Chuck Cunningham Syndrome

"Let us contemplate the mystery of Richie's older brother Chuck, who ascended the stairs with his basketball at the end of the first season and never came down again." —Peter Griffin, Family Guy, "The Father, the Son, and the Holy Fonz"

Wait, who is that again?

Generally, if writers want to remove a character from their ensemble, they will either kill that character off or put him on a bus (or both) to explain their absence. Sufferers of Chuck Cunningham Syndrome, on the other hand, simply disappear into limbo. They will often be retconned right out of the story's history, while, of course, everyone still left on-screen will simply carry on as if, as in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Oceania has always been at war with East Asia.

This is sometimes caused by the writers gradually losing interest in the character and, without making a conscious decision to remove them, eventually forgetting about them entirely. More often, complications behind the scenes drive the decision to remove a character.

The Trope Namer is Chuck, who was actually Richie Cunningham's older brother for two seasons on Happy Days. Remember him? No?

Exactly.

In recent years, though, as media has become more meta, playful references to the ignominiously departed have become common, either as lampshades within the series itself or in parodies or satires of it.

A subtrope of Unperson. Similar in spirit to The Other Darrin. Also see Out of Focus, when a character is gone but not quite forgotten; and Shoo Out the New Guy, who gets at least an excuse in the show for disappearing. Contrast with Remember the New Guy?. For characters who are written out of the main story but are still hanging around in view, see Demoted to Extra. For characters who are specifically brought in for a one-shot purpose, see Long-Lost Uncle Aesop. Compare Forgotten Fallen Friend and What Happened to the Mouse?. See also Absentee Actor. Can be crossed with Shoo Out the Clowns when stories take a dark turn and the writer removes a Comic Relief character and does not reinstate them.

Note when adding examples, this trope is specifically about characters who disappear entirely without explanation. If they reappear even briefly, or if their absence is explained in-show even flimsily, it is more likely one of the alternate tropes listed.

Examples of Chuck Cunningham Syndrome include:

• Anime & Manga
• Comics
• Film
• Literature
• Live-Action TV
• Video Games
• Webcomics
• Western Animation

Advertising

• Wendell the Baker for Cinnamon Toast Crunch used to have two other unnamed bakers with him (nicknamed Bob and Quello or Quienno by some), but they disappeared for reasons unknown around the early '90s, and were never featured again. Wendell himself seems to have disappeared as well.
• The vast cast of characters who once existed side-by-side with Ronald McDonald in McDonald's commercials were steadily eliminated from the 1970s onward, until only the "core cast" of Ronald, Grimace, Birdie, and Hamburglar remained. Today, McDonald's ads were almost entirely Ronald-centric. However, this is justified because Ronald, Grimace, Birdie, and Hamburgler are original characters, while the others were more-or-less, barrowed/Captain Ersatzes from/of H.R Pufnstuff

Fan Works

• Gensokyo 20XX:
  • While it verges on What Happened to the Mouse?, there's Shinmyoumaru "Shimmy's" Sukuna's absence. he isn't mentioned anywhere at all during Gensokyo 20XXV and disappeared somewhere in Gensokyo 20XXIV. In chapter 38 of 20XXV, she makes an appearance, peeking out from between Yukari's breasts, so, yes, it would be an assumption that she's spent a lot time there (being so little). She also isn't referred to in the final chapter, however, Amoridere stated that she still lives in Apartment Gensokyo. Similarly, there's Kokoro, who stops appearing after 20XXIV
  • Eirin, rather, her ghost. While it can be hand waved in that she became a ghost after she died, ergo, her spirit may have finally been able to cross over to the other side once she felt her duties were done but Chen did state she hasn't felt her presence since she's taken her to live with Aya before she died and guardianship was transferred over to Yuyuko (who is a ghost that can otherwise masquerade as human). Unlike some other examples, Eirin was actually mentioned afterwards.

Multimedia Franchises

• There are a number of Digimon that have apparently vanished off the face of the Digital World. Notably, the original Digimon World had Blikmon and Rockmon (not to be confused with Golemon), two Digimon who appeared a few times in a few other Playstation games and nowhere else. Chronomon served as a mascot for the Digimon Story games, until it dissapeared in Cyber Sleuth, without so much as a mention in anything else. This also happened to most of the V-Tamer 01 Digimon, with a few recieving a single card each, but overall, only the V-Dramon line, Demon, and NeoDevimon got continued coverage after the fact.

Professional Wrestling

• A particularly egregious example was when Hulk Hogan left the WWF in 1993. After losing the WWF title to Yokozuna at King of Ring, Hogan was never mentioned again until wrestling started taking on more 'realistic' storylines.
• This happens regularly. Wrestlers leave the company, which is very rarely acknowledged on the air. Or they will be taken off the air prior to leaving to lower their drawing value. Usually this happens to guys who work the lower matches and flies under the radar, but occasionally a big name will simply vanish. For example, Sable, who was extremely popular in the late 90s, abruptly vanished from programming. This of course was because she sued the company. Similarly, Eric Bischoff was taken off the air in WCW for his inept management, and his on-air departure was never acknowledged.
• One of the worst examples of this happening was the managers of "Stunning" Steve Austin after he first entered WCW. When he debuted, he was accompanied by a brunette named Vivacious Veronica, however after a few weeks she was replaced without explanation by a blond called Lady Blossom (who was Austin's then wife and former WCCW valet, Jennie Clark), about a year later she disappeared and Paul E. Dangerously (AKA Paul Heyman) took over the job of managing Austin.
  • Col. Robert Parker fits in there somewhere too.
• When Berlyn (WCW mainstay Alex Wright, repackaged) debuted, he originally came out accompanied by two bodyguards and a pretty female interpreter named Uta who was getting surprisingly popular fairly quickly. Then Uta and the second bodyguard disappeared about a month into the character's run with absolutely no acknowledgement.
• A recent example; in late 2010, after his Face Heel Turn, Tyson Kidd appeared on RAW with a new bodyguard, 7-foot developmental talent Jackson Andrews. Andrews, for all of his size and intimidation, was as green as grass, and after about 4 weeks, following Kidd losing a match to Mark Henry, Andrews sustained a World's Strongest Slam and returned to developmental limbo, where he would be released soon after, never to be mentioned or talked about again.
  • Happens a lot with valets, for instance, Carlito's temporary bodyguard-or-something, Jesus (as in "Hey-suess"), who, in Kayfabe, stabbed John Cena in a night club. He then faced Cena in a street fight at a PPV, which resulted in Jesus getting beaten within an inch of his life and never being mentioned afterwards.

Tabletop Games

• Warhammer has entire races that silently disappear between editions. What happened to the Fimir?
  • They made a recent appearance in the Graham McNeill Sigmar-era novel Empire. The 'mist daemons' are never definitively labelled as Fimir but it is very clear what they are supposed to be.
  • The Chaos Dwarfs in the Warhammer Fantasy world have also simply disappeared. To the point that even though they are still included in the last official Blood Bowl rulebook, they are the only official race not in the computer game.
    • They were mentioned, repeatedly, in the second edition of the role-playing game.
    • They are still mentioned quite a bit, both as a source of equipment for the other chaos factions and Ogres and as the origin story of the Black Orcs.
    • It seems likely, in-universe anyway, that there's simply too few Chaos Dwarfs to make a full army out of them, even with Hobgoblin and Orc slaves supplementing them, as the scarcity of their race was something mentioned repeatedly.
    • Chaos Dwarves have seen a resurgence, given that Forge World has started producing a line of them in Warhammer Forge. Whether or not they'll return to being a mainstream army is yet to be seen.
  • Bull Centaurs have it even worse. Chaos Dwarfs have three models being consistently produced as Hellcannon crew (admittedly without the stylish headgear of the classic Chaos Dwarf range). Bull Centaurs have vanished entirely.
  • The Squats vanished as well, likely because in addition to not selling terribly well they were too silly/campy in a setting that was becoming Darker and Edgier. Word of God has been less than consistent with excuses ranging from "the Tyranids ate them all" to "they never existed".
  • This is a setting with Chaos permeating literally everything and trying to undo the orderly universe. It happens.
  • This previously happened to several models in the 40k range with the simplification that happened in the 3rd and 4th editions. However some of them have been making a comeback in recent editions, most notably Bjorn the Fell-handed and the infamous Jokaero.

Theatre

• William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet: Paris is killed in the original play, but in the Baz Luhrmann film, he just disappears with no explanation.
• Reynaldo, in Hamlet, appears in one scene being given detailed instructions to watch Laertes and report his habits and misdeeds. He leaves and is never heard from again, even after Laertes comes back.

Web Original

• Shiny Objects Videos: Erik, Wesley, and Guido all just disappear. Enforced, as their actors moved away for various reasons.

Other

• This is what happened to Dreamfinder as a result of Executive Meddling on Journey Into Imagination at EPCOT.
• In Jon Buck's Paradise setting CM is mentioned by the cast of sequel series "Paradise:Veil" and is seen in the story Tall Tales, however his best friend Robert Hallman seemingly vanishes after the 9th "CM and Rob" story.
• Many toy-driven franchises that go on for multiple incarnations would often find many characters dropped from later series. The most notable case is G.I. Joe's Zarana: Mostly seen as an attempt to add a second female to Cobra, but she never made a screen appearance since the Di C-produced episodes. While she DID receive an expanded role in the DDP Joe comics, she is the only 1982-94-originated female character to never even get a mention in any of IDW's new Joe comics! Even Cover Girl and Pythona get odd appearances every now and then! She doesn't even appear in the Larry Hama-penned G.I.Joe: A Real American Hero AT ALL!

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