The TVTropes Trope Finder is where you can come to ask questions like "Do we have this one?" and "What's the trope about...?" Trying to rediscover a long lost show or other medium but need a little help? Head to Media Finder and try your luck there. Want to propose a new trope? You should be over at You Know, That Thing Where.
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openSupernatural Retribution Protection
A character is protected from direct harm on their life by something supernatural.
- In Wulfrik, the simple solution of killing the World's Best Warrior with magic won't work because his curse (to Walk the Earth looking for challenging fights, be tortured for eternity by demons if he loses) will then transfer to the killer, who prefer to be tortured to death than risk that.
- In Baskets Of Guts, the lich doesn't kill Anna because he knows that nature spirits Come Back Strong when killed, and get stronger with every defeat (as in needing armies to put down) until their killer is finally dead.
openBlack is the New Orange
A character who was white and red-headed in the source material is portrayed as black in an adaptation. (Starfire in Titans, Jimmy Olsen in Supergirl, Ariel in The Little Mermaid-)
openThe B(etter)-Team
In a work where the main cast are entertainingly dysfunctional assholes (Team A), there's a similar team on the same side made up of far more competent, successful, intelligent etc. people (team B), who are occasionally seen at work, outclassing the main team by a mile (and the main reason the work isn't about the better B-team is that it's funnier to see the assholes screw up or get bitten by karma). If they meet there's potential for overlap with The Resenter / Unknown Rival.
- Exterminatus Now has an Inquisitorial team that mirrors the main characters in terms of appearance and abilities, except they're all highly competent (instead of middlingly skilled and lucky) and actually enjoy each other's company.
- Eight Bit Theater has the real Light Warriors, who have similar classes to the main party but are actually good at their jobs, managing to find epic weapons by raiding dungeons (although they also serve as Butt Monkeys who repeatedly get their stuff stolen by the main cast).
- Any Macho Disaster Expedition plot that shows the men as bungling idiots and the women as competent.◊
openWork didn't predict the USSF/other services
Is there a trope (or trivia item), akin to Technology Marches On, where an older work set in the future, for example attributes a spacefaring enterprise to the US Air Force, whereas we now have the US Space Force and it is a much more apt fit for such a mission (and yes I'm aware it is still kind of under the purview of the USAF, but likely as time goes on it will be seen as more distinct and specialised)? I guess an alternative which the trope could encompass would be if works made during the early days of aviation presumed that planes would always be associated only with air forces but, quite soon after it became apparent that navies could also field them (and then helicopters too) via aircraft carriers. Or, going further back, at first planes were largely operated as a corps under armies, but these nascent organisations soon rose to become their own service branches.
Edited by FlashStepsopenCopy the enemy's idea
For example, in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Malfoy uses his enemy Harry's idea from the previous book of the Room of Requirement for illicit business, and Hermione's idea of the enchanted coins for secret communication.
I don't think this is Stealing the Credit, because Malfoy brazely says he stole the idea, rather than the credit for it.
openAirport runway attendant gag
Is there one about a flying character being directed to land by somebody on the ground with flags, like in an airport? Two examples of this are Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, where Hagrid directs the flying carriage to land, and Shrek, where somebody directs the good witches from Sleeping Beauty to land on their broomsticks.
open"Dude, Not Funny" as an Audience Reaction Trope.
When a joke is meant to elicit laughter, but at least a few other people in Real Life find it offensive. It's just like the in-universe trope but as a YMMV trope.
openEvidence is a too-early claimed year
The evidence against a person's apparent identity is that he makes a claim, using a year which is too early for this claim to make sense.
- Live action TV
- In Monk episode "Mr. Monk Meets Dale the Whale", Dale's doctor, Christiaan Vezza, claims to be named after Dr. Christiaan Barnard. However, he claims to have been conceived in 1965, and Dr. Barnard wasn't famous until 1967.
- Theater
- In ''The Music Man, Marion was certainly suspicious about "Professor" Harold Hill, but she knew he was lying when he said he's "Gary Conservatory of Music, Gold-Medal Class of Aught-Five" since the Gary Conservatory of Music was only founded in 1906.
resolved Non-Descript City-World
Is there a trope on the phenomenon where the entirety or most of a story takes place within a generic city landscape that is either unnamed or has a very generic name?
openCasual Alien Intermingling
Im trying to find a trope that captures a certain specific slice of extraterrestrial scifi. The type of scifi where alien intermixing is so common that the clerk at the convenience store is as likely to be a Xu'ruto with 3 heads as they are to be a human
Examples of what is this trope Star Wars Star Trek The Ascent Mass Effect Futurama High on Life
Examples that are not this trope: Stellaris/Twilight Imperium - these setting have many alien races but they for the most part keep to themselves and their own worlds
Space Invaders/Destroy All Humans/Mars Attacks: The most common type of alien media I see, these aliens are normally just atogonists
Ive been able to use the trope pages of the media I listed to find more examples but I haven't found a single specific trope that links them
Tropes like many many races, galactic civilization, and even space opera are similar but they arent specific to the type of casual alien intermingling Im talking about.
Im really passionate about this genre (I even tried to start a blog about it at one point) and tvtropes has been the only really helpful site in finding more. If this trope doesnt exist I really think it should.
openI can't think of that many examples for this, but...
A character is given a new name by a different culture, either because they're directly joining that culture or as a show of gratitude, renown, becoming The Dreaded, etc.. See Rusty being renamed to Firepaw in Warriors for an example of the first type. Might also include a person given themselves a new cultural name, such as the real life Muhammad Ali.
I was originally trying to find whether any historical examples of this existed, so real-life terminology would also be helpful.
openThis feels trope-y, but I can't place it
So, there's a scene in a movie I was watching where a character (a teen boy who's been captured by the villain) regrets that he never had a chance to apologize to his uncle (whom he had a spat with at the movie's beginning, before the plot kicked into gear)- and then the scene cuts to the uncle, who is worried about his missing nephew and lamenting that he was too hard on him.
It feels like a trope is in play here, but I can't seem to find anything specific...
resolved Everybody Followed Fashion in the Past Live Action TV
A flashback scene will feature characters wearing stereotypical fashion items of the era, to an exaggerated level, even if in the series' present time they just dress in clothes that might be common in different settings, such as suits, white shirts, and so on.
For instance, in The Simpsons, Dr. Hibbert has a short hairdo that doesn't really stand out, but in flashbacks he'll have jheri curls, braids or dreadlocks depending on the era.
Even Homer wears a nondescript white shirt and jeans, but is fashion-focused on flashbacks, like in That '90s Show, he wore an 8-Ball jacket over a hoodie... even though when the show actually aired in the 90ies, he had the same white shirt.
Might be a Justified Trope in that characters might care more about fashion when they're young, but still...
openA story references its adaptation and the author's less known works
Not sure if this is the same trope or different ones.
- An adaptation changes some of the original's designs. Then later the original references those designs as easter eggs.
- A story includes characters from the author's other works. One Recurring Extra is the protagonist of another, much more obscure story, and a few more are from an abandoned and unpublished story concept.
openReversed Reversal
A situation that can be played for drama or humor: something with a binary state (an on-off switch, a MacGuffin and an identical-looking decoy, etc.) keeps getting switched from one state to the other.
- A Jame Bond movie has Bond switch the Big Bad's computer tape with an audio one. Unfortunately, he disposed of the real one by putting it down the Bond Girl's bikini, who interpreted this as her needing to switch the tapes, which she did.
- In Asterix, two hostile Gaul chieftains (both Too Important to Walk and are carried on shields) are negotiating, with one turning his back on the other. His shieldbearers believe they're supposed to do the same, ruining the chieftain's attempt at drama.
- In Good Omens, three babies are present in the maternity ward, an American politician's son, the Antichrist and a third one. There's a Satanic plot to switch the first two babies out, but because two of the cultists do so separately, the Antichrist ends up raised by a perfectly normal couple instead of being in a position to start Armageddon.
- Often seen when playing Uno, when a player uses a reverse card but the next also uses one.
openDescribe this power set
Taromancy: Gaining insight into the future by using tarot cards.
Astrology
Cold reading
A plot, often appeared in a school setting, where a character is challenged to only say a certain word(usually the word 'yes') for a day. Hilarity ensues. One of the solutions to overcome this challenge is to not say anything or using non-verbal communication.
Another variant is where everyone in school has to speak a foreign language for a week (eg. English week in non-English media). Level of restriction may vary. The solution is the same as above.
Is there a trope that has a similar description?