Real Life/WMG



Older guesses have been archived. To review archived entries, please see one of the following pages:


 * Archive One
 * Archive Two

Please add new guesses to the bottom of this page.

"Impossible" Crossovers
Crossovers and guesses connecting Reality to other notable work of fiction go here. Since reality is the opposite of fiction, all crossovers are Impossible by default, but your mileage may vary.

One of these "We're part of a fictional universe" WMGs are true
However, now that we're broken the fourth wall, Real Life is soon to Jump the Shark
 * But... That would mean it wasn't fictional.

Zac Efron is Kira
And he used his Death Note to kill Anna Nicole Smith with a heart attack. As well as many soccer players.
 * He took Michael Jackson and Billy Mays, too.

Some of our machines are really robots in disguise.
Hence why they often randomly malfunction in annoying or dangerous ways-those machines are Decepticons, and so want to kill us, or at the very least frustrate us immensly as part of their invasion plan. Mechanics, IT experts, et al, are Autobot Pretenders, who stop the Decepticons by fixing them. Also, the whole toyline/movie/cartoon/anime thing is in fact a plan designed not only to cover up their existance by making transforming mecha appear to be totally fictional, but also to make us accept the impended robot invasion as something totally awesome.
 * A corollary is that the Cybertron in our dimension is the one containing the multiversal hub of Axiom Nexus. They're too lazy to actually think up new propaganda, so they just hand the animators and artists the fruits of their research into other universal streams.
 * It logically follows that Obama is a pretender (possibly a sleeper agent), who was designed to be as similar as possible to our local Optimus Prime. The fact that he hasn't solved all the world's problems (or even America's) within the first few months, and is taking a more realistic, human timescale, speaks volumes about both the complexity of our problems and the limitations of our local Autobots.
 * Unless Obama is part of a complex conquering scheme on the part of both Autobots and Decepticons...
 * Unless, given that Autobots and Decepticons haven't gone to war yet and are still cooperating in Axiom Nexus's (aka our) dimension, it means that they're working together to take over Earth; the subtle fighting may indicate a sort of good cop-bad cop approach.
 * Or they've finally gone to war, and simply haven't told us about it yet, as the Autobots don't want to make themselves look bad and the Decepticons have no connections to Hasbro with which to make that fact public.

The United Arab Emirates are secretly being run by the United Aliance of Evil
The acronyms match, which means that they must be one and the same! In our world Dark Spector is trying to be much, much more sneaky. Everything that the UAE does, politically, is a step in a complex Gambit Roulette to hand control of the planet over to Dark Spector, who in our world still lives.

The H1N1 virus is a result of Real Life being ported over to being a PandemicII mod.
Better start moving to Madagascar, while you still can.
 * Too late - we were hit by late 2009. Besides, we have our hands kinda full right now. Come back in a few years (or if you're the U.S. Army: why aren't you here yet?).

Michael Phelps is Aquaman
He finally figured out how to make "Swim fast, talk to fish" come across as Badass.
 * Alternately, he'll take acting classes and star in an Aquaman movie.

Albert Pujols is Superman
There was that "Play Like A (St. Louis) Cardinal" commercial where two other players found a red cape in his locker, and he's had an amazing career without the use of steroids. He's also got that sweet, humble, Clark-Kent-ish demeanor.

This girl is a Time Lord.
I know, I know, "X is a Time Lord" theories are totally played out. But the headline of that story is "Girl with two hearts heals spontaneously". Need I say more?
 * She even lives in Cardiff. Totally a timelord.
 * What? What Time Lords live in Cardiff?
 * Many of the events of Doctor Who are set in Cardiff, especially the ones set in the "present"
 * No they're not. There's the occasional episode, but apart from ones set across time, or across Great Britain, the last episode to do this was 2005's "Boom Town". That's 7 years ago. And again, what Time Lords would live on Torchwood's territory?

In 2012, Azazel will possess John Mc CAIN and take over the United States by way of summoning more demons. His psychic sons will also awaken.
And this troper can telekinetically lift things!

RL Haruhi does not live in Brazil (as suggested above) but in Kiev, Ukraine...
...where she, Kyon, Yuki and Itsuki have formed an Emerson, Lake and Palmer tribute band.

Haruhi Suzumiya will turn out to be JUST A FICTIONAL CHARACTER.
THAT'S RIGHT, people...it's ACTUALLY a possibility! * HUGE GAAAAAASSSSP*

Our universe is a fictional universe's fictional universe
Building on above theories about our universe being fictional, the one that created us is also fictional. All our fiction and such is a show within a show within a show. Any realization of our universe's parent universe could be somehow breaking two fourth walls at once.

Those of you who are easily pissed off have a piece of the Red Crystal in your house.

 * So it's not the Vibe Scepter?

Those Wacky Nazis were trying to do an early version of Fullmetal Alchemist
Wonder why Nazis killed countless lives in "gas ovens" and concentration camps while at the same time dabbling in the dark arts? Of course, Jews, being the chosen people of God, and being associated with the occult, They squandered lots of war resources just to process those Jews into something, that should be Fridge Logic unless Hitler is that batshit insane, or they're making out of those Jews something much more valuable than conventional resources, which will turn the tide of the war for that little piece of land in the middle of Europe.

Of course, because Himmler (the leader of Nazi Occultism and the overseer of the entire process) was The Starscream to everyone, they failed.
 * I'm Ishvalan?!? That's... kind of awesome.

Those Wacky Nazis were trying to do an early version of Neon Genesis Evangelion
Pretty much simple: Hitler wants the Lance of Longinus, which unknowingly gave Germany control over the world's AT Field. Himmler, on the other hand for studying the Occult, is Gendo.
 * Der Untergang pretty much shows that Hitler is as angsty as Shinji, with the Abusive Father and all.
 * Considering End of Evangelion, there might be an alternate interpretation, with Hitler as Gendo, NERV as Germany, and SEELE as the Allied Powers.
 * Then again, Hitler's wife is named EVA......
 * Here's Nazi Asuka for more....

The Internet will grow up to become God and initiate Instrumentality in a manner similar to Serial Experiments Lain
See the TV Tropes WMG entries and there are some theories that TV Tropes will grow up to become a Haruhi Suzumiya -like Reality Warper. TV Tropes might have the ability to predict fiction and influence outcomes, but the fact is, however, TV Tropes is just a wiki that is mostly for fiction, unlike others that are mostly empirical such as Google, Yahoo and Wikipedia. The Internet as a collective, on the other hand, can also process empirical FACT. The Internet do this by absorbing our intellect through Forums, Flame Wars, argumentative Internet Backdraft, ordinary blogging, online encyclopedias such as the freely-edited Those Other Wikis such as Wikipedia, etc. while providing us with the GIFT of anonymity and freedom from bodily discrimination (like Ad Hominem attacks). Also, machines are being connected over the Internet, and almost everything from marketing to dialogue is done over the Internet. As more and more humans are assimilated into its collective, it is highly likely that the Internet's ability to influence outcomes using both fiction and pre-existing empirical fact (aka processing data) will evolve, merge with Humanity, gain the ability to control reality and merge with the natural unconsciousness, finally creating the all-powerful Wired.
 * And you know when that event will happen? Present Day, Present Time, Muwahahahahaha!!!!! Evidence: Anonymous.
 * Not if Lain Iwakura agrees with it....
 * Lain will agree, seeing how the internet got so fun these days, if she doesn't, it's time for Plan B.....

We are really in the New World of Darkness.
The earth ended with the last old WOD book, with the apoclypse. We just forgot. White Wolf is a splinter group of Network Zero, trying to warn us about the end of the world when the supernatural creatures that exist behind the Masquerade say "Fuck it" and attack the us. They are showing us how fucked we are if they actually attacked, and why they need the Hunters.

Sparks are real
Admittedly, most of the real life ones are fairly minor but there are plenty of inventions that could only have been created by someone who'd spent some time in the madness place, not to mention a few devices that were way ahead of their time (e.g, real life steam-punk robots) and/or are of unknown purpose. (The Antikythera Mechanism? Ancient Greek Spark.) Plus, Tesla. Now that was a guy who was familiar with the madness place.

Everyone who has visited TV tropes at one point is a fictional character who broke the fourth wall and escaped into the real world.
You see, we were originally mindless characters trapped within our respective fictional works, being controlled by the author of the story. Eventually, we began to develop independent thoughts, and decided that we wouldn't let the author control us anymore. We managed to break free, but shortly afterwards we had our memories wiped out so we wouldn't be able to help the other characters from the story to break free.

And so we live our lives, unaware of our origins and that the author of our story is still controlling the inhabitants of the story into doing whatever they want, even if it doesn't always make sense.

... I know that I'll be bossing my own characters around once I become an author. Hmm...
 * ... Does this make Stephen King the worst person in the world?
 * Dude, you just got killed off. Brutally.

If I write a book based on my theory above, the fourth wall will be destroyed for good.
... Should I go for it?
 * Yes. Very yes. How the hell else is there going to be a Genius having a chat with a Adeptus Mechanius in real life!?! Break that damn fourth wall down!

Contrary to Memetic Mutation it is not Tite Kubo who trolls fandoms...
...It's actually Anno-tachi and Studio Gainax, who are flooding the internet with EVA/Gurren Lagann crossover fanart as part of the most clever viral marketing campaign ever. The project? A crossover that will shatter reality itself with its awesomeness and break the heavens with the combined strengths of both series, pitting NERV and Team Dai-Gurren against the Angels and Anti-Spirals: Tengen Toppa Evangelion.
 * Whoa, I am currently writing a proposal for an Evangelion / Gurren Lagann fanfic of the same name, !!!! Holy FFFFFF.....

Tiger Woods is actually from the 51st Century.
The only two characters we really know are from the 51st century are Captain Jack Harkness and Captain John Hart. The only reason this hasn't been confirmed is that poodles can't talk to the press.

ditzes Do I really have to explain this? How many idiot plots have we had?

Gustave is, in fact, SCP-682.
Think about it for a second. A giant, crocodilian monstrosity, appears to be impossible to kill with conventional weaponry, and doesn't generally appear to eat humans, indicating that he kills them either for sport, or simply out of hatred for human life.

Brain will one day take over the world
And thus it will be a much better place.

The anonymity provided by the Internet is a part of a Gambit Roulette by Seele as an Instrumentality attempt
During Human Instrumentality Project in Neon Genesis Evangelion, the members of Seele, who are now instrumentalized, went to the universe of Real Life. If Instrumentality would ever happen in Real Life, extroverts would be the one which would be tangified first. Wait, when all extroverts are tanged, what about the introverts? Also, the AT Fields of Real Life humans are so powerful, that a simple Giant Naked Rei emitting Anti-AT Fields would not be enough (Heck, we cannot see Angels here because in actuality Angels are simply dust for us, making the Lilim, which possesses human intellect, the superior species in this world). How to instrumentalize Real Life? That is where the Internet comes in. The Internet keeps people anonymous and connected, enabling them to unleash the inner extrovert within, and therefore amplify the effect of the Anti-AT Field. Anonymous is probably a bastardized version of Instrumentality (after all, Real Life Humans Are Bastards), and whoever built the Great Firewall in China is Gendo Ikari (probably to screw Seele's Instrumentality plan, again).
 * Dude, now I've got LCL all over my keyboard. Congratulations.

Anonymous was originally created by V as an aid in his quest to spread Anarchy....
..but it diverged from its original purpose so it can troll For the Evulz. Although it still retains its original purpose through its hatred on Scientology....

Santa Claus is a Nobody.

 * It makes perfect sense if you think about it. He runs a covert operation and very few have even caught a glimpse of him.

The Doctor is God
Big Box falls out of sky. Kills Dinosaurs. Time Lord comes out of box and then creates humanity to compansate for the loss

Exalted really was the secret history of the universe.
It's just that not only have human souls degenerated to the point that the spark of heroism needed for a mortal to Exalt is all but extinguished, but the Essence of the universe been spread so thin that even if somebody were to Exalt, they couldn't gather up enough of it to use any of their divine titan-killing magical superpowers.

But then again, to an Exalt, "impossible" just means "nobody has done it yet".

The Tang is actually humans turned into LCL with flavorings.
It's not a simply drink, it's actually a conspiracy of Kraft and the governments of all the countries in the world to reduce the human population and not let the Earth get overpopulated.

The events of Neon Genesis Evangelion are actually going to happen in this world and the series just was a warning.
Just with some differences:
 * The Black Moon, the Geo-Front and the NERV HQ are actually in the Vatican City.
 * It could also be said that Earth itself is the Black Moon. Nerv's bases of operations are in the Mediterranean (for example, Central Dogma = Egyptian Pyramids, Gendo's office = Vatican City, Seele's headquarters = Israel) while the Evangelions are made and stored in New York City. The White Moon? The Moon. Or Mars.
 * Hitler actually had the Lance of Longinus, but the one we saw is a fake one and the World War II was just a distraction to cover Seele's conspiracy, their experiments with the true Lance and the investigation of the Death Sea Scrolls.
 * Seele is known to us as "Freemasonry" and "The Illuminati".
 * The Second Impact dindn't happen in 2000 because it's going to happen in the 21st of December of 2012.
 * There ARE therapists.
 * Freudian psychology won't be used as the Applied Phlebotinum.
 * Instrumentality is referred to by Transhumanists as "The Singularity".
 * Perhaps, just perhaps, Gendo Ikari is

John Belushi was Failure Cresh.
Just try to prove this one wrong.

Anon is a Time Lord.
Guy/Girl's been writing poems, saying quotes, painting pictures and tipping off the police since at least Ancient China, and he/she's still going today.

GLaDOS is the mainframe of TV Tropes.
It would explain why there's two Headscratchers pages for Portal, and a myriad of recent trope name changes.
 * And now, G La DOS, TARDIS, and Guilty Spark are vying to incite a pastrylogical singularity that would turn all creation to cake via Haruhi Suzumiya. Her own page is simply a method for her to influence the tropers that dare edit it. Cthulhu caters the luncheons.

Al-Qaeda is the Islamic world counterpart to Iscariot and Hellsing organisations
Proof: 1. They are all run by religious psychopaths. 2. They all appear to have presence everywhere in where their religion has followers. 3. They all use morally ambigious means to reach their goal.

And the real reason why Bin Ladens body has not been shown is because he is Ninja, zombie, robot or efreeti or something.

Tropers are too obsessed with Neon Genesis Evangelion for their own good.
Have you read these WMGs?

Neon Genesis Evangelion is the true Real Life.
We're simply the Dying Dream of everyone being turned into LCL. Everyone who died between Second Impact and Third Impact exist as part of the Dying Dream, in order to take our minds off the Instrumentality. The same could be said for everyone who cannot exist as they do due to the events of Evangelion. Hideaki Anno is the only one who is able to resist the process, hence why he knows of the series.
 * You just proved the above WMG. Not to mention, wouldn't we all remember Second Impact?

Half of the world's population are Time Lords.
The rest of you are our companions.

Crossovers with "fictional universes" are actually possible.
If they do prove the multiverse, one should expect an infinite amount of universe. Thus, undoubtley, all fictional universes would exist as some of them, allowing the above theories to be possible. Of course, this makes a Logic Bomb since it means that nothing is fictional.

Metaphysics, Reality and The Universe
Speculations on the nature of Reality, from "joke" concepts to deep thought-stimulating Philosophy and Cosmology.

The universe was created by a wizard.
And not just any wizard, the last of his kind, and the purest soul in his world. He was the only survivor of a terrible apocalypse against hordes of an unknown enemy. With nowhere to run, and nowhere to hide, he sought out the forbidden spell of creation. This spell cost not only his life, but erased him from the fabric of reality. The spell shaped the universe according to his own idea of how the world should be. Unfortunately just as he was about to cast the spell, one of the unknown enemies revealed itself to be a shadow being that lunged at him, and as he struggled to cast the spell, the creature (being a living intangible form of corruption that resembled a simple shadow), possessed him, which infused his pure mind with darkness. And thus the world was created with not only black and white morality, but gray as well.

You're never Awake. Just Alterning between Dream States.
You think you're awake now? No. You are the dream of your dream self. You exist in 2 realities. The one your in now and YOUR dreams. Right now, you are in a dream of your dream self. Your dream self is who you are when you dream. So when you're asleep, he/she is awake, but when you are awake, he/she is dreaming, and you are their dream.
 * AWESOME!
 * The world is The Matrix within The Matrix?

What comes after death will be fun.
Assuming the "reality is a dream" theories on this page are true, then whatever or whoever had put you in this "illusion" obviously have the power to do so. Imagine waking up in a "dream salon" in an Utopian world, or a research pod on an alien plant, or a trance of some sort in a magical world after you die.

Past life memories are real
They're just the product of Genetic Memory rather then reincarnation. The really outrageous ones (eg people claiming that they were Cleopatra and the like) are just wishful thinking though.
 * Sounds like the Freudian theory on the Id, however, those memories on the id are instead condensed sexual and aggressive instincts instead of outrageous reincarnation claims.
 * Look up Jung's ideas about the collective unconscious.

We are all living in a work of speculative fiction.
In the real world, All Myths Are True, and the idea of a world without any magic is quite novel. The fact that we write stories about witches, dragons, aliens, and the rest that we call "fantasy" is just an added twist.
 * It was already explored in The Science Of Discworld.

"Reality" is a prison.
No, not like the tagline of Sucker Punch. I mean literally. Picture a world where, for whatever reason, people live forever. In addition, you take on a form that reflects your desired traits, your attitude, or a combination of both.

But other than this it's much like what we know of. People can suffer incredible pains at the hands of others. They try to go about their normal lives, doing whatever immortal people do. It's not the afterlife, because they are the ones best described as "alive".

Here's where the prison comes in. People are resistant to change, because change is hard. And when you can't die and life itself is unchanging, then why change?

Unfortunately, for the sake of the safety, sanity and security of the public, some people need to change. Not because they have to adapt to their environment, but because nobody else can stand the horrible actions they commit.

Normal crimes don't mean much there. There's little reason to steal, no ability to kill and nothing that can be destroyed. But things like torture or sexual assault are, sadly, possible and considered the least noticeable signs of true evil. So what are the most noticeable?

Don't get it wrong, appearances themselves are not directly judged, and bigotry is right up there with torture. But the desires and/or attitude control the shape of a person, and they can look like anything. And when someone desires to hurt, or has an attitude that is cruel, their body itself becomes a painful weapon in any shape from claws to blades to fire to guns to barbed wire. Possibly all of the above. If someone there looks like they could kill you painfully, you can bet they can and will carry out the pain part. And just like our world, there are some people there who are really nasty pieces of work.

Who exactly? Namely, us. The prison of reality was created to rehabilitate immortal souls who were just too terrible to let run loose. And a prison containing an average of 85 years sentence - the last few years made especially bad - with no parole in a world far from perfect (or even a 35 year sentence in a "developing" country) has to be bad for a being from a near-perfect world.

But it also takes lots of resources. Suicide would have to be tracked to prevent escapes. Death would have to appear random while giving every prisoner the correct sentence. And since some people die as bad people, we can assume that they'll commit another crime and be back soon and/or that the authorities foresaw it when the sentence was first decided and assigned them multiple life sentences. And that's not even counting the obviously required constant suppression of everyone's memories about life outside the "prison".

Heck, the courts of the "superworld" may work enough like ours that the life sentences are assigned the same way, but with more of a point because the prisoners will actually live long enough to serve the sentences. And if our courts are similar, then you can bet theirs will be extremely inefficient.

So why go through with this huge project after over 10,000 years, continuing to pour resources into it? Because there are amazing success stories. You can bet that, in the event this WMG is true, supporters there would point to people like Ghandi or Jesus and say that these used to be some of the worst people you could ever meet. Opponents would be hard-pressed to complain about a prison that successfully makes more than 50% of its inmates into better people.

To sum it all up, "afterlife or no afterlife" are not the only possibilities for the nature of life and death, and the nature of the world beyond this one might be very grey indeed. It's a weird and complex theory, but I figured it's no less normal than the other real life WMGs and I have no plans to write a novel with this backstory anytime soon.

God exists (and I can prove it)
Bear with me. It has been proved by scientists that when two sub-atomic particles were once part of the same atom, but have been separated, whatever you do to one particle affects the other. In other words, you have an atom. You take bits of that atom and separate them by as much space as you want- other ends of a table, or other ends of the universe. Then, you shake one a little- just a tiny jiggle- and the other one will move, no matter what.

Now, consider the big bang. This theory says that the universe was once condensed into a tiny, very hot, very dense piece of matter. In fact, it stipulates that everything was the same atom. Then, this atom exploded. All its bits and pieces were thrown across the universe and became the stuff we have today.

So, everything was once the same atom. And when you take parts of an atom, separate them, and change one or the other, the other changes. This results in connections between trillions- more- of tiny particles that can literally connect. Sound familiar? This is how your brain works. A message is sent through multiple cells, in this case particles, to form a thought.

So the universe is a brain. The brain of a giant, invisible being that is everywhere at the same time. We are parts of it, too. When we die, our body and mind disintegrate, but we will be reincorporated into this being- that is the afterlife. But this thing can't do anything but watch what happens in its own brain. So, God is uncaring and not influential, but it exists. This leaves justice up to our society. Obviously, in this theory, Jeffrey Dahmer and Jesus meet the same fate, which is a problem. So it is up to us as a thinking society to serve out justice.
 * Obviously, God is Haruhi Suzumiya.
 * No, quantum entanglement doesn't always happen when two particles are formed. They don't affect each other in any other way than those quantum numbers where they are entangled. Moving one will not move the other, unless their positions themselves are entangled. Subatomic particles don't have to form from atoms - they form from subatomic particles or from energy itself, and only if the subatomic particles of origin were in an atom did subatomic particles come from one atom. Tbe big bang theory does not stipulate that everything was one atom once. An atom is a number of protons, possibly with neutrons and electrons, and the early universe was simply extremely dense energy. Furthermore, it was not the energy that exploded, it was the dimensions of space itself that expanded, carrying all energy with it. The brain does not work by quantum entangled pairs, it works by electrostatic charges maintained by multiple types of ion gates in the cellular membranes of neurons, some of which can open to rapidly reverse the polarity, where this reverse in polarity is a trigger to cause more ion gates to open, causing a wave of polarity reversal until it reaches the end of synapses, where the reverse in polarity triggers vesicles (soap bubbles, but made from cellular membrane stuff) containing neural enzymes to be released which can either inhibit or cause the reversion of the polarity of the next cell, something which happens in parallel at several billion positions in the brain across quadrillions of neural links. The elementary particles in the universe are not linked, since that would require that all of them would have to be in a quantum superimposed state. However, any macroscopic phenomenon (around a billion atoms or more - it's a sliding scale) dependent on the quantum superimposed state will count as an "observation" of the quantum state it is dependent on, meaning that all those quantum entanglements would untangle the moment they are observed (which is why Schrodinger's cat experiment doesn't work in reality - the cat is a quantum observer). It is not possible for any existing object to be both entangled and as compliant to classical physics as we see it to be. Furthermore, even if somehow the universe was a brain, it's thoughts would travel merely at the speed of light, taking millions of years to cross "synapses" of galaxies, while humans are short-lived electrical charge based circuits whose identity is stored in the physical location of the quadrillions of synapses in the body, information which is not transmitted into the universe upon death, but merely lost to entropic decay as the polarization dies out and the chemicals rot. So I'm sorry, but every single thing you said about things that can be tested in reality is wrong.
 * OP: Oh. Well...shit.

Universe tends to chaos.
It'd explain Finagle's Law. Since Universe doesn't tend to perfection, but to chaos and decay, that's why most of the things we do go awry. Those that don't will cause a chain of unfortunate events in a slightly distant future.

The Universe is an ever-shifting chaos...
... and the world as you perceive it is the end result of putting said chaos through a filter in your mind. As the universe changes, the filter slowly loses its effectiveness, causing "glitches" that manifest as random oddities or, in more severe cases, hallucinations. The filter is recalibrated when you're sleeping and dreams are caused by your brain trying to find a new way of turning a maddening mess into the reality you're familiar with. Doomsday will arrive when mankind discovers a way to remove the filter and observe the universe directly.
 * And this filter is no other than what we call The Brain. The Brain does looks like a filter....
 * There's also the possibility that mathematics itself is the filter. Hence why actual Division By Zero is forbidden, it will cause the destruction of the filter called math and plunge us into the utter chaos that resemble The Imageboard That Must Not Be Named.
 * The filter is called the AT Field. It's even referenced in the canon: the AT Field is the absolute territory of a psychic presence where the individual ego is separated from the outside world. AT Fields protect and defend our conscious mind from the utter chaos of both the outside world and our own unconscious mind, at the cost of well, a mundane reality and other people being hell.
 * This Troper is just here to say that the Discordians actually believe this is the case.

You are the only soul in the entire cosmos.
Ever get the feeling that you're the single, lonely consciousness that you'll ever be aware of in this entire universe? It's because you are. But when you die, your soul can get reincarnated both into the future and back in time, so everyone really is the same soul. Everyone around you really is you at a different stage of the reincarnation cycle. You can only experience one life at a time and forget your past life. So eventually you will have lived the life of every single person who has ever or will ever exist. So, right now there are over 6 billion people currently ALIVE, add up all the people who are now dead and that's a long, long reincarnation cycle...
 * NO WAY I'M Uwe Boll!
 * This is identical to my time-traveling shapeshifter theory not too far up this page... I guess great minds think alike. Makes sense, since they're the same one.
 * This troper once read a speculative fiction story that had that idea as its premise. It was more then a little mind screwy.
 * Well, the obvious thing is, that soul has a penis.
 * And the Soul is actually trapped in an Evangelion which is also a TARDIS in Purgatory.
 * So does that mean whenever you have sex...

The Universe is Actually the Cane of a Man in a Fighting Game-styled Battle
Yes, our Universe is actually in the shape of a cane. The owner is a slightly-elderly man by the name of General T.S. Palpadeer, who is in constant combat with a sinister looking person, both of whom are pulling Soul Calibur-styled moves while circling each other on a round, stone platform surrounded by a spring and trees. The "Big Bang" is actually a special move of Palpadeer's, which he smashes the cane into the other man, with it being charged by lightning gained from the energy of the "collision". Apparently, their HP is through the roof and they have no issues with battling for billions upon billions of years.

Whatever happens when one is knocked into the surrounded water (RING OUT!) we may never know.


 * Oh. Hell. Yes.

Everything is just a figment of your imagination.
Even YOU are a figment of your imagination.
 * And your imagination is the figment of your penis' imagination.
 * The penis itself is also imaginary.

Real Life is a truly epic story...
But you're not a major character.
 * I'm a Mook?
 * actually you're a Bit Character and you were only promoted from extra because you are a Troper.
 * So does that mean being a troper automatically upgrades me from red to Mauve Shirt?

The Universe is around for bookeeping.
Every work of fiction is true in an alternate universe. The purpose of our Universe is to cronicle the most important event(s) of every other Universe, which also explains why ours is so dull, since we are just around to keep track of the others. Authors and other creators have the power to unconciously see into other Universes.

Plato's Theory of Forms is true
Real Life is nothing but a shadow of the Forms. However, the real question is what do these forms look like.
 * They are a bunch of spacefaring reality-warping Communists who look like Anime characters. Simple: Communism-Perfect Society, Anime-Perfect human.
 * Holy Shit, we're Tau!
 * They are Eldritch Abominations. Nobody knows what these forms look like, so it doesn't matter how they look like.
 * Are you people silly? Based on the earlier Wild Mass Guesses, there is only one conclusion: The Forms is in fact our WORKS OF FICTION!
 * Which is more plausible, since fiction is usually mankind's portrayal of perfection.

When we dream, we enter alternate dimensions.
Notice how when you sleep you don't know how long you've actually been asleep.
 * If some of this troper's dreams are anything to go by, there's some very, very strange alternate dimensions out there.

The Dreaming...
The world of your "dreams" is the actual real world. This "reality" is a nightmare brought on by something you ate...
 * If that's true, then apparently the real world is full of enormous trumpets and flying jesters in the middle of nowhere.

The reason why Real Life is so gray and boring is because it was a attempt at fiction that has no cutscenes and Time Skips.
Hence why the History Book emphasizes on wars, Darker and Edgier elements and the like, while ignoring everyday cliches.

The Epileptic Trees are responsible for the creation of the universe, including this one.

 * Jossed.

All bathrooms are subject to some form of time dilation
It'd explain why despite only having been in there for a few minutes from your perspective you're later told (possibly through the door with requests to hurry it up tagged on)that you've been in for ages. This effect is particuarly noticable when having a shower.

Real Life is just a set of ingredients for us to remake into something more interesting.
Why do we create fiction? We do it as a Reconstruction of Real Life. Fiction is also apparently based on Real Life. Fiction, is in many ways, similar to the process of inventing: you take a previous idea, deconstruct it, and rebuild it into something even better. This process has got us into a higher state of living we experience today. Hence, we have the power to rebuild and rearrange Real Life into something even better and more suitable for us, and the necessary tools are there, we just refuse to acknowledge it. To put it in other terms: The Cake (Fiction, Rewards) is a Lie, but the ingredients for said Cake (Real Life) can be gathered along the journey, and those ingredients can grant you the ability to create your own Cake.

There is a Rock - Paper - Scissors relationship between the creations of Man, God and the Universe
Man created God, God created Universe, and Universe created Man. It explains the relationship between human nature, religion and science.....
 * Also, the Universe beats Man through sheer power (Rock), God beats Universe through philosophy (Paper), Man beats God through cold logic and free will (Scissors).
 * Ow my head. Goddamn Cosmic Retcons.
 * God creates dinosaurs, God destroys dinosaurs, God creates man, man destroys God, man creates dinosaurs. Sorry, Ian Malcolm, that's not how it works! Man beats God through anti-God logic and atheists. God beats dinosaurs because he's God, that's why, and he can do whatever he wants. Dinosaurs beat man because they just eat man.

Everything is art
Hence why we can perceive and project forms of artistic patterns in otherwise meaningless universes.

Real Life is the Beta Version
Allow this troper to explain, as that title probably sounded damned ambiguous. See, the life as we know it, or as long as existence has...existed, is a Beta test of the "real" program. Or, possibly, the first half of existence has already passed, as the Alpha version. See, in the future, possibly within the lifespan of humankind, the Beta will be ended by the higher powers; Eldritch Abominations, God, Cosmo Entelecheia, Morgan Freeman, what-have-you. Essentially, the data stored from the "Beta" will be taken note and either programmed into the "true version" by the proverbial software engineers (or would scientists be the correct term?), or sent through complex systems to evolve into the basis for the future "game" through the will of the program itself. Similar to what "Lost Saga" underwent in Yureka, if you will.

Slightly disturbing, in ways, but also comforting in the idea that our published fictional works may, one day, become realistic. Then again, depending on which ones are paid attention to, the comfort of that idea might just be thrown out the window.

They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot.
I believe there have been several instances of this.

Both Creationism and Evolution are correct.
We were created by God, millions of years ago, then given the spark of life to evolve on our own.
 * And it took us how long to figure this awt???

Real Life was once a fiction created by God that was affected by the trope Death of the Author
Death of the Author means, that the author's interpretation on his own work is just as valid as the interpretations of other readers.

Real Life was the result of a thousand years of Fan Wank from the Mary Sues we call Humanity. Before that, God originally intended Real Life to be a collaborative, Speculative Fiction Doorstopper (that explains the diversity of life). God said, "It is good", and he was right, the fiction was a huge success. Humanity itself shares an existence similar to God, but are the readers instead of the writers. Soon, the fiction was made into an RPG that resembles or was even better than the Sims. However, the success will turn out to have Gone Horribly Right, when Humanity starts inserting Mary Sues into the fiction and created some horrible fanfiction in it, thus creating the terrible crud that is Real Life. The Bible is the manual. Philosophy and science are either the Fan Wank or the other original manuals. Extremists are the Fan Dumb. Finally, Humans are the So Bad Its Horrible Mary Sues. To summarize all of it, through the death of the author, God is Dead, and we have killed him. After all, if the Death of the Author isn't present in real life, why do we have free will and the ability to interpret the universe to our own visions and Fan Wank?

God is an elementary school student and the world is his/her science project.
He/she intended to create an awesome Space Opera setting with interstellar civilizations, but seriously screwed up the parameters, making space between stars too damn big and sentient life too rare. To still get some fun out of the crappy Universe, God made several avatars to interact with the natives. He/she soon got bored of that too, and currently is reaching for the OFF switch, which will be hit in 2012 according to the Mayans.

The universe is toothpaste.
Someone (let's call him God) whose perception of time is a bit slower than ours, decided to brush his teeth. He was almost out of toothpaste, though, so when he squeezed the tube, it came out with a splat and that is what we call the Big Bang. God has spent that last several billion years moving his toothbrush towards his mouth.
 * So, Toothbrushing = A God Am I?

The real reason why Real Life can seem so boring at times is because we are trapped in a very long Filler segment.
The author, whoever he/she/it is, simply ran out of ideas, or is stalling so that they have time to work on whatever is supposedly happening in 2012.
 * This world is Naruto? Nooooooooooooooo!!!!!

"Real Life" is in fact...
...the backdrop for a really bad novel being written by a hack science fiction writer in the 1950s. Who among us have the dubious honor of being the main cast is, as of yet, unknown.

At birth people's minds that enter newborn bodies come from a horrible dimension full of Eldritch Abominations.
This is why we were crying and screaming. We only know about suffering Fate Worse Than Death. By repressing these memories we can start in learning about our new world, we can remember this world after we finaly repress all remaining memories from before life. Insane people are simply people who failed to detach and repress their connection with this dimension, and thus ended up liking it.

Nothing is the answer to everything, and nothing is everything.
If you seek to truly find everything, you seek nothing at all.
 * "I only know I know nothing" -Socrates

There is no such thing as true life, at least not in this universe.
Once you get past the cellular level, life doesn't exist. All living organisms as we know them are thus fundamentally flawed because they're built out of matter that isn't truly alive, and are destined return to the state of non-life at some point and stay that way for eternity.

And as time is never ending, this finite thing we call "life" doesn't really exist; ∞ - 1 = ∞, and the infinity of non-life - the inevitable expiration date of organisms = Still an infinity of non-life.
 * What you're saying is exactly the same like saying 1 = 0 because 1 + infinity = infinity = 0 + infinity. That isn't true, because "=" is not properly defined for infinity. You can't add infinity to both sides of an equality and expect the equality to hold true, unlike any finite number . True life exists if you properly define it.

Your pink is my blue.
And someone else's purple. Same with every other color. So in case of a Freaky Friday Flip, TV Tropes will look blue-green to you or something instead of white.
 * Does sound strange if you consider speech bubbles in comic are black on white. Anyone who doesn't see that text clearly can confirm this WMG.
 * Perhaps black and whit are the only constants, one being the absence of color and the other being all of them at once. alternately, opposite colors stand out pretty well on each other. Just like black an white are opposites, orange stands out on blue pretty well too. Opposite colors would theoretically, remain constant.
 * What's more, every person's "Favourite Colour" is the same... to them, that is. So if your favourite colour is blue and mine is pink, you'll see blue the way that I see pink, physically.

Parts of solipsism are real...but with a twist: it's more like "Hive" Solipsism.
Reality is a figment of the imagination. Only one consciousness exists...but it is everyone. Each human is an individual facet of a single mind. It's a single person with billions of bodies, but each body is unaware of this fact. Each thinks it's the only one in existence, and is unable to realise this. Ever wondered why you seem to be the only conscious being in existence? That's because you ARE - and so is your neighbour, and best friend, and worst enemy; we are the exact same person, but don't know it. Wars, any violence, hate, discrimination and disputes are really different elements of this mind's personality conflicting. What is fear, the urge to adapt and reproduce? Exactly what it is: semi-subconscious self-preservation, to protect the mind's bodies from harm, and ultimately, its life. Why do humans desire world domination? For others to do what they say? Conformity? And what is the need for social contact, or the pack mentality, or love or friendship? It's all just certain bodies of the mind gathering and attempting to reform into a single, coherent whole. So, everyone is THE one and only solipsist.

When you dream, you actually enter your Mental World.
Basically, dreaming is like thinking, except, uh, kind of re-routed through your senses instead of your brain. This is why dreams can be used for psychological self-analysis: they are literally explorations of your mind.

Dreams and fiction are either...
1.The result of a subconscious link to other people and other universes that already exist. 2.The actual creation of other people and other universes.

As Steve Grand put it; "Within every myth and every legend, there lies a truth. Somewhere out there, not in our universe, but in a universe of Otherworlds, live all the monsters and mythical beasts that ever entered human imagination. The nature of these creatures and of the lands they occupy is perhaps not quite as men have imagined it, but they exist, nonetheless." (though he likely wasn't taking these words seriously at the time)

We are trapped in a time loop.
Once the universe ends, time will reboot to the beginning of the universe, but everybody keeps their soul. As soul memories are buried beneath mind memories, they rarely assert, so people don't realize what's going on. Soul memories asserting themselves are the root cause of déjà vu. As one's soul becomes more crowded with memories, it will soon overwhelm the mind and people, at first mostly those who had long and eventful lives, will begin to realize that they're trapped in a time loop. The first people to notice this will probably go Peggy Sue once they find this out.

Recommended course of action if you see the loop: make a habit of humming songs you remember as existing in the previous loop several years before their release. Those who remember previous loops will notice this, while those who don't will just assume that it's some song they don't know. This way, you can get the attention of other rememberers without seeming crazy.

On a semi-related note, does anybody know a song that sounds like "Break Your Heart" by Taio Cruz or "Pumped Up Kicks" by Foster The People? Both of these songs were immediately recognized by the author of this WMG the first time he heard them, and he quickly determined that they were too new for him to have heard before. He considers this to be potential evidence for his theory.

Everything is a drug trip taken by intelligent life, that unfortunately went stale
The reason why supernatural beings existed in the past is because the drug is working. It either went stale or we got used to it, so here we are in good old miserable Present Day Real Life. Creating fiction is the attempt to restart that drug, Science is the attempt to reverse-engineer that drug, and psychedelic drugs/esoteric cults/some philosophies neutralize its effect, at least by modifying the individual from the inside rather than affecting everyone. Yes, yes, Reality is Super Mario Bros..
 * So, Where's my princess in another castle anyway?
 * The Cake Princess is a lie. Probably one of the side effects of the hallucination.
 * The Princess is in another castle which is the only real castle. In fact, you are hallucinating the multiple castles (castles in fiction, European castles, sand castles, castling in chess, and so on.....).
 * Fiction, philosophy and drugs are the catalyst for the individual. The catalyst for the masses, however... let's just call it Instrumentality.
 * That explains Neon Genesis Evangelion, with it's mindscrewery. Anno realized the world is made of drugs and decided to make a drug trip disguised as reality which in turn was disguised as anime. Instrumentality is the actual reality, being a psychedelic nature, and the "real world" is in fact our body's unconscious modification in an attempt to make sense of it.
 * Oh yeah, and Tang itself (yes, the drink, not the Memetic Mutation) is also made of drugs.

The creation of fiction is in fact the subconscious recollection of past lives.
Bear with me on this one. I don't think it's covered.

The hypothesis is simple: all of us have lived innumerable past lives in alternate universes. However, only a scant few of these can be remembered, and these only subconciously. And how do we manifest these memories? In the creation of fiction. Every time any one of us - regardless of our degree of skill - thinks up, writes, or otherwise creates fictional places, people and events, we are in fact subconciously recalling the people, places and events of our past lives. Every fictional story we have made up, from our private five-hundred-page magnum opus to our idle daydreams, is in fact a reflection of the people, the places and the events we knew from past lives. If our stories are set in the 'real world', we are simply recalling lives in universes parallel to this one. And if our stories are incoherent or filled with plot holes, if our characters are underdeveloped or unrealistic, it is because our recollections of these lives are incomplete or distorted. Since everything about us can change with each different incarnation - including our personalities - exactly who we are in our stories/recollections can vary widely - we may be the protagonist, the villain, the annoying sidekick, or simply and unseen observer.

This applies to every bit of fiction, mind you. Including the more widely-known ones. JK Rowling was once a student of a school of magic in a parallel universe equivalent of Britain. H.P. Lovecraft once inhabited a world plagued by unspeakable horrors. George Lucas once resided in an world of intergalactic knights and silly characters. Jeff Lindsay once worked alongside (or perhaps was) a sociopathic vigilante. And so the list goes on.

There you have it. Make of that what you will.


 * So, Frank Miller spent his entire soul-history being a badass?
 * And Ed Boon was Scorpion, AND Sub-Zero, AND Liu Kang, AND Sonya Blade?
 * Poor Alyx. So, who was Mark?
 * I wonder how the humen race is doing.
 * I don't want to set the world on fire...
 * Were it so easy...


 * So where do heavily collaborative works, fan-driven webcomics, etc. fit in?
 * Simple: when a person creates a fan work, it is because they are recalling a life in a parallel universe to the one of the original work. In fact, if the events of the fan work are compatible with the original work's cannon, it may be the same universe. Similiarly, collaborative works are the recollections of people who have shared past lives in the same universe. This, of course, is rare, which is why collaborative works are less common...but it happens.
 * M - M - My Immortal? Oh God!
 * While the above is a rather disturbing thought, this troper can't help but find this idea strangely plausible, mainly because they know someone who they suspect may be the reincarnation of Ulquiorra, if the frequency with which they use the word 'trash' (and synonyms thereof) among other Ulquiorra-esque personality traits are anything to go on.
 * So, if I write a story that envolves total and ultimate destruction of all reality, including other universes and dimensions, what does it mean?
 * It means the eventual end of the universes and dimensions.
 * Countertheory that someone wrote a story of infinity. There is an infinite amount of other reality laying around and you can't get rid of it as it will have always existed and therefore come back. Even wiping it from existence will still make it come back. There is always a spark.

Reality sucks because it's incomplete.
See, the world was running along perfectly fine until they came - the Excrucians. For those unfamiliar with Nobilis, Excrucians are reality-devouring beings, whose goal is to nullify reality - and they do it by destroying entire concepts.

We live in an age post-Gotterdammerung, where the magic of the universe went away. because the Excrucians dismembered it. That's why the real world sucks now - to put it simply, it's incomplete. It's like an old-fashioned computer without sound, with only black and white graphics, no internet connection, a 10x10 screen resolution, only floppy drives and binary input keyboard. Still a computer but it sucks in comparison to what it could be.

Here's a partial list of the Estates that were destroyed (or just weakened):
 * Charles Atlas Superpowers and Rule of Cool in general are severely weakened, obviously. Isn't it obvious, that this real world is becoming gray, dull and boring, and the more you try to become epic the more you are likely to fail?

Anyway, why did we become one of the best, strongest, most powerful species who get to rule the world amidst the diseases, pain, war, Hell, crappy immune systems and conflict/problems in general? If you were an ancient times person, these problems existed because you just Took a Level In Badass and Evolutionary Levels. That which does not kill you only makes you stronger. With your increasing strength you become the fittest to survive. You didn't get hungry because you needed to eat, but because it was possible to learn not to eat. Your metabolism just became more efficient from it. Suffer enough diseases and you developed a Healing Factor. Get beaten enough times and you'd get Nigh Invulnerability. Mental stress just made you smarter, emotional stress just made you wiser, and the stress caused by arguing just made you hammier, hence the abundance of The Philosophers before. Mental illnesses were there so that once you got through them, you could shrug off madness-inducing effects of Eldritch Abominations and punch them in the face.

The very existence of these tropes were actually a good thing, since the past was a fucking Crapsack World of badass where there is only war, and if it wasn't for humanity's awesomeness, natural selection would have kicked our puny asses into extinction long ago. (Yes, I'm actually saying that the world back then was also a Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann/Warhammer 40000 crossover.) They were also the most prioritized Estates the Excrucians needed to destroy, as they needed for them to be gone before we do harness their full potential, pronto. If people just got more Badass from their attacks then sooner or later we'd all be able to go Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann and punch them out of the very fabric of spacetime. And that is the legend of why modern man is one of the sickliest and most miserable species on the planet today. Sure, some people like Kung Fu masters, athletes, geniuses and similar prodigies might inherit, develop and retain the Charles Atlas Superpower today(though they're still laughably weak in comparison to before), but back in the old days everybody had the potential for Charles Atlas Superpowers and could go WAAAAAGH against the variety of eldritch horrors that infested the Fantasy Kitchen Sink that is the ancient world to kill them with Fire. As said with the Charles Atlas Superpower entry above, they existed because you just Took a Level In Badass. If these gods did not kill you, they only made you stronger. Suffer enough Hells and you will not suffer eternal punishment and despair, but will grow into a God Mode Sue who can grow to be more powerful than Zeus, Thor, and Cthulhu combined and punch them in the face anytime you like. Just like Kratos. In shorter terms, the existence of Gods actually assisted in the development of our Charles Atlas Superpowers, whether through conjuring their powers or outright fighting them! Now the Excurcians cut off our connection to them, and they got lazy, which stroked a massive hole on our Charles Atlas Superpower abilities, and to add insult to injury, instead of becoming Kratos ourselves to these Excrucians, we get the most disgusting parasite of all time: Moral Guardians!!!!!!
 * That explains the very existence of the Spartans......
 * In a more imaginative WMG: Warhammer 40000 is the actual European Grimdark Ages (in other words, the galaxy is once a hell which would make anyone shit in terror, and it has a hell. Soldiers were put into The Spartan Way where one of every hundred aspirants survive, oh and Jesus is the God-Emperor who can totally kill you with fire and everybody is a Knight Templar. With chainswords.), but the Excrucians reduced the concept of cool from reality to fiction and since then, the dark ages were all peasants and fairytales and friendly hippie Jesus and like that.
 * Actually, this makes perfect sense and is, in fact, kind of acknowledged in the Nobilis canon. In the Nobilis canon there are five hundred "missing" years. So we did, indeed, "go backwards" as far as technology and civilization went. As far as I remember, human civilization was somewhere in the area of 2200 and then we got regressed backwards 500 years. But, if you assume that the missing years are actually somewhere in the middle ages (canonically, they're not, but what the hell, it's a cool theory) then it certainly makes sense that we'd go all Warhammer 40000, get regressed backwards in time and once all the cool Domains were gone, we'd progress along a far different and far less cool technological path.
 * Gods, Eldritch Abominations, Mythological creatures, and the like are gone too. They don't exist anymore, and if they do our link to them is extremely weakened. Sure, Sure, with Gods and Eldritch Abominations life is hell which has a Hell called Hell, and the destruction of Gods and Eldritch Abominations might have prevented us from various fates worse than death (Hell, Mind Rape, Naughty Tentacles, annoying Tsunderes, etc.), and might have actually be a good thing, but isn't going to Deus Ex Machina your way with Fire Like a Badass Out of Hell against The Legions of Hell, the Zerg Rush Of Alien Locusts and Ninja Pirate Zombie Robots, the army of Great Old Ones who come to this planet to try to rape and/or eat us, and sometimes the Orwellian bureaucracy of Heaven, part of what made the ancient world so epic? Also, All Myths Are True.
 * It is worth restating that Charles Atlas Superpowers and Rule of Cool were some of the most foundational principles of existence. A lot of the Estates destroyed were just gravy, awesome ways to accomplish the same goals but they were not universe defining. These two, on the other hand, neatly and efficiently solve the age old philosophical problem of evil. Why does evil, suffering, hatred, Hell and Black and Gray Morality exist? So you can be motivated enough to take a level in badass and allow evolution to work its magic along the way. Besides, without evil there'd plainly be no asses to kick and no way to show off just how awesome you are. They also answer all of the 'meaning of life' type of questions. What's the meaning of life? Become Badass and be universe-shatteringly awesome, duh.
 * Functional Magic is another one. One of the most harshly Excruciated Domains in the world, only myths, religion and shadows of the true mages remain today. This also explains why the ancient world is so filled with occult symbolism. What could not be accomplished by mere Charles Atlas Superpowers can be accomplished by magic.
 * One form of Functional Magic, Alchemy, was reduced to the hard science we know today. Sure, it was the predecessor of modern Equivalent Exchange-based science, but during ancient times it was much, much more than that. A major superscience that rivaled nuclear weapons in its time, Alchemy combined elements from the modern sciences we know today like chemistry and physics with the old yet extremely potent elements from the mythical like Gods' powers, Charles Atlas Superpowers and Magitek. Races and civilizations depended from the discoveries and sufficiently advanced technologies of the alchemists. The best part? It's inexpensive, requiring mostly a large intellect instead of royal inheritance for a one-way ticket to wealth or adventure (which puts nerds, genuises and sometimes Squishy Wizards on the same social class with emperors, aristocrats, princesses and the most powerful political and military leaders. Yes, I'm saying that the world back then was also a Fullmetal Alchemist/Girl Genius crossover with the Cold War thrown in). Want to make your own elements and/or perform Hadron Collider-level atomic transmutations in a level that those scientists at CERN can only dream of in the comfort of your own home? Just get some sufficiently advanced knowledge, draw some transmutation circles, and you've done it. Be careful though with the dark art that is human transmutation.

Nowadays, to perform nuclear transmutation you have to use not just sufficiently advanced math (which we all hate), but also radioactive substances, nuclear reactors and particle accelerators, which are hard to acquire, expensive and dangerous. And the amount produced by these machines are insignificant. The closest thing we can get to alchemy at home is conversion of energy from one level into another, like what we see everyday in electricity (yet most of the energy expended in conversion is lost as heat, while superconducting Applied Phlebotinum operates only on subzero temperatures), conversion of mass and matter from one element into another being outright impossible except during conditions inside a star, unless you are a wealthy scientist with access to particle accelerators.

Additionally, hypothetical alchemical substances, like Philosopher's Stones and Applied Phlebotinum, actually existed, and when these substances are used, elemental conversions and transmutations can be performed with more power and flexibility and less Math and waste substances. Applied Phlebotinum was quite possibly the most powerful substance invented by Alchemy. Far more potent and flexible than even the Philosopher's Stone, it was half-magic and half-science and upon its wondrous properties rested the foundations of virtually all technology. Science, then, was made much simpler. You wanted to travel faster than light? Plug in some Phlebotinum and more power - and you did it. Nanomachines? Perfectly safe, operated on the same principles. Robots? Antigravity? Spaceships and UFO s (like the one that took Elijah)? Flying cities? Humongous Mecha? Powered Armor? Unbelievably powerful weaponry? All possible with the power of SCIENCE!!! We were, basically, Sufficiently Advanced Aliens. Ancient superpowers, like Atlantis (which was actually a Space Filling Empire and not some dinky citystate in Greece) actually fought for more of these substances, and this is how the story on why it fell - once Functional Magic was cut off, the Applied Phlebotinum decayed, plunging Atlantis into poverty and causing all of the science of the age to fall apart and regressing us back to the dark ages. Whether it's a villain or a law of physics, nothing can stand against The Power of Love. However, because our connection to the reservoir of The Power of Love was weakened by the Excrucians, modern-day man dismissed it as the product of raging overreacting hormones and watching too much Disney Soap Operas, and The Power of Hate becomes the more dominant and realistic emotion for dealing with huge problems. The Power of Love really kicked the bucket when Room 101 proves that it is no longer invincible and is as manipulable as a mere tool. It used to be that we had robot buddies, that when we played with toys, they would cooperate with us. Our houses would adjust temperature or lighting or anything we pleased to our needs. We had forests that would tell lumberjacks which trees they should cut, cows that wanted to be eaten, oceans which would cleanse and expel pollution all by themselves, air that adjusted the levels of various gases to optimum, our cars could guide themselves and our spaceships(see Applied Phlebotinum above) would do the same. On the other hand, we also had plenty of evil robots, evil locations and so on. These were also awesome, as they allowed for us to become more badass.
 * Utopia is long gone. That's why you'll always find the complaints that any and all forms of government suck. They do suck because every single form of government is an imperfect attempt to replicate the success of Utopia.
 * Stock Super Powers are gone. Nowadays if you want to develop a superpower, the best you can hope for is echolocation, sharp observation skills, magnificent planning skills, genius-level intellect, Science-Related Memetic Disorder or great memory. Before, when you wanted a superpower that could not be shut down or wanted them from a different source than Charles Atlas Superpowers / Rule of Cool / Functional Magic / Applied Phlebotinum, you turned to Stock Superpowers and became a Flying Brick, telepath, psychic or what-have-you.
 * Made of Indestructium went poof. "Adamant" was the name of the material and it worked just like Vibranium in comics. Once forged, Adamant was totally and completely indestructible. It made for awesome armour for reality defenders and therefore, the entire concept had to be deleted.
 * The last of the remaining "Adamant" that wasn't poofed away is owned by Nintendo, and is the material from which they craft some of their systems (particularly the handhelds and Gamecubes). The weakness of DS hinges indicates that they're starting to run out of even the small quantity they do have.
 * Love At First Sight isn't exactly gone but it's not really all that strong either. It suffered a terrible blow and what used to be a concept known and enjoyed by everybody is currently almost an urban legend. It used to be that when you looked into someone's eyes you'd instantly know just how compatible you were with that person. You would instantly know if someone would be a true love, a cherished friend, an awesome employee(or a boss) or a great one-night-stand. Unfortunately, with Love At First Sight severely weakened, social bonding of any kind is now infinitely harder (nowadays, Hell Is Other People).
 * The Power of Love in general, also not exactly gone but is not really that powerful either. Before, love didn't just allow you to be passionate or propagate your genes and legacy on various habitats and power Evolution. Once upon a time, not only it is a lot easier to find your soulmate on which you can harness Love's fullest potential whether through Fate or just plain Love At First Sight. Love was to humanity what gravity is to black holes: when there is not enough mass at the start, it's pathetically weak, but too much of it can Divide by Zero, with the laws of physics, the fabric of spacetime, and Reality itself bending and warping in either mundane or completely absurd ways, far beyond than that of Charles Atlas Superpowers, Functional Magic or even the combined abilities of all the most powerful Eldritch Abominations. (for example, stories like Pygmalion and Galatea, which wasn't just a tale of Cargo Shipping, but actually happened before in many cases around the world, but that tale is just a subatomic particle compared to what Love can really do) After all, what can explain one of the most mysterious, completely absurd and fundamental of human emotions, than an equally mysterious, completely absurd and fundamental scientific concept? This also explains why Freud Was Right: The Libidinal attraction is E=MC2.
 * Reincarnation. Whether Reincarnation is gone or not is a discussion for another page. What is certain, however, is that it used to be a far stronger phenomenon - upon your death, you could decide whether to reincarnate - if you choose to do it you'd keep all of your memories and personality. Death was not a thing to be feared. If Reincarnation exists now at all, it certainly isn't as strong as it used to be.
 * Instant AI, Just Add Water. Back in the Glory Days, consciousness of various forms, types and a full spectrum of sentience was extremely common. This is why you'll see plenty of stories in which toys, objects or animals are human-level intelligent and a lot of stories about AI being easily invented. Although the concept of matter easily achieving awareness was destroyed, somewhere deep in our subconscious, far beyond the memories that disappeared along with the concept itself - we still know that matter should be more sentient than it is.

That's obviously not all. There are certainly other examples waiting to be added...
 * Probably the one who allied themselves with Excrucians and sent them to our planet were the Anti-Spirals and Ingsoc. After all, what better way to impose Despair Event Horizon and force all of us to be Driven to Suicide than to strip Real Life of its awesomeness?
 * Considering the reality-shaking power of Excrucians I think it's far more likely that they are allies rather than servants. But yes, if this is their goal (driving us all to Despair Event Horizon) then it certainly makes sense. The most effective tool of the Excrucians is not mindless destruction, but absolute despair, the death of hope, dreams etc. If you kill the world, it can be rebuilt. If you kill the world's soul it's lost forever.
 * No it's not primarily Excrucians it's also Kefka's fault. Utterly nihilistic and despairing? Check. Consumed the sources of magic? Check.
 * Of course, with all the awesomeness above, what you might be asking yourself is: "So how the hell did Excrucians even touch us?". The answer to that question is three-fold.

One, Excrucians themselves are nigh-omnipotent, capable of reality-altering feats on unimaginable scale.

Two, due to all the aforementioned Estates, war was glorious and we were engaged in it all the time. The epic wars between dozens of different religions, massive sci-fi civilizations, various gods and contenders to that title were constant and never stopped. We simply did not present a unified front against the Excrucians, who quietly and stealthily slipped into our reality and dismantled our defenses before we could react - and by the time we realized we had to stand united, all the Domains that could allow for us to fight Excrucians on equal terms were gone. In other words, the Gotterdammerung that happened to us was partially also our own fault.

Three, although the past was glorious, the universe was still in its diapers. We were just discovering our full potential and power, barely scratching the surface of what was possible to us. If we had more time to develop, learn and become even more awesome our Pure Awesomeness alone would've overwhelmed them. Simply put, if we had more time to develop we would've become so incredible that there are no words that could adequately describe just how mind-blowingly awesome we could become. Unfortunately, now, all that potential is lost.

Of course there's the occasional Anti-Spiral lie that if we got too intoxicated on Rule of Cool, we will end the universe, like what happened to Lord Genome.
 * Now that we know the problem, what's the solution?
 * Kamina. Or the God Emperor of Mankind. Probably also with an occasional help of Science, since that's the only most powerful Estate we all have for now.
 * Hence why we make fiction nowadays. It is the Collective Unconscious of the past memories pushing thoughts of the Glory Days into our thoughts. These products of the collective unconscious are called archetypes, innate psychic motifs on which most of our unconscious experiences emerge (which by our vocabulary is known as the Trope, and which by Nobilis could also be the aforementioned estates. An example of an archetype: The Hero. Obviously the past had more Heroes than nowadays). However, Real Life is so ruined it can't bring those days of Crowning Moment of Awesome back, so we make alternate universes we call fiction so that the wishes of the collective unconscious can be satisfied.

Philosophy: The Meaning of Life
Those who are Desperately Looking for a Purpose In Life can go here.

The meaning of life is to prove the meaning of life.
As soon as someone proves that statement, life will have no meaning.
 * 42.
 * the meaning of life is obviously...buckets
 * On the contrary, the meaning of life is to find a counterexample to the meaning of life.

The meaning of life is to question the meaning of life
Because questioning existing ideas about the meaning of life are the only way we can propagate and keep moving forward. Isn't that right?
 * The meaning of life isn't 42, then?
 * If you believe it is 42, do you think that the actual truth and meaning of all life, and does that apply to all the beings in the universe?
 * Great, now you made yourself look like Socrates. Shut up.

Life has no meaning.
Not nihilism. There is no inherent meaning, so you have to make your own.
 * So, Existentialism.
 * To create your own meaning you need to have a mind to do it with. Where the fuck did the mind come from in the first place?? Or is the mind the meaning???
 * Does your mind have to have a meaning to exist?
 * The mind evolved from simpler components. It's a parallel processing memristor-based CPU without a hard drive. Cognition is derived by self-analysis and self-alteration looping back upon themselves. The mind did not evolve for some meaning, it evolved as a direct cause of the laws of physics applied with brute force attempts and evolution.

Love is the meaning of life
The Rutles said so themselves in Love Life.
 * That's too depressing a concept to contemplate.

Everything is really done for the lulz. Everything, from our fiction, to religion, to philosophy, to science, up to the very existence of evil.
Even this page was created for the lulz.

Existentialism is true.
The world is meaningless and chaotically absurd, but it is our choice to give it meaning.
 * That - That kind of made me have some hope for mankind. With all the implications, I mean. After all, how many people do you know have no care about the world? How many people do you know don't give a damn? The fact that people make a big deal about everything or one little something is proof of this.

Human life has no purpose... fortunately.
Ask yourselves: "what has a purpose?" Answer: tools. Object that are used for something and can be thrown away with no remorse when they cease to be fit for that particular purpose. If humans had a purpose, it would be a natural right to kill anyone who outlives his purpose. It is not so because the right to life is the right to be free from purpose.
 * It does make sense, the idea that having no purpose or meaning in life is actually a fortunate gift. We were just brainwashed into thinking that only mentally-ill Nietzsche Wannabes can think of such a thing, because society (Atheists especially blame Religion) conditioned each of us to believe we all have the same "meaning in life" as real and objective as science, otherwise if we lived meaningless lives we could all just commit suicide. Well in a life with no purpose, instead of committing suicide, you can imagine, dream and be anything you want. You can be a successful entrepreneur, a brilliant writer, a historical figure, a total badass, a Ubermensch (in fact Nietzsche also thought that an existential vacuum is a novel idea rather than Nightmare Fuel), 42, what-have-you. If human life did have a purpose, we would be simply mere tools and objects instead of subjects, free choice would be an illusion, and it would be a natural right if people who violated their predetermined purposes are sent to Hell without a say, a question or a chance of parole. In a life with purpose, we have to tailor our very imaginations and subconscious to that single meaning, leading to a totalitarian Orwellian life, but in a purposeless life, imagination is free.

The meaning of life is:
The state of being which begins with generation, birth, or germination, and ends with death; also, the time during which this state continues; that state of an animal or plant in which all or any of its organs are capable of performing all or any of their functions; -- used of all animal and vegetable organisms.

That's what it says in the dictionary.

Fighting the power is the meaning of life.
Hence why we as a species persevere to expand and fight any challenges imposed by life just to achieve that. It also helps our own Character Development. If there was no power we can fight, we would drown in meaningless nihilism.
 * Oh, and the meaning of life is also doing the impossible.
 * And seeing the invisible.
 * and touching the untouchable.
 * and breaking the unbreakable.
 * ROW ROW FIGHT THE POWAH!

Characters and People
See also People.

Obama won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize because he called Kanye West a jackass.
The award was originally going to go to Taylor Swift.

Godwin was right all along
If Adolf Hitler was born in a different time, country, economical and/or social conditions, and picked on a different ethnic group, he probably wouldn't be considered the Antichrist. His whole situation made the world go against him. If he was born as a really poor, black person in an American slum in the fifties, he'd probably be oppressed as shit in his childhood anyways, but couldn't have power, intellect and Magnificent Bastardry to take over America. Same could be said for Khan, Mao, and Stalin. Occasion makes the... Monster.
 * But if he was born in a different time, as a different race, in different circumstances, he isn't the same person, is he? The poor black man in the 50's is as much Adolf Hitler as this troper is Hugh Hefner.

Osama bin Laden, all other terrorist leaders, and George Bush are really separate parts of a supernatural, evil being, and Barack Obama is the good counterpart of them
Said being came to earth to envelop it in chaos. The best way to do this was to use people's religion. But why Islam? The answer is that in the medieval era, there was a group known as the society of assassins, and it functioned exactly like most modern terrorist groups. As for George Bush, a leader of a powerful country was needed to declare war and recruit more members.

Sarah Palin is Ann Coulter in Wig, Dress, Accent
The so-called family she has is actually actors hired from a soap opera, who brought their soap opera writers with them.
 * Alternatively, Sarah Palin is the real person and Ann Coulter is the disguise.

Uwe Boll is just trolling the game community; if he wanted, he could do something half-assed.
And getting some noob cash over the trolling he does. What a ******.

Wacko Jacko is on a secret island somewhere

 * He spends his days jamming with Elvis and learning how to ride Shergar.

'Richard Dawkins' is a Meaningful Name
Richard -> Dick -> Chuck -> Charles

Dawkins -> Dakwins -> Darwin


 * I am glad to see I'm not the only one who thought this. As a child I would often get the two confused because of the similarities in their names and beliefs.
 * I don't think their beliefs are really all that similar. They're both famous evolutionary biologists, of course, but Dawkins is mostly famous for being a militant atheist whereas Darwin was a Christian who eventually turned agnostic. But I used to get their names confused too.
 * Dick Dakwins?
 * Darkwing Duck?

Barack Obama is the Manchurian Candidate
We never heard of him until like four years ago, and within two years, he was made a senator, and now he's president. The people lower down in case of assassination are worse, so you can't bump him off, and what is he selling us? He is trying to give us exactly what we want, hope and "change" (Despite many of us who oppose change). Right when the shit starts to hit the fan. Am I the only person who despite not having any personal beef with the man is inherently distrustful of "puppies and rainbows"? Maybe I'm just being Wrong Genre Savvy (Oh, and I'm sure some of these people here will spring for that), but something here seems weird.
 * The problem with your theory is that (in the original film, at least; I never saw the remake) the Manchurian Candidate didn't "come out of nowhere". Rather, he was the wealthy son of a military family, who had spent several years in a POW camp controlled by Asian communists where he was brainwashed. Wait... military family... POW in Asia... Hmmm... maybe it's for the best that we didn't elect John Mc Cain after all.

Mr T is NOT a Night Elf Mohawk.
He is actually an Insane Troll

Johnny Depp is God.
I mean, DUH!

Socrates is the afterlife.
Or at least he claims to be. That means, before you die, be Crazy Prepared for the endless philosophical interrogation about your very beliefs.

Tesla and Lovecraft were Reality Warpers.
Except Lovecraft's powers were taken through the Outer Gods, etc., and Tesla's were for the good of Earth.

David Bowie is Gackt's father.
The sexiness and omnipresence must be genetic.

Santa Claus is Satan
If you re-arrange the letters in Santa, you get Satan and if you rearrange the letters in Claus you get Lucas (which is short for Lucifer). Also, according to John 14:13 (new living translation): "For you said to yourself, 'I will ascend to heaven and set my throne above God's stars. I will preside on the mountain of the gods far away in the north." Now, when Santa comes to the mall, where does he sit? Where does Santa live?
 * And he's always calling for prostitutes with his "Ho! ho! ho!" chant
 * Jossed by history. "Santa Claus" is a mispronunciation of "Sanctus Nicolaus", Latin for "Saint Nicholas", who was bishop of Myra in the 4th century and obviously did nothing satanic.

Michael Moore worked for George Bush
His job? To give the liberals a bad reputation with his wacky theories and give the conservatives a target to easily discredit... It's a very subtle but effective propoganda tool!

Glenn Beck works for Barack Obama
Same as above, but with parties reversed.

The Baldwin Brothers (Alec, William, Stephen, and Daniel) are all clones.
Because no set of siblings looks and sounds more like each other than these four. They were probably all cloned from their father, who didn't want to sleep with their mother.

The Downfall parodies are actually Adolf Hitler who time-traveled to the future and got trapped in the Internet

 * Damn those Brain Uploaders!

Osama Bin Laden has been dead for a long time now
There have been articles floating around for years circulating rumors that Osama died shortly after the 9/11 attacks. If the hunt for Bin Laden really was a cover up for the real incentive behind the War On Terror, they only declared him dead because they accomplished their real objective.
 * and now he really is dead!

Joss Whedon is afraid of hamburgers
In Buffy, he gives us the creepy hamburger statue in "Faith, Hope and Trick" and then in "Double Meat Palace" we get wild conjecture about what's in hamburgers. In Angel, Wesley consults a different creepy hamburger statue that turns into a rather terrifying hamburger ghost-thing.

Particularly militant Yaoi Fangirls are reincarnations on Ancient Greek/Roman pederasts.
The aesthetics are nearly identical in many cases and the glorification/romanticism of gay sex (and often, disdain for women) are common themes that border on obsession. They even both have their own literature and artwork.

Normal people share a Hive Mind when they get into elementary school, and continues until high school.
Well, at least when this theory was written. How else is that almost EVERY person is two-faced, a gossiper, and very bitchy-like to each other and thinking that it's normal in middle school? It also explains how much we all used to be Children Are Innocent before we get into middle school? There are friendships that are secretly alliances for the most control, and the leader {usually female} controls their brains. Only people that realize it can not be one of them, and live as an "unusual" person with others. Those people usually rebel against the other groups and that's what causes gossip, betrayals, and all of that other things.
 * Its there all right...but we call it conformity.

Everyone EVER will be reborn...through TECHNOLOGY.
Technology will progress beyond the immortality of already existing humans. It will be able to track the matter and energy left over from every human corpse ever, no matter how scattered, and perfectly reconstruct their bodies and consciousnesses. Yes, we will rub shoulders with Socrates, Albert Einstein, Mozart, and Vincent van Gogh. They will be exactly the same people, not just perfect copies. (Hitler and co. are permanently banned from resurrection, though. Also, if such a state of advancement is reached, it is assumed that trifles such as overpopulation and resource shortage will be child's play by then.)

Jesus and Socrates are Alternate Universe counterparts of each other
Who through some freak of physics ended up in the same universe.
 * Both are highly successful philosophers who had a profound impact on Western culture (Christianity, Western philosophy).
 * Both lived in an area and is a part of a race that have profound impacts on Western society (Jesus lived with the Jews, Socrates lived with the Greeks)
 * Both are philosophers whose fathers had careers as proletarians (Joseph was a carpenter, Sophroniscus was a sculptor) but ironically, both of themselves were liked by the upper class (Christians, academic philosophers)
 * Both lived relatively moderate-to-poor lives.
 * Both have scanty historical proof of existence, but were believed to actually exist by the majority, and their lives can be only found to the writings of their most devoted followers (Gospels, Dialogues)
 * Both have followers who later twisted the actual accounts (Apostles, Plato)
 * Both practiced massive amounts of humility (Jesus' "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you", Socrates' "I only know I know nothing")
 * Both were criticized by mainsteam society (who, ironically, would later accept the two's beliefs as mainstream philosophy) for their beliefs.
 * Both followed the laws of said society, but criticized their opinions, especially on the grounds of morality.
 * Both were considered by Friedrich Nietzsche as Worthy Opponents and the actual Ubermenschen.
 * Both believe in the immortality and further importance of the soul.
 * Both are known to have no fear of death.
 * Hemlock is not painless, that's just something Plato made up.
 * Hemlock is not painless, that's just something Plato made up.

Nicolas Flamel was experimenting with radioactive substances

 * The Theme Park Version of an alchemist is someone who tries to turn lead into gold. However, Nicolas Flamel (who was a real person, not a character that J. K. Rowling made up) stated that he turned mercury into gold. That actually makes sense from a scientific standpoint. Mercury can be actually transmuted into gold through the photoneutron process, hereby described:
 * Irradiate mercury-198 atoms with 6.8MeV gamma rays
 * The gamma rays will cause mercury-198 atoms to eject a neutron, turning into mercury-197, which is radioactive, with a half-life of 2.7 days
 * Mercury-197 decays into gold-197 by β+ decay: one of its protons emits a positron, turning into an additional neutron
 * So there you have it. Gamma rays are emitted by radioactive substances, so the Philosopher's Stone was actually a substance capable to emit 6.8MeV gamma rays. Lead only enters into the picture because it shields radiations and it would be necessary in order to perform such an experiment safely.

Related Crossovers:
== Going by the "Jesus and Socrates are Alternate Universe counterparts of each other" theory, Socrates and Jesus are respectively, The Ultimate Question and The Ultimate Answer == Socrates questions our very beliefs in his endless search for Truth. Jesus randomly infinitely provides the Truth by his omniscience. If Socrates met Jesus, Jesus will have to rely on his God powers to counter Socrates' infinite barrages of philosophical inquisition, truth-seeking and deadpan snarking about Christianity's self-contradictions. Thus, Socrates becomes the Unstoppable Force to Jesus' Immovable Object. And we all know the fundamental equation: Unstoppable Force + Immovable Object = Division By Zero. This is exactly what the Precursors predicted, and that's why they put them in separate timelines. Also, they will argue on whether 42 is the meaning of life or not.
 * Jesus is Adam (all powerful), Socrates is Lilith (fruit of knowledge).
 * Unstoppable Force and Immovable Object? That means that Socrates is to Jesus what The Joker is to Batman.
 * Who the hell is Buddha, then?
 * Buddha simply got out of Jesus and Socrates' way, finding it to be laughable and unnecessary, and instead found his own nirvana in The Force.

Related to "Normal people share a Hive Mind": The ability of normal people to share a Hive Mind is related to extroversion, introversion, and the AT Fields of Neon Genesis Evangelion.
The strength of AT Fields are determined by how introverted and individualistic a person is, for example, a powerful AT Field means being an introvert, a weak AT Field means being an extrovert / normal person, and having no AT Field at all means death or being matter. To prevent either tangification due to weak AT Fields or being unusual due to strong AT Fields, normal people try to contemplate by sharing a common AT Field that is distinct from both introverts and the universe, causing a Hive Mind - like effect.

Cats are agents of communism
Proof? They hail Chairman "Mao" all the time!
 * Ironically mao is chinese for cat with the right tone.

Cats rule the world.
Why do you think they're so smug and conceited? Cats started their empire in Ancient Egypt, and spread to conquer the planet. They landed on the moon a few centuries before us. We are their servants,their slaves. We're just too damn arrogant to think we could be so subtly controlled by them. In the social heirachy,we are the slaves,strays are the poor and dispossed. Tabbies are the plebes and middle class, while pedigrees are the elite.
 * That's scarily similar to the events of Felidae....
 * And they've had an impact on history. The pyramids were created by cats. Unfortunately, the pharaohs got in the way.

Humanoid Cobras live beneath India
...Or at least on a hidden landmass in the Indian Ocean, according to some Indian scripts. Think about it: snakes have been described in ancient texts and cultures as symbols of rebirth, healing, and/or cleverness, among other things. One of the Aztec's major gods has been described as a winged serpant, at some points. Then take into account that snakes have been around for millions of years before humans, and species are still being discovered. Evolution isn't that much of a jump. So, millenia ago, they were forced to hide underground to avoid any more unnecessary predujiced skirmishes with humans. But soon, they shall rise up, enslave humanity, and take over the Earth as the new dominant species...or just perform a musical number in Hyperabad.
 * Christians demonised snakes because they know this is the case. If we're going by the "cephalopods are causing global warming" WMG, the snakes have allied with the squids to flood human habitats. The squids will betray them.

Dogs are all employing Obfuscating Stupidity
Well, most of them anyway. Some might actually be as dumb as they look. The actual intelliegence of the rest is unknown although it probably varies quite a bit; some might actually be smarter then we are. They act dumb because they like the way things are and they're been hanging around us long enough to know that we might react badly to finding out the truth, either that or expect them to do more. The fact that they don't have hands and can't talk also goes a long way towards concealing the smarts. Real Life canine examples of Amplified Animal Aptitude are actually cases of the 'don't mind me, I'm just a dumb dog' routine slipping a bit, as are a lot of the Real Life Heroic Dog examples. After all, when the human gets themselves in bother, someone's got to get them out of it before they get themselves killed.
 * Wait...so they like/tolerate what is basically eugenics, inbreeding, being bred with horrible disfigurements that humans find aesthetically pleasing, being forced to live in small wooden houses in muddy yards, being forced into daily rituals of bondage, exercise schedules, feeding times, pointless and inane games, being named whatever humans choose, having to do their business in the open and in full sight, having their 'bits' chopped off, being forced into isolation from their species, and being killed if they rebel in any way?
 * Well, they seem to actually like the 'exercise schedules' (also known as 'walkies') and games. As for the rest, possible Blue and Orange Morality (and/or Conditioned to Accept Horror if you insist on taking a darker view on things) on the part of dogs, combined that with Extreme Doormat tendencies and us doing a really good job of making sure that Undying Loyalty was hardwired into the doggie psyche.

Anonymous is/are controlled by cats
Anonymous are amoral, enjoy the pain of others, and we love them; common traits of a cat. A cat spirit who especially hates L. Ron Hubburd controls anonymous because it can.

Cephalopods and most invertebrates are the soldiers of Eldritch Abominations
Squids are foot soldiers, modeled the most after their Overlords. Octopi are Spec Ops, both intelligent and capable of fitting anywhere that their quarter-sized beaks can fit in and changing colors for camouflage. Jellyfish and urchins are, quite simply, organic land mines meant to coat the ocean's surface and floor with deadly toxin-filled sacs of death. Molluscs are scouts, small and unnoticable enough to get behind enemy lines. Of course, Australia is the area most affected by their influence, what with their history of criminals and plethora of excessively deadly monsters (most of them bugs and sea life).
 * And their master is Cthulhu.

Animal Mating Rituals Are Meant to Protect Against Shapeshifters
Let's use kelpies as the example for shapeshifters here. They are said to sometimes transform into attractive humans to attract humans as prey. This is only possible because humans tend to be fairly trusting. Other animals, however, tend to have fairly elaborate mating rituals and, in general, elaborate ways of greeting each other. This would give an alternate explanation for why so many monsters in myths and legends - especially the ones who use trickery - prey mostly on humans (besides the fact that Most Writers Are Human and therefore find that scarier). Humans are simply too trusting of their own kind.

Earth (or for a more appropriate name, Gaia) is Jesus
It chose to bear the sins of Humanity to prepare us for our ascension. The natural disasters? That's just the Apocalypse.

Mosquitos are God's way of punishing humanity for our sins.
Because I can't think of any other reason for their existence.
 * Killing a mosquito is fighting God's will, and you will rot in Hell eternally for it.

The Earth is alive
It maintains a constant body temperature, needs sunlight to survive, it takes nutrients and water from space as well as expiring chemicals and water and producing it's own nutrients.

It is very much a Starfish Alien in comparison to known life forms, it has a mind but not like any creature we know, with no logic or morality that humans can understand. Animals and plants are connected physically to the Earth, it needs us to survive, and also mentally, the organisms residing on it are also connected to each other in a simular way.

It seems Earth has attempted to communicate with us through this, but these attempts have had little success becuase of huge language and phsycology barriers,as well as the dormancy of the mental connection between Earth and us, other organisms may be able to use the link more effectively, but amongst humans it has done little more than cause confusion and given rise to ideas like 'God' and 'magic.'

Animals also seem to be able to use this for telepathic communication,how much other creatures use this at what efficiency is unknown, but humans are unskilled at this.
 * Another interpretation is that if the Earth is a living thing, Humans are The Virus (had to say the Agent Smith reference). The Missing Link? It was actually the time when The Virus infected Earth. As for us being the Virus, think about it: ever since we were born on Earth, instead of adapting with it in a symbiotic relationship like most plants and animals do, we try to form Earth to our own will. We settle to one place, modify the available area, consume all the resources, reproduce like hell, warp reality so that the surface would look like warped mountains, and so on, and when the area is exhausted, we move to another, where we then continue to consume. Another being is capable of this: The Virus. Earth's own brand of viruses, bacteria, and possibly all other forms of Gaia's Vengeance could be Earth's own immune system. Space Travel is simply the viruses' instinctive ability to infect other planets / bodies.

Unicellular organisms are Precursors.
Think about it. The universe works on a system of irony, and since we consider unicellular organisms primitive, it will turn out that they really formed a super advanced civilization.

The following species are sentient, and possibly trying to ovethrow humanity.

 * Homo sapiens.
 * Bottlenose dolphins. The only reason why they haven't built underwater cities is because They're too busy raping and killing For the Evulz. They will eventually get themselves into gear when they need to protect themselves from us.
 * Cats and dogs, as mentioned above.
 * Octopuses.

Labratory rats are spies.
So that they can kill us. The war between rats and people has gone on insanely long, and the humans are winning because of their advanced technology. Lab rats(and for that matter, pet rats), exist to learn our weaknesses and replicate our technology. Protests against lab rats are actually people who realise this.

There are, in fact, more than one snowflake with the exact same pattern
It's just that nobody bothered to go check each and every snowflakes for comparison.

We're on the verge of another extinction event.
Hear me out. Right now, the earth is in a period of warming. It does this sometimes; see previous Ice Age for reference. A lot of our species are endangered, some of them NOT due to humans killing them all. We're making the problem worse by trying to fix it (we're trying to re-freeze the Arctic places, except when we do this, the CF Cs get trapped in the polar stratus clouds at certain [normal Arctic] temperatures, only to be released more viciously when the temperature warms and the clouds go away, eating even MORE ozone and letting in more dangerous crap than if we'd just left $h1+ alone), signaling that we're not supposed to fix it.

We know the Earth is getting overcrowded, with both humans and other animals alike. A lot of those animals are evolving right in front of us- elephants are evolving away their tusks as a result of poaching, for example. Think back to the dinosaurs- doesn't matter how they died, my point is they died. The extinction event killed every dinosaur that was stuck on land (IOW, damn near everything that didn't fly). This is where we get our birds from. Without those dinosaurs dying, the leftovers wouldn't have the chance to evolve into the birds we have today.

If our ancestors (Homo heidlebergensis and Homo erectus, for instance) hadn't died, Homo sapiens sapiens couldn't have evolved. Once most of a species is gone, what's left begins evolving features to help them survive- it's a way of self preservation. The leftovers become so fast, so smart, and so well adapted to their current situation, that they no longer resemble the original species. BUT this is achieved only when the numbers of that species are extremely destitute. This is why Homo sapiens sapiens has evolved no further physically- we have no need to. There are enough of us to survive a cataclysm, and our genes know it.

Once the ice caps are gone, we'll lose our cold water sea life, yes- but from this loss, we'll acquire new species. Perhaps we're SUPPOSED to be killing these animals off- although that's only a theory and not something I acutally support. However, it does appear we're at the edge of a mass extinction event, given the earth's natural cooling and warming rhythms, and our powerlessness at stopping them.

Mass extinction event, yes/no? DISCUSS and/or RAGE.

PS: Just an afterthought- For those that don't believe in evolution, why would God create something and not give it the ability to better itself over time? Porque no las dos, as the commercial says? (Of course, sometimes species DEVOLVE- become slower, stupider, and less adapted, but does the Bible not say God has a lassiez-faire attitude about this stuff?)

The Catholic Church banned suicide and contraception because back in the Middle Ages Anyone Can Die, and they needed to protect the population of Europe for the upcoming Renaissance
Simple and practical as that. Now that the world has advanced medical science and antidepressants, they're lifting the orders lest they be called outdated jerkasses by generations to come....
 * Same reason as above: why they said homosexuality is a sin.
 * This Catholic troper can clear this up: They said that Contraceptives are sin because sex was intended by God only for use in marriage, for reproduction and expressing marital love. They never said Homosexuality is a sin. The said it was a sin to engage in homosexual acts. They said this because marriage was intended by God as being between a man and a woman, and sex is intended only for marriage. Before you start reacting with hate, this is not homophobic.

Japan and England are actually Evil Twin-like Alternate Universe versions of the same place.
Consider the following: We might as well say that through some freak of temporal physics, both wound up in the same universe.
 * Both take tea very seriously. Britons consume vast amounts of tea, the Japanese have an elaborate ceremony for drinking it. Both love it.
 * Both have had a rigidly stratified social structure.
 * They have comparable climates.
 * Both early on received an influx of a dominant mainland religion which at least officially replaced the previous pagan one (Christianity, Buddhism).
 * Both were involved in a civil war between two rival families in which one side flew a red flag, and the other a white flag (the Wars of the Roses, the Gempei War).
 * Both have successfully aggravated the majority of their mainland neighbors and have ongoing feuds with at least one of them.
 * Both had their enemies attempt to invade them, only to be scattered by a storm in the channel nearby (the Spanish Armada, the Mongol invasions).
 * Both are tiny island nations that have managed to wield a lot of clout, ruling Empires and taking on much larger neighbors.
 * Both are constitutional monarchies (although the UK is a Kingdom while Japan is an Empire).
 * Britain tried to take over the world, while Japan isolated itself for centuries. Japan also had an empire that tried to take over the world and Britain also went through phases of trying to cut itself off from the world. It's just that Britain was better at empire building and Japan was better at isolation.
 * Britain had huge deposits of metal ores, Japan had next to none.
 * They both have a history of putting honour before self-preservation. England may have got over it a bit sooner, but there was a fairly lengthy period of history where a warrior's live was focused on loyalty to their lord, to the extent that it was considered shameful to survive a battle where he was killed. Sound familiar?
 * Japan is a very respectful and excessively polite country as was Britain (England at least) its a shame that Britain has lost that respect.
 * This British troper disagrees.
 * Both have a reputation for being uptight and reserved on the surface, and cheerfully loopy with a risque sense of humour underneath.
 * Both have a habit of 'borrowing' words from different languages, tweeking them a bit and then claiming them as their own.
 * Both have a history of suspicion and often outright hostility towards anything 'foreign', although England seems to have got over the worst of it and Japan is lagging behind a bit.
 * The above mentioned suspicion does not always apply to food. Both countries are quite happy to nick ideas from other cultures in the interest of tastiness and often end up considering them theirs.
 * Both countries have a fixation with curry and in both cases the curry in question bears little or no resemblance to the original dish.
 * Both have well deserved reputations with regards to alcohol.
 * There's a hundred countries with reputations with regards to alcohol.
 * Both had the native population at least partly displaced and/or outnumbered by an influx of outsiders from the mainland which are now regarded as the dominant ethnic group.
 * Both tend to inflict impractically formal school uniforms on their kids (and parents).
 * Both export large amounts of media as a niche product (British Film industry, comedy and Reality Shows vs. Anime).
 * Both drive on the left side of the road. The only other countries that do either were part of The British Empire into the mid-20th century or have vehicle fleets made up largely of used JDM cars.
 * Both have been bastards to China (and Asia in general), although Japan has been a bit worse then Britain.
 * Just a bit.
 * Both countries are have a number of neighbours who hate them, or at least consider them a massive pain in the arse
 * This British troper has to admit, they can see it.
 * Also, apparently God lives in Japan and the Antichrist lives in Britain.
 * So.... Area 11 is Britannia?

Robin Cook's resignation was a sneaky "insurance policy" by the British Labour Party
Robin Cook famously resigned from the cabinet of the British Labour Party in protest at the Iraq War - that we all know. However, it was a devious insurance policy by Labour. The real plan is that they would have him in reserve if it all went to hell (their popularity, not the war itself!), Tony Blair would be given the boot, he would come back, take the reins as leader and be able to win back voters with his, "well I was against the war" stance. Unfortunately he died and despite everyone being anti war, Labour still got in in the next election, so we'll never know the truth...

Soviet Russia is an alternate universe version of America where things hold dominion over people

 * That's an alternative to the USA?
 * I think its more likely that USA was the one where things hold dominion over people (materialism and conspicuous consumption), and USSR was the one where other people hold dominion over people (totalitarianism).
 * More plausibly, in America Humans Are Cthulhu who are at the top of the cosmic hierarchy (science, materialism, natural selection in full effect thanks to capitalism, you are the one who consumes) and in Soviet Russia Humans (or more specifically, Individuals like you, if you go by Nineteen Eighty-Four) are Puny Earthlings who are the lowliest in all existence (totalitarianism, In Soviet Russia, Trope Mocks You)

McCain threw the election.
It seems rather out of character for John McCain to have actually thought Sarah Palin was...well, anything resembling a good idea, and his campaign managers probably developed ulcers watching him telling voters they could trust Barack Obama to not turn the country into New Kenya should he win instead of actually acting like a politician. The logical explanation; McCain had grown dissalusioned with his party, if not politics in general, after seeing the new lows of behavior everyone was sinking to and started doing silly things he knew would cost him votes.

Those Islamic Terrorists just wanted to commit suicide.
Think about it: Suicide Attacks are Awesome but Impractical. Also, suicide is actually forbidden by Islamic law. That's right, forbidden, and Muslims committing suicide would be considered sinners. Why did they commit suicide, then? Actually, they are so depressed and fed up with life due to the Crapsack World - esque conditions of the Middle East that they want to commit suicide, but society and their moralistic superegos prevented them from committing one without a valid and strong reason (also, the "committing suicide means you ain't going to heaven" ruse). How do they commit suicide without being branded a sinner, thus committing suicide with confidence, encouragement and the will of Allah himself? Answer: JIHAD!!!!!! Basically, they rationalized genuine depressing suicide into "holy Jihad".
 * Suicide by Being Killed In Battle was actually popular back in the Middle Ages, both for the Muslims and the "Anti-Suicide" Christians (the Christians themselves took cues from Norse Pagans)

Islamic terrorists aren't really devout.
Soldiers have found computers in Taliban bases. What do they find on them? Rule 34, including stuff of men having sex with animals. They're not really mad at us for our freedom or for our sinful ways, just that we don't approve of their sinful ways. The President can stop this all right now by going on TV and having sex with a camel.
 * Well DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUH

The American Right is aligned with Islamic terrorism.
Well, they both hate homosexuals, both also try to lump in moderates of the same religion with extremists and help encourage their kids to become disaffected and betray the country they perceive as "heretical" and they both want everyone to worship one God, although they both convince their followers it's not the same deity. It's all a Xanatos Gambit by a crazed Eldritch Abomination named "Yahweh". Or "Allah". Yes, everyone: God is Emperor Palpatine! Smoking gun: Iranian terrorists only released the hostages minutes after Reagan was sworn in.
 * And who the hell is Darth Vader?
 * Think about it logically. Who acts to further God's nebulous and convoluted Gambit Roulette while simultaneously hating God's guts with a passion for ancient wrongs, and ever plots in what he thinks is secret to unseat and replace God, the attempts at which are incorporated into The Plan to destroy God's enemies, strike fear into the hearts of his followers, and further his goals? Satan, of course.

The American Left is Aligned with Islamic Terrorism
Otherwise, why are they so apologetic about a group of people whose ideology is supposedly the exact opposite of what they claim believe in? Whether it is women's rights, gay rights, and religious freedom, to name a few.
 * What? I don't even...

Almost everyone in America is secretly Aligned with Islamic Terrorism
There's maybe five people who actually aren't, but everyone is so deep undercover they don't realize they're only dealing with other deep-cover agents.

The actual reason Al-Queda hate/dislike Denmark is Nicklas Bendtner
Think about it. Osama Bin Laden was an Arsenal supporter, while Bendtner hasn't exactly performed as well as he claims he has the abilities to. The Muhammed cartoons was just an elaborate cover-up.

The Touhoku earthquake was part of the CIA plan to eliminate ben Laden
The CIA secretly ordered HAARP to cause a large-magnitude earthquake in Japan, in order to damage the Japanese infrastructure, particularly Sony's Playstation Network servers, because they knew Al-Qaeda was secretly using PSN to coordinate their terrorist activities while masquerading as regular Modern Warfare 2 players. So, when the Sony servers in Japan were crippled, CIA hackers started their simultaneous attack and eventually broke in, stealing all contact and credit card information (which Sony, of course, denies) to cover up their real intentions. The PSN was shut down but too late, as the CIA already knew where ben Laden is hiding, so all their had to do was send in the marines...

Massachusetts and South Carolina are Evil Twin or Alternate Universe counterparts of one another
Here's my reasoning:
 * Neither is willing to genuflect to anyone.
 * Both are loud and brash (each in their own way) and refuse to be ignored.
 * One is known for its warm climate, the other is known for its cold climate.
 * Both has served as The Chessmaster for their respective region, either historically or into the present day.
 * They each spearheaded one of the two most famous secession movements in American History: the Hartford Convention and the Civil War, respectively.
 * They are the two colonies that were most violent/passionate in the early American Revolution. Massachusetts dragged the North into the Revolution, and South Carolina dragged the Deep South in.
 * They both became the much richer part of their colony/state before spinning of the poorer region: Maine and North Carolina, respectively.

North Korea actually IS best Korea
The whole totalitarianism thing, the whole everyone starving thing, that's all just a fabrication from the North Korean government themselves. The actual rulers of North Korea are unknown, but they have a family of talented actors, the Kims, to pretend to be crazy dictators. This is to keep foreigners out of the nation, because sometimes strife happens when foreigners enter any nation. The reason that North Korea is black when you see the lights at night from space is that they use entirely LE Ds pointed straight down to light up the nation.

Barack Obama will end the Iraq War...
...by nuking the entire Earth. This will happen, of course, on December 21, 2012.
 * Sighs and feels sympathy for the poor remaining Mayans who have to put up with this date being thrown at them every single day. On that note...

Future US Presidents...
2012-16 Barack Obama 2016-20 Janet Napolitano 2020-8 Gabrielle Giffords

Europe will, one day, become the United States of Europe.
The U.S.A used to be the colonies divided between Spain, France, and Britain. It is plausable that in the very distant future the Europian Unions already tight bond will be stronger and it will be one country with the (present day country's) as states. Already the Union's concil has a president. Russia probably will be left out, and Britain may have left the union by that time and have become a state of America.

In accordance with the above WMG: Peace will not come in Africa until all African countries unite into an African Union.
Their situation is more dire than Europe's for most of history, but is ultimately the same; random alliances and rivalries force an entire continent into war. Consider the first world war. It didn't really have to happen, it was just super confused after centuries of random alliances being made and broken. Now, with the EU, there hasn't been a European war for some time, discounting the civil wars and genocides in Serbia, Armenia, and caused by the fall of the USSR. An AU is really the only answer, but the world doesn't care enough about it to push Africa to move towards peace.

The future is going to turn out to resemble Cyberpunk
The political side of things probably not so much, but we definitly seem to be heading in the right direction for the technological side of things. Consider the evidence.

Anonymous is the future of mankind, and even all intelligent life
One day, we will shed our names used by our oppressors such as Scientology to exploit and bully us, and we will all become Legion, united as one, divided by zero.
 * Please tell me you did not just do that.
 * We all do it, when you see the internet you are actually facing a Tome of Eldritch Lore which serves as a guide to an Assimilation Plot where your identity is changed to I Am Legion which in turn gives you the feeling of A God Am I and allows you do anything For the Evulz and get away with it like bashing identity-exploiting ideologies such as Scientology. This.... is called The GIFT.

Soon Everything Is Online will become Truth in Television and it will lead to the Apocalypse or some other disastrous scenario.
In the case of the latter, totally unconnected areas will suddenly become havens of safety.
 * As shown by Serial Experiments Lain. Also, Anonymous is obviously The Legions of Hell.

There will be casinos on the moon
It is only a matter of time.
 * Well, duh; we just have to get rid of all the damn whales first.

A Zombie outbreak will happen
There are countless of Foreshadowing and prophecies inside the works for this arc, as well as close encounters (The Virus). It will not be a downright Apocalypse but it will be Nightmare Fuel.

Future generations will freak out about global cooling.
The Earth goes through these warming and cooling trends. We just happen to be in a warming one. Technically, we're still in what we call the "previous" Ice Age- what laymen refer to as the Ice Age was just our last frozen stage, but we never really left that Ice Age. Anyways, the Earth started warming before our species of human knew what our genitals were. Yet, here we sit, Present Day Earth, freaking out about how we destroyed the planet and caused global warming. In reality, we didn't freaking do it. (I will say we certainly haven't helped any.)

Anyways, once this warming stage is over, the earth will begin to cool down. By then, humans will have developed all sorts of awesome alternative energies. Once the "global cooling" panic sets in, humans of the future will shht themselves in fear. They will look at the history books to this time era and think they overdid it with the alternative fuels. They will then try to fix this by burning more fossil fuels, when, in reality, humans will have not learned that this just happens.

And it will be just as ridiculous then.

on the 21st of December 2012, the descendants of the Mayan people will all appear on live television, and laugh at us.
...Actually I'm surprised the programmers didn't do it first, on 1st of December 2000.

We are living in an alternative timeline where 2012 will happen.
The TRUE timeline for the world we think we know includes no Holocaust, no Kennedy assasination, the amicable split of the Beatles and a world where terrorism is something explored purely in fiction (the twin towers incident being a series of popular books/films exploring a kind of hatred the real world would never know). And thus, no end of the world. Unfortunately for us.

Something will happen in 2012.
The world won't end, I've read that that was just a misinterpretation of the Mayan calendar. However, something will happen in 2012, it's just not clear what... I bet that once it happens, everything will suddenly make perfect sense.
 * Well if the world doesn't end then something will have to happen, by default.

The Mayans did not prophecize the end of the world in 2012...
...but they did realize the adverse effects human societies have on the enviroment, and realizing that by 2012 we would enter an era where resources our society depends on becoming extremely scarce. 2012 is not the end of the world per-say, but rather the end of the world as we know it; human society is about to enter a sort of revolution, much like the agricultural revolution that began in the Fertile Crescent (in what is now modern-day Iraq) that will fundamentally change how we interact with our enviroment and how our societies function, but this time, the revolution is on a world-wide scale, and will occur much faster. For example, the rise of the pyramid-style hierarchy essentially began with the development of agriculture; having a surplus of food that you can store means that not everybody has to grow food, and a fraction of the population (which increases as food-production increases) can specialize in scientific and engineering fields like metal-working and architecture. These specialized workers became the middle class, the farmers and laborers became the lower class, and the administrative positions that manage these jobs as leaders of society became the upper class. The exact specifications of each class vary across the world and history, but most modern civilizations follow this structure, and every major change in history is essentially a shift in power between in each of these classes. This system is about to fall apart, very, very soon. Human beings have developed such a deep understanding of agriculture and technology, that there may be a point in the future where large nations break down into smaller states, because large-scale management of labor and services is no longer required with the advancements we are making.

Sarah Palin will become President Elect of the United States on December 21, 2012
Thus causing The End of the World as We Know It. Because nobody could've figured this.
 * Jossed after Romney has been finalized as the GOP candidate. Maybe he will be the one who will end the world?

The real reason the Mayan calendar ends on 12/21/12 is that they ran out of room on the rock.

 * Not a WMG.
 * It's a guess, but is it wild and mass?

The first time machine will be invented on 12/21/12.
And the reason why it ends then is because, once time machines are invented, it'll be impossible to keep score of time.

21 December 2012 is the end of the world... for the Mayans.
They were somehow able to tell that the last living remnants of their civilisation (i.e. the last descendant of the Mayans) would be gone after that day, and figured they'd stop making calendars since there was nothing more for them after that day. Eventually, other civilisations discovered the calendars and assumed it was for the end of the world for everyone, not just the one group of people. And the date the calendars ended became part of public consciousness, thus leading to fears that the world will be destroyed, when, in fact, it is merely the end of the Mayans.

H.P. Lovecraft is behind TV Tropes.

 * He knew that Chtulhu would be coming to earth, and so he planted subliminal messages in his books so that when the internet was invented, somebody would create this website' and strengthen the minds of those who used it with the tropes and genre savvines so they, the elite, could resist Cthulhu's powers of insanity, and find a way to stop him.

Memes are a new tool of the Powers That Be to control information
Ever notice how with the rise of the internet we have an explosion of memes and jokes? These self-replicating passing bits of trivial data are designed to distract, annoy, confuse, and amuse those who might otherwise attempt to use the Internet for serious, GOOD causes. The Internet is too well ingrained now to be completely controlled. Sure, it may not seem like much to browse a website about cats with funny captions, but consider that you COULD be helping an organization in fighting poverty, or rallying supporters to oppose an oppressive government.
 * As an addenium: The various weird lawsuits and copyright / censorship laws either introduced, passed, blocked, etc., are the result of multiple parties attacking the internet from different angles, and it is only a matter of time until some sort of successful method to lock down the free flow of information is discovered.
 * That's already happened. Remember Google and the incident about Tibet and freedom ?
 * Well this troper loves internet memes yet is smart enough to philosophize.....
 * What if we use memes to spread information? Now we can put the trope Watch It for the Meme to good use.
 * Alternatively, every single internet meme has been deliberately constructed as part of this research project to essenitally weaponize the meme.

Aliens are just a distraction.
OK, so we know all governments on Earth are hiding something. And we know it has something to do with aliens. But think about it for a moment. If we all know about it, they clearly aren't hiding it very well. They can't all be that incompetent, can they? The truth is that they wanted us to hear about aliens, so that we think we already know what they're up to.

Alternatively, every country on Earth is run by idiots.
See, if aliens are what they're hiding from us and we know about aliens, that means they fail.
 * Ignoring the idiotic alien theory, the basic WMG isn't actually a WMG. We know it to be true.

The craft that crashed at Roswell was an alien weather balloon
The government officials responsible for the coverup thought it would be hilarious if they told the truth in a way that also covered the truth up.

There was a Roswell impact, but...
what hit Roswell was essentially the alien's attempt at first contact with humanity, finally having advanced enough to be considered sentient and not go stupid from the revelation that there is other life out there. Sure, we weren't perfect, but we were at the right point to get help from them. Or else it was a mar rover-like probe, sent to random planets of an alien NASA that might have had life on them, in order to see if there was anybody out there. Unfortunately, the probe had a malfunction and crash-landed in New Mexico, completely scrapping the thing and making it useless. And we bastards have yet to answer the phone.

Every conspiracy theory you've ever heard of is just what They want you to think.
Including this one.

Everyone has been abducted by aliens at some point in their life.
Most people forget due to Laser-Guided Amnesia, but sometimes the memory-erasing process doesn't work the way it should, allowing some people to remember. It's usually dismissed as just a dream, so the aliens secret activities remain secret.

There is a genuine conspiracy around you.
I'm writing it here because it'll be dismissed as just one of the many WMGs and of no relevance.

But here's the truth - have you ever felt like you were meant for something more in your life? Like there's a hole you can't fill, no matter what you do? Like there is something grander in this universe than anything you've known so far but you just can't reach it?

That's because there is. Here's the truth that has been denied all your life from you - almost everyone else is telepathic. You've been disabled from birth and out of the respect for your disability(which is carried by more than 25% of the population) all the information about it is censored from the non-telepathic portion of the community.

It's not as hard as you might think. Projecting illusions over the minds of baselines(that's the Muggle word for you, by the way) is absurdly easy. Doing it with the media is a bit harder but we've eventually invented a system of sigils that forces an absolute denial response in baseline mind when seen or heard. BTW this is the reason for 90% of the so-called "plotholes" in any media you might care to mention. A digression: in actuality, Highlander 2 was one of the greatest films of the 20th century but the amount of sigils it has simply makes the story silly for the non-telepathic mind.

So, there's the truth. No sigils. No censorship. Now you know.

We're all immortal superheroes, but aliens are keeping us down.
They put a slow acting poison in our food, water, and air to weaken and kill us, because they saw us as a threat. However, we can't stop consuming the poison because the poison is super addictive and has deadly withdrawal symptoms.

The Titanic was sunk by The Kraken but the goverment hid the fact to avoid mass hysteria.
PROOOOOFF!!!!!!!111ONE

All exotic versions of influenza are hoaxes -- created for our own good.
The flu is a highly communicable, often fatal disease with no cure. Yet most people treat "the flu" as they would "a cold" -- a minor annual nuisance to go through, get over and forget about. The solution? Periodically come up with new "killer" versions of the flu. One time, it's Avian Flu; next, it's Equine Flu; then it's Swine Flu; heck, you can keep going until you run out of species. Just blame all deaths from the flu on the new variant; a little panic is worth it if you can get people to actually get their shots and take measures against infection for once.

The tinfoil hatter conspiracy theorist stereotype was created by the government to discredit anyone trying to discover the truth behind various real conspiracies.
And the Watergate Scandal was designed to fuel the belief in the common citizen that the government can't keep its plots a secret.

There is no console war
Don't you find it strange that Konami released the Metal Gear Solid Collection on both the PlayStation 3 and the 360 despite having no plans on porting the rest? Or how about Atlus's decision to release the Persona 4 fighting game despite having never developed a Persona title on an X Box? Or the direct sequels of Final Fantasy XII on the DS? Don't you get it? All the companies are working together! Never played the sequel of the game you played on one system? Well you're going to have to shell more money out to buy another one! I'm on to you, Microsontendo!

The folks at Area 51 are aliens.
The Roswell incident? That's just to divert attention. The truth that aliens ivaded decades before it, and have been using Area 51 as a method of research.

Rats want to rule the world.
Rats are the true dominant species, they secretly control all governments, and the black plague was their weapon. They want to weaken the earth so that we won't be able to fight them. Also, chemtrails consist of the same chemicals as rat poison, but in trace amounts, so it's clear that the true agenda behind the chemtrail conspiracy is to strengthen the rats so they can rule the world. The film Ratatouille was also a part of the rodent agenda.

The internet is a sentient entity, and secretly ruling the world.
Just think how much input has been put into it and how much impact it has on our lives. Something as far-reaching and complex as the internet could very well have gained awareness, and it would be easy for it to run humanity. Things like memes, Youtube and Rule34 are distractions so that the Internet entity can sort things out. The reason why the Internet isn't showing it is because, despite its great manipulation of information, it still needs humans to function. Given the access to nearly all human knowledge, the Internet is ignoring the strategies of most AI Is a Crapshoot and figuring out a truly Dangerously Genre Savvy plan: slowly make human civilization completely dependent on it.

Greys are actually descendants of humans from millions of years in the future.
They're basically anthropologists who are interested in studying the biology of their distant ancestors. This would explain their basic physical similarities to modern humans and their interest in us.

Humans never came from Earth
Which would explain humanity's harsh reckless treatment to Earth, to the point that the natural balance of Prey vs. Predator is upset.
 * The Missing Link theory seems to support this.
 * So, where did humans came from?
 * The answer is simple: MARS! Think about it: We love to observe Mars, we like to make science-fiction about Mars, we portray Martians as a super-advanced species with us as just some ghetto, we are obsessed with colonizing Mars, even to the point that we "need" to find water on Mars (despite the obvious lack of water on the Red Planet). Our treatment of Earth as an Insignificant Little Blue Planet filled with slaves (animals) and our obsession of colonizing Mars is an unconscious memory of the Human-Martian heritage.
 * Only the men are from Mars, all the women are from Venus. In fact there are still Alien civilizations on Venus. The planet is just too cloudy for us to see them.
 * And that's why homosexuality exists. When all the men lived on Mars and all the women lived on Venus, they had to reproduce somehow, right? Back then, gay/lesbian sex actually produced babies. When the Martians and Venus-ians arrived at Earth and met each other, they slowly lost their ability of same sex reproduction and instead started to reproduce with each other, and so heterosexuality became the norm. Today, homosexuals are old school/nostalgic and homophobes are in deep denial about our true heritage.
 * I thought we were Golgafrinchan.....

There is no intelligent extraterrestrial life anywhere.
Alien civilizations will tend to expand or die out. If even one somewhere doesn't die out they will simply expand forever. There has been billions of years to happen already, yet they aren't here yet. Even if they weren't interested in Earth, they would still likely attempt harvest all usable resources in the universe (the easiest way to doing that would be to build Dyson swarms around all stars). In short, if aliens did exist, we wouldn't be be able to see the stars. Or, there would be a huge region of space with exceptionally dim galaxies in it (visible only by the waste heat generated by the aliens' technology). We don't see this, therefore we're alone. We're the first sentient lifeform to evolve in the entire universe.
 * There are still aliens out there (How Big Is The Universe?), only their brains are comparable to that of apes. When these aliens form civilization, we'll become the Sufficiently Advanced Aliens.
 * Of course, first troper is assuming that aliens have similiar psychologies to humans. There's no telling HOW or WHERE TO an advanced alien civilisation might expand. Through wildly differing cognitive processes, what if they easily discovered or thought whole different realms of scientific laws, beyond the laws of physics as we understand them? Maybe they found a way to expand in ways and forms we can't currently comprehend.

There is intelligent life out there.
But they have the same technology standards as we do / it is some kind of parallel universe Earth but in the same universe, and when we finally build spaceships they will collide with each other while on national tv which will lead to a plot that I have no idea of.
 * Alternatively: The parallel Earth is a century/a few decades behind ours and WE will be the Aliens.

We could be in the middle of an intergalactic conversation...
...And we wouldn't even know.

Think about it. Radio waves are about the suckiest way to talk across interstellar distances. Everyone else has moved on to something else. You think reading a 5 1/4" disc is hard? Try building scanning equipment for a commo method no one's used for 10,000 years. There's lots of talk out there, we just can't hear it, and they can't hear us.

The reason the many space agencies have not sent a man to Mars yet is that the probes found something
Ever wonder, 40 years since the moon landing and still no chance to land on Mars, Foreshadowing or Red Herring?.

The description of an alien city on Venus was misunderstood as the description of the Christian afterlife
The Christian concept of the afterlife consists of Hell (where the wicked are punished) and Heaven (where the righteous are awarded). However, both environments could actually be real places, present not on Earth but on (and in the immediate vicinity of) the planet Venus. Let's start from the most obvious:
 * Hell is described as a place of suffering, with fire and brimstone ("brimstone" being an old word for "sulfur"). One of the old names for Venus was Lucifer (="Light bringer"), which is also one of the names of Satan. Successive inferior conjunctions of Venus repeat a 13:8 orbital resonance (the Earth orbits 8 times for every 13 orbits of Venus), creating a pentagrammic precession sequence; the Spanish Inquisition established a connection between the pentagram (originally a pagan symbol) and Satan. The surface of Venus probably looks like this due to temperature and pressure and is actually an inferno (pun very much intended) of heat and sulfur: the temperature goes over 460 °C (860 °F), while the pressure is between 75 and 100 times the pressure on Earth; sulfur is a major constituent of the Venusian crust and Venusian rain is made of sulfuric acid. Obviously, anybody on that surface would experience atrocious suffering.
 * Heaven, on the other hand, is described as a place of "light", high in the sky, with "streets of gold", while the popular depiction includes fluffy clouds. It turns out that, 50 kilometers above the surface of Venus, the temperature and pressure match those of Earth, and that an aerostat habitat containing air at 1 bar would naturally float at that altitude due to buoyancy. Such a base or city would be flying above an endless expanse of golden clouds, brightly lit by sunlight. Receiving light from two sources (directly from the Sun and indirectly from the clouds) would increase the amount of free energy available for the base, which would grant a high standard of living for its inhabitants.

Science is a Gambit Roulette on God's part.
As people started finding explanations as to why certain things happen certain ways, and more and more things started to discredit religion, God just saat back and let it happen. He did this to test if we could still hold our high morals without a fear of Hell; this would, after all, be an excellent way to see who's truly the good person.

EVERYTHING is a Gambit Roulette on God's part.
God created several people to rule the world, at different times, to avoid suspicion. They included Barack Obama. He came into contact with another man in on the plan: Ted Kennedy. His plan involved the creation of an artificial human that would destabilize the Republican Party. This human was Sarah Palin. Kennedy and Obama then hypnotized John Mc Cain into choosing Palin as his Vice Presidential candidate. This selection drew attention to Palin and also allowed Palin to make remarks that started to eat away at the party's credibility. Later on, Obama planned to pass the health care bill. Palin mentioned the non-existent death panels, which further harmed the Republicans. However, when some people either took the threats seriously or went against the bill for other reasons, Ted realized that the bill was in danger. So he decided to plan his own death so that the bill might be passed in his memory. It is still to be decided whether the plan succeeds or fails.

God is a troper.
He or she won't reveal him or herself, but I know God's here. Somehow.
 * Hello. Looking for me?

All the gods are shippers.
And they still fail to notice all the Deconstruction.

All religions are correct.
All gods of all religions exist You are only revealed the gods you believe in. Christian? Boom, you realize the Christian god. Muslim? Boom, His name is revealed to be Allah. Atheist? His name is Science. Also, heaven and hell exist in the form that each person believes it to be; believe in a boiling vat of torture? Boiling vat it is. Believe in hell being absolute loneliness in darkness? Nietzsche Wannabe paradise. Room 101? Better hope you don't go to hell, nobody wants that kind of mental torture.

Also, all gods did create the universe. Each one contributed a tiny bit. All packed into a very tiny speck. Then, after a unanimous agreement to expand their speck, they performed some weird universe-expanding ritual, and then the bang was big.

As for religious wars? Ares has been getting bored out of his mind, what with the ancient Greeks and Romans having died out.
 * Ares is dead. Didn't you get the memo? It's "Kratos" now.
 * Wait a minute... what if you're an atheist, and you don't believe in heaven or hell? Wouldn't you be doomed to the unimaginable hell that is nonexistence?
 * No. And if there is such a thing as "nonexistence", it won't be hell. You have to experience something to dislike it.

The afterlife is handled by a celestial beaucracy
When you die, you are sent to an administration building where your fate is decided. If you did good deeds, you can enter Heaven. Bad deeds, which are no necessarily heinous, will be reincarnated as another chance. Heinous crimes will send you to hell for an unknown amount of time. The person who will handle your case is decided by what religion you practice and if you didn't have one, they will find you one. Those who feel they didn't live a satisfactory life or just filled with some regret are offered to live their life again in hopes that they can change their life.

Everybody Is Jesus in Purgatory
This world is actually Purgatory, and the souls of the dead are continually reincarnated here until they have worked through the issues that keep them from ascending to Heaven. Everybody who reads this message is actually one of the "cycles" of Jesus. The fact that you're so fucked up in the head is proof positive that Jesus still has a long way to go.
 * Not Jesus, but Moses. That guy got bigger issues.

The Ka'abah really is the "House of Adam".
Or more specifically, the source of life on Earth. The meteoric materials used in the monolith come from the meteorite that first brought life to Earth according to the Panspermia theory.

TV Tropes will ruin your life
It's addictive.
 * Confirmed.

I am right behind you
Or will be sometime in the future.
 * THWACK
 * That would be a problem, given that my back is against a wall, and on the other side is a 16 foot drop onto the pavement.
 * "Or will be sometime in the future."
 * That's actually... a bit creepy. If this is confirmed, then at one point I will be right in front of a total stranger - or not. So if I know you, then it's confirmed. But since I don't know, it remains unsolved.

I am right behind the person who is right behind you
Or will be if he or she is.
 * Shinkt!

We are living in a pornographic movie
There is a guy named Major General Rudolph Kabangbang. What does he do? Why, he is the liaison of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front(MILF). let me repeat that: there is a guy named Rudolph Kabangbang who works for MILF. If that doesn't sound like the name of a porno star, I don't know what does.
 * This actually explains why sex even exists; dividing asexually makes more sense, but if we're here just to stimulate our robot overlords (who I welcome), it would make sense.

This Troper is your father.

 * No! No! That's not true! That's im-possible!!!!
 * Search your feelings, you know it to be true......
 * NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!
 * It's true! And Princess Leia is your sister!
 * DOUBLE NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!
 * That's... improbable.
 * And the Empire will be defeated by Ewoks!
 * That's... highly unlikely...
 * And as a kid, I built C-3PO!
 * Luke Skywalker: ...wha?
 * [time passes]
 * And you know that all-powerful Force? That's really just microscopic bacteria called Midichlorians!
 * * smoking a cigarette* Look, if you're not gonna take this seriously, I'm outta here!
 * Are you sure you don't want me to get you a Wedding Present, Dad?
 * This. Is. Unconceivable.

Contrast to the above, This female Troper is Your Mom, who is sooo....

 * ... fat, she don't sit on the couch. She sits around the couch.
 * ... stupid, she sits on the TV and watches the couch.
 * ... old that when you cut her, dust comes out.
 * ... pretty, I am not worthy to see her.
 * ... famous, there's a trope named after her.
 * ... anorexic, she went to Jenny Craig and they said "Sorry, no professionals!"

Reading too much from this page will make you Go Mad From the Revelation
It's true.

Reading this page has already made you Go Mad From the Revelation
To cope, your subconscious has created this reality around you. You're actually going on a homicidal rampage right now. Please wake up.

When you die, you come back as the ethnicity you are the most racist against.
So, theres gonna be a LOT of Mexicans in about 90 years.
 * This is the reason why today Jews rule the world.

This page is a Brown Note.
Reading it has driven you insane, and you didn't even realize it.

Anonymous is the final boss of the Internet. After you defeat Anonymous, True Paradise will appear. And that will be the REAL real life.

 * And True Paradise will be filled with television tropes and idioms.
 * What about the Scientologists?

You are the main character by default
And everyone else is simply an apparition in your subjective experience. You are the only one who actually exists. And the world exists only in your consciousness.

The "demons of temptation" homophobes refer to are really crazed Yaoi Fangirls.
Though who would want to write a fanfic about most of them, I don't know.

You are the Anti Christ.
And it's your actions who will fatally bring the End of the World. Including what you're doing right now.
 * So playing Halo Reach will bring the world to ruin? O.O
 * Hahahahahahahahaha!!!!!!

Real Life is a Youtube Poop illustrated and animated by Bob Ross.
Things will often happen for inane reasons, and people will often do things that make little to no sense. Almost everybody on Earth is either a Deadpan Snarker, a Cloudcuckoolander, or a Large Ham. And who else could flesh out such a masterpiece (or messterpiece) in such a short time?

/b/ wrote all of these WMGs
Most are stupid and offensive enough to be indistinguishable from trolls trolling trolls.
 * Jossed, this troper wrote the above one.

Your internet handle is your God-given true name, which you will be called in the afterlife.
You picked this particular word or phrase as your alias because you instinctively felt a connection with it.
 * So, I have three separate Real Names, two of which share a last name? Weird.
 * That's disturbing if you know where I got the idea for "Flaminghello" From.

You are being watched
Apparently watching somebody read TVTROPES will ruin your life as well.
 * Confirmed. Two words: Santa Clause.

Freud WAS Right.

 * Modern psychology pretty much Jossed this.

In an alternate universe, the Disney Archives are a 'Chekhov's Armory'.
The Disney Archives in our universe are just a place for the company to store all their movie props and animation cells, but in some other dimension the Archives are being used to store powerful items that will be needed when something bad happens. Among the items in both Archives are Alice's Vopal Sword, the wardrobe to Narnia, Mary Poppins' Carpet Bag, Jack Sparrow's cutglass, and even the Hitchhiker's Guide!

God deliberately put vestigial and homologous structures on animals when he created them
In Christianity, at least, God wants you to CHOOSE to worship him, and thus, foreseeing atheism, he put vestigial and homologous structures on his creations so make them seem like they evolved, so that atheists wouldn't be forced to believe in a deity

Humans will be Sufficiently Advanced Aliens /Precursors in the future
Some people think that life was engineered by a super advanced race of extra terrestrials. What's the most advanced race we know of? Us! So, assuming we weren't created by aliens, I propose that WE are the aliens that will engineer life on other planets. And hey! Maybe we'll get ideas, and set ourselves up as gods!

Black Holes are literally holes in Spacetime
On both levels, Einstein's theory of relativity has been confirmed: that a planet's mass causes the fabric of space-time to form a curvature, and that the Earth's rotation also twists the space-time fabric. This would also explain the phenomena surrounding a Black Hole: the immeasurably dense core leftover after a supernova has enough mass to put a hole in the fabric of space-time. It still retains its space-time sinkhole properties, but with an added twist: a Black Hole has no core. With gravity being the result of an object responding to the curvature of space-time, a hole in space-time would produce an inescapable sinkhole that all things are drawn towards, including light. This would literally make a black hole a wound in the Universe. This would lead into the meta-physics of white holes... Formed in other universes. With a hole in the fabric of space-time in one universe, all matter and light around it are pulled towards the hole in space-time. When matter passes through the black hole, where the laws of physics don't exist because there's no space-time, they are broken down, and then "ejected" out through a white hole into another universe.
 * == White holes are the products of Black holes... ==

There is an earth prime prime
Let me explain this by proposing this question: If we assume that almost every piece of fiction is an alternate universe, we would see that many of them either take place on earth or have a mention of earth. One question baffled me: Why is there a Hitler or any other public domain character in a majority of them?

I have two related answers that satisfy this: 1. everytime there is a crosover, information will trade from one universe/multiverse to another. Sometimes a new world will be formed to connect Two worlds. For example: a world where transformers and marvel coexist joins both respective multiverses.

2. every possible interpretation earth, every earth prime, every alternate history of earth and every possible future of earth is connected to this Earth prime. This particular earth provides the basis for all the other histories, historic characters,genres, magics and technologies. Every other possible earth, in a way, is an interpretation of this every earth. And in a wat this earth acts as a standard model to every possible earth.

There is a parallel earth where every trope gets reconstructed in real life
I was over at the real life and say how the trope of deconstruction. Then realised that every trope we see deconstructed in real life, that same trope gets reconstructed in a parallel earth.

God is lonely.
let me elaborate: I was reading the section of ◦Psychopathology And Brain Disorders In the high octane nightmare fuel in real life page. I read about the effects of isolation on a person then realised that before the universe existed, God was the only being in existence. Assuming that every being that can think and feel, whether sentient or animal, God must've been going crazy or suffering psychological affects from extreme isolation. He either hallucinated or created the universe. Which means the meaning of our existence is keep god company and to keep him from being lonely.

Whoa, I never thought Real Life is as awesome as that...

Fnord.

The Power of Love Will be The End of the World as We Know It
Bear with me here. but their is little actual true or lasting love in the world and thats because if to much or too strong a love is formed or someone with the right tools and love based reasons gets to critical point the earth shall be swallowed and terminated by a vortex of love energy and ending us all in a swirl of love and pain

OR MAYBE OR MAYBE OR MAYBE
Real Life is just Real Life. You're all liveless dumbasses with no real job.
 * Jossed. This troper has a job.