Talk:Promethean Punishment

To me "The Punishment" doesn't remotely communicate the gravity of a sentencing so severe that it has long-term repercussions generations down the line. I feel like we could do with a better one, but do other people agree with that?

And if so, does anyone have suggestions for a better one? Perhaps "Powder Keg Punishment" (in the sense that these always seem to backfire later on an unwitting generation who might not even be aware of it)?

Yeah, this is vaguely named, like your rename proposal.

Helpful.

Tagging some folks before I snooze (and thusly lose that opportunity):

@HeneryVII @Robkelk @Looney Toons @Utini501 @SelfCloak @GentlemensDame883 @Goo Monster

Yeah, "Powder Keg Punishment" sounds pretty cool.

Agreed, on all counts - "Powder Keg Punishment" suits the trope much better than "The Punishment" does.

Yeah, agreed.

What about Curse of Immortality?

Wait, that doesn't work because the trope also requires getting magic powers or something too!

And Who Wants to Live Forever? is its own trope already.

I would rather call "Punished and Empowered". It rhymes. Everything is better with rhymes.

Maybe there's a difference between our accents - that doesn't rhyme when I say it out loud.

I'm happy with "Powder Keg Punishment" for the reason given. I'm also open to "Empowering Punishment" as an alternative structuring of Horny's suggestion.

That would be Cursed with Awesome - additionally, direct from this page's description:

Which may prompt the audience to wonder "Wait... they're giving him magic powers and immortality as a punishment?! Is this Cursed with Awesome or not?" The answer, is, of course, "Yes." Of course, even with powers it's still implied that it hurts. It's sometimes more a punishment to humanity for allowing such a person to exist. Or the punisher just doesn't care what kind of threat they would become if free... just as long as The Punishment is in as much pain as possible.

Honestly, now you brought his up, his trope may be redundant, or a least must be considered a sub-type o of Cursed Wih Awesome. There is no difference except the punishment involves actually inflicting pain or something similar.

...except that the description also indicates that it's something neither the recipient nor the (very general) audience would consider "awesome", and has repercussions that extend far beyond the "punishee" in question.

I would like it if we could work in immortality into the name.

I'm up to considering that, Goo, but it'll be a bit tricky... Perhaps "Pandora's Powder Keg"? Maybe "Promethean Powder Keg" (or perhaps "Promethean Punishment")?

EDIT: Yet another suggestion that came to me.

Ooh, now THAT'S a good one.

Okay, it's been a week. "Promethean Punishment" I think is the current proposal. I like it, and I think that's what Henery was responding to. What does everyone else think?

I'm game. Let's use that LT.

"Promethean Punishment" is the best name that I've seen yet for this trope. Let's do this.

I guess that's fine.

Promethius doesn't fit. He was chained to a (I think remote) rock and had an organ ripped out and regrown everyday by a bird. So I think that's more of a I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream situation.

My reason for suggesting "Promethean" in particular was the fact that the punishment was unnecessarily/disproportionately long, particularly tortuous, and is likely to instill further animosity in the punished party - And I Must Scream can certainly overlap, but needn't be the case. Prometheus didn't exactly visit vengeance upon the gods and/or humanity, either, but then a lot of Trope Namers tend to not be straight examples themselves, because tropes are funny like that.

Honestly, I prefer Powder Keg Punishment, though "Promethean Punishment" is something I'd consider a third option.

Well... we have three votes for (plus a half-hearted "sure") and I think Goo's comment is a "no"? I think "Promethean Punishment" passes.

All right, I've moved the page and its subpages, and I've started going through the links to it and updating them. I'm finding some predictable misuses -- at least a couple cases so far that were clearly written by people who thought it was a generalized trope for any kind of punishment.

at least a couple cases so far that were clearly written by people who thought it was a generalized trope for any kind of punishment.

Well, that's what I would think "The Punishment" means.

Agree, the description as it was pre-move absolutely did not help matters (and made it sound sort of like a wrestler name?).

And I'm done updating inbound links. Approximately a quarter to a third were misuses.