Averted Trope/Headscratchers
Does an Averted Trope have to be done on purpose? I always assumed that was the case, but I've seen entries such as:
- Art Evolution: Averted, the animation quality in Season Two is worse than in Season One.
That sort of thing just looks more like a Take That than anything.
- Really? I thought it was Inverted.
Examples like that should be removed on sight. As the main Averted Trope page says, the only aversions we need listed are:
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Tropes that are so common the list of aversions is actually shorter, or the aversion is in a work that anyone familiar with is likely to look for. |
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If the example is actually an aversion (and not someone using the term wrong) and doesn't fit those criteria just remove it.
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Here's what really bugs me: If you do something that's a trope, it's a trope, and your TV show (etc.) belongs in the examples. If you do the trope backwards instead, you've inverted it, and your TV show belongs in the examples. If you start to do the trope but then go another direction, you've subverted it, and your TV show belongs in the examples. If you avoid the trope altogether, you've averted it, and your TV show belongs in the examples. Combine with the fact that almost every situation can be boiled down to a basic trope, and Averted Trope means it is literally impossible to stay off a trope page except by never writing anything.
- That's because, as said above, averted tropes should only be used for tropes so common that the list of aversions is shorter than the list of examples.
- I always thought Averted Trope could only be used if the actual trope would be possible in-story, but there's no setup. (lest it be a Subversion) Like, for The Butler Did It, I always thought that if there was a butler, but he was never suspected or thought of, and didn't do it, that would be an aversion. But if there was no Butler at all, creating a situation in which the Trope could not possibly come into play, then it wouldn't even be an Aversion. It'd be nothing.
- That's still an aversion.
If you avoid a trope altogether, then it shouldn't go on the list. If it doesn't show the trope at all, why say it had the trope in there? Aversion of a trope is basically the same thing as not having the trope at all, right? So it shouldn't go on the list.
- Mentioning that the trope is not there (thus, averted) is a good idea if the trope is normally omnipresent, either in the genre or in storytelling in general. Saying "there really isn't a Big Bad in this story, because it's a struggle against the circumstances rather than any individual enemy" is useful if the genre would lead you to expect a Big Bad, and that knowing that there isn't one would assist with understanding the story.