Fiction clichés you like and dislike
 

Which fiction clichés do you like and dislike? This applies to any fiction (books, stageplays, films, TV series, musicals, operas or whatever).

I dislike

*In seafaring adventure films, it's always pirates who have hookarms and wooden legs. Why can't it be a seaman from a merchant ship seriously wounded in fight against pirates? Also dislike pirates using ships with broken sails.

*Science fiction:

Spacecraft flying like aeroplanes through outer space.

Spaceflight terms being indentical to water transport (spacecraft called spaceships or ships, spacefleets, space pirates to much based on stereotypical seafaring pirates).

Short distances between minor-planets and planetoids, sometimes called "asteroids", (like Star Wars).

Extraterrestrials in disguise having already been on Earth for a long time, and speed up evolution (don't care if it's just some years like Utroms not doing anything such, worse with all time the Kraang claim to have been on Earth).

Early-humans coexisting with dinosaurs. There are no scientific proof for that.

Wrong animal and nature at wrong place (tigers in African countries, lions in India or penguins in the Arctic and polar bears in Antarctica)

Second World War: Fascists from Germany and Italy escape to the Moon or Mars in a spacecraft

Alternate history: CSA successfully breaks away during the mid-or late-1860's, still in 2017 slaveships cross the oceans (slavery would probably be over by 1880, then just some discrimination like what we saw in the southern USA).

I don't have examples specific to movies or books. But words and phrases in general that are annoying to me. Even if I have used them in the past. So they might apply to your "whatever" category.

Dislike:
-Epic
-Ominous
-Disrupt the market
-When you have lemons, make lemonade
-Transparent
-game changer

Like:
-a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush
-the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence
-wicked good
-cool (it's classic and will always work)

If I think about it I'm sure I could come up with several more in both "like" and "dislike" sections. :trazz:

I find it a bit annoying when the dark-haired protagonist is oblivious to the fact that he has multiple girls fawning over him. That happens way too often in anime.

Also having an American flag behind someone as they’re doing something heroic.

It's become a bit of a cliche to call out cliches for me.

Especially where Disney is concerned. And I've realized that a lot of the time, even when there's "Love At First Sight™", they don't really get married right away. We don't know how much time there was between Cinderella marrying her Prince. Or Ariel and Eric getting married. Heck, Cinderella was happy just to have a One Dance Stand with a dude that she found handsome and nice and was good to leave it at that, and was dumbfounded when she learned she was dancing with the Prince.

Though, I can understand Aurora and Phillip getting married pretty quickly since they were already betrothed from the time that they were very tiny.

So, I call bull on the "you can't marry someone you just met, Anna!" situation in Frozen because except for some very few exceptions, it doesn't seem that was something that happened in most Disney films.

However, I do love the "If you start singing, I'm going to throw up" line in Moana :lol: . A Call Out Cliche cliche that I like.

I've expressed in earlier that I really don't like the "goody-goody peaceful species" that comes up in science fiction and fantasy a lot. Specifically, the Neutrinos and Mirage/4Kids Utroms, suffering from the same problem of "non-violence unless in extreme danger". Which was why the Illuminated and South American waste dumping were such a huge relief, and why I am eagerly anticipating King Zenter's great "oh god, what have I done?".

I think having a "peaceful" race could work to some extent. It works pretty darn well with Hobbits now that I think of it, since they're basically clueless to the world outside of the Shire and thus end up cut off from a violent world, where the most bloodshed they'd see would either be from a horrible farming accident or a birth ending badly. Or butchering meat. A bit like how Dodos or penguins were/are so cut off from large land predators that they didn't recognize the danger in the things that would kill them, and wipe them out in the former example.
However, when they're actively being [Nixon Voice]Bleeding Heart Hippies[/Nixon Voice], it gets a little grating. Come on guys, get the skeletons out of the closet and shed your Dark Violent Secrets. You know they're there.

Cliches I dislike- villains who want to destroy the world/universe for whatever reason. Makes no sense. Any "good" villain would be too much of a narcissist to ever do something that would harm themselves. It only really works for some nihilistic "God is dead and life isn't worth living" type of character, and those are usually just suicidal anyway as opposed to wanting to take out the entire world with them. An extension of this is the "if I can't have her NO ONE can!" villain who tries to kill the object of his lust after being rejected. It is more realistic maybe, but still a bit over the top.

Cliches I do like- heroes having an "evil twin" or duplicate who wants to take their place, never mind the fact that they missed the obvious consequence that by doing so they would reap whatever karma or legal repercussions would ensue from the change in persona. IE, if Evil Kirk had taken over the ship and disposed of his double without being discovered, sooner or later when his crew realized he was drastically different they would have had him locked up and he'd be stuck in a cell the rest of his life. Same goes for any evil doppleganger of superheroes. If they try to ACT like the hero in question, they would either end up literally being them, or would revert to true persona and get busted. But they are so caught up in the IDEA that they never grasp how complicated it would be!

Witty characters who only succeed at being so because other characters are written to set them up all the time. I could be a regular Quippy Magee if everyone around me kept throwing out feeder lines.

It's much like characters who seem extraordinarily capable because they are surrounded by unreasonable levels of incompetence. The Murder She Wrote phenomenon. You buy that a folksy mystery novelist can solve a murder every week, because she operates in a world devoid of competent law enforcement.

one cliche I like is when a character is much bigger, but when they face something they are scared of they hide behind someone that is considered much more frail.

Let's see, for the sake of simplicity, I guess I'll use the TVTropes name or something similar:

Cliches I Dislike--

The Leader is the Best at Everything--Good God, I despise this cliché. Luckily, it seems that shows are edging away from it as I don't see it much any more but it still pops up. A leader doesn't mean you best the rest of your team at their strengths; it means you understand how to use people, command/lead people to use those strengths. Real Life example--George Washington was a horrible tactician but he recognized it so he surrounded himself with people that WERE good tacticians

Blood vs Adopted--Again, I don't see this one too much anymore but it still pops up occasionally. When a blood child is favored over an adopted one, it drives me crazy. Now, is this true for some people? Most likely but it seems more likely it to be the opposite.

The Funny One--I'm not against humor but I am against it being all shoved into one character. That has never made sense to me. It makes a lot more sense for all the characters to share the humor.

Don't Listen to the Kid/Nerd, etc.: Seriously, this would save people so much trouble. It's usually the kid or the nerd or whatever 'outcast' that knows what they're talking about.

Cliches I Like--

Mama Bear/Papa Wolf/Big Brother-Sister Instinct: Basically, the idea that if you mess with someone's family, they are going to make you pay for it. It's especially satisfying to me if it's a relationship that is far from perfect but threats to family still trigger this.

Beware the Quiet Ones: I love this one because usually there is truth to it. Quiet folks usually will take and take abuse because they hate confrontation (though not always) but when pushed far enough, they will snap back. One of my friends summed it up pretty well in a quote she read in a fanfiction a few years ago: "Kindness has its limits. I've finally reached mine."

Pre-Asskicking Oneliner: The cool phrase or line used prior to someone entering a battle. I love it. Probably not realistic but issuing a threat and then following through on it is awesome.

I've stopped watching TV shows I've liked where the "bad boy moves into town, disrespects everyone in the town except for the female lead, female lead falls for him and calls him "misunderstood" causing all this kind of friction between her and everyone else.

I just hate it so freakin' much.

you just described Cool as Ice

I hate forced friction between best friends over a woman or a man.

Oh man, and the worst part of Cool as Ice is that the entire town is right about him!

Don't forget the "badass fighter who suddenly and for no apparent reason gets his butt handed to him". AKA Worf. Or the Batman's utility belt trope.

Don't you guys realize everything in fiction has already been done? Everything is a cliche these days, but only because there's only so many ways to write a story. Or a characters personality, there's not that many different personality tropes to choose from.

They say, "There are only 10 stories in all of fiction" and I can believe it.

It's not really a "cliche" but still something that bugs me.

And that's depicting alligators and crocodiles as green. They're gray!
Now, that's probably because green looks better, but for once I'd like to see a dark gray alligator.

I don't like "badass" heroes who are pure and awesome with no character flaws or diversity tokens that a placed into stories just to make them PC.

I guess I'm tired of seeing the "Chosen One" trope as well.

True, but Cool as Ice is so darn awful/charming that it gets a pass. It's impossible to take seriously.

I feel like this era is mostly over...but the whole "I'm so plain and average, but oh, look at this two supernatural boys sparring over me!" YA romance cliche was something that I'm pretty sure got on everyone's nerves. I don't blame Twilight, buuuut...

(Oh man, I don't even want to know what this place was like when Twilight was first booming :lol: . And yet...I'm curious. Like it's a curtain that I shouldn't look behind.)

I hate when a character is so upset or anxious that they can't eat. I have never, ever been that worried and I've been through a lot of ****.

You'd be disappointed. It was basically Twilight free.

For whatever it's worth, it's happened to me. So it's within the realm of possible at least.

Actually, count me as fascinated. Given the way things are here, I'm surprised the jokes didn't fly. Unless the Dramadrome is a recent phenomenon.

Cliche I do like:

Character A: Oh no, character B is going to be so scared!
Character B: Doing just fine.

Most iconically in Avatar.