Tropey McTropeface

[anthrodisiac]

"You, hero, were chosen by destiny, and nobody else could have possibly done this task!"
Really? Nobody? Not a single person?

"You, everyman, who were not chosen by destiny, but you'll do, despite having no training or any real skills, and somehow take down the greatest evil." (Unless it's Rincewind, then I'm okay with it.)

Middle ground is nice, I like that.
"You, everyman, who were not chosen by destiny, but you have at least SOME applicable skills, so it's at least mildly plausible."

 

[ElectricBlue]

The "aliens that are humans, but blue!' trope.

Make your damn aliens alien. I don't even care if they're bipedal or anthropomorphic (clearly), but stop making them humans, just blue, or just pointy ears. Put some creativity into it, for Zlorp's sake!

Well fuck, there goes sixty years of Doctor Who.

 

[TheRedChamber]

Well fuck, there goes sixty years of Doctor Who.

In fairness, Doctor Who's most iconic villians are genetically-unviable pool of squid-shaped flesh.

 

[designatedvictim]

Related one: skipping ahead in the slow-burn / tension-building phase by butting in with a sexy dream involving the main characters.

You can just tell that the author didn’t trust his ability to hold reader’s interest and had to throw in a demo version of the later sex scene. It’s especially annoying when the scene is actually plausible, and makes you wonder “Wait, did I miss something? Were they more into each other than I thought?” and then it is revealed that nope, it’s just a dream.

I get the anxiety over writing 10k with seemingly nothing sexy happening, but if one really wants an early bird “payoff” it’s better to be honest and write it as an explicit fantasy of the character. It has the added bonus of actual plot development then, since he or she has to admit harboring sexual interest in the other person.

I tend to write slow-burns, myself.

My first story got to the first sex scene at about the 7.5K-word point.

My second took about 12K-words for the first sexual contact, but about 28K-words for the first actual sex.

My third went about 17K-words before the sex began.

Clearly, my with my first story, I jumped the gun, so to speak.

I'm both wordy and not particularly concerned about not getting to the sex too quickly.

Having said that, and in the spirit of the thread subject, after posting my first two, I came to the realization that my stuff generating a feeling of... familiarity, of... sameness. As in, I've seen it all elsewhere before.

I even started a thread a while back about having 'written in tropes.'

It's not really a sin. Pretty much everything is a trope. There's nothing new under the sun.

One of these days I need to write something that starts in medias res, where the MMC is getting ridden by the FMC and having him think How did I get here?

"I'm Bob Smith and everything started three months ago when I first met..."

 

[designatedvictim]

Especially when anyone with a room temperature IQ would understand what's being said but a bunch of supposedly smart characters can't.

What do they call that? Passing 'the idiot-ball' to the character so they can act so uncharacteristically clueless simply to create needless drama?

 

[HelenL]

It was all a dream! Or a hallucination, etc. I'll give those an uno and I'd scratch dirt on them like a cat burying a turd if I could.

Some tropes are better than others, but I think this is the one unforgivable trope.

 

[caleb35]

Well fuck, there goes sixty years of Doctor Who.

In fairness to the old BBC budgets of decades ago, it's impressive that they were able to afford body paint or Papier-mache.

 

[HelenL]

Fake dating never really works for me, especially in queer romance. HelenL's effort being an honorable exception.

Back at you on this one. One of my least favorite romance tropes is "I broke up with her for her own good." Your use of this trope in Love is a Place 4 is maybe the only one I've really found believable. Of course, it only works because of Samantha.

 

[ElectricBlue]

In fairness, Doctor Who's most iconic villians are genetically-unviable pool of squid-shaped flesh.

Wait, what? The Master wasn't a squid!

Granted, a Dalek is, but what about Ice Warriors, Cybermen? I guess they fall into the category of "big dudes in body armour."

 

[TheRedChamber]

Wait, what? The Master wasn't a squid!

Granted, a Dalek is, but what about Ice Warriors, Cybermen? I guess they fall into the category of "big dudes in body armour."

Well, Doctor Who has used animated mannaquins and statues as enemies before, and cyborgs that turn humans into robots. All which make sense as being humanoid. I'm not saying it doesn't use the trope but it probably does better with it than Star Trek or Star Wars. Trek has always done 'humans can even breed with Klingons/Vulcans/Cardassians etc' which, even with its justification TNG episode, always seemed like a stretch.

 

[anthrodisiac]

Well fuck, there goes sixty years of Doctor Who.

To be fair, some of the best Doctor Who monsters were the very, very inhuman ones.

Time Lords don't count, it's not their fault humans look like them.

Wait, then I need to amend:
The trope where aliens are just Time Lords in blue body paint.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

My most unfavored tropes are student offering sex for grades, and the inverse, prof demanding sex for grades, even though, or perhaps because, I've experienced both, as the prof in the first and the student in the second.

 

[Britva415]

One of these days I need to write something that starts in medias res, where the MMC is getting ridden by the FMC and having him think How did I get here?

"I'm Bob Smith and everything started three months ago when I first met..."

Why do you need to do that?

I don't object to it as a trope, but around here it usually devolves very very quickly into a thick, gristly slab of what I call "had had had haddy hadhad."

My attitude is, if three months ago is when "everything started," find a way to tell that part of the story in the same tense as the later parts of the story. One introductory paragraph, or sentence, or phrase, of simple-past tense narration about what res we're in media now immediately followed by hundreds of words in past-perfect is clumsy and spammy.

My other attitude about in media res is that it calls for at least a whole-ass scene describing what res we're in media. I won't wonder or care how everything started if I only have one paragraph, or sentence, or phrase, about the present situation. That isn't enough storytelling to establish the stakes, and it isn't enough of a hook to make up for the clumsiness of spamming "hads" (the past-perfect marker).

I think that that's why people do it: They think that opening with something dramatic-seeming like "my ass was hanging out a 42th story window, how did I get here?" is an interesting hook. It isn't, unless I know why it's interesting before we flash back to how everything started.

So like I said: It isn't the trope I object to, but this is one in particular which is far too frequently done poorly.

 

[Britva415]

Star Trek

ah, the old "forehead of the week" cliché

 

[Kelliezgirl]

ah, the old "forehead of the week" cliché

Understandable in an environment with limited budgets for FX like original Trek had. Not understandable in written media where the FX budget is essentially unlimited.

 

[Actingup]

There's a lovely essay by @THBGato about the 'Just One Bed' trope, which is my favourite. If it's poorly executed, of course it can be terrible and a lazy way to get characters together. But if you have to force your characters to get over a situation with strong inhibitions (incest, shyness, past trauma, etc etc), it can be more fun than shots and spin the bottle. I've played with it a couple of times in stories where the characters are in on the joke, and I was pleased with the results.

 

[TheExperimentalist]

Most of my dislike for this trope tends to disappear with the caveats you've mentioned here; but especially if it's clearly said that what follows is a dream, and therefore likely to be a gratuitous scene that I can skip or skim through, if I don't feel like reading it, and lose nothing of the main plot. It's really about respecting your reader, and making him feel like everything in the story matters and isn't just a cheap trick.

So as of now, that scene as (partly) written, doesn't explicitly specify that it's a dream upfront, though the character is drifting off in bed just before the scene transition, and it's SOOOO over the top porny that I think it'll be obviously a dream. (For instance, the character's personality is to anxiously overanalyze EVERYTHING, and in the dream just boldly goes in and starts doing and saying cheeky things... Part of the idea also being to create a juxtaposition with their ACTUAL first time, which is going to be tense and nervous and unsure and have a ton of conflicted feelings, as even the most socially acceptable of first times often are.)

I'm not set on that presentation though, will have to see how it flows once it's written. I may end up changing the entire sequence.

Especially when anyone with a room temperature IQ would understand what's being said but a bunch of supposedly smart characters can't.

I actually reinvent this one too. In the same WIP as above, the character mishears something that hinges on an exact homophone. In chapter 1, Katie hears her brother masturbating (NOT instantly joining him, as the trope often goes, but just getting that little spark of intrigue) and he sighs "Okaaay" as he cums. She doesn't realize until chapter 4 that he was actually sighing "Oh, Kay," which is his nickname for her. The first uses of the nickname and this scene are, I hope, sufficiently distinct so it's not immediately obvious, but someone REALLY paying attention may pick it up. There's also a hint in chapter 3 where she's imagining a scenario with him in which he says "Oh, Kay", but it's just the natural flow of her daydream, and isn't similar enough to trigger the "wait, is that what he actually said?" connection yet. A bit simplistic, maybe, but I think it'll work.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Why do you need to do that?

I don't object to it as a trope, but around here it usually devolves very very quickly into a thick, gristly slab of what I call "had had had haddy hadhad."

My attitude is, if three months ago is when "everything started," find a way to tell that part of the story in the same tense as the later parts of the story. One introductory paragraph, or sentence, or phrase, of simple-past tense narration about what res we're in media now immediately followed by hundreds of words in past-perfect is clumsy and spammy.

Absolutely agree. It's the same as those stories that start, "When I went back home for summer break, blah blah fucking blah."

I can't back out of those stories fast enough!

 

[TheExperimentalist]

Absolutely agree. It's the same as those stories that start, "When I went back home for summer break, blah blah fucking blah."

I can't back out of those stories fast enough!

Is your issue the phrasing or the framing? If the former, what exactly? If the latter, what's wrong with summer break?

 

[caleb35]

Wait, what? The Master wasn't a squid!

Granted, a Dalek is, but what about Ice Warriors, Cybermen? I guess they fall into the category of "big dudes in body armour."

The Ice Warriors were never iconic and the Cybermen only were for a limited portion of the show's run. Now, the Master, however... you might have a point there...

 

[Kelliezgirl]

So as of now, that scene as (partly) written, doesn't explicitly specify that it's a dream upfront, though the character is drifting off in bed just before the scene transition, and it's SOOOO over the top porny that I think it'll be obviously a dream. (For instance, the character's personality is to anxiously overanalyze EVERYTHING, and in the dream just boldly goes in and starts doing and saying cheeky things... Part of the idea also being to create a juxtaposition with their ACTUAL first time, which is going to be tense and nervous and unsure and have a ton of conflicted feelings, as even the most socially acceptable of first times often are.)

I'm not set on that presentation though, will have to see how it flows once it's written. I may end up changing the entire sequence.


I actually reinvent this one too. In the same WIP as above, the character mishears something that hinges on an exact homophone. In chapter 1, Katie hears her brother masturbating (NOT instantly joining him, as the trope often goes, but just getting that little spark of intrigue) and he sighs "Okaaay" as he cums. She doesn't realize until chapter 4 that he was actually sighing "Oh, Kay," which is his nickname for her. The first uses of the nickname and this scene are, I hope, sufficiently distinct so it's not immediately obvious, but someone REALLY paying attention may pick it up. There's also a hint in chapter 3 where she's imagining a scenario with him in which he says "Oh, Kay", but it's just the natural flow of her daydream, and isn't similar enough to trigger the "wait, is that what he actually said?" connection yet. A bit simplistic, maybe, but I think it'll work.

Love it! That's the kind of nuanced miscommunication that works!

 

[ElectricBlue]

Is your issue the phrasing or the framing? If the former, what exactly? If the latter, what's wrong with summer break?

The framing. Stores that starts that way - typically several paragraphs.of info-dump, followed by some unimaginative scene setting and angsty nineteen year old emotional dynamics - are almost unfailingly terrible. They're nope, out, for me.

 

[TheExperimentalist]

The framing. Stores that starts that way - typically several paragraphs.of info-dump, followed by some unimaginative scene setting and angsty nineteen year old emotional dynamics - are almost unfailingly terrible. They're nope, out, for me.

I see. All I can say is the couple of WIPs I have that take place at summer break have no infodump, and settings that I hope are at least somewhat imaginative... Probably still a little bit of early-adult angst, but honestly, a little doesn't bother me as long as it's not whiny and juvenile...

I guess I really DO like to take tropes and reinvent them in ways that (at least I think) are less annoying.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

I see. All I can say is the couple of WIPs I have that take place at summer break have no infodump, and settings that I hope are at least somewhat imaginative... Probably still a little bit of early-adult angst, but honestly, a little doesn't bother me as long as it's not whiny and juvenile...

I guess I really DO like to take tropes and reinvent them in ways that (at least I think) are less annoying.

Stand by Me was a great example of the nostalgia framing device, but it's frequently just bad...and doesn't really help the story.
There isn't any clear reason for the tale to be told by the MC's future self.

 

[TheExperimentalist]

Stand by Me was a great example of the nostalgia framing device, but it's frequently just bad...and doesn't really help the story.
There isn't any clear reason for the tale to be told by the MC's future self.

Wait, is that what we were talking about? I thought we were just talking about stories where the MC goes home for summer break (maybe) told in first-person past tense. Which is in a sense, I guess, being told by the MC's future self, but the narrating future self doesn't really have to be an active character in the story, if that makes any sense. Either way, none of the WIPs I mentioned are written nostalgically in that way.