Sliding Scale of Shiny Versus Gritty: Difference between revisions

[[File:girl_walking_in_dirty_housegirl walking in dirty house.jpg|frame|<small>Compare the elegant lady with the cobwebbed chairs.</small> ]]

Historical romances such as ''[[Dangerous Liaisons (Literature)|Dangerous Liaisons]]'' and adventure films such as the ''[[James Bond]]'' franchise (especially the classic Roger Moore films) tend toward the shinier end. The recent [[Robin Williams]] film ''[[What Dreams May Come]]'' is an exceptionally shiny film, in spite of its often-sombre tone.

=== '''Related Tropes: ==='''

* [[EverythingsEverything's Better Withwith Sparkles]]

* [[EverythingsEverything's Better Withwith Rainbows]]

* [[Living in Aa Furniture Store]]

* [[Shiny -Looking Spaceships]]

'''==Shiny End'''==

=== Anime and Manga ===

=== Film ===

* The ''[[Star Wars]]'' [[Prequel|prequelsprequel]]s

* ''<nowiki>~[[2001: A Space Odyssey~</nowiki>]]''

=== Live-Action TV ===

** The 2009 ''[[Star Trek (Filmfilm)|Star Trek]]'' movie, on the other hand, has some very, [[Lens Flare|very]] shiny parts (where all the iPod-esque walls and screens appear to be scrubbed by [[Red Shirt|red shirts]] armed with with Federation-issue general-purpose cleaning solution every hour on the hour) contrasted with some grittier parts (grittier for the series, anyhow; busier, messier crowd scenes than anything previously seen in ''Trek'', the outsides of the ships are clearly not scrubbed with the same rigor as the insides, child Kirk speeds in a jalopy whose only really shiny parts are the electronics, industrial-grade rails and plastic curtains abound, and Vulcan is made of dust storms {{spoiler|even before it gets turned to dust entirely}}).

* ''[[Mad Men]]'': The Sterling Cooper offices are elegant examples of the International Style, the brand-new SCDP offices--particularlyoffices—particularly Roger's office--areoffice—are enthusiastically Mid-Century Modern (i.e. That Style You See And Immediately Think "Sixties" No Not Hippie Stuff The Other Thing, Yes, Like JFK Airport), the Draper house is well-furnished (though not expensively so), even Peggy's small Brooklyn apartment is well-kept (well-worn, but hardly "gritty"...unless you would describe a well-maintained kitchen as "gritty"...), and the hotels and restaurants we see are mostly top-hole. And let's not forget the [[Gorgeous Period Dress]]. Of course, the series follows ad executives in the early Sixties (i.e. the era of the Three Martini Lunch and other such examples of excess), and additionally borrows heavily from the "visual vocabulary" of the era, so it's hardly surprising that despite the lean towards cynicism, the show is pretty much on the shiny end. Mind you, the occasional bit of dirt shows up, but it's not terribly common.

=== Toys ===

=== Video Games ===

** Unless, of course, you are playing the [[Heavy Metal (Music)|Heavy Metal]] version.

* ''[[Super Mario Galaxy (Video Game)|Super Mario Galaxy]]''

* ''[[MirrorsMirror's Edge]]'' is very high on the shiny scale, with lots of clean white and bright sunlight, yet it feels also very oppressive and gloomy.

* ''[[Umineko no Naku Koro Nini]]'' juxtaposes a very shiny wealthy family and very shiny inhuman witches with horrific, gritty murders full of [[Gorn]]. However, the shiny aspects definitely win out for the overall production.

=== Web Comics ===

=== Western Animation ===

** ''[[Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Disney film)|Snow White]]'' has the least gritty mine and miners ever.

'''==Somewhere In The Middle'''==

=== Film ===

* The films of ''[[Harry Potter (Filmfilm)|Harry Potter]]'': Magic is sparkly; ancient castles are not; the vague [[Steampunk]] vibe is somewhere in the middle.

=== Live-Action TV ===

=== Video Games ===

* ''[[World of Goo (Video Game)|World of Goo]]'' has elements common in both ends.

=== Web Comics ===

* ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20110924014530/http://www.blastwavecomic.com/index.php?p=comic&nro=1 Gone With The Blastwave]'' takes place in a completely ruined city, but the would-be [[Badass Longcoat]] soldiers manage to somehow stay fairly clean.

=== Western Animation ===

* ''[[The Transformers (Animationanimation)|The Transformers]]''

'''==Gritty End'''==

=== Anime and Manga ===

=== Comic Books ===

=== Film ===

* ''[[Monty Python and Thethe Holy Grail]]'', although plenty of historical films at the time were made in reaction to [[Gorgeous Period Dress]].

** [[Terry Gilliam (Creator)|Terry Gilliam]]'s ''Jabberwocky'' is, if anything, even grittier.

* ''[[La Reine Margot (Filmfilm)|La Reine Margot]]'' made even the gorgeous period dresses look gritty.

* ''[[Nineteen Eighty -Four]]'', especially the 1984 (yes!) film version.

* ''[[Repo! theThe Genetic Opera]]'', where we learn that the future is [[Goth]] and cities are little spots of grime surrounded by graveyards. And seas full of dead bodies. Then again, there ''was'' that pesky organ failure epidemic...

=== Live-Action TV ===

* ''[[The Wire]]'' was intentionally shot to maximize the run-down aspects of Baltimore. The studio executives were uncertain about this decision at first, but in the end went along with it -- toit—to great effect.

=== Video Games ===

* ''[[Machinarium (Video Game)|Machinarium]]'': Game takes place in a mechanical city made largely out of decaying buildings made out of cracking stone and rusty metal. This world is completely devoid of living animals although there is some plant life present.

* Most [[First -Person Shooter]] games in the modern day fall pretty deep into the gritty end of the scale.

'''==Contrasting'''==

=== Anime and Manga ===

* ''[[WolfsWolf's Rain]]'' has the dirt covered, dilapidated human cities that sharply contrast with the glittery, self-indulgent decadence of the Nobles' flying ships.

=== Comic Books ===

=== Film ===

* ''[[The HitchhikersHitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy (Filmfilm)|The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy]]'' manages to hit every point in the spectrum. Arthur even points it out. "Well, it's a whole lot better than that dingy Vogon crate! This is my idea of a spaceship, all gleaming metal, flashing lights, everything."

* ''[[Robo Cop|RoboCop]]'' takes place in gritty [[Twenty Minutes Into the Future|Old Detroit]], but the evil and shiny OCP corporation plans to develop a cleaner and shinier Delta City "where Old Detroit now stands".

* ''[[Slumdog Millionaire]]'' is gritty for the majority of the flashbacks depicting Jamal's childhood in the slums, which starkly contrasts with the sleek, stylized look of ''[[Who Wants to Be Aa Millionaire?]]?''

* ''[[Twenty Eight28 Days Later]]'' takes a somewhat unorthodox approach to mixing the two. The ''look'' of the film overall is gritty (they shot it on digital camcorders for this reason), but a lot of the locations are of typically shiny and clean places (hospitals, a castle, convenience store etc). The look of the film and the locations eventually converge as the story progresses.

* ''[[Underworld (Filmfilm)|Underworld]]'' contrasts the shiny vampires and their shiny mansion and their shiny clothes with the gritty, concrete-plywood-and-brown-leather existence of the Lycans.

=== Literature ===

=== Live-Action TV ===

* ''[[Babylon Five5]]'' does this a fair amount. Most areas on the station are crowded, but nice enough; the command staff quarters are nice, if sometimes a bit Spartan; the ambassadorial wing is VERY shiny (or its equivalent; it's implied that for Narns, at least, "shiny" still involves furniture of rough-hewn stone); and Downbelow is just a hell-hole.

* The TARDIS interior from ''[[Doctor Who (TV)|Doctor Who]]'', compare the sterile and minimalist console room from the old series with Ninth and Tenth's dilapidated techno-organic console, or Eleventh's cobbled-together steampunk decor.

=== Tabletop Games ===

* ''[[Warhammer 40 K,000]]'' runs the entire spectrum, with the [[The Fair Folk|Eldar]] at the shiny end, [[The Corruption|Chaos]] at the gritty end & everybody else somewhere in the middle.

*** The Dark Eldar, like other followers of Slaanesh, are shiny. However, they strive to be gritty in order to express their love of inflicting [[Cold -Blooded Torture]]. So they [[Scary Impractical Armor|put blades all over their armor]], although they just end up looking [[Narm|ridiculous]].

=== Theatre ===

* The musical ''[[Wicked (Theatretheatre)|Wicked]]'' manages to combine both aspects with Shiz and the Emerald City being fairly shiny, but the Witchunters and Kiamo Ko being pretty gritty.

=== Video Games ===

* ''[[Portal (Video Gameseries)|Portal]]'' is shiny in the test chambers (and even there, there are broken parts) and gritty after the [[Wham! Episode|Wham Level]]. The first half of the game is shiny, the second half is gritty.

* ''[[Chrono Trigger (Video Game)|Chrono Trigger]]'': Compare the [[Crystal Spires and Togas]] kingdom of Zeal to the run-down, [[After the End]] scenario of 2300 A.D.

* ''[[BioBioShock Shock(series)]]'' is an interesting example: it was once ''very'' shiny, but it was made gritty by a civil war.

* ''[[StarcraftStarCraft]]'' features a war between the shiny Protoss, the gritty Terrans, and the even grittier Zerg.

* ''[[Deus Ex (Video Game)|Deus Ex]]'' aggregates nice and tidy accommodations of Versalife corporation and UNATCO headquarters and the rather unpleasant urban neighborhoods (barring Paris that will look gorgeous even the world comes rolling to the doors of Hell).

* Ditto for ''[[Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines]]''. The [[La Croix]]LaCroix Tower explicitly stands out of the generally bleak and tarnished surroundings. As a matter of fact, the Downtown LA map where the Tower is situated features this in spades: the western half of the map features an [[Abandoned Hospital]], an awful lot of dingy-looking buildings and houses, a crackhouse, the Last Round bar, a derelict warehouse, and an underpass used by the local vagrants as shelter. The eastern half of the map, while still somewhat gritty, features the Confession Club (which used to be a cathedral), the Skyline Apartment Building, and the decidedly upmarket Empire Hotel.

* ''[[EveEVE Online]]'' has shiny Amarr ships versus "flying junkyard" Minmatar ships. Conversely, Gallente ships have shiny, smooth, almost organic curves while Caldari ships are angular and much more utilitarian.

* ''[[Fallout]]'' contrasts the shininess of the Vaults and Brotherhood of Steel-related locations with the ultra-gritty Wasteland. In [[Fallout 1 (Video Game)|the first game]] it is worth noting that the shinier a location, the more likely it was to be ultimately evil, while the gritter-looking places and people were usually mostly harmless. [[Fallout 2]] is ''much'' shinier than the original, with far more built-up cities and far more slick gangsters in the form of mafia-style families and even a porn cinema, while [[Fallout 3 (Video Game)|Fallout 3]] is more gritty, like the first game.

* Taken to extremes in ''[[Dystopia (Videovideo Gamegame)|Dystopia]]'' where [[Cyberspace]] lies on the extreme end of shiny, and meatspace is on the medium-high part of gritty. This is especially noticeable in areas where cyberspace is shaped the same as meatspace. Punk architecture is usually more gritty than Corp architecture.

=== Western Animation ===

=== Real Life ===

** [[Dubai]]. The [[ItsIt's All Upstairs From Here|world's]] biggest tower with "migrant worker areas" at its feet.

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