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Suspiciously Specific Tense
- 178 statements
- 34 feature instances
- 15 referencing feature instances
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Suspiciously Specific Tense | comment |
Someone's tense implies something significant. So Alice is telling Bob an incredible story about something that's happened in the past. Say for instance, Alice says "Elvis was the greatest rock star in the world!" Almost peculiarly, Bob will pick up the word "was," and make some sort of question based around "You said was, so what happened to him?" This includes any instance wherein a character picks up on something due to the past tense. A classic example is a Conviction by Contradiction situation where the suspect refers to a murder victim in the past tense when the suspect couldn't know the victim was dead. In some other cases, the speaker intends the listener to pick up on the implication. Can be somewhat annoying because people say "was" without denoting anything happening in the past all the time - and appropriately so, as it expresses the imperfect tense, which can denote actions that have begun and are continuing - so when a character points it out, it seems like they have God knowledge about the plot and serve as a means to get into a tragic backstory about what happened to Elvis. |
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2023-08-29T06:59:16Z | |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense | processingComment |
Dropped link to MemeticMutation: Not an Item - CAT | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | isPartOf |
DBTropes | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_1fc7499e | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_1fc7499e | comment |
Also done in Reaper Man, when the New Death possesses a hay-cutting machine in a last-ditch attempt to get at Death. | |
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Reaper Man | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_1fc7499e | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2b60ae0f | type |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2b60ae0f | comment |
In Bruges: Ken thinks he's having a normal phone conversation with Harry about Ray's opinion of Bruges until Harry says he's glad Ray got to see the place. "Because he wasn't a bad kid, was he?" He goes on to give instructions about where Ken will get the gun to kill Ray and what to do afterwards. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2b60ae0f | featureApplicability |
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In Bruges | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2b60ae0f | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2b8d3d42 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2b8d3d42 | comment |
In Time After Time, H.G. Wells pursues Jack the Ripper to 1979 San Francisco and accidentally uses the wrong tense due to his obvious ignorance of 20th Century history when talking to a female bank teller about women's liberation. | |
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Time After Time | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2b8d3d42 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2fe9d705 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2fe9d705 | comment |
Follies: | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2fe9d705 | featureApplicability |
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Follies (Theatre) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_2fe9d705 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_3b88d68c | type |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_3b88d68c | comment |
The main character of The Divine Comedy recognizes a damned heretic and in his excitement, he mentions that perhaps the son of the heretic "did disdain" God. The heretic catches on to the "did" and asks if his son is alive. The protagonist hesitates, leading the heretic to wrongfully presume his son has died. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_3b88d68c | featureApplicability |
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The Divine Comedy | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_3b88d68c | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_3c3ca2e | type |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_3c3ca2e | comment |
One episode of The Adventures of Harry Nile, Harry is asked by a police officer if a recently murdered man "was" a client of his: | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_3c3ca2e | featureApplicability |
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The Adventures Of Harry Nile (Radio) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_3c3ca2e | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_468bebb0 | type |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_468bebb0 | comment |
Discworld: At the beginning of Wyrd Sisters, the ghost of King Verence (who hasn't quite realized he's dead yet) takes offense at being hailed with a simple "Hello" by Death: Also done in Reaper Man, when the New Death possesses a hay-cutting machine in a last-ditch attempt to get at Death. |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_468bebb0 | featureApplicability |
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Discworld | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_468bebb0 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_513f5832 | type |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_513f5832 | comment |
In Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Spock refers to whales becoming extinct in the past tense. Gillian catches this. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_513f5832 | featureApplicability |
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Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_513f5832 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_52eb7183 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_52eb7183 | comment |
Irregular Webcomic!, here: | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_52eb7183 | featureApplicability |
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Irregular Webcomic! (Webcomic) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_52eb7183 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_567e37ec | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_567e37ec | comment |
Someone who has recently had a loved one die can have trouble processing that information and adjusting verb tenses. In Pet Sematary (novel only, doesn't happen in the movie), Louis (a doctor) uses this, among other details of the conversation, to check Jud's mental functioning after his wife Norma dies suddenly. Jud's doing as well as can be expected, with no reason to worry about his mental health, Louis decides. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_567e37ec | featureApplicability |
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Pet Sematary | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_567e37ec | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_56b62db5 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_56b62db5 | comment |
Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: At one point in the final trial, you have to point out a discrepancy between two testimonies, namely that Kira says Miss Darklaw was the Great Witch who gave orders to the Shades. Which raises the question: if Darklaw stepped down as leader of the Shades, then who gave the order to assassinate the Storyteller? | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_56b62db5 | featureApplicability |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_56b62db5 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_56b62db5 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_5d2be66d | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_5d2be66d | comment |
The Barrier has a subversion. Marta secretly recently lost her mother. Her father's newest job is being part of the help in a minister's home, but due to the job opening being for a married couple, Marta's maternal aunt is being passed off as her mother. In one episode, Marta is brought to the minister's house and ends up playing with Sergio, a boy around her age who lives there. During a conversation with Sergio and Rosa, one of the house's employees, Marta says that her mother "was" a teacher due to not having gotten use to pretending her aunt is her mother quite yet. Fortunately, both Sergio and Rosa understand it as her saying her mother used to be a teacher before working as a maid. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_5d2be66d | featureApplicability |
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The Barrier | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_5d2be66d | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7899c84f | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7899c84f | comment |
In The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole, Adrian is writing about "Stick Insect", the woman he thinks is his father's ex-mistress: "I have just realized that Stick Insect used the present tense when she was referring to her relationship with my father. It is absolutely disgraceful. A woman of thirty not knowing the fundamentals of grammar!" | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7899c84f | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7899c84f | featureConfidence |
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Adrian Mole | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7899c84f | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7981ca33 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7981ca33 | comment |
In WarGames, while David is trying to explain how he hacked into a computerised missile launching system to Mr. McKittrick, he mentions the system's original designer, Professor Stephen Falken, who has been dead for nearly a decade. McKittrick, a former colleague of Falken, says, "He's a brilliant man, a little flaky..." The fact that he says Falken is brilliant but flaky, not that he was brilliant but flaky, is David's (and the audience's) first clue that Falken is still alive. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7981ca33 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7981ca33 | featureConfidence |
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WarGames | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7981ca33 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7de1376e | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7de1376e | comment |
At the beginning of Wyrd Sisters, the ghost of King Verence (who hasn't quite realized he's dead yet) takes offense at being hailed with a simple "Hello" by Death: | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7de1376e | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7de1376e | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
Wyrd Sisters | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7de1376e | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7fc78282 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7fc78282 | comment |
In The Lord of the Rings, Gandalf realizes Saruman isn't living in Orthanc after Treebeard uses words such as "was" and "dwelt" in a conversation about Saruman (though Saruman's departure was important enough that it would have been brought up anyway...eventually). | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7fc78282 | featureApplicability |
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The Lord of the Rings | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_7fc78282 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_8d817ccb | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_8d817ccb | comment |
In Lost where, moments before we saw Daniel get killed, Widmore says of him in the future, "He was my son, too." If we weren't too stunned by the paternity revelation to notice it, we knew Daniel was toast. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_8d817ccb | featureApplicability |
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Lost | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_8d817ccb | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_8f8c88cf | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_8f8c88cf | comment |
A variant is done in Ella Enchanted. While Ella is well aware of the death of her mother, hearing Hattie referring to her mother in the past tense is shocking enough for Ella to not snipe back at Hattie's rude behavior. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_8f8c88cf | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_8f8c88cf | featureConfidence |
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Ella Enchanted | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_8f8c88cf | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_90f7114 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_90f7114 | comment |
Played with in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street: "Such a nice plump frame what's-his-name has...had...has." The switch back is because even though Pirelli is now dead, Mrs. Lovett is contemplating baking him into a pie, for which purposes he does still have the nice plump frame. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_90f7114 | featureApplicability |
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Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (Theatre) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_90f7114 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_95521c97 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_95521c97 | comment |
On The Spectacular Spider-Man, Harry has found evidence that the Green Goblin was never his own Superpowered Evil Side, despite having believed it himself: | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_95521c97 | featureApplicability |
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The Spectacular Spider-Man | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_95521c97 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_9e84c324 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_9e84c324 | comment |
In the movie Batman Returns, after Catwoman reveals to Max Shreck that Bruce Wayne, who is "dressed up like Batman," actually is Batman, Shreck says "Was," and tries to kill him. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_9e84c324 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_9e84c324 | featureConfidence |
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Batman Returns | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_9e84c324 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_a13a0bb0 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_a13a0bb0 | comment |
Six of Crows: On Vellgeluk, after seeing who Van Eck really is, Jesper tells him that Wylan "deserves a better father than you". Van Eck's reply? "Deserved." | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_a13a0bb0 | featureApplicability |
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Six of Crows | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_a13a0bb0 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_a1d1e55d | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_a1d1e55d | comment |
In Space Quest IV: Roger Wilco and the Time Rippers, Roger meets his future son. Showing his father a volumetric display of his mother (i.e. Roger's future wife), Roger Jr. remarks "she was quite beautiful". When Roger Sr. presses on him about the word "was", the young man pleas that he cannot explain. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_a1d1e55d | featureApplicability |
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Space Quest IV: Roger Wilco and the Time Rippers (Video Game) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_a1d1e55d | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_ac4b6a62 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_ac4b6a62 | comment |
Questionable Content: Bubbles the Robot's first hint of her Dark and Troubled Past and the tragedy that left her a Shell-Shocked Veteran comes when she says she won't fight in the robot arena where she works. It comes up again in a later conversation. |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_ac4b6a62 | featureApplicability |
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Questionable Content (Webcomic) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_ac4b6a62 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_b4996199 | type |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_b4996199 | comment |
In an issue of Spider-Man, an enforcer and a corrupt gym owner are talking about a boxer who wants to leave the gym, and plotting to kill him. | |
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Spider-Man (Comic Book) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_b4996199 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_b5b957e0 | type |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_b5b957e0 | comment |
Pixie and Brutus: Pixie comments that Brutus' former handler, Sgt. Castillo, sounds like a really nice guy. Brutus responds that he was. The next strip reveals that Sgt. Castillo was killed in the same action where Brutus got his scars. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_b5b957e0 | featureApplicability |
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Pixie and Brutus (Webcomic) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_b5b957e0 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_c3a5fa9 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_c3a5fa9 | comment |
Robin of Sherwood: Much can't bring himself to say what happened to his father, Robin's stepfather, but he manages to say "He was your father too!" through tears. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_c3a5fa9 | featureApplicability |
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Robin of Sherwood | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_c3a5fa9 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_c43df4d8 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_c43df4d8 | comment |
A similar effect is achieved in the Doctor Who episode "Twice Upon a Time", when a British soldier from 1914 catches the Doctor referring to the conflict he's currently involved in as "World War One", implying the existence of a second one yet to come. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_c43df4d8 | featureApplicability |
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Doctor Who | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_c43df4d8 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_cac1f772 | type |
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Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_cac1f772 | comment |
CSI also use it occasionally to subtly reveal, when children are present, that someone has died: "He was your client." | |
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CSI | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_cac1f772 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_d0e25eb9 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_d0e25eb9 | comment |
In Heavy Object, Skuld claims that Quenser is just as insane as her, causing Wraith to snap and say that he was nothing like her. This allows Skuld to figure out that Quenser is dead (Wraith had earlier been coerced into shooting him). In a subversion, it turns out Wraith had faked Quenser's death - apparently she's a good enough actor to keep up the deception even in a moment of weakness. | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_d0e25eb9 | featureApplicability |
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Heavy Object | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_d0e25eb9 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_de386b52 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_de386b52 | comment |
In Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990), during the confrontation with Shredder, the Big Bad implies that the Turtles' master is dead through the use of this trope: | |
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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_de386b52 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_dfdfe88c | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_dfdfe88c | comment |
In The Time Traveler's Wife, Henry accidentally reveals when Claire's mother will die on a jaunt to the past. | |
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The Time Traveler's Wife | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_dfdfe88c | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_f46fa37 | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_f46fa37 | comment |
In Cyrano de Bergerac, Roxane realizes Christian has just died when Cyrano slips and refers to him in the past tense. | |
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Cyrano de Bergerac (Theatre) | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_f46fa37 | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_f4e799ee | type |
Suspiciously Specific Tense | |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_f4e799ee | comment |
In an episode of Burn Notice, Larry returns and forces Michael to help him break into an office building. He then talks to Fi, Sam, and a shrink on a radio. The shrink points out that Larry said that Michael was his friend, as if he's already dead. Fi goes crazy and kills Larry. Unfortunately, this results in the deaths of several security guards, which was set up by the "shrink" to hold it over Fi's head to force Michael's cooperation. | |
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Burn Notice | hasFeature |
Suspiciously Specific Tense / int_f4e799ee |
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