Playing With / Scotireland

2 Following

Basic Trope: Ireland and Scotland are depicted as the same place.

• Straight: The setting of Tales of Troperia, Bluesland (basically Tropeland's version of Scotland and Ireland), contains elements of both Scottish and Irish culture, such as bagpipes, men wearing kilts, shamrocks, Leprechauns, a Stock Ness Monster, and fiddles.
• Exaggerated:
  • Bluesland is a massive mishmash of Gaelic culture, such as dozens of castles and tall green hills, lots of tartans and plaids, creatures such as banshees, selkies, faeries, loch monsters, brownies, Leprechauns and will-o'-the-wisps being commonly seen together, lots of drunken redheads wearing green all over the place, surnames such as "O'Campbell" and "MacKelly" being commonplace, shamrock leaves growing as the leaves of Scottish Thistles, the place itself being literally called "Scotireland", and accents so ridiculously thick that they sound like a mix between Scottish and Irish accents.
  • Bluesland contains elements of all the Celtic cultures: Scottish, Irish, Welsh, Manx, Breton, and Cornish.
• Downplayed: The work is set in either the real world's Scotland or Ireland, but only one aspect is obviously that of the other, such as shamrocks growing in the Highlands, or an Irish pub serving Scotch Whisky, and it's so subtle most viewers would only catch it as a Rewatch Bonus.
• Justified:
  • The work is set as a Period Piece during the kingdom of Dál Riata of the mid-First Millennium A.D, which was a Real Life Gaelic kingdom that stretched from western Scotland to north-eastern Ireland.
  • The work is about a family of Irish immigrants living in Scotland, who are still getting used to life in the country where they settled, or vice versa.
  • It is set in an alternate timeline where the two countries were united into one nation after Scotland got independence from the United Kingdom around the same time as Ireland.
  • It is set in ancient-ancient times, when there wasn't any distinct borders, and some Gaels settled in Pictland, whilst some Picts settled in Hibernia.
  • The setting of the story was settled by equal numbers of Scots and Irish, or they had roughly equal amounts of power.
• Inverted:
  • The cultures of Scotland and Ireland are depicted exactly as they usually are, without any crossovers.
  • Despite the similarities in the cultures of Scotland and Ireland, the story treats them as mutually exclusive.
• Subverted:
  • In the Highlands, at John o' Groats, Alice and Bob meet a creature whom they mistake for a leprechaun, but it's a brownie.
  • Beer and whiskey are served at an Irish pub in Dublin, but they are home-brewed kinds.
• Double Subverted:
  • Only for the "brownie" to reveal that he was a leprechaun the whole time.
  • But one of the whiskeys is a Scotch Whisky.
• Parodied:
  • A common Running Gag involves people getting confused about where they actually live, as they cannot seem to tell the difference.
  • The names of the countries are used interchangeably.
  • Thanks to an Almighty Idiot, Ireland is literally merged with Scotland, as in the island is forcibly moved northeast into Scotland, crashing into the Hebrides and effectively wiping out the North Channel, with the compression of the Rhinns of Galloway into Belfast Lough turning the city of Belfast into a inland city, while the Mull of Kintyre merges with the Antrim coast, turning the Firth of Clyde into a giant loch with the Isle of Arran as a lake island, and the countries' liquor gets twice as strong.
  • Names of places and even the countries hosting them are swapped around, so among folk songs for example, "Scotland the Brave" becomes "Ireland the Brave", "The Dublin Pub Crawl" is now "The Edinburgh Pub Crawl", "The Galway Girl" is "The Glasgow Girl", "The Rose of Aberdeen" becomes "The Rose of Cork" and so on.
  • People displaying the most outrageous stereotypes of Scotland and Ireland (and often assuming they're just one and the same) is treated as something that just Crosses the Line Twice and as such the mere sight just takes Refuge in Audacity.
• Zig-Zagged: The setting constantly changes between either a normal depiction of either Scotland and/or Ireland, or a random crossover of both depictions.
• Averted:
  • Same as Inverted, but the work portrays only either the Scots or the Irish.
  • Neither the Scots nor the Irish are represented in the work.
• Lampshaded: "Hey... is it just me, or aren't leprechauns supposed to be in Ireland? Because there's one right here, walking about in Glasgow for some reason..."
• Invoked:
  • The people notice how popular this idea is, and shamrocks suddenly start to grow in the Highlands...
  • The pan-Celticists want to promote their idea of merging Scotland and Ireland as a one country.
  • The Show Within a Show of Tales of Troperia: The Bluesland Ballads is designed to offend both the Scots and the Irish by the heavy use of this trope.
• Exploited: The work is considered more interesting because of the crossover, and it continues to do so to appeal to the audience.
• Discussed: "I wonder, why do people always confuse Scotland with Ireland? Aren't they different, in a way...?"
• Conversed: "Isn't anyone so tired of those studios always confusing those two countries? It's starting to become annoying..."
• Defied:
  • Bob, a key member of the creative team, has firsthand experience of both Ireland and Scotland and knows all the differences between them, so he points out and corrects every error of this kind at the script stage.
  • Irish and Scottish people drive things stereotypically associated with each other out of their respective countries.
• Implied:
  • A tourist is visiting the Highlands, but suddenly finds a pot of gold buried at the end of an rainbow.
  • A tourist is on the water in County Cork, only to spot what appears to be a Stock Ness Monster.
• Deconstructed: Experts point out frequently that Scotland and Ireland are not the same country, because if that were the case, they would have been founded as one nation long ago.
• Reconstructed: But then, the next morning, Scotland declares independence from the UK and unites with Ireland to form one nation.
• Played for Laughs: Same as Parodied.
• Played for Drama: Because of the confusion, several people have an identity crisis about whenever they are actually Scottish, or Irish, and attempt to try finding out which group they belong to, but to no prevail.
• Played for Horror: As Tales of Troperia: Stories from the Ditzy Dragon is a Folk Horror setting, the scariest elements of both Scottish and Irish mythology would be brought up. For example, legend tells that one night, a group of friends got lost in a forest near a loch, and after a moment of wandering, found a Will-o'-the-Wisp on a path, and used them to try finding their way out, but then, a Dullahan appeared, scaring the humans away, and they tried running into the loch for safety, only for the large monster in the loch to wake and attack the humans with little difficulty, with nothing left of them to be seen anymore. However, at the same time of the attack, far back at their hamlet, a loud screech was heard in the woods nearby, and several people rushed out of the houses to try finding the source of the noise, but they found nothing and went back home to sleep. But then, at midnight, one of the parents of one of the group's members suddenly woke up in the middle of the night, and turned to look at a window, only to see a pale woman in black standing outside, looking into the window...