The Gump: Difference between revisions

{{quote|"''Yeah, sir, you might want to send a maintenance man over to that office across the way. The lights are off, and they must be looking for a fuse box, 'cause them flashlights, they keep me awake.''"|'''[[Forrest Gump]]''', on a [[Historical In-Joke|disturbance at the Watergate complex]]}}

Enter '''The Gump'''. While in many cases an original and often very well-written character in their own right, this character simply cannot get around the fact that a good chunk of his screen time is being the driving force behind major events that have already been written or described by others. In effect, he is made more interesting by association due to having "guest starred" in a suitably major event. Just like anything else, it depends on the strength of the writing. If done well, The Gump can be a brilliant twist on an old historical event or previous plot. If not, then he can be a leech who drains strength of character for himself at the expense of the host event.

Not to be confused with flying furniture of the same name from ''[[The Marvelous Land of Oz]]'' and ''[[Return to Oz]]'', nor the elf in ''[[Legend (film)|Legend]]''.

* ''[[Atomic Robo]]'' alternately averts this trope and plays it straight. Robo participates in World War II in a story where Robo is off on a side mission while real-life soldiers are fighting real-life battles; goes along for the ride for the first Mars probe mission but does not contribute anything to the actual accomplishments of NASA; and he declares himself neutral during the Cold War. He has, however, been to the moon, but probably well after humans had already made it. Essentially, Atomic Robo is [[The Gump]] in that he's around for all sorts of historical events, but he's an aversion because he never takes away from what was done by historical human beings.

** [[The Zelig]] is a combination of [[The Gump]] and [[Master of Disguise]]. Whenever he met a famous person, he would [[Blank Slate|blend in]] with them, being mistaken for a member of their inner circle. This allowed him to [[Kavorka Man|bed hundreds of women]]. He could also [[Black Like Me|change his race]], and being played by Woody Allen, caused the Ku Klux Klan to pronounce him [[I Resemble That Remark|"a triple threat"]].

* ''[[Titanic]]'' implies that its heroes inadvertently doomed the ship--theship—the watchmen didn't see the iceberg soon enough because they were distracted by Jack and Rose kissing on the deck. These two also manage to visit pretty much every area of the ship as it sinks and one moment or another, and are even on the stern when the ship goes down. Between Jack, Rose, and a few other main characters, we see pretty much every major episode of the sinking.

* In ''[[Back to The Future]]'', we see that Marty is responsible for the skateboard, the frisbee, rock and roll, inspiring a black janitor to become mayor, and his own name. Specifically, he inspires [[Chuck Berry]] to write "Johnny B. Goode", as one of Berry's friends witnesses it and calls Berry.

* The ''[[Flashman]]'' series often moves in this direction, having him not only indirectly responsible for important events in British history, but also having him as the inspiration for ''[[The Prisoner of Zenda]]'' and ''Uncle Tom's Cabin'' (!). One novella, ''Flashman and the Tiger,'' has him getting the [[Sherlock Scan]] from [[Lawyer-Friendly Cameo|lawyer friendly cameos]] of [[Sherlock Holmes]] and Watson and isn't as well done since the series (outside of the characters of ''[[Tom BrownsBrown's Schooldays]]'') doesn't have literary characters as real people, only as the inspirations for them.

* ''[[Discworld/The Science of Discworld|The Science of Discworld]]'' novels posit our world being a sort of novelty science experiment on the Discworld, where the wizards' meddling is not only responsible for life in general, but more specifically [[Shakespeare]]'s and Darwin's successes.

* Elias Vaughn in the [[Star Trek Novel Verse]]. Introduced in the [[Star Trek Deep Space Nine relaunchRelaunch]], he was an elderly Starfleet officer with a long history in Starfleet Special Operations. He went on to make apperances in novels fleshing out many established events in the Federation's history; the [[Star Trek: The Lost Era|Tomed Incident]], the [[Star Trek: The Lost Era|Betreka Nebula Incident]], the [[Star Trek: The Battle of Betazed|fight to liberate Betazed from the Dominion]], among others. That well-known but as-yet-unexplored historical event? Vaughn will probably have been involved. Some readers certainly feel this trope got over-used with Vaughn.

{{quote| "The heroine is a sort of super-Mata-Hari, who is, alternately and sometimes simultaneously, in the pay of the Nazis, the Soviets, the Vatican, Chiang Kai-Shek, the Japanese Emperor, and the Jewish International Bankers, and she sleeps with everybody but Joe Stalin and Mao Tse-tung, and of course, she is in on every step of the A-bomb project. She even manages to stow away on the ''Enola Gay'', with the help of a general she's spent fifty incandescent pages seducing." }}

*** Somewhat [[Justified Trope|justified]] there, in that Jenny is literally the "spirit of the 20th century"—being -- being [[The Gump]] is pretty much part of the job description.

* ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'':* A flashback in the Anya-centric "Selfless" episode shows the ex-vengeance demon and her friend Halfrek dining in a room full of massacred victims in St. Petersburg in the year 1905. Halfrek praises her for granting a wish which seemingly sparked the Russian Revolution.

{{quote| '''Halfrek''': There’s a revolution going on outside that you are somewhat responsible for. Aren’t you the teeniest bit interested?<br />

*:* Anya's past Marxism is a comical allusion to her later [[Patriotic Fervor]] which sees her fall deeply in love with capitalism.

** [[Doctor Who/NS/Recap/S3 E2S29/E02 The Shakespeare Code|Inspired Shakespeare]];

** [[Doctor Who/Recap/S19 E4/E04 The Visitation|Started the Great Fire of London]];

** [[Doctor Who/Recap/S2 E4/E04 The Romans|Accidentally inspired Nero to start the Fire of Rome]]:

** Been responsible for [[Doctor Who/Recap/S19 E6/E06 Earthshock|a spaceship crashing into Earth and killing off the dinosaurs]];

** [[Doctor Who/NS/Recap/S4 E2S30/E02 The Fires of Pompeii|Made Mt. Vesuvius explode]];

** and even [[Doctor Who/Recap/S17 E2/E02 City of Death|ensured that the "spark" that kicked off the development of life would take place.]]

** And, going with the theme of Watergate being mentioned, [[Doctor Who/Recap/S32 E1/E01 The Impossible Astronaut|the Doctor, very clearly, tells Nixon to keep his tape on constantly, so he never forgets anything.]] Now, who knows what ACTUALLY happened in those missing 18 minutes?

*** Not to mention the side character who killed Jack the Ripper. ''Side'' character.

** Hercules embedded Excalibur itself in stone, found himself caught up in the Norse gods' [[Rag Na RokRagnarok]], invented the Olympics (with Salmoneus providing the name), saved King Midas from his gold curse and was present at the destruction of Atlantis. Iolaus, meanwhile, was implied to be one of the Three Wise Men and helped claim the Golden Fleece.

* Brazilian miniseries ''Copas de Mel'' had the titular character and her husband helping Brazil conquer most of its [[FIFA World Cup|FIFA World Cups]]s.

* In the flashbacks of ''[[Lost]]'''s fifth season finale, the infamous {{spoiler|Jacob}} appears repeatedly in other peoples' flashbacks, always being responsible for something important in those characters' lives: he buys Kate the lunchbox she uses for her time capsule, gives Sawyer a pen with which to write his letter to the real Sawyer, preventing Sayid from being hit by the car that kills {{spoiler|Nadia}}, saying hello to Sun and Jin at their wedding, asking Ilana for help with an unspecified task, speaking to--andto—and possibly reviving--Lockereviving—Locke after he is thrown out a window, giving Jack a candy bar after his first surgery, and convincing Hurley to return to the island.

* A episode of ''[[Blossom]]'' spoofed the trope namer in a dream sequence. Blossom had the Gump role and was responsible for inadvertently giving [[Michael Jackson]] the inspiration for the moonwalk. The parody is spoiled because the writers [[Did Not Do the Research]] -- they—they meet ''after'' the Pepsi commercial shoot which left him injured, which was in 1984. He first performed the moonwalk the previous year.

{{quote| '''Helen''': There ''is'' such a thing as before my time!<br />

'''Will''': *skeptical look* Really?<br />

* The music video of "Wir sind Wir". The photographer is there during the reconstruction post [[WW 2]], was at a famous soccer game, and the fall of the Berlin wall (he even took pictures of it going up).

** Alternate intepretation: the narrator is [[Humans Are Bastardsthe Real Monsters|humanity itself]].

* ''[[Witch Girls Adventures]]'' has a lot of it. Most gods, mythical heroes, legendary monsters and the like are somewhat distorted accounts of witches and otherkin; witches were major players in the Underground Railroad and were responsible for starting the American civil war; open Witch and Otherkin influence was pivotal in the flourishing of science and the arts in the late 19th and early 20th century and Allied victory in World War II -- butII—but was later erased from records and memory by the witches; the Flower Power movement was the result of a large-scale spell cast by the counselor and several students at Coventry school for girls... it goes on like this for a bit.

* The Boss from [[Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater]] is the United States' Queen of this trope. By the very end it is revealed {{spoiler|that she participated in major Nuclear Bomb's testing, became the first human in space before Yuri Gagarin, participated in the Normandy landing, the Bay of Pigs Invasion, and Project Mercury}}.

** In-universe, Johnny Sasaki lives and breathes this trope. By sheer coincidence, he winds up getting involved as a minor [[Mook]] in all of Snake's missions ,<ref> As a member of the Genome Soldiers in ''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'', as one of the Gurlukovich mercenaries in ''[[Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty]]'', and as a member of Rat Patrol 01 in ''[[Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots]]''</ref>, and his grandfather (also named Johnny) personally met Big Boss while serving as a guard at Grosnyj Grad in ''[[Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater]]''. Despite his stupidity and general bumbling nature, he's one of the few recurring characters to actually survive all that insanity--whichinsanity—which Snake happily lampshades.

{{quote| "How the ''hell'' did you survive ten years?"}}

** It was {{spoiler|really Kota}} who did most of the important work. He was the one who {{spoiler|located and contacted all of the Rebel leaders,}} and Galen never would have gotten as far as he did without his guidance. Not to mention the fact that {{spoiler|the future Rebel senators}} were not only already familiar with each other, but that their plans {{spoiler|for an Alliance}} went back as far as ''before the Empire was declared''. The only reason Galen got all the credit is probably because he did most of the fighting, along with {{spoiler|his [[Heroic Sacrifice]] aboard the Death Star I.}} It would be more accurate to say that Galen, {{spoiler|Kota, and the rest of the Rogue Shadow crew}} were ''collectively'' [[The Gump]].

* In the [http://everything2.com/title/SPECWEAPS SPECWEAPS] story series, a lot of events throughout history and the modern day have apparently been caused by weaponization of and warfare between [[Eldritch Abomination|Eldritch Abominations]]s. Specifically, [[H.P. Lovecraft|the originals]].

* The collective story of the [https://web.archive.org/web/20160402232432/http://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=85097 AH.com Eternals] strays into this. The immortal named Gregorios has so far served as an ambassador for the Emperor Anastasius, been a trader on the Silk Road, lived as a farmer (and charged as a witch) in [[Anglo -Saxons|Anglo-Saxon]] England, been "executed" by the Sassanids, fought in the Battle of Septimania, inspired the writing of ''[[Beowulf]]'', worked as a merchant in Tang China, lived as a Yakut nomad, served in the Byzantine navy, defended Paris against a Viking invasion, circumnavigated medieval Ireland, fought in the Welsh armies against the invading Anglo-Saxons, went with Leif Ericsson to discover Vinland, became a tribal chief in the Miqmaq nation, served as an interpreter in the Crusader States, became Balian of Ibelin, was sold as a slave after the Venetians sacked Constantinople, served as interpreter and guide for [[The Travels of Marco Polo|Marco Polo]], inspired the image of [[The Grim Reaper]], fathered the Romanov dynasty, fought at the final [[Fall of Constantinople]], sailed with [[Christopher Columbus]] to the New World, got painted into "The Last Judgement Day," fought with the Catholic League during the French Wars of Religion, took part in the first production of ''[[Romeo and Juliet]],'' became one of the founding members of the Plymouth Colony, served as a professor or languages at Harvard, rode circuit as a doctor in colonial Virginia, dumped tea at the Boston Tea Party, and fought in both the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.]] And he's only told his story up to 1827.

** [https://web.archive.org/web/20120730092348/http://www.timeslikethis.com/index.php?id=488 The classic "clumsy chef" bit] on [[Sesame Street]].

** [https://web.archive.org/web/20120730092357/http://www.timeslikethis.com/index.php?id=162 Ellen DeGeneres' talk show.]

** [https://web.archive.org/web/20120730092325/http://www.timeslikethis.com/index.php?id=196 A key scene in] [[Monty Python and Thethe Holy Grail]].

** [https://web.archive.org/web/20120730092304/http://www.timeslikethis.com/index.php?id=332 The Declaration of Independence.]

** [https://web.archive.org/web/20120730092441/http://www.timeslikethis.com/index.php?id=102 A hook for a Prince song.]

{{quote| '''Bender:''' That's no flying saucer. That's my ass!}}

* ''[[American Dragon: Jake Long]]'' invokes this trope in at least two episodes.

* ''[[The Fairly Odd ParentsOddParents]]'': Cosmo sunk Atlantis nine times, caused the volcanic eruption that destroyed Pompeii and George Washington used his head as a cannon ball to win a battle.