenomenon. Put on a silly costume, head to the theater with your friends, be the show, bring in some unwitting newbies in the process, and a great time had by all. If you're just watching the dang 'ol thing at home, well, nothing special about it even if you are into transvestism and bisexuality and whatnot.
I'm not sure RHPS falls into this trope at all.
- A Song Of Ice And Fire is starting to get this. While there are still few imitators, they are starting to show up, and its style of mature, gritty, realistic, deconstructed fantasy is becoming less and less groundbreaking.
This is speculative; add it back when it's firmly no longer groundbreaking.
- Your Show of Shows.
Please elaborate
- Bill Bruford (of King Crimson and Yes) and Neil Peart (of RushJust as influential as Keith Moon's "messy" drumming is the use of multiple, varied time signatures over the course of a song. You can thank them for this.
I could not make head or tail of this.
- Rage Against The Machine have been able to avert this. Their Music remained popular long after Their break up and,while many Bands such as Green Day make half hearted attempts at social statements,none have ever come within a hundred feet of Zach De La Rocha's raw power or Tom Morello's highly Intelligent Lyrics
I like R At M, but I didn't feel like dealing with the random Capitalization and missing spaces to rescue an aversion (which doesn't belong here) and a Take That! against Green Day.
- Bill Watterson, creator of Calvin And Hobbes, wrote this a few months before the end of Peanuts' run:
"Back when the comics were printed large enough that they could accommodate detailed, elaborate drawings, "Peanuts" was launched with an insultingly tiny format, designed so the panels could be stacked vertically if an editor wanted to run it in a single column. Schulz somehow turned this oppressive space restriction to his advantage, and developed a brilliant graphic shorthand and stylistic economy, innovations unrecognizable now that all comics are tiny and Schulz's solutions have been universally imitated.... By now, "Peanuts" is so thoroughly a part of the popular culture that one loses sight of how different the strip was from anything else 40 and 50 years ago."
- Bill Watterson, creator of Calvin And Hobbes, wrote this
Good quote but redundant.
- Shakespearean comedy in general is susceptable to this, especially to the high school students who just can't see the joke. If a modern reader has a good enough grasp on the English and the cultural context, most will be able to figure out that Shakespeare's comedies are strewn with clever wordplay (with copious innuendo) and the local equivalent of pop culture references.
That's more about it not being funny because Language Marches On or Society Marches On or some damn thing marches on, not because of this trope.
- A lot of people can't grasp why The Producers was such a hit or why it won so many Tonys, what with their choreography being stolen for almost every musical and numerous shows copying their raunchy style of humor.
- The Producers Although it could be argued that it doesn't fit this trope, since many people were not able to grasp why those things happened at the time, since it wasn't innovative when it was written (which should go without saying, since it was based on a 40-year-old movie).
If it doesn't fit the trope, it shouldn't be listed.
- See also Jokes Explained and ''Jokes Explained'' Explained. Might just be taking it too far. Or just far enough.
- See also Jokes Explained
I don't want to lose the links
- In an old interview, Bob Newhart commented that he frequented comedy clubs as a way of keeping up with the state of the industry. He claimed that he could usually pick out who would make it big in three years by figuring out who was being themselves on stage as opposed to all the people apeing the style of their favorite comedian.
Sorry, Schroeder. But it's only tangentially relevant.
Edited by HersheleOstropoler The child is father to the man —Oedipus
Can we add the YMMV banner to the top to this page? This is clearly a page that is subjective.
Please help out our The History Of Video Games page.
Removed from under the Superman example because it's just natter, and kind of mean-spirited natter to boot:
- The bloodthirsty-defensive Fan Dumb of the character might not help. Buuut...
- The extreme Hate Dumb of the character not only pull out a bunch of clichés to show some shortcoming (creating strawman arguments when someone shows where he had an adequate challenge to face or where he displayed a character flaw) but never let you forget it, showing up to troll message boards and Playing The Victim when attacked by Misplaced Champions.
The Longest Yard (1974) is cited for several tropes (scrappy underdog vs. championship team, lame coach, even lamer "rousing" speech, bring in the ringer) that were Lampshaded in the football game in M*A*S*H (1970) - link is https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/Ptitleg61am70o3b3w and I don't know how to render that in this wiki.
Large chunks of the literature section keep being deleted. I think that if people are going to remove sections of the article THAT LARGE they should at least discuss it here first so as to come to a concensus.
Edited by 24.235.237.126
Why does the article put forth three related-but-different origins for Dada?
The Ant King
Removed until further explanation is given.
•The Omen. Some of it is corny.
Edited by Myrmidon Kill all math nerds
Personally I would call it I Love Lucy Is Unfunny, because Seinfeld is still way too contemporary right now.
Whether or not Fullmetal Alchemist's use of alchemy is internally consistent is entirely beside the point. The point is that it is in no way a remotely accurate depiction of either alchemy or modern science. I altered it to acknowledge the possibility that the author was aware of the deviations, but that doesn't change the main point.
For the love of all that is good and decent can we please rename this damn thing?
Hide / Show Replies
Take it up with the forums. I don't even see a link to a long-dormant discussion and a crowner that closed a month ago.
Actually, it's rather obvious that Ryoko was meant to be the girl that wins. Tenchi met her first, she's the only girl to get any character development, and she's the only reasonable canidate who isn't his great aunt. The problem is that in between Tenchi Muyo being canceled half-way through and it's being revived, everyone else had done First Girl Wins to death, so since they were annoyed that everyone could now see it coming they decided to go with the current ending.
Edited by 70.156.92.50
Removed from the main page pending explanation of which brothers were intended.
- Films by the Brothers have been ripped off and parodied so many times that modern viewers feel like they already know the plot after three minutes of the film.
- Wachowski? Weitz? Pang? Hughs? Farrelly? Coen? Wayans?
Please tell me you're not also going to go after Seinfeldian Conversation.
Hide / Show Replies