Counterpart Comparison/Playing With
- Basic Trope: A character lives in the shadow of a similar one that was created earlier, and is often compared to or confused with him.
- Straight: Spectacular Girl is similar to Amazing Girl and fans often dislike her for that reason.
- Exaggerated: Spectacular Girl has the same hairstyle as Amazing Girl, and fans threaten to murder her.
- Justified: Spectacular Girl is an Expy or Captain Ersatz of Amazing Girl, and creators are well aware of it.
- Inverted:
- Fans prefer Spectacular Girl over Amazing Girl.
- In-Universe, Spectacular Girl is more popular and people confuse Amazing Girl with her.
- Despite Spectacular Girl being a clear homage to Amazing Girl, fans fail to recognize Spectacular Girl as such, thinking she's a rather original character (possibly because Amazing Girl is a rather outdated heroine.)
- Subverted: Despite obvious similarities, fans quickly recognize Spectacular Girl as her own, different character and don't compare her to Amazing Girl.
- Double Subverted: Aside from a large group of Fan Dumb who don't miss a chance to call her an Amazing Girl rip-off.
- Parodied: Spectacular Girl is Amazing Girl's identical twin and acts quite similar to her. She's immensely insulted when people confuse the two.
- Deconstructed:
- All of Spectacular Girl's achievements goes to Amazing Girl's account, and even those who are aware that they're different people expect her to live up to Amazing Girl's standards.
- People confuse them so much that when Amazing Girl gets framed for murder, police try to arrest Spectacular Girl.
- Reconstructed: Despite being aware of her reputation as Amazing Girl's shadow, Spectacular Girl doesn't seem to mind it, because she likes doing good-deeds to help people, not for the sake of fame and glory. For her, the gratitude and well-being of those she has saved is more important than whatever other people might think about her.
- Zig Zagged: ???
- Averted: Amazing Girl and Spectacular Girl are nothing alike, and fans don't compare them.
- Enforced: ???
- Lampshaded: “Oh, I'm sorry, I thought you're Amazing Girl.”
- Invoked: Spectacular Girl is a big Ascended Fangirl of Amazing Girl that took her homage to her heroine a bit too far.
- Exploited: Spectacular Girl is used as a decoy for Amazing Girl.
- Defied: Writers realize that Spectacular Girl is too similar to Amazing Girl and explore several of her aspects that make her different, before fans start comparing them.
- Discussed: “Spectacular Girl will always live in Amazing Girl's shadow, they're too similar”.
- Conversed: “Oh for Heaven's sake! If I will ever meet one more stupid comics nerd talking how Spectacular Girl is a poor man's Amazing Girl, I promise, I'm gonna shove his comics collection up his throat!”
- Plotted A Good Waste: Writers intentionally made Spectacular Girl obviously similar to Amazing Girl in order to explore the drama of living in somebody's shadow and make her have to work hard to prove she's not Amazing Girl's copycat.
- Played For Laughs: Spectacular Girl meets Cool Guy, who thinks that she is Amazing Girl at first. Spectacular Girl then goes into an hour-long speech about Amazing Girl, while Cool Guy wishes that he never said anything in the first place.
- Played For Drama: Being compared to Amazing Girl at every step drives Spectacular Girl insane – she does a Face Heel Turn, becomes obsessed with Amazing Girl, dresses in her costume and tries to kill her. During a fight, Amazing Girl manages to remind her why she become a superhero in the first place. Spectacular Girl bursts into tears, realizing what she did. She points a gun at her own head, says “I wanted to help people. But all they need is... you.”, and pulls the trigger.
Make sure you go back to Counterpart Comparison, not the newer page "Comparison Counterpart".