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I think the answer to Movie where a girl fought her inner demons of conformity on the way to the bathroom is completely accurate, and the girl in question zapping laser beams from her fingers that seem to damage the world around her seems fantastical to me. However, since this is essentially a music video turned into a commercial, it's a bit more fuzzy as to whether we're supposed to take the actions at face value, or simply as metaphorical events.

To use a slightly different example, a music video by the same people is the famous "Weapon of Choice" featuring a similar situation of someone beginning to dance and transitioning to a more fantastical set of actions (here, flying).

I just figured I'd proactively poll the group as to how they feel.

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  • Naive question: Is the problem that the alleged fantastic elements are metaphorical or that the particular examples are commercials/music videos? Is there any example besides the aforementioned ones?
    – Hans Olo
    Jan 7, 2020 at 20:11
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    Hmm... another example might be Being There, where at the end Chance walks across the water without explanation.
    – FuzzyBoots
    Jan 7, 2020 at 20:38
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    Possible duplicate of Is the story-ID question that turned out to be about the Axe commercial, on-topic? - basically, the OP didn't know the beams were metaphorical; this passed for a "genuine" SFF movie, which is on-topic regardless of the eventual answer.
    – Jenayah
    Jan 7, 2020 at 20:39
  • @Jenayah The OP's question seems to not be restricted to commercials, so I don't think it's a dupe.
    – Hans Olo
    Jan 7, 2020 at 21:06
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    @Rebel-Scum the reasoning is the same no mater the media: if it looked SFF enough for the OP to believe it was SFF, then a story-id question is on-topic. Now, if this Meta is about whether plot questions about this commercial would be on-topic, I agree it's a different discussion. Fuzzy - can you clarify? (Maybe it's obvious for others, but I'm not seeing it)
    – Jenayah
    Jan 7, 2020 at 21:34
  • @Jenayah I agree, it would help if Fuzzy clarified this point.
    – Hans Olo
    Jan 7, 2020 at 21:39
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    You know what, I'm in agreement that if the querent was reasonably confused, it's on-topic, much like how we allow for works where it turns out the explanation is mundane. If they were aware that it was not fantastical (such as where it's shown to just be an Imagine Spot), that would not be on-topic.
    – FuzzyBoots
    Jan 7, 2020 at 21:58
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    Which, honestly, I think allows for most such usages in music videos where people will readily fly through the air, turn into robots, etc, for the purpose of the video. Ambiguous cases (like "Weapon of Choice", for example), can be dealth with on a case-by-case basis. Like, we have no explanation for why Walken can fly in the film, so we can close as Opinion, but if someone vaguely remembers a scene where someone hops over a hotel balcony rail, and starts flying, that's completely on-topic to identify it.
    – FuzzyBoots
    Jan 7, 2020 at 22:00
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    Okay, so... Possibly related/dupe of Are works that may or may not just be dreams on topic??
    – Jenayah
    Jan 7, 2020 at 22:24
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    @FuzzyBoots - Now I want to know why he can fly.
    – Valorum
    Jan 7, 2020 at 22:40
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    If something like Captain Eo can exist, I think we can accept something like this as SFF. (I had written something longer with power of imagination, Munchausen, and Walter Mitty, but it was crap too).
    – Radhil
    Jan 8, 2020 at 1:56

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Quoting myself here:

An answer should not make a question off-topic, if the question without the answer seems on-topic.

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