Stranger Things

Well, as for the npc’s, I wasn’t claiming this to be plagiarism. In fact, I even admitted that this part of my argument was weakest. The reason I chose plagiarism above copyright infringement is because CI deals, usually, with trademarks. For instance, of the show had a princess named Zelda and a hero named Link, but did not have right from Nintendo. Plagiarism is claiming an idea as your own when that idea belongs to someone else. The very foundation of the story of 4 warriors, with d&d roles, discovering a girl from another dimension, whose eternal entity is a prince of darkness…is an EXACT replica of the final fantasy game. Final fantasy even states this chaos has cast a great shadow over the land. So, is it true that the story is not word for word exactly the same? Yes. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t plagiarism. Let’s take the book pride and prejudice and zombies. Let’s assume the writer did not acknowledge pride and prejudice and just called it “zombies in love.” Even though the stories aren’t “exactly the same,” it would still be considered plagiarism.

No, it doesn’t. Copyright and Trademark are two separate forms of IP.

To reuse your Zelda example…

If you took Legend of Zelda and swapped out the sprites, and did a search and replace on the script so that Zelda was named Princess Pinkiepants, Link was Elfboy, Gannon was Pigface The Evil, the Triforce was the Shamrock of Power, Kukos were just Chickens, etc…

You’d still have infringed on Nintendo’s copyrights, despite not using any of their trademarks. Same as if you swiped any sprites not protected by trademark protection for a game, whether the game itself was directly swiped from LoZ or not.

Speaking of swiping (though not necessarily infringingly so), of course, the first Final Fantasy did a whole bunch of it, from D&D, although they were almost all removed when the game got localized - Beholders (Evil Eyes - which, unlike the others, had their sprite changed), Mind Flayers (Wizards), Marilith (Kary), Tiamat’s 5-headed dragon form, etc. (And taking a step back, D&D stole shamelessly from Tolkien…)

While I think the Final Fantasy / Stranger Things link in grasping at straws, I’ve long wondered about the season five finale of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Buffy is using a hammer to clear obstacles while climbing towards a goal of rescuing someone at the top of the frame of a highrise. At the top is Dawn, the Key. Coincidence, or subtle easter eggs?

Considering the writer was Joss Whedon? I’d go with the nerdiest explanation possible.

That’s actually kind of funny, though. I never made that connection.

No.

Olay, let’s go with this definition then.

You just said it’s about using things that someone else OWNS. No one owns plot elements and structures like this.

That is a very, very, very, specific plot structure - using 4 warriors, who use D and D roles, to save someone from an alternate dimension, whose eternal entity casts a shadow over the land and is considered to be a prince of darkness. That is a very, very, specific story. Remember, plagiarism counts as passing off one’s IDEAS, not story, as their own.

To add:
Squaresoft/Final Fantasy might not own storytelling based on D and D, and might not own general adventure stories. I do believe, however, that it owns the following, very, very, specific plot: using 4 warriors, who use D and D roles, to save someone from an alternate dimension, whose eternal entity casts a shadow over the land and is considered to be a prince of darkness. That is a very, very, specific story. Remember, plagiarism counts as passing off one’s IDEAS, not singular story, as their own.
let’s take my Pride and Prejudice and Zombies example from earlier. If the P & P & Z author said that the work is completely his own, and did not gain inspiration from any other book…we would know that to be a lie. He very much copied Jane Austen’s story, but added his own zombie twist. If he never references Jane Austen or P &P, it would fall under the category of plagiarism.
If I write a book about a wealthy stubborn man who meets a poor judgmental girl from a big family with many sisters, who are courted by various gentlemen, and one sister marries the stubborn man’s best friend, another sister marries the stubborn man’s “enemy,” the judgmental girl marries the stubborn man after many fights…but then I use different names and put the setting in 1980’s America and title the book “Love Interests,” well guess what, that’s plagiarism. But hey, I only copied plot elements, would be a foolish thing to say in this case.

Didn’t El actually save them? Where are the Orbs? What about Will getting kidnapped?

No, it’s not really all that specific. And you’re only making it fit by generalizing the characters, generalizing the roles and mashing them together.

  1. Where is the “passing off” part? People tell all kinds of stories. In telling a story, storytellers are not held to be claiming that all of the ideas in the story are novel to themselves. In other words, when I publish a story, it does not come with the implied assertion that “Every idea in this story is novel to me.” Without that assertion, there can be no “passing off.” It comes only with the assertion that “I have not copied the expression from someone else.”

  2. Who is the “someone else” that owns these ideas? Story elements like this aren’t “owned” by anyone.

This is why the concept of plagiarism doesn’t quite work unless you are referring to a specific articulable professional standard. To the extent you’re developing a standard, it’s not one that is generally expected of storytellers.

I’m not a fan.

I got to the 7th episode of the first season, where they have 11 in the pool, and I noped out of the rest.

There are too many “strange things” in this show. I can handle a monster. I can handle interdimensional travel. I can handle telekinesis. I can handle smartmouth youths and their formulaic bullies and clueless parents.

But I guess I don’t find all of these things mashed together very enjoyable.

Stranger Things is flawed, but fun.

If it ain’t your thing, it ain’t your thing, but I would take issue with the bullies being formulaic. You probably haven’t gotten far enough to see what I consider the best moment in the show.

All Hail King Steve.

So…you are just going to leave me hanging? What’s the best moment in the show? If it’s in the 8th episode, maybe I’ll watch it.

I mean, sure, Steve isn’t “formulaic”. But the other bullies certainly are.

Well it’s not a plot-centric moment but a character driven one. For me it’s when Steve

grabs his baseball bat and runs back into the house, effectively choosing to stay and protect the others

I really like what they did with his character. He originally was supposed to be a formulaic bully but the actor brought so much to the role, they kept him.

I’m not about to try to talk you into liking a show you don’t care for. I just thought the bully redemption thing is one of its strong points.

Stranger Things is basically a collection of homages, and for the most part I’m fine with it. There are some rare moments here and there when the homages are so on-the-nose they start to feel something akin to plagiarized. For me it was the scene in season one when Mike shows Eleven his toys; it’s so blatant a steal from E.T. that it feels more lazy than affectionate. In season two it would probably be

the scene where the soldiers are ambushed by the demodogs in the lab, a carbon copy of Aliens, made all the more blatant by the presence of Paul Reiser.

I can at least entertain this argument, and it’s one that I think the creative community does actively engage in—look at views over the way that Quentin Tarantino has built a career basically rearranging things he’s seen before.

But the OP gets nowhere close to this level of specificity.

There was an episode in the second season set in Chicago and 11 is talking to another girl and they would be in Lake Michigan! The only piece of land out there is to the side where the aquarium is and it looks like there in some kind of storage facility.

Pretty much they’re acting like Chicago is like New York where you can look at the skyline from land across the water. Except with Chicago it’s just Lake Michigan.

there are numerous points along the lakefront that look like that. The curvature of the shoreline means you have people on land with the Chicago Skyline behind them across water, especially as you head south. See this banner on the Chitown M site.

Sorry, your theory is just too absurd. There are so many influences to Stranger Things that the writers have acknowledged that explain its plot structure, and Final Fantasy is just a really bad fit, as everyone else has pointed out. In fact, the most distinctive thing about FF1’s story arc is the time loop, otherwise it would just be a generic D&D ripoff itself, and Stranger Thing has no time loop.

Let me direct your attention to some useful info wrt “common, almost timeless, plot devices and plot elements.”

No it’s a fictional place across the water, it’s a storage facility with trailers and the L train and a track. That’s not located out where Shedd Aquarium is located especially the L train and a track. They wanted to have everything in the shot including the skyline and the famous L train. So they made a fictional place to put everything together.