I'm putting this here because it's not necessarily a fanfic problem; It's not pet peeves, and it's not blatant cliches.

I want to know what you are just sick of seeing. What tropes, genres, characters and narrative directions are overused and make you wish someone would try something new?

Sick of lone-wolf heroes? Done with vampire stories? Think comical side-kicks are passe? Don't care for starting in media res?

In short, what writeing devices and techniques ought aspiring writers avoid in order to stand out?

I'll start:

The hero no one believes. Yes, it's a trope, been around since the dawn of story telling. Hero knows something fantastic and world-altering, but even when revealed, the info is ignored by the authorities who say it's impossible. The hero, of course, eventually proves he was right, and the authorities get egg on their face. It's beyond cliche, it's all but required in some stories to make sure the hero is the one who has to act, but I personally think there has to be another way around it.

Also:

Vampires and zombies. Twilight was the beginning of the over-saturation for me, and I sadly see the zombie genre going the same way in the wake of The Walking Dead. I simply don't want anymore.

So, what are you sick of?

 

I'm sure that once I start think about it, I will find bunch of things that I have seen enough times to be sick of. But at the moment I remember only one thing that recently made me really disappointed about one story.

It's when the heroes defeat the main villain by making his creations rebel against him. It's only worse is when he is not prepared for it even though to this moment he had back-up plans of the back-up plans. Very annoying.

Well, there is another thing I'm sick of - dark, edgy and gritty reinventions. It's fun, but not when everybody is doing it.

 

I'm kind of sick of the rebel hero - by this I mean one who's against the establishment (sort of like Dresden and the White Council). Some people do it well (like Butcher) but most don't.

I'd like to see a hero who's a company man.

 

The wizard being the good guy. Whatever happened to the evil warlock trying to take over the kingdom? These days it seems everyone's a new Gandalf or Harry potter. I'd like to see a good old fashioned wizard trying to kill everyone, without another wizard hero.

 

I'm really tired of the elements being a huge part of every single magic system ever. I mean, seriously. It's fucking magic. It can do just about anything you can think of and more, and you've gotta constrain it to fireballs and wind? This is one of the reasons I love Harry Potter so much- elements are only a very small part of the magic system (if you can call it that).

The Dresden Files gets away with it because there are so many different branches and types of magic, but the vast majority of stories like this just fall flat for me.

 

Mine is simple:

Overly Emo main characters.

Yes, it's sometimes entertaining to see someone wrestle over making a decision and then making it, but taking entire chapters to tell us every little thought that's running though their mind is enough to give me cramps. I used to really like Elric stories, now I can't stand going back to read them.

 

The main character getting beaten to within an inch of his life before being able to pull off a victory. Yeah, it's necessary at points to create tension etc. But, for every fight the main hero gets the shit kicked out of him there should be others where he kicks the shit out of them. And, not just at the end of the book, but the first time he meets them because he's just better then them.

 

You probably hate DF series, don't you?

 

I hate the long lost super powerful race of people suddenly reemerging, or a lone descendant suddenly appearing after hundreds/thousands of years since they supposedly died out. Lets see, just in the last year alone, this has happened in Skyrim, Diablo 3, and Mass effect. It wasn't enjoyable the first time, let alone the next two. Apparently some people like this shit because it keeps reappearing.

 

The biggest one I can think of is the oft repeated trope of "ancient lost technology/magic/maguffin" that is somehow infinitely better than what the modern society has, despite the fact that said modern society has had millennia to improve the tech. Shit just doesn't work that way.

Beyond that, I've got a minor quibble with the fact that just about every single story in Western history subscribes to the Joseph Campbell school of thought. It's so damn hard to find anything worthwhile that deviates substantially from the Hero's Journey plot structure and I'm mildly sick of it.

 

Nah, I could never hate it but it does frustrate me. It's part of the reason I like the short stories so much is it gives a sample of day to day life where Dresden is the big fish in the little pond and not vice-versa.

 

Yea, those are the genres I was talking about as well, and there's very, very few. I vaguely remember Arthur C. Clarke's Ramma series deviated from it at times, but it's been over a decade since I last read those so I may be confusing it with something else.

There's also The Reality Dysfunction by Peter F. Hamilton that doesn't really follow the Hero's Journey structure within its own bounds. It's the first in a trilogy though, and while I haven't read the subsequent books, it certainly seemed to be preparing to start the "Journey to the Underworld" segment of a trilogy-spanning Journey, if that makes any sense.

The last set I can think of that's on my bookshelves is a goodly chunk of Lovecraft's stuff, mostly because it bypasses the Journey entirely and just sends everything straight to hell.

 

God, yes. Mass Effect is the most recent series to annoy the hell out of me with this.

 

CheddarTrek and Alive and Free mentioned but I can't stress how sick I am of seeing lone heroes fighting against the established order because it's cold/heartless/insert unflattering description here.

I'm also sick of the hero being the long lost prince or just the son of someone big and important (I blame Star Wars for this).

 

I hate it when the plot is to stop some villain from destroying the world/galaxies whatever. Why the hell does it always have to be so extreme? I find it difficult to believe that the world survived thousands of years but now its survival depends on one person.

I also don´t like the hate of nobility systems that so many modern fantasy stories seem to show especially if the hero is a noble(like the lost prince issue peace mentioned). In the medieval times the peasants had better things to worry about than changing the political system. Hell most of them couldn´t even read or write.

A other issue I have is that most seem to think that a civilian with a weapon can beat a soldier in a fight. Or that armed mobs have a chance against a army. It is just wrong. Soldiers have training and discipline and often superior equipment and as such should easily defeat any civilian uprising. History has many examples of this.

Edit:
Forgot one thing: The need to explain the magic system and the mechanical ways magic seems to function in every fantasy written today. What Gandalf and Co made special was that their magic was mysterious and unexplained.

 

Incompetent villains, or villains who are made out to be badass then just fail. I'd like my hero to have to fight every step of the way to get better so that the villain doesn't just destroy him with a wave of his hand. And in the final battle I'd like it if some Dues Ex Machina isn't thrown in as to why the hero wins.

 

All conflicts need to be physical and have an immediate consequence. Personally I like social conflict that has repercussions further along in the story. An example of that would be 1984.

If the villain is a large organization, they never use their reach/resources to deal with a drawn out hero who has been causing major problems. If the protagonist is seriously pissing off some giant company, like they usually do, there should be a constant threat of being caught. There shouldn't be the ability to waltz around a city without a care in the world.

Also, when everything is black and white, the main character being good and has never done anything wrong while the villain is completely evil. That is extremely annoying and should be avoided.

 

I would love to see stories where the heroes suffers drastic consequences as a result of their casual killing of mooks.

It gets annoying to see how villains are accused of being evil by randomly killing heroic mooks when heroes are doing the exact same thing.

It will be interesting to see the fall of a hero at the hands of a mook's brother.