TVTropes

[vynsane]

http://www.tvtropes.org

i've been wasting a lot of time this weekend at this site, fuckin' hysterical, really insightful stuff. however, they're comic book tropes are the best.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... uperpowers

[Rollo Tomassi]

Navigation there blows.

[vynsane]

Navigation there blows.

true, but i tend to use it more as a search-and-click site as opposed to a navigate site. i search for a tv show, an actor, or a phrase, then end up clicking away afterward...

[vynsane]

i started a new trope creation process for "sudden, but inevitable, betrayal" - can anyone who's active on there help out with examples?

i'm also considering creating a trope "nefarious, yet indistinct, plans" as the name of another one, after using that phrase in the initial write-up of the other one.

[anarky]

You might have to pay Dr. Douche if you use the second one.

What exactly is the definition of your first? Their server appears to be down, so I can't check it. I've got several things in mind based on the name, but want to make sure they fit properly given the description.

[vynsane]

i yield the floor to Doctor Douche to submit "nefarious, yet indistinct, plans"

yeah, it was down for a few minutes just now. the description i wrote is

Happens most often in comics and comic adaptations, wherein the "good guys" team up with the "bad guys" to fight some threat to both. Eventually we KNOW the "bad guys" will screw over the "good guys" for their own nefarious yet indistinct goals - maybe they just can't help but be "bad guys", maybe they think they're still working towards the same goal as the "good guys", or maybe it was the plan all along.

Whatever the case, it happens - suddenly - but the audience isn't surprised. If they're genre savvy, neither are the "good guys" ("We should've seen that coming"). If they're particularly genre savvy, the "good guys" already have a plan to deal with such a turn.

Think X-men/Magneto in X-men 2, Fantastic Four/Doctor Doom in both FF movies, Blade/Blood Pack in Blade 2, Mal/Saffron in the Serenity episode "Trash".

one comment added a great (possibly, the first ever) example:

The Scorpion and the Frog is a classic fable where the frog helps a scorpion cross the river on the assumption that the scorpion will not sting the frog since that would doom them both. When the scorpion does sting the frog and they start drowning, he justifies this betrayal by saying that it is its nature.

[anarky]

Ah. Not quite what I was expecting, but gotcha.

There's also the gingerbread man, which also ends with one character crossing the pond on the back of another. In this case, the gingerbread man trusts the fox to get him across, but the fox eats him.

Similar case, though not quite as appropriate, in The Stinky Cheese Man (a spoof of the gingerbread man story, definitely worth reading if you haven't).

Didn't the crew of the Enterprise have to work with Klingons, pre-treaty, in one of the films, only to be screwed over?

The remake of 3:10 to Yuma sort of falls in this. The original defies the trope. (That's why the original is awesome and the remake is overrated garbage--albeit well-executed garbage that could've been awesome with a less pile-of-shit story.)

Something is right on the tip of my tongue involving a fat Soviet guy. Cannot think of what it is to save my life.

[vynsane]

yeah, cool, the gingerbread man is pretty much a retelling of the scorpion and the frog, but it still fits.

i can't remember the specifics of the betrayal "undiscovered country", but yeah, it might fit. it might not be 'inevitable', though. that's sort of the key.

[anarky]

I may be mistaken (and our other Joe-nerds might be able to help), but the episode of GIJoe about the Gamesmaster (I think it's actually called "The Gamesmaster") is really shitty but has a cool twist on this. Two Cobras and two Joes are kidnapped by this loony who wants them to basically play his stupid obstacle course. (It really is one of the shittiest Joe cartoons, which is saying quite a bit.) The four have to work together, despite Baroness and Cobra Commander betraying them (and each other) a few times during the course of the episode. The twist comes with the folks trying to rescue them: obviously, each side blames the other, and Duke and Destro make a deal to work together to save them when it's clear a third party is involved. And Cobra doesn't betray them in the end.

[Rollo Tomassi]

Would Paul Reiser in Aliens fit in this category?

Or Ilsa Schneider at the end of Last Crusade. Hmmm. Maybe not that one.

PS since certain Losers here refuse to watch Firefly, they don't realize "sudden, but inevitable betrayal" comes from that show. So consider it acknowledged. You stock dropping wanker.

[vynsane]

okay, so i updated the description and added a bunch of examples - suggested ones as well as my own:

Hoban 'Wash' Washburne (as plastic Stegosaurus): Yes... Yes... This is a fertile land and we will thrive. We will rule over all this land and we will call it... This Land.
Wash (as plastic Allosaurus): I think we should call it your grave!
Wash (as Stegosaurus): Ah, curse your sudden, but inevitable, betrayal!
Wash (as Allosaurus): Ha ha ha, mine is an Evil Laugh! Now, DIE!
Wash (as Stegosaurus): Ahhhhh, NNNNO, God. Oh, DEAR GOD IN HEAVEN.
--- Firefly - "Pilot"

It's The End Of The World As We Know It - or it will be unless we use Applied Phlebotinum on this Doomsday Device. Unfortunately, the only person I know with a stockpile of enough Phlebotinum is Enemy Mine. We'll have to put aside our differences and work in concert towards our mutually beneficial goal of foiling the current Big Bad's scheme, since Status Quo Is God. Maybe Enemy Mine will even have a Heel Face Turn and become the man I once knew.
Yeah, good luck with that.

Happens most often in comics and comic adaptations, wherein the "good guys" team up with the "bad guys" to fight some threat to both. Eventually Genre Savvy viewers KNOW the "bad guys" will seize the Villain Ball with both hands and betray the heroes the minute they get the chance, regardless of the advantage it might bring. Maybe they just can't help but be "bad guys". Maybe they think they're still working towards the same goal as the "good guys". Maybe it was the plan all along. Whatever the case, it happens - suddenly - but the audience isn't surprised. If they're Genre Savvy, neither are the "good guys" ("We should've seen that coming"). If they're particularly Genre Savvy, the "good guys" already have a plan to deal with such a turn.

This trope accompanies Chronic Backstabbing Disorder and Reliable Traitor in the same way that My Significance Sense Is Tingling accompanies Spider Sense. Compare to The Farmer And The Viper, wherein the farmer acts unilaterally, asking for no guarantee from the viper.

Anime and Manga

Comics
Fantastic Four - With Reed Richards busy fighting something and the the cosmic radiation that gave the four their powers causing complications to the birth of his second child with Sue Richards, Johnny Storm, the Human Torch, turned to Doctor Doom for assistance. In repayment, Doom asked only that he be allowed to name the child, a request that was granted. He named her Valeria, after a woman he had loved in the past. Unbeknownst to the FF he also placed a spell on Valeria, making her his "familiar spirit" as part of a greater scheme to increase his mystical powers.

X-men - After the two Secret Wars miniseries', Magneto, who had curiously been placed by The Beyonder with the heroes in the original conflict, begins a Heel Face Turn that ultimately sees him take over for Charles Xavier as the headmaster of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. His tenure was marked with suffering and loss, pushing him to revert back to his more extremist views in a resultant Face Heel Turn.

Film

Blade - In Blade II, Blade is attacked at his base of operations by the Blood Pack, a group of Ninjas. They ask for a truce and his help to defeat a new type of vampire that preys upon humans and vampires alike. It's revealed that, until this new threat surfaced, they had been training to take on Blade himself.

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer has the US Government forcing the titular group to team up Doctor Doom in order to subdue the Surfer. Doom's Chronic Backstabbing Disorder kicks in.

Revenge Of The Sith - Given the nature of prequels, Anakin's Face Heel Turn on the Jedi Order and The Republic is literally Because Destiny Says So.

X-men
X2: X-Men United presents William Stryker, who poses a common threat to The X-Men and Magneto's Brotherhood. The two mutant factions put aside their differences and cooperatively storm Stryker's compound, where, once divided from his collaborators, Magneto takes advantage of the situation.

X-Men: First Class, as a prequel, poses a similar Because Destiny Says So situation to Revenge Of The Sith concerning the relationship between Erik and Xavier.

Literature

Subverted during one battle in the Belisarius Series, where the Genre Savvy Belisarius considered the betrayal by an allied general so inevitable that he actually formulated his plan around it.

The Man From Uncle novel The Dagger Affair. Archenemies UNCLE and THRUSH team up to fight the DAGGER organization. Each side exchanges hostages to make sure the truce between them is kept. After DAGGER is defeated, THRUSH tricks UNCLE into releasing the THRUSH hostages early and then tries to assassinate several UNCLE agents before they learn of the betrayal.

Live Action TV

Angel, "Not Fade Away" (the last episode).
Angel: This may come out a little pretentious, but... one of you will betray me.
[Spike raises his hand]
Angel: Wes.
Spike: [disappointed] Oh. Can I deny you three times?
Turns out it's Harmony who betrays Angel, which Angel anticipated. He fired her but left her a letter of recommendation.

Firefly, "Trash" - Known swindler Saffron has a big heist planned and needs the Serenity crew's help.
Subverted when Inara, proving highly Genre Savvy, hatches a plan of her own to snare Saffron after her double-cross, allowing her to believe that this was part of Mal's plan all along (it wasn't).

i need some more examples. i don't know about Paul Reiser in Aliens - that's a bit iffy. there's no concrete evidence for the audience that he will betray everyone else. if that GIJoe example can be confirmed, it's probably a good subversion of this.

[Diabolical]

Elsa in Indy 3

Barbossa in Pirates 3 (I think)

Jake Sully in Avatar - He turns on the humans.

Unbreakable - Sam Jackson's big twist ending.

Toy Story 3 - Lotso and his crew turning on Buzz, Woody and the gang (also the creepy baby turning on Lotso)

The Incredibles - Syndrome's chick assistant helps the Incredibles.

Up - The old aviator turns on Carl and the kid.

The Rocketeer - Timothy Dalton turns out to be a Nazi.

Return of the Jedi - Darth Vader's redemption. Did anyone think Luke would not save his dad?

[vynsane]

Jake Sully in Avatar - He turns on the humans.

The Incredibles - Syndrome's chick assistant helps the Incredibles.

Return of the Jedi - Darth Vader's redemption. Did anyone think Luke would not save his dad?

these are some of the best examples of the trope i'm getting at, as they each show the build-up of emotions in the respective characters that leads to the inevitable betrayal, yet they're subversions of the 'standard' way it happens. 'the incredibles' and 'jedi' each have a bad guy having a Heel Face Turn, betraying the other bad guy. 'avatar' is a double-subversion in that we already root for the naavi and finally jake makes his in-universe Face Heel Turn from humanity, but, really, it's also a Heel Face Turn because he's doing the right thing.

lotso not saving the toys in the garbage incinerator is the best example of this trope from TS3 - they originally save him, they all try to escape together, and he betrays them. the initial heel face turn (when the true nature of the school is revealed) is not really anticipated or inevitable.

[vynsane]

so, those two never really gained favor and continue to languish. they might have been a bit too specific.

got another one, though.

Landing the Big Account. i need support/more examples.

Oftentimes, in order to create conflict between work and home life, the protagonist's career will hinge on one home-run presentation, one sure-fire pitch, or landing the big account. This one singular task will pull all attention away from anything else, causing family and friends to pick up the slack, increasing the conflict and stress.

If the moral of the story is that the joy of life is in slowing down and enjoying friends and family, look for said friends or family to somehow deliberately or unintentionally sabotage, demolish, or otherwise undermine all the hard work that went into the presentation in the first place. Subversions can come into play if the presentation is changed for the better by the meddling.

Examples

Film

• Elf - Titular character Buddy's biological father, Walter Hobbs, is commanded to have a pitch for a new children's book ready for a meeting on Christmas Eve. This pressure only compounds the stress of finding out he has a son he never knew about who believes he was raised by North Pole Elves.
• The Smurfs - Patrick Winslow's make-or-break-career ad campaign pitch is put into jeopardy when little blue creatures from another realm wreak havoc with his life. Sabotaged by Clumsy Smurf when the wrong (abandoned) campaign is attached to an email and (somehow) printed on billboards, busses, and taxis by the next morning. Subverted when the campaign proves a success with the help of the incantation the Smurfs use to get back home.

Literature

• In Lush by Natasha Friend, Sam's father's attention is divided between his family and a big architecture project, and he actually assaults his four-year-old son for spilling grape juice on the blueprints.
• The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit features Tom Rath, a public relations guy working for the head of a TV network, who must design a pitch for his boss (to spearhead the establishment of national mental health services) to be presented to a group of physicians. Rath's boss wants the doctors to rise in unison and appoint him to run the campaign, so there's a lot riding on this project. Of course, there are other issues (oblivious TV-addict kids, social pressures to succeed, Rath's PTSD from World War II, etc.), but the proposal's pitch is a big drain on Rath's time and energy.

LiveActionTV

• This accounts for the plot of roughly 1/4 of the episodes of Bewitched. Darrin has to land the big ____ account for the advertising firm where he works.
• The advertising execs of Mad Men are always trying to land the next big account and it often puts considerable stress on their professional and personal lives. Other times keeping the big account is the real issue. One notable subversion occurs when the partners want one of the account execs to use his family connections to land a new account. He refuses since he is already bringing in a large portion of the agency's revenue and he will not exploit his family for more.

NewspaperComics

• Pops up a lot in Blondie.

[anarky]

Kinda on-subject, kinda not....

If there is a large sci-fi or superhero team of characters who exist only in one show or book (meaning X-Men during most of the Claremont run, or G.I.Joe, or something like that, as opposed to Avengers, where a lot of the characters have their own books), the female characters will mostly be there for romantic attachments to the male characters. A male character may or may not have a relationship. If he does, it may or may not be with a teammate. Women who are not in relationships are rather rare. Although that part is somewhat due to the general fact that there are more guys in such stories than girls, females having relationships with people not on their team are practically nonexistent.

Looking at female G.I.Joe before X-Men, for the simple fact that the teams are more static (even if there are a shit-ton more):

Scarlett: always tied to someone--Snake Eyes, Duke, Mainframe, or Ripcord, depending upon the continuity
Lady Jaye: almost always tied to Flint
Cover Girl: looking across all continuities, more guys have been inside her than have been in Grand Central Station
Baroness: always attached to Destro (even when the initial writers make a point to have them hate each other)
Zarana: usually attached to Road Pig or Destro
Chameleon: on the rare occasions she actually gets fleshed out, she's a human trampoline for her teammates
Lady (Mistress?) Armada: attached to Destro Jr
Doc II: barely introduced, and already shacking up with Quick-Kick

This leaves us with Jinx, Daina, Helix, Shooter, and Zanya. You could possibly argue Dr. Biggles-Jones as well. Biggles-Jones was never developed much beyond her initial arc, nor was Shooter. Zanya was a victim of poor characterization. So the three real remaining women are the three who are often portrayed as almost being emotionless engines of mass destruction... and at least two of them, possible all three, have still had romantic attachments to teammates in at least one continuity each. (I won't count female Dial-Tone; Dial-Tone's a dude.) And that stupid Fobbit from IDW whose name I can't remember only exists because she wants Mainframe.

There are very rare occasions when an ex-boyfriend is mentioned, but, for the most part, these women didn't have any sex lives before they joined Joe, Cobra, or the Oktober Guard. And they have only fucked teammates since.

On the male side of the coin, I could rattle off a dozen or more characters who have had lovers who weren't on the team: Hawk, Cobra Commander, Ripcord, Stalker, and Grunt come immediately to mind.

You can even do this with Firefly. You have River, who's a crazy killer. Every other woman is attached to (or only really, secretly, has feelings for) a male crew member.

So, in a nutshell, if there is a team, starship crew, whatever, the women who actually have any emotions seem to exist only as romantic interests for the male characters.