About: Teasing Creator   Sponge Permalink

An Entity of Type : owl:Thing, within Data Space : 134.155.108.49:8890 associated with source dataset(s)

Sometimes you get the feeling that a series creator is having a little too much fun messing with their audience's collective heads. This is a creator who loves to mess around with their audience, keeping them hanging for as long as humanly possible. They'll hint, contradict themselves, be deliberately vague and occasionally outright mock the Epileptic Trees offered... only to prove said Epileptic Trees right at the very moment the majority of the fandom gives up on them. It only really counts as a meta-trope though - all stories aim to keep their audience guessing, but this creator does so outside the story itself, be it in interviews, on a blog or at conventions. Shrug of God is their language of choice.

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  • Teasing Creator
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  • Sometimes you get the feeling that a series creator is having a little too much fun messing with their audience's collective heads. This is a creator who loves to mess around with their audience, keeping them hanging for as long as humanly possible. They'll hint, contradict themselves, be deliberately vague and occasionally outright mock the Epileptic Trees offered... only to prove said Epileptic Trees right at the very moment the majority of the fandom gives up on them. It only really counts as a meta-trope though - all stories aim to keep their audience guessing, but this creator does so outside the story itself, be it in interviews, on a blog or at conventions. Shrug of God is their language of choice.
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  • Sometimes you get the feeling that a series creator is having a little too much fun messing with their audience's collective heads. This is a creator who loves to mess around with their audience, keeping them hanging for as long as humanly possible. They'll hint, contradict themselves, be deliberately vague and occasionally outright mock the Epileptic Trees offered... only to prove said Epileptic Trees right at the very moment the majority of the fandom gives up on them. It only really counts as a meta-trope though - all stories aim to keep their audience guessing, but this creator does so outside the story itself, be it in interviews, on a blog or at conventions. Shrug of God is their language of choice. There's a fine line to walk here. This tactic can create genuine suspense, since the creator is so unpredictable. Or it can annoy the fans, and make them feel like they're being unfairly toyed with by a superior being, perhaps leading to cries of Small Name, Big Ego. However, it can also be a reaction to Fan Dumb: if the creator makes a concrete statement which is then ignored in favour of speculation, they might decide "screw it" and play along. The creator's pedigree can make this trope more or less effective - if you've sunk the ship or eliminated main characters before now, there's every chance you'll do it again... but then, if you make a habit of it, people will stop finding it suspenseful and simply give up on caring for your characters, knowing you're likely to Kill'Em All or stick them with a Downer Ending. Tends to be most popular in webcomics, since they're one of the few remaining mediums that can genuinely be kept under wraps, spoiler-free. Ship Tease is a specific variety of this trope, as is The Walrus Was Paul. Differs from Shrug of God since there is definitely a deliberate tactic being employed, and it isn't always in response to fans' questions - in fact, you get the feeling the the fans are being provoked into asking questions. Compare Trolling Creator, when this gets outright malicious. Examples of Teasing Creator include:
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