Stranger in a Familiar Land: Difference between revisions

{{quote|''"...with no direction home, like a complete unknown; like a rollin' stone."''|'''[[Bob Dylan]]''', ''Like A Rollin' Stone''}}

 

 

A character returns home after a [[The Quest|long absence]] and finds that they no longer fit in, either because [[Fish Out of Temporal Water|their home has changed too much over time]], or (more commonly) because they themselves were changed by their experiences. In the latter case, it can lead to a [[But Now I Must Go]] sentiment. In less extreme cases, the character may eventually settle down again with some effort.

Often, characters placed in this situation will choose to put themselves back [[In Harm's Way]].

 

 

* Ayato in ''[[RahXephon]]'', at several points in the story.

* This happens at the end of Season 2 of ''[[Monster Rancher (anime)|Monster Rancher]]'', where Genki's sudden return to Earth after a good year or so in another world is portrayed to be as devastating as you would expect.

** Both the non-canonical ''Ghost In the Machine'' and the [[Canon]] comic ''Tron: Betrayal'' imply this happened to Flynn (who behaved erratically and vanished in both continuities).

* Jason Aaron's [[The Punisher|Punisher MAX]] story arc "Frank" details Frank Castle's experiences with this back during the period between his return from Vietnam and the death of his family. He struggled to be a normal family man again, but the whole time he desperately craved a return to war and violence in general. Parallels are drawn between this period in his past and the present, where he's in prison.

 

== [[Film]] ==

* In ''[[The Demonata]]'' by Darren Shan, the second book ends with Kernel returning home...however, due to time running differently in the [[Exclusively Evil|the Demonata]]'s universe, his parents had accepted his and his {{spoiler|magically-transformed not-in-any-way-a}}brother's deaths years ago, end leaves again.

* Happens {{small-caps|TWICE}} in Shan's [[The Saga of Darren Shan|first series]]. The first is when, in book eight, Darren returns to a city he met his first girlfriend in, but doesn't fit in (though it's implied that 1. the city isn't in the same country that Darren is from, due to the accents school students use 2. when he's going back to school, as a fifteen-year-old, when the last time he was in school was the age of twelve, i.e. fifteen years ago, he ends up looking like an idiot. Plus, being a vampire prince who has spent almost a decade doing vampire-y things probably hasn't helped him fit in to humanity well.

{{quote|Teppic stared at him and thought "I am a stranger in a familiar land."}}

** Comes up a number of times in the books. The oft-quote reply is "you can't cross the same river twice".

{{quote|'''Ridcully:''' Why not? This is a ''bridge''.}}

* Brian from the ''Hatchet'' series, after being forced to survive in the woods decides the woods are better when he goes home.

* [[Land of Oz|Oz series]]: Ironically, Dorothy Gale fell to this trope. The longer she stayed in Oz, the harder it was to go back to Kansas. Eventually, instead of having to choose between Em and Henry in Kansas and the wonders of Oz, she [[Take a Third Option|brought Em and Henry to Oz]], where Ozma set them up with a little patch of farmland in Munchkin Country.

* ''[[Moonraker (novel)|Moonraker]]''. [[James Bond]] experiences this while in posh club Blades, imagining that his work as a [[Career Killer]] has somehow made him 'un-English' and that the other club members can perceive this.

* Happens three times in ''[[The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]]''. At the end of the first book, Arthur arrives home on Earth a few million years in the past and remains stranded in a cave for several years. In the fourth, he arrives again to find the present-day Earth exactly as it was before the Vogons destroyed it, save for the absence of any dolphins, and then again in the fifth book, he he travels to the sector where the Earth was only to find a ''[[Crapsack World]]'' by the name of Now What, with identical continents and extremely violent wildlife.

* In [[Jack Campbell]]'s [[The Lost Fleet]] novel ''Invicible'', {{spoiler|Duellos}} talks with Geary about how he got this when on leave.

 

* Teal'c in ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'', at times when he briefly returns to Chulak.

* Sam Tyler in ''[[Life On Mars]]'', who finds himself {{spoiler|unable to readjust to life in the present, after waking up from his coma, to the point that he doesn't notice any pain when he cuts his hand open, and ends up committing suicide to return to the life he had in 1973.}}

* Rose Tyler from ''[[Doctor Who]]'' {{spoiler|after the Doctor tricks her into going home to save her from certain death.}} Also his former companion Sarah-Jane Smith, who complains about how hard it was just waking up every day and knowing she'd never see the grandeur of space again.

** It is even more prominent with Donna. She only had one adventure with the doctor, maybe for about an hour, and she gets hooked. After declining his companion position, she regrets it and goes looking for him to see if the offer still stands.

** Also Worf who finds that his humorless dedication to honor and duty has little to do with how Klingons in the Empire conduct themselves.

* Happens more than a few times in ''[[The Twilight Zone]]'':

* ''[[Dragon Age II]]'': all that's left of what Hawke's mother had in Kirkwall is a bitter brother to remind her of what she'd lost. When Aveline asks Hawke about returning to Lothering, he/she can reply that it's no longer home.

 

* In [[Quentyn Quinn, Space Ranger]], thanks to temporal dilation, quirks in various forms of FTL travel, gravity wells and other [[Negative Space Wedgie]]s, it's essentially the default outcome for all members of the Space Ranger Corps.

* Hudson in ''[[The Lydian Option]]'' attributes his return to the frontiers of space to a feeling that he was an outcast after human rights protests against actions he participated in during the Spiral War.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Drama Tropes]]

[[Category:Just for Pun]]

[[Category:Older Than Feudalism]]

[[Category:A Stranger to This Index]]