Editing 2741: Wish Interpretation

{{comic
| number    = 2741
| date      = February 22, 2023
| title     = Wish Interpretation
| image     = wish_interpretation_2x.png
| imagesize = 740x288px
| noexpand  = true
| titletext = "I wish for everything in the world. All the people, money, trees, etc." "Are you SURE you--" "And I want you to put it in my house."
}}

==Explanation==
In this comic [[Black Hat]] has found a lamp with a {{w|Genie (Disney)|magical genie}} inside. This genie will only fulfill one wish (not the standard three) and warns that it will twist the wish to teach him a lesson...

In stories where wishing can come true by magical means, a common cliché is that the wisher will make a wish (for greater or lesser personal gain) but the entity who grants it will {{tvtropes|LiteralGenie|inadvertently}} (or {{tvtropes|JackassGenie|'inadvertently'}}) fulfill the exact wording in such a way that something bad happens which the wisher clearly did not foresee. This may teach the wisher, or at least the reader of the story, an important moral lesson against greed. The wish-granter is not always represented as deliberately obtuse or malicious, but may merely be a naive and uncritical servant of the wish-granting process. A wish for money, for example, might be 'easiest' to accomplish by suddenly being the recipient of a loved-one's Life Insurance rather than the rather less upsetting scenario of finding that they possess a winning lottery ticket. In the comic, however, this genie is perfectly self-aware of the part he will play in creatively misapplying the wish, and even goes so far as to forewarn the wisher – maybe a deliberate ploy to have wishers take a moment to think and tone down their more spontaneous demands.

However, as is characteristic for him, Black Hat has no concern for the wider negative effects, and immediately wishes for rain to no longer happen, perpetually, for the apparent trivial reason of merely saving him the need to carry an umbrella. The {{w|Water cycle|consequences}} of this drastic change to the weather (no matter by which method it is accomplished) would plainly be very bad, as Black Hat is almost certainly fully aware. The genie realizes that there is very little 'good' idea for him to twist into a bad one, and that Black Hat will be peculiarly unreceptive to being 'taught a moral lesson'. Especially compared to the utter devastation that the granted wish ''will'' cause to the rest of the non-wishing world, which the genie might be reluctant to enact. 

Having persuaded his wisher to retract the original request, the genie now has to deal with two rather ''too'' open-ended, generally pessimistic requests in a similar vein. Exactly what Black Hat "deserves" is possibly subjective; and someone "getting what they deserve" tends to be a rather negative outcome. To this, the genie seems dismayed at Black Hat essentially wishing for a bad outcome (with nothing to twist to serve a moral lesson), but the genie still seems to have enough latent sympathy to be concerned about the trouble being invited, assuming that it was a particularly unintended turn of phrase.

Undaunted, the next version of Black Hat's revised wish uses even more unambiguously perilous wording. The suggestion of "what's coming to" someone is frequently used as a threat (or menacing promise) of violence. Even taken at face value, the wish would either be meaningless (Black Hat would receive whatever fate would have befallen him without the wish, and the genie would have effected no change), or it would be tautologous (whatever is coming to him is whatever the result of the wish is, so how is the genie to decide what that should be?). Regardless of the outcome, Black Hat is wishing for something already negative with no room for a moral twist, or something that is essentially tautological. This disheartens the genie even more, given the genie's apparent obligation to be inconveniently literal and problematic in interpreting wishes.

Clearly outclassed in his attempt to establish his ability to cause problems, or perhaps out of pity for Black Hat's self-destructive wishes, the genie gets frustrated and backtracks rapidly. He offers just $20 (a token amount of money, possibly out of his own pocket in order to completely avoid using his potentially dangerous magical abilities) to get himself out of the original formulaic deal and permanently away from having to be under Black Hat's influence.

In the title text, the wisher (possibly still Black Hat) wishes for everything in the world. This is itself a not unknown "bad wish" that would be creatively twisted into a bad consequence for the necessary narrative reasons (for example, ownership of everything in the world might come with inconvenient or even impossible responsibilities). The wish continues, however, and explicitly asks that all of this be put into their house. This is impossible for two reasons: First, everything wouldn't fit in their house unless it was made extremely dense, beyond the point of usefulness; second, it causes an infinite recursion, since their house is something in the world, so it would have to be put inside itself. Trying to grant this wish would likely also frustrate the genie, and certainly not allow them their usual scope of a personal (and proportional) educational twist.

Black Hat has been seen experimenting with the rules for wishing before, in [[1086: Eyelash Wish Log]].

==Transcript==
:[Black Hat is holding a genie lamp in his hands. A genie has appeared from the end of the lamp. The genie is depicted as a turbanless Cueball-like figure floating without a lower body, having a puff of smoke in place of his legs.]
:Genie: I will grant you one wish.
:Genie: But beware, I will twist the meaning of your words to teach you a lesson!

:[Black Hat holds the lamp to his side. The genie has his arms crossed.] 
:Black Hat: Gotcha! Hmm.
:Black Hat: I'm tired of carrying an umbrella. I wish it never rained again.

:[Close-up on the genie.]
:Genie: ...Okay.
:Genie: I'm supposed to twist your words to teach you a lesson, but that actually sounds very straightforwardly bad.
:Genie: Can you maybe try again?

:[Zoom back to Black Hat and the genie.]
:Black Hat: Fine. Just give me what I deserve.
:Genie: Oh my god. Have you read '''''any''''' stories about wishes?
:Black Hat: Come on! I want to get what's coming to me.
:Genie: Listen, I'm just gonna give you $20 and call this even.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Genie]]