Genre Shift: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

 

The weird cousin of [[Executive Meddling]], except it can be planned in advance by the writers.

Controversial or extremely different ideas are very hard to get past sponsors and audiences suspicious of anything new and unfamiliar. An easy if sneaky way around this is merely to present the beginning of the story as something familiar. However, once the main plot kicks in, your audience is hopefully loyal enough not to notice the quick shift in tone and pacing. If you did it well, in hindsight they might notice little hints you dropped about what was to come. As a side effect, the story will probably also undergo [[Mood Whiplash]].

 

 

 

 

Even worse is if a genre shift is used as [[Deus Ex Machina|the solution to a plot point]], which just feels tacky.

If this happens one time only in a series before reverting back to the main genre, it's an [[Out-of-Genre Experience]]. If it happens before the work is released to the public, it's a case of [[Mid-Development Genre Shift]].

 

 

{{examples}}

== Anime and Manga ==

* ''[[Yu Yu Hakusho]]'' started out as a supernatural story, then a supernatural crime drama, then a supernatural martial arts story, and ended up a supernatural psychological thriller.

* A strange example occurs in the last ''[[Steel Angel Kurumi]]'' [[OAV]], a far-future prequel done in the format of a fairly serious drama instead of the show's usual bubblegum cuteness.

* Naturally, ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]'' also surprised many fans ([[What Do You Mean It's Not for Kids?|and parents]]) at its increasingly dark tone as the show went on. To be specific, it starts as a [[Monster of the Week]] [[Real Robot Genre|giant robot series]] and ends up as an extended philosophical and psychological treatise. It's so much of a genre shift that even the plot itself essentially fades away at the end, to the point where after the last two episodes, you're asking yourself "What the hell did I just watch?" It doesn't help that after so many years, [[Gainax Ending|people still can't tell you what was up with the last two episodes.]]

* ''[[Princess Tutu]]'', in its first season, was about a magical ballerina princess/therapist restoring emotions to her love interest. The second season revealed it just wasn't like a fairytale, and it turned into a dark, epic struggle against the sadistic author trying to wreck his character's lives. In other words, a slightly different type of fairytale.

* Similarly, ''[[Love Hina]]'' became prone to Road Trip arcs as the series lingered and most of the romantic misunderstandings had been resolved. These were apparently brief but enjoyed changes of pace for the author, as the later series ''Negima'''s framework allows them to be used more extensively.

** And then the 2 penultimate episodes were straightforward drama/suspense/action eps. So the shift... metalooped? Is that a word?

* ''[[Soukou no Strain]]'' had a first episode much like a [[Shojo]] series, and though its marketing in the [[Bishoujo Series]]-focused ''Megami Magazine'' could predict that that would change, no one predicted its quick shift to angst and its new motto in [[Anyone Can Die]].

* ''[[Ouran High School Host Club]]'' went through most of the [[Anime]] as an over-the-top [[The Parody|parody]] of [[Shojo]] drama, but in the last few episodes became more of a shojo drama with jokes added.

* One may be excused for thinking that ''[[Guyver]]'' is a typical school-based shonen anime after the first few issues/episodes. But this changes pretty rapidly when {{spoiler|the school is blown up by either Zoanoids or Guyver 2, depending on what medium you prefer}} and Sho is almost never seen in school again.

* In the first few episodes (both in the Anime and Manga) of ''[[Bleach]]'', a reluctant teen fights ghosts (Hollows) [[Monster of the Week|in a series of unconnected locations.]] However, once Ichigo travels to the Shinigami world, the series completely abandons ghostbusting in favor of high-power duels between [[Sorting Algorithm of Evil|progressively more powerful rivals.]] Additionally, the series replaces its largely simplistic good spirit/bad spirit dichotomy with increasingly complicated plots, intrigue, and a much larger cast.

** The first movie, ''Memories of Nobody'' ended up being somewhat of a [[Wham! Episode|Wham Movie]] to those used to the dragging plot lines of the series, with a much different tone still.

* The OVA ''[[Moldiver]]'' spends three episodes as a gender-bending superhero send-up before abruptly switching into a serious drama in the final two episodes.

* ''[[Berserk]]'', though it does show a number of demons at the beginning of the anime and a fight with demonic [[Blood Knight]] Nosferatu Zodd early on in the anime, goes from grim and gritty medieval fantasy into straight up horror in the final episodes when {{spoiler|Griffith makes his [[Deal with the Devil]] and becomes [[Dark Messiah]] Femto, and the demons start coming ''en masse'' to rip apart the members of the Band of the Hawks who Griffith has marked out for sacrifice}}. Since both Guts and Casca are marked with the Godhand's [[Magnetic Plot Device|Brand of Sacrifice]] as a result of Griffith's betrayal, both of them have to deal with the monsters from that point forward, and they soon become Guts' primary enemies.

* The ''[[Suzumiya Haruhi]]'' series (both the original light novels and the anime) begins as a comedy series that, while featuring a very eccentric protagonist in [[Genki Girl]] Haruhi, was still a fairly realistic [[Slice of Life]] comedy. Then the aliens, time travelers, and psychics start turning up, and we get the big reveal that {{spoiler|Haruhi is God (or at least the next best thing), and her subconscious desires can warp reality, or even destroy the universe if she becomes bored enough.}} It actually remains a [[Slice of Life]] comedy for the most part, but it's slices of much weirder lives than we originally thought.

* ''[[Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle]]''. It starts out as standard fairly light shonen fare, then takes an extremely abrupt left turn in Tokyo onto [[Mind Screw]] Way towards Drama Town.

* Oh God, ''[[Narutaru]]''. It initially shows signs of being a lighthearted, female version of [[A Boy and His X]]... only to suddenly change into a dark, depressing series with lots of horrible things.

* ''[[D.Gray-man]]'' has evolved somewhat from being a [[Horror]] Gothic [[Shonen]] series to more of a... normal [[Shonen]] series. Oddly enough, if the [[D.Gray-man/Nightmare Fuel|Nightmare Fuel page]] is to be believed, the switch from horror-style [[Monster of the Week]] plots to a more complicated storyline has actually made it a lot ''more'' scary.

* ''[[School Days]]''. It starts out as a typical romantic comedy, then slowly takes a turn for the worse, going into pretty much horror at the end.

* ''[[Chobits]]'' is a comedy series with a touch of sci-fi for the first two-thirds or so. Then it becomes serious sci-fi with a touch of comedy for the remainder of the series.

** As mentioned above [[CLAMP]] enjoys doing this with their series.

* ''[[Onani Master Kurosawa]]'' is perhaps another poster child of this. It starts off as ''[[Death Note]]'' [[X Meets Y|with]] [[A Date with Rosie Palms|fapping]] (yes, ''seriously'') but then after a certain [[Wham! Episode]] the main character decides he'd rather be [[The Catcher in The Rye|Holden Caulfield]] than Light Yagami.

** As the series nears it's end ([[Dangerously Genre Savvy|if the villain is to be believed]]), this would indeed appear to have been the point, as it's now come full circle back to the original plotline, except much changed from all the fighting and genre savviness that arose from the first shift.

* The ''[[Trigun]]'' anime started as a humorous, lighthearted western with sci-fi elements, with a bit of mystery sprinkled throughout (courtesy of Vash, the show's protagonist). That all changed with the episode "Diablo." Suddenly, Trigun became [[Darker and Edgier]], the comedic moments were few and far between, and the show was much more plot oriented. In this case, the shift worked very well, since the second half fleshed out details that were only teased in the first half.

** That's happened because the anime basically took all the lighthearted and comedic parts of the manga, and used them in the first part. The manga version was a dramedy from the beginning - it became increasingly darker towards the end, but not to the point of complete mood shift.

* The ''[[Higurashi no Naku Koro ni]]'' [[When They Cry]] series starts off as a bloody horror show, much like a slasher flick, each arc unconnected from the others. The Second season, Higurashi Kai, turns it into a supernatural suspense with traces of an even an ''action'' series by the end, with the gorn of the first season all but gone, and focused now on conspiracies. Then there was Higurashi Rei, which goes from comedy to drama and then back to comedy.

* ''[[Hellsing]]'' starts off as an action-horror story about a [[Government Agency of Fiction|vampire hunting organization working for the British government]] who [[Psycho for Hire|employ a vampire of their own]], with a bit of mystery thrown in as they try to uncover a plot to artificially manufacture vampires. Once [[Ghostapo|Millenium]] is properly introduced, it evolves into a war epic depicting a huge three-way battle over London, with much [[Contemplate Our Navels|introspection]] and many characters having to [[Character Development|rise to an enormous challenge]].

* ''[[Phantom Thief Pokémon 7]]'' starts out as a quirky manga about a boy living a double life as a [[Phantom Thief]]. It quickly turns into a dark, violent, adventure to save his sister from the unusually menacing Team Galactic. In the end it seems to turn into the original story, but in trio form. However it ended before anything came out of that.

* ''[[Tenchi Universe]]'' is a lighthearted romantic action comedy. The second ''Tenchi Universe'' movie, ''Tenchi Forever'', is a serious romantic drama with little action or comedy.

* ''[[Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann]]'' started out as a [[Desert Punk]] mecha show with an extremely [[Hot-Blooded]] protagonist. Then roughly halfway through, it turned into a [[Space Opera]], with the most epic battles ever created.

** That was only the FIRST shift. [[Mind Screw|It does several very casually]] when the elements are progressively revealed. {{spoiler|And then it decides to [[Reconstruct]] itself with a [[Decon Recon Switch]] of a [[Gainax Ending]].}}

* [[Shakugan no Shana]] shifts back and forth between action/supernetural and typical high school love story, though it stop shifting genre and generally gets worse in the recent light novel version.

* ''[[Kinnikuman]]'' started off as a superhero parody, but eventually became more focusing on wrestling.

* The second half of the 2nd OVA for [[Seto no Hanayome]] switches from comedy/action into straight horror, borrowing elements from [[The Ring]], then suddenly switches back to comedy at the end.

* This happens in [[Monster]], which switches very early on from an almost noir-like hospital drama to a horror story involving Neo-Nazis, espionage, and serial killers shortly after adult Johan shows up.

* ''[[Chirin no Suzu]]'' starts off as a cute kid's movie about a baby lamb, but halfway through the film it turns into a dark tale of revenge.

 

== Comic Books ==

** A character known as Phantom Falcon stands out because he went through both - he began as a non-costumed air ace, turned into a superhero after being presumed dead and then turned into a civilian detective.

** The Black Hood gets a odd one in the very last issue of his Golden Age run when a villain unmasks him and he dropped the costume to become a civilian detective. The 'civilian detective' direction continued for a few back-up stories in Pep Comics.

 

 

* ''[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/404359/1/Gaijin Gaijin]'' started as a darkly comic [[Self-Insert Fic]] in which the SI character was essentially Murphy's Law incarnate (''despite'' being more powerful than he had any right to be). Then he started disguising himself as [[Spider-Man (Comic Book)|Spider-Man]]. Then more analogues of Marvel characters started appearing, the most recent as of this writing being the Fantastic Four and "Tako-sama" (Doctor Octopus)...

* ''[[Undocumented Features]]'' started off as a joke, a corny self-insert fic in which college students launch part of their dormitory into space to fight anime villains. It quickly went [[Grimdark]] with the "Exile" plot, stabilized into an odd mash-up of science-fiction adventure, has intermittently gone [[Song Fic]], and has dipped into romantic fantasy with the "Symphony of the Sword" plot.

 

 

== Film ==

* ''[[Wild Things]]'' starts out as a formulaic [[Wrongly Accused]] plot, complete with Bill Murray as a sleazy lawyer trying [[The Perry Mason Method]]... until the one hour mark. That's when it's revealed that the defendant was working with his accusers for a damages settlement, but they all have their own plans, which quickly create a [[Jigsaw Puzzle Plot]].

* ''[[Legally Blonde]]'' should end about 2/3 through, as technically Elle has accomplished her revised goal (instead of chasing Warner, she has become a serious person). Instead, she gets applied to a legal case. It's still a fun movie, and the musical revises this by making Emmitt a legitimate romantic lead that you want Elle to be with at the end.

* The original ''[[Alien]]'' was a haunted house movie in space. ''Aliens'' is straight out [[Actionized Sequel|sci-fi action]]... and it works perfectly.

** And then ''Alien³'' shows a return to the haunted house style of the first film. And then another shift with ''Alien: Resurrection'', which is actionized like ''Aliens''.

* The Oscar-winning film ''La Vita è bella'' (In English, ''[[Life Is Beautiful]]'') begins as a very charming, but rather generic romantic comedy, except that it happens to be set in Mussolini's Italy, and the characters are Jewish. Now, flash forward three years. The male and female leads are now married, have a son, and the Holocaust is about to start. Amazingly, it ''remains a comedy'', only with an entirely different premise: the father starts telling his three-year-old son wild stories to protect him from the truth of what is happening.

* One of the classic examples is, of course, ''[[From Dusk till Dawn]]'', which begins as a dark crime drama about crooks on the lam kidnapping a dysfunctional family, but abruptly turns into a slapstick action movie with vampires over the course of a striptease.

* The movie ''Miracle Mile'' starts out as an indie romantic comedy. It ''sure'' doesn't end that way.

* The 2007 film ''[[Sunshine (film)|Sunshine]]'' starts out as a hard sci-fi film about a mission to reignite the dying sun. Then, at almost exactly the three-quarters mark, it suddenly becomes a horror film in space.

* ''[[Hot Fuzz]]'' spends the first half humorously [[Deconstruction|deconstructing]] Nineties action film clichés, and spends the second half [[Reconstruction|playing every single one of those clichés straight]].

* ''[[The Lost Boys]]'' begins as a bleak, played-straight vampire horror film and then takes on a humorous tone in the third act, with the teenage heroes spouting such lines as "Whoa, death by stereo!"

* ''Click'' started as a [[Fantastic Comedy]], then very suddenly and very early turned into drama. [[Trailers Always Lie|Guess what part the ads were sampled from]].

* ''[[Adaptation]]'', starring [[Nicholas Cage]], starts as an amusing dramedy about a scriptwriter suffering from a writer's block, but slowly turns darker and darker, with elements of a thriller, until in the climax {{spoiler|the protagonist's comical twin dies}}. It still tries to [[Bittersweet Ending|end things]] [[Earn Your Happy Ending|on a high note]], though.

** The really key shift is when {{spoiler|Charlie asks Donald for help on his screenplay}}; due to the highly self-referential nature of the movie, it's implied that {{spoiler|everything after that, all the drugs/guns/sex, is [[Literary Agent Hypothesis|being written]] by or on the advice of Donald}}. The thing to remember is that {{spoiler|Donald's the only character in the movie who isn't [[Real Life|a real person]]}}.

* In-story example: in ''[[The Addams Family|Addams Family Values]]'', Wednesday, in [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]], transforms a cheesy Pocahontas musical into an [[Nightmare Fuel]] action play.

* ''[[Million Dollar Baby]]'' begins as a scrappy underdog sports movie and turns into a thoughtful but depressing drama about {{spoiler|spinal cord injury and euthanasia}}.

* ''The Forgotten'' begins as a typical drama about a woman who is told by every person in her life (including her ''husband'') that her recently-dead son never existed and gradually becomes {{spoiler|a sci-fi about abductions and alien experiments with the human mind}}.

* This is one of [[Alfred Hitchcock]]'s favorite tropes, and one that's unfortunately [[It Was His Sled|a bit spoiled]] by how famous his movies have become:

* ''[[Chungking Express]]'' starts as an urban thriller, and one third of the way through, becomes a romantic comedy.

* ''[[Kill Bill]] Volume 1'' is a kung fu action thriller that's given an excuse plot and little consideration as to character or story development. ''[[Kill Bill]] Volume 2'' is a character-driven, plot-heavy ode to the Western. Both Volumes were originally intended as one four-hour movie.

* The tone of the movie ''[[The Dirty Dozen]]'' changes dramatically once the team actually starts their mission. The first act could almost be considered a comedy. The second... [[Kill'Em All|not so much]].

* ''[[The Prestige]]'' begins as a romantic tale of a professional rivalry between magicians, and ends very much as [[Science Fiction]].

 

== Literature ==

** Even then, after the Fellowship splits, each character's story is, in many ways, a different genre, ranging from modern stories concerning war and morality to epic tales in a more medieval vein. These changes were more intentional than the shift out of a children's story, as Tolkien toyed a lot with the difference between medieval and modern works.

* ''The Hedge Knight'', the prequel for ''[[A Song of Ice and Fire]]'', reads first as an romantic tale about an up-and-coming knight, but anyone familiar with the author knows it'll turn into tragedy.

* [[Michael Chabon]]'s ''[[Summerland]]'' starts out as a [[Coming of Age Story]] with some [[Magic Realism]], about a boy lives in a quirky island town and plays for his local baseball team. Then the [[Our Fairies Are Different|baseball-playing fairies]] show up and the [[Save the World]] plot begins, and the book becomes full-on [[High Fantasy]].

* In Jeff Lindsay's ''[[Dexter]]'' series, about a serial killer who only kills bad guys (on which the TV show of the same name was based), the first two books (''Darkly Dreaming Dexter'' and ''Dearly Devoted Dexter'') are mainstream crime thrillers aside from the unusual protagonist, but the third (''Dexter in the Dark'') takes a sharp left turn into dark fantasy territory, pitting Dexter against supernatural forces, ancient conspiracies, and [[Cosmic Horror]].

** In addition, it's not until an offhand remark by a character about a third of the way into the book about ports in the back of peoples head that you realize it's a sci-fi story set in the future.

* The ''[[Discworld]]'' series started off as fairly straightforward parodies of [[Heroic Fantasy]]. Later novels have been much more heavily focused on social satire, with heavy emphasis on philosophy and topics such as morality, class warfare, religion, theoretical physics, and modern city life. It works because they're still bloody hilarious.

* The ''[[Harry Potter]]'' books started off as a slightly tongue-in-cheek [[Urban Fantasy]] and gradually became an epic [[High Fantasy]] in which [[Anyone Can Die]]. [[J. K. Rowling]] planned from the start that the series would become [[Darker and Edgier]] as Harry (and his readers) grew up.

* P.C. Hodgell's ''[[Chronicles of the Kencyrath]]'' series starts out in [[Low Fantasy]] territory in the first book, ''God Stalk''; while there's foreshadowing there, the wider [[High Fantasy]] plot doesn't really emerge until the second book, ''Dark of the Moon''. The shift alienated some readers, who wanted more of the same style of book as the first.

* [[Orson Scott Card]]'s ''Treasure Box'' turns out to be {{spoiler|one of his "tales of dread,"}} but you don't realize it's in that genre until well into the story, about the same time the main character does.

* ''[[Ranger's Apprentice]]'' begins in classic fantasy style - a young orphaned hero has to fight against an evil sorcerer controlling an army of monsters. However, in later books there's not a shred of the fantastic to be seen; indeed, one story deals with an old man using primitive science to fake magic.

* [[Nikolai Gogol]]'s classic short story "The Overcoat" is set in nineteenth-century Russia and appears to have no elements of the supernatural at all. Then, in the last few pages, {{spoiler|the main character dies and comes back as a zombie.}}

* ''[[The Boy Who Couldn't Sleep and Never Had To]]'' turns from a coming-of-age tale to a frenzied escape from [[The Man]] (literally) about two-thirds through.

* [[The Bartimaeus Trilogy]] undergoes one, together with some major [[Character Development]] somewhere during the second book, and, most noticeably, between the second and third. It starts out as your typical fantasy story about a [[Kid with the Leash|preteen boy and his quirky sidekick demon]] defeating the bad guy and saving a whole lot of [[Adults Are Useless|useless adults]] in the process. In the later books the saved government is exposed to be oppressive and totalitarian, the glorified idols of the protagonist's youth are viciously unmasked. By the end of the series the books describe a dying empire, clinging desperately to it's former glory. The most interesting part is probably that {{spoiler|the kid from the first book turns into one of the oppressors and the reader ends up rooting for [[La Résistance]], that is originally introduced very briefly as nothing more than a bunch of deranged terrorists.}}

* A story ''Distant Rainbow'' by Brothers Strugatski starts as a funny story about peculiar scientific experiments and shifts into a story about an apocalypse halfway through, as their experiement has [[Gone Horribly Wrong]].

* [[The Diary of a Young Girl|Anne Frank's diary]] does not begin with her family hiding in the attic. It begins with a girl receiving a blank diary for her thirteenth birthday, having a party, attending school, describing her friends...

* [[Vladimir Vasilyev]]'s novel ''The Black Relay Race'', while not a direct sequel to his ''Death or Glory'' novel, takes place in the same 'verse. However, unlike ''DoG'', which involves a human colony discovering that there's more to humans than meets the eye, while alien races are hunting them, ''The Black Relay Race'' is a horror novel, taking place on a space yacht transporting strange cargo with the crew disappearing one-by-one. Then follow the novels ''The Legacy of Giants'' and ''No One but Us'', with an additional genre shift, although much more like the first novel than the second. These are pure war novels, inspired by [[David Brin]]'s ''[[Uplift|Startide Rising]]''.

* [[Dale Brown]] books: ''The Tin Man'' was the first one to be almost entirely focused on the dirtside perspective, unlike previous titles that were almost solely the flyboys' game. More infantry-centric content started creeping in after that.

 

== Live Action TV ==

*** When all's said and done, the show went from being being more subtle SF/F to full-blown science fiction in Season 3 when {{spoiler|Desmond started time-travelling}}, and cemented that change in Season 4 with an episode written with the specific purpose of smacking the viewers around the head with the message "LOST IS SCIENCE FICTION."

** And then season six ditches the science fiction in favor of becoming a fantasy show.

* ''[[Passions]]'' started out as a typical soap opera and quickly mutated into a supernatural weird-fest. Ditto for ''[[Dark Shadows (TV series)|Dark Shadows]]'' and ''[[General Hospital]]'''s [[Spin-Off]] ''Port Charles''.

* The early episodes of ''[[Lonelygirl15]]'' were in the style of a realistic video blog. Over time, it turned into a sort of soap opera/drama/thriller hybrid with evil cults, conspiracies, guns and laser beams. For an example of just how different the show has become, compare classic episode "Proving Science Wrong!"[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQEBobE9XZs\] to one of the early season 2 episodes, "Home Invasion."[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnVvMzQpGUo\]

* For much of its long life, ''[[The Bill]]'' was a [[Police Procedural]], but when a new executive producer took over in 2002 it rapidly shifted into a [[Crime-Time Soap]], alienating many long-term fans.

* ''[[Baywatch Nights]].'' Goes from action to sci-fi in season two.

* As lampshaded by the announcer, following the move from TechTV to G4, the video game review show ''[[X-Play]]'' became less about reviewing games and more about employing successive [[Gag Series|"lame vaudeville gags]]." At one point, the show was able to provide thorough reviews of at least five games in one single airing, but thanks to the space the gags took up, they were barely able to get through three. They have become less frequent recently, and ''[[X-Play]]'' now only has one or two sketches a week.

** Really it can be argued that the ''opposite'' then happened. It used to be a sketch comedy/video game review show, but now it's ''just'' about the reviews (and even then, there's only about two an episode) and video game news (that are significantly less comical) as it's [[Network Decay|the only thing on G4 still about video games]], and ''[[X-Play]]'' has simply become a 22-minute distillation what G4 was 24 hours a day not even a few years before.

* Likewise, the ''[[Supernatural]]'' episodes "The Benders" and "Family Remains."

* ''[[Doctor Who]]'', the parent show of ''[[Torchwood]]'', can and frequently does change genres from one story to the next. A show whose premise is that the main character travels throughout time and space lends itself to this.

** Series 6 turned into a [[Sci Fi]] [[Soap Opera]] at times.

* ''[[Jonas]]'''s first season was your average sitcom, featuring the Jonas Brothers in the title role of course. Its second season, ''Jonas L.A.'', has a stronger plot and is a borderline soap-opera, complete with [["Previously On..."]] and [["On the Next..."]] segments.

** ''Community'' is renowned for managing all sorts of single-episode genre shifts perfectly. It's been an action movie ("Modern Warfare"), a Rankin-Bass style Christmas Special ("Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas"), a spaghetti Western ("For a Few Paintballs More"), a single-camera documentary show ("Intermediate Documentary Filmmaking"), and even a zombie movie ("Epidemiology"). The reason it can pull all of this off is because while each episode is great example of the genre it's shifted to, it's also a great episode of ''Community'' at the same time.

 

== Music ==

** Cerys Matthews' first solo album after leaving Catatonia was a country album, ''Cockahoop!''.

** There's also the aptly titled "Country Song" by [[Seether]] (though still much closer to rock overall).

* Apoptygma Berzerk was an EBM band that many considered on par with VNV Nation and Covenant, and in fact was one of the two bands (along with VNV) to initially be considered in the sub-genre of "Futurepop." Now they make indy-sounding electro-rock, similar to the Killers or Shiny Toy Guns.

* [[They Might Be Giants]]. Shifted from [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAbZzdalZh4 catchy lyrical pop] to [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3Kgj6EiZtw kid-friendly tunes] and finally to the punky [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CccPPDe2JU "I'm Impressed"] in ''The Else''.

* The Cult started out as a heavily-produced, effect-laden musical experience that inspired modern Goth rock for their first two albums. On their third album, Electric, however, they had finished recording the entire thing when they realized that they didn't really like the way it sounded, so they found a new producer with whom they re-recorded the entire album as a straight-up hard rocker that sounded quite a bit like AC/DC and other heavy rock bands of the time. The resulting schism in their fanbase makes them seem like they became an entirely new band.

* [[Miyavi]] has gone through several genre shifts, starting with a kind of [[Marilyn Manson]]-esque kind of rock, moving to acoustic pop and rock, then into a fusion of hip-hop and punk, and now has his own blend of rock the showcases his percussive guitar technique.

* Happens occasionally in [[Hip Hop]]. If a rapper is also a decent singer, there's a very high chance (that increases as they get older) that they'll abandon rapping completely in favor of singing. This isn't necessarily a ''bad'' move; the quality is still high and they're likely to appeal to a wider audience (especially if their career was beginning to stale), but fans of their older material might feel left out in the cold. See: [[Queen Latifah]], [[Kid Rock]], [[Lauryn Hill]], Cee-Lo, Andre3000, etc.

** The Black Eyed Peas. 'Nuff said. Those of you who only knew of them post-''Elephunk'', listen to [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FqoKEyvdjv8 "BEP Empire"] and be utterly amazed.

* Charlie Simpson went from being a member of the clean-cut British boy band Busted to the lead singer of the post-hardcore band Fightstar to a folk rock solo artist.

* Darius Rucker had huge success in the 1990s with guitar-pop band [[Hootie and the Blowfish]], briefly flirted with R&B in the early '00s, and became a country music artist in 2008.

* Marc van Linden went from epic trance to minimal tech-house, now he appears to be doing nu-skool Euro-house.

* [[David Bowie]] built an entire career on this trope, switching between psychedelic folk-rock, glam rock, Philly soul, and Krautrock within an entire decade alone. This resulted in a [[New Sound Album]] every time he stepped into a recording studio.

* Bill Callahan started out doing avant-garde lo-fi rock for his first few albums as Smog, switched to baroque pop for an album, then folk for a while, and has settled now on alt-country.

* Exile started out as a pop-rock band, having a big hit with "Kiss You All Over" but absolutely nothing else. A few membership changes later, they successfully reinvented themselves as a country-rock band which scored ten #1 hits.

* Rozalla (Miller), best known for the Eurodance hit "Everybody's Free (To Feel Good)" back in 1993, now does easy listening soul jazz.

* [[Behemoth]] went from [[Black Metal]] to [[Death Metal|Blackened Death Metal]], and then [[Death Metal]].

 

== Newspaper Comics ==

* Chester Gould's strange twist of ''[[Dick Tracy]]'' from crime drama (albeit with futuristic technology) to SCI-FI, one of the most obvious genre shifts of all time. This is so (in)famous, it could almost be the trope namer.

* During the Great Depression, a good number of comic strips shifted from domestic comedy to comedic adventure.

 

 

== Tabletop RPG ==

* Lesser Shades Of Evil -- the book quite literally ''begins'' with a disclaimer telling would-be PCs not to read any further, which is setting them up to make blessed champions of the gods in a high fantasy setting, then face all of the following in ''the very first session'': that was all centuries ago, their powers are all genetic engineering and nanomachines, the intervening time has moved the setting [[After the End]]... and even the idyllic fintasy setting was after a separate, ''earlier'', end. Also, their main superpower is creating multiple bodies for themselves. After this exposition-heavy first session (which fast-forwards the PCs through their actions over these hundreds of years), one assumes the players are meant to go home and contemplate why any of that was kept secret if it were just going to be revealed as soon as they made their characters, anyway.

 

 

== Toys ==

 

 

== Video Games ==

* ''[[Battletoads]]'' starts out as a 2.5D beat 'em up, and then changes so dramatically that it's almost like a collection of minigames rather than a cohesive whole. It changes nearly every stage, with only hints of the first few beat 'em up levels surfacing every so often

** And then there's the elements of espionage/technothriller stuff that starts early on in Part 3, with Max battling heavily-armed mercenaries and infiltrating a military bunker in order to get to the bottom of Valkyr, along with a brief detour back to the usual crime-noir in Chapter 4, where {{spoiler|Max confronts B.B., the backstabbing bastard who actually murdered his partner and set him up to take the fall for it}}. Then after that, we go into espionage mode again, this time with what seems like some kind of [[Ancient Conspiracy]] {{spoiler|but which is actually, according to Max Payne 2, a very old criminal syndicate}} culminating in a final confrontation at the top of Aesir Plaza.

* ''[[Drakengard]]'' starts off as [[Heroic Fantasy]], but slowly and surely turns into a [[Hack and Slash]] version of [[Survival Horror]], the [[Horror Tropes|horror]] aspect being the emphasis here. When things start to really get weird, they [[Lampshade Hanging|hang a lampshade]] on it when one of the mission descriptions is "Time and space fall apart, and the fantasy begins."

** And the {{spoiler|cannibal mutants}} in ''[[Uncharted]]: Drake's Fortune''.

*** Seems to be toyed with in ''Uncharted 2'' when {{spoiler|you bump into what seems like a yeti-type monster while in the mountains. However, later on it turns out to be a bunch of apparently bullet resistant natives in suits. Which you then discover are actually mythical ape-like Guardians of Shangri-la, so everything is okay again.}}

** Those "doom fortresses" are actually real. 8 were built, they were ridiculously sized, and they had more refuge in intimidation than use. I mean, come on, they're towers built to repel air attacks that are also made of concrete. Still true to this trope, however, the Allies never actually attempted an attack on one of them.

* The ''[[Chzo Mythos]]'' goes from fairly conventional (but good) horror, to [[Recycled in Space|SPACE horror]], to [[Cosmic Horror]].

* In terms of in-game Genre Shift, ''[[Spore]]'' goes from the hunt/gather adventure-game-esque "Cell" and "Creature" stages, to real-time strategy for "Tribal" and "Civilization," to a [[Wide Open Sandbox]] for "Space."

* ''[[Okami]]'' gets a bit of a shift towards the end, from a feudal Japan mythical fantasy to a feudal Japan {{spoiler|Sci-Fi}} fantasy.

** To Elaborate: {{spoiler|Near the end, you see Kaguya, a woman born from a Bamboo shoot in the myth, have a ''rocket that looks like a bamboo shoot'', and in the last part of the game, the eponymous Ark of Yamato turns out to be a ''fucking spaceship'', also implying that these monsters you've been facing... They're aliens...}}

* ''[[Final Fantasy VI]]'' shifts from a linear world to an openended one - the game begins in the World of Light, a bright, happy world with a linear plot and virtually no subquests. The second part of the game, the [[Apocalypse How|World of Ruin]], is a dark, dreary place and is entirely open for exploration, the player free to recruit allies and do subquests in any order before heading to the final dungeon.

** The [[Final Fantasy]] series has toyed with adding in modern and even [[Sci Fi]] elements from time to time, starting with an entire race of moon people and a giant robot in [[Final Fantasy IV]] (or even earlier than that, with [[Bonus Boss|Warmech]] from the very first game.) and hitting full force by [[Final Fantasy VII]], which went from straight up fantasy with the occasional [[Sci Fi]] element to [[Urban Fantasy]].

* The game system in the ''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'' series remains mostly unaltered, but the story and style subtly shift between games.

** ''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'' is gritty modern military (unless playing ''The Twin Snakes'').

** Also the final boss battles: {{spoiler|1=MGS1 ends with a fist fight and chase sequence. MGS2 ends with a sword duel. MGS4 ends with hand-to-hand brawl. MGS3 avoids this, as stealth is a very effective tactic when fighting The Boss.}}

** ''[[Metal Gear Solid Rising]]'' finally dropped the stealth and jumped headfirst into [[Hack and Slash]] [[Action Game]].

* ''[[Perfect Dark]]'' is a first-person shooter through and through. But while it starts off as a spy thriller similar to ''[[GoldenEye 007 (1997 video game)|GoldenEye]]'' (to which ''Perfect Dark'' is a [[Spiritual Successor]]), the story becomes increasingly sci-fi to where the final level takes place on an alien planet that's at war with another race.

* ''[[Resident Evil]]'' began as an atmospheric horror series, the fifth numerical installment, which took place largely in broad daylight, substituted fast, intelligent opponents for the slow, plodding (but frightening) zombies of the original trilogy and supplied the player with ample ammunition and explosives to deal with them. The fourth game has similar gameplay to the fifth, but still had a horror tone to it.

* The game ''[[Psychonauts]]''. During the first parts of the game, the game is very quirky, and quite a few jokes are made, and the focus is mostly on an escape from home, but then, it develops into a fight against a conspiracy involving stealing brains of fellow Psychonauts, from that point on, the game's humour becomes a little darker, the minds more and more creepy, and it shifts towards a psychological thriller - with the final level being a rather infamous example of [[Nightmare Fuel]] (And [[Scrappy Level]]).

** Though to be fair, the game is pretty dark at the start when you look into their mental vaults, or after you complete the game.

*** Suffice to say the game is fairly darkly humorous throughout, but the darkness is a little more insidious during the first portion of the game, when it's bright and sunny outside and the game isn't rubbing it in your face that you're dealing with a bunch of crazy people (you are, in fact, dealing with a bunch of crazy people. But it's not as obvious as later).

* The original ''[[Star Control]]'' is an action/strategy sci-fi game with very little plot. The sequel is a plot-heavy action/adventure game, and [[Growing the Beard|much better]] for it. The creators have [[Word of God|said]] that this was quite deliberate; they weren't too excited by the idea of a sequel that was just more of the same.

* The first three ''[[Warcraft]]'' games were all RTS games where you could build and command entire armies In fact, ''Warcraft'' more or less refined the RTS format. ''[[World of Warcraft]]'', however, is a MMORPG where you command ONE character. But the first three games provide most of the backstory, and there's even places in the ''World of Warcraft'' where you can site where specific events in the previous games happened. For example, the throneroom above Undercity was directly based on a cinematic from ''Warcraft III'' where {{spoiler|Arthas betrayed his people and murdered his father.}}

** The shift from RTS to RPG started in ''Warcraft III''. Although it is definitely an RTS, you can recruit heroes that level up, learn new abilities, and carry items and equipment. The maps also contained many mooks that could be slain to level up heroes and earn treasure. The Frozen Throne pushed the concept further up to the point where the Orc campaign was a proof-of-concept prototype of [[World of Warcraft]]: The campaign follows a single hero who traveling along Kalimdor, meeting quest givers and completing quests in instances.

* ''[[Police Quest]]: SWAT'' started as a first-person [[Interactive Movie]], then changed to isometric overhead RTS, then to a ''[[Rainbow Six]]''-style [[Tactical Shooter]].

** Going back further, [[Police Quest]] 1-4 were all [[Sierra]] adventure games. The first game was a straightforward [[Police Procedural]]. The second game was mostly a police procedural with more of a ''[[Lethal Weapon]]'' flavor. The third game was a [[Darker and Edgier]] tale of revenge. And ''Police Quest: Open Season'' was an even darker [[Author Tract]] about trying to hunt a [[Depraved Homosexual|crossdressing serial killer]] despite the media's interference.

* ''[[Boiling Point: Road to Hell]]'' most of the game is set in a Troperiffic [[Wide Open Sandbox]] [[Banana Republic]]. You deal with the drug lords, the rebels, the army and the CIA. The final act: Stop the [[Big Bad]] in his volcano lair from using his giant mind control device.

* The [[Ultima I|very first ''Ultima'' game]] begins as a more-or-less typical fantasy RPG and then gets to the point where you have to use a time machine and go into outer space to defeat twenty spaceships to gain the title of "Space Ace." All this in 1980, mind you.

* ''[[Rainbow Six]]'' switched from a plan-based multi-team [[Tactical Shooter]] to a more straightforward single-team semi-tactical shooter starting with the console versions of ''3''.

* The first two installments of ''[[Need for Speed]]'' had fairly realistically-handling cars, then it shifted to arcade-style handling starting with ''Hot Pursuit'', then to [[Wide Open Sandbox]] racing from ''Underground to Undercover''. Only with ''Shift'' did it return to its simulation roots.

* ''[[Wonder Boy]]'' went from ''[[Super Mario Bros.]]''-style platformer to linear [[Action RPG]] to [[Shoot'Em Up]] to [[Metroidvania]] in the span of four games.

* The original ''[[Ikari Warriors]]'' was a ''[[Rambo]]''-inspired run 'n gun shoot-'em-up essentially developed to be SNK's answer to Capcom's ''Commando''. The sequel, ''Victory Road'', retained the same game system from the first game, but was now set in outer space and featured alien enemies and high-tech power-ups. The third and final game in the series, ''Ikari III: The Rescue'', returned to the military theme of the first game, but was now an overhead beat-'em-up instead of a shoot-'em-up.

* There was a minor trend among game developers to turn established belt-scrolling franchises into competitive [[Fighting Game|fighting games]] as a result of the "fighting game boom" of the 90s.

** All three versions of ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Tournament Fighters]]'' by Konami, which were all preceded by various ''Turtles'' beat-'em-ups such as the [[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles the Arcade Game|original arcade game]] and ''[[Turtles in Time]]'', as well as the console-exclusive ''Manhattan Project'' and ''Hyperstone Heist'' (although to be fair, the first NES game and all three Game Boy games were platformers).

** ''Double Dragon V: The Shadow Falls'', a Tradewest-developed game based on the ''[[Double Dragon]]'' animated series, and the Technos-developed Neo-Geo game simply titled ''[[Recycled Title|Double Dragon]]'', which was based on the movie.

** ''Final Fight: Revenge'' for the arcade and Saturn, which is ironic since the original ''[[Final Fight]]'' began development as a beat-'em-up spin-off of ''[[Street Fighter (video game)|Street Fighter]]'' titled ''Street Fighter '89''.

* The original ''[[Saturday Night Slam Masters]]'', along with its upgraded edition ''Muscle Bomber Duo'', played pretty much as one would expect from an arcade-style [[Wrestling Game]]. The sequel, ''Ring of Destruction: Slam Masters II'', plays like a wrestling-themed version of ''[[Street Fighter II]]'' (i.e. multiple punch and kick buttons, command-based special moves, 2D playing field, victory by KO, round-based matches).

* The original ''Mario vs. Donkey Kong'' for the [[Game Boy Advance]] was a puzzle platformer modeled after ''[[Donkey Kong 94]]'', but the sequels from ''Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2'' and onward were ''[[Lemmings]]''-style puzzle game that utilize the touch screen and stylus.

* [[Fahrenheit (2005 video game)]]'s story is an extreme example of this; the story starts out as an occult murder mystery, but, somehow, it suddenly turns into a philosophical sci-fi action flick a la [[The Matrix]] near the end.

** This has happened a lot with the [[Shin Megami Tensei]] series. The main series tends towards dark, post-apocalyptic stories, the first two games and [[Strange Journey]] having heavy sci-fi elements (you use some kind of technological device to summon your demons,) while [[Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne|Nocturne]] does away with all the sci-fi elements. Meanwhile, the ''[[Persona (video game)|Persona]]'' series ditches the post-apocalyptic elements and introduces high-school life and Jungian psychology into the mix, with the demons becoming aspects of a person's psyche, and the enemy demons doing the same, turning into Shadows starting with [[Persona 2]]. By [[Persona 3]], [[Slice of Life]] and [[Dating Sim]] elements are introduced, while [[Persona 4]] turns into a more [[Lighter and Softer|light-hearted]] [[Scooby Doo]]-style murder mystery with MegaTen trappings. Meanwhile ''again'', the [[Raidou Kuzunoha vs. the Soulless Army|Raidou]] [[Raidou Kuzunoha VS King Abaddon|Kuzunoha]] games are [[Alternate History]] with more action elements and also more light-hearted, while [[Devil Survivor]] acts very much like a [[Deconstruction]] of the [[Mons]] genre in general. And that's only counting a ''few'' of the games in the franchise.

* ''[[Super Mario Galaxy]]'' starts off like most typical ''Mario'' games, where the title plumber had to rescue Princess Peach from Bowser (in this game, Bowser kidnaps Peach and carries her off into space), but about halfway through the game, the plot unexpectly shift to a sad story about the loss of a different princess' family, but then cuts back to Mario still trying to save Peach from Bowser.

 

== Web Comics ==

* ''[[El Goonish Shive]]'''s [[Cerebus Syndrome|change from comedy to dramedy]] was apparently planned from the very beginning.

* Ditto ''[[Unicorn Jelly]]'', which goes from a quirky almost-but-not-quite Fantasy series (the main character is a witch with apparently no magic) to science fiction spanning hundreds of thousands of years and multiple universes. A Powers Of 10 map on the site really hits it home, going from the main character's home out out into the multiverse.

* ''[[Wapsi Square]]'' started out as a lightweight and slightly surreal urban [[Sitcom]], but gradually began adding elements of [[Science Fiction]] and/or [[Fantasy]] with the introduction of characters who might be gods, immortals or aliens, the concept of humans possessing (or being possessed by) inner demons, and a 12,000 year old mystery. In spite of all this, the sitcom elements are still present, and often just as strong as ever.

* ''[[Penny and Aggie]]'' began as a relatively light-hearted, family-friendly [[Betty and Veronica]] comic with brief story arcs and a long stretch of unconnected gag-a-day strips. [[Word of God]] says this was because the creators tried to pitch it as a syndicated [[Newspaper Comics|newspaper comic]]. When the syndicates failed to show interest, the creators took advantage of the Webcomic medium's greater flexibility by increasing the drama-to-comedy ratio and by introducing more experimental storytelling techniques ("Second Looks," "20 2020 Pennies"), [[Hotter and Sexier|mature themes]] ("Behind Closed Doors," "Awakening"), and arcs running several months ("Dinner for Six," "The Popsicle War," and "Missing Person," the first chapter of which was a [[Police Procedural]], and the final chapter a [[Psychological Thriller]]).

* ''FOG Club'' began life as a romcom about four college anime fans, before - with little to no explanation - having the cast sucked through a portal into an alternate dimension based on Trigun, where they fought an evil scientist called Falco Amadeus and an android duplicate of the main character.

* ''[[Achewood]]'' shifts back and forth between domestic, observational strips that find humor in the mundane, and surreal fantasy arcs involving Mexican [[Magical Realism]], three-hundred-man outdoor brawls, and Heaven burning down.

** ''[[Megatokyo]]'' is a good example of this. It began as a simple, four panel webcomic about two friends trapped in Japan, the focus being more on the two men playing off each other verbally and [[Two Gamers on a Couch|talking about video games]]. As time went on, [[Continuity Drift|the comic drifted away from this]], and began to focus more on the relationships Piro and Largo were creating in Japan, and [[Deconstruction|picking apart aspects of popular Japanese culture]].

* [[Bob and George]] was originally intended to be a superhero comedy webcomic about the titular brothers. It changed into a sprite comic after the author realized he couldn't draw.

* [[Kid Radd]] started out as a general parody of video games. Then Cerberus syndrome sets in.

* Since-ended [[Keenspot]] comic ''Cool Cat Studio'' started out as a mundane office comedy without any hint of unusual goings-on. And then one of the characters got [[Abducted By Aliens]]. The sudden genre and tonal shift caused many readers to cry foul.

 

== Web Original ==

** As of it's later seasons, it is firmly entrenched in serious business, albeit with some gags.

* "[[Ruby Quest|Okay, so we're playing as an adorable bunny with amnesia.]] And we have to rescuse our little cat friend from his cell. Okay, seems to be a standard puzzle game, so far so good...hey, is there someone behind that door?"

* [[The Nostalgia Chick]] talks about how ''[[Dragonheart]]'' went from [[A Boy and His X]] to Buddy Comedy halfway through.

** Similarly, [[The Nostalgia Chick]] herself went through a major genre shift. Going from the linear nature of the Critic to doing analytical reviews with her friends doing sketches related to the movie.

 

== Western Animation ==

* The entire first season of [[Venture Brothers]] is pretty much just slapstick comedy in a parody setting; season 2 downplays the raw slapstick and up-plays the parody/[[Satire/Deconstruction|Deconstruction]] elements of the show, culminating in a funny but fairly serious season finale. Seasons 3 & 4 still feature a lot of humor, and it's definitely still a comedy show, but there's been a significant shift from it being a parody of sci-fi/action/everything to now being a genuine example of those genres.

* ''[[The Lion King]]'' has a particularly famous example of this trope. The first third or so focuses mainly on Simba's lighthearted escapades around his father's domain, with a tone and style typical of pretty much any Disney-made comedy. [[Mood Whiplash|Then Scar kills Mufasa and makes Simba think it was his own fault]]. The rest of the film becomes a practical drama that deals with Simba's guilt and his need to fulfill his destiny by kicking Scar off the throne of Pride Rock. [[Hakuna Matata|Lighthearted elements are still present, of course]].

* ''[[We're Back! A Dinosaur's Story]]'' starts out as a cheery musical film about cute talking dinosaurs, but about halfway through the film, it turns into an animated horror film about an evil scientist and his [[Circus of Fear]].

* ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]'' was an Asian-influenced [[High Fantasy]] that featured its heroes [[Wandering the Earth]] to stop an [[Evil Overlord]]. The [[Sequel Series]] ''[[The Legend of Korra]]'', by contrast, is an Asian-influenced [[Urban Fantasy]] series with the protagonists fighting an [[Anti-Magical Faction]] in a [[City of Adventure]]. Technology has also advanced from [[Steampunk]] to a more [[Roaring Twenties]] aesthetic.

 

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