Real World Episode: Difference between revisions

In short, this trope is when fictional characters cross over into (a representation of) [[Real Life]]. At some point, they often meet their author. If they wander into a fan convention, they will be told [[Your Costume Needs Work]].

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).

== Anime and Manga ==

** This turns into the entire plot for [[The Movie]], ''Conqueror of Shamballa''. They end up in Germany in that movie.

* ''[[Sonic X]]'' would probably count. At the very beginning of the series, Sonic, Robotnik and a whole menagerie of characters from their world are pulled into the explosion of Chaos Control (in the English dub) and end up in what is, for all intents and purposes, the real world. It gets progressively less "real" as the show goes on, however (for example, it turns out that the city Sonic and most of friends emerged in was Station Square from the ''[[Sonic Adventure Series]]'', and later episodes had the two worlds merge in order to adapt both ''Sonic Adventure'' and ''Sonic Adventure 2'').

* 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.

** 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.

* A borderline example would be a [[Crossover]] comic, where the characters from ''[[The Simpsons (Comic Book)|The Simpsons]]'' end up in the world of ''[[Western Animmation/Futurama|Futurama]]''. Both series share the same creator.

* The comics of Marc-Anthonie Mathieu explore the (two-dimensional, black-and-white) protagonists occasionally becoming aware of such things as "three-dimensionality" or "four-colour offset". These are implied to be dreams of the protagonists.

* In 'World's Funnest', Bat-Mite and Mxyptlk fight across countless realities, briefly ending up in one made of photos, not drawings. Despite their God-like abilities, the weirdzo locales and POV's they've visited and the scores of mega-powers they've brought low during this fight, the place scares the crap out of them and they leave quickly by mutual consent.

* In a metafictional sort-of inversion, one month Marvel published comic books based on what they would look like if published in the [[Marvel Universe]] itself. Of course, the writers there don't know anyone's secret ID, nor can they do comics based on what the heroes are really doing, so it gets weird.

== Fan Fiction ==

* 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]].

== Film ==

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

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

* ''[[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]]''.

* 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.

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

* The premise for the movie ''[[Stranger Than Fiction]]''. The main character, Harold, is a real person and hears a narrator narrating his life. {{spoiler|He eventually ends up meeting his narrator.}}

== Literature ==

** The fan film ''[http://www.snowgumfilms.com/runrincewindrun/ Run Rincewind Run!]'' - created for the opening of Nullus Anxietas (the 2007 Australian Discworld convention) - features Rincewind being hit by a spell that sends him to "meet his maker." (Which he does, at the convention.)

*** For a fan film, they should have done more research. Rincewind ''never'' looks behind him while running (it slows you down).

* Bernard Werber's ''Le mystère des dieux'' also ends like this: the characters actually hit the end of the universe... which turns out to be the page of a book.

* In the novel ''My Hero'' by [[Tom Holt]], fictional characters [[Animated Actors|clock out between chapters and negotiate with their agents for choice heroic roles]], all the while [[No Fourth Wall|actively bitching out their authors for shoddy plotting]]. Much of the book revolves around the misadventures of characters pulled into the real world, but since this vision of the real world is one in which mad Cornishmen build footballers from body parts and a literary agent turns out to be planning the End of the World, the "this is reality" effect is rather diluted.

* In [[Diana Wynne Jones]]'s ''[[Chrestomanci]]'' books, this happens at least twice (so far). In ''The Lives of Christopher Chant'' Christopher decides to escape to "World Twelve B" which is very similar to his (12A) but with no magic. He decides against it after nearly being squashed by a Routemaster London bus. And at the end of ''Witch Week''{{spoiler|the protagonists' world, which has magic, is combined with World 12B, which it had previously split off from (the cause of the split? Guy Fawkes.) The implication is that our world may regain some magic, but not in the same concentration as in the split-off world, and the magic-using characters will have non-magic talents instead.}}

** There's some sort of connection to the real world in nearly all her books. ''The Merlin Conspiracy'', ''Power of Three'', {{spoiler|''Howl's Moving Castle''}}...

* Jasper Fforde's ''[[Thursday Next]]'' series pulls this ''all the time'', in [[Mind Screw|as many ways as you can think of.]] It starts with Thursday Next's reality being the "real world" for the fictional characters she meets when she ventures into fiction (kind of like the ''Inkheart'' sequel that way). It's even possible to go behind-the-scenes in any work of literature (to the backstory, the frontispiece, etc) which makes it seem even more staged. Then it gets ''more'' bizarre when Thursday is offered a way to {{spoiler|un-eradicate Landen}} by hopping along to another world, which sounds even more suspiciously like our world. She eventually decides {{spoiler|against it, since the price for both her and Landen being alive was that they would not remember or have ever met each other.}}

* A senior-citizen Gamer in ''[[Dream Park]]'' tells the other Gamers a story about how, back in the days of [[Tabletop Games]], her adventuring party opened a door in a dungeon full of magical portals, and found itself in the living room where her gaming group was playing. One of the heroes shot the [[Game Master]] with a crossbow bolt, and the entire dungeon disappeared.

* Marshall in an episode of ''[[Eerie Indiana]]'', in which everyone starts calling him Omri Katz, the name of his actor.

* In an episode of ''[[Growing Pains]]'', Ben Seaver wishes his life were more like TV, and wakes up to discover his entire life is a television show called ''Meet the Seavers''. All the actors are referred to by their real names, and members of the production crew feature prominently. At one point Kirk Cameron, who usually plays Ben's older brother Mike, confides to Ben [[Mind Screw|that he actually is Mike, and has been trapped in the real world for years]].

* Happens to the video game characters in ''[[Ace Lightning]]''.

* A meta-version takes place in the finale movie of ''[[The Famous Jett Jackson]]'': Jett, an actor in the show's world, switches places with Silverstone, his character on the [[Show Within a Show]].

* Happens in an episode of ''[[Supernatural]]'', when Sam and Dean Winchester get blasted into the real world where everyone sees them as Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles, stars of the television series ''[[Supernatural]]''. It gets very meta. Among the things that the Winchesters discover is that Bobby is named for a show producer, Jared got married to the actress who played Ruby, ''Supernatural'' is filmed in [[Stargate City|Vancouver]], and Sam and Dean [[Crowning Moment of Funny|CANNOT ACT]].

* 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.}}

* In ''[[Drakengard]]'s'' fifth ending, Caim and Angelus follow the Queen Grotesquerie to Japan 2004, and end up causing a [[Apocalypse How|Class 3-4 cataclysm]] that is followed by ''[[Nie R]]''.

* This is where ''[[Leisure Suit Larry]] 3'' and ''[[Space Quest]] 3'' ends.

* [[Spider-Man]], towards the end of [[The Nineties]] animated series. Peter met [[Stan Lee]], voiced by Stan Lee.

** Speaking of Marvel, the title Earth-1218 was recently used to designate ''our'' world.

* A ''[[The Simpsons|Simpsons Halloween Special]]'' had Homer being sucked into The Third Dimension ([[Sting|dun-dun-dun]]!). He eventually destroyed that universe and wound up in our world.

** Specifically the erotic cake store at 13567 Ventura Boulevard in Los Angeles.

** In fact, one of the glimpses we get of the planet shows a billboard advertising the show.

* 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.}})

* 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.

* An episode of ''[[The Smurfs]]'' has the in-universe fictional character Don Smurfo (a Smurf [[Zorro]] expy) enter into the real universe of the Smurfs.

* Daffy Duck at one point argues with his creator, who erases and redraws the situation. And Daffy into a flower.