For Contest #954, the very detailed Creature from the Black Lagoon cartoon by Harry Bliss, I was so tempted to start my caption with a tone-setter: "Relax." It's kind of a popular opening tone-setter so I decided against it. Plus, the caption wasn't that good (common problem I have.)
"Relax. Swim team, Jersey Shore, Black Lagoon—I'm qualified."
The best—IMO—Finalist Round caption using "relax" was in Contest #392; coincidentally another Harry Bliss cartoon (The Incredible Hulk cartoon.) Tone-setters usually start the caption, but this second place Finalist was the whole enchilada; the elusive one-word caption unicorn. Something else interesting about Contest #392 is that all three captions use a bang(!)
I was going to write about the use of tone-setters in our captions, but ChatGPT did a better job of describing it than I could have:
Tone-setters can be considered deadwood…
…if they don't add meaningful voice, timing, or context to the caption. In those cases, they're just clutter.
For example: "Well, that didn't go as planned." vs. "That didn't go as planned." If "Well," doesn't change the tone, personality, or delivery, it's just filler — deadwood.
🧠 But they're not always deadwood.
In fact, in caption contests (like The New Yorker), a well-chosen tone-setter can do a lot of work:
- Establishing character ("Honestly," = someone defensive or sarcastic)
- Controlling pace ("So..." = hesitance, awkwardness)
- Setting emotional tone ("Sorry," = faux apology, irony)
- Framing the absurdity ("Look," = mock authority)
Compare:
"Sorry, I thought this was the break room."
vs.
"I thought this was the break room."
The first one implies embarrassment or sarcasm. The second is flatter.
*** End chatty. ***
BUT, one thing ChatGPT doesn't have (yet! But, the stealers are out there! Protect your work folks from folks that don't give attribution.) is the dataset of all those wonderful Finalist Round captions.
∴ the computer scientist—and Batman fan—in me says: "To the data, Robin."
I don't count function (grammatical) words such as: a, the, and, etc. There are many more function words. Note: sometimes in our obsessive word economy practice we remove function words which can instead end up with a confusing or awkward caption. Function words and their structural role in captions is worthy of a whole other post.
I was going to do the ubiquitous Top 10, but there were just too many common tone-setters (or just openers) authored by you, the lucky Finalist Round winners.
I used the "Search" feature in WordsBelow and found these common openers.
There are more than in this list and I'm sure we'll use one of these again.
"O.K.," here they are. hehehe.
Common Caption Openers
ActuallyApparently
Bad news
Be careful
Can you
Could you
Did you
Do you
Don't worry
First
Good
Have you
Honey
I don't know
I guess
I hate
I know
I miss
I see
I think
I thought
I told you
I'd like
I'm sorry
Let me
Let's just
Looks like
Maybe
O.K.
Please
Relax
Remember
So,
Sorry,
You know
