Real World Episode: Difference between revisions

Line 6:

This trope is related to, but distinct from, Refugee From TV Land. In [[Refugee From TV Land]], a character is pulled out of a [[Show Within a Show]], whereas Welcome To The Real World concerns characters the viewers have been following for some time prior to this, and no indication had yet been given that they were in fact fictional (other than the fact that they, y'know, exist in a TV series, movie, book, comic, or video game). Also, while the [[Refugee From TV Land]] plot often [[Lampshade Hanging|hangs lampshades]] [[Leaning on the Fourth Wall|on everything]], a [[Welcome to The Real World]] plot rarely does.

Compare [[Mage in Manhattan]], [[Up the Real Rabbit Hole]] and [[Tomato Surprise]]. Compare and contrast with [[Through the Eyes of Madness]] and [[Mind Screw]], both of which overlap with this. Contrast [[Trapped in TV Land]] (basically the inverse of this).

Sounds like [[This Is Reality]], but it's very different.

Line 20:

== Comic Books ==

* The whole premise of ''[[Fables]]'', in which [[Public Domain Character|Public Domain Characters]] from folklore and fairy tales have decided to emmigrate to our world.

* [[The DCU]], prior to ''[[Crisis on Infinite Earths]]'', had Earth Prime, a world that is in fact ''our'' world, with no superpowers or anything. [[Superman]] and The [[Flash]] occasionally ended up here. Earth Prime got its own version of Superboy shortly before being destroyed in the Crisis.

** Recently, {{spoiler|Earth Prime was recreated, and the aforementioned Superboy wound up being dumped there after he [[Never the Selves Shall Meet|punched himself.]] He seemingly lost his powers and did nothing there other than [[Meta Fiction|reading the very issues you were reading]], [[Troll|trolling]] DC message boards and making his parents cook for him. Recently though, the [[Blackest Night]] somehow managed to breach into Earth Prime; he regained his powers shortly afterwards.}}

** He's stuck as a [[Basement Dweller]] because people read about [[Complete Monster|what kind of a person he was]] while trapped in the DC Universe.

* An early issue of [[Grant Morrison]]'s deservedly famous run on ''[[Animal Man]]'' builds to a climax in which the title character (a.k.a. Buddy Baker) freaks out because he can see the reader(s). At the conclusion of a long [[Mind Screw]] [[Story Arc]] (which involves one of the few characters who can remember ''[[Crisis on Infinite Earths]]'', as well as the [[Silver Age]] version of DC continuity), Buddy has a long metaphysical conversation with Grant Morrison in person, who says that, at this point, he can't think of anything else to do with the comic than hand it over to somebody else.

** It is heavily implied that the last issue of Morrison's run on ''[[Doom Patrol]]'' also takes place in the same world as his last Animal Man issue, i.e. the real world. Aside from the fact that the world seen in the Doom Patrol issue apparently has no superheroes, it also shares the same colour scheme with the final issue of Animal Man. And if we take into consideration Morrison's later DC comics, it seems the final issues of Doom Patrol and Animal Man both take place {{spoiler|inside the infant universe Qwewq, which is revealed to be our universe}} in [[All Star DC Comics|All Star Superman]]. This also means that {{spoiler|the final fate of our universe is to get speared by Frankenstein}} in Morrison's [[Seven Soldiers]]!

Line 39:

* Notably used in a ''[[Back to the Future (film)|Back to The Future]]'' [http://www.kristensheley.com/bttf/interactiveII.html fanfic], where accidental interaction with the creators and actors changes them to earlier drafts. Interference with Michael J. Fox's audition causes Marty's appearance to change to that of [[The Other Marty|Eric Stoltz]], flying past Bob Gale causes the DeLorean [[Time Machine]] to revert to a refrigerator, and tearing off a page establishing the [[MacGuffin|almanac]] from the sequel's screenplay wipes out all the events stemming from Marty buying it in 2015.

* The [http://shifti.org/wiki/Xanadu_(setting) Xanadu storyverse], in which at a fairly large convention called "[[Title Drop|Xanadu]]" all of the [[Becoming the Costume|costumes become real]]. While most stories focus on weirdness and some on [[Furry Fandom|furries]], naturally a number of cosplayers were featured, with varying levels of mental change, from "Whoa, suddenly my costume is perfect!" to "Where is this place? Where did my [[True Companions]] go?" Two stories have [[Refugee From TV Land|characters and such from fictional fiction]]; [http://shifti.org/wiki/Slinx Slinx], a [[Pokémon]] [[Expy]], and [http://shifti.org/wiki/The_Perils_of_Voice_Acting The Perils Of Voice Acting], a pastiche of He-Man, She-Ra, and other cartoons from that period.

* Way back in 2002, someone wrote a story called the [http://www.henneth-annun.net/stories/chapter.cfm?stid=339 Fanfic Lounge.] It took place in a lounge made for fictional characters so they could relax between fanfics. While I'm not sure how many spin offs were made, this one was about the [[Lord of the Rings]] cast, along with Elijah Wood and Orlando Bloom, being gathered in the lounge in order to find a solution to the problems plaguing LOTR fanfiction. IIRC, this is where the LOTR cast discovers their fictional status, and Orlando Bloom and Elijah Wood are just as weirded out at meeting their fictional counterparts. The story featured the culture shock scenario for the LOTR cast was, and contained such gems as: {{spoiler|Boromir trying to open a can of Mountain Dew with a dagger, the cast becoming confused at references to future events in the books/movies (the cast was taken some time before the splitting of the Fellowship), and perhaps the best part, the cast being informed of the existence of Yaoi slash fiction, and being informed of who is frequently paired with who.}} The two [[Real Life]] actors also experience their own variant, when {{spoiler|Elijah Wood is nearly torn apart when he accidentally walks into a room used to hold [[Mary Sue|Mary Sues]] (and then later identifies ''[[Sailor Moon]]'' as being among them), and Orlando Bloom becoming horrified when he's told that the body he's currently inhabiting was pulled out of an NC-17 fic, explaining why he was missing his shirt (hard to explain, you'd have to read it).}}

* Appears in [http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4413991/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_Soul_of_the_Hero Harry Potter and the Soul of the Hero], where the author and Harry have a conversation for the sake of heroic [[Deus Ex Machina]].

* The ''[[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic|My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic]]'' fanfic [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NwdIJMALxxi6egHz832IuNIHy1J7JAqulJFoGeLM5tY/edit?hl=en_US&pli=1 My Little Dashie]. An [[Inversion]] of the fandom's usual [[Self-Insert Fic|Self Insert Fics]], the story involves Rainbow Dash arriving into the real world (as a filly), and becoming essentially the narrator's adopted daughter. [[Better Than It Sounds]], apparently.

== Film ==

Line 47:

* This is the premise of the live-action ''[[Fat Albert]]'' movie.

* The ''[[Rocky and Bullwinkle]]'' movie did this.

* And the Woody Allen movie ''[[The Purple Rose of Cairo]]''.

* ''[[Enchanted]]'' as well, also doubling as an [[Affectionate Parody]] of the Disney Princess films.

* An early (and fortunately rejected) [http://www.scifiscripts.com/scripts/wtchmn.txt Sam Hamm script] for a film version of ''[[Watchmen]]'' written in 1989, ended with Dan, Laurie and Rorschach inadvertently finding themselves in real-life New York City, where a young kid recognizes them as characters from the comic book. Of course, in the ''real'' 1989, children [[What Do You Mean It's Not for Kids?|generally didn't read]] ''[[Watchmen]]''.

* Inverted and lampshaded in ''[[Galaxy Quest]]'', wherein the cast of the titular [[Show Within a Show]] is transported to the spaceship of a race of aliens who believe the show is real and have based all their technology off of it. Naturally, they expect the hapless actors to save them from a genuine alien threat.

* The Arnold Schwarzenegger film ''[[Last Action Hero]]'' is chock-full of both [[Refugee From TV Land]] and [[This Is Reality]].

* The movie ''Wes Craven's New Nightmare'' uses this trope straight, but turns the [[Antagonist]] into the one doing the world-corssing. In this, the real-life cast of the ''[[Nightmare On Elm Street]]'' movies (including Robert Englund, who played Freddy) are attacked by a demon who takes on the persona of the fictional Freddy Krueger.

* ''[[The League of Gentlemen]]'s Apocalypse''.

* This also occurs at the end of the short film ''[[The Gamers]]''. {{spoiler|The roleplayers are all killed by the characters they are roleplaying.}}

Line 94:

== Video Games ==

* The Final Destination stage in the ''[[Super Smash Bros]]'' series is said to travel between the fictional world where the characters live and the real world. This is evidenced as the scenery changes as the time passes along the level, from space, to a wormhole, to a realistic sea.

* The Final Destination stage in the ''[[Super Smash Bros.]]'' series is said to travel between the fictional world where the characters live and the real world. This is evidenced as the scenery changes as the time passes along the level, from space, to a wormhole, to a realistic sea.

* The "[[Game Over]]" scene of the Sega Genesis game ''[[Comix Zone]]'' shows a comic book villain, having successfully traded places with his author, go on to do comic book villainy in the real world. (The game itself follows the adventures of the author, who is [[Trapped in TV Land]] and has to be the comic book hero.)

* Late in ''[[Star Ocean: Till the End of Time]]'', {{spoiler|the protagonists discover that the creators of their world are going to destroy it, so they go up a level in reality to 4D space, and find out their world is a video game, and their creators are the company that developed it. Inverted in that the world where this game company exists isn't the world of our Earth- the game world is.}}

Line 106:

* In the guest story "The Sluggite Koan" in ''[[Sluggy Freelance]]'', [[Killer Rabbit|Bun-bun]], after being thrown out of time itself in a previous canon story, emerged from the computer screen of a fan of the comic. Being who he is, he proceeded to thrown the guy [[Trapped in TV Land|in in his place]] and left to menace his own creator.

* [[Planescape Survival Guide]] implied that the "Firstworld" (Earth) was a real place for several chapters. In the 4th chapter, many of the characters ended up there, and also discovered D&D campaign settings depicting the very Multiverse they just came from. How or why has not yet been explained.

* In ''[[Real Life Comics]]'' this occurred during the [[Plot Hole]] Arc. It was played for laughs due to there being [[No Fourth Wall]] and solved relatively quickly.

* ''[[Sinfest]]'' has the Reality Zone. The art style changes and Real world physics apply. [[The Devil]] steers clear.

Line 124:

* In ''[[Chaotic]]'', the episode ''Chaotic Crisis'' involves the Underworlders reverse-engineering human technology to create portals linking Perim, Chaotic, and Earth. ({{spoiler|It was [[All Just a Dream]], however.}})

* About half of the episodes of [[Di C]]'s ''[[The Adventures of Super Mario Bros 3]]'' had the characters visiting Earth in some way. In this continuity, Mario and Luigi are plumbers from "the real world" who discovered the Mushroom World on a plumbing job, and Earthlings are drawn with the same art style as the Marios. Yet Bowser and Peach and Toad refer to Earth as "the real world" even though the Mushroom World is as real to them as the real world.

* The tv series (blending CG I with live action) [[Ace Lightning]] featured a group of videogame characters trying to exist in the real world.

* In ''[[Family Guy]]'' Peter does Acid in an episode which results in a live-action hallucination.

** In the episode the Road to the Multi-Verse, Stewie and Brian get transformed into Live Action versions of themselves in one episode.