Pride Cometh Before the Autumn

My latest favest TvTropes, fresh for [two]oh-ten, suckaz!

• Ever seen an invisible character beat the crap out of antagonists, even when they know s/he's coming? But, wait, how can you see someone that's invisible? The Badass Blink. (e.g. The only time you can see Batman is when he is kicking your ass.)
• When a supposedly awesome attack ends up effecting negligible damage, what you have isn't awesome: it's a Worf Barrage. The trope's named after Star Trek: TNG's resident Klingon warrior Worf, who can't win a fight for his life.
• Shows are often criticized for worsening over time, i.e. "jumping the shark." But some shows gets better over time. This is called "growing the beard." Again, this is named after Star Trek, but the most important example in my memory is the growth of the The Daily Show after Jon Stewart took over for Criag Kilborn.
• Deadpool. Just a hilarious read.[1]
• Villains like to brag and show-off, but sometimes they bite off more than they can chew — say, an evil frog who wants to be an ox — and end up paying the price. Derived from an Æsop fable, this gets my love for its real world example of Reggie Miller!

Miller is a guy who posted game winners over Michael Jordan, utterly annihilated the Knicks, and even taunted Spike Lee with a choking gesture... but the Pacers have never-ever-EVER won a championship.

PONÊD!

[1] Honorable mention to the Candlejack entr—...

What Measure is a Trope?

In the vein of the last post, here are 5 TvTropes entries I like:[1]

• You enter a dungeon, get past several devious puzzles, and avoid all sorts of nasty traps through your psychic powers and reflexes. As you you walk through the final door you find... your love interest lying on the ground and her kid brother on crutches mourning over her. How did they get there? They Took A Shortcut.
• You can shoot fast-moving vehicles with you missiles, but can't attack stationary buildings. Some building time and resources later, You Have Researched Breathing, and you can do that. Also prone to happen in any other type of game with character customization or unlockables (you can't wear boots until you play enough...).
• A seemingly trivial obstacle cannot be circumvented or removed with brute force. There are several variations of the Insurmountable Waist Height Fence, such as: The Adamantium Door,The Impassable Forest, The Gentle Slope of Unlclimability, and The Ledge of Instant Death.
• No matter how urgent your quest is, you can always take your time achieving unnecessary goals before finishing the main one. On a smaller scale, even the most pressing, immediate tasks, such as rescuing a fellow character who is dangling off a ledge at five hundred feet in the air, can be done at one's leisure.[2]
• Hot Skitty on Wailord Action (HSOWA). Any work of fiction in which two grossly dissimilar species are somehow capable of interbreeding. This pretty much misses the point of the term "species", which is supposed to indicate which animals can breed successfully.

My interest in the site actually derived from the HSOWA entry on Bulbapedia.

[1] In general I avoid TvTropes because it is the most sticky of wikis.

[2] But see: Timed Mission

The Good PokeShip Hippop[otas]

For a while I've considered The Muppet Wiki as the world's best fanwank after Das Trekkers' Memory-Alpha. But Fuck Yeah PokeMeme has me reading Bulbabedia a lot lately, and I gotta give those kids credit.

Following are my five favorite entries (ephhwiyi: I find these genuinely interesting p_^;;; )

• Legendary PokéMon, A to Z. DYK: The Weather Trio is based on the Old Testament?
• Cartoon characters' clothing. DYK: Ash pretended to be a girl to enter Celadon Gym?
• 130+ romantic relationships. DYK: 13 of the entries feature people/PokéMon pairs?
• CODs/Characters of the Day. DYK: Ash's combatant in EP076 was Pete Pebbleman?
• PokéMon World & Universe. DYK: Most game locations can be mapped onto Japan?
• A Catch Rate for a PokéMon. DYK: Rarity of finding a PokéMon is unrelated to this?

How could you NOT love that? I mean, besides not being a dork. But, if you're not a dork, how'd you even find this? Mad suss, son...

Which Brat is Wurst? [See what I did there?]

The children of sailors and marines are more likely to be called "juniors" than brats, so I understrand their low numbers. But, why are there so many hits for "Coast Guard Brat" and so few for "(Air Force or USAF)" brat? I wouldn't have figured the former a more transient lifestyle than the latter. And "National guard brat"??? Don't they always stay in their home state? It's not like the kids go with them to the theater of war...right? o_O