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{{meta-trope}}
You have before you three series. The first, Series A, was the first known use of a trope, but it may or may not have been intentional. The second, Series B, was the first intentional use of the trope. The third, Series C, does not claim originality, and may in fact have ripped off series B, but is the template that all later uses of this trope follow.
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Series B is the [[Trope Maker]].
Series C is the
The [[Trope Maker]] is frequently also the
The
'''Important''': "Trope Codifier" does not mean [[Most Triumphant Example (Sugar Wiki)|the Most Triumphant Example]]. It means "Example that has fingerprints of influence on all later examples of the trope". The true marker of a Codifier is that it invents some unique spin on the trope that ''all'' later examples have some reaction to. Take, for example, [[Werewolves]]. There were earlier examples of werewolf stories, but it is with 1941's ''[[The Wolf Man]]'' that we first see werewolves as an infection (previously, it was a curse or part of a [[Deal with the Devil]]), silver vulnerability (previously, it was ''vampires'' or ghosts who were usually associated with weakness to silver), made the werewolf a human cursed to turn into a wolf-man (previously, all kinds of variations were available, from wolf that turns into a man, to man who [[Baleful Polymorph|was permanently turned into a wolf]]), and tied the wolf to the night of the full moon (previously, they either focused on the three nights around the full moon, or had little to do with the phase of the moon). Almost all later examples of Werewolves bear some of these subtropes, which originated with ''The Wolf Man'', or at least [[Discussed Trope|discuss]] them in order to explain why [[Our Werewolves Are Different]]. Thus, we can state with confidence that it is the Trope Codifier.
Examples should be of [[Trope Codifier|Trope Codifiers]] that aren't [[Trope Makers]] themselves.▼
▲Examples should be of
Related to [[Older Than They Think]]. If a [[Trope Codifier]] is particularly influential, and the [[Trope Maker]] a little twisted you may have an [[Unbuilt Trope]].▼
▲Related to [[Older Than They Think]]. If a
Also see [[Most Triumphant Example (Sugar Wiki)|Most Triumphant Example]].
{{examples|Examples:}}▼
== Anime & Manga ==▼
== Advertising ==
* ''Tetsujin 28'' (listed under the English title ''[[Gigantor]]'') was the first giant robot anime made, but the one everyone copied and still references today is ''[[Mazinger Z (Anime)|Mazinger Z]]''.▼
* The Tampa Bay Buccaneers codified [[Cutlass Between the Teeth]] in their promotional materials and helmet logo [[Older Than They Think|decades before it showed up in any anime]].
▲* ''Tetsujin 28'' (listed under the English title ''[[Gigantor]]'') was the first giant robot anime made, but the one everyone copied and still references today is ''[[
** Of course, this depends on whether you consider the genre in question to be "giant robots" or "giant robots piloted by humans". The former is only ''slightly'' larger.
** Similarly, Sayaka Yumi was the
* ''[[
** ''Eva'' is the
* ''[[GaoGaiGar]]'' and ''[[Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann]]'' are the Trope Codifiers for the modern [[Super Robot]] anime, which ''heavily'' runs on exaggeration. Some claim that both are an answer to ''Eva'' but this really isn't the case - in fact both "approaches" to mecha developed side-by-side.
* ''[[Sailor Moon]]'' is frequently cited as the first user of the [[Magical Girl Warrior]] subset of [[Magical Girl]] shows. ''[[Cutey Honey]]'' used some of the tropes, but was usually seen as a straight-up [[Superhero]], especially since at the time "[[Magical Girl]]" meant [[Cute Witch]].
* [[Ranma One Half (Manga)|Ranma Saotome and Akane Tendo]] aren't even [[Rumiko Takahashi]]'s first couple with [[Belligerent Sexual Tension]]. But they're the standard by which all others are measured.▼
** [[Lyrical Nanoha]] codified the modern [[Seinen]] Magical Girl, by taking ''Cutey Honey's'' sex appeal and some of the exaggeration that was common in anime back then, mixing them together into an incredibly potent mix.
▲* ''[[Ranma
** Ranma is also the most likely codifier for [[Martial Arts and Crafts]] unless someone who knows their kung-fu flicks can dethrone it - it's probably harder to think of a pursuit they ''didn't'' use in the series than one they did.
* ''[[Love Hina]]'' essentially defined the current style of [[Unwanted Harem
* ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist]]'' popularized the concept of [[Equivalent Exchange]] and [[Magic
** Also Maes Hughes is the codifer for both [[Doting Parent]] and [[Overprotective Dad]]
* If ''[[Fist of the North Star]]'' is the [[Trope Maker]] for the shonen [[Fighting Series]], then ''[[
* While there had been examples and uses of [[Cyberpunk]] tropes in other series such as ''[[Appleseed]]'', ''[[Ghost in
* ''[[
* ''[[Gundam Wing]]'' jump-started the trend of [[Humongous Mecha]] series having [[Bishonen]] protagonists to give it a [[Periphery Demographic]] of young females.
* ''[[Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann]]'', out of all things, is most certainly the
* ''[[
** Also, Yukari set the standard by which all other [[Drives Like Crazy|bad drivers]] are held up to.
** Also, she and Nyamo, at least in anime (unless [[Evangelion|Misato and Ritsuko]] count), are
* ''[[Higurashi no Naku Koro
* ''[[One Piece]]'' is the codifier for [[Inelegant Blubbering]] (which the author delivers with gusto)
** I see your [[Inelegant Blubbering]] and [[Rubber Man]] and raise you
== Comic Books ==
* ''[[Watchmen]]'' and ''[[The Dark Knight Returns]]'' are co-codifiers of [[Darker and Edgier]].
* [[Superman]] is the
* [[Batman]] is the
* [[The Joker]] is, of course, the
* [[Spider
** Also to [[Building Swing]], Since almost every time you see it anywhere else, it is a reference, or [[Lampshade Hanging|Lampshaded]] by a character.
* Jay Garrick, the first [[The Flash|Flash]] is the
* Robin is the codifier for [[Kid Sidekick]].
* [[Rubber Man]] existed a couple of decades before [[The Fantastic Four]] ([[Plastic Man]] comes to mind here), but it's best-known as Mister Fantastic's power - making Reed Richards the Trope Codifier.
== Film ==
* ''[[Halloween (
* ''[[Star Wars]]'' is the Trope Codifier for Joseph Campbell's [[
** ''[[Star Wars]]'' (along with ''[[Blade Runner]]'') was also instrumental in making the [[Used Future]] concept widespread.
* ''[[Batman (
* The 1931 movie version of ''[[Dracula]]'' codified most modern [[Vampire Tropes]].
** And the Trope Codifier for [[Our Vampires Are Different]] would be ''[[
* The 1940 film ''[[The
* ''[[Birth of a Nation]]'' pulled together all of the little camera tricks and editing techniques that were tried in the early years of film into a coherent set of storytelling tools. It was also horrendously racist. The gymnastics film history classes have to go through because of this are quite amusing.
** ''[[Triumph of the Will]]'' was this for documentaries. It was another source of mental gymnastics for film history and also a codifier of certain
* ''[[This Is Spinal Tap]]'': The Codifier for the feature film [[Mockumentary]] genre. The [[Trope Maker]] is probably ''[[Zelig]]'' by Woody Allen, released just one year before (1983). The older example, [[The Rutles]]' ''All You Need Is Cash'' being a television film (1978).
* ''[[The Blair Witch Project]]'' is the trope codifier for the [[Found Footage Films|found footage]] mockumentary horror films of the '00s. The trope maker is ''[[Cannibal Holocaust]]''.
* 1972's ''[[The Poseidon Adventure]]'' pretty much established the template for future [[Disaster Movie
* Time travel; [[Ur Example]]: ''[[A Connecticut Yankee in King
* The ''[[Creature
* There were car chases on film before, but the one in ''[[Bullitt]]'' became the most famous one which all films after tried to emulate.
* ''[[Forbidden Planet]]'' may be this for several [[Space Opera]] tropes, such as [[Mad Scientist's Beautiful Daughter]], Three-Man Band (was picked up by ''[[Star Trek]]'', but didn't become widespread) and [[Precursors]].
== Literature ==
* The [[Standard Fantasy Setting]]'s [[Trope Maker]] was ''[[The Lord of the Rings]]''; the Trope Codifier was ''[[Dungeons
** Except for [[Vancian Magic]], which was [[Trope Maker|made by]] ''[[Dying Earth (
*** ''D&D'' can also be seen as the Trope Maker of Fantastic Miniatures War Games (''Chainmail'' was the [[Ur Example]] of a Mini's games featuring fantastic elements, and D&D was originally just the "small warbands" variant of it), but ''[[Warhammer Fantasy Battle]]'' and ''[[Warhammer
** Another Trope Codifier was Terry Books's novel ''The Sword of [[Shannara]]'', which showed that [[Doorstopper]] fantasy novels that weren't written by Tolkien could also go on to sell zillions of copies.
* ''[[Sherlock Holmes]]'' is the Trope Codifier for many detective tropes; [[Edgar Allan Poe]]'s ''Dupin'' stories were the [[Trope Maker]], including such tropes as the less astute [[The Watson|Watson figure as narrator]] and the far-reaching deductions based on attention to seemingly trivial details.
** A second possibility, wildly popular at the time but now more obscure, is ''[[The Moonstone]]'' by Wilkie Collins. It placed such concepts as the private detective helping out the near useless police and the [[Locked Room Mystery]] into the popular consciousness a few decades before Doyle's novels.
* ''[[
* [[Raymond Chandler]] is considered the Trope Codifier of hard-boiled crime fiction, following Carroll John Daly with the Ur-example (his "Knights Of the Open Palm" was published several months before Hammett's first 'Continental Op' story) and [[Dashiell Hammett]] (the [[Trope Maker]]).
* The earliest use of [[Ancient Astronauts]] is ''Edison's Conquest of Mars'' from 1898, but the first popular story to use the concept was ''[[
* ''The Red Badge of Courage'' did this for [[War Is Hell]].
* While ''[[Dracula (
* Contrary to [[Older Than They Think|what some fans believe]], ''[[Harry Potter]]'' didn't originate the [[Wizarding School]]
* ''[[Snow Crash]]'' is widely recognized as the codifier for [[The Metaverse]] and the [[Digital Avatar]] but [[William Gibson]] did them first.
* Jonathan Swift's ''A Modest Proposal'' is regarded as the codifier of the [[Stealth Parody]].
* [[Robert E. Howard]]'s [[Conan the Barbarian]] codified the [[Barbarian Hero]]
* ''[[Twilight (
== Live Action TV ==
* In [[Reverse Whodunnit
* Despite the name, [[Dawson Casting]] was neither made nor codified by ''[[
** 90210 is also the
* ''[[Star Trek]]'' did not ''invent'' modern science-fiction television; but it made many science-fiction tropes commonplace on television, so much so that it is its own franchise and has influenced almost every subsequent speculative fiction series since, up to and including ''[[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]]''.
** ''[[Star Trek:
* Mork from ''[[Mork and Mindy]]'' is the most prominent example of an [[Amusing Alien]].
* ''[[Iron Chef]]'' is the
* ''[[Eastenders]]'' is definitely the trope codifer for a miserable [[Soapland Christmas]].
* ''[[Malcolm in
** A year before ''Malcolm'' premiered, ''[[Spaced]]'' did the same thing for British sitcoms.
* [[Everybody Loves Raymond]] was hugely influential to later sitcoms and is a codifier for [[All Women Are Prudes]] in sitcoms (the notoriously anti-sex Debra)
** It was also a reinforcer of the feminist wife who was always right, even if she argued that the sky was kelly green, initially codified by [[Home Improvement (TV series)|Home Improvement]], where wife Jill was a self-admitted feminist and Tim was the one who screwed up 99.5% of the time.
* ''[[Saved
* ''[[The Real World]]'' is the Trope Codifier for [[Reality Show
* ''[[V (TV series)|V]]'' is the
* Lionel Luthor from ''[[Smallville]]'' is the
* ''[[Kamen Rider Ryuki]]'' is the trope codifier for [[There Can Only Be One|Battle Royale-esque]] fiction in Japanese media.
* ''[[Cheers]]'' and [[Belligerent Sexual Tension]]. Sam and Diane provided the template for sitcoms to follow.
* The 2007 reboot of [[Bionic Woman]] was the beginning of a trend of adorning hot [[Badass]] Action Girls in leather jackets, even when such attire would be so uncomfortable it'd be a hindrance (such as in summer heat), but it became a new standard for both [[Rule of Cool]] and [[Rule of Sexy]]. Regardless, after this, we see the leather jacket begin to lose its 20th century image as a macho coat worn by a [[Badass]] like [[Happy Days|Fonzie]] and become seen as a feminine piece of attire that [[Color Coded for Your Convenience|just screams]] [[Action Girl]] with the leather jacket on badass males slowly becoming [[The Artifact]] except on villains. Notable examples of this trend are Erica Evans in V, Carrie Wells in Unforgettable, Renee Walker from 24 (and even one of the main female villains), and especially {{spoiler|Olivia and Peter's future daughter}} Etta, who [[Older Than They Look|looks 17 but is really 25]] in 2036 who is from Fringe.
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== Music ==
* By the time of [[Michael Jackson]], [[Music Video|music videos]] were evolving beyond just shots of the band, but he set the standard for everything that came after him.
* If [[
** W.A.S.P. was the Trope Codifier of heavy metal's ''image'' in the 1980s, combining the Judas Priest facade above with KISS and Alice Cooper-style shock rock antics turned up to eleven, unsubtle Satanic imagery, songs about sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll, big hair, pointy guitars and spandex.
* Pierre Schaeffer's 1948 opus ''Cinq Études de Bruits'' was not the world's first musique concrète. John Cage's ''Imaginary Landscape'' and perhaps other such works predate it. But it was the first music to have that label (coined by Schaeffer), and codified the genre.
* Richard Wagner coined the term "leitmotif" in an 1851 essay and codified the concept in his famous cycle ''Der Ring des Nibelungen,'' which he had been working on at the time. But the trope was invented two decades earlier by Hector Bérlioz, who called it "idée fixe" in his own writings.
* Using Auto-Tune for a robotic effect didn't become prominent until the arrival of [[T-Pain]] in 2005. Unlike other artists that relegated it to subtle uses or genres aiming for a digitalized sound (such as electronica or techno), T-Pain used it obviously and flagrantly on nearly all of his releases. His huge success led to a slew of imitators within pop, R&B, and hip hop.
* If this trope is possible on one network, then [[Hilary Duff]] is the trope codifier for the current batch of teenage [[Idol Singer
* Despite [[
* While [[
== Tabletop Games ==
* It's unclear whether or not ''[[Dungeons
** The [[Order Versus Chaos]] aspect was borrowed from [[Michael Moorcock]], for what that's worth.
* The Zerg of ''[[
** Also The book also broke all the Bugs into casts of Worker and Warrior bugs, all directed by a special hierarchy of subterranean Brain Bugs.
* ''[[GURPS]]'' quite literally defined the [[Weirdness Magnet]] trope.
* Although there were [[Trading Card Game
== Theatre ==
* [[Shakespeare]] is another example; he used almost entirely unoriginal plots (with his fame coming from ''executing'' them brilliantly), so anybody harkening back to Shakespeare for a basic plot is going to the
* "Laurey Makes Up Her Mind" from ''[[Oklahoma!]]'' was the
** ''[[Oklahoma!]]'' can also be considered the
== Video Games ==
* [[Quick Melee]] has existed in some form in shooters, but the ''[[Halo]]'' series is what started the trend in modern shooters, and the ''[[Modern Warfare]]'' series and ''[[Call of Duty: Black Ops
* ''[[
* ''[[Quake]]'' is the codifier for the 'mouselook' control scheme, where instead of only using a keyboard to control an FPS character, you control the view with a mouse as well. Bungie's ''[[Marathon
* Even though ''[[Doom]]'' was the [[Ur Example]] of the [[Space Marine]] trope in videogames, ''[[Halo]]'' became the poster boy for the trope.
* ''[[Super Mario Brothers]]'' was the Codifier for [[Platform Game
** And ''[[
** Not to mention ''[[Super Mario World (
** And then we have the romhacks... [[Kaizo Mario World]] codified [[Platform Hell]] (and, of course, [[Kaizo Trap]].)
** Also worth noting is [[
* ''[[
** [[World of Warcraft]] later became a second Trope Codifier for the MMO genre.
* The ''[[Metal Gear]]'' series and the ''[[Thief]]'' series are jointly the Codifier of the stealth genre. ''Metal Gear Solid'' and ''Thief'' came out at about the same time, but had different approaches. ''MGS'' had a bunch of action sequences, while ''Thief'' was ''pure'' stealth. In fact, when it came out, most critics had difficulty pidgeonholing what category to put ''Thief'' into.
* When it comes to [[Match Three Game
* ''[[Pong]]'' is usually considered the first [[Video Game]] by the general public. The ''actual'' first [[Video Game]] is a bit debatable depending on how you define [[Video Game]], ranging from an unnamed game of [[Cathode Ray Tube Amusement Device]] in 1947 to the 1972-released [[Magnavox Odyssey]] game console (the strongest contender turning out to lie smack in the middle, 1962's ''[[Space War
* [[
* Although there were definitely 3D beat'em ups/hack-and-slashers in the [[PS 1]]/Sega Saturn/Nintendo 64 era, the first ''[[Devil May Cry]]'' gave the genre new popularity and credence and is widely seen as the key inspiration for similar "Stylish Action" games like ''[[God of War (
** Chaining on that previous point, ''God of War'' is one for [[Action Commands]].
** Actually, God of War and Resident Evil 4 came out the same year. That would be why they're both credited. How one views the [[Press X to Not Die]] is another matter entirely.
* ''[[Street Fighter]] II'' for [[Fighting Game
** Also, Ryu is this to [[Shotoclone
*** [[Capcom vs. Whatever]] games for the concept of "tag battle" fighters (discounting wresting games, which have wildly different gameplay.)
* [[Resident Evil 1|Resident Evil]] for the [[Survival Horror]] despite not being the first of its kind.
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* For the 3D [[Fighting Game]], ''[[Tekken]]'' is the most likely codifier, bringing together concepts introduced in [[Trope Maker|preceding 3D fighters]] like [[Virtua Fighter]] and [[Battle Arena Toshinden]].
* Broadly speaking, nothing in any Blizzard game is new or original. They just introduce and tweak the successful elements of previous games to make ones that are quite good. One thing they did create was [[Stop Poking Me|units giving ever more amusing responses if you won't leave them alone]].
* ''[[
* While ''[[Recca]]'' probably was the [[Ur Example]] and ''Batsugun'' was definitely the [[Trope Maker]], ''[[Do Don Pachi]]'' codified very much of [[Bullet Hell]]. And it continues to redefine and codify the meaning of it as the [[True Final Boss]] Hibachi has progressively gotten harder and harder [[Nintendo Hard|beyond]] [[Beyond the Impossible|belief]].
* ''[[Final Fantasy]]''
** It's interesting to know that ''[[Final Fantasy]]''
* ''[[Grand Theft Auto]]'', particularly ''Grand Theft Auto III'', codified the [[Wide Open Sandbox]] genre.
* ''[[Pokémon]]'' is the codifier for the [[Mon|monster-capturing]] game genre, though it is [[Ur Example|predated by]] the [[Darker and Edgier]] [[Shin Megami Tensei]] series.
** And with [[Pokémon Black and White]], Pokemon's even using the [[Anti
* [[Tower Defense]] games were one of the major categories of user-made maps in ''[[
* Also on mods/user-made maps, ''[[Defense of the Ancients]]'' is not the Maker for [[Multiplayer Online Battle Arena]]. The concept was Made by ''Aeon of Strife'' from the ''[[
* The original ''[[Halo]]'' didn't actually ''pioneer'' any of the revolutions in gameplay it featured (all of them, from limited inventory, to [[Walk It Off|regenerating health]], to melee attacks, to seperate buttons for firearms and grenades, had been done before in previous games), but it is unquestionably the game which popularized them all to the point that most modern First Person Shooters now use them by default.
* ''[[
* ''[[Gears of War]]'' took the idea of [[Take Cover]] as an integral part of the gameplay system - as opposed to an organic "hide behind stuff so you stop getting shot" - from earlier games, but the concept's current popularity would most likely not exist without it.
* [[Metroid]] was [[Trope Maker|the first]] [[Metroidvania]]-game, and [[Even Better Sequel|Super Metroid]] is the
* ''[[The Legend of Zelda (
* While most certainly not the first [[Survival Horror]] game, [[Silent Hill]] introduced, or at least popularized atmosphere with limited visibility that maximizes [[Nothing Is Scarier]].
* While the [[Action RPG]] genre had already seen some entries, ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]'' made it mainstream; virtually every [[Action RPG]] since ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]'' owes at least a partial debt to its formula.
* While [[Dune]] is the most likely candidate for the very first [[Real Time Strategy]], [[Command
* While [[Modern Warfare]] wasn't the first game to use an RPG-esque leveling-up system for its multiplayer, you'd be hard pressed to find another online FPS today that doesn't use a system almost exactly like it. It's fairly easy to implement and can keep the player invested for another fifteen to twenty hours that they normally wouldn't have bothered with.
* ''[[Twisted Metal]]'' wasn't the first competitive [[Vehicular Combat]] game (Both ''Battlesport'' and ''Cybersled'' predates it), but it certainly did popularize the genres and some features, such as tournament-based storylines, quirky characters and more differentiated vehicles.
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* [[Tex Avery]], particularly in his short ''[[Red Hot Riding Hood]]'', codified the [[Wild Take]].
* ''[[An American Tail]]'' codified the [[Award Bait Song]], which even spread into live action works.
* [[Popeye]]'s spinach is the codifier for [[Power
* ''[[The Ren and Stimpy Show]]'' codified the [[Gross Up Close
* [[Wallace and Gromit]] codified [[Silent Snarker]]. Seriously.
== Other ==
* ''[[
* An earlier work by [[William Gibson]] [[Trope Namer|coined]] the term "[[Cyberspace]]". Both ''[[Neuromancer]]'' and ''[[Tron]]'' set the standards for what we think of it.
* Acorn Computers' Arthur OS had the Ur-Example. NEXTSTEP had the original and the user-interface trope namer. But if you've got a dock in your operating system, the OS you're inevitably accused of copying is Apple's Mac OSX. So of course it's also [[Older Than They Think]].
* For graphical interface conventions in general (mice, menus, windows, etc.), the Ur-Example was Xerox PARC's groundbreaking research of the '60s and '70s, which never turned into commercial products on their part, but was [[Just for Pun|Xeroxed]] by Apple (the Trope Maker) as the basis for its Macintosh interface, and then ripped off (and made even more popular and mainstream) by Microsoft in Windows, the Trope Codifier.
* Fortune teller characters nowadays will likely take some influence from Miss Cleo. This results in [[Roma
* While not the first [[Video Review Show]], ''[[
* Clarence Darrow's defense of [
* James Watt didn't invent the first stationary steam engine, and George and Robert Stephenson didn't invent the first steam locomotive. But their versions were so much more efficient than previous ones that [[Older Than They Think|they are often credited as the inventors]].
* While there were doubtlessly others before him (one of the earliest known is Liu Pengli in 144 BC), [[Jack the Ripper]] established the concept of [[Serial Killer]]s to the general public and all of them, real or fictional, will be compared to Jack the Ripper. He however far predates the trope name, which was the FBI referring to Wayne Williams in the 1970s.
{{reflist}}
{{Trope Life Cycle}}
[[Category:
[[Category:Tropes of Legend]]
[[Category:Meta Concepts]]
[[Category:
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