Amazing Technicolor Population: Difference between revisions
→Video Games
m (Mass update links) |
|||
(23 intermediate revisions by 10 users not shown) | |||
Line 1:
{{trope}}
[[File:
{{quote|'''Saves A Fox:''' Okay, now try a skin-colored one.
'''
'''
In the real world, the color range of human skin is fairly limited. We largely come in varying shades of {{color|brown|brownish}}, and even the most generous will generally only give humans four distinct "colors": {{color|pink|pink}}, {{color|brown|brown}}, {{color|red|red}} and {{color|gold|yellow}}. This is to say nothing of proper [[Race Tropes|ethnicity]].
This is not so in cartoons. Animators, whether they're drawing cartoon characters or building models for a video game, have the freedom to make or draw anything they want. Thus, the normal range of human skin colors needn't have any bearing on the appearance of cartoon characters. Want your characters to be {{color|blue|blue}}, {{color|orange|orange}}, and {{color|silver|silver}}? Go right ahead! Want a dude with a {{color|purple|purple}} face to live next door to a [[Green-Skinned Space Babe|green-skinned, not-from-space babe]]? The freedom's all yours, pal! If the characters are [[Genre Blind]], their unusual skin tones will probably go unnoticed. If not, this may be [[Hand Wave
Giving your characters unrealistic skin tones sounds like a great way to avoid [[Race Tropes]] and [[Unfortunate Implications]], doesn't it? Well, sometimes. [[A Worldwide Punomenon|Unfortunately]], it doesn't always work like this. If a character is meant to be of a specific ethnicity, they will most likely have the "correct" skin tone for their ethnicity, regardless of anything else. It seems as if [[Humans Are White|only "white people" get Amazing Technicolor Skin]]
Compare
▲Compare Japan, which seems to do the same thing with [[You Gotta Have Blue Hair|hair]]. See also [[Ambiguously Brown]], for when the skin tones are within the realms of possibility, but not clearly "defined".
----
{{examples}}
== Anime and Manga ==
* Zentradi in ''[[Macross]]'' (and thus the first ''[[Robotech]]'' saga) mainly have natural human skin tones, but quite a few of them have been seen to have {{color|purple|purple}}, {{color|green|green}}, {{color|blue|blue}}, or {{color|gray|grey}} skin. In ''[[Macross Plus]]'' and ''[[Macross 7]]'', we only see them with natural and {{color|gray|grey}} skin color, and by ''[[Macross Frontier]]'', they all have natural skin colors.
* ''[[
* All the members from the Noah family in [[
** That's true of the anime version. However, in the original manga color art, they're also often drawn with skin in various shades of {{color|brown|brown}}.
* Not sure if this counts, but in a lot of series, people in flashbacks are shown to have completely black skin (possibly referencing kabuki theater). ''[[Revolutionary Girl Utena]]'', for instance, gives everyone this treatment in flashbacks.
* In ''[[Star Blazers]] / [[Space Battleship Yamato]],'' Gamilons are shown with human skin tones ''until'' the episode where humans first encounter one face to face. From that episode on, they're all shown to have sky {{color|blue|blue}} skin. Members of the second season's evil Comet Empire are all a rather icky shade of olive {{color|green|green}} (except Invidia, for some reason).
** In fact, so many anime extraterrestrials have {{color|blue|blue}} skin that it seems to be a kind of cultural shorthand for alienness.
* For inexplicable reasons, Meg's rival Non in ''Majokko Megu-chan'' has an unhealthy looking white complexion. No one seems to mind, though.
== Comic Books ==
* Pops up occasionally in the [[Marvel Universe]]. People with gamma-radiation based powers will usually be {{color|green|green}}-skinned, the Atlanteans and Kree are {{color|blue|blue}}-skinned, and, occasionally, mutants have technicolor skin.
** This got lampshaded in ''[[
** Let's not forget Karolina from ''[[
* ''[[Teen Titans (Comic Book)|Teen Titans]]'' has gold/{{color|orange|orange}} Starfire, {{color|red|red}} Kid Devil, and {{color|green|green}} Beast Boy and Miss Martian.
** Of course, [[Fantasy Kitchen Sink|both Starfire and Miss Martian are aliens, Beast]] [[Justified Trope|Boy is a mutant, and Kid Devil was turned into a demon]].
Line 40 ⟶ 39:
* Does the unnatural chalk-white Joker count?
** The {{color|green|leaf-green}} Poison Ivy surely does.
* Once famously lampshaded to discuss racial matters in [[
{{quote|
** And then, some years later, reversed (in a fairly light-hearted way) when a bunch of {{color|purple|purple}}- and {{color|orange|orange}}-skinned aliens visit Earth to complain that GL is neglecting the rest of his space sector to look after Earth; they use the same words with the colours swapped. Poor Hal just looks to the sky in frustration.
* [[Watchmen (
* [[Depending
== Film ==
* In [[The Film of the Book]] of ''[[Coraline (
** IMDb notes that he has a Chernobyl clean-up medal, possibly meaning he got radiated during it.
* All the characters from the Land of the Living in [[Tim Burton]]'s ''[[
== Literature ==
* In [[
* In [[Larry Niven]]'s Known Space universe, "flatlanders" of Earth are a technicolor population, but it's just fashionable skin dye.
* Steven Erikson's ''[[The Malazan Book of the Fallen]]'' has people of all colors that exist on earth, plus {{color|blue|blue}}. (Which is mentioned very off-handedly and thus is very puzzling at first.)
* In ''[[Monster (
* Serroi, of Jo Clayton's ''[[Duel of Sorcery]]'' and ''Dancer'' trilogies, has {{color|
* [[Isaac Asimov]]'s "Forward the Foundation" has a (human) judge with faint {{color|blue|blue}} skin — the color gets more pronounced when she's angry.
* The {{color|blue|blue}}-skinned carnival freak from Mitch Albom's "The Five People You Meet in Heaven" (mercury poisoning caused his unusual skin color).
* The Capitol and its inhabitants in ''[[The Hunger Games (
* The Uglies series hints at this in Diego. It's made clear that more 'Extreme' fashions aren't allowed in New Pretty Town but in Diego anything seems to go
* In the web-novel ''[[
* The human inhabitants of {{spoiler|the moon in}} ''[[The Darkangel Trilogy]]'' can have white (''not'' pale beige), black (''not'' dark brown), {{color|#cc5500|copper}}, {{color|gold|amber}}, {{color|blue|blue}}, {{color|green|green}}, {{color|teal|teal}}, or {{color|purple|purple}} (possibly {{color|#E0B0FF|two}} {{color|#8E4585|different}} shades of that last, no less) skin. {{spoiler|They were almost certainly [[Designer Babies|deliberately engineered]] for it.}}
* The inhabitants of Tormance in David Lindsay's ''A Voyage to Arcturus'' have many different possible skin tones, some of which [[Fictional Color|don't exist in our spectrum]].
== Live Action TV ==
* [[The Muppet Show|Muppets]], anyone? [[Sesame Street
** Savion's reading of "[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LT0qNwAx1Ss The Purple King]" hung a lampshade on this.
** Similarly, the "human" puppet characters in ''[[Avenue Q]]'' are {{color|green|green}}, {{color|blue|blue}}, and {{color|orange|orange}}.
* ''[[
** "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield", probably the most [[Anvilicious]] episode of the [[Star Trek:
* For its part, the [[Star Wars Expanded Universe]] has a number of [[Human Aliens|humanlike aliens]] and "near-humans" who are brightly colored. Most are explained as being normal humans in the far past who got separated onto different planets. Different living conditions and thousands of years' worth of microevolution resulted in people with {{color|blue|blue}} and {{color|pink|pink}} skin.
** For instance, Twi'leks come in all colors of the rainbow.
Line 85 ⟶ 82:
== Tabletop Games ==
* Being inspired by pulp sci-fi, the ''[[Dungeons
** Starting in second edition, a number of existing humanoid races became more colorful, such as giants and genies who could now be {{color|green|green}} or {{color|blue|blue}} or what have you. Prior to this, their skin and hair color had just never been mentioned.
* ''[[
* [[New Horizon]] has Wafans, [[Ridiculously
* [[
** The Orks have {{color|green|Green}} skin and the Tau have {{color|blue|blue}} skin
** Tyranids, to a degree, also have this, mainly because they're biologically engineered. Still, one wonders why a hive mind would consider flourecent pink with reflective metals to be good for camouflage.
== Video Games ==
* ''[[Saints
* [[
** [[Hero Smash]] has Yergan, a character with {{color|yellow|yellow skin}}
* ''[[
** Chops is a Black Canadian with {{color|red|red}} skin and {{color|green|green}} hair, though. And Milla Vodello is a Brazilian whose skin and hair are actually fairly realistic, if a little dark in the skin.
*** {{color|blue|Blue}} skin also tends to mean "bad news": Both of the [[Final Boss
* The minor character Yoa in ''[[Beyond Good
* Bosco of the Telltale ''[[The Adventures of Sam
** [[Ambiguously Gay|Hugh Bliss]], who is genetically Caucasian, can change his skin color to colors of the rainbow.
* ''[[Guitar Hero|Guitar Hero World Tour]]'s'' character creation mode allows the full spectrum of color to be used for hair, beard - and skin.
Line 110 ⟶ 107:
** ''[[The Sims]] 3'' abolished the monsters (for now, anyway), but allows you to have exotic skintones right off the bat. In addition to normal skintones, there's also red, blue, and green. Plus, you can adjust it to any shade you wish. You can also set their hair or eye color to anything you wish and it will pass to their children. A man with blonde hair and a woman with black can have a child that has black hair with purple tips.
* Many of the townspeople in the game ''[[Nox]]'' have fairly normal skin, but due to character customization, you can make the player character any color you want. Of course, no one notices if you happen to be a blue bald man walking around in your underwear...
* In ''[[
* ''[[
* ''[[Geneforge]]''. In the earlier games, only spellcasters had funny skin colors, but more recently, anyone could be blue, green, or hot pink.
* The [[Playing
** [[One-Winged Angel|Turning into dragons]] wasn't obvious enough?
*** Again, it doesn't really come up in idle chatter, and {{spoiler|the protagonists' parents get turned into a dragon}}, so what does ''that'' mean?
** The Beastmen of Morgal in ''[[Golden Sun: Dark Dawn|Dark Dawn]]'' also tend to get pretty outrageous fur colors, especially since they're supposed to be... well, animal-people. The band alone contains a bubblegum-pink [[Catgirl]], a teal green fox, and a dark blue wolf. The king of Morgal is also blue-furred and ''has brown hair''. Rather disconcerting. {{spoiler|After the firing of the Apollo Lens, everyone left in Morgal apparently has [[Hair of Gold|fur of gold]] now, bar Sveta who wasn't there during the firing.}}
** Also in ''Dark Dawn'', Blados of Tuaparang has blue-white skin. He was initially assumed by fans to be from Prox, but lacks the pointy ears and scales (and, you know, [[Captain Obvious|is from Tuaparang]]). Another character from his hometown looks entirely human aside from having [[Anime Hair]] and ''horns'', so again, "not entirely human" might be the cause.
* [[Inverted Trope|Inverted]] in indie-developed [[Xbox Live Arcade|XBLA]] game series ''[[The Dishwasher]]'' - everyone has completely white skin, regardless of actual race. [[Chef of Iron|The]] [[Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep"|Chef]] is, [[Word of God|according to the sole creator]], quite black, but appears just as ashen as everyone else.
* The ''[[
* In a world where every car has a different paint job, the [[Putt
* [[Pajama Sam]] has light {{color|blue|blue}} skin, as with most of the other "normal" characters in the series.
* In ''[[Jak and Daxter]]'', the Sages' skin colors correspond with the type of eco they're the Sage of. So Samos Hagai, sage of green eco, has {{color|green|green}} skin, the Blue Sage is {{color|blue|blue}}, and the Red Sage is, unsurprisingly, {{color|red|red}}.
* Possible in the character creator for ''[[Nioh]] 2'' with [[Good Bad Bugs|a little work]]. A clear case of [[Gameplay and Story Segregation]], just like playing a non-Japanese character, since the main character's historical figure father and [[Yokai]] mother don't change their appearance.
== [[Web Comics]] ==
Line 129 ⟶ 126:
** Justified, since they are all monsters living in a monster-only world.
* The background characters in ''[[Supernormal Step]]'' are far more colorful than the main cast, and that's really saying something.
* ''[[
** A less cartoonish image of a purp is [https://web.archive.org/web/20170312062622/http://www.planetmercenary.com/the-planet-mercenary-role-playing-game/ on the cover] of ''Planet Mercenary'' RPG book.
* ''[[
* ''[[The Law of Purple]]'': Caligulan natives sport a rainbow of random skin colors amongst their total population - it's a species trait. So far, this includes blue, green, red, white, pink, yellow, silver, purple, and probably more.
* ''[[
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20131023213824/http://www.notmadcomic.com/ I'm Not Mad] started off with an Amazing Technicolor Population and then abandoned that after its second year (called season in the comic) reboot.
* The gang of Blue Boys from ''[[
{{quote|
'''Slick:''' THAT'S RACIST }}
* One strip of NSFW fantasy comic ''[[Oglaf]]'' shows a Land of Indulgence where the population is this trope.
* In ''[[
* Justified in ''[[Dreamwalk Journal]]'' and its spinoffs, because the planet Cyeatea's inhabitants are anthropomorphic insects and spiders. Between them they display all the colors of terrestrial insects and spiders, and more besides.
== [[Web Original]] ==
Line 146 ⟶ 144:
== Western Animation ==
* ''[[The Simpsons (
** Interestingly enough, in the early seasons, the Asians were [[Shaped Like Itself|pale white]].
** It depends on what type of Asian you're talking about. Southwest Asians (Arabs and Indo-Aryans) tend to be rendered "white" (which is to say, "yellow") or "Mexican brown". South Asians such as Apu Nahasapeemapetilon or the Thai restaurant owner will be "reddish-brown" (like Native Americans). Chinese characters tend to be "white" ("yellow"), while Japanese characters are depicted either as icy pale (as if they were all wearing geisha or kabuki makeup) or "white" ("yellow"). Yeah, it's one fine mishmash.
Line 152 ⟶ 150:
** Krusty the Clown causes continuity errors with this trope. Depending on the episode, his unusually pale skin is either clown makeup or his natural color. However, that only seemed true in earlier seasons, and now it's implied to be due to Krusty's harsh, self-destructive lifestyle, with all his childhood flashbacks having him have normal skin.
*** The shorts on [[The Tracey Ullman Show]] featured background characters who were blue, grey, or orange.
* [[
** For instance, Roger was green, Chalky was yellow, Bebe was purple, Mr. Dink was purple. Since Skeeter was blue (more like a dark teal, really), the prevalence of the [[Black Best Friend]] trope caused many to assume that blue is the equivalent of black in that world.
{{quote|
'''Doug:''' That's Skeeter! }}
** This was explained by the creator in a bonus feature from [[The Movie]]'s VHS release. When first drawing the main cast (as a child!) he often lacked flesh tone, and therefore substituted other common colors for other characters' skins.
Line 160 ⟶ 158:
* The somewhat obscure cartoon ''[[Angela Anaconda]]'' featured people with oddly toned clip-art faces.
** Everyone had grey skin, and their hair and clothing would be in color.
* All the humanoid "sprite" characters in ''[[
** AndrAIa and Ray Tracer are borderline, since they're different shades of orange, a color which often results from cheap self-tanner in the real world.
** Enzo runs into [[Fantastic Racism|racial prejudice]] at the start of season three. For while, Mainframers will happily accept green merchants and scientists, though a green guardian is [[Does This Remind You of Anything?|apparently beyond the pale...]]
** Interestingly, this all suggests a kind of inherent caste system. Guardians are blue, the Matrices and probably other system-based sprites are green, and web-based sprites are orange.
* In ''[[Voltron]]'', the people from the evil planet (planet Doom in the English translation) are all different cool tones, including almost pure white, sky blue, deep cobalt blues, and even a green or brown
** Serendipitously, this was true not only for ''Golion'' (Lion Voltron), but ''Dairugger XV'' (Vehicle Voltron) as well.
*** Blue skin seems to be Japanese cultural shorthand for "alien". In America, aliens are little green men; in Japan, they're tall blue dudes.
* ''[[The Cramp Twins]]''. Lucian has "normal" flesh-toned skin, but his brother Wayne is ''purple''-skinned. Must be fraternal twins... However, [[Mind Screw|both their parents have green skin]].
* ''Cupido'' is set in a town with white (as in snow-colored), red, blue, and yellow people, who are divided into ghettos by an evil council. The [[Character Title|titular character]] and his two friends are the only characters with realistic skin colors.
* ''[[The Thief and
** Not to mention Zig-Zag's minions (who are purple, pink, green, and gray), the purple-skinned One-Eyes, and the multi-colored populace of the Golden City. The desert-dwelling brigands, the witch, and King Nog all have relatively normal skin tones.
* From ''[[
** And Ron turns blue when he briefly [[Not Himself|goes evil]], leading to the popular [[Epileptic Tree|Tree]] that he's actually Drakken's son.
* The Gross Sisters from ''[[The Proud Family]]'' are rather randomly blue, considering all the other characters are correctly colored and the series is '''all''' about [[Five
** Several episodes imply that the "blue skin" is simply the result of the girls being extremely ashy. Yet, for some reason, it doesn't wash off in water.
*** Penny becomes blue when she "goes bad" in one episode. Apparently, if you ask the Disney channel, [[Fantastic Racism|red or black aren't the "evil" colours -- blue is.]] Perhaps like the [[Yellow Submarine
**** Many dark-skinned black people who have ashy skin can sometimes appear as being a light periwinkle, almost faded greyish-black in the most extreme cases. Considering that [[The Proud Family]] is a cartoon with rather colorful art direction, it could be inferred that this was one of the most blatant exaggerations for artistic license.
* ''[[
* The gargoyles in ''[[
** The Children of Oberon (at least, the humanoid ones) run the color gamut, too. Puck is white (as in Caucasian), Oberon is light blue, and Titania is kind of green.
* An episode of ''[[Fat Albert and
* Then, there's ''[[Chowder]]''. I think that goes without saying...
** Chowder and Panini count as [[Amazing Technicolor Wildlife]] though.
* Nobody seems to make much of it within the canon materials, but [[
** Apparently, Murdoc has some serious problems with personal hygiene, but it's highly improbable that just this would make his skin so green.
* In ''[[Making Fiends]]'', everyone is a single unnatural color, not just the skin, but the [[You Gotta Have Blue Hair|hair,]] eyes, clothes, etc. are all one flat color. Most minor characters in the webtoons were grey or dull in shade, although the TV series makes them all [[Adaptation Dye Job|more vivid]]. Lampshaded pretty much every episode as [[Villain Protagonist|Vendetta]] always calls [[Too Dumb to Live|Charlotte]] [[Fantastic Racism|"Stupid blue girl!"]].
* Some of the background characters in ''[[The Problem Solverz]]'' have colorful skin. The town's several mayors have had yellow and red skin, and in one episode, the gang was freaked out by a teacher who was purple.
* In ''[[
* ''[[Pirates of Dark Water]]'' antagonist Bloth has skin that [[Depending on the Artist|varies]] between pure white, and very pale green, but either way he counts.
== Real Life ==
Line 195 ⟶ 193:
*** Neither one is a "nice shade" of blue. The usual comparison is to a bruise.
** On a related note, prolonged contact with copper will turn your skin green. It's not a myth or something made up for that episode where the main characters get scammed on their class rings, it really happens and it's the primary reason why you won't see many copper ring bands, earring hooks, or anything else that stays tight to the skin.
** Stan Jones, who unsuccessfully ran for Senate as a Libertarian, consumed home-made colloidal silver out of fear of [[
* Eating nothing but carrots for an extended period of time will turn your skin orange, most obviously your palms and the bottoms of your feet. The effect will wear off once you change your diet.
* The [[Blue Man Group]]. Granted, it's really greasepaint, but still.
Line 209 ⟶ 207:
** Chimerism is more common in certain animals. Tortoiseshell cats have two lines of skin cells covering different parts of the body.
* Some fake tan products don't quite get the color right and dye your skin orange instead.
* A certain type of birthmark known as the [
* As noted in the [[Word of God]] for the ''[[Doug]]'' example, kids without "proper" flesh-toned crayons/pencils/markers/et cetera will frequently default to more colorful options. Oranges seem to be common.
* Strawberry marks aren't all that uncommon in babies, but some are born with unusually large patches of bright red areas due to those. Rare cases have them covering half the face or more - this can be corrected with cosmetic surgery, usually. Can also occur with children afflicted with large areas of hemangiomas - some of the skin will have the large, bright red masses, but other areas are just flat and red. This is also often dealt with surgically, especially if the hemangiomas get too large.
Line 215 ⟶ 213:
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Graphical Tropes]]
[[Category:Cartoon Characters]]
[[Category:Personal Appearance Tropes]]
[[Category:Amazing Technicolor Index]]
[[Category:Improbable Appearance Tropes]]
[[Category:
[[Category:
|