askchapo

I said they are my personnel favorites

I requested an explanation for what you meant by a setting not being a 'wallpaper'. That was the explanation that I got, along with 'appreciation of scale' which itself requires an explanation.

and unless you find settings that are internally inconsistent to be good writing, certainly not "overrated"

Internal inconsistency of a setting is not (usually, at least) good writing, but something can be written well while having its world not be consistent. So yes, I maintain that worldbuilding is overrated. I am not sure what your refutation is.

BUT IF YOU'RE GOING TO INCORPORATE A SETTING then the requirements I laid out are crucial to allowing worldbuilding and characterization to mesh in ways that doesn't undermine either one, that's been my point the whole time

Can you substantiate that point, i.e. that worldbuilding has to specifically be used to make main characters to feel 'small and insignificant', and using worldbuilding to instill something else is somehow not good? Do you consider works where characters do not feel 'small and insignificant' to be badly written just on that basis alone?

Yes the world should be bigger than the characters, if you're gonna have a world;

Over the Garden Wall has a setting that is substantially different from real life (in contrast to works set in historical and contemporary settings). Its worldbuilding, however, is both minimal (we know basically nothing about the world outside of the main characters' immediate surroundings) and doesn't make the characters feel 'small and insignificant'. And yet, you and I both seem to concur that the work is written well.

unless you believe characters should be bigger than their worlds outside of character focus and viewpoint, do you find most power fantasies evocative or examples of good writing?

Firstly, do I understand it correctly that you divide narratives that involve characters into ones where characters are 'small and insignificant' and ones that are power fantasies?
Secondly, I actually can appreciate some power fantasies, but I would rather not get into this particular topic.
Thirdly, not sure what you mean by a world being 'bigger/smaller than the characters'.

In that case I got a million isekais for you

'I can appreciate some power fantasies' and 'I like all power fantasies' are two different statements. Do you suggest I say that you are obligated to love every narrative with 'small and insignificant' characters?

Why do you have such a literal view of the words I use

Okay, can you explain what you mean, then? Surely, you don't consider me obligated to try to guess when you mean something very different from what you are saying and then try to divine what you mean, do you?

when I say "small and insignificant" I don't literally mean physically tiny or always at the bottom of the social ladder

What do you mean, then?

when I use "triumph" I don't literally mean the characters at the end of every narrative hold a Roman style Triumph

There is a huge gap between characters not holding a 'Roman-style Triumph' and a story having a saddening/bad conclusion for the characters, so I'm not sure where the claim that I read you too literally is coming from in this case.

It's relational and contextual, like with Over the Garden Wall, where "small and insignificant" means children lost in a dark forest with no knowledge of its inner workings, in another story it means something else

If 'small and insignificant' can mean basically whatever you want it to mean, then your initial words about wolrdbuilding having to make main characters feel 'small and insignificant' are simply not informative at all.

Also, let's consider another example - Bojack Horseman. Do you consider characters from there to feel 'small and insignificant'? If so, in what way do they feel 'small and insignificant'?

lmao you're just replacing the word "worldbuilding" with "surroundings" yes i.e. THE WORLDBUILDING AND THE SETTING which plays a crucial role in the narrative

I am not. If you think those words to be interchangeable, then we should be able to say the following:

as the narrative is focused almost entirely on them and their immediate worldbuilding, with surroundings being limited to, well, said worldbuilding

That obviously does not sound right, as worldbuilding is a literary tool, and the word 'surroundings' refers to people and things in one's vicinity. Those words are not synonymous, and this accusation is rather silly.

Yes that's part of my original point, nothing is really answered concretely, no over-explanation of how the forest works, the mystery, the questions are still intact throughout the show and elevates and pushes the narrative along, that is what I mean by effective worldbuilding and effective lore, take the forest away it's not Over the Garden Wall anymore, it's a different show which may or may not be good

Notably, none of those things make characters feel 'small and insignificant' to me. If anything, the smallness of the setting makes one feel as if the main characters are some of the few actors capable of making an impact on the forest, and the fact that the story focuses on the main characters' interpersonal relationships rather than on some world-ending threats or global politics makes them feel very important (because they very much are in their relationships, which is the focus of the narrative).

Frankly, I suspect your definitions of "lore" and "worldbuilding" simply don't mesh with mine, for me the "lore" of Over the Garden Wall is fully developed despite the narrative being unfinished

Well, Over the Garden Wall has basically no lore to speak of (at least, not within the cartoon). And the work doesn't need more of it.
As for the narrative being unfinished, I do not understand. In what way is it unfinished when the characters got a thorough conclusion to their stories?