Doomed by the Narrative

Submission 5,144

Part of a series on Catchphrases. [View Related Entries]

About

Doomed by the Narrative is a catchphrase and trope used to describe a character who is doomed to die or meet a tragic fate in service of a story's plot, their death being alluded to through foreshadowing or other narrative devices. Sometimes known as being "doomed by the canon," the phrase started to become popular in memes in mid-2022 on sites including Tumblr, X (Twitter) and Reddit, in which being "doomed by the narrative" is often used as an excuse for someone's behavior or state of being.

Origin

The media trope of being "doomed by the canon" was added to TV Tropes^[1] on September 19th, 2010. It describes characters who the viewer, reader, etc. knows are destined to a certain, often tragic fate before they're introduced to the story.

The first known use of the specific alternate term "doomed by the narrative," purportedly meaning the same thing, in a meme, was posted by Tumblr^[2] user cemeteryeverything on June 18th, 2022, via an image macro reading, "This could be us but I'm already doomed by the narrative," garnering over 9,000 notes in two years (shown below).

Spread

On September 13th, 2022, Tumblr^[3] user berrytart posted, "why are you even talking to him… you know he’s doomed by the narrative right?" garnering over 52,000 notes in two years (shown below). On October 26th, Tumblr^[4] user saintemiliosandoz posted, "doomed by the narrative and haunted by the narrative and a secret third thing (narrating the narrative)," garnering over 120,000 notes in two years.

On November 7th, Tumblr^[5] user twinsfawn posted, "i’m not 'mentally ill' i’m just doomed by the narrative," garnering over 16,000 notes in two years (shown below, left). On December 21st, Instagram^[6] user 1.dried.persimmon posted a piece of Death Note fan art using berrytart's post, garnering over 1,600 likes in just over a year (shown below, right).

On March 28th, 2023, X^[7] user @lathanders posted a meme using several Tumblr posts about being doomed by the narrative, garnering over 3,100 likes in 11 months (shown below, left). On August 29th, iFunny^[8] user JMIII_BUT_CANCER posted a meme using the phrase that gained over 4,500 smiles in six months (shown below, right).