[T]he Imaginative Man who works himself into a Passion because he thinks Some one may insult him.
— John T. McCutcheon
, writing the Laconic Wiki entry◊ a full century before it exists.
, writing the Laconic Wiki entry
◊ a full century before it exists.
Alice and Bob are going to meet each other at some point, to negotiate something or just make amends with each other. While Alice's waiting for Bob to show up, various horrible cases of the What-Ifs start creeping into her mind, making her more and more angry.
By the time Bob shows up, Alice's gotten herself so worked up that she blows up at the fictional events that have occurred in her mind. Usually, before Bob even has a chance to open his mouth to say anything beyond "Hello."
Compare Mad at a Dream, which is being angry at something that happened in a dream; Rejection Projection, when a person who self-isolates mistakenly believes that they are being rejected by other people; and Indulgent Fantasy Segue, when someone is enjoying a violent Imagine Spot.
Examples:
Anime & Manga
- Azumanga Daioh: When Yukari finds a stray cat and tries to get the girls to take care of it, Sakaki starts thinking of what she would name it if she could take it home. This quickly leads her to dream up an elaborate and tragic backstory for the kitten, until she finally reduces herself to tears, much to Kagura's confusion.
- Revolutionary Girl Utena: In "The Sunlit Garden Finale", Miki and Utena duel because Miki reasoned that, because Anthy is engaged to Utena, Utena could order Anthy to give up the piano, and Miki wants her to be able to play the piano as much as she wants. However there's no evidence whatsoever that Utena ever planned to do such a thing.
Comedy
- Danny Thomas: The "jack story", popularised by him. A travelling salesman gets a flat tire on a country road, and he starts walking along the road looking for a house to borrow a jack from. He gets increasingly aggravated during the troublesome journey, and starts imagining various reasons he's going to get rejected—they don't have a jack, he looks too suspicious, etc.—and after he finally reaches a house and knocks, as soon as the door is opened he just shouts "Keep your damn jack!" and storms off.
- A man goes to his neighbor intending to borrow a hammer. On the way there, he starts doubting whether his neighbor would lend it to thim. He becomes angry thinking over it and when the neighbor opens the door, he shouts: "Stick your hammer up your...!"
Films — Live-Action
- Duck Soup: Firefly imagines Ambassador Trentino rejecting his handshake and is so worked up about it that when Trentino arrives, he slaps him before he's even said a word.
Literature
- Sesame Street: In the picture book Some Friend!, there's a story about one character wanting to borrow from another but overthinking it so much that they end up yelling at the poor, unsuspecting fool.
Live-Action TV
- Dead Like Me: George gets a dog (J.D.) and is kicked out of her apartment because Daisy is allergic to dogs. George moves in with Mason, but while at work is overcome by an irrational fear that Mason would bring J.D. into a hot tub and use him to pick up chicks and promptly moves out. George later chastises Mason for this imagined slight, leaving Mason confused.
- Harry Enfield and Chums: The central joke of the Self-Righteous Brothers, who get more and more worked up about entirely hypothetical scenarios involving celebrities.
- Scrubs: J.D.'s inner monologues sometimes lead to this.
- Two memorable ones: First, there was the time he went into an Imagine Spot to hypothetically talk to people who died because of him, so he could ask them whether they thought he killed them. This imagined spot takes place in a diner, and when he orders flapjacks discovers heaven doesn't serve them. He spends the rest of the episode calling flapjacks 'devil-cakes'.
- Secondly, he once imagined Turk being a father, and accidentally taking a pumpkin home instead of the kid. Eventually, the pumpkin graduates school, but falls and splatters open, then Turk's biological son gets hit by a car. When J.D. comes out of it, he calls Turk a terrible father.
Puppet Shows
- Sesame Street: In "Grouch Airlines", Ernie wants to borrow a vacuum cleaner from Herbert Birdsfoot but goes through this while imagining Herbert's possible reaction to the request. When they finally meet, Ernie is so worked up that he snaps at Herbert, saying he can "just keep [his] stupid, old vacuum cleaner!".
Web Videos
- I'm a Marvel... And I'm a DC: In the seconds before doing a skit with Batman shortly after the release of The Dark Knight, Iron Man finds himself sympathizing with Batman about how the movie will never live up to the hype that's built up around it... only, after saying his familiar "Hi, I'm a Marvel," line, suffering through a dream sequence in which it does, and more besides. As a result, after Iron Man faces an ordeal with hyperactive fans, time travellers from a future where the success of The Dark Knight has resulted in a utopia, an alien species opening trade relations based on the movie's wonderfulness, Santa Claus skipping Christmas to catch it and Jesus putting the Rapture on hold just so that he can catch the twelve o'clock screening, he comes back to reality:
Batman: ... and I'm Batman.
Iron Man: [Snapping] Oh, fine, yes! Okay? I know! Alright?! You're Batman! You're awesome! Fine! I get it! Alright?! Huh? Huh?! Huh?! [Storming off] GOD!!!!
Batman: [Bemused] ... Fine, I'm a DC.
Webcomics
- El Goonish Shive:
- In this strip, Elliot starts out consciously trying not to be prejudiced against Melissa for wronging Justin but thinking about it makes him angry to the point that when he actually meets her, his greeting is dripping with barely suppressed rage.
- More Premature Sadness than Aggravation, but in this strip, Sarah recognises that Eliot is planning to break up with her (because she was planning to break up with him) and while she starts off thinking that simplifies things, she then starts wondering why, so by the time they actually meet up, she's got Puppy-Dog Eyes.
- In this
- The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob!: In the 19th6 strip, Jean has just been harshly reminded of something stupid Bob did months ago. She shows up for their date and starts yelling at him for no apparent reason.
- xkcd: The 439th strip combines this trope with Super Window Jump.
Western Animation
- The Brak Show: Brak's father declares a hypothetical brother dead to him after imagining what he would be like.
- The Simpsons: Homer Simpson does this with some frequency. Oddly enough, they usually spur him to do the right thing, although it is almost always for the wrong reasons. In "The Wandering Juvie", Homer is initially unconcerned about Bart's escaping from the juvenile hall—his emotion is ratcheted up to alarm once his mental hypothesis concludes with Bart being forced into a shotgun wedding to an alien.
