Most hated fantasy cliches: What do you think?

[Mythopoet]

So assassins and thieves aren't cliche yet? Curious. Seems like every other book on the fantasy bookshelves these days are about assassins. Maybe we need to wait another decade or so for that one.

They're still acceptable because they're dark and gritty. Anything that is anti-Tolkien is en vogue.

Seriously, I'm so sick of assassins and thieves. The only place I've really enjoyed them was Discworld, which of course was always willing to poke fun at itself. I've been avoiding assassins and thieves like the plague for years. And what do you know, I tried a new book by a new author recently (an indie whose book I got for free) and lo and behold there is an assassin character that I can't help liking. So you just never know. Even when you're sick of something, you can end up finding books that do it well.

 

[Incanus]

Like any cliche, there are plenty of successful versions of it. I suppose as long as something is still currently popular, though much used, it doesn't quite qualify as a cliche. I guess cliche is not so much a matter of how much it is used, but a matter of when it appears to have been overused, according to a significant portion of the population. I'm not going to strain my brain over this stuff though.

There does seem to be a bit of a Tolkien backlash going on. No matter. For myself, I'm always going to be attracted to quality over 'vogue'. Upon rare occasions, they even coincide (I happen to be a GRRM fan).

 

[Panda]

I think assassins and thieves are still popular because they're fun to play in role-playing games, and there's a huge intersection between people who like RPGs and people who read (and write) fantasy stories.

By the way, not to repeat what Mythopoet and others have already said but, since I said earlier in the thread that I love coming-of-age stories, I feel it's important to clarify: "Normal person chooses to become hero" and "Normal person is destined to be a hero" really are two completely different tropes. I'm a fan of the former, not the latter. In fact, I really freaking hate the latter.

 

[Jabrosky]

On the topic of cliches in general, allow to me to propose that there's more to the problem than an inherent dislike of monotony on our part (we humans are still, and always have been, creatures of habit and ritual). In some cases when we encounter cliches, our gut reaction is to lose faith in the writer's skill, and often question their literary sincerity too. Be honest, whenever you see a post-Twilight paranormal romance, especially one with vampires or werewolves, your first thought says "hack" or "opportunist". With the next Hollywood reboot, it's something to do with studio greed at the expense of creative effort. It's not simply that we're bored of these trends, it's that we're setting up a filter against halfhearted rip-offs. Cliches to us are not the problem alone but a warning flag for hackery.

 

[Incanus]

I think assassins and thieves are still popular because they're fun to play in role-playing games, and there's a huge intersection between people who like RPGs and people who read (and write) fantasy stories.

By the way, not to repeat what Mythopoet and others have already said but, since I said earlier in the thread that I love coming-of-age stories, I feel it's important to clarify: "Normal person chooses to become hero" and "Normal person is destined to be a hero" really are two completely different tropes. I'm a fan of the former, not the latter. In fact, I really freaking hate the latter.

Yes. I think I agree with every single word here. The distinction you point out is HUGE.

 

[Nagash]

I usually try to avoid "hate-lists" such as this one without any nuance to the concept of cliché. Take it from a former hater who's always been helplessly closed to far too many things in way to short a life time... I've learned, with time, that a cliché is generally something classic or excessively appealing which has been copied over and over again with limited success. I'd say a cliché is a distortion of something that used to be great, but was overshadowed by its poor imitations. I believe most - not every single one of them - of the plot elements listed in the article can still be very effective and appealing, if the author is subtle enough and adds a little innovation to the genre. Yes, "the chosen one" is something we've seen in literally every fantasy (and even sci-fi) work of the past decades, and most of the time, it did come off as bland. Yet, every once in a while, there comes someone who's just creative enough to make it somewhat original, intriguing and "personal". I like to use irony to make these clichés my own; i.e., the man who's convinced he's the chosen one, galvanizes those around him, and eventually fails dramatically, leaving his adepts in complete confusion and questioning the idea of a "chosen one". As pointed out above, the GRRM vibe these days really helps to recycle these clichés in a darker mood.

I'll repeat what has been said before, just because it's worth being said that many times: you should never stick to hate something when approaching creative writing, just because it feels so "overused". Instead, try to think how to make a common occurrence unique.

 

[Guy]

I don't read for person vs beast, or even good vs evil. I read for person vs person and person vs system. Endless pages of monster-splatting has no real emotional meaning for me. But fantasy gives the biggest and best pvp or pvs storylines.

By and large, I do, too. But I would think somewhere, either in the blurb or the cover art, but somewhere there would probably be an indicator that somewhere within this book their lurks the possibility of mythical beasts. That being the case, anyone who hates them should not read it. I'm sick to death of vampire stories, so as soon as I see the book is about vampires, I put it down and move on.

Now that I think about it, this is true of most of these things these people are whining about.

 

[joshwolf]

Thanks to everyone above who reminded us to focus on the positive. Yes, even the basic Joseph Campbell-hero's journey could be described as a cliché, but I agree with Tom N. that a cliché is ripe for subversive originality. Spin it! Fracture it! Fantasy will never stop evolving, whether we're dredging up a Greek myth for the umpteenth time or mining German fairytales again and again.

 

[Fyle]

I think Katniss would be a unique case. There's no prophecy around her like Neo, and she's not the child of anyone super important, whether for good or evil, like Luke or Aragorn. Katniss is just an ordinary girl who did something extraordinary, volunteering as a Tribute in the Games, and that is what made people pay attention to her. She gets where she's going by her own merit, not because of law or magic or prophecy.

It's about her starting point vs. her ending point. Not really about the details of her story. Maybe she is a weaker example, but still goes from ordinary to worldwide fame and importance.

If she stayed at home and watched the games from beginning to end, being politically active and hardly noticed by the government, then she would not be an example at all.

Or, if the story started out as Katniss already a star in the games, the plotline would not take her from ordinary to star.

 

[Addison]

I found two good ways to beat cliches.

As cliches are usually used to describe someone or thing take a few minutes to think about the subject and describe it as a riddle. Imagine you're Bilbo facing Gollum in the riddle game. Whether you're describe the wind, snow, a man's clever mind or sneaky hands, describe it in a riddle. You'll be amazed at the non-cliche words you come up with.

Second is to just step back and think. When it comes to describing things we're on an auto pilot after our own reading experience to use certain descriptions and such. For instance, "white as snow". There are hundreds of different things in the world that are white that can be used. Off the top of my head: flour, sugar, paper, rice, clouds, ice, marshmallow.
Different words can give the subject more depth.

For instance when describing someone's hair as "snow-white" you get a different image than "marshmallow-white". Because we associate the two adjectives with different things. Snow is flat, cold with a sharp glow. Marshmallows are soft, warm and fluffy.

Try this out and be surprised. Happy Writing.

 

[Jabrosky]

I agree that there's something to be said for twisting an old trope to get story ideas. Certainly old tropes can be fertile soil for the "what if" questions that give the macro-genre of speculative fiction its name. I might even recommend writing down a summary of the most cliched storyline you can imagine, just so you can see which aspects you want to fiddle with.

Let's say you have in mind the trope of missionaries getting captured by cannibalistic natives in some faraway jungle. What if the missionaries were the cannibals, perhaps in the manner of Jeffrey Dahmer or Hannibal Lecter, and the natives had good reason to keep them at bay? Maybe it's the natives who get captured, and they have to somehow break out of the mission before those crazy missionaries eat them. Hey, that actually sounds like the rudiments of a neat horror movie idea to me.

 

[Guy]

I agree that there's something to be said for twisting an old trope to get story ideas. Certainly old tropes can be fertile soil for the "what if" questions that give the macro-genre of speculative fiction its name. I might even recommend writing down a summary of the most cliched storyline you can imagine, just so you can see which aspects you want to fiddle with.

Let's say you have in mind the trope of missionaries getting captured by cannibalistic natives in some faraway jungle. What if the missionaries were the cannibals, perhaps in the manner of Jeffrey Dahmer or Hannibal Lecter, and the natives had good reason to keep them at bay? Maybe it's the natives who get captured, and they have to somehow break out of the mission before those crazy missionaries eat them. Hey, that actually sounds like the rudiments of a neat horror movie idea to me.

When I first heard someone had written Beowulf from Grendel's perspective, my first image was of a guy with these noisy neighbors who stayed up partying all night, so he goes over to complain, gets assaulted by a crowd of armed drunks and things snowball from there, culminating in the poor guy getting his arm ripped off and screaming, "I'm going to tell my mom on you!"

 

[glutton]

I agree with this one from the article the most - "the fact that a great female warrior is NEVER as good as the hero."

And especially the "great female warrior" being portrayed as a badass against mooks or bullying men who aren't inclined to fight back but then being useless against real opposition.

 

[Mindfire]

I agree with this one from the article the most - "the fact that a great female warrior is NEVER as good as the hero."

To be fair, neither is anyone else most of the time.

 

[glutton]

To be fair, neither is anyone else most of the time.

Well, there is often an antagonist or more than one antagonist that's at least good enough to challenge the hero or make him look like an underdog. I tend to be pleasantly surprised when a female warrior who isn't the main lead goes head to head with that caliber of opponent and manages to not get humiliated.

I'm not necessarily looking for complete parity, just for females being sold as badasses to actually stay badass in their performances and not turn out to be paper badasses.

 

[Jabrosky]

Well, there is often an antagonist or more than one antagonist that's at least good enough to challenge the hero or make him look like an underdog. I tend to be pleasantly surprised when a female warrior who isn't the main lead goes head to head with that caliber of opponent and manages to not get humiliated.

I'm not necessarily looking for complete parity, just for females being sold as badasses to actually stay badass in their performances and not turn out to be paper badasses.

If it were up to me, I'd make the heroine be the one who steps in for her man when he's down and delivers the final blow to the antagonist during the final battle.

 

[X Equestris]

I agree with this one from the article the most - "the fact that a great female warrior is NEVER as good as the hero."

And especially the "great female warrior" being portrayed as a badass against mooks or bullying men who aren't inclined to fight back but then being useless against real opposition.

Having a female protagonist will let me avoid that one rather easily.

 

[Mindfire]

Well, there is often an antagonist or more than one antagonist that's at least good enough to challenge the hero or make him look like an underdog. I tend to be pleasantly surprised when a female warrior who isn't the main lead goes head to head with that caliber of opponent and manages to not get humiliated.

I'm not necessarily looking for complete parity, just for females being sold as badasses to actually stay badass in their performances and not turn out to be paper badasses.

Ah, now I see what you mean.

 

[Guy]

Well, there is often an antagonist or more than one antagonist that's at least good enough to challenge the hero or make him look like an underdog. I tend to be pleasantly surprised when a female warrior who isn't the main lead goes head to head with that caliber of opponent and manages to not get humiliated.

I'm not necessarily looking for complete parity, just for females being sold as badasses to actually stay badass in their performances and not turn out to be paper badasses.

Yep. One of the issues I had with the Drizzt series. Cattie Brie was completely competent until she's up against Artemis Entreri. Mind you, Artemis was bad ass enough to give Drizzt a run for his money, but she was instantly rendered completely helpless and easily captured. Not even a decent escape attempt. Nothing. Then the guys got to come save her. It really disappointed me.

 

[Reilith]

I really hate when a solid, capable, intelligent and badass warrior female turns into a damsel in distress. I guess that would be the one trope/cliche that really does put me off.