That feeling you get when you feel like you accomplished something important, but then soon realized you either didn't need to do it, or there was no result
You stab him in the kidney. You just killed the murderer Shia LaBeouf!
But wait he's not dead shia surprise! There's a gun to your head, and death in his eyes.
A phenomenon in film/television series, most notably streaming series, where the main premise is drawn out to such a point that it takes an entire season or more to get the parts of the series the audience is actually interested in seeing.
For example, if a series is titled "Surf Dracula," a majority of viewers would tune in expecting to see Dracula surfing by the first or second episode. However, the entire first season would instead be tedious padding and backstory before finally ending with Dracula surfing in the last five minutes of the season finale.
I watched "Smallville" on Netflix the other day. Dude, it was ten seasons of filler before he finally flew! Major Surf Dracula Syndrome!
Finding your way back to the truth by fixing on one verified fact and working out from there, the way you navigate by the North Star when everything around you is spinning.
Rumours were flyingeverywhere, so she went northstarring — one checked fact at a time.