The Little Shop That Wasn't There Yesterday: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

{{quote|'''Marge:''' Eugh! Homer, where did you get that thing?

'''Shop Vendor:''' ''(waving)'' You'll be sorrrrrrry!|'''[[The Simpsons (animation)|The Simpsons]]''', Treehouse of Horror II, ''The Monkey's Paw''}}

 

 

Just don't expect a liberal returns policy.

 

 

Compare with:

 

{{examples}}

== Anime and Manga ==

* An accidental, curious stopover at a store of this type sets up the entire plot of ''[[Video Girl Ai]]''.

** Akane went to a similar shop and got a recipe and ingredients for a magical snack food (but she messed up the recipe and it tasted awful along with doing the exact opposite of what it intended).

* The villains in the first season of ''[[Sailor Moon]]'' opened a series of shops as fronts to steal the [[Life Energy]] that they needed from ordinary humans.

** Also used by the villains in the second arc of the second season.

** Palla Palla created a dentist clinic in an episode of the fourth season.

* One of these traps Sasami in an episode of ''[[Tenchi in Tokyo]]''. (Although, neither she nor Tenchi had ever been in the area before, so nobody knew that the shop was magical.)

* In ''[[Aria]]'', Akari winds up in a cafe that is usually only open to cats. Sure enough, when she walks out it appears to have been long abandoned.

* The eponymous pet shop in ''[[Pet Shop of Horrors]]'' tends to stay in one place a bit longer than most of the listed examples, but still has the ability to vanish mysteriously overnight, and fits the trope precisely in most other ways.

* Kaede gets the coffee mug that starts off the whole ''Wagamama Fairy * Mirumo de Pon!'' series, but only in the anime. In the manga, her mother gives it to her as a souvenir from her recent trip.

* In [[Naruto]], [[Cool Old Guy|Jiraiya]] sneaks into [[City of Canals|Amegakure]] and sets up a pub on one of the lower levels of the city to lure in two Amegakure ninja. He plays the role of barkeeper before throwing off his [[Paper-Thin Disguise|ridiculous disguise]], then the pub [[Malevolent Architecture|turns into]] [[Frogs and Toads|a toad]].

* In ''[[Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch]] Pure'', there were two instances of this, both set up by the villains. One was a videoke house (that somehow had the heroines' songs in their list), and a fortuneteller's tent. Both in the same place, but not at the same time, of course. One character even noted it.

 

== Comic Books ==

* Subverted in the 90's version of DC's ''[[Starman (comics)|Starman]]''. Jack (Starman, on the run from the Bad Guys) ducks into an alley and discovers a fortune teller's shop that he's never seen before. He thinks it's something like this trope... until the fortune teller explains that she's been there for a few months, and there's nothing mysterious about Jack not noticing.

* [[Grant Morrison]]'s ''[[Doom Patrol]]'' had an entire ''street'' made of nothing but Little Shops That Weren't There Yesterday. Also, the street is a transvestite. [[It Makes Sense in Context]]. Or not.

 

== Film ==

* Ostensibly, this is where Gizmo the Mogwai was purchased in the first ''[[Gremlins]]'' movie.

** In the sequel, the shop gets bulldozed and replaced by ''the little skyscraper mall that wasn't there last week.''

 

== Literature ==

* Terry Pratchett did this once or twice in his [[Discworld]] novels:

*** There's also a traveling shop in the Discworld MUD, which sells some very rare items, and is useful for getting to distant locations.

* Subject of the novel ''[[Needful Things]]'' by [[Stephen King]]. Lightly subverted in that the building itself ''was'' there yesterday and will be there tomorrow: it's run as a perfectly normal small town curio store, complete with "coming soon" signs before the grand opening and regular business hours. ''(Tuesdays and Thursdays by appointment.)'' Less suspicious that way.

** Of course, given that the story is by ''[[Stephen King]]'', the question is: Will the ''town'' still be there by the time all is said and done? {{spoiler|The answer is, "No." This was the last Castle Rock story, for just that reason.}}

* This is the entire premise for the ''[[Magic Shop]]'' series of books by [[Bruce Coville]], where children buy powerful magical relics from a magical shop like this, usually ones that teach them [[An Aesop]].

** ''Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher'' has the title character buying a dragon's egg from the magic shop, which he then finds out he has to hatch. (Actually, the egg chose him. Dragons apparently have the power to attract their own prenatal egg-sitters.)

** In ''Juliet Dove, Queen of Love'', an extremely shy girl named Juliet goes into the store, but instead of the old man we have come to expect, a strange woman gives her a necklace - which can't be removed. It's the amulet once owned by Helen of Troy, and has the same effect on all the boys in Juliet's class...

** In a short story in one of Bruce Coville's "Book Of" anthologies, a young man who expresses interest in the metamorphosis stage trick (where the magician switches places with his assistant) and is given a bag and an instruction manual. The instructions say to sleep in the bag every night over a certain period, and when he complies, he starts to grow wings. This story is actually one of the few times where what the character wants from the shop more or less matches up with what the character needs, because he happens to live with an extremely abusive uncle...

* The shop from which Cassie, of ''The Haunting Hour Volume One: Don't Think About It'', purchased the book was located down an alley, changed its room layout to prevent her from leaving until she made the intended purchase, and disappeared soon after. The owner ''did'' stick around long enough to give them a cryptic (and by "cryptic", I mean "reasonably obvious") clue as to how to deal with the thing that had been unleashed. And to remind her that she had broken the first rule of the book...

* The basic premise of ''The Moving Toyshop'' by Edmund Crispin. It's a detective story, so there's [[You Meddling Kids|a logical reason of course]].

* ''The Store'', a novel by Bentley Little. A nice little patch of land turns up bulldozed one day. Despite a dead guy under some knocked-over trees, the eponymous store is built and all kinds of horrors, mundane and supernatural happen. Anything can be bought, if you ask the right questions. From the oddly possible, powerful firecrackers for a nickel, to the insanely impossible, such as a video game called 'N*** gerKill' (not censored) . Eventually the whole place goes cockeyed, the villains seemingly defeated but...a small farmer's market several hundred miles away terrifies a traveling couple.

* The 1915 [[Lord Dunsany]] short story ''The Bureau d'Echange de Maux'' features a little shop in Paris where men may exchange whatever "evil" or burden they feel they have for twenty francs. Once a trade is made, a client will never find the Bureau again.

* [[Walter The Weremouse]] features: An old lady, a secret reading room in a library, some strange phone cards, an eleven key on payphones, and some strange cheese, all of which appear only under very specific circumstances. The old lady is at the center of it all, and she eventually turns out to be the daughter of a renowned supernatural expert, and terrible procrastinator; she's the daughter he never got around to having, the reading room is full of books he never got around to writing, and in fact he never got around to becoming renowned or even a supernatural expert. She appears to people who make up the dregs of society, but nonetheless have the potential to be something much more if only they were able to get around to it, and gives them the means to get around to it.

* A short story from an old issue Isaac Asmov's Science Fiction that went something like: The protagonist - a dentist - noticed a new donut shop on the way to work and bought some. He noticed that when he dunked them in milk (his personal donut-eating technique) they sucked all the milk into the hole with incredible force. After some examination he determined that they were mobius donuts, with a half-twist in them. With a little experimentation with some extracted teeth he had in his office, he realized they really, ''really'' liked to "eat" calcium and he considered what would have happened if he had taken a bite. He went back to the store and jammed two donuts together whereupon the store disappeared fairly spectacularly.

* Played with in "The Astronomic Blur", a [[Story Within a Story]] in [[Thomas Ligotti]]'s ''"Sideshow", and Other Stories'', in which a small shop that [[Weirdness Censor|no-one had previously noticed]] is suddenly inhabited by... [[Cosmic Horror|something.]]

** The mask shop in "The Greater Festival Of Masks" seems to be one of these, although [[Mind Screw|it is probably one of the least mystifying things in said story]].

'''Shopkeeper''': This isn't that kind of store. I'd go out of business if I kept moving my location. }}

* In ''[[Garrett P.I.|Deadly Quicksilver Lies]]'', Garrett exits the witch Handsome's shop without asking her a question he should've. He immediately turns back, but the shop entrance has vanished. Being [[Genre Savvy]], Garrett isn't surprised, figuring it serves him right to be denied a second chance to ask.

 

* Sardo's Magic Mansion from ''[[Are You Afraid of the Dark?]]'' was a recurring setting in several episodes.

** The toy factory in "The Thirteenth Floor".

** It's a bit of a subversion, since Sardo has no idea how to actually do magic or how the stuff in his shop works. He's just the middleman. His shop being mobile is probably something in the store beyond his control.

* It also showed up in a Christmas Episode of ''[[Punky Brewster]]''.

* Not so much a shop as potential employer in ''[[Malcolm in the Middle]]''. After eavesdropping on a coworker's phone interview, Hal took off to a building he'd never been to before for a new job. He'd never remembered it being there before. He went through a lot of weird trials and tests as part of the interview (say, spy-type stuff), and when he decided against the job...the entire building was gone the next day.

* This was the basis for the ''Sharon, Lois & Bram's Elephant Show'' episode "Curio Shoppe". The titular shop sells magical antiques that let the trio live out their daydreams. When they go back to show Eric Nagler, the shop is gone.

 

* ''Dark Dungeons'' RPG, supplement ''Samaris, Island of Adventure''. In the city of Southport there's a small magickal shop called the Bizarre of the Bizarre. It can only be found at night, and even then only sometimes. Those who find it can buy the most wonderful gifts and items of all. Unfortunately most visitors never realize that these objects are mere delusions hiding worthless junk. Or are they?

 

== Video Games ==

* Throughout the ''[[Persona (video game)|Persona]]'' series, there's a place called the Velvet Room. The long-nosed man who runs it, Igor, can fuse Personae together for you. Only the main character can even see its door, and it appears in the strangest places, such as [[Persona 3|under the stairs of a karaoke bar]], or [[Persona 4|in the back of a limo]].

** But in Persona 1 and 2, everybody could enter it. Also, everybody could change Personas.

* ''[[Time Hollow]]'' has not only the store that wasn't there, but also the store that used to be there... and some other Fridge Logic moments

* ''[[The World Ends With You]]'' does this with one of its missions; namely, a competing ramen shop opens up and somehow closes in the span of one day. Somewhat subverted, as you can get the ramen shop to reopen depending on certain actions later in the game.

** It should be noted, this is actually impossible to do in-game.

* The titular [[Lovecraft Country|rural New England]] [[Town with a Dark Secret|town]] of ''[[Anchorhead]]'' has one (complete with odd old shopkeeper), which is also the source of a key artifact you'll need to win the game.

 

== Web Comics ==

* ''[[HERO (Webcomic)|HERO]]'' does not have any little shops that weren't there yesterday. However, it ''does'' have an enormous oceanic base-on-stilts that wasn't there two seconds ago.

* ''[[MSF High]]'': Subverted: While Donovan's sword is said to be an ancient artifact wielded by a destined hero bought at one of these, it was revealed to be made by the Magic Teacher, who runs her own company!

 

== Web Original ==

* [http://www.improfanfic.com/shops/ One of Those Shops] is an experimental branching [[Round Robin]] writing project whose premise involves the main character ending up as the owner of a Little Shop.

* ''[[The Barber (novel)|The Barber]]'' has a ''Barbershop'' that wasn't there yesterday.

** Similarly, [[Ben Drowned]] has its protagonist getting a haunted [[The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask|Majora's Mask]] cartridge from a garage sale. When he comes back to talk to the old man he bought it from after the game begins acting... ''strange'', he finds that his house is for sale. Really, this trope seems to be common in creepypasta about video games.

 

== Western Animation ==

* The pilot of ''[[Clerks the Animated Series]]'' has both the Towering Skyscraper That Wasn't There Yesterday ("''That's'' new.") ''and'' The Glossy Shopping Mall That Wasn't There Yesterday ("I find it hard to believe no one noticed that either."). The Skyscraper remains, but the Mall soon disappears... less because of magic, and more because Jay and Silent Bob [[Stuff Blowing Up|blow it up]].

* In ''[[Kim Possible]]'', Ron's parents adopt a child from the Adoption Agency that Wasn't There Yesterday. By the time Kim and Ron realize his sister has super powers, it's a newly-opening pet store. Fortunately, despite her super strength, Hana is friendly and benign (toward the protagonists, at least.)

 

== Real Life ==

* Without the mystical elements, it's not too surprising to see various shops come and go within the malls and various single-landlord shopping complexes in America.

** Same with franchised stores.

 

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