Guy Fleegman knows things are about to get ugly

It’s Tuesday! There really isn’t much of a reason to be excited for Tuesday beyond the fact that it’s the day after Monday, which means you’re slightly closer to the weekend but not close enough to actually care. If you really stop and think about it, Tuesday is an exceedingly dull day. It’s not dreadful like Mondays, and it doesn’t even get you to the half-way mark like Wednesdays. What gives, Tuesdays? Be less dull.

To alleviate the usual Tuesday tedium, we like to run a segment we call Trope Tuesday. Every week we look at a literary device or theme that makes the entertainment we love work. This week, we’re investigating a trope called Genre Savvy.

The exact opposite of Genre Blindness. A Genre Savvy character doesn’t necessarily know they’re in a story, but they do know of stories like their own and what worked in them and what didn’t. More sophisicated versions will also know they can’t tell which genre they are in (and are often in far more realistic or complicated genres that the stories they remember), or which characters they are.

They know every Simple Plan is doomed to failure from the start and instead of participating, sit back and wait to get in their “I told you so”, or even a “We Could Have Avoided All This“. They can spot someone being controlled by Puppeteer Parasite from a mile away (usually). They’re more likely to listen when they catch someone in a compromising position who sputters “It’s Not What It Looks Like!”.

They can tell fairly early that the strange old man who’s offering free lollipops is probably best avoided. And they’ve seen enough Horror movies to know that when there’s an ax murderer on the loose, the last thing you want to do is either splitup, boink your significant other, or investigate strange noises in the Sinister Subway. They know how to avoid getting a bad rank on the Sorting Algorithm of Mortality.

The Genre Savvy live to hang lampshades, give Aside Glances, and say, “You just had to say it, didn’t you?” right after use of a Tempting FateStock Phrase. Their exasperation with the sheer stupidityof the entire universe usually makes them a Deadpan Snarker. They are likely to be told that This Is Reality or just ignored, and likely to be the one who always wanted to say that.

I’ve never bothered to hide the fact that I am extraordinarily fond of Aaron Allston’s entries into the Star Wars Expanded Universe. A big reason for that is he (and his characters) demonstrate a wonderful amount of genre savvy. Executed well, this trope can add just the right amount of humor to a scene and is a good way to break up dark and gritty plot for a bit. Or it can be used to call attention to an expected trope and then subvert it. Take, for example, this line from Tyria Sarkin in Wraith Squadron:

Tyria: This isn’t going to be one of those squadrons with one female pilot that all the men are chasing, isn’t it?

Then of course you’ve got Allston’s Ben Skywalker, a lampshade hanging machine that clearly inherited the Genre Savvy gene from his mother.

Greatest example of this trope, however? Pretty much the entirety of Galaxy Quest.