More examples: Futurama: Silly devices/gadgets/design fiction objects Simpsons: Arguably the couch gags+intro mini-story that triggers the main story, like “they go to the fair and Homer buys 1 dumbbell” South Park: “we learned something today” faux-morals
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Rick and Morty: inter-dimensional cable and quick-sketched useless parallel universes which don’t do anything for the plot, like the farting-asses universe. Best example might be the brilliant pizza-universe set. There is NO good reason for this scenehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUBmEDAoGOE …
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Venkatesh Rao Retweeted Jonathan Korman
What to call this principle? Spice-note?https://twitter.com/miniver/status/1331675875947937792 …
Venkatesh Rao added,
Jonathan Korman @miniverReplying to @vgrThis is nifty and needs a name, like “spice note” or something: the fun flavor element which does a lot of the story work Star Wars: spaceship design Superheroes: costume design aSoIaF: house banners & words Agatha Christie: etiquette Wuxia: special weapons & attacks https://twitter.com/vgr/status/1331673021367480320 …1 reply 1 retweet 4 likesShow this thread -
Venkatesh Rao Retweeted mark safranski
Secret sauce is perhaps too broad.
This is a narrower animating thing.https://twitter.com/zenpundit/status/1331703351097090055 …Venkatesh Rao added,
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Big mood? Generator? Flywheel? Root chakra? Idiopathy? Principle needs a clear statement too: “every successful genre story has an unnecessarily overbuilt world id-element.”
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Replying to @vgr
I think it’s “leitmotif”. And then you have to break it down into the leit and the motif. The motif is the theme that people notice: eh pratchett’s puns and historical references. The leit is the motivating force behind them.
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Replying to @Archivd
Are leitmotifs necessarily overbuilt though? To me the overbuilding is the key part. In your case I don’t think it is computer science concepts. It is wordplay (not just dad jokes). Whatever you have “too much” of for story needs in a sense.
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I’d argue that the leitmotif is the reinforced “important” theme not necessarily the overdone abundance signal. Related but not the same thing.
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Sometimes they’re the same, but not always. In Rick and Morty I’d say the leitmotif is the nihilistic disillusionment bits scattered in every episode, but the id-element is “cheap universes”. Relationship: a multiverse where universes are really cheap induces nihilistic stories.
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Replying to @vgr
I think we are saying the same thing but arguing about what to call it. There’s the “virtue” that shines through and the “vice” that necessarily tags along with it.
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Main reason I don’t think they’re the same is that literary fiction usually has leitmotifs but not the abundance signals. Genre fiction is abundance-driven. Literary fiction seems to come from a place of scarcity.
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