#worst tropes

[pokeprism]

This will be a My Top Five Worst Tropes post.

(Credit to my talk with @simplecatgirl for this post's existence)

This will be in ascending order, starting with fifth and going to first place. The rest will be below the cut as to not crowd y'all's dashboard!

Also will say that I'm not gonna be on point with using TV Tropes terms because that website doesn't need my traffic :D

5th Worst: Pinocchio Plots

... I'm starting with a spicy one huh? To acknowledge my own biases, I quite like human-adjacent/humanoid and non-human characters, and the textbook version of this trope is all about stripping the agency from the character going through this plot because being a human is paramount in that type of story. The only popular example of this trope that I liked was Del Toro's Pinocchio, and that film was explicitly a subversion of that usual narrative.

4th Worst: All A Dream

As I have alluded to before, I am a person with schizophrenia who's also medicated for it. A lot of tropes associated with unreality/delusions are VERY vilified both in and out of pop culture, and this trope is the most common commonly mentioned of them. I also take issue with the "we're in a fake reality" trope for the same reason.

3rd Worst: Trauma for Trauma's Sake

I'm too traumatized to write this garbage and you're bad if you bang on about how it's "realistic". Because it's never realistic, and that's because I've seen that explanation is ALMOST exclusively applied to non-adult characters, especially the femme presenting ones. Peeps who like this trope are very transparent with their maladjusted tastes, especially the animation brats. I refuse to write this trope as a result.

2nd Worst: Master x servant pairings

Beyond this type of dynamic being VERY rotten already, this trope gets worse when it's made to be a romantic pairing. Especially if the story refuses to give the servant any agency or decency. The worst and most recent instance of this trope that affected me was Pearl and Rose from SU, and that's only one prong of why! The only reason I'd come close to writing this trope would be to deck the master involved. (Side note, I should do some form of essay on why Pearl x Rose doesn't work but not right now)!

The Worst: Enemies to Lovers

Enemies to lovers is the third and final trope I refuse to write. This trope being nasty AF and never succeeds in the first place. Not fucking writing this ever.

~~~~~~

And that concludes this post! Thanks for reading, yo~!

[starry-bi-sky]

don't you want to be a cult leader? - danyal al ghul au

this is mostly a joke post but i thought it was funny and had to share so--

his first mistake was, obviously, inheriting his father's inability to see an injustice and stand still. -- actually, danyal's first mistake was his lair being so big. a mountainous island with a large temple in the center resembling his old home in Nanda Parbat? With sprawling foliage and rivers and streams and waterfalls galore? What was he going to do with all that space? Let it go to waste? He had plants there! Native trees of the ghost zone growing from the soil! He couldn't let it all be left unchecked!

So naturally after helping a fellow teenage assassin ghost -- who he later learns is named Akihiko, -- from Walker of all people, he sent them over to hang low at his lair until it was safe enough for them to wander around the Zone. Walker couldn't get through Danyal's astrofield if his life depended on it, and trust him -- he's tried. Danny was clearing out debris from his stupid transport vans for weeks.

Honestly it wasn't so bad, he and Aki really quickly became fast friends and Danny loves having a sparring partner close to his level again -- he hasn't had this much fun fighting since he left the League. Aki was very dedicated and levelheaded, the both of them clicked really well because of it.

Nonono, the real trouble began after Danyal met some long-passed League members and allowed them to come join his island as well. Apparently they had made a few enemies of the zone, and maybe Danyal still felt some loyalty to the League. He couldn't just let them be left to rot. Their zealotry could be overlooked so long as they kept it contained and helped him take care of his island.

And it.. snowballs from there? He meets a teen squire aptly calling himself Ambroise -- whether that was his living name or not is yet to be seen -- who died during feudal france, who is just about as dramatic and passionate as every french stereotype makes them out to be. He calls Danyal "my moon and great muse" -- which is both flattering and little uncomfortable, but Danyal's grown up in the League as the Grandson of the Demon Head, he is used to mild worship. he passes it off as nothing more, nothing less. -- and while his energy is overwhelming on the worst of days, he helps Danny draw out of his shell more in ways that Sam and Tucker still struggle with.

Him and Aki butt heads a lot, but the two seem to hold the other in at least some positive regard, so Danny doesn't worry too much about them fighting while he's gone. It only becomes a mild issue when Aki also begins calling Danny "my moon". It's a little sweet, so Danyal brushes it off.

Then he takes in a troupe of ghosts some time after he defeats Pariah Dark and they begin calling him "great one" just as the yetis do in the far frozen. This is where he meets the twins -- a pair of sibling ghosts who call themselves Trixie and Missy (short for Trick and Mislead) -- who aren't quite as passionate as Ambroise but more energetic than Aki. Eventually they also start calling Danyal "my moon" and attach themselves to his hip, even within the living. They like to hide in his shadow and cause trouble for the rest of the students. He makes sure they don't hurt anyone.

He's pretty sure Aki is jealous, same with Ambroise, but he can't be too certain other than the fact that they become much more lingering (re: clingy) whenever he visits the island.. Something he's trying to do much more often these days due to the increasing amount of people living there now. Since when did he become so popular?

Then there's Pēnelópeia from the Greater Athens, who ran away from home and joined his Island after he ran into her while she was being chased by Skulker -- and he's pretty sure the reason was because of her chimeric appearance. Her strange eyes and mismatched wings and lion's tail and talons. She assimilates into his friend group very easily, she gets along well with Ambroise and Trixie and Danny usually finds the three of them climbing the trees to pluck the most fruit from the top. They can fly and he knows it, but they prefer to climb.

Then finally there's silent poet Akkara who comes from ancient mesopotamia, who gets along most with Aki -- which is no surprise there considering their similar personality dispositions. he watches Aki and Danyal fight each other and leaves comments on this or that that he notices. He writes Danyal poems on clay tablets and leaves them by his room.

They're one big mismatched group of outcasts, and Danny's got the other ghosts on his island to tend to, because they're living on his island and he wants to be hospitable even if he struggles with that. But he spends the most of his time with them.

Sam and Tucker are making fun of him. Tucker jokingly tells him 'careful Danny, at this rate you're gonna start a cult'. Danny really wishes he had taken that joke more seriously.

He just. keeps. collecting people. Wayward souls lost in the zone, looking for shelter or refuge from something or other -- whether that be another hostile ghost, or a past afterlife, or just a purpose. Danyal finds them, he takes them in, offers them a place on his island until they are ready to leave. Many seldom do. He's not complaining -- he has the space, and it feels like it's only ever growing.

His close friends, his "inner circle" as he's heard the others call them, keep insistently calling him "my moon". He starts calling them his stars, because then it only feels fair. They're his stars, this is his constellation. It becomes a thing; little star halos begin forming behind their heads, picking them out from the rest. He loves them so much, it's hard to place. Sam and Tucker are also his stars, but they reside in the living realm, they're his tie to Life. Meanwhile, his friends here know what it's like to be dead, and sometimes its nice to relate.

Those living on his island keep calling him "Great One" and he's beginning to notice zealotry in their care for his island. He really, deeply appreciates it. His close friends gain nicknames -- as his stars, it's only natural for him to pick them out from the cluster in the skies. Akihiko, his Sirius and bright star. Trix and Missy, Castor and Pollux, the twins and troublemakers. Ambroise, his zealous Antares and close friend. Penelopeia, chimeric and loyal Vega. And Akkara, his Arcturus and strength.

It's ridiculous how long it takes for him to notice; he is, of course, a deadly trained assassin. He is meant to be observant -- and normally he is! But somehow this becomes a blind spot. One that becomes too big to be dealt with by the time he realizes it.

He should've noticed when Aki, his Sirius, stood beside him one day while Danyal looked over his island and saw the sprawling spirits carrying on about their afterlife and bowing to him as they saw him, and said: "I looked down into the depths when I met you; I couldn't measure it." They aren't one for flowing prose, it took him so off guard he was silent for over a minute before he finally spoke.

Danyal should've recognized devotion for what it is, and yet he didn't. He should've recognized it when Antares began spouting praises about him, crowing about his radiance and resplendence to the heavens. He just brushed it off as Ambroise being Ambroise. He should've recognized it when Trix and Missy nearly broke Dash's leg after he knocked Danyal's books out of his hands, he excused it as them being protective. Of them coming from times where such violence may have been customary -- after all, that's what he used to be like. What he was still like, sometimes, when his emotions nearly got the better of him.

He should've noticed it when the people living on his island followed his word like gospel, looked at him like he hung the stars in the sky. When his friends gifted him a shawl with the moon phases delicately embroidered into it, with silver, shimmering thread and moving stars lovingly stitched into it. Their constellations seen clear as day in the dark fabric. When he found small shrines dedicated to him -- but they lacked any image of him beyond stones carved to look like moons, so he ignored it. When the religious imagery began popping up.

He really, really should've noticed it when a bunch of cultists accidentally summoned Antares, and Antares had turned to him when he arrived and called them heretics. But he was so centered on the fact that they had kidnapped one of his stars, that he hadn't paid much attention to what Ambroise had said.

Sages say that faith is blind, they should also say faith in you is even blinder.

It really only hits him one afternoon while he's sitting in Sam's room studying with Tucker, Missy and Trixie lounging at his feet, Aki sat on his right, Penelopeia braiding his hair, Ambroise draped against him, and Akkara lurking over him. Its one of the rare few times they're all in one room together.

It hits him like a bolt of lightning. He looks up from his textbook. "Oh Ancients," he says in no amounting shock. Everyone looks up to him.

"I've become my grandfather."

[homiu-l]

SL!Grian in yellow

[bitter-hibiscus]

people keep talking about Dick killing Joker as something he did for Jason (not true) when the much more interesting conversation we could be having is that Bruce revived Joker so Dick wouldn't have to live with the weight of taking someone else's life, therefore not only taking away all of Dick's autonomy in the situation but also making him have to live with the knowledge that his anger is capable of driving him to such lengths while also being aware that his anger won't fix a goddamn thing, which in turn makes him repress his negative emotions even more

[jupitersmegrim]

The most underappreciated thing about Pride and Prejudice is that it's a romance wherein the heroine barely spends any time pining for her love interest.

[tryingonametaphor]

thinking about this again

[seance]

EDWIN and CHARLES in THE CASE OF THE VERY LONG STAIRWAY

[aerionbrightflamed]

the penguin 1x04 / succession 2x01

[foundfamilywhump]

whumper who weaponizes whumpee’s insecurities to break them down emotionally, to make them easier to manipulate or even just for fun, to see them hurt. make them cry.

reminding whumpee of the parent(s) who hurt them. the friend who betrayed them. the team who kicked them out. dredging up the sources of their beliefs that they won’t matter to anyone, that their pain, their suffering, their life is nothing anyone would care about.

taunting them: who’s coming for you? even if you got away/told someone what’s happening, what would be the point? go ahead. we’ve already called them, they say good riddance. we could put an ad out in the paper, broadcast it online and no one would lift a finger in your name. you’re free for the taking. anyone could do anything to you. just face it: you’re a defenceless target.

[lurkinginnernarrator]

Need more fics where sj!SQQ and a martial sibling gets stuck in a situation, and instead of them having a bonding moment or something stupid and emotionally healing, sj just pulls out a knife.

[millionsknives]

the inherent catholicism of the firearm or whatever

[fairsweetlonging]

the thing that sets apart hua cheng from most other devotee/worshipper-type relationships in other media is that hua cheng would actually throw himself on his knees and crawl across the floor if xie lian wanted to, he would demean himself without shame because shame comes from the perception that you have done something wrong or foolish in another's eyes, and hua cheng would never see his god's will as either, nor care for anyone's else's opinion

[chappellrroan]

[shouts-into-the-void]

I love Spirit Hunter: Death Mark's approach to the amnesia trope and the question of "If you can't remember who you were, are you even the same person?"

A lot of narratives play around with the weight of that, only to turn around and say "Of course you're the same, who else would you be?" The character gets their memories back and they're suddenly exactly as they were before, maybe with a life lesson along the way.

But Death Mark doesn't. Without all the knowledge and experiences of Masamune Kujou, Yashiki is fundamentally a kinder and less apathetic person, without any sort of prompting. Even when confronting dangerous spirits out to kill him, he takes the time to learn their stories and show them some small form of kindness. He listens to the recording of who he used to be, and he can't reconcile the callousness that Masamune had towards the deaths caused by his mistake with the way he feels about them, to the point where he doesn't even go back to using the identity that he's worked so hard to remember. Even when the game gives you the option to forgive Masamune, the options are still "It had to be done" and "I can't forgive him" because Kazuo Yashiki and Masamune Kujou are not the same.

And I think that's a way more interesting take than the protagonist just reverting back into the same person they were despite all the experiences we saw them go through.

[medi-bee]

isat pokemon au, my liege?

my rambling in tags

[mask131]

I saw again another post implying that J.K. Rowling "invented" the idea of a "school for wizards/school for witches" in fiction... *sigh*. Again, while Hogwarts definitively marked the cultural landscape and changed our modern vision of what a "school of sorcery/magic school" is supposed to be... Rowling invented nothing, and there were many, MANY, magic schools in fiction long before the first Harry Potter book was released. As much in fiction for adults as fiction for children. Let me recap some big points:

The Invisible College, from Diana Wynne Jones' The Tough Guide to Fantasy Land, one year before Harry Potter - AND which forms a parody/reference to most of the schools listed below.

Wizard's Hall, from the titular Wizard's Hall book by Jane Yolen - six years before Harry Potter.

Groosham Grange, from the novel of the same name by Anthony Horowitz, nine years before Harry Potter.

The Unseen University, from Terry Pratchett's Discworld - 14 years before Harry Potter.

Miss Cackle's Academy for Witches, from Jill Murphy's The Worst Witch, 23 years before Harry Potter

The island of Roke, from the Earthsea series by Ursula K. Le Guin - 29 years before Harry Potter.

We can even go back to Dom Daniel, from T.H. White's original version of The Once and Future King, 58 years before Harry Potter.

And I am not even counting the various "magic colleges" and "sorcery academies" that appeared in role-playing games such as Dungeons and Dragons long before Harry Potter came out...

Conclusion: Hogwarts is interesting and influential... But not inventive.