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{{trope}}
{{quote|'''Joe''': You're Norma Desmond! You used to be in silent pictures; you used to be big!
'''Norma''': I ''am'' big. It's the pictures that got small.|''[[Sunset Boulevard]]''}}
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Compare [[I Coulda Been a Contender]], [[Tough Act to Follow]], [[White Dwarf Starlet]], [[Jaded Washout]] (spends his time wishing he was still back there), and [[Trade Your Passion for Glory]].
When a character had to leave a dangerous life for a more mundane one, and spends it longing for his
Contrast [[While You Were in Diapers]].
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* In ''[[Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann]]'', Simon and the rest of the Gurren Brigade find themselves bored out of their minds after the [[Time Skip]].
** Averted in the [[Distant Finale]], {{spoiler|where Simon seems content [[Walking the Earth]]}}.
* The old men from ''[[Gun X Sword]]''. They keep drinking and talking about the
** They trump their
* A painful example would be from the 2003 [[Utsuge]] turned [[Anime]] ''[[Kimi ga Nozomu Eien]]''. Hayase Mitsuki, a once-in-a-generation swimming prodigy had the makings of an Olympic-Grade Champion. She leaves it behind to look after her best friend Haruka's boyfriend Takayuki. He is unable to complete high school because of his suicidal depression over Haruka's car-accident induced coma. An accident inadvertantly caused by Mitsuki. Three years on, when Haruka awakens, Takayuki leaves Mitsuki behind to restart life where he left it. Mitsuki, now a mere office lady, meets an old-rival who is now an olympic grade champion-swimmer doubly reminding her of the meaninglessness of her sacrifice.
* In ''[[
* ''[[Cowboy Bebop]]'' has a trio of old men (possibly former cowboys) which keep talking of the great days back in their youth.
== Comic Books ==
* Silk Spectre sums up her comrades' feelings: ''[[Watchmen (
* In ''[[Nextwave]]'', Monica Rambeau can't start a sentence without mentioning how she once led [[The Avengers (Comic Book)|The Avengers]].
* Most of the depowered heroes in [[JLA:
== Film ==
* Norma Desmond in ''[[Sunset Boulevard]]''
* Producer David O. Selznick had his greatest hit with ''[[Gone
* In ''[[
** Until then, that [[Large Ham]] had been happily [[Chewing the Scenery]] and enjoying having fans; the rest of the cast were long-since sunk in awareness that they were washed up and abiding hate for their 'captain' coworker. (William Shatner approves this message.)
* Uncle Rico from ''[[Napoleon Dynamite]]'' is a particularly sorry example of this trope, as he looks back on a football game that he spent warming the bench. He spends all his free time practicing his throw and lamenting that he could have won the game and gone pro if the coach had put him in.
** He even buys a "time machine" on the Internet so he can go back and change his life.
* Played with to the point of subversion in ''[[Music and Lyrics]]''; whilst former pop-star and professional has-been Alex Fletcher's
* In ''[[This Is Spinal Tap]]'', the titular band spend most of the movie actively determined to pretend that the Glory Days aren't well and truly behind them, despite the fact that the crowds and venues are getting noticeably smaller.
** As are the stage sets.
* Randy "The Ram" Robinson in ''[[The Wrestler]]'' is basically [[Jake Roberts|Jake "The Snake" Roberts]] if he'd been as "THE star" as Hulk Hogan.
** While the subplot with his daughter is clearly drawn from Jake's life, the rest is every third ex-wrestler you care to name. People in this business do ''not'' deal well with aging.
** Subverted in that after September
* Sam Rothstein laments the old Vegas at the end of ''[[Casino]]''.
* Robert De Niro's character in ''The Fan'', to an [[Axe Crazy]] degree.
* The [[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles]] were going through this in ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (
* ''[[Rocky Balboa]]'' was also meant to remedy such a situation caused by ''Rocky V''.
* "Fast" Eddie Felson in ''[[The Color of Money]]''. We saw his
* Mr. Incredible from ''[[The Incredibles]]'' exemplifies this trope. After a forced retirement from his career as a super-hero, he settles down and becomes a typical cubicle dweller. While his wife has adapted to their new circumstances, he is stuck re-living his past glories, {{spoiler|a fact which the villain exploits to get Mr. Incredible to unknowingly help him.}}
** He is even on the cover of a [[Lampshade Hanging|''Glory Days''' magazine]].
{{quote|
'''Bob:''' Well, reliving the glory days is better than acting like they didn't happen! }}
** Actually, the central theme of the entire movie is adapting to new circumstances without losing your sense of identity. So, in a way, it both embraces and disregards the idea of
* Parodied in ''Hamlet 2''; Elizabeth Shue plays herself as a survivor of the [[Hollywood Hype Machine]] having decided to quit acting and become a nurse instead. The main character is a huge fan of hers and invites her to the school to give a talk about acting to his drama
* One of the main themes in ''The Turning Point.'' Emma was once a great dancer, but now she's in her mid-forties and can barely execute a double pirouette. Her old friends Wayne and
== Literature ==
* Tan'elKoth in ''[[The Acts of Caine
* One of the main themes in ''[[The Death of the Vazir Mukhtar]]'', at least for the characters associated with the secret societies that were crushed in 1825 (the book is set in 1828). The main character's glory days are seemingly still in full swing, but a) [[Genre Savvy|he has great and well-founded fear of suffering this trope in the future if he doesn't take some risks]] and b) while his political and social career has been doing well, [[Lonely
* Bavragor Hammerfist from ''[[
* In [[Robert E. Howard]]'s ''[[Conan the Barbarian]]'' story "A Phoenix on the Sword", Thoth-amon's days when he owned the [[Ring of Power]].
* Many characters in ''[[The Great Gatsby]]'', but especially Tom Buchanan, who used to be a star football player for Yale. Nick's impression of Tom is as a restless man who goes about his entire life looking for another football game to win.
** Gatsby himself inverts this. He never had such pure happiness in his past, but he's ignoring reality in order to try and make the ''future'' glorious and perfect and lovely.
* Subverted in ''Children of the Lens'', last in the ''[[Lensman]]'' sequence: the surviving crew of the battleship "Dauntless", now top brass, cast off their regalia and revert to their original roles aboard ship of twenty years before in order to re-enter a strange universe and craft the ultimate weapon. They literally get to ''relive'' their glory days, even as they are living a second set.
== Live-Action TV ==
* A witch in an episode of ''[[
** Buffy has moments of this, at least at the beginning of the show, missing her popular cheerleader days, back when she didn't have to be a slayer.
* ''[[Star Trek:
* Did you know that Al Bundy of ''[[Married...
* Illyria, a Cthulu-esque goddess demon from ''[[
* In ''[[
* A running gag in ''[[Babylon 5]]'' with the [[Vestigial Empire|Centauri Republic]] in general and Londo Mollari in particular, leading to an in-universe [[Light Bulb Joke]]:
{{quote|
A: Just one... but in the
* The main theme of ''[[
* ''[[Highlander (TV series)|Highlander]]'' actually has an episode called "Glory Days", where Joe Dawson, who was the star quarterback of the high school football team, meets up with the head cheerleader he'd once dated. He gets depressed because he lost his legs in Vietnam, and doesn't think she'll like him, that he's 'damaged goods' (she was actually married anyway, but she does reassure him that he isn't damaged). Meanwhile, Mac is targeted by a former mobster immortal who's depressed and unhappy and wants Mac dead for instigating the 'death' that got him kicked out of the mob back in the 30s.
* On ''[[
== Music ==
* Deconstructed in [[Bruce Springsteen]]'s "Glory Days"
* Also deconstructed in [[
* [[Bryan Adams]]' ''Summer of 69'', by way of employing [[Nostalgia Filter]]. "Those were the best days of my life."
* [[Mike Oldfield]] - After the surprisingly huge success of his debut album "[[wikipedia:Tubular Bells|Tubular Bells]]", he tried to reproduce it [[wikipedia:Tubular Bells II|again]], [[wikipedia:Tubular Bells III|again]] and [[wikipedia:The Millennium Bell|again]] to save his decreasing popularity, which didn't help much.
** Nor did [[wikipedia:Tubular Bells 2003|completely re-recording it]].
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== Mythology ==
* Jason from the ''[[Classical Mythology|Argonautica]]'' met his end because of his obsession with his
== Theatre ==
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== Video Games ==
* Guybrush at the start of ''[[Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge]]''. After he beat LeChuck in the first game he had a great life, but people were expecting more and eventually he lost Elaine and people forgot about him. This one of the factors motivating him to find the Big Whoop.
== Web Original ==
* In ''[[
* In ''[[Survival of the Fittest]]'', it's often argued that Version 1 was the
** This was subverted in a recent thread on the board, in which ''both'' V1 and V2 were criticised - V1 for being too spontaneous and for a lesser writing quality, and V2 for being overplanned. To quote the Admin of the site, "for the most part, V3's found a good mix of both planning and spontaneity". Read the thread [http://z10.invisionfree.com/SOTF_V2/index.php?showtopic=2707 here].
* The main theme of ''[[There Will Be Brawl]]''. Mario, Link, and a few other characters in particular seem to have taken it hard.
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== Real Life ==
* Some people in the United States when it comes to [[World War II]]. Now both the left and the right agree it was a good thing we were involved.
* The pre-[[American Civil War]] south for some.
* Some see communist Russia as this (one aspect of [[Why We're Bummed Communism Fell]]).
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[[Category:Drama Tropes]]
[[Category:Fame and Reputation Tropes]]
[[Category:
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