thinking again about TvTropes and how it’s genuinely such an amazing resource for learning the mechanics of storytelling, honestly more so than a lot of formally taught literature classes
reasons for this:
basically TvTropes breaks down stories mechanically, using a perspective that’s not…ABOUT mechanics. Another way I like to put it, is that it’s an inductive, instead of deductive, approach to analyzing storytelling.
like in a literature or writing class you’re learning the elements that are part of the basic functioning of a story, so, character, plot, setting, et cetera. You’re learning the things that make a story a story, and why. Like, you learn what setting is, what defines it, and work from there to what makes it effective, and the range of ways it can be effective.
here’s the thing, though: everyone has some intuitive understanding of how stories work. if we didn’t, we couldn’t…understand stories.
TvTropes’s approach is bottom-up instead of top-down: instead of trying to exhaustively explore the broad, general elements of story, it identifies very small, specific elements, and explores the absolute shit out of how they fit, what they do, where they go, how they work.
Every TvTropes article is basically, “Here is a piece of a story that is part of many different stories. You have probably seen it before, but if not, here is a list of stories that use it, where it is, and what it’s doing in those stories. Here are some things it does. Here is why it is functionally different than other, similar story pieces. Here is some background on its origins and how audiences respond to it.”
all of this is BRILLIANT for a lot of reasons. one of the major ones is that the site has long lists of media that utilizes any given trope, ranging from classic literature to cartoons to video games to advertisements. the Iliad and Adventure Time ARE different things, but they are MADE OF the same stuff. And being able to study dozens of examples of a trope in action teaches you to see the common thread in what the trope does and why its specific characteristics let it do that
I love TvTropes because a great, renowned work of literature and a shitty, derivative YA novel will appear on the same list, because they’re Made Of The Same Stuff. And breaking down that mental barrier between them is good on its own for developing a mechanical understanding of storytelling.
But also? I think one of the biggest blessings of TvTropes’s commitment to cataloguing examples of tropes regardless of their “merit” or literary value or whatever…is that we get to see the full range of effectiveness or ineffectiveness of storytelling tools. Like, this is how you see what makes one book good and another book crappy. Tropes are Tools, and when you observe how a master craftsman uses a tool vs. a novice, you can break down not only what the tool is most effective for but how it is best used.
In fact? There are trope pages devoted to what happens when storytelling tools just unilaterally fail. e.g. Narm is when creators intend something to be frightening, but audiences find it hilarious instead.
On that note, TvTropes is also great in that its analysis of stories is very grounded in authors, audiences, and culture; it’s not solely focused on in-story elements. A lot of the trope pages are categories for audience responses to tropes, or for real-world occurrences that affected the storytelling, or just the human failings that creep into storytelling and affect it, like Early Installment Weirdness. There are categories for censorship-driven storytelling decisions. There are “lineages” of tropes that show how storytelling has changed over time, and how audience responses change as culture changes. Tropes like Draco in Leather Pants or Narm are catalogued because the audience reaction to a story is as much a part of that story—the story of that story?—as the “canon.”
like, storytelling is inextricable from context. it’s inextricable from how big the writers’ budget was, and how accepting of homophobia the audience was, and what was acceptable to be shown on film at the time. Tropes beget other tropes, one trope is exchanged for another, they are all linked. A Dead Horse Trope becomes an Undead Horse Trope, and sometimes it was a Dead Unicorn Trope all along. What was this work responding to? And all works are responding to something, whether they know it or not
((The second after-ask picture: Deskel and @koopa-trash-asks‘s Ludwig listening to some classical music together!
I’m actually kinda proud how I drew Ludwig here. Especially the sweater and the poofy hair. XD I’m really getting some experience with texturing in this series! :D
Honestly, Deskel took as long to draw as the first after-ask picture did in whole, the lanky bastard. XD))
My friend from Lebanon wrote up a really good thread on Twitter I thought I should share here, just to clear up some of the inaccuracies floating around:
And here are some of the links they provided:
https://www.supportlrc.app/
https://www.gofundme.com/f/prevent-suicides-due-to-poverty-and-unemployment
https://www.gofundme.com/f/medical-relief-to-lebanon
https://www.gofundme.com/f/hope-for-lebanon
https://www.gofundme.com/f/lebanonneedsorg
http://www.caritas.org.lb/get_involved/donate
https://beitelbaraka.net/donation/pay/
https://gogetfunding.com/beirut-emergency-relief/
https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/lebanon-relief
https://www.givingloop.org/offrejoie
https://www.gofundme.com/f/beirut-explosion-emergency-disaster-relief
@judytheoutlaw the stolen cake probably means Kirby: Squeak Squad, where the Squeaks steal (among other things) Kirby's strawberry shortcake slice. ... which leads to a quest culminating in the Squeaks freeing and Kirby defeating Dark Nebula. Nebula, according to the game's ending, is THE RULER OF THEIR UNIVERSE'S UNDERWORLD.
this is the best tik tok ive ever seen i love her so much
((OOC: May as well. I've got babies who are in financial trouble irl QwQ))
This is the money cat, reblog in the next 24 hours and money will come your way!
My hand is busted right now so I can’t draw and I can’t do commissions or anything for art, and I need to buy school materials and food, and right now I have literally negative $9 in my bank account and I’m not in a good place to provide services.
If you can, please send something to my ko-fi. If you can’t, reblogs would be extremely appreciated. Thank you very much for reading.
Paypal is also spider.eastweb@gmail.com!
The version in the boss arena is split into quarters, and its colors are instead achieved with lights and animated texture effects to get the “moving gradient” look it has in game.
Varnish sat in front of the gate to Medium's castle. The Canvas Plains had been rather uneventful today, and his rising boredom seemed ready to spawn a surprise nap.
Until, that is, his phone went off.
Varnish took out his phone and had it read the new notification.
"New message from: Unknown Sender. Testing?"
Oh, Varnish thought. Someone must have texted the wrong numb-
"Arl-teesh-dla S.M.R."
... the Hells?
With nothing else demanding his immediate attention, and some worry for the well-being of the text-sender after that jumble of sounds in the second text, Varnish replied.
FROM: Varnish TO: Unknown
🍴: Are you okay? 😕
▲ Now that Link knew he had a fome- fone?- whatever- he couldn’t help himself, fiddling with it and pressing all the buttons. Next thing he knew, the words ‘sent’ and ‘all’ came up on his screen. Oops. He didn’t mean to do that.
FROM: Link TO: All
▲: testing? ▲: arltlyhl;dla,smr
Looks like the Dirtuns are joining the humans for their festivities. Palette’s giant Dirtun ought to make a nice float, but I doubt she’ll be happy about her car having walked away.
Ask the demons of Graffiti Kingdom, a 2004 (Japan) / 2005 (else) PS2 game. Ask them anything!
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