Sledgehammer Message

''I get it. I get it. I 𝔾𝔼𝕋 𝕀𝕋''

When an idea that the story is trying to convey to the audience is made overbearingly clear. The most popular method of achieving this is engraving the message into the audience's skulls with agonizing repetition. It doesn't always have to be the theme that's a Sledgehammer Message. It could be a temporary topic about what's happening in the story at that very moment, like how somebody is feeling or their opinions of another person. A Sledgehammer Message can come in many forms like Obvious Symbolism, Emotion Montages (especially negative ones), or Song Breaks. This UnTrash is a very effective tool for Annoying The Audience, though this is not a good thing.

Unsurprisingly enough, playing Sledgehammer Message comes with several downsides. In addition to the aforementioned annoyance of the viewers, it also has potential to come off as offending. If the creator feels the need to restate the same basic idea, the ones on the receiving end may interpret it as insulting to their intelligence. A Sledgehammer Message that doesn't make its audience feel stupid may make them feel doubtful of its truth. Reiterating a single thought can give off the impression it needs to be almost hypnotized into the audience's minds just so they believe it. The sheer nerve to Pause The Universe and preach is likely to upset or bore the audience. It also detracts the story from its primary purpose: being fiction, not an advertisement. It's pretty hard to take a story seriously if its in-your-face messaging bombards you as the character blab about the exact moral of the series of events around them. This Tell, Never Show style of writing can slaughter Suspension Of Disbelief and be a rude reminder that the story is just fiction and not a tale based in a real, living world.

Between the audience's respect for the creators and the franchise's Entertainment Value, it might be said that the latter is more seriously harmed by Sledgehammer Messages. The viewers can't comfortably dig into a story that takes its time breaking down the Main Idea and spoon-feeding it to them little by little. Even on a slightly subtler level, a Sledgehammer Message can eat up time to regurgitate what's already been established more smoothly by previous events. As for the cast, the audience can easily lose sight of them being people and perceive them more as sock puppets that stand in for concepts relating to the Main Idea. It's criticism that's more legitimized if the cast is deficient in Character Building, which widens the gap between them and reality.